Uncategorized
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How Can You Access Blocked Web Sites in China?
With the Olympics underway, Americans are devoting countless hours to Googling their favorite athletes and using the Web to find out all they can about China. But how free are people in China to interact online with fellow citizens and the world? How easy is it to surf the Web in China? The Chinese government…
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Negrito Please
I recently spent some time in Mexico, where it seemed that every surface was covered by ads for Bimbo, a wildly popular baked goods company. In a country where tortillas and pan dulce reign supreme, Bimbo’s success in peddling packaged breads and sweets to the masses is no small feat. In fact, the company even…
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No Guts, No Glory
First things first: Ben Stiller’s new movie Tropic Thunder, is neither as offensive as some feared nor as wry as I had personally (perversely?) hoped. In an age where repetitive, moronic attacks on the dignity of various groups are often met by tactical shows of manufactured outrage, Thunder, with its kitchen-sink jumble of provocations—blackface, Jewface,…
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Lil' Wayne's World
Dear Mr. Wayne, I am such a fan. Really. But I am getting ahead of myself. Male groupies are kind of embarrassing … What I mean to say is that I find your move to a more singing, spoken word form of rap very, very exciting. For example, from “A Milli” on “Tha Carter III”:…
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State of the Art
Making films is hard and making good ones even harder, so the American Black Film Festival, held last weekend in Los Angeles, adheres to the old adage that 90 percent of life is just showing up. To paraphrase a panelist during one of the festival’s events, “I’ve seen Citizen Kane and that shit was boring.…
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The Rays’ Cinderella Season
Nearly every year, some baseball team has a Cinderella season, rising from the depths of many losing or mediocre seasons and jostling among the perennial contenders for first place. But no team fits the metaphor as well as this year’s edition of the Tampa Bay Rays. The Rays, who changed their name from Devil Rays…
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Double Take
My son, Liam Kojo Johnson, entered the world pink and screaming, slate blue eyes squeezed shut. Peach fuzz covered his perfectly shaped head, a place-holder for the blonde hair that would soon grow there. His twin sister, Chloe Adjoa, came in peace. She was the color of gingerbread, with jet-black hair. Her calm, stoic face…
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Check Yourself
Let me relate one of my most unpleasant dining experiences. ABoston journalist was passing through Los Angeles for a night and hoping to see as many of her LA-based friends as possible. To help keep things sane, one of her local buddies organized a group dinner so she could see everyone at once. The evening…
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Grae's Anatomy
Sometimes when the planets align and all the stars have found their height, there is a second when the world slows to a crawl and your ears stand at attention, and in that moment it all makes sense. Jean Grae caught that second like a firefly and stuck it a Mason jar when she hooked…
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Why Russia Can't Be Ignored
The international conflict between Russia and Georgia over the status of Georgia’s breakaway territory of South Ossetia rightly brought about hand-wringing from a war-weary international community. The crisis has already caused a humanitarian catastrophe in which thousands have been killed and tens of thousands have been displaced in and around South Ossetia. The idea of…