Articles and Op-Eds: 2011

When Congress nearly failed to continue funding the government recently, one of the provisions in the spending bill that they couldn't agree on was an obscure bit of legislation related to the almost 50-year-old embargo of Cuba.

The provision -- which was eventually dropped -- would have reinstated a Bush administration policy that restricted Cuban Americans to visiting family in Cuba only once every three years, and then only to immediate family and with no humanitarian exceptions -- even for deathbed and funeral visits.

United Nations officials have issued a warning that the Government of Israel's plans for Palestinian Bedouin communities living in Jerusalem's periphery could constitute "mass forcible transfers" and "grave breaches" of international law. A pending plan in the West Bank threatens to displace Khan al-Ahmar, a Bedouin village of refugees originally from Israel's south, pushed off their indigenous land in the early 1950's. Khan al-Ahmar lies on the side of a major West Bank thoroughfare and is sandwiched between the Israeli settlement of Maale Adumin and Jerusalem.

By historical measures, there’s really not all that much to be angry about. Since 1981, the proportion of the developing world living in extreme poverty has fallen from 50 percent to less than 20 percent, according to the United Nations. Infant mortality is down across the board; the number of girls in school is up. Terrorists and tyrants get their comeuppance with toe-tapping regularity. The chances of dying in war have never been lower. In 2011, the 7 billionth person was born into a world that’s richer, healthier, and safer than at any time in history.

A sizeable number of young kids will be getting e-readers this Christmas. Though not everyone is plunging in –  The New York Times recently reported that some adults are eschewing them for their children even while they embrace them for themselves – the appeal to parents is strong, especially when marketers pitch the devices as on-ramps to literacy.