April 2012

How Ben Bernanke saved the economy, Rahm Emanuel's big plans, the triumph of HBO's Game of Thrones, Philip Roth's not-quite-autobiographical fiction, and more

The Atlantic - April 2012

Editor's Note

Creative Destruction

The modern Republican Party has braided together a reverence for tradition with a devotion to free markets. But those two values are inexorably in conflict.

Letters & more

Letters to the editor

Responses and reverberations

Advice

What’s Your Problem?

Never pay for marijuana, and other advice

Features

The Villain

The left hates him. The right hates him even more. But Ben Bernanke saved the economy—and has navigated masterfully through the most trying of times.

Meet the New Boss

Tattered finances, broken schools, rampant crime—can Rahm Emanuel make Chicago work?

The Man Who Broke Atlantic City

Over the course of five months, Don Johnson won $15 million from three different casinos, devastating their monthly revenues. Here’s how he did it.

What Isn’t for Sale?

Market thinking so permeates our lives that we barely notice it anymore. A leading philosopher sums up the hidden costs of a price-tag society.

How We Spend

And what that tells us about the economy

Dispatches

Moneyballer

Why did Harrison Barnes stay in college when he could have played pro? It’s all about building his brand.

School, Crossing

How do you move a 3-million-pound building across New Orleans? Carefully.

The Playboy

A former cricket star may become Pakistan’s next ruler.

The Royal Me

How Australians’ disdain for authority has led to an epidemic of secession

The Peaks of Persia

Sharing the rope on a rare expedition in the mountains of Iran

The Secret Ingredient

Liquor companies love to claim they use closely guarded, centuries-old recipes. Usually it’s just marketing.

Columns

Europe’s Real Crisis

The Continent’s problems are as much demographic as financial. And they won’t go away anytime soon.

The Enchanted State

HBO’s Game of Thrones, based on the novels by George R. R. Martin, represents a triumph of storytelling.

Books

Night Owls

How nightlife changed Western culture, plus why New Zealand is better than the U.S.

Roth v. Roth v. Roth

The complexities and conundrums of reading Philip Roth’s work as autobiography

Cover to Cover

Katherine Boo’s unsparing portrait of slum life in Mumbai; two Agatha Christie memoirs; a modern Victorian novel set at the races; and more


Video

Miami: The Next Big Start-Up City?

How the city became a center for innovation

Video

Video

A Brief History of Romantic Comedies

From The Atlantic's Chris Orr

Video

Life in 'the New Arctic'

A moving portrait of a fading landscape

Video

Video

The Rise of New York City

A fascinating look at Manhattan in the 1940s

Video

What Is Methane Hydrate?

"Flaming ice" is a vast natural energy source

Video

NASA's Time-Lapse of the Sun

Now with epic dubstep music

Video

Shaken Not Tuned: Cocktail Experiments

Can a tuning fork improve a cocktail?

Video

Video

Is He Cheating? A 1950s Guide

'That little blonde secretary from the office?’

Video

New Yorkers: Vintage Vacuum-Tube Amps

Risking electric shock to restore old amplifiers

Video

The DIY Piano-Bicycle

Everybody needs a hobby

Video

What Does It Take to Make Real Craft Gin?

Tour the Green Hat Gin distillery

Video

Letter From the Editor

The June 2013 issue

Video

What Straights Can Learn From Same-Sex Couples

New insight from decades of research

Video

The End of the Mall Rat

A tribute to that pillar of teen culture

Writers

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