TIME Magazine

Writing in the International Herald Tribune last week, Trita Parsi, President of the National Iranian American Council, and analyst Anatol Lieven, argued that insisting Iran give up its right to any uranium enrichment is untenable, and instead suggested that the Western powers base their demands on the rights and limitations of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty -- which would allow the international community "to place a verifiable cap on Iranian enrichment and other nuclear capabilities well short of weaponization." LINK

Does Osama bin Laden matter anymore? You could be forgiven for thinking he doesn't. In recent months, an impressive cast of terrorism experts and counterterrorism officials around the world has coalesced around the notion that al-Qaeda's leader is no longer an active threat to the West. They point out that he has not been able to strike on U.S. soil since 9/11 or in Europe since the London bombings three summers ago. In Iraq, his most successful franchise operation is… more

...What we need going forward is third-way patriotism, a new patriotism that blends the faith of our fathers with, as Lincoln said, the unfinished work remaining before us. That new patriotism, as Eric Liu and Nick Hanauer write in The True Patriot, means "appreciating not only what is great about our country but also what it takes to create and sustain greatness..." LINK

...Tomás Jiménez, a fellow at the New America Foundation, says that the vast majority of municipalities around the country haven't enacted any anti-immigration laws or seen any raids. So it's unlikely that most workers are leaving out of fear. "This happens a lot," he says. "DHS and border patrol taking credit for things that are actually driven by other forces."

Jiménez worries that the government will just pour more recession dollars into immigration raids and border enforcement at a time… more

Full article . . . "If you're not talking to everyone, you're going to be Chalabied every time," says Daniel Levy, an Israeli who has negotiated extensively with Palestinians, referring to Ahmad Chalabi, the Iraqi who helped mislead the U.S. into war with Iraq. . .

For Pakistanis, the Dec. 27 assassination of Benazir Bhutto was the J.F.K. murder and 9/11 rolled into one, plunging the nation into days of mourning and setting off riots across the country. It was a stunning victory for Pakistan's militants, who have increasingly turned their firepower against the state, conducting more than 50 suicide attacks in 2007 alone.

The government quickly fingered Baitullah Mehsud as the mastermind of the Bhutto assassination; he had previously threatened to kill her. The details of… more

I imagine he said it as if he were confessing a deep, dark secret. And, of course (wink, wink), he had no idea his little confession would make the rounds. But when Sergio Bendixen, Hillary Clinton's pollster and resident Latino expert, told the New Yorker after her win in New Hampshire that "the Hispanic voter -- and I want to say this very carefully -- has not shown a lot of willingness or affinity to support black candidates," he started… more

Will Google Go Mobile? (TIME Magazine)

...The speed of innovation depends on whether a newcomer like Google or Qualcomm, both of which are registered bidders, has the money and the will to acquire enough licenses to break into the wireless game and force the telecom companies to break old habits. Sure Google has the cash, but do they really want to get in the labor-intensive business of broadband networks? Already, startup Frontline Wireless, a venture supported by a group… more

"I don't think anyone will deny that girls are academically superior as a group. Girls are more academically powerful. They make the grades, they run the student activities, they are the valedictorians..."

Is it bad that more boys are in special education, or should we be pleased that they are getting extra help from specially trained teachers? And haven't boys always tended to be more restless than girls under the discipline of high school and more likely to wind up… more

Making the most of our retirement-age population has become a hot issue in Washington, where for the past 75 years federal policy has been designed around easing folks who are past 50 out of the workforce rather than enticing them to stay in it. If you're reaching that age now, however, you're headed for a whole new reality.Everyone knows the fiscal pickle we're in: baby boomers are about to retire and tap Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid benefits.… more