Virtual Issues

A USB-style interface for smart energy meters could allow them to deliver big savings through greater efficiency

There are some corners of the world where communities, city officials and governments are changing the environment for the better – here are some of them

High population growth is not sustainable – but neither is low fertility, says Reiner Klingholz

There are some corners of the world where communities, city officials and governments are changing the environment for the better – here are some of them

Can I get everything I want in a credit card? Some people say yes, others think that some concessions must be made. Generally speaking, you can get everything you want in a credit card if you are willing to keep an open mind and search for the perfect piece of plastic.
Before you can get the [...]

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. (Photo: litherland / flickr)

read more

    One of the most contentious elements of the American health care debate right
now is the proposal to create a public agency that would offer the uninsured
– especially poor and low-income citizens – a nonprofit alternative to private
insurance companies. President Obama has made it clear to the American people
that those who already get their insurance through the private system can keep
their coverage, and that their freedom of choice will be maintained in all cases
at all times.

read more

    No longer the stuff of disturbing futuristic fantasies, an arsenal of “crowd
control munitions,” including one that reportedly made its debut in the
US, was deployed with a massive, overpowering police presence in Pittsburgh
during last week’s G-20 protests.

    Nearly 200 arrests were made and civil liberties groups charged the many thousands
of police (transported on Port Authority buses displaying “PITTSBURGH WELCOMES
THE WORLD”), from as far away as Arizona and Florida with overreacting
…

read more

    Opposition leader Sidya Toure: “They just started to
shoot people directly”

    At least 157 people were killed when Guinean troops opened fire on opposition
protesters on Monday, a human rights group says.

    But the country’s interior ministry has told the BBC that a total of 57 people
have died in the protests.

read more

    The crisis demonstrated the bankruptcy of a certain set of right-wing free
market policies. But it’s the center-right that wins elections. That’s the German
paradox that we must seek to shed light on. In this election, the Social Democrats
experienced their lowest results since the Second World War. Consequently, “Super
Merkel” will ally herself with an FDP that is a disciple of the market
triumphant to conduct a policy that is pragmatic, certainly, but, in any case,
more imbued with free market ideology than before.

read more