by Bill Simmons
Editor's note: This column appears in the March 14 issue of ESPN The Magazine.
Ever play the musician/athlete game? You just pick a band or singer and then decide which sports star they'd be. For instance, Springsteen is Larry Bird, the workingman's hero. Guns N' Roses are Doc Gooden, the prodigy who flamed out too fast. The Stones are Ali, the greatest until they hung around too long. The Police are John McEnroe -- gifted, tortured, ultimately unable to keep it together.
You can easily kill an eight-hour car ride this way ... as long as you keep U2 out of it. Trying to find a match for that band will make you crazy. Kareem and Roger Clemens had similar longevity, but nobody liked them. Ditto for Barry Bonds, although Bonds' head and Bono's both have grown exponentially over the years. Nolan Ryan was breathtaking in moments, but never transcendent. Gretzky and MJ didn't dominate long enough. The closest comparison? Jack Nicklaus. Big splash in the '60s, superduperstar in the '70s, stunning revival in the '80s -- it's a similar arc, right down to the success of "Vertigo" and the 1986 Masters. But can you compare U2 to a golfer? Of course not.
Here's the point: bands just don't do what U2 have done. They don't stay together for 26 years without even a token separation (or 20). They don't continue to pump out quality albums and concert tours (sorry, I don't count the Dead, who haven't been nearly as popular). And they don't resonate with three different generations.
There hasn't been nearly enough made of these guys. Unlike what we do with our sports heroes, few of us consider the overall body of work of musicians. It always comes down to what they did most recently, or who died at the optimal time, or whose music aged best. Fact is, there is no black-and-white way to judge them. How can you prove Jimmy Page was a better guitar player than Eric Clapton? Instead of statistics and awards, we rely on emotions and memories, on what a particular band meant to us. It leads to some deceiving outcomes -- like how everyone forgets that, when Kurt Cobain killed himself, Nirvana had been eclipsed by Pearl Jam and the Smashing Pumpkins. Had he lived, there's a 90 percent chance Cobain and Courtney Love would be starring in a reality show on VH-1 right now. You just never know. That's why people rarely argue about music ... well, unless they're stoned.
With sports, there is nothing to do but argue about this stuff. If music were sports, Kornheiser and Wilbon would be fighting to the death over "Who's better: Franz Ferdinand or The Killers?" But we don't approach music this way, and so U2 never get their due. Take everything you ever read or heard about MJ, then double it -- that's what we'd have if U2 had played ball. What would their rookie card be worth? How many covers would they have graced? What formula would Rob Neyer have concocted to legitimize their run?
Maybe I'm biased. Some people have photo albums; I have U2. When I listened to them as a kid they were belting out angry diatribes about growing up in Ireland, so who could have imagined they'd provide a soundtrack for my life? There was "The Unforgettable Fire" for my moody years, and "The Joshua Tree" for when I began to put it all together. When "Rattle and Hum" came out, I was also taking myself a little too seriously. "Achtung Baby"? We were both running on all cylinders. "Zooropa" and "Pop"? We were both figuring out where to go next. We finally crossed paths with "All That You Can't Leave Behind." I was covering my first Super Bowl and U2 was singing at halftime of the eventual Pats upset, and yes, it was a "Beautiful Day." With their most recent, "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb," I'm in a good place, and so are they. They're E.T. to my Elliott.
Throw in the unintentional comedy and general weirdness -- how Bono doesn't age (much like David Robinson); how you can't call "The Edge" just "Edge"; every delightfully absurd minute of the Rattle and Hum documentary (my favorites: The Edge's extended mullet, the Graceland trip and every conversation between Bono and B.B. King); Bono's pompous concert speeches; even Adam Carolla's idea that we should deport Bono so he can annoy Ireland instead of us -- and there has never been another band like this. At the recent Grammys, they were still as strong on stage as anyone else, even though I'm pretty sure The Edge died about three years ago and they're just propping him up. Against all odds, they keep plugging away.
They have no peers in the business, and no sports equivalent. So if you ever play the musician/athlete game, save some time -- skip U2 and go right to a band like Van Halen. (They were Sugar Ray Leonard, but that's a whole other story.)
Bill Simmons is a columnist for Page 2 and ESPN The Magazine. His Sports Guy's World site is updated every day Monday through Friday.
Friday, March 04, 2005
articles 3/4
Was George Bush Right About Freedom and Democracy?
Maybe. Maybe Not.
By Fred Kaplan
Newsweek
Soft Power, Hard Choices
Commentary
What Became of the CIA
Commentary
Will the Real Shakespeare Please Stand Up
Free Speech for Terrorists?
by Andrew C. McCarthy
Real Clear Politics
Softball & Kerry's Form 180
And That's the Way It Was
How to revive CBS News.
by Peggy Noonan
Neocons May Get the Last Laugh
by Max Boot
Term of Endearment, Term of Abuse
What is a "neocon," anyway? A new book offers some clues.
by Sol Schindler
Social Security blues
by Robert Novak
George W. Bush, who is not prone to confessing mistakes, has confided to close associates that he committed a whopper on Social Security.
Calling the kettle gay
by Ann Coulter
It's been a tough year for Democrats. They lost the presidential election, their favorite news outlets have been abjectly humiliated, they had to sit through a smashingly successful election in Iraq, and most painfully, they had to endure unwarranted attacks on a cartoon sponge. So I understand liberals are upset.
Francis Schaeffer's political legacy
by Marvin Olasky
Who's the major figure behind the election and re-election of George W. Bush? On one level, the visionary Karl Rove. At a deeper level, a theologian most Americans have never heard of:
On following ideas over a cliff
by Paul Greenberg
A day-long conference here in Little Rock the other day on school reform should have been entitled: Education and Its Discontents.
We have no more need for PBS
by George Will
Public television is akin to the body politic's appendix: It is vestigial, purposeless and occasionally troublesome.
Fort Worth Weekly
Police reporter's life was more bizarre than any of his stories
John Makeig was obsessed with the possibility that a rash of suspect cattle mutilations might be the work of space aliens. When his editors urged him to steer clear of the livestock abduction stories and stick to news on the night police beat, he continued to chase down strange theories during the day. He also collected weird names he encountered covering the news: an anesthesiologist named Gasser, a banker named Ernest Deal, the Boxwell funeral home, a burglar named Lawless, a man in a sex case named Orji, and a prostitute named Flesher.
Rocky Mountain News
Doors Reopen
Patient U2 fans bid on tickets below face value
Evening Standard
Sit Back and Relax? Bono's Wife Can't.
'But as an American . . .
'We hardly ever watch Comedy Central's "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart," but our TV happened to be tuned to it last night when erstwhile Clinton aide Nancy Soderberg, author of "The Superpower Myth: The Use and Misuse of American Might" (foreword by Bill Clinton, blurb by Madeleine Albright) came on. We're not sure what possessed us to turn on the sound and watch, but we're glad we did, for it was a fascinating interview. Here's a TiVo-assisted transcript of most of it:
Stewart: This book--it talks about the superpower myth of the United States. There is this idea, the United States is the sole superpower, and I guess the premise of the book is we cannot misuse that power--have to use it wisely, and not just punitively. Is that--
Soderberg: That's right. What I argue is that the Bush administration fell hostage to the superpower myth, believing that because we're the most powerful nation on earth, we were all-powerful, could bend the world to our will and not have to worry about the rest of the world. I think what they're finding in the second term is, it's a little bit harder than that, and reality has an annoying way of intruding.
Stewart: But what do you make of--here's my dilemma, if you will. I don't care for the way these guys conduct themselves--and this is just you and I talking, no cameras here [audience laughter]. But boy, when you see the Lebanese take to the streets and all that, and you go, "Oh my God, this is working," and I begin to wonder, is it--is the way that they handled it really--it's sort of like, "Uh, OK, my daddy hits me, but look how tough I'm getting." You know what I mean? Like, you don't like the method, but maybe--wrong analogy, is that, uh--?
Soderberg: Well, I think, you know, as a Democrat, you don't want anything nice to happen to the Republicans, and you don't want them to have progress. But as an American, you hope good things would happen. I think the way to look at it is, they can't credit for every good thing that happens, but they need to be able to manage it. I think what's happening in Lebanon is great, but it's not necessarily directly related to the fact that we went into Iraq militarily.
Stewart: Do you think that the people of Lebanon would have had, sort of, the courage of their conviction, having not seen--not only the invasion but the election which followed? It's almost as though that the Iraqi election has emboldened this crazy--something's going on over there. I'm smelling something.
Soderberg: I think partly what's going on is the country next door, Syria, has been controlling them for decades, and they [the Syrians] were dumb enough to blow up the former prime minister of Lebanon in Beirut, and they're--people are sort of sick of that, and saying, "Wait a minute, that's a stretch too far." So part of what's going on is they're just protesting that. But I think there is a wave of change going on, and if we can help ride it though the second term of the Bush administration, more power to them.
Stewart: Do you think they're the guys to--do they understand what they've unleashed? Because at a certain point, I almost feel like, if they had just come out at the very beginning and said, "Here's my plan: I'm going to invade Iraq. We'll get rid of a bad guy because that will drain the swamp"--if they hadn't done the whole "nuclear cloud," you know, if they hadn't scared the pants off of everybody, and just said straight up, honestly, what was going on, I think I'd almost--I'd have no cognitive dissonance, no mixed feelings.
Soderberg: The truth always helps in these things, I have to say. But I think that there is also going on in the Middle East peace process--they may well have a chance to do a historic deal with the Palestinians and the Israelis. These guys could really pull off a whole--
Stewart: This could be unbelievable!
Soderberg:---series of Nobel Peace Prizes here, which--it may well work. I think that, um, it's--
Stewart: [buries head in hands] Oh my God! [audience laughter] He's got, you know, here's--
Soderberg: It's scary for Democrats, I have to say.
Stewart: He's gonna be a great--pretty soon, Republicans are gonna be like, "Reagan was nothing compared to this guy." Like, my kid's gonna go to a high school named after him, I just know it.
Soderberg: Well, there's still Iran and North Korea, don't forget. There's hope for the rest of us.
Stewart: [crossing fingers] Iran and North Korea, that's true, that is true [audience laughter].
No, it's--it is--I absolutely agree with you, this is--this is the most difficult thing for me to--because, I think, I don't care for the tactics, I don't care for this, the weird arrogance, the setting up. But I gotta say, I haven't seen results like this ever in that region.
Soderberg: Well wait. It hasn't actually gotten very far. I mean, we've had--
Stewart: Oh, I'm shallow! I'm very shallow!
Soderberg: There's always hope that this might not work. No, but I think, um, it's--you know, you have changes going on in Egypt; Saudi Arabia finally had a few votes, although women couldn't participate. What's going on here in--you know, Syria's been living in the 1960s since the 1960s--it's, part of this is--
Stewart: You mean free love and that kind of stuff? [audience laughter] Like, free love, drugs?
Soderberg: If you're a terrorist, yeah.
Stewart: They are Baathists, are they--it looks like, I gotta say, it's almost like we're not going to have to invade Iran and Syria. They're gonna invade themselves at a certain point, no? Or is that completely naive?
Soderberg: I think it's moving in the right direction. I'll have to give them credit for that. We'll see.
Stewart: Really? Hummus for everybody, for God's sakes.
We've long been skeptical of Jon Stewart, but color us impressed. He managed to ambush this poor woman brutally, in a friendly interview. She was supposed to be promoting her book, and instead he got her to spend the entire interview debunking it (at least if we understood the book's thesis correctly from the very brief discussion of it up top).
She also admitted repeatedly that Democrats are hoping for American failure in the Middle East. To be sure, this is not true of all Democrats, Soderberg speaks only for herself, and she says she is ambivalent ("But as an American . . ."). But we do not question her expertise in assessing the prevailing mentality of her own party. No wonder Dems get so defensive about their patriotism.
Interesting too is Stewart's acknowledgment of his own "cognitive dissonance" and "mixed feelings" over the Iraq liberation. It's a version of an argument we've been hearing a lot lately: As our Brendan Miniter puts it, "The president's critics never seem to tire of claiming that the war in Iraq began over weapons of mass destruction and only later morphed into a war of liberation."
Miniter correctly notes that "this criticism isn't entirely right," but for the sake of argument let's assume it is. What does it mean? President Bush has altered his arguments to conform to reality, while his critics remain fixated on obsolete disputes. This would seem utterly to refute the liberal media stereotype. Bush, it turns out, is a supple-minded empiricist, while his opponents are rigid ideologues.
Maybe. Maybe Not.
By Fred Kaplan
Newsweek
Soft Power, Hard Choices
Commentary
What Became of the CIA
Commentary
Will the Real Shakespeare Please Stand Up
Free Speech for Terrorists?
by Andrew C. McCarthy
Real Clear Politics
Softball & Kerry's Form 180
And That's the Way It Was
How to revive CBS News.
by Peggy Noonan
Neocons May Get the Last Laugh
by Max Boot
Term of Endearment, Term of Abuse
What is a "neocon," anyway? A new book offers some clues.
by Sol Schindler
Social Security blues
by Robert Novak
George W. Bush, who is not prone to confessing mistakes, has confided to close associates that he committed a whopper on Social Security.
Calling the kettle gay
by Ann Coulter
It's been a tough year for Democrats. They lost the presidential election, their favorite news outlets have been abjectly humiliated, they had to sit through a smashingly successful election in Iraq, and most painfully, they had to endure unwarranted attacks on a cartoon sponge. So I understand liberals are upset.
Francis Schaeffer's political legacy
by Marvin Olasky
Who's the major figure behind the election and re-election of George W. Bush? On one level, the visionary Karl Rove. At a deeper level, a theologian most Americans have never heard of:
On following ideas over a cliff
by Paul Greenberg
A day-long conference here in Little Rock the other day on school reform should have been entitled: Education and Its Discontents.
We have no more need for PBS
by George Will
Public television is akin to the body politic's appendix: It is vestigial, purposeless and occasionally troublesome.
Fort Worth Weekly
Police reporter's life was more bizarre than any of his stories
John Makeig was obsessed with the possibility that a rash of suspect cattle mutilations might be the work of space aliens. When his editors urged him to steer clear of the livestock abduction stories and stick to news on the night police beat, he continued to chase down strange theories during the day. He also collected weird names he encountered covering the news: an anesthesiologist named Gasser, a banker named Ernest Deal, the Boxwell funeral home, a burglar named Lawless, a man in a sex case named Orji, and a prostitute named Flesher.
Rocky Mountain News
Doors Reopen
Patient U2 fans bid on tickets below face value
Evening Standard
Sit Back and Relax? Bono's Wife Can't.
'But as an American . . .
'We hardly ever watch Comedy Central's "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart," but our TV happened to be tuned to it last night when erstwhile Clinton aide Nancy Soderberg, author of "The Superpower Myth: The Use and Misuse of American Might" (foreword by Bill Clinton, blurb by Madeleine Albright) came on. We're not sure what possessed us to turn on the sound and watch, but we're glad we did, for it was a fascinating interview. Here's a TiVo-assisted transcript of most of it:
Stewart: This book--it talks about the superpower myth of the United States. There is this idea, the United States is the sole superpower, and I guess the premise of the book is we cannot misuse that power--have to use it wisely, and not just punitively. Is that--
Soderberg: That's right. What I argue is that the Bush administration fell hostage to the superpower myth, believing that because we're the most powerful nation on earth, we were all-powerful, could bend the world to our will and not have to worry about the rest of the world. I think what they're finding in the second term is, it's a little bit harder than that, and reality has an annoying way of intruding.
Stewart: But what do you make of--here's my dilemma, if you will. I don't care for the way these guys conduct themselves--and this is just you and I talking, no cameras here [audience laughter]. But boy, when you see the Lebanese take to the streets and all that, and you go, "Oh my God, this is working," and I begin to wonder, is it--is the way that they handled it really--it's sort of like, "Uh, OK, my daddy hits me, but look how tough I'm getting." You know what I mean? Like, you don't like the method, but maybe--wrong analogy, is that, uh--?
Soderberg: Well, I think, you know, as a Democrat, you don't want anything nice to happen to the Republicans, and you don't want them to have progress. But as an American, you hope good things would happen. I think the way to look at it is, they can't credit for every good thing that happens, but they need to be able to manage it. I think what's happening in Lebanon is great, but it's not necessarily directly related to the fact that we went into Iraq militarily.
Stewart: Do you think that the people of Lebanon would have had, sort of, the courage of their conviction, having not seen--not only the invasion but the election which followed? It's almost as though that the Iraqi election has emboldened this crazy--something's going on over there. I'm smelling something.
Soderberg: I think partly what's going on is the country next door, Syria, has been controlling them for decades, and they [the Syrians] were dumb enough to blow up the former prime minister of Lebanon in Beirut, and they're--people are sort of sick of that, and saying, "Wait a minute, that's a stretch too far." So part of what's going on is they're just protesting that. But I think there is a wave of change going on, and if we can help ride it though the second term of the Bush administration, more power to them.
Stewart: Do you think they're the guys to--do they understand what they've unleashed? Because at a certain point, I almost feel like, if they had just come out at the very beginning and said, "Here's my plan: I'm going to invade Iraq. We'll get rid of a bad guy because that will drain the swamp"--if they hadn't done the whole "nuclear cloud," you know, if they hadn't scared the pants off of everybody, and just said straight up, honestly, what was going on, I think I'd almost--I'd have no cognitive dissonance, no mixed feelings.
Soderberg: The truth always helps in these things, I have to say. But I think that there is also going on in the Middle East peace process--they may well have a chance to do a historic deal with the Palestinians and the Israelis. These guys could really pull off a whole--
Stewart: This could be unbelievable!
Soderberg:---series of Nobel Peace Prizes here, which--it may well work. I think that, um, it's--
Stewart: [buries head in hands] Oh my God! [audience laughter] He's got, you know, here's--
Soderberg: It's scary for Democrats, I have to say.
Stewart: He's gonna be a great--pretty soon, Republicans are gonna be like, "Reagan was nothing compared to this guy." Like, my kid's gonna go to a high school named after him, I just know it.
Soderberg: Well, there's still Iran and North Korea, don't forget. There's hope for the rest of us.
Stewart: [crossing fingers] Iran and North Korea, that's true, that is true [audience laughter].
No, it's--it is--I absolutely agree with you, this is--this is the most difficult thing for me to--because, I think, I don't care for the tactics, I don't care for this, the weird arrogance, the setting up. But I gotta say, I haven't seen results like this ever in that region.
Soderberg: Well wait. It hasn't actually gotten very far. I mean, we've had--
Stewart: Oh, I'm shallow! I'm very shallow!
Soderberg: There's always hope that this might not work. No, but I think, um, it's--you know, you have changes going on in Egypt; Saudi Arabia finally had a few votes, although women couldn't participate. What's going on here in--you know, Syria's been living in the 1960s since the 1960s--it's, part of this is--
Stewart: You mean free love and that kind of stuff? [audience laughter] Like, free love, drugs?
Soderberg: If you're a terrorist, yeah.
Stewart: They are Baathists, are they--it looks like, I gotta say, it's almost like we're not going to have to invade Iran and Syria. They're gonna invade themselves at a certain point, no? Or is that completely naive?
Soderberg: I think it's moving in the right direction. I'll have to give them credit for that. We'll see.
Stewart: Really? Hummus for everybody, for God's sakes.
We've long been skeptical of Jon Stewart, but color us impressed. He managed to ambush this poor woman brutally, in a friendly interview. She was supposed to be promoting her book, and instead he got her to spend the entire interview debunking it (at least if we understood the book's thesis correctly from the very brief discussion of it up top).
She also admitted repeatedly that Democrats are hoping for American failure in the Middle East. To be sure, this is not true of all Democrats, Soderberg speaks only for herself, and she says she is ambivalent ("But as an American . . ."). But we do not question her expertise in assessing the prevailing mentality of her own party. No wonder Dems get so defensive about their patriotism.
Interesting too is Stewart's acknowledgment of his own "cognitive dissonance" and "mixed feelings" over the Iraq liberation. It's a version of an argument we've been hearing a lot lately: As our Brendan Miniter puts it, "The president's critics never seem to tire of claiming that the war in Iraq began over weapons of mass destruction and only later morphed into a war of liberation."
Miniter correctly notes that "this criticism isn't entirely right," but for the sake of argument let's assume it is. What does it mean? President Bush has altered his arguments to conform to reality, while his critics remain fixated on obsolete disputes. This would seem utterly to refute the liberal media stereotype. Bush, it turns out, is a supple-minded empiricist, while his opponents are rigid ideologues.
Tuesday, March 01, 2005
articles 3/1
Kofi Annan’s critical role in the genocide in Rwanda
by Joel Mowbray
If you watch this powerful film — and you should — what you won’t see is the even more incredibly true story of the man with direct culpability for the deaths of 800,000 Tutsis: now-UN Secretary General Kofi Annan.
Rocky Mountain News
Cops taser man accused of pilfering salad at Chuck E. Cheese
An angry mom says: "They had no regard for the effect this would have on the kids. This is Chuck E. Cheese, you know."
River Bend Telegraph
Police chief defends cops who Tasered, then fatally shot cat
It all started when officers were called to a home to deal with a cat fight. Now fur is flying all over town.
Boston Globe
Man accused of headbutting parent after "squirt" hockey game
Quit the AARP
Meet the Conservative Republican Seniors Against Bush.
by Rich Lowry
Read My Lips: The Sequel?
Bush opens the door to a big tax increase.by Stephen Moore
Wake-up call for my fellow Muslims
by Kamal Nawash
Muslim-bashing. That’s the accusation many of my fellow Muslims now hurl at the various news outlets for their news stories about a Freedom House investigation that found extremist Islamic literature in some leading American mosques.
Some suggestions for the Harvard faculty
by Star Parker
The sad truth about a society that becomes increasingly politicized by the day is that the principal victim is integrity. Thoughtfulness and honesty count for less and less and appearances count for more and more.
Believing the true believers
by Thomas Sowell
While the media have been focusing on the flap at Harvard growing out of its president's statement about the reasons for the under-representation of women in the sciences, a much worse and more revealing scandal has unfolded at the University of Seattle.
The flat tax in the old Soviet bloc
by Bruce Bartlett
On his trip to Slovakia last week, President Bush praised Prime Minister Dzurinda for the flat tax system he instituted last year.
Rodney Dangerfield at Harvard
by Suzanne Fields
Larry Summers, the president of Harvard, aspires to be the Rodney Dangerfield of academe: He don't get no respect.
The Arabs' Berlin Wall Has Crumbled
by Mark Steyn
What's Wrong With American High Schools
by Bill Gates
Sport of Kings (and Queens)
Why so few women chess masters? America's top female player ponders the question.
by Barbara D. Phillips
The 'Hotel' Lobby
After Rwanda and Iraq, Americans may demand more humanitarian interventions.
by Brendan Miniter
WSJ Editorial
Carrots for the Mullahs
A surefire path to a nuclear Iran.
Trackback to Freedom
by Joshua Livestro
Bloggers should do all they can to support the revolution in the Arab streets.
To Have and to Hold, for Richer for Poorer
by David Brooks
We Need More Speech Codes
by Douglas Kern
Perhaps a liberal society requires illiberal education.
by Joel Mowbray
If you watch this powerful film — and you should — what you won’t see is the even more incredibly true story of the man with direct culpability for the deaths of 800,000 Tutsis: now-UN Secretary General Kofi Annan.
Rocky Mountain News
Cops taser man accused of pilfering salad at Chuck E. Cheese
An angry mom says: "They had no regard for the effect this would have on the kids. This is Chuck E. Cheese, you know."
River Bend Telegraph
Police chief defends cops who Tasered, then fatally shot cat
It all started when officers were called to a home to deal with a cat fight. Now fur is flying all over town.
Boston Globe
Man accused of headbutting parent after "squirt" hockey game
Quit the AARP
Meet the Conservative Republican Seniors Against Bush.
by Rich Lowry
Read My Lips: The Sequel?
Bush opens the door to a big tax increase.by Stephen Moore
Wake-up call for my fellow Muslims
by Kamal Nawash
Muslim-bashing. That’s the accusation many of my fellow Muslims now hurl at the various news outlets for their news stories about a Freedom House investigation that found extremist Islamic literature in some leading American mosques.
Some suggestions for the Harvard faculty
by Star Parker
The sad truth about a society that becomes increasingly politicized by the day is that the principal victim is integrity. Thoughtfulness and honesty count for less and less and appearances count for more and more.
Believing the true believers
by Thomas Sowell
While the media have been focusing on the flap at Harvard growing out of its president's statement about the reasons for the under-representation of women in the sciences, a much worse and more revealing scandal has unfolded at the University of Seattle.
The flat tax in the old Soviet bloc
by Bruce Bartlett
On his trip to Slovakia last week, President Bush praised Prime Minister Dzurinda for the flat tax system he instituted last year.
Rodney Dangerfield at Harvard
by Suzanne Fields
Larry Summers, the president of Harvard, aspires to be the Rodney Dangerfield of academe: He don't get no respect.
The Arabs' Berlin Wall Has Crumbled
by Mark Steyn
What's Wrong With American High Schools
by Bill Gates
Sport of Kings (and Queens)
Why so few women chess masters? America's top female player ponders the question.
by Barbara D. Phillips
The 'Hotel' Lobby
After Rwanda and Iraq, Americans may demand more humanitarian interventions.
by Brendan Miniter
WSJ Editorial
Carrots for the Mullahs
A surefire path to a nuclear Iran.
Trackback to Freedom
by Joshua Livestro
Bloggers should do all they can to support the revolution in the Arab streets.
To Have and to Hold, for Richer for Poorer
by David Brooks
We Need More Speech Codes
by Douglas Kern
Perhaps a liberal society requires illiberal education.
Monday, February 28, 2005
Sign Up For Fantasy Baseball
For the fourth straight year, the Playing For Keeps league is up and running. If you'd like to play this season, sign up here. You'll need two things, the league ID # (9516) and the league password (canseco). The live draft is set for 9:30 p.m. ET, Friday, April 1.
articles 2/28
The Tipping Points
by Tom Friedman
'Delightful for Its Ordinariness'
A roundup of the past two weeks' good news from Iraq.
by Arthur Chrenkoff
High Taxes Wither Away
Former communist countries lead the way in abandoning progressivity.
Lebanese ministers resign office
Mr Karami denies any involvement in the attack on Mr HaririLebanon's Prime Minister Omar Karami has announced he and his government are resigning, two weeks after the murder of former PM Rafik Hariri.
The Peculiar Institution: Understanding Why Palestinian Terror Is Different
by Lee Harris
Terrorism is the Palestinians' peculiar institution, the way slavery was the peculiar institution of the American South in the nineteenth century. And like American slavery, Palestinian terrorism has its defenders. Lee Harris explains why those who continue to apologize or palliate Palestinian terror in any way are betraying the very people that they are claiming to support.
Are We All Happy Yet?
by Robert McHenry
Happiness surveys don't tell us anything intelligible. But even if they did, there is a deeper problem with them....
Father Knows Best?
by Sandy Szwarc
Part One of why you want your government out of your healthcare.
A Mideast Makeover?
by Jackson Diehl
NY Sun
Clinton Says Wife Would Be Good President
Minds Are Changing
by Michael Barone
The hinge of history
by Robert Novak
Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's stand against embryonic stem cell research not only changes the long-range picture for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.
Rolling back the tide of tyranny
by Mike S. Adams
Last semester, the faculty senate at the University of Alabama (UA) passed an Orwellian speech code designed to restrict 'any behavior that demeans or reduces an individual based on group affiliation or personal traits, or which promotes hate or discrimination.'
What's next for liberalism?
by John Leo
Question for the day: if liberalism isn’t dead, then why are autopsies performed so regularly?
Time’s up for Syria
by Peter Brookes
It should now be widely recognized that the President’s unwavering push for Muslim democracy has reaped significant results.
All wet
by George Will
In this city of histrionic architecture, the building that matters most may be the bland, low-slung headquarters of the Southern Nevada Water Authority.
NY Times
Alternate Reality Video Games Blur Many Lines
\Alternate-reality gaming blends real-life treasure hunting, interactive storytelling, video games and online community -- and may be one of the most powerful guerrilla marketing mechanisms ever invented.
Online Retailers Pursue Teenagers
Companies like Macy’s are trying to get teenagers to shop on their Web sites, using techniques that, they hope, reflect the shifting and sometimes contradictory signals of this group.
Now We Need the Media's Help in Iraq
by Iyad Allawi
Natan Sharansky: A Scorned Idealist
by Aluf Benn
Admiral Steers Support for Gays in Military
by Deb Price
The Arab Street
A vanquished cliché.
By Christopher Hitchens
Mac's Original Designer Dies
Jef Raskin, who died Saturday at 61, believed that computers should be user-friendly and affordable. Those ideas helped get Apple off the ground and changed the nature of computing forever.
Known Hole Aided T-Mobile Breach
Looks like a hacker was able to break into the wireless giant's customer records and private e-mail last year because the company neglected to patch a security hole in a commercial software package.
Wired
Mind Control
Matt Nagle is paralyzed. He's also a pioneer in the new science of brain implants.
by Tom Friedman
'Delightful for Its Ordinariness'
A roundup of the past two weeks' good news from Iraq.
by Arthur Chrenkoff
High Taxes Wither Away
Former communist countries lead the way in abandoning progressivity.
Lebanese ministers resign office
Mr Karami denies any involvement in the attack on Mr HaririLebanon's Prime Minister Omar Karami has announced he and his government are resigning, two weeks after the murder of former PM Rafik Hariri.
The Peculiar Institution: Understanding Why Palestinian Terror Is Different
by Lee Harris
Terrorism is the Palestinians' peculiar institution, the way slavery was the peculiar institution of the American South in the nineteenth century. And like American slavery, Palestinian terrorism has its defenders. Lee Harris explains why those who continue to apologize or palliate Palestinian terror in any way are betraying the very people that they are claiming to support.
Are We All Happy Yet?
by Robert McHenry
Happiness surveys don't tell us anything intelligible. But even if they did, there is a deeper problem with them....
Father Knows Best?
by Sandy Szwarc
Part One of why you want your government out of your healthcare.
A Mideast Makeover?
by Jackson Diehl
NY Sun
Clinton Says Wife Would Be Good President
Minds Are Changing
by Michael Barone
The hinge of history
by Robert Novak
Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's stand against embryonic stem cell research not only changes the long-range picture for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.
Rolling back the tide of tyranny
by Mike S. Adams
Last semester, the faculty senate at the University of Alabama (UA) passed an Orwellian speech code designed to restrict 'any behavior that demeans or reduces an individual based on group affiliation or personal traits, or which promotes hate or discrimination.'
What's next for liberalism?
by John Leo
Question for the day: if liberalism isn’t dead, then why are autopsies performed so regularly?
Time’s up for Syria
by Peter Brookes
It should now be widely recognized that the President’s unwavering push for Muslim democracy has reaped significant results.
All wet
by George Will
In this city of histrionic architecture, the building that matters most may be the bland, low-slung headquarters of the Southern Nevada Water Authority.
NY Times
Alternate Reality Video Games Blur Many Lines
\Alternate-reality gaming blends real-life treasure hunting, interactive storytelling, video games and online community -- and may be one of the most powerful guerrilla marketing mechanisms ever invented.
Online Retailers Pursue Teenagers
Companies like Macy’s are trying to get teenagers to shop on their Web sites, using techniques that, they hope, reflect the shifting and sometimes contradictory signals of this group.
Now We Need the Media's Help in Iraq
by Iyad Allawi
Natan Sharansky: A Scorned Idealist
by Aluf Benn
Admiral Steers Support for Gays in Military
by Deb Price
The Arab Street
A vanquished cliché.
By Christopher Hitchens
Mac's Original Designer Dies
Jef Raskin, who died Saturday at 61, believed that computers should be user-friendly and affordable. Those ideas helped get Apple off the ground and changed the nature of computing forever.
Known Hole Aided T-Mobile Breach
Looks like a hacker was able to break into the wireless giant's customer records and private e-mail last year because the company neglected to patch a security hole in a commercial software package.
Wired
Mind Control
Matt Nagle is paralyzed. He's also a pioneer in the new science of brain implants.
Sunday, February 27, 2005
articles 2/27
NY Times Magazine
Tex Macs
McDonald's is creating its own worst enemy: a healthy burrito.
The New Wave
Why I Write
by David Warren
Time
Who Says A Woman Can't Be Einstein?
Yes, men's and women's brains are different. But new research upends the old myths about who's good at what. A tour of the ever changing brain
Newsweek
Martha Breaks Out
After five months in prison, Martha's primed and ready for her next act: two TV shows and a marketing blitz stage-managed by a new A-list team. Inside the Martha Makeover Machine
Newsweek
The True Believers
Why would anyone still be devoted to Michael Jackson? He's on trial for child molestation. He hasn't had a No. 1 hit for a decade. Look at the face. Look at the life. These hard-core fans people call Jacko's Wackos—what are they thinking? They told us.
World Magazine
Free societies vs. fear societies
Natan Sharansky discusses the prospects for democracy in the Middle East and Russia and how in President Bush he has "found another dissident"
U.S. News & World Report
Condi vs. Hillary?
Condi Rice has so wowed Washington and the world that there's new buzz she is blazing a trail to the presidency.
NY Times Magazine
The Lost Soldiers of Stalag IX-B
On the European front in the last months of World War II, the Nazis sent 350 U.S. Army prisoners of war to work in a concentration camp in eastern Germany. First on the list were all the American Jews they could find.
LA Times
Looking for the Why of Buy
Researchers scan for insight into how marketing may brand the brain's preference for products.
What Dean Means
by Matt Baih
He's a centrist, leftist, healer, divider. How fitting for today's Democratic Party.
Soft Power, Hard Truths For Europe
by Victor Davis Hanson
The War On Terror Began With Salman Rushdie
by J. Rauch
A Specter is Haunting Arabia
by Uriah Kriegel
Fear and practice have been undermined by recent events in the Middle East.
Among the Fellow Travelers
by Radley Balko
Is there still a chance for an alliance between libertarians and limited-government conservatives?
Coffee Causes Cancer! Oops, This Just In! Coffee Prevents Cancer!
by Dr. Elizabeth M. Whelan
Consumers must be constantly skeptical of studies linking variable A with disease B.
President Cheney?
by Fred Barnes
Reuters
WiMax May Pose Fresh Challenge to Broadband
The Washington Doctrine
by Michael M. Rosen
What Charles Krauthammer has elegantly characterized as "democratic realism," or the solemn American obligation to...
The Sorry Fiscal Record of a "Conservative" Administration
by David Broder
NY Warms to Hillary. Is America Next?
by Andrew Sullivan
NY Times Magazine
Training Brand
A lingerie line that appeals to girls emulating women who dress like children.
Iran Nuke Program Traced to '87
New evidence shows Iran bought some equipment then, but Tehran says it was for energy generation.
Business 2.o
Luring 'Em In
Who cares about prices? Bass Pro Shops hooks customers with tuna and taxidermy.
Business 2.o
The Grocery Store of the Future
Smart shelves. Fingerprint payment systems. The store of the future is here.
Business 2.o
Executive-in-Chief
Love what George W. Bush has to say or hate it, corporate leaders can learn a lot from how he says it.
LA Times Magazine
Rock, On
Chris Rock steps onto entertainment's grandest stage tonight as host of the Academy Awards telecast. Can a gig that big turn a rebel comedian outside in?
Barry Bonds Press Conference
Transcript
Watch it
Bono's Three TED Wishes
As one of the recipients of this year's TED prize, given this week at the annual Technology, Entertainment, and Design conference, Bono was given three wishes which TED will spend $100,000 to help fulfill. Bono's wishes, as you could've guessed, were directed at getting more Americans involved in the campaign to help Africa via the ONE Campaign and specifically at connecting hospitals and schools in Ethiopia to the Internet.
Tex Macs
McDonald's is creating its own worst enemy: a healthy burrito.
The New Wave
Why I Write
by David Warren
Time
Who Says A Woman Can't Be Einstein?
Yes, men's and women's brains are different. But new research upends the old myths about who's good at what. A tour of the ever changing brain
Newsweek
Martha Breaks Out
After five months in prison, Martha's primed and ready for her next act: two TV shows and a marketing blitz stage-managed by a new A-list team. Inside the Martha Makeover Machine
Newsweek
The True Believers
Why would anyone still be devoted to Michael Jackson? He's on trial for child molestation. He hasn't had a No. 1 hit for a decade. Look at the face. Look at the life. These hard-core fans people call Jacko's Wackos—what are they thinking? They told us.
World Magazine
Free societies vs. fear societies
Natan Sharansky discusses the prospects for democracy in the Middle East and Russia and how in President Bush he has "found another dissident"
U.S. News & World Report
Condi vs. Hillary?
Condi Rice has so wowed Washington and the world that there's new buzz she is blazing a trail to the presidency.
NY Times Magazine
The Lost Soldiers of Stalag IX-B
On the European front in the last months of World War II, the Nazis sent 350 U.S. Army prisoners of war to work in a concentration camp in eastern Germany. First on the list were all the American Jews they could find.
LA Times
Looking for the Why of Buy
Researchers scan for insight into how marketing may brand the brain's preference for products.
What Dean Means
by Matt Baih
He's a centrist, leftist, healer, divider. How fitting for today's Democratic Party.
Soft Power, Hard Truths For Europe
by Victor Davis Hanson
The War On Terror Began With Salman Rushdie
by J. Rauch
A Specter is Haunting Arabia
by Uriah Kriegel
Fear and practice have been undermined by recent events in the Middle East.
Among the Fellow Travelers
by Radley Balko
Is there still a chance for an alliance between libertarians and limited-government conservatives?
Coffee Causes Cancer! Oops, This Just In! Coffee Prevents Cancer!
by Dr. Elizabeth M. Whelan
Consumers must be constantly skeptical of studies linking variable A with disease B.
President Cheney?
by Fred Barnes
Reuters
WiMax May Pose Fresh Challenge to Broadband
The Washington Doctrine
by Michael M. Rosen
What Charles Krauthammer has elegantly characterized as "democratic realism," or the solemn American obligation to...
The Sorry Fiscal Record of a "Conservative" Administration
by David Broder
NY Warms to Hillary. Is America Next?
by Andrew Sullivan
NY Times Magazine
Training Brand
A lingerie line that appeals to girls emulating women who dress like children.
Iran Nuke Program Traced to '87
New evidence shows Iran bought some equipment then, but Tehran says it was for energy generation.
Business 2.o
Luring 'Em In
Who cares about prices? Bass Pro Shops hooks customers with tuna and taxidermy.
Business 2.o
The Grocery Store of the Future
Smart shelves. Fingerprint payment systems. The store of the future is here.
Business 2.o
Executive-in-Chief
Love what George W. Bush has to say or hate it, corporate leaders can learn a lot from how he says it.
LA Times Magazine
Rock, On
Chris Rock steps onto entertainment's grandest stage tonight as host of the Academy Awards telecast. Can a gig that big turn a rebel comedian outside in?
Barry Bonds Press Conference
Transcript
Watch it
Bono's Three TED Wishes
As one of the recipients of this year's TED prize, given this week at the annual Technology, Entertainment, and Design conference, Bono was given three wishes which TED will spend $100,000 to help fulfill. Bono's wishes, as you could've guessed, were directed at getting more Americans involved in the campaign to help Africa via the ONE Campaign and specifically at connecting hospitals and schools in Ethiopia to the Internet.
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