from this August 6th issue of Newsweek
Anna Quindlen's How Much Jail Time?, where she looks at the unwillingness to take the anti-abortion line to the logical conclusion of jailing women--or treating them like they aren't responsible because they're incapable of making decisions.
and
Gorilla Warfare: Even after 10 years of war, rangers are stunned by the mysterious killings of great apes in Africa's oldest park.
It's well-written and discusses the political and environmental factors in bringing mountain gorillas closer to extinction. The gorillas referenced were not killed for their fur or meat, as the animals were left intact but dead and in one case burnt. It may be a way of intimidating park rangers who have spoken out about rapid deforestation in the area due to charcoal industry. It's an incredibly dangerous job--about 120 rangers have been murdered since 1994, and they patrol with AK-47s now. And one of the rangers who has been very vocal against the charcoal interests in now under arrest because the gorillas were killed under his watch, something the killers may have planned all along. For more information on how you can help, visit Wildlife Direct, the organisation that pays the salaries of most of the rangers, rather than the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Of the 12 members of the gorilla group, only 5 remain, mostly young males (the alpha male was one of the ones killed, along with a pregnant female. Other females and infants were killed or are missing.) For those of you who care about animals (including gorillas), the environment, or for that matter the survival of the human population in the area, whose resources are already stretched due to the influx of refugees (the deforestation will do no good to them, either, in the long run), please let others know about these events.
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