New Republic, May 16
The cover package examines how House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and lobbyist Jack Abramoff enabled the current climate of big-government conservatism. “[M]uch of the money [Abramoff] wheedled from his clients did not go into his own pockets. He directed it instead to various financial cogs in the GOP machine—candidates, foundations, and think tanks.” Meanwhile, many of the charges against DeLay “stem from his efforts to build and operate a patronage machine for his party.” A related piece notes DeLay’s plummeting popularity in Texas, his home state. Another story unravels how Abramoff courted the conservative press and think tanks, claiming that he did so “not because these op-eds had a demonstrable effect on policy, but because they served as tangible evidence to clients that he could influence opinion—and therefore justified his eye-popping fees.” … An enthusiastic review of pianist/composer Fred Hersch’s Leaves of Grass, weighs Hersch’s success against past attempts to set Walt Whitman to music.—B.B.
Economist, May 6
The cover chides British voters for giving the Labor party such a narrow victory. Claiming that Tony Blair’s weakened position will lead to weaker policies, the piece argues that “by diminishing him, Britain’s voters have almost certainly ensured they will have a more timid, less radical government.” … Another article looks at the newly established International Criminal Court’s attempt to pursue its first case. The court wants to arrest Ugandan rebel leader Joseph Kony and his associates, who are accused of such atrocities as kidnapping thousands of children and forcing them to fight. “By way of initiation, many are obliged to club, stamp or bite to death their friends and relatives, and then to lick their brains, drink their blood and even eat their boiled flesh.” However, the leaders of the northern Acholi, the tribe that has born the brunt of Kony’s wrath, doesn’t want the ICC’s interference because it “will deter the rebels from accepting a government-offered amnesty, and therefore prolong the war.”—B.B.
Atlantic, June 2005
Dismissing NATO’s current incarnation as “dead,” Robert Kaplan predicts a Cold War in the Pacific with China. He emphasizes that PACOM (U.S. Pacific Command, a U.S.-led alliance) understands that “the center of gravity of American strategic concern is already the Pacific, not the Middle East.” Kaplan thinks the best deterrence strategy for PACOM would be to operate “from a geographic hub of comparative isolation—the Hawaiian Islands—with spokes reaching out to major allies.” He suggests reconfiguring the U.S. Navy, urging improvement of its stealth capacities because “China will approach us asymmetrically, as terrorists do.” … William Langewiesche profiles Ziad al-Khasawneh, a Jordanian who heads the 2,000 voluntary lawyers in Saddam Hussein’s defense committee. Calling Khasawaneh’s defense plans a “mixture of fact and fantasy,” Langewiesche deplores the fact that the prosecuting tribunal doesn’t return the lawyer’s calls and has given him no information about depositions, charges, and “rules of evidence and procedure.”—B.B.
Reason, June 2005
Colombian enthusiasm for the U.S.-supported “war on drugs,” is eroding in the face of years of conflict, says a piece. Toby Muse writes that drug legalization is gaining support as a way to curtail the funding of guerilla groups in the ongoing civil war and ending the feuds among drug cartels. Muse writes, “Conservative support for the decriminalization or legalization of drugs is based largely on the belief that Colombia fights alone on the front line of the ‘War on Drugs,’ and that as a result, the entire country has become a battlefield.”… A piece pays tribute to controversial 1950s publisher EC Comics. The company’s Tales from the Crypt line set the gold standard for comic book gore in the face of Senate hearings and industry pressure, eventually attaining cult status. “If EC’s horror comics hadn’t been driven off the stands, the might be remembered as just a footnote,” writes Franklin Harris; instead, “they became forbidden fruit, which, as everyone knows, is tastiest of all.”—J.S.
New Yorker, May 9
Jeffrey Goldberg interviews Douglas Feith, who is about to step down from his position as undersecretary of defense, about postwar Iraq. In keeping with his bookish reputation, Feith professes an admiration for Edmund Burke and Abraham Lincoln. When Goldberg asks him if he likes Lincoln “because Lincoln shifted the rationale for his war in the middle of fighting,” Feith readily agrees. Goldberg says that he’s surprised because he’d expected Feith to argue that “the Bush administration has not changed the rationale for war.” … Another piece calls E.M. Delafield, an early 20th century English columnist and novelist, “Bridget Jones’s grandmother.” It credits her with establishing a new genre—one that concerns itself with “the foibles, domestic and otherwise, of an ostensibly ordinary woman,” and praises Delafield for gradually broadening her range, “concerning herself first with poverty and injustices in her own village and later with political turmoil and war, while almost never faltering from her darkly comic perch.”—B.B.
New York Times Magazine, May 8 The cover story focuses on the burgeoning fathers’ custody-rights movements in both Britain and America. A representative of the stunt-happy British group Fathers 4 Justice (most famous for tossing a purple flour-filled condom at Tony Blair) comes to advise an American group about tactics. Noting that “in 2001 only 52% of divorced [American] mothers received their full child-support payments,” the article points out that American fathers’-rights groups might find it more difficult to strike a balance between “goofy playfulness” and “enough dignity to maintain respectability” than their British peers, who “realized early on that men marching in the street and shouting look like a public menace rather than nurturing caretakers deserving of more time with their children.” In the U.S., there are currently “40-some class-action lawsuits demanding a 50-50 split of custody.” Though their tactics might differ, fathers on both sides of the Atlantic want their rights to be valued as much as the child’s best interest.—B.B.
Weekly Standard, May 9 On the eve of the British elections, a piece examines why Brits of all stripes seem to hate Tony Blair so much and asks why, despite that, Blair is still poised to win. Decrying those who suggest that Blair lied about Iraqi WMD, the author explains “the charge has had such public resonance because there has often been something slightly tangential about Blair’s relationship to the arc of political truth.” However, the editorial points out that “the British economy has been enjoying its longest period of economic growth since the industrial revolution,” and notes that Blair’s opposition is weak. Applauding Blair’s support of President Bush, the article concludes, “He deserves better than the Pyrrhic victory he will win this week.”… Another opinion piece notes that Chinese President Hu Jintao’s father died in the Cultural Revolution and Premier Wen Jiabao’s grandfather was shot by Chinese Nationalists and urges both officials to stop blaming the Japanese invasion of China for their family tragedies.—B.B.
Glamour, May 2005 The magazine recently won a National Magazine Award for general excellence; a look at the current issue reveals the magazine’s focus is still on fashion and celebs. Actress Ashley Judd takes readers on a journey through Kenya, Madagascar, and South Africa, via her journal. She writes of becoming attached to a boy named Lucky and other AIDS patients and says, “I am so transformed by my trip that I know I will return many, many times.”… Cartoonist Marisa Acocella illustrated her personal bout with breast cancer from discovery to recovery. “I am happy. Despite the months of radiation yet to come, not to mention the check-ups and paranoia … my negativity has vanished,” Acocella said in an article. … In another piece, fashion designer Narciso Rodriguez explains, “My job is to appreciate that the body is about curves.” The article highlights Rodriguez’s career and the celebs he’s dressed. … “How far would you go to have a baby?” Brian Alexander asks in an article that weighs the pros and cons of having in vitro fertilization done abroad.—M.N.
Time, Newsweek, and U.S. News and World Report, May 9
The new middle kingdom: In an eight-article special report, Newsweek asks, “Does the Future Belong to China?” Noting that a quarter-century of the fastest growth in recorded history has made China the world’s largest producer of coal, steel, and cement; the second-largest energy consumer; and the third-largest oil importer, columnist Fareed Zakaria says that “China is now.” In the global economy, China performs a service analogous to the essential British role in the Industrial Revolution, as “the workshop of the world,” Zakaria observes, and declares that “China’s rise … represents the [next] great shift in global power—the rise of Asia.” Beyond conventional alarmism, the report acknowledges several obstacles to Chinese supremacy: a disproportionately weak military and a confused foreign policy that seeks to establish economic clout but devolves quickly into fervent, post-Communist nationalism.
Wars to end all Wars: The May 19 * release of Star Wars: Episode III occasions a Time assessment of the series and a hagiographic reckoning with the legacy of director George Lucas. In Revenge of the Sith, the “narrative arcs of the grand epic, gracefully bending in a double helix, will be complete,” says the magazine of the new installment, which “shows Lucas storming back as a prime confector of popular art.” In an interview, Lucas embraces the artificiality of his confections. With digital technology, he says, “I can paint reality. In essence, it means that cinema has gone from being a photographic medium to a painterly one.” … An item in the front of Newsweek looks at religious disciples of various faiths who see spiritual metaphors and roadmaps in the Star Wars series. “I think there’s a much more interesting conversation about spirituality happening in pop culture than there is in the typical church,” says one devotee.
The great alternative energy race: Hybrid cars “are becoming the feel-good phenomenon of the decade,” writes U.S. News in a cover story. Increased fuel efficiency makes them an economical option, but “hybrids have become popular for reasons that have little to do with practicality,” chiefly a sense that drivers are environmentally responsible and technologically avant-garde. A sidebar examines General Motors’ obsession with building a workable, marketable fuel-cell automobile, powered by chemistry rather than machinery. Such a machine would liberate the auto industry from both the environmental albatross and business burden of oil politics. … In Time, columnist Joe Klein considers President Bush’s squandered opportunity to stake his second term on sensible energy alternatives rather than Social Security reform. Embracing alternative energy, Klein writes, would engender “boldness of a sort that George W. Bush usually loves—a patriotic way to simultaneously address high gasoline prices, the war on terrorism” and untangle the U.S. from sometimes embarrassing relationships with Middle Eastern leaders.—D.W.W.
Correction, May 3: This article originally stated the release date of The Revenge of the Sith was May 20. The release date is in fact May 19. Return to the corrected sentence.
