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Today’s coverage of the elections in South Africa in the New York Times evinces all kinds of pessimism in a political process that continually rewards the African National Congress no matter how low their approval ratings fall. After all, when you liberate a country from apartheid, you’re pretty much guaranteed positive name associations no matter [...]

A staple of the holidays that nobody really understands (not even Wikipedia) but still tries to excel at, there’s something typically American about absurd gingerbread house design. Not only does it involve turning something joyful, silly and festive into a competition, it also means creating ever larger and sweeter fake homes out of candy, cookies [...]