On the Waterfront

The Gowanus Canal runs one and a half miles through brownstone Brooklyn, cutting a disreputable gash between two of the most desirable residential neighborhoods in New York City. Sunken below street level, no more than 100 feet across at most points, the canal does not really flow — it skulks.

Published: Oct 21, 2009
Length: 29 minutes (7,354 words)

The Audacity of ‘Precious’

Although Lee Daniels will be 50 this year, he has the bouncy, mercurial energy of a child. The previous night, at the gala screening of his movie “Precious,” which he directed and helped produce, he greeted the audience by saying, “I’m a little homo, I’m a little Euro and I’m a little ghetto.” The crowd cheered.

Published: Oct 21, 2009
Length: 8 minutes (2,018 words)

Inside the Islamic Emirate

We’re in Pakistan, I thought to myself. We’re dead. Eight days earlier, a Taliban faction had kidnapped me along with an Afghan journalist, Tahir Luddin, and our driver, Asad Mangal, during a reporting trip just outside Kabul.

Published: Oct 18, 2009
Length: 25 minutes (6,454 words)

A Drone Strike and Dwindling Hope

A stalemate between the United States and the Taliban seemed to unfold before me. The drones killed many senior commanders and hindered their operations. Yet the Taliban were able to garner recruits in their aftermath by exaggerating the number of civilian casualties. (Part 4 of 5)

Published: Oct 20, 2009
Length: 17 minutes (4,267 words)

7 Months, 10 Days in Captivity

During our time as hostages, I tried to reason with our captors. I told them we were journalists who had come to hear the Taliban’s side of the story. I told them that I had recently married and that Tahir and Asad had nine young children between them. I wept, hoping it would create sympathy, and begged them to release us. All of my efforts proved pointless.

Published: Oct 17, 2009
Length: 18 minutes (4,677 words)

Stanley McChrystal’s Long War

Success takes time, but how much time does Stanley McChrystal have? The war in Afghanistan is now in its ninth year. The Taliban, measured by the number of their attacks, are stronger than at any time since the Americans toppled their government at the end of 2001. American soldiers and Marines are dying at a faster rate than ever before. Polls in the United States show that opposition to the war is growing steadily.

Published: Oct 14, 2009
Length: 40 minutes (10,208 words)

100 European Hotels Under $150

Over the last three years, thousands of readers have posted comments about their favorite hotels on the roughly 1,500 destination guides found on the Travel Web site. For this special issue, “Fall in Europe,” we used that database to research and then select 100 hotels that we feel represent some of the best bargains for travelers headed to one of 14 European cities in the next few months.

Published: Oct 11, 2009
Length: 9 minutes (2,334 words)

Putting America’s Diet on a Diet

On his first day in Huntington, W. Va., Jamie Oliver spent the afternoon at Hillbilly Hot Dogs, pitching in to cook its signature 15-pound burger. That’s 10 pounds of meat, 5 pounds of custom-made bun, American cheese, tomatoes, onions, pickles, ketchup, mustard and mayo. Then he learned how to perfect the Home Wrecker, the eatery’s famous 15-inch, one-pound hot dog (boil first, then grill in butter).

Published: Oct 6, 2009
Length: 18 minutes (4,619 words)

Understanding the Anxious Mind

Watching this video again makes Kagan fairly vibrate with the thrill of rediscovery: here on camera is the young girl who, as an infant, first embodied for him what it meant to be wired to worry.

Published: Sep 29, 2009
Length: 30 minutes (7,566 words)

Can the Right Kinds of Play Teach Self-Control?

Over the last few years, a new buzz phrase has emerged among scholars and scientists who study early-childhood development, a phrase that sounds more as if it belongs in the boardroom than the classroom: executive function.

Author: Paul Tough
Published: Sep 25, 2009
Length: 16 minutes (4,175 words)