It seems that science is growing closer to being able to grow meat in a lab.
The piece is pretty fascinating. As Jonah Goldberg points out, the propsect of meat without animals raises fascinating questions:

...I am curious what the animal rights and eco-types would say to the proposition of lab grown meat -- assuming they could get past their deep luddism. After all, the suffering of farm animals would be sharply curtailed if not eliminated. Forests wouldn't need to be cleared for cattle and billions(?) of acres of forest land around the world could be allowed to revert to wilderness, improving the quality of our air and water.
Of course, even if we perfected the technology overnight (which we wouldn't), there are some obvious downsides: millions of farm animals would probably have to be killed since their would no longer be much economic utility in feeding them. Worse, billions of people around the world would have their traditional social, political and economic arrangements shattered. Our attachment to the land would be even more attenuated. Whole new quasi-religions and political movements would develop around the need to eat "authentic" meat. Anyway, it's an interesting topic for lazy-day pondering.

All true. But those questions pale in comparison to the most important one of all: would such laboratory-grown meat be kosher? Would stakes genetically from cattle and bison, without the intermediate steps of existence as a living animal and shechitah, be kosher? What about grown pork - would the non-existence as an actual pig be enough to render it kosher?
I need to research this issue a little more closely.

The latest issue of The New Yorker has a few great pieces.
First, Anthony Lane lets it rip in reviewing "Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers":

Onscreen, Jackson braids the two strands together, adding the tale of fellow-hobbits Merry and Pippin, who, in a twist guaranteed to make environmentalists spill their carrot juice for joy, are literally hugged by trees. We also get ... a flawless white horse that, if you give a little whistle, gallops in from nowhere, though only in slow motion. And lo, the name of this steed is Shadowfax, or, as it was told in the olden tongue, Palmpilot.
...Gollum, who guides Frodo on his quest, is white-skinned and blue-veined, like a moldering cheese, and his shrunken frame is topped by a triangular head with protruding eyes. Think of Ross Perot after ten years on the Atkins diet, and you're almost there.
...In essence, the worthy folk of Edoras, under their king Théoden (Bernard Hill), have retreated to Helm's Deep, where they are besieged by Orcs, Uruk-hai, and other evildoers who come bearing hard consonants. It is a close and vicious fight, but at last the long vowels of Théoden and Aragorn, aided by the soft fricatives of Gandalf, carry the wordy day.

Second, Robert Sullivan has a wonderful spoof of the New York Times' weekly real estate feature "If You're Thinking of Living In...," which profiles a neighborhood in the tri-state area:

Dan and Daniella Daniels plan to retire in Hob Nob. They love their home, which they have renovated twice in the past six years—first by adding three bedrooms on the second floor, and then, last fall, by tearing down the house itself and replacing it with an apartment on the Upper West Side. "This is a wonderful place to bring up kids," said Daniella, whose children come home from boarding school in Maine during the holidays each year. "I wouldn't leave here if you paid me, which is why we don't plan on going anywhere unless we get a really good price for our house."

(Thanks to Gawker for the link.)

Finally, David Remnick has a wonderful appreciation of the retiring Vaclav Havel:

Havel is a liberal—and, unlike many American liberals, he is proud to proclaim it. As he begins to make his exit, it is worth adding up what his liberalism has wrought. He helped bring freedom of the press, freedom of religion, and freedom of commerce to his country. The Czech Republic is a member of NATO and will soon join the European Union. Czechs (Slovaks, too) travel at their pleasure. But Havel has also, unlike some other European leaders, refused to renounce, or even flinch from, the potential of power, even armed power, in the name of security and justice. His government pushed (in vain) for the West to intervene more quickly and completely in Rwanda. He pressed for armed intervention in Bosnia and Kosovo. And now, in the age of stateless terrorism, he is unabashedly in favor, as he said in New York, of the principle that "evil must be confronted in its womb and, if there is no other way to do it, then it has to be dealt with by the use of force."
Among Havel's myriad achievements, one of the most lasting is that he has helped to reorder our thinking about artist-intellectuals and political influence. Who is left to prize the fevered delusions of Sartre and Pound, the selective political blindnesses of Aragon and Shaw, when there is the clear-eyed example of Havel? Who is left to question that a thinking person, profound and humane, can find a place in real politics, both in opposition and in power? Countless countries still seem doomed to autocracy without a homegrown version of its antidote. Havel's journey has shown a way out. He leaves the Castle having provided the gift of normalcy to his people, and having restored to many others the dimensions and vigor of the liberal idea.

Date/Time: Monday, 12/30 - 7:00 P.M.
Location: O'Flanagan's Ale House - 1591 2nd Ave. (between 82nd and 83rd)
At a mutually convenient time, we can move next door for some quality kosher dining at Va Bene. Or not, depending on what people feel like doing.
UPDATE: Here's another reason to come.

Why have the Boston Red Sox not won a World Series in 84 years...and counting?
In an effort to keep warm through this longer-than-usual (for a Yankee fan) baseball winter, I recently paged through a book that offers a partial answer to that question. In Shut Out: A Story of Race and Baseball in Boston, Howard Bryant (a sportswriter for the Bergen Record who grew up in Boston) details how, for many years after Jackie Robinson entered major league baseball, the Red Sox did not attempt to sign black players and passed up chances to sign players such as Willie Mays. Even after the Red Sox integrated, Bryant describes how, into shockingly recent times, the team has often made life difficult for its black players. Others such as Glenn Stout have also described how the Red Sox’s slowness to integrate contributed to its mediocrity in the 1950s and 1960s, but Bryant’s book goes further in explicating the residual effects of the team’s problems with race.
The Red Sox’s problems recruiting and keeping black players have been, first and foremost, a moral failing. But they were also, as the team’s fans probably realize, a bad business practice. A sports team’s business is to win, and - as Bryant notes - a team in a competitive environment such as major league baseball cannot ignore a talent stream as substantial as African-American players and expect to win championships.
Similarly, while the integration of major league baseball was most importantly a cessation of an immense moral wrong, it also expanded the talent pool from which baseball teams drew. As such, it introduced a competitive pressure upon teams. Those that adapted to the post-Jackie Robinson era succeeded at the expense of those that did not.
All this was, or should have been, understood at the time by those whose primary priority was to win. While Branch Rickey certainly deserves tremendous moral credit for providing the means for Jackie Robinson’s entrance into the major leagues, he was just as undoubtedly interested in the competitive advantage his team would derive. When the Dodgers combined black players such as Robinson, Roy Campanella, Don Newcome and Junior Gilliam with white players like Duke Snider, Gil Hodges and Carl Furillo, the result was a team that won six pennants in Robinson’s ten seasons. As Adam Smith might have predicted, the Dodgers’ self-interest was a moral force.
The National League generally followed the Dodgers’ example to a greater extent than the American League did, with the expected result: according to Bill James’ Win Shares method, there were 11 National League players in 1963 that were better than any American League player that year. (The contrast is especially stark because Mickey Mantle was injured for most of that season, but the general point remains true.). Probably not coincidentally, the National League dominated the All-Star Game in that era.
Even the mighty Yankees were forced to adapt the competitive pressure exerted by the integration of baseball. As Bryant describes, the Yankees’ record on race was almost as bad as the Red Sox’s for a long time. The Yankees’ first noteworthy black player, Vic Power, was judged too “flashy” and quickly traded away despite his talent. The star catcher Elston Howard met the Yankees’ criteria, but not many others did. In his book October 1964, David Halberstam describes how the Yankees’ neglect of the talent afforded by the integration of African-American (and by then, Latino) players into baseball contributed heavily to the downfall of the Yankee dynasty in the 1960s. (There were, of course, other contributing factors: the Yankee player-development system was starved for resources in the early 1960s and didn’t develop many good white players, either.) When the Yankees resumed winning championships in the late 1970s, the team included outstanding minority players such as Mickey Rivers, Chris Chambliss and, of course, Reggie Jackson (who satisfied no era’s definition of decorum). And, as Bryant describes, the current dynastic Yankees are a model of diversity in terms of players’ backgrounds. Lingering prejudice against groups of players is, practically speaking, incompatible with George Steinbrenner’s monomaniacal desire for championships, and such prejudice has accordingly been overcome. The Yankees’ most recent moves - the signing of Japanese outfielder Hideki “Godzilla” Matsui and Cuban defector pitcher Jose Contreras - perfectly illustrate how the demand for the best players has overcome any prejudice against groups of such players. While it would be nice to assume high-minded motives on the Yankees’ behalf, it seems like Steinbrenner’s insatiable appetite for championships deserves the credit for the overcoming of such prejudice.
None of the above is especially novel. What is not understood as often, though, is that competitive pressures analogous to the ones exerted by the integration of baseball a half-century ago (though not usually with the same moral imperative) continue to be exerted.
About 20 years ago, the Dominican Republic became a tremendous source of talent for baseball. Teams such as the Blue Jays and Dodgers took early advantage of that source and gained a competitive advantage. More recently, the influx of Japanese baseball players such as Ichiro Suzuki and Hideo Nomo has introduced a new source of talent, which has been best exploited by the Mariners and Dodgers. The Yankees’ most recent moves may be understood as a response to those pressures, in addition to the specific tactical benefits afforded by signing those players. By signing Matsui, the Yankees joined the competition for Japan’s best players and signaled that the team would not allow the Mariners and Dodgers to monopolize the talent from that source. Similarly, the signing of Contreras continued the Yankees’ efforts to take advantage of the too-few opportunities to sign Cuban players, which began with Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez and the ill-fated Andy Morales. (We can all hope for the future expansion of such opportunities, as a minor fringe benefit of the not-soon-enough downfall of Castro.)
No team that aspires to win a championship can afford to ignore any source of talent, including intellectual. Over 20 years ago, Bill James began popularizing certain principles and methodologies of statistical analysis with respect to players’ performances (which he dubbed “sabermetrics”). For a while, his work was mostly ignored by the baseball establishment. In recent years, though, a number of baseball executives – especially Billy Beane, the general manager of the Oakland Athletics - have begun incorporating many insights pioneered by James (and his successors such as Baseball Prospectus and Baseball Primer) into their management, with positive results. Most notably, Beane’s Athletics have made the playoffs for three consecutive years despite having a budget as low as any team in baseball. Baseball is currently being subjected to competitive pressure by the spread of sabermetrics throughout baseball management, and teams that adapt to that pressure will succeed at the expense of those who do.
One team that is adapting to the pressure is the Red Sox. The team has an owner who is familiar with the work of Bill James, and recently hired a 28-year-old general manager who is steeped in James’ work. Most notably, the Red Sox recently hired James himself as a special adviser – the first time James had ever been employed by a major league team in a permanent capacity, despite his influence on the sport. It would be obscene to equate the delay in hiring James to the prejudice suffered by African-American players before the integration of baseball, it seems apparent that one of the reasons it took so long for teams to hire James was due to his outsider status. Having never played or been involved in the game in any official capacity (though he recently has contributed some commentary to Major League Baseball's official website), James seemed to be outside the pool of acceptable baseball hires, despite his influence on the game. (Baseball teams have employed statistical consultants in the past, but none of them have had as high a profile or as much influence as James.) After 84 years…and counting, the Red Sox’s desire for a championship overcame any prejudice against hiring an outsider. And, as Bryant notes at the end of his book, there have been indications in recent years that the Red Sox are finally removing the last vestiges of racial and ethnic prejudice from their organization (an effort that began under the management of the much-maligned general manager Dan Duquette). The desire to do the right thing has surely been part of the Red Sox’s calculus in those efforts. The desire to catch the resurgent, hated Yankees, with their talent drawn from virtually every conceivable source, probably played a greater role. (Significantly, the Red Sox apparently tried as hard as the Yankees did to sign Contreras. While they did not succeed, similar efforts will undoubtedly pay off in the future.)
As Adam Smith noted, people’s attempts to satisfy their self-interest may have beneficial consequences to society. In the context of professional sports, a team’s desperate desire to win a championship might lead it to overcome prejudices which many people assume are immutable.

UPDATE: David Pinto comments:

What killed the Yankees in the 1960's was:
1. Ownership by CBS, which didn't have the killer instinct for winning.
2. The implementation of the baseball draft, which prevented the Yankees from signing the best young players to bonuses. The baseball draft, like today's luxury tax, was an item specificially designed to end Yankee hegemony at the expense of player wealth.

Those factors help explain why the Yankees were down for so long, but they don't explain the team's initial sudden collapse in 1965 after winning the pennant in 1964. CBS bought the Yankees in November 1964, and the amateur draft began in 1965. If the team's development system had been in great shape at that time, it should have taken a while for CBS' ownership and the draft to bring down the Yankees. Those two factors could not have caused the Yankees to collapse immediately. It takes a while for drafted players to reach the major leagues, and if an organization is in decent shape, it takes a while for ownership to wreck it, even if they try hard - Peter Angelos' stewardship of the Baltimore Orioles is a good example.