Click here for Slate’s complete Kosovo coverage.
Economist, May 15
The editors find a silver lining in Chinese outrage over the bombing of its Belgrade embassy: The famously withdrawn country may finally expand its role in world affairs. … The magazine defends day traders. The onliners have helped the market by driving down commissions and encouraging efficient pricing. … A column feasts on Larry Summers’ ill-suitedness for the politicking-heavy job of treasury secretary (“Imagine the effort required for this man to feign interest in the idiotic ramblings of some member of Congress, next to whom the stupidest graduate student Mr. Summers ever met was John Maynard Keynes.”).
New Republic, May 31
The cover story argues that NATO has been more a relief organization than a military force in the Kosovo crisis, sheltering and protecting the displaced as the U.N. relief operation became mired in bureaucracy. “NATO is not in the business of meals on wheels; it should be in the business of guns and missiles,” an American soldier sighs. … An editorial argues that the embassy riots in Beijing are a warning that the United States should stop underestimating anti-American sentiment in China. … A piece explains the drubbing Gen. Wesley Clark has received from fellow military leaders. Clark’s peers are suspicious of his pedigreed background and political connections; worse, NATO’s half-hearted military strategy smells to them of another Vietnam. … A delightful essay slams Germaine Greer’s new book as “a sour and undiscriminating litany of charges against men.”
New York Times Magazine, May 16
The second installment of the magazine’s year 2000 series is devoted to women, “the shadow story of the millennium.” (Click here if you missed the first installment.) … A brief history rates monogamous marriage, education, employment, and improved health among the major developments in the lives of females over the last thousand years. An accompanying time line illustrates women’s progress, beginning with a 12th-century German nun and ending with Purdue University’s 1999 women’s basketball team. … A piece reports that Japanese scientists are close to creating the first artificial womb. Drawback: American researchers suspect that fetuses perceive their mothers’ emotions in utero. … An article surveys changing attitudes toward female sexual pleasure, from St. Thomas Aquinas’$2 13th-century allegation that “woman is defective and misbegotten” to a 1995 study suggesting that orgasms may be linked to fertility. … The magazine’s food columnist gushes over Martha Stewart, calling her “America’s superego.”
Time and Newsweek, May 17
Newsweek blasts the hype surrounding Star Wars: The Phantom Menace (its star turns in major magazines were “carefully engineered” by Lucas) but splashes the film on its cover anyway. Inside, a critic brands the film “a big disappointment.” Carrie Fisher, a k a Princess Leia, dryly reminisces about her metal bikini and crush on Harrison Ford during the filming of the original trilogy but says she can’t even remember what the third installment was called. Time applauds the film’s splashy special effects but deems it short on “human magic” (for more early returns, check Slate’s own “Summary Judgment“).
Time’s cover profile of Madeleine Albright defends her Kosovo policy from charges of poor planning and incoherence, and tallies her successes instead: She consolidated European support for airstrikes at Rambouillet, has deftly cultivated consensus among NATO’s member countries, and is drafting a “mini-Marshall Plan” to restore stability to the Balkans. … The magazine tracks how Albanians around the world are funneling money to the Kosovo Liberation Army. Émigrés write checks to organized fund-raising networks, which then smuggle cash and weapons over remote Albanian roads into Kosovo.
Newsweek wonders how George W. Bush will survive the transition from honeymoon to full-fledged campaign. (“If Bush were a movie, he’d be the new Star Wars: the closely guarded, breathlessly anticipated next episode in a multigenerational saga of family destiny.”)… Time lauds Elizabeth Dole’s New Hampshire debut, citing her gutsy stances on gun control and huge potential to win centrist voters. She “is running the campaign she wanted her husband to run.”
U.S. News & World Report, May 17
The cover story christens professional wrestling “a new American art form,” albeit a savage one: Fifty episodes of a popular wrestling TV show included “1,658 instances of grabbing or pointing to one’s crotch, 157 instances of an obscene finger gesture, 128 episodes of simulated sexual activity, and 21 references to urination.” The wrestlers also enact crucifixions, sadomasochism, and prostitution. … A sidebar speculates that Slobodan Milosevic is probably hoarding chemical weapons, including nerve gas, blister agents, choking compounds, and hallucinogens. … The magazine predicts softer GOP stances on gun control and abortion. Elizabeth Dole has sounded the cry for increasing restrictions on guns, and both Dole and George W. Bush have been “mute” on abortion. (For Slate Editor Michael Kinsley’s take on Dole’s and Bush’s halfhearted pro-life stances, click here.)
The New Yorker, May 17
A piece describes how the leading Kosovar Albanian newspaper is currently being published in exile in Macedonia by a ragtag bunch of twentysomething editors. The paper, which serves as a lifeline for dispossessed Kosovars, is lukewarm on the KLA and favors the establishment of an international protectorate. … A mesmerizing article describes how a cadre of plaintiffs’ attorneys, fresh from recent victories over Big Tobacco, are going after the gun industry. Amazing detail: The idea of suing gunmakers, one of the lawyers says, came straight from a Wall Street Journal editorial decrying the ever-widening scope of tort lawsuits. … A writer chronicles the transformation of her baby nephew, born with a severe genetic cranio-facial disorder. A series of operations has given the baby eyes, fingers, a navel, and an airway for breathing.
Weekly Standard, May 17
A jubilant cover story congratulates Gov. Jeb Bush for the passage of Florida’s–and the nation’s first–statewide voucher system. To avoid charges of being anti-public-education, Bush cannily referred to the vouchers as “opportunity scholarships.” … An editorial mocks the overtures white politicians make to minorities: Republicans are “dorky and patronizing;” Bradley is “schoolmarmy” and self-righteous; Gore is “cartoonish”; and none is serious about dismantling the racial and ethnic classifications that still plague American law. … A piece recommends that Alan Greenspan be awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics. “Shouldn’t a man who saves the world financial system rank with one who makes a fundamental discovery in the field?”
The Nation, May 24
Almost the entire magazine is devoted to opposing the Kosovo intervention. The editorial declares that the intervention “has failed catastrophically.” The editors argue that Milosevic’s release of the POWs was a “humane gesture that should be built upon.” The allies must stop bombing and let the Russians negotiate on their behalf. A U.N. force with Russia at its core should police the peace. … Tom Hayden calls “Clinton’s war” a “Vietnam-style quagmire” that should be abandoned. … An article argues that NATO is “the armed hand of the new capitalist global order.” NATO averted its eyes to Milosevic’s atrocities until it was clearly in the strategic interest of capitalism to intervene.
