Of course, that's yet another unfair fact of life: really stupid people seem to acquire wealth and power with relative ease because they don't have the impediment of conscience or second-guessing reflection.

WSJ: Best of the Web Today

But for that price, users get a machine with the power to grind through Microsoft Office with ease.

FORBES: Ditch Your Laptop For These Gadgets

"The Hobbit" is a brilliantly constructed story, unfolding themes that remain all too relevant to the modern world: the nature of evil, the significance of human choice, the corrupting power of greed and the ease with which good people can be drawn into destructive conflict.

WSJ: The Grown-Up Pleasures of 'The Hobbit'

From the outside she seems far too big an object to move at all much less at better than thirty knots but deep inside is a seething power plant that will handle that speed with ease.

FORBES: Do You Love Work More Than Your Wife? YES, Said Gibbs (Book Review)

Although about half of Sweden's power comes from reactors, it has never been at ease with nuclear technology.

ECONOMIST: Energy policy: A nuclear waste | The

However, since Brazil switched on more gas-fired thermal plants in October, to cope with growing demand and ease the pressure on the hydroelectric power system, costs have increased significantly.

BBC: Brazil drought stokes worries over energy shortages

In one of them, a televised conversation between Katniss and Stanley Tucci's madcap, blue-pompadoured interviewer, Caesar Flickerman, we see the power of her beauty and honesty, and, at the same time, the ease with which she might be corrupted in the pursuit of celebrity.

WSJ: 'Hunger Games' Has a Less-Than-Full Plate | Film Review by Joe Morgenstern

But even in places to which global NGOs have little access, the ease with which images and sounds can be disseminated has tilted the balance of power in favour of environmentalists.

ECONOMIST: The environment and people power

In 2009, this newspaper reported that the control systems for the U.S. electric power grid had been hacked and secret openings created so that the attacker could get back in with ease.

WSJ: Richard Clarke: China's Cyberassault on America