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Research for Rent, Solutions for Sale
January 06, 2015
“America’s think tank sector is far bigger, and far more influential, than most people realize,” Hans Gutbrod, a Thomas Pynchon character and the executive director of nonprofit think tank watchdog Transparify, said recently. “This underlines the importance for think ...

Daily Bafflements
January 06, 2015
• Mars, here we come—sort of. A historic rocket launch by SpaceX—part of which would send supplies to the International Space Station, part of which would land on an ocean barge (“autonomous spaceport drone ship”)—was called off at the last minute this ...

Notes from the Underdogs
January 05, 2015
It’s not controversial to say that the book publishing world is, and has been for the past several years, a mess. What was once a genteel profession for those with a certain sensibility (and, often, family money) has become a starved and desperate industry. The twilight of the ...

Daily Bafflements
January 05, 2015
• A new San Francisco startup aims to “print” the DNA designed by its customers on a computer program. “Anyone in the world that has a few dollars can make a creature, and that changes the game,” the company’s founder told the San Francisco Chronicle. ...

The Best of The Baffler in 2014
December 31, 2014
Well well well, 2014 was a big year for The Baffler, yessir. This summer, we launched our new website and complete online archives. This fall, we organized a conference on feminism in the workplace with keynote speaker Susan Faludi (here are the illustrations and videos), and ...

Daily Bafflements
December 31, 2014
• This AP report on the controversial “opossum drop” in North Carolina just absolutely must be read in full. Happy New Year! • “As art was institutionalized, so, inevitably, was the artist,” writes William Deresiewicz in a brief history of the ...

Gambling on Armageddon
December 30, 2014
When oil giant Mobil donated land containing the Texas City Prairie Preserve to the Nature Conservancy–America’s largest environmental group–in 1995, wildlife conservationists breathed a sigh of relief. At last, the endangered prairie chicken that had been threatened for ...

Daily Bafflements
December 30, 2014
• Today in Billionaires: two self-made billionaires (sorry, “producers”) have a new book out that shares the secrets of their success. Billionaires, you see, “cannot predict the exact time to make an investment…they are willing to operate ...

Blaming Parents, and Other Neoliberal Pastimes
December 29, 2014
The State of California believes the following things to be true: first, that reading to children will make them smarter. Second, that parents ordinarily disinclined for reasons of time or temperament from this activity may be won over by means of thirty-second radio spots. ...

Daily Bafflements
December 29, 2014
• Which one are you going to? We haven’t decided yet: “Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs and Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich are planning ­rival New Year’s Eve parties on the ritzy island of St. Barts,” reports Page Six. Diddy’s will have Kim ...

The Baffler Guide to Gift Guides
December 24, 2014
Towards the end of every year, magazines and newspapers fill up their copy quotas—and woo their most lucrative advertisers—with the help of bright and shiny holiday gift guides. They are almost always at least a little absurd. This year, a thirty-second video ad that ...

Daily Bafflements
December 24, 2014
• Today in Billionaires: a 2011 Escalade drove through the New Jersey home of billionaire Peter Kellogg on Monday, through the center hall, into the living room, and out into the back yard, according to NJ.com. An unnamed 26-year-old driver and 56-year-old passenger only ...