The Plight of Refugees, the Shame of the World →

The world is facing the biggest refugee crisis since World War II, a staggering 60 million people displaced from their homes, four million from Syria alone. World leaders have abdicated their responsibility for this unlucky population, around half of whom are children.

The situation is sadly reminiscent of that of refugees fleeing the destruction of World War II and the Nazi onslaught. Then, too, most governments turned their backs, and millions who were trapped perished.

We are mired in a set of myopic, stingy and cruel policies. The few global institutions dedicated to supporting this population are starved of resources as governments either haven’t funded them or have reneged on their pledges of funds. Wealthy and powerful nations aren’t doing their part; the United States, for example, has taken fewer than 1,000 refugees from Syria...

US gives Shell the final approval it needs to drill for oil in the Arctic →

The US government has given Royal Dutch Shell the final approval it needs to drill for oil below the Arctic Ocean floor, off Alaska's northwest coast. Shell plans to drill two exploration wells before late September, when the open-water season ends.

US officials approved the permit after Shell bought technology that should help avoid well blowouts. Shell had previously only been allowed to drill the top sections of the two wells located in the Chukchi Sea because an important piece of equipment — called the "capping stack" — needed to be repaired in Portland, Oregon, reports the Associated Press. Now that the icebreaker carrying the equipment has made it to Alaska, Shell is free to drill at about 8,000 feet below the ocean floor for the first time in over 20 years.

Syrian army bombards Douma as air raid toll rises: monitor →

The Syrian military bombarded an area northeast of Damascus on Monday, keeping up its attack on a rebel-held district where around 100 people were killed on Sunday in an air strike on a market, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Sunday's air strike on Douma, 10 miles (15 km) northeast of Damascus, was one of the bloodiest attacks of its type in the four-year-long war that has killed an estimated quarter of a million people and driven 10 million from their homes.

Parable of the Polygons →

Cute way of visualizing how small, "harmless choices can make a harmful world," and what it takes to fix it.

A Serious Issue: The Republican Party has 17 presidential candidates. Where are their ideas? →

I try not to stray too far into partisan politicking, but the lack of substance is worrisome.

If you asked me to name one thing Clinton would do in office, I could describe her plan to change the capital gains tax and encourage long-term investment. If you asked me the same of Sanders, I could explain his plan to fund college tuition with a financial transaction tax, or his plan to tax carbon emissions and use the gains to help consumers and spur renewable energy sources. If you asked me that of Bush, I could give you a guess—based on the GOP platform and his own interests—but I wouldn’t have a great answer. I might even shrug.

As an analyst of American politics, I think this is unusual. But if I were a Republican voter, I’d be concerned.

Sexism in Tech: Don’t Ask Me Unless You’re Ready To Call Somebody a Whistleblower →

Frankly, between the people who are mistreated because they are seen as persecutors, those who are seen as self-promoting, and those seen as liars, whistleblowing for sexism in tech is getting really unattractive for anybody who isn’t willing to leave the tech industry. We’re in a difficult place though because if we are asked and we deny that anything wrong went on, we know we’ll just be trotted out as evidence against any actual whistleblower to show that nothing is wrong and they are just making stuff up. If we decline to comment, we’re seen as cowards. It’s not a pretty situation to be in.

What needs to change is three-fold...

2 Women on the Cusp of Making Army History →

History is in the balance: For the first time, two female students advanced to the third and final phase of the notoriously exhausting course in the swamps of Florida and are within reach of graduating. If they pass, they will become the first Ranger-qualified women in the history of the U.S. military and will be celebrated at an Aug. 21 graduation ceremony at Fort Benning, Ga., that is expected to draw not only family and friends, but hundreds of other well-wishers and media from across the country.

If they graduate, the Army must confront a separate, but related, decision: Whether to allow women to try out for the elite 75th Ranger Regiment. The highly trained Special Operations unit carries out raids and other difficult missions and includes about 3,600 soldiers, according to a recent Government Accountability Office report. It remains completely closed to women, even though some of the jobs in it, ranging from parachute rigger to intelligence analyst, are open in other parts of the Army.

Democrats Are Not Socialists, and Neither Is Bernie Sanders →

The modern Democratic Party isn’t about revolution. Since FDR, Democrats have consistently supported regulated competition and redistributive policies that direct private profits toward the relative losers in market exchange. These strategies are better understood as “welfarism” than socialism. A concrete example? Compare Britain’s NHS before Thatcher’s reforms to Medicare…or Obamacare, for that matter.

There’s something of a spectrum between these positions. Even so, you don’t meet many socialists in mainstream politics these days. Most “Socialist” parties in Europe abandoned their revolutionary dreams a long time ago. And the self-declared socialist Bernie Sanders offers a welfarist agenda that’s barely updated from the ’50s.

So no, Democrats aren’t socialists. We might be able to have a less stupid discussion of their actual positions if welfarists, and their critics, knew the difference.