Greece, alone, is in a very vulnerable position. If the Greeks had had support from progressive left and popular forces elsewhere in Europe they might have been able to resist the demands of the Troika, but they had almost no support. Not even from Portugal, Spain, or other left forces. They were left alone.

Another recollection is that [ Paul Johnson] mostly kept away from ideas and dedicated activism, and concentrated on sex lives and other gossip.

The possibility of interpersonal communication has increased substantially with contemporary technology. But as compared with the major changes, which were long ago, these are not huge.

As for climate change, it's by now widely accepted by the scientific community that we have entered a new geological era, the Anthropocene, in which the Earth's climate is being radically modified by human action, creating a very different planet, one that may not be able to sustain organized human life in anything like a form we would want to tolerate.

Fed and electoral college could use some tinkering, but they are not the source of the problems.

There are questions as to whether it should even exist. Who should corporations be responsive to, the management of a corporation? Theoretically they are responsive to the shareholders, but I why not to the so - called stakeholders, the work force and the community? Nothing in economic theory opposes that. Those are social and political decisions.

Africa's a wreck and it's not because it was hit by an asteroid. It's a wreck largely because it was hit by Europe.