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LOS ANGELES - It's almost unthinkable now that environmentalists and manufacturers once stood together as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a bill making California the first state to regulate toxic chemicals in consumer products.

All the fixation on creating jobs in America is outdated and misguided, argues media theorist and author Douglas Rushkoff. He explains to WSJ's Dennis Berman his theory on new models that could actually increase productivity and make Americans more satisfied.

Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek, akaThe Elvis of cultural theory, is given the floor to show of his polemic style and whirlwind-like performance. The Giant of Ljubljana is bombarded with clips of popular media images and quotes by modern-day thinkers revolving around four major issues: the economical crisis, environment, Afghanistan and the end of democracy. Zizek grabs the opportunity to ruthlessly criticize modern capitalism and to give his view on our common future. We communists are back! is the closing remark of Slavoj Zižeks provocative performance. Our current capitalist system, that everyone believed would be smoothly spread around the globe, is untenable. We find ourselves on the brink of big problems that call for big solutions. Whatever is left of the left, has been hedged in by western liberal democracy and seems to lack the energy to come up with radical solutions. Not Zižek. Interview: Chris Kijne Director: Marije Meerman Production: Mariska Schneider /Pepijn Boonstra Research: Marijntje Denters/Maren Merckx Commissioning editors: Henneke Hagen/Jos de Putter

David Garland is a well-respected sociologist and legal scholar who taught courses on crime and punishment at the University of Edinburgh before relocating to the United States over a decade ago. His recent Peculiar Institution: America's Death Penalty in an Age of Abolition is the product of his attempt to learn "why the United States is such an outlier in the severity of its criminal sentencing." Thus, while the book primarily concerns the death penalty, it also illuminates the broader, dramatic differences between American and Western European prison sentences.

The scientific community has long agreed that our dependence on fossil fuels inflicts massive damage on the environment and our health, while warming the globe in the process. But beyond the damage these fuels cause to us now, what will happen when the world's supply of oil runs out? In a new video series from The Nation magazine and On The Earth Productions, Bill McKibben, Noam Chomsky, Nicole Foss, Richard Heinberg and other scientists, researchers and writers explain. Visit TheNation.com for more videos in this series.

About twenty years ago, Professor Nicholas Ashford of MIT came to Washington and testified before Congress in great detail about how and where safety regulations create jobs and make the economy more efficient in avoiding the costs of preventable injuries and disease.

Patent is the set of exclusive rights given to the inventor of anything that no other person or company has invented earlier. In case any other person starts making that particular product, without the consent of original patent holder or inventor, then it is categorized as infringement.