The Fulbright Scholarship has long been a symbol of America’s openness and willingness to support a variety of voices in the academic world.  Founded by Sen. William Fulbright nearly 50 years ago, the program was designed, in Fulbright’s words, to "bring a little more knowledge, a little more reason, and a little more compassion into world affairs" by helping U.S. scholars travel abroad and funding foreign scholars’ work in the U.S.  Politics have always been a part of the selection process, since funding comes in part from the U.S. government, but the selection and placement process is supposed to be independent — and coordinated by non-profit educational organizations and universities.  But the odd machinations concerning Palestinian scholars, reported on by Ethan Bronner in the New York Times, shows that unarticulated concerns and inferences may be enough to stop educational exchanges in their tracks. (more…)

The New York Times’ editorializes today in support of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act that easily passed the House and Senate last week, and will soon be signed by the President. The editorial largely focuses on the improvements made in children’s safety, noting the "nearly 30 million hazardous toys pulled from the nation’s shelves" last year.

But the Times does mention a product that has brought far more injuries and deaths than toy magnets: all terrain vehicles. The bill mandates the commission to establish new safety standards for ATVs.

Indeed in the grand scheme of product problems ATVs trump toxic toys. Congress and consumer advocates have used the toy safety issue to write an unusually strong regulatory bill. What bears monitoring is if CPSC uses the bill as a springboard to focus on big-picture issues or heeds the call to be fixated on Thomas the Tank Engine.-MB

The New York Times’ William Glaberson has been diligently covering the alternative reality that is the Guantanamo Bay military commissions trial of Salim Hamdan, Osama bin Laden’s driver. Yesterday the defense for Hamdan made their closing argument: that he provided valuable intelligence back in 2002 about the whereabouts of bin Laden. “You know what Mr. Hamdan agreed to do,” Lt. Cmdr. Brian Mizer, Hamdan’s defense attorney, cryptically said. “You know what happened, how we squandered that opportunity.”

Military prosecutors have charged Hamdan with material support of terrorism, which, presumably, carries a life sentence. But if acquitted, Hamdan would almost assuredly continue to be in military custody. His defense argues that he’s lost his sanity after six years detained at Guantanamo.-MB

The Washington Post’s Josh White obtains emails from the State Dept. that show when representatives of foreign countries visited their citizens being held at Guantanamo Bay those visits were taped. The practice started as early as 2002, when Guantanamo opened. While detainees and the public have been left in the dark about this practice, it appears the visiting representatives were aware.

With habeas corpus trials for detainees looming, it’s possible that these tapes could be useful in extracting whether the detainees were being legitimately held. But it’s not clear how many of the tapes have been kept.-MB