--- title: Five Best Ideas of the Day: December 18 description: How Obama's Cuba move confounds interest group politics, giving away "The Interview," saving global markets from the Ruble's fall, and more. canonical: https://time.com/3639615/five-best-ideas-of-the-day-december-18/ author: TIME article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-12-18T17:01:42.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:06:36.083Z article:section: Ideas og:title: These Are Today's Best Ideas og:description: How Obama's Cuba move confounds interest group politics, giving away "The Interview," saving global markets from the Ruble's fall, and more. og:url: https://time.com/3639615/five-best-ideas-of-the-day-december-18/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: These Are Today's Best Ideas twitter:description: How Obama's Cuba move confounds interest group politics, giving away "The Interview," saving global markets from the Ruble's fall, and more. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Five Best Ideas of the Day: December 18 by [The Aspen Institute](/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Dec 18, 2014 5:01 PM CUT by [The Aspen Institute](/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Dec 18, 2014 5:01 PM CUT **1\.** [**By breaking with the Cuba lobby, President Obama could massively disrupt American interest group politics.**](http://www.sltrib.com/opinion/1960976-155/bloomberg-view-op-ed-obama-gambles-that?fullpage=1 "undefined") By Noah Feldman in the Salt Lake Tribune **2\.** [**Sony can take a stand against the hackers whose threats have forced them to pull “The Interview” by giving the movie away online.**](http://www.theverge.com/2014/12/17/7407493/why-sony-pictures-should-release-the-interview-online "undefined") By Bryan Bishop in the Verge **3\.** [**Could the West help save the ruble without throwing Putin a lifeline?**](http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-debate/why-the-west-should-help-putin-save-the-ruble/article22114113/ "undefined") By Juliet Johnson in the Globe and Mail **4\.** [**By tracking rising global temperatures, satellites can predict cholera risk.**](http://boingboing.net/2014/12/17/the-climate-cholera-connection.html "undefined") By Dr. Kiki Sanford in BoingBoing **5\.** [**After the Taliban’s shocking attack on a school in Pakistan, the military there understands “the Frankenstein that it helped to create must now be killed.”**](http://www.cnn.com/2014/12/16/opinion/bergen-pakistan-military-taliban/ "undefined") By Peter Bergen at CNN  [_The Aspen Institute_](http://www.aspeninstitute.org/ "undefined") _is an educational and policy studies organization based in Washington, D.C._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3639615/five-best-ideas-of-the-day-december-18/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3639615/five-best-ideas-of-the-day-december-18/"},"headline":"Five Best Ideas of the Day: December 18","datePublished":"2014-12-18T17:01:42.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T05:06:36.083Z","description":"How Obama's Cuba move confounds interest group politics, giving away \"The Interview,\" saving global markets from the Ruble's fall, and more.","url":"https://time.com/3639615/five-best-ideas-of-the-day-december-18/","keywords":["Innovation","Ukraine","russia","North Korea","Pakistan","climate","global warming","Sony","Taliban","Cuba topic","Sanctions","satellites","the interview"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"The Aspen Institute","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/innovation/","name":"Innovation"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3639615/five-best-ideas-of-the-day-december-18/","name":"Five Best Ideas of the Day: December 18"}}]}] ```