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Although the famous Chinese curse May you live in interesting times is not, in fact, a Chinese curse, given China's enabling role in our present predicament it ought to be. Since the fall of 2007, 35% of the value of publicly traded companies has evaporated, along with $3 trillion worth of home equity - $10,000 per American man, woman and child - and five million jobs. Iconic businesses and whole industries are variously dead and dying...
...Star Wars. The sci-fi flick and the collectables it spawned rekindled America's appetite for action figures, so Hasbro reintroduced a scaled-down line of G.I. Joes to try and capitalize on the trend. Instead of a single character, there was an entire battalion of G.I. Joes, each given signature weapons, backstories and code names like Scarlett and Snake Eyes. Joe also got a new enemy, Cobra -"a ruthless terrorist organization determined to rule the world," as described in the intro to the 1980s TV cartoon G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero. (Cobra operatives got action figures...
...West in postwar aid and loans. Since the end of the war, 240 unarmed European Union monitors have been patrolling the border on the Georgian side to ensure that the terms of the cease-fire brokered by French President Nicolas Sarkozy are not broken. But they have not been given access to the Russian-patrolled South Ossetian side of the border and so cannot confirm the reported provocations or back up any of the accusations Russia and Georgia are leveling at each other. (See pictures of the Russians in Ossetia...
...uneducated Pashtun tribesman from a modest clan, Mehsud reportedly came from a family that made their living driving trucks. Though given to boasting about his grand plans for inflicting mass murder, Mehsud was also cautious. He shunned photographers - there are no definitive portraits - traveled in convoys protected by armed guards and hopped between safe houses. Despite his bellicose rhetoric, Mehsud was also described as baby-faced and jocular in person...
...enough to qualify for Medicare, while keeping younger people's premiums much lower. In a recent letter to Henry Waxman - chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, one of five congressional committees with jurisdiction over health reform - the president and CEO of Blue Shield of California wrote, "Given the systematic consequences of imposing such a tight band, we strongly urge you to widen...