Paris Bookstores and Amazon

The French government has enacted laws to keep markets competitive so the corporations, namely WalMart, Target, and Amazon, cannot under price small businesses and thus put them out of business.
Why don't we see more of that in the US? Would that be considered the government interfering in a free market?

http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2013/10/25/240766585/little-libraires-that-could-french-law-keeps-amazon-at-bay

How Fox News Does Business

Misleading data presented as facts to the general public courtesy of Faux News.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/10/28/1251247/-One-Fox-News-chart-that-will-mislead-you-about-welfare-and-jobs-in-three-different-ways?detail=hide

Let Children Have More Control Over Their Own Learning

Recent concept and practice of letting children have much more control over their learning.

http://www.wired.com/business/2013/10/free-thinkers/

Is Winning Everything?

Article on parents obsession with winning and impact on the sports their children play. Am coaching soccer now and see parents/coaches who are still focused on winning being everything. Goals of previous league was in was to play for the tie. Measure of success of the league was how many players returned the following season. Teams were formed anew every season by rating players based on previous season.
I've found winning and losing tend to balance out over time. Sometimes you lose all the time, others you win all the time. Maybe all that extra stress/effort exerted may really not make a difference after all. Maybe the real focus should be on having fun.

http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/10/parents-ruin-sports-for-their-kids-by-obsessing-about-winning/280442/

Low US Test Scores Continued

Possible reasons for continued low US test scores are discussed.
Is inequality the reason? Is it the concept of privilege the main reason?

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/09/americans-dumb-oecd-study-test-scores

Cancer Drugs Gleevec/Gilvec, Patents, Pharmaceutical Companies

There are some very promising cancer drugs on the market these days (Gleevec/Gilvec for one). They work similar to the AIDs drugs thru misdirection, inhibit the reactions necessary for the cancer to thrive. Big improvement over trying to kill every cancer cell in the body. The big pharmaceuticals are charging astronomical prices for and India has been making generic brands to sell for about 3% of the cost of Gleevec. Thus, the big pharmaceuticals are suing. Money takes precedence of course.

Perhaps a system based on one's income would suffice here. For things we must have, payment would be based on a percentage of one's income. For example, life-saving drugs, everyone pays 5% of their annual income per year.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/apr/01/indian-court-novartis-cancer-patent

http://rt.com/news/cancer-drugs-giants-profits-583/

http://www.propublica.org/article/where-are-the-low-cost-cancer-treatments

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imatinib