Harper’s, May 2006 This issue contains a “Letter from Iowa” on the evolution of the modern pig. The author surveys the various types of pig farms, from superfarms reliant on artificial insemination to the few remaining “old-fashioned” farms where pigs roam and copulate freely. By relying on the sperm of a few prize boar, pig geneticists have created frankenpig, who isn’t a monster but a bland, skittish creature of uniform size and weak immune system. Such a pig moves efficiently and smoothly—literally—through the plants that kill and package it for market. “Meatpackers want identical pigs, the better to give customers identical hams,” he writes. This “brave new pig,” with more pounds of desirable lean meat than its ancestors, has come at the expense of flavor and genetic diversity. … Outgoing editor Lewis H. Lapham pens his farewell “Notebook” column, lamenting the decline of the English language brought about by television and big business. “[O]ur newfound gifts for saying nothing make it difficult to hear voices that haven’t been swept clean of improvised literary devices, downsized into data points, reduced to an industrial waste product,” he writes.—S.S.
New Republic, May 8 An article profiles Egyptian pop star Shaaban Abdel Rahim, who sings “geopolitical” songs that align with the opinions of the proverbial Arab street. Since his first politically tinged song, “I Hate Israel,” became a runaway hit in 2000, Shaaban has been singing on current events. “Darkly alleging that Israel was responsible for September 11 in Egypt is the equivalent of railing against the evils of smoking in the United States—it’s not dangerous, it’s banal,” the author writes. … The cover story by Ryan Lizza profiles George Allen, Virginia senator and Republican presidential hopeful, focusing on his untidy past as a Confederate-flag-brandishing high-schooler in 1970s California. “Why would a young man with such a sensitive understanding of Southern racial conflict and no Southern heritage wear a Confederate flag in his formal yearbook photo?” he asks.—S.S.
Economist, April 29 An article details Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s plan to overhaul local schools by creating a council of the 28 mayors whose communities are within the enormous district to implement policy, such as opening more charter schools. The restructuring would essentially make Villaraigosa the district’s education czar, which has the teachers union up in arms, according to the piece. His proposal is ambitious, but the current system is failing miserably, the writer points out. … An editorial notes that President Bush will meet with President Ilham Aliev of Azerbaijan this week and urges Bush not to soft-pedal relations with the oil-rich and strategically positioned country. “If Mr Aliev can be pressured into change, Azerbaijan has the potential to become a well-off, democratic Muslim state. If he is not, America may one day be faced with an oil-rich Muslim country in a volatile region that is disillusioned with democracy and the West, and susceptible to other ideas.”—M.M.
New York Times Magazine, April 30 Amr Khaled, a rock-starlike Egyptian television preacher, is depicted as a modern-day Muslim Billy Graham in the cover piece. “Although Evangelical Christian preachers in the United States have for years blended self-help, management-training jargon and religion into a crowd-pleasing performance, it is a new phenomenon in the Muslim world,” the author offers. And this new approach is attracting a fresh crowd—young, religiously conservative Islam. … Slate senior editor Emily Bazelon explores the possibility that genes can influence how well survivors “bounce back” from childhood abuse. Researchers have used Rhesus monkeys to test how gene variations can determine human emotional “resiliency” and have recorded encouraging data, she reports. “Other experts, however, are skeptical. Whatever an abused child’s genes, they argue, she still needs the ingredients that promote resilience—adults she can trust, the reinforcements that make her believe in herself.”—M.M.
West, April 23 The Los Angeles Times Sunday magazine cover article profiles undocumented college students. A state law passed in 2001 allows illegal aliens to pay in-state tuition at California state universities under certain circumstances. Many are academic standouts, but they are sometimes made to feel like second-class students by administrators or just by life, according to the piece. “After all, unlike their parents, undocumented children never chose to break immigration laws. They came like luggage,” the author writes. … After an impromptu visit to a flavor factory, a writer decides to explore Los Angeles with his nose. Spicy foods, dead dogs, blossoming trees—not much escapes his sniff. “As I drove home, I spied the drivers around me, their windows rolled up tight. They didn’t know what they were missing,” he concludes. … Speaking of smells, a short piece spells out the pleasures of “stinky cheese.” “As Brillat-Savarin, food sage and chauvinist, once said, ‘A meal without cheese is like a beautiful woman with only one eye,’ ” the author muses.—M.M.
New York, May 1 A cover package touts a lifestyle and design revolution centered in Brooklyn, with articles on the fashion, furniture, and food scenes, plus several shelter pieces picturing dazzling apartments and profiling the lucky creative types who inhabit them. What is “Brooklynism”? Answer: It’s “looser and more playful than its Manhattan counterpart, homey and ironic, comfortable but always conscious of its looks, and often of its politics.”… A business story explains how Daily Candy, an e-mail beauty and shopping tipsheet for woman, ended up on the block for $100 million just three years after former AOL insider Bob Pittman bought a majority interest in the business for $3.5 million. This isn’t an absurd price based on revenues, the article argues; but whoever buys Daily Candy will most likely do it for the mailing list, which is “nothing less than the Holy Grail of e-commerce: a million trendy female shoppers begging to be spammed.”— B.W.
Weekly Standard, May 1 An article on Sino-American relations explains why last week’s summit between Presidents Hu and Bush seemed “like a Seinfeld episode, a ‘summit about nothing.’ ” Washington has continued the Clintonian strategy of “comprehensive engagement” with Beijing—essentially giving free passes on matters like democracy, human rights, and China’s relationships with Iran and North Korea. The article argues that the United States should put real diplomatic and trade pressures on China—and shouldn’t reward its leaders with any more photo-op summits that duck big issues. … A critical piece argues that Bush’s economic policy needs to be comprehensively revamped to remain true to “compassionate conservative” principles and also acknowledge new economic realities. Among the liberal-leaning recommendations: 1) decrease deficit spending; 2) transfer more of the tax burden to the very rich; 3) rethink energy policy and introduce an imported oil tax.— B.W.
The New Yorker, May 1 Drama, intrigue, an aging drug kingpin turned witness for the feds—an article lays out the made-for-TV case against two former New York cops who are accused of knocking off enemies of the Luchese Mafia dynasty in their spare time. … Author and critic Daniel Raeburn recounts his wife Rebekah’s labor and delivery of their stillborn daughter. “I raised the receiver to my ear, heard a silence that I sensed was Rebekah’s, and felt anguish tremble like electricity,” he writes. “I knew immediately that Irene was dead.”… A writer traveled all the way to Italy to learn the art of butchery and picked up more than knife skills during his sojourn; he came away with classic Tuscan recipes for almost every part of a pig. Upon his return, he butchered a swine that produced 450 meals. “This pig, we know precisely, had been slaughtered for our table, and we ended up feeling an affection for it that surprised us,” he concludes.—M.M.
Time and Newsweek, May 1 Everyone’s Bolten: The newsweeklies describe new White House staff Chief Josh Bolten as a press-shy, no-nonsense leader—a quiet storm moving in to wash away the ineffectual elements of the administration. Newsweek calls Scott McClellan’s resignation and Karl Rove’s demotion the “most visible changes Bolten could make” and quotes an anonymous staffer as saying, “People are worried about their jobs.”Time profiles Bolten and lists his five-step plan to rescue the Bush legacy, including cracking down on illegal immigration, renewing tax cuts on dividends and capital gains, and handling the media better. “[N]ow Bolten must prove to his many constituencies, internal and external, that although he’s a veteran of the Bush team, he can still get it off the ground,” the article asserts.
Odds and ends: An unexpected result of Saddam Hussein’s ouster is a booming sex trade in Iraq. An article in Time reports that girls are snatched off the street and sold into brothels and harems. Families often do not try to rescue the “tainted” girls, and even if the young women are rescued, they may be sent to jail for possessing fake ID made by their captors. … A piece in Time follows a woman who was beaten and jailed as a result of her attempts to flee totalitarian North Korea. She escaped to Thailand with the help of Christian missionaries. President Bush has asked China to help the beleaguered North Koreans.… And, a Newsweek article says “vaccine fatigue” is causing the reemergence of childhood diseases such as mumps. Parents neglect to properly vaccinate their children because they think the diseases are no longer a danger, causing a swell in disease cases. A theory that vaccines are linked to autism has also contributed to parents skipping inoculations.—M.M.
Economist, April 22
The cover story asserts that ailing GOP approval ratings and upcoming midterm elections represent a prime opportunity for the Democrats to pounce. “With America mired in Iraq and the Republicans mired in scandal, the Democrats have plenty of large, slow-moving targets to aim at,” the writer quips. Democrats have drafted the “Real Security” strategy, vowed to crack down on overspending, and promised to extend Medicaid in their quest to win back Congress. But a lack of clear leadership may be their downfall, the author concludes. … An article reports that international economic stability may land the International Monetary Fund in the red. With poorer countries staying on top of their finances and borrowing less money, the fund isn’t collecting enough interest to pay for its operations. Economists recommend that the fund entice underrepresented countries to utilize its services by giving them more say in IMF affairs.—M.M.
New Republic, May 1 An article describes the newly minted Sarajevo-based war crimes court, the “domestic judicial body” that will handle the caseload of the U.N. tribunal in The Hague after those proceedings wind up in 2008. The court, which the author dubs a “long overdue experiment,” will prosecute war criminals under Bosnian law. “Rather than having the international community extradite and try war criminals, the new court raises the possibility of states dispensing post-conflict justice on their own terms,” the author writes. … Slate’s Bryan Curtis reflects on the pickup truck, a vehicle of dubious usefulness but indisputable symbolic power. “This is the strange duality of the pickup truck. It must be urbane enough to navigate the boulevards of the New South while, at the same time, dignifying visions of running grandpappy’s bathtub gin through the holler with Toby Keith riding shotgun,” he writes.—S.S.
