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The Enron Scandal, Grasshoppers, and the Truth About 9/11

The big one of the week is a prominent piece in the Financial Times on Nicolas Veron's Smoke & Mirrors, Inc.
They call it "...an excellent primer on the political-economy of accountancy."  We can only agree.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/ae725756-4131-11db-827f-0000779e2340.html


Commonweal has an excellent review of Clayton Sinyai's Schools of Democracy.
Here's the opener, "It is the rare volume of labor history that opens with a quote from Rousseau.  What has the Social Contract to do with John L. Lewis's famous dictum that unions exist to get 'more' --a formulation that, taken at face value, shows scant regard for the general welfare? But as either a scholar or trade-union activist, Clayton Sinyai sees no contradiction.  'Equipping America's workers for democracy was--and is--how American trade unionists find meaning,' he argues.  Schools of Democracy thus tells a familiar story with a new twist."

http://www.commonwealmagazine.org/article.php3?id_article=1720&var_recherche=sinyai


An AP story on Capinera's Field Guide to Grasshoppers, Katydids, and Crickets of the United States is being picked up by newspapers around the nation.  Here's the latest in the Providence Journal.

http://www.projo.com/garden/content/projo_20060827_bugsongs.2c8890e.html


Asia Times reviews Pholsena's Post-war Laos.  Excellent placement.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/HG29Ae01.html

And finally, now that we've successfully survived yet another 9/11, some food for thought from both our own John Mueller, his recent Foreign Affairs article featured on Truthout.org...

"Despite all the ominous warnings of wily terrorists and imminent attacks, there has been neither a successful strike nor a close call in the United States since 9/11. The reasonable -- but rarely heard -- explanation is that there are no terrorists within the United States, and few have the means or the inclination to strike from abroad."

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/090306A.shtml


and our inestimable pundit Faisal Devji...

http://www.slate.com/id/2149194