Thomas Friedman has no need of me to call attention to his op ed pieces. He has a readership. I have none. Nevertheless today he speaks exactly my mind (and I suppose that of many others). When he says this in today’s Times: “Frankly, if I had my wish, we would be on our way [...]
Archive for the ‘Online readings’ category
I wonder if our President reads Thomas Friedman
January 17, 2010Aristotle and Wahid and the Voice of Moderate Islam
January 7, 2010Thomas Friedman has frequently written about the failure of moderate Muslim leaders to speak out against the Muslim extremists among them. In a recent Times op ed piece, for example, he writes: “What is really scary is that this violent, Jihadist minority seems to enjoy the most ‘legitimacy’ in the Muslim world today. Few political [...]
Atul Gawande, Transforming Health Care
December 11, 2009Is Atul Gawande on to something in what he asks in a recent New Yorker article, “The health-care bill has no master plan for curbing costs. Is that a bad thing?” Can we, as he suggests, usefully and justifiably compare the place of health care, in particular the escalating cost of health care today, with [...]
Michael Porter on strategic thinking
November 17, 2009Well over one year ago Michael Porter of the Harvard Business School outlined what he thought were the sources of our country’s exceptional prosperity. The U.S. has prospered, he said, because of a “set of unique competitive strengths.” These were: an unparalleled environment for entrepreneurship, for starting new companies. an entrepreneurship fed by a science, [...]
Eric Zencey: G.D.P. R.I.P.
August 10, 2009It’s true that the value we give to things doesn’t represent something that we might want to call their “real value.” The best we’re able to do is come up with an appraisal, or market value, what they might be sold for. What is the real value of this country’s production? Is it GDP, or [...]
General Wald needs to come down to earth.
August 7, 2009General Wald (U.S. Air Force four-star, retired) in today’s WSJ, There is a Military Option on Iran, defends air and naval strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities. He says that otherwise, “we risk Iranian domination of the oil-rich Persian Gulf, threats to U.S.-allied Arab regimes, the emboldening of radicals in the region, the creation of an [...]
“They said, ‘We will protect you,’” he recalled. “I said, ‘We don’t trust you.’”
July 28, 2009An article from the Times, Landowners Still in Exile From Unstable Pakistan Area. Pakistan again. As if in answer to the question, why they’re not returning, this article, From the BBCÂ News, Pakistani policeman decapitated, “The headless body of a police constable has been found in Mingora, the main town in Pakistan’s troubled Swat Valley.” [...]
A Nation Hard to Short
July 27, 2009A New Yorker article by Nicholson Baker, A New Page, Can the Kindle really improve the book? His answer is no. He finds a number of faults, the principal one being the screen. “The problem was not that the screen was in black-and-white; if it had really been black-and-white, that would have been fine. The [...]
