¶ Matins: As mains deteriorate, the American habit of regarding water as a free resource makes repairs politically difficult. 

The root of the problem, in our view, is the Nineteenth-Century earnest devotion to the idea of Building to Last. Building to Update makes for steadier work. (NYT)

¶ Lauds: Jason Clark compares and contrasts two distantly similar shows On and Off Broadway, Geoffrey Naufft’s Next Fall and Alexi Kaye Campbell’s The Pride. (The House Next Door)

¶ Prime: “What Happens if America’s Credit Rating Is Downgraded?” Good things, perhaps. Perhaps just things that won’t happen otherwise. (NYT)

¶ Tierce: While we raise our eyebrows at a few of Sara Firisen’s implications about early education at home and abroad — she skirts the fact that kids elsewhere must work much harder in order to shine (and live in cultures that value slogging) — we think that she’s quite right to dismiss the claim that the pursuit of excellence is “elitist.” (3 Quarks Daily)

¶ Sext:  Speakeasy wants to know: does the Best Actress award doom the winner’s marriage?

¶ Nones: Andrew Sullivan seems surprised by the familiar mode of the Vatican response to the latest outcrop of sexual abuse, this one in the current pope’s former archidiocese.

Surely, the Roman Catholic Church has seen itself as a victim since the days of Nero and Diocletian. (It’s what comes of being married to a crucified saviour.) Not that there hasn’t been some progress. Mr Sullivan won’t be burned alive, or forced to beg papal forgiveness by standing barefoot in the snows of Canossa. (Daily Dish)

¶ Vespers: Luke Epplin, who has lived in Santiago but slept through minor tremors, writes about the Chilean earthquake in literature. (The Millions)

¶ Compline: Hendrik Hertzberg brings us up to date on current bien-pensant thinking about nuclear power. (The New Yorker)

Drop me a line at rjk@dailyblague.com
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