Caribbean Medical Schools

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/23/nyregion/23caribbean.html?hp=&pagewanted=all
New York Medical Schools fight to prevent Caribbean medical school students from completing part of their core education in NY hospitals alongside US medical students.

The Captive Arab Mind

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/21/opinion/21iht-edcohen21.html

Keep the Internet Free

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2010/12/steve-wozniak-to-the-fcc-keep-the-internet-free/68294/
Steve Wozniak (co-founder of Apple) to the FCC.

Top Secret America

http://projects.washingtonpost.com/top-secret-america/articles/monitoring-america/

Nine years after the terrorist attacks of 2001, the United States is assembling a vast domestic intelligence apparatus to collect information about Americans, using the FBI, local police, state homeland security offices and military criminal investigators.

The system, by far the largest and most technologically sophisticated in the nation's history, collects, stores and analyzes information about thousands of U.S. citizens and residents, many of whom have not been accused of any wrongdoing.

The Real Science of Mind

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/19/a-real-science-of-mind/

In Defense of Disgust

http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/2010/12/in-defense-of-disgust
Is the emotion of disgust a result of natural selection? Surely in part it must be. But does evolution give us a complete picture?

The Crisis of the American Intellectual

http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2010/12/08/the-crisis-of-the-american-intellectual/
Our intellectual life is becoming reactionary: opportunities are viewed as threats, hopes as dangers, progress as the unraveling of all that is beautiful and true

Michael Bloomberg, American God

http://www.slate.com/id/2278234/

Mao Ze Dong

http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2010/12/20/101220crbo_books_mishra?currentPage=all

What Makes a Sad Song?

http://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2010/12/what-makes-a-song-sad/67709/

Lawrence of Arabia -- Lessons for and seeds of the current conflict in Middle East

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-11-15/te-lawrence-michael-korda-hero-on-his-middle-east-legacy/full/
What We Need to Learn From T.E. Lawrence by Michael Korda

To Conquer Wind Power, China Writes the Rules

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/15/business/global/15chinawind.html?hp
China's "house rules" for those who want to play in its market -- the biggest game in town.

Health Care and the Deficit

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/12/opinion/12sun1.html
Ah, the health care mess.

US & Europe should rethink unconditional support for Israel, Palestinians

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/12/opinion/12friedman.html

Hitchens on Populist Claptrap

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2011/01/hitchens-201101
Forfeiting a both-houses Republican victory, rational conservatives ignored or excused the most hateful kind of populist claptrap (e.g., the fetid weirdness of Glenn Beck’s 9/12 Project). The poison they’ve helped disseminate will still be in the American bloodstream when the country needs it least.

All the President's Captors

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/05/opinion/05rich.html
Does Obama suffer from Stockholm Syndrome?

No Secrets

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/06/07/100607fa_fact_khatchadourian?currentPage=all
Profile of Wikileaks and Julian Assange.  I love The New Yorker!

The Online Threat

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/11/01/101101fa_fact_hersh

The Eligible-Bachelor Paradox

http://www.slate.com/id/2188684/
How economics and game theory explain the shortage of available, appealing men.
(Brought to mind by recent conversations.)

Marry Him! The case for setting for Mr. Good Enough

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/03/marry-him/6651/
And old article brought to mind by a couple of recent conversations.

The Shameful Attacks on Julian Assange

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2010/12/the-shameful-attacks-on-julian-assange/67440/

Obama: President; McConnell: Sucker

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/12/obama-president-mcconnell-sucker.html

A Proposal to Classify Happiness as a Psychiatric Disorder

From the Journal of Medical Ethics (1992).  J Med Ethics 1992;18:94-98 doi:10.1136/jme.18.2.94
Original link: http://jme.bmj.com/content/18/2/94
PDF link: https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0BxfPsH53fxUSNjQyMjhlNzctMGQ0NS00ZjA4LTllNjEtYTVhZDIyOGU0N2Zl&hl=en&authkey=CPfiw8oF

Freedom of Speech?

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/closeread/2010/12/banishing-wikileaks.html
Amazon ceased to host the Wikileaks website on its servers.  Oh, the irony of a bookseller thwarting free speech.  I wonder how many Americans know the difficulty Al Jazeera had (has) in finding distribution channels in the US -- Comcast and others refused to carry it.

Africa Needs Aid, Not Flawed Theories (by Bill Gates)

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704243904575630761699028330.html
By stressing exchange as the key mechanism in the success of our species, Matt Ridley underplays education, law, patents, and science. Bill Gates likes Ridley’s message, but...

Colleges Are Producing New Style of AIDS Activist

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/01/us/politics/01aids.html?_r=1&hp
This made me nostalgic.

The Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v32/n23/james-harkin/cyber-con
There's little to support claims of the vast political power of social media.

Lengthy interview with WikiLeaks' Julian Assange

http://blogs.forbes.com/andygreenberg/2010/11/29/wikileaks-julian-assange-wants-to-spill-your-corporate-secrets/

Updike Redux

http://www.guernicamag.com/interviews/2159/updike_11_15_10/

“Nabokov writes prose the only way it should be written: ecstatically.”  In a previously unpublished interview, John Updike talks about Nabokov and his other literary heroes, why he wrote a book about a terrorist, and why he never expected to be a novelist.

A Bully Finds a Pulpit on the Web

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/28/business/28borker.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all
DecorMyEyes.com offers so much: first, the wrong style, then endless phone calls, emails, abuse and threats of violence, lasting for months or years.

The Spanish Prisoner

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/29/opinion/29krugman.html?_r=1&hp
Krugman on Spain's economic woes vs. those of America and the benefits of a flexible currency.

Facing Death

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/facing-death/?utm_campaign=viewpage&utm_medium=toparea&utm_source=toparea
A powerful look at today's medicalized death.  How far would you go to sustain a loved one's life, or your own?

A Fistful of Dollars

http://motherjones.com/politics/2010/11/vigilante-justice-oklahoma-indian-reservations
Crime is rampant. The cops and courts are a joke. That's why residents of Oklahoma's Indian nations turn to a bruiser-for-hire like Ruben. (Mac McClelland)

The Insanity Virus

http://discovermagazine.com/2010/jun/03-the-insanity-virus
Schizophrenia has long been blamed on bad genes or even bad parents. Wrong, says a growing group of psychiatrists. The real culprit, they claim, is a virus that lives entwined in every person's DNA.