Linsanity may now be considered a bona fide cultural moment, if for no other reason than the response it has provoked: It has generated its very own backlash.

The boxer Floyd Mayweather caused a stir on Twitter on Monday when he dismissed Jeremy Lin, the sensational Knicks point...

DAVOS, Switzerland -- They came, they feasted on smoked sturgeon and black truffle risotto, drank liquor paid for by global banks, endured dozens of security checks, and tried not to fall down in the snow. They talked about the perilous state of the global economy and the future of capitalism....

DAVOS, Switzerland -- Eric Schmidt, the executive chairman of Google, is clearly tired of modern-day Luddites complaining about the job-destroying forces of technology.

"I assume that everybody here agrees that globalization is wonderful," he said here Friday, speaking during an afternoon panel at the World Economic Forum -- certainly among...

DAVOS, Switzerland -- As much of the globe grapples with lean economic prospects, and as Europe in particular sinks toward a recession that could spread to multiple shores, world leaders gathered here this week appear to be operating with a rough consensus over how to proceed: Attack budget deficits by...

DAVOS, Switzerland -- A mile away, in the center of this posh ski resort, some of the most powerful people on earth are gathered in pinstripes, discussing the state of the globe at the World Economic Forum. No one could accuse organizers of lacking ambition: "COMMITTED TO IMPROVING THE STATE...

DAVOS, Switzerland -- Do they hand out Nobel prizes for advances in delusional thinking? If so, I hereby nominate Germany's chancellor, Angela Merkel, for her address this afternoon before the assembled participants at the World Economic Forum here in this lavish ski resort in the Swiss Alps.

Merkel has contributed...

DAVOS, Switzerland -- Among the less helpful ideas that has managed to endure despite a reappraisal of economic wisdom is the notion that faster-growing countries -- principally, China and India -- would prove so robust that they alone could propel the planet. They could spare the globe a synchronized economic...

I've just returned from a sojourn in an alternate historical universe, which is to say I've been in South Carolina, listening to the Republican presidential candidates.

These people have managed to distill modern American times down to a deliciously accessible account that goes something like this:

In the beginning there...

COLUMBIA, S.C. -- Inside a cavernous ballroom at a downtown hotel, Newt Gingrich stands beneath crystal chandeliers, addressing a crowd of several hundred local businesspeople -- most of them men in dark suits and ties, and many looking not unlike Newt Gingrich.

The former House speaker long ago mastered the...

LAS VEGAS -- Inside the mad hum of the convention center, an overwhelming array of gadgetry confronts attendees at the Consumer Electronics Show, a showcase for much that is new in the technology world. The products seem impervious to the workings of time, as if the latest smartphones and tablet...

LAS VEGAS -- Listening to Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer last night hyperventilate about the company's supposedly stupendous future as purveyor of the planet's life-altering experiences was not unlike watching a heavyset, middle-aged guy strutting through a pulsating club, telling all the slinky, 20-something women how hot he looks in...

North Korea long ago mastered the art of brandishing the most potent weapon at its disposal: its credible impersonation of a country that might just be loony enough to start a nuclear war. Its leaders have proven adept at striking fear and harvesting concessions by exploiting the power of uncertainty.

The European currency union has become like a bad marriage whose deep-seated problems have burst embarrassingly into public view, while the beleaguered partners stay together for the sake of the children. Maybe it's finally time for the unhappy couple to own up to the fact that they were never meant...

CAPE CORAL, Fla. -- They sent her off with a lavish retirement party -- dinner and drinks at a local yacht club, overlooking the inky waters of the Caloosahatchee River. They thanked her for her more than two decades of service in the office of a local real estate company...

The world's most irresponsible global citizen of the moment is not North Korea or Iran, despite the obvious dangers each poses. It is not China, favored target of blame for job losses from Indiana to Istanbul. Rather, it is one of the primary beneficiaries of global integration, a country now...

Sports metaphors pervade every crevice of American conversation, so it stands to reason that the National Basketball Association has opted to put aside dribbling and passing to instead turn itself into the ultimate metaphor for society writ large: The wealthiest of the wealthy refuse to distribute the spoils to protect...

The government can't create jobs. Only the private sector can. So ditch the naïve talk that Uncle Sam can wade into this economic mess and do anything meaningful to fix it.

We hear these sorts of assertions with increasing regularity these days, a rhetorical shrug at the reality that the...

The number of Americans living in communities of extreme poverty -- neighborhoods in which at least 40 percent of the population is poor -- soared by one-third between 2000 and the latter half of the decade, according to a new study from the Brookings Institution.

The marked increase...

What explains the silence from most of the business world on the need to get serious about creating millions of jobs?

In what passes for the national discourse, talk of joblessness is invariably cast as political fodder -- Can Obama get reelected despite the horrible jobs numbers? -- or...

Earlier this month, the Wall Street Journal, a paper widely respected for speaking with authority on economic issues, dispatched a team of reporters to five American cities to try to figure out what to make of the people coalescing in urban spaces under the banner Occupy Wall Street.

"Who are...