Ehsan Yarshater’s Encyclopedia of Iranian History - NYTimes.com

Deal Would Bring Inspections of Overseas Drug Suppliers - NYTimes.com

If I were the President, I'd be touting advances like this a lot more. Americans need to hear that the "government" is at work and doing good things.

Where Will Economic Growth Come From? - NYTimes.com

It seems to me as a non-economist that growth is going to come when people and organizations (i.e., mostly businesses and governments) spend more by way of purchasing and/or investing.

Governments everywhere claim to be out of resources for them to do this, and the will to borrow seems to have evaporated, for better or worse.

So put that group aside for the moment.

Then take organizations. Sure, there are non-profits and others who could spend more of their money either giving it away or buying stuff to give to others, or at least investing it in a way that adds to growth.

But it's the two remaining groups - businesses and individuals - that offer the greatest opportunity.

There is no point beating up businesses to hire people just to reduce unemployment if they do not need them. But businesses do have a fiduciary and moral obligation to support the economic health of the markets they serve.

So why shouldn't they start buying more things that they can give to people unable to afford them. The buying of the goods and services means that those vendors/providers wind up doing better, mayeb even hiring more people with enough of this. The company does better because the economy improves. And, lest anyone forget it, the people who really need help with basic necessities get some help beyond whatever governments provide.

That idea has not receive a lot of attention.

This one has received none.

Why not start asking rich people - people with more money than anyone with a conscious might say they need - to do the same. They could start simply buying things in their local markets that other people need and cannot afford. Local food. Local products. Local services.

Just give these things to the people who need them and don't expect a tax deduction.

So what if you wind up with a net worth of 3 million USD instead of 3.5 million as a result?

Imagine what the 500,000 could do for the economy and some wonderful fellow citizens.

Rachel’s Last Fund-Raiser - NYTimes.com

America's Newspaper History Gets Mapped - Technology - The Atlantic Wire

What Happened to Obama’s Passion? - NYTimes.com

What a global food crisis looks like: Oxfam's food prices map | Oxfam International

Imagine connecting a newspaper - not just a link, but an institution - to each of these countries and their food stories.

The Global Food Crisis, Mapped - NYTimes.com

Off Media Radar, Famine Garners Few Donations - NYTimes.com

What if we could all set up our start or home pages - whatever we look at first and most - to telll us of a pressing need in the world every day and the chance to simply program it so that entering an amount and one click would make it happen? In other words, something that would treat every charitable cause the same way?

Somali Tied to Militants Held on U.S. Ship for Months - NYTimes.com

Imagine that you are overseas. Imagine that someone acting on behalf of the country's government where you are apprehends you. Imagine that they put you on a ship at sea. Imagine that they inerrogate you there for two months.

Imagine you are innocent of anything that might have justified your apprehension.

With the US doing the first paragraph, and not worrying about many legal protections for the second, how would you argue - and to whom - that this should not happen to you?

Think about it. It may be the scariest scenario that you could imagine, and the one that is increasingly a viable risk.

If we do not apply our innocence presumption and lawyer guaranteed rules to anyone we apprehend, we do far more than invite other countries to do the same with US citizens.

It's a cause not only of immense shame but huge danger to millions of Americans.

Local Laws Fighting Fat Under Siege - NYTimes.com

That's fine if they want to do this. But require obese people in those communities to pay for their own health care entirely out of their own pockets - no insurance of any kind that operates on any notion of shared risk.

Let’s Make a Deal, Amazon Tells Texas - NYTimes.com

Why does the word bribery so quickly come to mind?

Ads with no connections?

This ad appears now on the NYTimes.com home page as I access it in Nice, France. I moused over it, and wanted to know more about the prize. No contact link here. Nothing comes up in Bing search, and the website for BNP is hopeless. Shouldn't the NYT better connect us customers with NYT advertisers, every one of them?

Come Meet the Author, but Be Prepared to Open Your Wallet - NYTimes.com

I always thought this made a lot of sense. Now the independent bookstores have to offer e-book options at the same time on all of the possible readers. One ought not have to buy a printed book in this situation.

Countdown with Keith Olbermann

It seems somehow quite astounding, as I sit here in France, that Current TV seems to have made no provision for how it can offer me the new Keith OLBERMANN show. When I say "offer", I mean on their terms. They have not figured out a way to give it to me with advertising for which they receive payment and the advertiser gets my eyes. Nor have they figured out a way to offer it to me such that I pay them directly for each show or a subscription.

What's the barrier?

This is all they say:

"If you missed the show, it'll be replayed at 11/10c and we’ll be posting video clip highlights on our webpage: http://t.co/uY3MfPb"

The Weirdness of Walking to Raise Money - NYTimes.com

Quick Guide to the Greek crisis | Reuters

Which newspaper has set up the best wiki-style summary like this one, and is committed to keeping it up to date? If no newsppaer is doing so, then to what source that is are any newspapers making a link?

French newspapers and US newspapers - ever heard of one another?

It's bad enough that most US newspapers, and most French newspapers, would not dream of adding links (most of the time) to any other newspaper in their country for a different perspective, added depth or breadth on a story. In some ways, it's even worse when they refuse to do this across the sea.
The Dominique STRAUSS-KAHN case is a perfect example, and perhaps the best. Sure, the articles and the source materials in some cases appear in languages other than the first language of most of their cusotmers, but what's to be lost (and how much ot be gained!) by giving customers a chance - using various online translation tools if necessary - to see how the "other side" of the Atlantic is reporting the case. It's complicated for people in each country to understand the other's criminal justice system in all its aspects, and why not pull out all the stops - add all the links - in order to give readers their best shot at comprehending the full story? Isn't that what newspapers are supposed to do? If I have time, I will add some examples. This morning, here in France, I heard a report on French radio of the release of the prosecution's summary of events at the time of STRAUSS-KAHN's arrest. The announcer said that the full text was on the Europe1 website. English, French, links to anything else?

That same document as posted on the NYTimes site, and on Europe1.

High-Tech Tools for Customer Service - NYTimes.com

How many newspapers are doing this sort of thing?

Ron Johnson, Apple Stores Chief, to Lead J.C. Penney - NYTimes.com

Imagine what he might do if hired to takeover Newspapers, Inc (i.e., the newspaper business)?