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India, the United States and political strategy

From Prospect, India's middle class failure: India's 200m-strong middle class is the most economically dynamic group on the planet, but is largely uninterested in politics or social reform. Until it begins to engage politically, India will suffer from a lop-sided modernisation. How to Unravel an Unchecked Superpower: India's history provides timeless lessons on how (and how not) to confront corporate power with protest, litigation, regulation, rebellion and, ultimately, corporate redesign. The partition evasion: Dividing territories and "unmixing" peoples is an idea whose time is past. The introduction to Hindu Nationalism: A Reader

Robert Kahn (St. Thomas): Why There Was No Cartoon Controversy in the United States. A cartoon due to appear in Sunday's Washington Post and several other newspapers across America has been pulled after it was deemed offensive to Muslims. Frenemies at the Gate: America's most dubious partners in the the war on terror. A nation of outlaws: Scourge of the free world! Peddlers of poisonous foods! Pirates of literary works! Counterfeiters of medicine! A century ago, that wasn't China — it was us. Several countries are opening their polls to their more baby-faced voters, but are American adolescents ready (or willing) to step up to the booth? 

A Guide to Media Manipulation, Republican Style: In recent years the GOP has turned the technique of making hay from their opponents' words into a reliable formula for success — with a few distortions and a little help from the media, of course. The poisonous rhetorical legacy of Karl Rove: Even Fox's Chris Wallace wants to know why Bush's newly departed advisor had to paint Democrats as traitors. David Brooks reviews The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation by Drew Westen (and an interview). Kevin Drum reviews Talking Right by Geoffrey Nunberg and Whose Freedom? The Battle Over America’s Most Important Idea by George Lakoff.