Volume 2.27 (July 1-7)

Pick of the Week—

American Way of Birth, Costliest in the World (Elisabeth Rosenthal, NYT)– see also Having a Baby in the U.S. Costs Way Too Much, Especially if you Actually Pay Your Bills (Allison Benedikt, Slate)

 

Economics

Diagnosis: Insufficient Outrage (H. Gilbert Welch, NYT)

Paid via Card, Workers Feel the Sting of Fees (Jessica Silver-Greenberg and Stephanie Clifford, NYT)

Yes, the Sequester is Affecting the Job Market (Catherine Rampbell, NYT)

The Orphan Jackpot (Steven Rattner, NYT)

Justice for Big Business (Erwin Chemerinsky, NYT)

Austerity Won’t Work if the Roof is Leaking (Robert Frank, NYT)

Is this the end of health insurers? (Sarah Kliff, Wonkblog)

The Legacy of the Boomer Boss (Gar Alperovitz, NYT)

History

Why the Civil War Still Matters (Robert Hicks, NYT)

International

Barring of Bolivian Plan Infuriates Latin America as Snowden Case Widens (William Neuman and Alison Smale, NYT)

Loan Practices of China’s Banks Raising Concern (David Barboza, NYT)

Military Reasserts its Allegiance to its Privileges (Ben Hubbard, NYT)

For Islamists, Dire Lessons on Politics and Power (David Kirkpatrick and Ben Hubbard, NYT)

What happened to India’s economic miracle? (William Dalrymple, The New Statesman)

Why Chevron is suing one of DC’s most powerful lobbying firms over…the Amazon jungle? (Steve Mufson, Wonkblog)– Note to readers and potential attorneys who want to take this case on on the side of Ecuador– Chevron.  Will.  Never. Pay. You.  A. Dime.  (Take that from someone who had a role, albeit a small one and in a former job, in doing some discovery work for Chevron).

Politics

Data Mining, Without Big Brother (Leonard Schrank and Juan Zarate, NYT)

Rethinking Surveillance (Kenneth Roth, NYRB)

Privacy is Lost and We Are All to Blame (Andrew Lam, In These Times)

Justice, Law and Politics (Patrick Mason, Peculiar People)

How to Win in Washington (Mark Leibovich, NYT)

One Nation, Incentivized and Deincentivized (Justin Fox, Harvard Business Review)

Obama, You’ve Got Leverage.  Now Use It. (Noam Scheiber, The New Republic)

Class-Based Affirmative Action is Not the Answer (Walter Benn Michaels, The American Prospect)

Progressives’ Post-DOMA To-Do List (Scott Lemiuex, The American Prospect)

The Religious Right’s Terms of Surrender (Gabriel Arana, The American Prospect)

Oregon is Doing Free Higher Education the Right Way (Matt Bruenig, The American Prospect)

Culture

Has ‘Caucasian’ Lost its Meaning? (Shaila Dewan, NYT)

Manhood Among the Ruins (Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Atlantic)

William Shakespeare’s Star Wars (Ian Doescher, Slate)

‘Doing the Best I Can’: Fatherhood in the Inner City (Harold Pollack, Wonkblog)– See also New New Fatherhood in the Inner City (Dana Goldstein, The Daily Beast)

Mormonism

The Political Culture of Mormon History (Ben Park, Juvenile Instructor)

Education

Mission Impossible? (Paula Marantz Cohen, The American Scholar)

The Humanities Make Life Bearable (Peter Laarman, Religion Dispatches)

No Self-Mockery Please, We’re American (Terry Eagleton, The Chronicle of Higher Education)3