Sam Tanenhaus has a review of Jonathan Franzen‘s book Freedom: A Novel at the NYT titled “Peace and War.” Here is an excerpt:

The dream-power ratio is lived out most acutely — most oppressively, but also most variously and dynamically — within the family, since its members orbit one another at the closest possible range. The family romance is as old as the English-language novel itself — indeed is ontologically inseparable from it. But the family as microcosm or micro-history has become Franzen’s particular subject, as it is no one else’s today.

(Find the chart above here. H/t: the Daily Dish.)

Project Syndicate has a post by Mario Margiocco titled “Debt and America’s Decline.” Here is an excerpt:

Starting in 1990, the US began to import more and more capital, particularly from Asia. In the 2000’s, China became the prime source of debt financing, and Americans were happy, because it enabled the US Federal Reserve to keep interest rates low.

There were some who foresaw danger. The Swedish economist Axel Leijonhufvud foresaw asset-price inflation – houses in particular – and a worsening of credit quality. Financial innovation soon made that prediction come true. It is enough to remember that in 2008 there were only 12 public companies in the world with AAA credit ratings, but more than 60,000 – mostly American – triple-A structured financial products. The US, the world’s banker, had mutated into the world’s hedge fund.

With that change, the banker’s traditional imperative to maintain fidelity and trust – to “keep faith,” as Higginson put it – was forgotten. And it is in America’s public debt that the debris of its financial system’s broken promises are collected, just as Italy’s massive public debt reflects its past national prodigality.

(Find the image above in the post “America’s Coming Decline?” from the New Atlanticist.)

Children aiming sticks as guns, lined up against a brick building. Washington, D.C.(?), between 1941 and 1942. Reproduction from color slide. Photographer Unknown. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress

The Denver Post showcases an excellent series of photographs under the title “Captured: America in Color from 1939-1943.”

These images, by photographers of the Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information, are some of the only color photographs taken of the effects of the Depression on America’s rural and small town populations. The photographs are the property of the Library of Congress and were included in a 2006 exhibit Bound for Glory: America in Color.

(H/t: Shawn.)

RealtyTrac has a post titled “1.65 Million Properties Receive Foreclosure Filings in First Half of 2010.” Here is an excerpt:

Foreclosure filings were reported on 895,521 U.S. properties during the second quarter, a decrease of nearly 4 percent from the previous quarter and an increase of less than 1 percent from the second quarter of 2009. Default and auction notices were down on a quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year basis in the second quarter, but bank repossessions (REOs) increased 5 percent from the previous quarter and 38 percent from Q2 2009 to 269,962 — a new quarterly high for the report.

“The second quarter was a tale of two trends,” said James J. Saccacio, chief executive officer of RealtyTrac. “The pace of properties entering foreclosure slowed as lenders pre-empted or delayed foreclosure proceedings on delinquent properties with more aggressive short sale and loan modification initiatives. Meanwhile the pace of properties completing the foreclosure process through bank repossession quickened as lenders cleared out a backlog of distressed inventory delayed by foreclosure prevention efforts in 2009.

“The midyear numbers put us on pace to exceed 3 million properties with foreclosure filings by the end of the year, and more than 1 million bank repossessions,” Saccacio continued. “The roller coaster pattern of foreclosure activity over the past 12 months demonstrates that while the foreclosure problem is being managed on the surface, a massive number of distressed properties and underwater loans continues to sit just below the surface, threatening the fragile stability of the housing market.”

(Find the photo above by Andrew Ciscel in the Jacques Vallee post at boingboing titled “Stating the Obvious: If you don’t have a house you don’t need no sofa.”)

(The Young and the Connected.)

The most audacious advertiser-funded programme ever. The first daytime soap to show the realities of how young people live today. Its storylines focus on the drama that social networking adds to life in our modern connected world.

The Daily Dish highlights a post from Christopher Papagianis and Reihan Salam titled “We Can’t Afford This House,” which makes conservative points regarding the housing sector we can agree with. Here is an excerpt from it:

In the United States, our industrial policy for most of the last century has been centered on housing. Tax subsidies and the government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have helped channel hundreds of billions of dollars into housing. There was a certain logic, however flawed, behind this policy. As opportunities for less-skilled workers declined, construction jobs provided a much-needed income boost to many working- and middle-class households. But like any arrangement built on government favoritism, this one was bound to fall apart. Long-term unemployment has skyrocketed in no small part because of the evaporation of construction jobs that date from the overbuilding that occurred during the bubble years.

What we need now is to turn away from this disastrous policy and find new, sustainable sources of jobs and economic growth. That will require a series of painful steps — among them, phasing out the mortgage-interest deduction and eliminating the GSEs — that will minimize the privileges housing enjoys relative to investments in other industries. By shifting resources from housing to more productive sectors, we will have higher and more sustainable growth. With trillions of dollars and the health of the economy at stake, the question isn’t whether we must do it, but whether we will do it now or wait until our economy is in even worse shape.

Flowing Data has the chart above, which follows up on our previous post “Fostering Care: ‘Flowchart to lifelong happiness.’“