From TLS, follies of Roman Catholicism: How the Catholic Church failed to save itself from the Reformation. A little-known Egyptian-born priest may be the source of Benedict XVI's ideas on Islam — and the source of his controversial speech about Muslims and violence. From Vox, Willem Buiter on macroeconomics’ crisis of irrelevance: The unfortunate uselessness of most "state of the art" academic monetary economics; and Barry Eichengreen on the G20, global governance, and the missing “vision”. When, exactly, will the misery end? When can we expect to see the economy turn around? 11 experts hazard a guess. The finalists of this year's Lionel Gelber Prize, an annual award for the best writing on international affairs, reflect the difficulties of trying to find light in a dark landscape. Yes, We Plan: How altruism and advertising could change the world. From TNR, from Obama with love: How his "secret letter" to Russia helps isolate Iran, undermine Putin, and save us money; just like Reagan, Obama is using the budget to put his imprint on the federal government — you gotta problem with that, Republicans?; and of course newspapers are in decline, but don't worry: Our democracy will be just fine. Beyond the pale: John Dean on the newly-released, indefensible Office of Legal Counsel terror memos. A show 2 lame 2 miss: Scoff if you must, but Orem, Utah, loves MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice.
