archive

Might have been

Joel Reidenberg (Princeton): The Data Surveillance State in the US and Europe. From World History Connected, a forum on Jesuits and world history. Erik Wemple reads a pile of books by cable talk-show hosts so you don’t have to. David Dayen on how frustrated blogger Duncan Black made expanding Social Security a respectable idea. American writers are self-censoring, PEN survey finds: 73 percent of respondents are more worried about government surveillance now than they ever have been. Alex Fletcher reviews On Resistance: A Philosophy of Defiance by Howard Caygill. Thanksgiving in Mongolia: Ariel Levy on an adventure and a heartbreaking loss. Rightbloggers find gloom in wins by McAuliffe and de Blasio — and even in Christie's. What's to stop the NSA from being used to rig U.S. elections? Imagine what Richard Nixon might have done with these surveillance tools. Jonathan Chait on George Will and monetary policy. The nuke that might have been: Being plentiful and cheap, thorium is the only fuel that stands a chance of generating electricity as cheaply as burning coal — as such, it is the only fuel capable of weaning the world off the biggest single polluter of all. Jonathan Cohn on how Bill Clinton's Obamacare comments are wrong. The NSA might know everything but it is not all powerful — in a world without privacy, our spies are not exempt. His life aquatic: A practical tiny sub can dive as deeply as 3,300 feet. Harvard professor Niall Ferguson can't get Paul Krugman out of his mind.