The Case for George Zimmerman Is the Case Against Him
Let's assume, for the sake of argument, that the facts of the case are basically as Zimmerman's defenders claim More »
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Robert Wright is the author of, most recently, the New York Times bestseller The Evolution of God and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. He is a former writer and editor at The Atlantic. More
Wright is also a fellow at the New America Foundation and editor in chief of Bloggingheads.tv. His other books include Nonzero, which was named a New York Times Book Review Notable Book in 2000 and included on Fortune magazine's list of the top 75 business books of all-time. Wright's best-selling book The Moral Animal was selected as one of the ten best books of 1994 by The New York Times Book Review.Wright has contributed to The Atlantic for more than 20 years. He has also contributed to a number of the country's other leading magazines and newspapers, including: The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, Foreign Policy, The New Republic, Time, and Slate, and the op-ed pages of The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Financial Times. He is the recipient of a National Magazine Award for Essay and Criticism and his books have been translated into more than a dozen languages.
Let's assume, for the sake of argument, that the facts of the case are basically as Zimmerman's defenders claim More »
Headline of the weekend goes to "30,000 Godless Undeterred by Rain." It was a reference to the "Reason Rally," which brought lots of atheists and agnostics onto the Washington Mall. Some of my best friends are reasonable, and I try to be that way myself most of the time, but there is one thing about this rally that bothered me: the intermittent lack of reasonableness evinced by its most famous participant, Richard Dawkins. More »
While a student at UC Berkeley, Roland Saekow had the idea for a tool that would help people visualize history--all the way from the big bang to yesterday--and zoom in on whatever parts interest them. Called ChronoZoom, it's kind of like Google Maps for the fourth dimension, and it will get richer and richer as it's fleshed out wiki-style. Here Saekow demonstrates: More »
My conversation with Fadi Quran about his arrest and his role in the growing movement to oppose the Israeli occupation via nonviolent resistance More »
David Corn's book Showdown, which chronicles the Obama presidency during a pivotal year, was published this week. In discussing the book with Corn on Bloggingheads.tv, I was struck, more than ever, by Obama's cool self-confidence. You can scroll down the page to see Corn discussing examples of that. But first his reaction when I asked him something I've long wondered--whether Obama's calm comes from a sense that God is on his side: More »
Never, ever, get in the middle of a fight between Andrew Sullivan and Jeffrey Goldberg. More »
The Syrian opposition has been running into some bad publicity lately. More »
With Peter Beinart's book The Crisis of Zionism only days away from publication, the attempt to marginalize Beinart has begun. This morning Israel's Ambassador to the U.S., Michael Oren, said that Beinart is "well beyond the Israeli mainstream, the moderate left, and the vast majority of Israelis who care about peace"--he's part of a "marginal and highly radical fringe." Oren said this on Facebook, and the trouble with Facebook as… More »
Some Israeli peaceniks, frustrated by their prime minister's tone toward Iran, have taken matters into their own hands. More »
My previous post suggested that maybe Newt Gingrich suffers from a condition known as hypomania--which is like the manic phase of classic manic-depressive illness except a bit less so. (Hence, as the commenter Xclamation noted, the prefix "hypo" rather than "hyper"--signifying a state of mind that is sub-manic, though still intense.) Speaking of commenters: Some weren't happy with my post. Two kinds of complaints seem especially… More »
If the former speaker has hypomania, it would explain why he insists on staying in the race even as his shot at the nomination fades to black. More »
It isn't just the physical packaging whose time has come, but the whole idea of a top-down, orchestrated compendium of knowledge. More »
As the carnage in Syria continues, support in America for military intervention will presumably grow. But can the support spread very far beyond its current base? More »
Robert Wright interviewed the New York Times' William Broad, author of the new book 'The Science of Yoga,' and learned two things: Yoga can enhance your sex life, and yoga can kill you. More »
A much-retweeted tweet today came from Blake Hounshell, Managing Editor of Foreign Policy: "Did the internet catch Joseph Kony yet?" It was a reference to the mega-viral video "Kony 2012," which in four days has drawn more than 50 million viewers along with praise, criticism, and scorn. In case you suffered a four-day power outage and missed the story: Joseph Kony, leader of the Lord's Resistance Army, is a horrible African warlord … More »
The graph above charts the chances of war with Iran as judged over the past few months by the wisdom of the crowd. More specifically, it reflects betting on the Intrade.com proposition "USA and/or Israel to execute an overt air strike against Iran before midnight ET 31 Dec 2012." As you can see, the collective wisdom of people who are willing to put their money on the line is that the chances of Iran getting bombed by the end of… More »
Yesterday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave President Obama a copy of the book of Esther. More »
The Washington Monthly wins the award for most pungent description of the argument that an Iran with nuclear weapons would be highly dangerous. More »
When a 43-year-old man dies of an apparent heart attack, you look for something extraordinary that might help to explain it. More »
