The Week: Most Recent Home Page Posts

Can Michael Dell save his struggling PC empire?

The Week — Tue, 15 Jan 2013 09:35:00 -0500

Dell has seen brighter days. The world's one-time No. 1 computer company is now No. 3, behind HP and Lenovo, and its 10.2 percent share of the PC market is down from 12.2 percent a year ago. On top of that, the overall market for PCs, laptops, and netbooks — about two-thirds of Dell's business — is shrinking as consumers and businesses shift toward smartphones and tablets like Apple's iPad. Dell's computer shipments dipped 21 percent in the fourth quarter, and its third quarter profits were down a hefty 47 percent. So perhaps it's not surprising that Dell's stock jumped Monday on a...

Why new gun controls are inevitable

Taegan Goddard — Tue, 15 Jan 2013 09:17:00 -0500

Despite the success of the gun lobby blocking new gun control measures over the last few decades, public opinion has reached a tipping point in favor of new curbs on guns. It comes just as President Obama is set to make a new push for gun control legislation.

A new Pew Research poll finds there are now "clear areas of agreement" on a variety of gun control proposals with 85 percent of Americans in favor of making private gun sales and sales at gun shows subject to background checks. In addition, 80 percent now support laws to prevent mentally ill people from purchasing guns. Both measures have broad...

Will Obama cave on the debt ceiling?

The Week — Tue, 15 Jan 2013 08:47:00 -0500

At his press conference on Monday, President Obama insisted repeatedly that he wouldn't negotiate with congressional Republicans over raising the debt ceiling, demanding that Congress allow him to pay the bills it has racked up. The House GOP "will not collect a ransom in exchange for not crashing the American economy," he said. For many liberals, this looks like a more politically savvy use of the bully pulpit than Obama has demonstrated previously, the idea being "that he can simply continue to say, 'Do your job,' to Congress when and if they come to him seeking concessions in exchange for it...

10 things you need to know today: January 15, 2013

The Week — Tue, 15 Jan 2013 08:20:00 -0500

1. LANCE ARMSTRONG REPORTEDLY CONFESSES TO DOPING
Disgraced cycling champion Lance Armstrong admitted to Oprah Winfrey that he used performance-enhancing drugs to win the Tour de France, according to The Associated Press. The Monday interview, scheduled to be aired on Thursday, marked his first public comment on the issue of doping since he was stripped of his record seven Tour titles in October and banned from the sport after a report by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency said Armstrong had used banned substances and blood-doping techniques throughout his career. Armstrong had vehemently denied cheating...

Operation Red October: The top-secret global espionage campaign that's been running for five years

The Week — Tue, 15 Jan 2013 08:00:00 -0500

Russian anti-virus firm Kaspersky Labs has uncovered a high-level cyber-espionage campaign that has been targeting government agencies, research institutions, and diplomats for the past five years to gather "classified information and geopolitical intelligence," per a report published on Monday. Here's what we know about operation "Red October," which has some hallmarks of government-sponsored C++ computer viruses Flame and Stuxnet that came before it:

What's going on exactly?
A sophisticated digital infrastructure that's utilizing a chain of more than 60 command-and-control servers...

Obama's second inaugural speech: 6 things he should say

The Week — Tue, 15 Jan 2013 06:55:00 -0500

President Obama will stand on the steps of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 21 and deliver his second inaugural address, giving him a chance to reach one of the largest audiences of his second term. The stakes are high — as Obama faces a nation still struggling to emerge from a brutal recession and riven by political polarization — but the expectations really aren't. Abraham Lincoln's second inaugural "was perhaps the greatest speech of any kind," Martin Medhurst, an expert on presidential rhetoric at Baylor University, tells the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. But very few presidents have delivered...

14 wonderful words with no English equivalent

The Week — Tue, 15 Jan 2013 06:21:00 -0500

1. Shemomedjamo (Georgian)
You know when you're really full, but your meal is just so delicious, you can't stop eating it? The Georgians feel your pain. This word means, "I accidentally ate the whole thing."

2. Pelinti (Buli, Ghana)
Your friend bites into a piece of piping hot pizza, then opens his mouth and sort of tilts his head around while making an "aaaarrrahh" noise. The Ghanaians have a word for that. More specifically, it means "to move hot food around in your mouth."

3. Layogenic (Tagalog)
Remember in Clueless when Cher describes someone as "a full-on Monet... from far away, it's OK,...

Why a government shutdown would help the GOP

The Week — Tue, 15 Jan 2013 06:13:00 -0500

Now that we've moved past the tax portion of our never-ending series of fiscal cliffs, we're heading to the spending portion. Or at least that's what most of us thought after Barack Obama largely won the tax debate and got rates increased for those making more than $400,000 a year, along with a permanent Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) patch that protects the middle class from the LBJ-era equivalent of the Buffett Rule. But in a rare press conference marking the upcoming end of Obama's first term in office, the president insisted on Monday that he would refuse to agree to any deficit solution that...

Why the White House really rejected the Magic Coin

Marc Ambinder — Tue, 15 Jan 2013 00:06:00 -0500

The president is, right now, in control of the debate about the debt ceiling. He is not in control of how the conflict with House Republicans, which is really a conflict within the House Republican conference, will end. In theory, the U.S. treasury could simply print money equivalent to the balance between the amount Congress has authorized the government to spend and the debt-conditioned "ceiling" imposed on such spending by Congress. The U.S. dollar is not tied to any particular piece of metal, or "specie," and while minting a platinum coin and injecting it into the system (thereby allowing...

Obama moves on war powers

Marc Ambinder — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 23:29:00 -0500

In 2011, President Obama was pilloried for, in the case of NATO's action in Libya, refusing to formally invoke the War Powers Resolution, which requires 48-hour notification to Congress anytime the United States participates in a war that Congress has yet to authorize. After such a formal invoking, the president would have 60 days to do the job before Congress had to give its assent.

The administration said that its actions in Libya were mostly "non-kinetic," was in service of a U.N. resolution, didn't involve troops on the ground, and ultimately the NATO coalition that helped the country...

Clarence Thomas breaks his 7-year silence on the Supreme Court

The Week — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 17:48:00 -0500

Justice Clarence Thomas is notorious for being the most taciturn member of the Supreme Court. For seven years, he has refused to speak at oral arguments, which often showcase spirited exchanges between lawyers and the eight other justices. Thomas once dismissed the exercise as beneath the court's dignity. "We look like Family Feud," he told a bar association in Richmond, Va.

That's why it came as a surprise when Thomas broke his seven-year reign of silence on Monday, in response to a question over a lawyer's competence. And what did Thomas say after keeping his thoughts to himself for all...

Is President Obama anti-social?

The Week — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 16:55:00 -0500

A common knock against President Obama is that he's too aloof for the job. While Vice President Joe Biden can put his Republican colleagues at ease with his car salesman's smile and bottomless store of near-nonsensical Joe-isms, Obama reportedly has nothing but disdain for Washington's greasy back-slapping traditions. The thinking goes that if Obama had a little of Bill Clinton's glad-handing magic or Ronald Reagan's sunny disposition, he would have far fewer problems reaching agreements with the GOP on a host of issues.

Asked about his alleged misanthropic streak at a news conference on Monday...

Why Americans are buying more guns

Marc Ambinder — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 15:46:00 -0500

The president of the National Rifle Association says President Obama is to blame for the surge in weapons stockpiling after the recent spate of mass shootings. He's right. But that's only part of the story. The reason why Americans are afraid is because the NRA exists to make them afraid, as does (as I and many others have explained) the echochamber that the conservative activist media lives in.

It's not that the NRA is trying to push up gun sales, although their corporate members I'm sure are happy with that as an after effect. (These corporations give heavily to the NRA's "non-profit" advocacy...

The massive comet that may shine brighter than the moon in 2013

The Week — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 15:35:00 -0500

Don't be surprised when you look up this November and see an exceptionally bright object streaking across the night sky. It'll just be the Comet ISON, a large, luminous space rock that astronomers say has the potential to join 1996's Comet Hyakutake and 1997's Hale-Bopp as one of the brightest "Great Comets" in history. Indeed, ISON may go down as the brightest comet ever gazed upon by human eyes. Here's what you should know:

Why is it called ISON?
Russians Vitali Nevski and Artyom Novichonok are credited with first photographing ISON...

The daily gossip: Britney Spears and Jason Trawick call it quits, and more

The Week — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 15:07:00 -0500

1. Britney Spears and Jason Trawick call off engagement
In news that has already spawned a thousand "Oops… She Did It Again" headlines, Britney Spears and former fiancé Jason Trawick have reportedly called off their engagement — which would have been Spears' third marriage — and ended their relationship. Though the couple has not publicly explained the reasons behind their breakup, The Huffington Post reports that sources say Trawick felt the relationship "took away his individuality," which is something he probably should have seen coming when he started dating one...

The NRA's new shooting app... for 4-year-olds?

The Week — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 15:05:00 -0500

One month after a gunman shot and killed 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook elementary in Newtown, Conn., the NRA has released an iOS app called NRA: Practice Range that teaches players to shoot at targets on their mobile device. The NRA says the app "[i]nstills safe and responsible ownership through fun challenges and realistic simulations." Unsurprisingly, though, the app has people on edge, partially because it's approved for children ages 4 and up. "The organization really missed an opportunity here," says Leslie Horn at Gizmodo. "This would be an excellent time to teach kids about...