Plastics are everywhere. Bags, bank cards, bottles, and even boats can all be made of this celebrated but much-maligned material. Yet most of us know next to nothing about plastics. We do know that they are practical and cheap - but they also represent a huge environmental problem, for they literall[...]

In this gripping, first-hand account, Dan Green tells the story of U.S. efforts to oust the Taliban insurgency from the desolate southern Afghan province of Uruzgan. Nestled between the Hindu Kush Mountains and the sprawling wasteland of the Margow and Khash Deserts, Uruzgan is a microcosm of U.S. e[...]