September 2009 Blog Posts (19)

Sarah Palin may no longer be governor of Alaska, but she's certainly destined to become a best-selling author. HarperCollins, her publisher, has announced the print-run of her memoir will be a staggering 1.5 million copies -- equal to the print-run of Senator Ted Kennedy's posthumous autobiography published this month. Publishing sources tell me that such a giant run is only ordered up when there is clear evidence from booksellers and surveys of massive interest in a book.

The book,…

In the final hours of her campaign for re-election, Chancellor Angela Merkel proclaimed that anchoring worldwide the principles of the German economic and social model would be a main task of a new government in Berlin.

Mrs. Merkel said this was a matter “of the defense of our ideals,” according to a dispatch from the German-language service of The Associated Press.

To say the least, here was a fairly puzzling and even contradictory statement about where the world’s leading…

PITTSBURGH (Reuters) - The Group of 20 is set to become the premier coordinating body on global economic issues, reflecting a new world economic order in which emerging market countries like China are much more relevant, according to a draft communique.

Leaders of the G20 developed and developing nations also agreed to make the International Monetary Fund more representative by increasing the voting power of countries that have long been under-represented in the world financial…

This hoard will change lives. Terry Herbert, the finder, and the anonymous landowner will be well compensated: by how much no one knows, but such is the scale of the treasure that when the valuation committee meets, it will have to consider the depressive effect of unleashing on to the market a record quantity of supreme gold artistry. The farmer who not long ago sold the field to its present owner might lose a few nights' sleep, too.

But what does it mean for the…