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Saturday, December 31, 2011

The Browser daily newsletter [31 Dec 2011]

31 December 2011

 Best of the Moment

Delayed Gratification

James Surowiecki | New Yorker | 26 December 2011

On the return of "layaway", or saving in instalments for big-ticket items and buying when you've saved enough. Antithesis of, and antidote to credit card binge. Not rational perhaps, but works because money to hand is money spent Comments

A History Of Disappointment

Jackson Lears | London Review Of Books | 29 December 2011

"How did Obama develop his paradoxical combination of fierce ambition and persistent timidity?" Hostile assessment of US president says part of the answer may lie in his family background and a "genealogy of disappointment" Comments

Modernisation, Not Morality, Is The Dirty Word Of Politics

Peter Oborne | Telegraph | 28 December 2011

"Modernisation" is little more than set of techniques for securing, keeping power. Practitioners included Blair, Mandelson, Cameron. Worked in electoral terms; useless at tackling national problems. Looks intellectually bankrupt now Comments

How Much Dam Energy Can We Get?

Tim Murphy | Do The Math | 20 December 2011

Physicist investigating how we can replace fossil fuels turns attention to hydroelectric power. Steady, self-storing, efficient, low-carbon. Better than tidal. But a few calculations show it'll never be a big player Comments

George Steiner: A Certain Idea Of Knowledge

Juliette Cerf | Telerama/Presseurop | 30 December 2011

High-flying interview with literary scholar and polymath. Interesting throughout. "Our world is shrinking. Science is becoming inaccessible to us. Is it possible to be literate if you do not understand non-linear equations?" Comments

Revolutionary Chaos

Sergei Karaganov | Foreign Affairs | 28 December 2011

Harsh, perceptive global view from dean of Russian foreign policy analysts. Western democracy follows communism into oblivion. Authoritarianism emerges as best form of government. History returns to "customary state of chaos" Comments

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