CBS Mornings (December 9, 2024): Saturday was a special day in Paris as Notre Dame Cathedral held its first mass in more than five years after a fire in April 2019 destroyed much of the cathedral’s roof. Senior foreign correspondent Seth Doane has been following the renovation over the years.
Lawmakers have toppled the government for the first time since 1962. How did we get here? By Lauren Collins
Two political newcomers have arrived to slash big government, but so far the project seems less revolutionary than advertised.
by Henry Farrell and Abraham Newman
In a revelatory book, Farrell and Newman describe how the United States has turned its control over information networks into a hidden tool of economic domination—and warn of the risks of Washington’s weaponization of data power for ordinary people, as well as for the global financial system.read the review
by Sergey Radchenko
In a major reconsideration of Cold War history, Radchenko examines the Soviet Union’s competing ambitions for revolution, security, and legitimacy—and how Soviet leadership, blinded by its own hubris and aggression, set the stage for the downfall of the USSR. read the review
by Alan S. Kahan
Kahan argues that what unifies liberals across the centuries, including those involved in building and defending liberal democracy today, are their efforts to build societies free from the fear of arbitrary power. He sculpts a masterful and beautifully written history of liberalism’s long intellectual journey. read the review
by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt
In this sobering study, Levitsky and Ziblatt demonstrate how the United States’ enduring constitutional order—one forged in a pre-democratic age—increasingly thwarts the will of an expanding multicultural majority in favor of a shrinking rural white minority.read the review
by Anne Applebaum
Focused on the sophisticated and networked world of autocracy, dictatorship, and tyranny, Applebaum argues that what separates hardcore autocratic states, such as China and Russia, from softer illiberal and authoritarian regimes, such as those in Hungary, India, and Turkey, is the ruthlessness and reach of their dictatorial power and their deep hostility to the Western-led democratic world.read the review
THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE (December 7 2024): The 12.8.24 Issue features William Langewiesche on the secret Pentagon war game how nuclear escalation spirals out of control; Daniel Bergner on a mysterious gap in psychosis rates; Alexis Okeowo on an endless war in Ethiopia; and more.
The devastating outcome of the 1983 game reveals that nuclear escalation inevitably spirals out of control.
The Academy Award-winning actress discusses her lifelong quest for connection, humanity’s innate goodness and the point of being alive.
A rare look inside a region still reckoning with the toll of war crimes, even as new conflicts roil the nation. By Alexis Okeowo
Black Americans experience schizophrenia and related disorders at twice the rate of white Americans. It’s a disparity that has parallels in other cultures. By Daniel Bergner
BARRON’S MAGAZINE (December 7, 2024): The latest issue features ‘The Bull Case for Investing Abroad’…
Investing abroad has been a tough sell, but overseas markets offer growth—and value.
Investors effectively are paying nearly $240,000 for each of the company’s 402,100 Bitcoins, well above the market price.
People can avoid messy family fights by preparing a will. It needn’t be a complicated document.
Rising prices are here to stay. Use these investments to beat the inflation trap.Long read
The Week In Art Podcast (December 6, 2024): The Art Newspaper’s editor, Americas, Ben Sutton, and our art market editor, Kabir Jhala, are in Florida and report on the sales and the mood on the first VIP day at Art Basel Miami Beach.
On 8 December, the cathedral of Notre-Dame in Paris will reopen, more than five years after the fire that partly destroyed it. Ben Luke talks to one of the architects responsible for its rise from the ashes, Pascal Prunet. And this episode’s Work of the Week is The Madonna and Child with Saints (1526-27) by Parmigianino, better known as The Vision of Saint Jerome.
The painting this week returned to public display for the first time in 10 years, in a new exhibition at the National Gallery in London, following conservation, and we talk to Maria Alambritis, the show’s co-curator.
Art Basel Miami Beach, until Sunday, 8 December.
Notre-Dame reopens on Sunday, 8 December.
Parmigianino: The Vision of Saint Jerome, National Gallery, London, until 9 March 2025
‘
Model-stumping benchmark shows human experts remain on top—for now
Researchers probe volcanoes’ response to a changing world
Urgent action underway to bolster treatments and prevent dangerous microbes from spilling across borders
Times Literary Supplement (December 4, 2024): The latest issue features ‘HIs Other Country’ – The James Baldwin revival continues in the 100th anniversary year of his birth. A trickle of biographies has become a flood, and the causes for which he stood, racial equality and gay rights, speak to the times.
Record-label scouts chase ‘strange compositions’
A video game challenges the history of Argentina
By Mia Levitin
The gambling frenzy is mostly about people being free to enjoy themselves
It has no government and no budget, and is politically gridlocked
His coup attempt was foiled. But grave tests still remain for the country
The president’s reversal is understandable, hum
Boomers Daily 