Reuters, reporting on a study from the Costs of War Project by the Watson Institute for International Studies at Brown University:

The report concluded the United States gained little from the war while Iraq was traumatized by it. The war reinvigorated radical Islamist militants in the region, set back women’s rights, and weakened an already precarious healthcare system, the report said. Meanwhile, the $212 billion reconstruction effort was largely a failure with most of that money spent on security or lost to waste and fraud, it said.

Grey2K:

According to new data from the National Greyhound Association, the number of greyhounds registered to race declined again in 2012. During the year, a total of 10,157 dogs entered the racing system for the first time. This is the tenth year in a row that the number of greyhounds bred for racing has declined. In fact, this number has been cut in half in just five years. This drop in race dog breeding is yet another indicator that greyhound racing is a dying industry.

Washington Post:

Schools in Japan, by contrast, give children the sort of food they’d get at home, not at a stadium. The meals are often made from scratch. They’re balanced but hearty, heavy on rice and vegetables, fish and soups. The meals haven’t changed much in four decades.

Mealtime is a scene of communal duty: In both elementary and middle schools, students don white coats and caps and serve their classmates. Children eat in their classrooms. They get identical meals, and if they leave food untouched, they are out of luck: Their schools have no vending machines. Barring dietary restrictions, children in most districts can’t bring food to school, either, until they reach high school.

H/T +Guy Kawasaki 

Time:

Since M-dwarfs are rich with orbiting planets, this means that any number Kepler is reporting is a gross under-sampling of what’s really out there. If, as astronomers Jonathan Swift and John Johnson of Caltech and several of their colleagues have done, you multiply the number of planets known to orbit M-dwarfs by the number of M-dwarfs in the Milky Way, you get an estimate of no fewer than 100 billion planets in the galaxy, and maybe a lot more.

"Santa Claus" comes from the Dutch "Sinterklaas," an alteration of "Sint Nikolaas," i.e. Saint Nicholas. (Either way: Happy Holidays!)—
Merriam-Webster (@MerriamWebster) December 24, 2012

The New York Times:

The Guardian:

Caribbean coral reefs – which make up one of the world’s most colourful, vivid and productive ecosystems – are on the verge of collapse, with less than 10% of the reef area showing live coral cover. With so little growth left, the reefs are in danger of utter devastation unless urgent action is taken, conservationists warned. They said the drastic loss was the result of severe environmental problems, including over-exploitation, pollution from agricultural run-off and other sources, and climate change.