Economist, Aug. 18
The cover package assesses the state of the global financial system, which shows signs of strain as money markets slow. As banks lend billions of dollars to restore confidence to the markets, it is “clear that this mess is about more than a bit of rash mortgage lending to Americans who were in the habit of falling behind with their monthly payments.” And as the crisis deepens, anyone “who says the worst is definitely over is either a fool or someone with a position to protect.” … A commentary that deems the Iowa straw poll “a cross between a money-raising wheeze for the Iowa Republican party and a free day at the fair for local conservatives” segues into an analysis of marginal front-runner Mitt Romney’s poor standing among social-activist Republicans. He has yet to “[win] over the guys with the ‘Jesus is cool’ T-shirts” because of his late arrival to the pro-life movement and his discomfort among “ideologues who are in politics for the red meat, not the organizational niceties.”—M.S.
Time, Aug. 27 The cover story argues that kid geniuses are being left behind by the American public school system. “Gifted” children—those with an IQ above 145—often find it just as difficult to relate to their “normal” classmates as special needs children do. But since No Child Left Behind, “lifting everyone up to a minimum level is more important than allowing students to excel to their limit.” The best solution for gifted chilren isn’t special schools, but rather “allowing them to skip ahead at their own pace. We shouldn’t be so wary of those who can move a lot faster than the rest of us.” … In light of his resignation, a piece gives a mixed verdict on Karl Rove and, with the Republican party “in retreat,” questions his status as a political genius. He might not have failed, but he made little progress toward a conservative realignment: “If America remains more or less evenly divided, the presidency that was supposed to produce a watershed change in U.S. politics has … made almost no change at all.”— D.S.
Esquire, September 2007
A feature dishes on Dateline NBC’s To Catch a Predator, in which potential sexual predators are lured into a decoy house, interviewed by a reporter, and turned over to police. Esquire’s account of a recent sting—which resulted in a sex-soliciting prosecutor committing suicide when his home was stormed by a SWAT team—casts doubt on the legality of Dateline’s aggressive tactics. NBC claims it maintains strict separation from police investigation, but the writer contends Predator manipulates law-enforcement officers and cuts legal corners. … A rambling profile joins Sean Penn during post-production on his new film, Into the Wild. Everything about Penn is intense—his acting, his directing, his politics, his drinking. At 14, he passed out on set from the heat because he kept his costume on to stay in character. Now, he’s “edgy” when the projector at his screening isn’t quite right. But he’s intense because “he’s an idealist. He actually believes—in art, in patriotism, in action above words and truth beyond irony. No wonder the poor bastard needs a drink.”—D.S.
New York, Aug. 20
Anyone who still associates New York City with Mean Streets and dystopic grit should read this cover story, which examines why New Yorkers can expect to live nine months longer than the average American. This unusual longevity is the result of a dramatic drop in homicide rates, infant mortality rates, and drug-related deaths—all byproducts of “the freakish infusion of boom-time wealth.” Plus, the New York-built environment is especially conducive to health: “Every city block doubles as a racewalking track, every subway station, a StairMaster.”… An article offers Gov. Eliot Spitzer some “expert” makeover advice. Paul Labrecque, a hairdresser, says he “could take his ears in a little bit”; democratic strategist Hank Sheinkopf thinks the governor should eat Brooklyn hot dogs “until his stomach gets bloated”; and David Barton, a gym owner, suggests a “rounder butt.” Now that’s the kind of guy you can have a beer with, the piece declares.— J.L.
New York Times Magazine, Aug. 19 A profile of Horton Foote pays tribute to the playwright’s contributions to American literature and his devotion to his small-town Texas roots. Foote has not outlasted his creativity or his productivity—at 91 he manages to be “a great American artist who’s still commercially viable in Hollywood, of all places.” The piece captures Foote’s innate storytelling ability: “His conversation is like his dialogue. … The words are like music, and he takes deep pleasure in speaking them and hearing them. It’s like writing, with company.”… An article reports on the tangled case of Joseph Dick, who contends he falsely confessed to the rape and murder of a Norfolk, Va., woman in 1997. At first blush, Dick appears to be another convict attempting to capitalize on changing political tides: Even his defense lawyer thinks he’s guilty. But as the case’s history unravels, a bumbling judicial process emerges, and it seems Dick might be telling the truth.— M.S.
Newsweek, Aug. 20 The media romance with Facebook continues. A cover story about the oft-reported-on social-networking site asks: Can founder Mark Zuckerberg maintain the momentum of the networking “utility” as it forays into broader Internet territory? Will hip college kids still join a site that also accepts “graybeards” and “geezers”? And for said elderly users, the writer helpfully clarifies that “poking” is “not a sexual act, but just a little cozier way of saying ‘hey, you’ online.”… An article follows the debate around a group of accredited Jackson Pollock paintings—whose true origins are a mystery that “has become as tangled as the skeins of color that wind and loop through a classic Pollock.”… A commentary glows over a new Billy Graham biography, a book “full of details so delicious that even if you’ve read them before you’re happy to read them again” that shows the 88-year-old pastor as “a lion in his winter, turning over the events of his extraordinary life sweetly, with pride, puzzlement and remorse.”— M.S.
Weekly Standard, Aug. 20 An editorial attacks Barack Obama’s commitment to fighting al-Qaida everywhere in the world except Iraq. Unlike his fellow Democratic presidential hopefuls, Obama has at least made “a fairly serious attempt” to explain his position on Iraq. But his plan is preoccupied with the “purity” of the al-Qaida presence. “Al Qaeda in Central Asia and the subcontinent has, for the senator, a cleaner pedigree, traceable directly to Osama bin Laden. But what in the world do the circumstances of birth have to do with counterterrorism?” The idea of abandoning Iraq on such grounds is not a measured conclusion but a “shallow” political reaction, the writer contends. … A brief report examines Cambridge University Press’ destruction of its remaining copies of Alms for Jihad, a book linking Saudi billionaire Sheikh Khalid Bin Mahfouz to terrorism. Alms is the latest in a long string of books that Bin Mahfouz has suppressed “to squelch any unwanted discussion of his record.” Using libel suits in British courts, he has created a chilling effect on American writers attempting to uncover connections between Islamic charities and terrorism.—D.S.
The New Yorker, Aug. 20 An article delves into the political history of Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani, hypothesizing that the former mayor’s no-nonsense aggression toward New York City’s entrenched welfare-state mentality makes him attractive to middle-American conservatives. “New York was a study in failed liberalism,” and conservatives were impressed by Giuliani’s solutions. What began as a meandering celebrity campaign seems to have found its voice and, if the polls are any indication, conservative voters are willing to listen. Still, Guiliani faces an uphill battle to convince some on the right to judge him by his “whole record” when the subject of his moderate social views arises. … Adam Gopnik reintroduces American sci-fi novelist Philip K. Dick, whose stories inspired films like Minority Report, Blade Runner, and A Scanner Darkly, among others. Dick has “become for our time what Edgar Allan Poe was for Gilded Age America: the doomed genius who supplies a style of horrors and frissons.”—D.S.
Believer, August 2007 An article addresses the problem of picking out the perfect name for ourselves and fictional characters. The disorganized piece is solipsistic (with mentions of the author’s novel-in-progress and his therapist) and sometimes clumsy (babies are “drooling eight-pound blobs of potential”), but some of the thoughts on monikers in fiction are pretty solid. Ultimately, though, the drive-by literary analysis proves too broad to be interesting, and the concluding sentences, which somehow seem to contradict the whole point of the article while further indulging the author’s self-consciousness, will leave you feeling annoyed. … Another article elegizes the feminist novel of the ‘60s and ‘70s, unpacking the archetypes in works by authors such Erica Jong, Marilyn French, and Nora Ephron. Unlike today’s pastel-packaged chick lit, the older books inspired women when “[i]t was chronically square for smart women to give a shit about designer labels/wedding planning/personal grooming.” The politicized outrage and revolutionary anticipation of those books are absent from contemporary fare: “Life is expensive, the world is conservative, and we all just want to get buy.”— K.E.
