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Learning from Kanye: A Thought Experiment
February 24, 2015
Being a Kanye West defender in 2015 is a thankless task. Yeezy makes it hard: he’s frequently offensive and (I’m told) deeply unlikable. He’s been called arrogant, narcissistic, materialistic, pretentious, rude, insensitive, and insane. But this is exactly why I like him. ...

The Merchants of Europe
February 24, 2015
Unfortunately, Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice provides one of the best models for understanding the drama of the debt crisis in Greece today. I say “unfortunately” because, after all, the (sympathetic) villain of the play is Shylock, a Jew whose very Jewishness ...

Daily Bafflements
February 24, 2015
• Fifteen former students of colleges owned by Corinthian Colleges, one of the world’s largest for-profit education companies, are going on debt strike; Sarah Jaffe and Vauhini Vara report. • The FBI doesn’t seem to want the public to learn about the use of ...

The Labradoodle Racket
February 23, 2015
Last week, a gorgeous black standard poodle named Flame came close to taking the “Best in Show” title at the annual Westminster Dog Show, but lost out at the last minute to the stunning beagle Miss P. Purebred dogs like these, not surprisingly, are costly companions. But ...

Daily Bafflements
February 23, 2015
• Wei-Hock Soon, a scientist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics whose work is often cited by politicians opposing climate change legislation, has been found to have accepted $1.2 million from the fossil-fuel industry over the past ten years, thanks to ...

Gentrifying the Web
February 20, 2015
An ad recently appeared on the New York City subway—right in one of those above-the-seat ad spots that turns even public transportation infrastructure into a passive #branding vehicle—for “the domain that never sleeps.” This “exclusively for New Yorkers” deal, as the ...

Daily Bafflements
February 20, 2015
• The latest Snowden revelation, published on The Intercept on Thursday afternoon, is particularly devastating. Spies from the U.S. and UK hacked into the computer systems of Gemalto, the world’s largest SIM card manufacturer. “With these stolen encryption keys, ...

Guns, Money, and Ukraine
February 19, 2015
Despite this week’s deadline for Russia and Ukraine to stand down, an end to the fighting is unlikely. And as often happens in situations like this, where no vital American interests are at stake, but there appears to be a “bad guy” doing bad things, Washington ...

Daily Bafflements
February 19, 2015
• Here’s Jessica Roy, US Weekly style, on the preferred diets of the GOP presidential hopefuls, from Jeb Bush’s Paleo to Bobby Jindal’s “whatever” method. • PSA: This Jeb Bush flask is only $35 at the site Millennials for Jeb! The website copy ...

Delhi Needs Another Hero
February 18, 2015
There is something delightful about seeing the chief minister of an Indian state going on protest against his own police force, which is what happened in January 2014 when Arvind Kejriwal, leader of the Aam Aadmi (Common Man) Party (AAP), took charge of the state of Delhi after ...

Blaspheming BuzzFeed
February 18, 2015
BuzzFeed isn’t just for listicles anymore, and whoever says otherwise is regurgitating outdated folk wisdom. Or, at least, that’s the prevailing meme ping-ponging around media circles (read: people I follow on Twitter). It’s true, BuzzFeed has changed. The company has ...

Daily Bafflements
February 18, 2015
• Today in Billionaires: Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has dumped stock in Exxon Mobil, citing a desire to stop supporting non-renewable energy resources that are threatening our environment. What’s that? Oh, sorry, no, the reason is actually just ...