>The Great College Hoax

>by Kathy KristofForbes.com (February 02 2009)As steadily as ivy creeps up the walls of its well-groomed campuses, the education industrial complex has cultivated the image of college as a sure-fire path to a life of social and economic privilege.Joel Kellum says he's living proof that the claim is a lie. A forty-year-old Los Angeles resident, …

>The Propaganda of the Victor

>How the poor were airbrushed from historyby George MonbiotThe Guardian (February 24 2009)Is there any other democracy so adept at editing its history? Even Spain, for years notoriously reluctant to get to grips with the legacy of Franco, has begun to acknowledge the past, as the success of Guillermo del Torro's masterpiece Pan's Labyrinth shows. …

>The Unnoticed Technologies

>by John Michael GreerThe Archdruid Report (February 18 2009)Druid perspectives on nature, culture, and the future of industrial societyWhen people talk about the role of technology in the future, most of the time the technologies they have in mind are the flashy ones - that is, those that haven't been around long enough to slip …

>The Real Great Depression

>The depression of 1929 is the wrong model for the current economic crisisby Scott Reynolds NelsonThe Chronicle Review (October 17 2008)As a historian who works on the 19th century, I have been reading my newspaper with a considerable sense of dread. While many commentators on the recent mortgage and banking crisis have drawn parallels to …

>"It’s (not) the Economy, Stupid"

>by Dan Bednarz Culture Change (January 28 2009)Author's note: This article will be followed by "How Brittle Is Healthcare?"As societies throughout the world wobble on the edge of socioeconomic chaos, New York Times columnist Bob Herbert avers, "The economy is obviously issue Number One". Well, that's the proximate problem, but what else is going on? …

>The Abyss Stares Back

>Clusterfuck Nation by Jim KunstlerComment on current events by the author ofThe Long Emergency (2005)http://www.kunstler.com (February 23 2009)The public perception of the ongoing fiasco in governance has moved from sheer, mute incomprehension to goggle-eyed panic as the scrims of unreality peel away revealing something like a national death-watch scene in history's intensive care unit. Is …

>Finance Capitalism Hits a Wall

>The Oligarchs' Escape Plan -at the Treasury's Expenseby Professor Michael HudsonGlobal Research (February 17 2009)The financial "wealth creation" game is over. Economies emerged from World War II relatively free of debt, but the sixty-year global run-up has run its course. Finance capitalism is in a state of collapse, and marginal palliatives cannot revive it. The …

>Energy Return on Investment

>This Op-Ed was refused publication by the New York Times.by Charles Hall and Nate GagnonEROEI.com (March 23 2007)Op-Ed Editor, New York Times:The recent front page article "Oil innovations pump new life into old wells" by Jad Mouawad (March 5 page 1) is dangerously misleading. The author would have us believe that technological innovations will increase …

>The Conservation Imperative

>Energy Limits to Growth and the Path to Sustainabilityby Richard HeinbergMuseLetter 201 (January 2009)Post Carbon Institute (January 09 2009)Dear readers: This issue of MuseLetter is Part I of a brief series of articles about energy alternatives, net energy, and the best options for an energy transition. Later this spring the articles will be published as …

>The politics of bollocks

>In his latest column for the New Statesman, John Pilger borrows from Lord West of Spithead to deconstruct current mythology, such as the 'impartiality' of the BBC and the 'radical changes' implemented by President Obama.by John Pilgerwww.johnpilger.com (February 05 2009)Growing up in an Antipodean society proud of its rich variety of expletives, I never heard …