From Vanity Fair, the so-called Sunni Awakening has been credited with dampening the insurgency in much of Iraq — but new evidence suggests that the Sunnis were offering the same deal as early as 2004; Baghdad is full of ordinary men and women who are learning a clandestine new trade — armed insurgency; think things are grim for Wall Streeters in the here and now? Envision the scene in hell, where the Devil is talking bonus cuts, the Pit of Remorse is packed with frustrated financiers, and trophy wives are weeping; and if New York City were to slide back into the crumbling anarchy of the 1970s, as some fear, would that be so bad? (and more) From The Atlantic, from Russia, with self-loathing: Meet Agniya Kuznetsova, the It Girl for a poorer, darker, angrier; and is Jacob Zuma, South Africa's next president, a savior, a criminal, a Marxist revolutionary — or all of the above? From The Wilson Quarterly, a review of Sweating the Small Stuff: Inner-City Schools and the New Paternalism by David Whitman, Work Hard. Be Nice.: How Two Inspired Teachers Created the Most Promising Schools in America by Jay Mathews, and Whatever It Takes: Geoffrey Canada’s Quest to Change Harlem and America by Paul Tough. Rene Stulz writes in defense of derivatives and how to regulate them.
