Americans have developed an admirable fondness for books, food, and music that preprocess other cultures.

But for all our enthusiasm, have we lost our taste for the truly foreign?

From the archive, Decius:

Noticing is easier in a foreign place because mundane things are unusual. It's the sameness of the familiar that closes minds.

McCulture

A special report on the coming age of instability.

Niall Ferguson:

Forget Iran, Iraq, and North Korea—Bush’s “Axis of Evil.” As economic calamity meets political and social turmoil, the world’s worst problems may come from countries like Somalia, Russia, and Mexico. And they’re just the beginning.

Jeffrey Gettleman:

Somalia is a state governed only by anarchy. A graveyard of foreign-policy failures, it has known just six months of peace in the past two decades. Now, as the country’s endless chaos threatens to engulf an entire region, the world again simply watches it burn.

From last week, Robert Levine:

The Great Depression brought the New Deal to the United States. It brought the rest of the world Nazism and universal war. This time, though, many nations have nuclear weapons.

The Axis of Upheaval

Kevin Kelly:

In any debate about the merits of embracing new technology, the Amish stand out as offering an honorable alternative of refusal. Yet Amish lives are anything but anti-technological. In fact on my several visits with them, I have found them to be ingenious hackers and tinkers, the ultimate makers and do-it-yourselfers and surprisingly pro technology.

Amish Hackers

Paul Kedrosky:

Here are two useful Depression-era factoids to keep in mind. The time it took various economic measures to return to 1929 levels:

* Real GDP: 8 years (1937)
* Real S&P: 27 years (1956)

Some Depression Recovery Factoids

Steve Coll:

Only eighteen per cent of Afghans think the U.S. decision to send more troops to the country is a good idea; forty-four per cent want fewer troops. This skepticism seems to be associated with a broad belief that US military action has not and will not improve the security of Afghan civilians. The Taliban remain unpopular -- more unpopular than the United States -- but the gap is closing, and larger numbers of Afghans now see the Taliban as “more moderate” than in the past. As bad as all this is, the poll suggests there is probably enough -- if barely enough -- residual support for the international forces in Afghanistan to support a turnaround, if the US-led forces can change conditions quickly enough.

Afghan Hearts and Minds

John Kerry:

We shouldn't delude ourselves into thinking that we are in anything but a race against time in a region suspicious of foreign footprints. A senior US commander warned recently that "it's going to get worse before it gets better."

Afghanistan is not Iraq, and we should not expect the same results from a troop increase as occurred in Iraq.

Corruption remains a powerful obstacle to progress.

It is not too late to turn the tide, but only a comprehensive strategy, sufficient resources and bipartisan resolve will lead to success in Afghanistan.

A Race Against Time in Afghanistan

Martin Wolf, the world's preeminent financial journalist, asks:

Has Barack Obama’s presidency already failed?

Hoping for the best is foolish. Yet hoping for the best is what one sees in the stimulus program.

All along two contrasting views have been held on what ails the financial system. The first is that this is essentially a panic. The second is that this is a problem of insolvency.

Under the first view, the prices of a defined set of “toxic assets” have been driven below their long-run value and in some cases have become impossible to sell.

Under the second view, a sizable proportion of financial institutions are insolvent. Personally, I have little doubt that the second view is correct and, as the world economy deteriorates, will become ever more so.

The correct advice remains the one the US gave the Japanese and others during the 1990s: admit reality, restructure banks and, above all, slay zombie institutions at once.

Be advised:

We should probably tell you that the full title of this game is Zombies! Apocalypse - Massive Multiplayer Online Zombies Massacre, even though that's basically given away the point of it all.

Rattle once said:

I think Decius and I should start to practice claiming that MemeStreams is worth four billion while keeping a straight face.

A final thought from Jack Handey:

It takes a big man to cry, but it takes a bigger man to laugh at that man.

Obama's New TARP Will Fail

Last month, Paul Watson reported from behind the lines.

The building hardly had the feel of a besieged guerrilla hide-out. The small reception room had new white curtains, clean cushions for guests to recline on and a well-kept wool rug. A few framed photos of family elders decorated the white-painted walls.

In keeping with the Pashtun custom of generous hospitality, the guerrillas served glasses of steaming hot sweet tea and a bowl of white candied almonds. In no hurry to end the conversation, they laid out bowls of chicken broth, yogurt, a shaker of salt and freshly baked flatbread for lunch.

Any indulgence that harms the body is haram, or forbidden, to strictly observant Muslims. But in Taliban-held villages, the guerrillas' taste for chew wasn't the only hint that the mullahs may be taking a softer line on at least some of their old edicts, though they continue to execute people deemed un-Islamic enemies, such as teachers and other government workers.

Compare:

There is a limit of one plenary indulgence per sinner per day.

Confidence and strength of Taliban grows

Tim Flannery, on E. O. Wilson's new book, for NYRB:

Is it possible, The Superorganism left me wondering, that the invention of the Internet is leading to a similar social evolution of our own species? The proliferation of conflict, much of it prompted by defense of national boundaries, may make us doubt it, but other trends are occurring that give pause for thought. As we strive to avert a global economic disaster or agree on a global treaty to prevent catastrophic climate change, we inevitably build structures that, as with the ants, allow the superorganism to function more efficiently. But of course it's possible that we'll fail to make the grade—that our destructive path will catch up with us before we can make the transition to a seamlessly working superorganism.

The Superior Civilization

Think Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were a politicized financial disaster? Just wait until pension funds implode.

The Next Catastrophe