Dying here is forbidden
“The lady doth protest too much, methinks,” Queen Gertrude dryly observes to her son Hamlet after watching a play he has staged about the murder of a king and the remarriage of his wife — a play meant to echo…
A new greatest Indian (after Gandhi)
India’s Outlook news magazine has released an Independence Day special issue on the legacy of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar (1891-1956), who was recently voted by a wide margin to be the greatest Indian after Gandhi — significantly (and to many, surprisingly)…
Songs and the square
Although we last touched base with the 2011 Egyptian revolution only three months ago (see “A revolutionary/counter-revolutionary phrase book“, January 24), French broadcast services RFI and France 24 recently unveiled a remarkable web documentary on the music and musicians of…
Before corporations were people
The protection of corporate “speech” has been a contentious subject in the United States, most recently so in the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision of 2010, in which the U.S. Supreme Court used the First Amendment to prohibit…
Gettin’ across
New Zealand is getting closer to building the final link in a regional walking and cycling network that has been split by the lack of a route across Auckland’s Harbour Bridge. Copeland Associates Architects were commissioned last year to design…
North Korea’s opportunity, South Korea’s long moment
Although most eyes are focused on Iran and Syria as the highest-risk areas for military conflict in the near term, North Korea remains worryingly close to the center of war planners’ desks. While the possession (and feared proliferation) of nuclear…
