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Calendar
Letters to the Editor
COMMENT Our Faith-Based Future The White House remains unperturbed by the growing prospect of economic calamity
by Clive Crook
FINANCE Disasters and the Deficit
by Linda Bilmes
PHOTO OP The Other "El Norte"
photograph by Sergi Camara
HYPOTHETICALS If America Left Iraq The case for cutting and running
by Nir Rosen
THE LIST Cities Rising
by Matthew Quirk
BRIEF LIVES Challenge Match How the former world chess champion Garry Kasparov hopes to unseat President Vladimir Putin
by Jeffrey Tayler
CASE HISTORY The Dismantling of Russian Democracy
by Abigail Cutler
FOREIGN AFFAIRS The Covert Option Can sabotage and assassination stop Iran from going nuclear?
by Terrence Henry
Primary Sources Will Saudi Arabia's Shiites remain docile?; Europe's dim view (quelle surprise!) of the United States; new doctors as menaces; the fairer, cleaner sex
Compiled by Marshall Poe and Ross Douthat
Why Iraq Has No Army
An orderly exit from Iraq depends on the development of a viable Iraqi security force, but the Iraqis aren't even close. The Bush administration doesn't take the problem seriously—and it never has
by James Fallows
Missing Bellow
A family story
by Scott Turow
Captivity Pageant
December 1979: Christmas comes for the Great Satan
by Mark Bowden
Sultan of the Steppes
Kazakhstan's Soviet-schooled dictator—part economic modernizer, part Muslim progressive, part vainglorious despot—has enough oil to make himself into anything he wants
by Paul Starobin
Is God an Accident?
Human beings come into the world with a predisposition to believe in supernatural phenomena—and this predisposition is a by-product of cognitive functioning gone awry
by Paul Bloom
INTERVIEWS Wired for Creationism?POETRY Small House Torn Down to Build a Larger
Paul Bloom, the author of "Is God an Accident," on why—ironically—belief in Intelligent Design may be an inherited trait
by Jennie Rothenberg Gritz [Web only]
[with audio]
by X.J. Kennedy
POETRY Amber
[with audio]
by Eavan Boland
POETRY Two Poems
by C. K. Williams
EDITOR'S CHOICE Passion in Fashion
Sample: Cuttings From Contemporary Fashion, edited by Bronwyn Cosgrave; Encyclopedia of Clothing and Fashion, edited by Valerie Steele; Mao, by Jung Chang and Jon Halliday; New Art City, by Jed Perl
by Benjamin Schwarz
Books of the Year
Selected by The Atlantic's literary editor, Benjamin Schwarz
Books in BriefSit and Spin
Books reviewed in The Atlantic Monthly in 2005 [Web only]
How slot machines give gamblers the business
by Marc Cooper
READING LIST Cuba Libre
Castro's least favorite books
by Steve Wasserman
Hurricane Lolita
Fifty years ago Vladimir Nabokov published his most notorious novel. Its ravishing effects can still be felt
by Christopher Hitchens
New Fiction
Accidents, by Yael Hedaya
by Joseph O'Neill
NEW FICTION A Close Read
The Truth of the Matter, by Robb Forman Dew
by Christina Schwarz
Serf Advisory
A practical guide for hired help, from the eighteenth century to ours
by Mona Simpson
BEST SELLERS ABROAD France
by Charles Trueheart
TRAVELS Back to the Future
Which way is the new Las Vegas Monorail heading?
by Wayne Curtis
MOVIES Can Jesus Save Hollywood?
From The Passion of the Christ to The Chronicles of Narnia, the Christian audience is making spirits rise
by Hanna Rosin
FOOD Merlot for Snobs
A Long Island winery is challenging Merlot's deservedly dismal reputation
by Corby Kummer
THE PUZZLER Cryptic Recipe
by Emily Cox and Henry Rathvon
Word Fugitives
by Barbara Wallraff
POST MORTEM The Least Worst Man
Sidney Luft (1915-2005)
by Mark Steyn
Who's Who
A selective index to this month's issue
by Benjamin Healy