The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age

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The Sky is Falling

By Donal on Sat, 02/19/2011 - 12:41pm | World Affairs

In this half hour interview, Dmitry Orlov once again compares the collapse of the Soviet Empire with what he sees happening to the American Empire. His proposal that we are near collapse may seem outrageous, but the reasons he gives are not easy to dismiss.

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World Affairs
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Wozniacki Again #1, Wins in Dubai

By Donal on Fri, 02/18/2011 - 11:33am | Sports

Already set to reclaim the #1 world ranking from Kim Clijsters, Caroline Wozniacki easily won the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championship today, winning in the final 6-1, 6-3 over Svetlana Kuznetsova.

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Sports
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Fed Up With Decline

By Donal on Fri, 02/18/2011 - 8:29am | Politics

I started reading the Econbrowser blog because it's peak oil-aware founder JD Hamilton posted frequently on The Oil Drum. At some point, Hamilton brought in the very technical Menzie Chinn as co-blogger. Yesterday, in Analogy Watch: "Cairo has come to Wisconsin"? Chinn repudiated the claim Paul Ryan had made on MSNBC:

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Politics
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The High-Priced Spread

By Donal on Tue, 02/15/2011 - 4:20pm | World Affairs



I thought oil was supposed to be fungible, so I was curious as to why a barrel of Brent could be selling in the low $100s while WTI was around $85/barrel. That sixteen dollar spread is some sort of record.

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World Affairs
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Auto No-Show

By Donal on Fri, 02/11/2011 - 3:25pm | Technology

I walk past the convention center every morning and evening, so I stopped to look at the Motor Trend Auto Show here in Baltimore yesterday. I visited the same auto show a few years ago, when Pontiac was still a brand. Back then I wanted to see the Prius, the Escape hybrid and the Smart Car; tonight I wanted to see the Volt, the Leaf, the Sonata Blue Drive hybrid and the Smart Car, which wasn't at the previous show.

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Technology
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Oh, the Media's Red Glare

By Donal on Mon, 02/07/2011 - 12:08pm | Media

I'm bemused by all of the attention given to Christina Aguilera messing up a few lines of the National Anthem at the Superbowl last night. I enjoyed Leah Michele's performance of America the Beautiful. I wasn't listening very closely to Aguilera, but I read that she lost her way in the fourth line, but kept going.

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Media
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What does it mean when you don't find something to eat?

By Donal on Fri, 02/04/2011 - 10:20am | Social Justice



I tuned into The Takeaway at 7:10, while waiting for the bus. The topic was food inflation, and the hook was whether common American breakfast foods would be luxuries in a few years. Coffee, orange juice, grains, sugar all have risen sharply. An analyst from the NY Times, Louise Story, noted that common measures of inflation exclude food and energy, which amused the radio hosts, but said that was something economists debate a lot. She discussed whether Bernanke's Quantitative Easing 2 was to blame for rising food prices, thus for the revolutions in Tunisia, Egypt and unrest throughout the Arab world. Bernanke denies that, claiming that a weaker dollar means a stronger Egyptian currency for buying food. Story blames, "a little bit global warming, a little bit economic recovery, a little bit politics." 

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Social Justice
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Fill Yore Hands, Egyptians

By Donal on Thu, 02/03/2011 - 4:34pm | Politics



During the video and reporting from Cairo last night, I heard automatic gunfire. MSNBC said it was just the army keeping order because neither protesters nor thugs were likely to have firearms. It occurred to me that it could have been very different if they had our gun culture. Not surprisingly, numerous bloggers had the same idea, and they show the usual divide:

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Politics

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Donal is now posting on a wordpress blog called simply, Donal.

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