August 2, 2012: Afternoon
- Few can tell if a product is produced by slave labor—with 21 million slave workers worldwide, it's quite common.
- Inequality began with horse ownership, which first separated the haves from the have-nots.
- After underscoring his Palestinian view in the National Review, Romney is confusing "culture" with "institutions."
- There's a whole new sub-economy for Kickstarter that's making it expensive for amateurs to get funding.
- Once complex works of art, patent drawings are now "embarrassing doodles."
- The origins of the milk carton—still popular, but not as progressive as a non-resealable plastic bag.
- Today's safety-conscious chemistry sets for children have removed the opportunity for discovery—and explosions.
- The Millions serves up some different kinds of trashy beach reads.
- Seeing Aerosmith with the New Yorker's poetry editor.
- Californians who raised funds to keep parks open dismayed to learn the parks had an extra $54 million laying around.
- New BFI poll ranks Vertigo the top film, knocking Citizen Kane off its perch for the first time in 50 years.
- Australia's finance minister cites Springsteen as his economic hero.
- Kevin Guilfoile on the shouting man who inspired Springsteen's 2002 album.
- Matthew McConaughey renames the King Ranch Casserole.