Archive for October, 2009
Hot buttered rums for the house, barkeep.
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It isn’t Denis Mukwege, the doctor who’s treated at least 21,000 rape victims in the Democratic Republic of Congo. He’s the only doctor there who does such treatment and the hospital he founded has helped hundreds of thousands of women. It isn’t any of the Chinese dissidents who’ve been jailed or had to flee their native land for daring to speak against its government. It isn’t any of the human rights campaigners working in difficult nations without major media recognition. It isn’t the Afghan woman’s right campaigner. And it isn’t Handicap International and the Cluster Munition Coalition, two organizations dedicated to clearing mines and helping the victims of cluster bombs and land mines. Instead, the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize goes to the leader of a nation that continues to use cluster munitions and refuses to ratify the ban on land mines. The prize has been awarded on hope.
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 Results: Well, damn. There’s no denying the greatness of Carlos Santana, but there’s also no arguing that this is the biggest surprise of the tournament so far: Santana, the upset machine, laps the field, eliminating Van Morrison and Peter Gabriel. The numbers: Santana 53%; #3 Van Morrison 29%; #9 Peter Gabriel 18%. Santana advances to the Sweet 16.
Our search for the greatest band of all time shifts now to the Red Rocks region, where a band that many (but not all) regard as the greatest of our time entertains two very different and very talented opponents. Hang on to your bloomers, boys. There’s just no telling what’s going to happen in this one. Full story »
 On September 22, Politico ran an article by Glenn Thrush that egregiously misrepresented the words of Rep. Tom Perriello (D-VA). The subject was town hall meetings and racist comments that he had witnessed. In due course Thrush’s “error” was “pointed out” and Perriello’s actual words were substituted. (The original post, corrected, appears here.) Thrush then issued an explanation and apology.
So far, no crisis. Mistakes happen, are fixed, retractions and apologies are run, the world is right again, right? Full story »
 Yeah, there’s a book called Zombie Haiku, and it’s exactly what you think it is—and I bought it anyway.
Zombies have overridden some nameless city, and a hapless poet falls victim to the plague. As he transforms into the undead, the poet recounts his experience using haiku, three-line poems with five, seven, and five syllables:
Blood is really warm.
It’s like drinking hot chocolate
but with more screaming.
When dealing with zombies, one has to suspend disbelief to begin with, but Zombie Haiku takes that suspension to a whole new level. The basic conceit of the book—that a rampaging zombie can somehow write haiku as he’s rampaging—is a tough conceit to accept, even for readers eager and willing to embrace the humor the book offers.
But once a reader gets past that, the book is loads of fun. Full story »
 Henry Kissinger is said to have once remarked, when asked if he was planning to consult with Europe on something or another, “Who do I call?” Well, there may soon be an answer to that question, following the approval by Irish voters this past weekend of the European Constitution. It now appears very likely that the only two remaining countries whose approval is required, Poland and the Czech Republic, will give their approval by the end of the year. Should that occur, Europe will get a President, and, equally importantly, a Foreign Minister. These are, we are told, good things to have, and we should. Europe, taken as a entity, represents the world’s largest economy, a substantial military (and nuclear) presence, and a needed counterpoint to American (and growing Asian) geopolitical and economic influence. So this is potentially quite an important development for global geopolitics, and one would think that Europe would want to but a European face forward. So why on earth is everyone in the UK trying to push the idea that Tony Blair is the best candidate for the position?
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 The results: Three incredible competitors, three worthy showings. The Boss surges to an early lead and never looks back. The numbers: #2 Bruce Springsteen/E Street Band 50%; #10 Tom Petty/Heartbreakers 33%; #7 Dire Straits/Mark Knopfler 18%. Springsteen advances to the Sweet 16.
Our search for the greatest band of all time now slides over to the wickedly tough Fillmore region, where two exceptionally talented prelim pod winners find themselves matched up against the man from Belfast.
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Modern Conservative is a powerful language, more capable than Greek or Hebrew of expressing the profound new concepts that Christianity introduced into the world. Evidently then, it needs to be applied to the Christian Canon. The perfectly revealed word of God turns out to be not-quite-perfect enough. Just kidding. It’s that liberals, feminists and maybe even Catholics have muddled the good news. You see, The Lord must have spoken Modern Conservative because he made modern conservatives in His image. It says so in the Book nearly ruined by pervasive, liberal influences.
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Grover helps Thomas Jefferson meet a deadline:
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 Blame it on Dick Lugar. He provided Barack Obama with living proof that a Republican could work towards a bipartisan end with a Democrat. The most senior senator of his party, he’s the last of a dying breed — a Republican who’s both willing to meet the Democrats halfway and actually work with them. Lugar, of course, is most noted for the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program that he sponsored in 1992 along with former Democratic Senator Sam Nunn.
Its purpose was to secure and dismantle weapons of mass destruction in the former Soviet Union states in accordance with disarmament treaties such as SALT II. To give you an example of how positive a force a Republican can be, this program has eliminated 6,312 nuclear warheads — and that’s just the tip of its iceberg. Of course, the recent, regressed breed of feral Republicans claim that the program only frees up Russian money for new weapons programs. Perhaps, but at least they’re conventional weapons. Full story »
 Prediction is a big, big business these days, and even those of us who aren’t explicitly in the prediction business probably do all we can to make sense of the future. For example:
- Does your company do marketing research? (If it’s a business of any size and sophistication, the answer is probably yes.)
- Do you track the financial pages?
- Do you keep abreast of the latest innovations in your industry (or any industry, for that matter)?
- Have you factored in economic considerations when trying to decide whether or not to buy a house?
- If you have an IRA, have you factored in where you think the damned economy is going in making fund decisions? Full story »
I learned something new today Full story »
 Results: Our final preliminary pod went more or less to form, with the top seed running off and hiding from the pack. The numbers: #5 Neil Young 68%; The Doors 13%; The Levellers 9%; The Red Hot Chili Peppers 6%; The B-52s 3%; Iron Maiden 1%; Deep Purple 0%. NY advances to the Great 48. Speaking of the Great 48….
Now, ladies and gentlemens, the Tournament of Rock – Legends edition, S&R’s epic search for the greatest band of all time, gets serious. Our 32 preliminary pod winners now join our top 16 seeds (four in each region) in the Great 48, and may the best band rock!
Our first match-up is a tough one. Really, really tough. Please welcome the #2 seed in the Hollywood Bowl region, hailing from Asbury Park, New Jersey… Full story »
I’ve been desperately in love 79 times. I know that might seem kind of creepy, that I’ve kept count and an accurate count at that, but I still remember my first true love. Or maybe she was my second or third. Anyway, her name was Elizabeth, and I loved her the way all eight-year-old boys love: like an idiot. But if it weren’t for Uncle Tuesday and my crippling lack of balance, I just might have pulled it off. Full story »
“And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and every thing that is in the earth shall die.” ~Book of Genesis
We all know what happens after that. The wickedness of the world is washed away in a deluge of planetary proportions, and only Noah, his family and the two of each unclean animal along with seven of every clean animal (but oddly, no plants) are saved to repopulate the world. Of all the mythological motifs that circle the Earth and run like a string through human history, none is told with more regularity and consistency than the story of the flood.
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This is an unusually personal post for me. I lost my Dad to cancer several years ago. I wasn’t ready for that – he still had more to teach me. He was an avid photographer. The last of his personal effects amounted to several boxes filled with slides, negatives and prints from a life long hobby.
One series of pictures I found especially moving were from two January days in 1958. He photographed his home town to share with his fiancee, my Mom. Here is a look at London in 1958.
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 Remember the last year, when Big 3 executives went pleading for salvation in Washington? Of course you do, and you probably remember the Southern politicians telling them to shove it because the transplant factories of the South were the beacon of union-free automotive manufacturing. The foreign companies that own those factories were models of efficient production that could carry the weight, so send the domestics to the dustbin of Soviet Socialist history. On the other side of the political divide, liberals sang the praises of their efficient, reliable Toyotas. They cursed the domestics and beyond the bleeding of their hearts for those blue collar workers in the Rust Belt, cared little for the collapse of the domestic auto industry. Many of them cheered because the domestics make “inferior” products in any case.
Now Akio Toyoda is ready to commit seppuku because Toyota is on the brink of “capitulation to irrelevance or death”. That would explain why it still wants the millions promised to it by the state of California early this year for training workers, even after it pulled out of the NUMMI plant that will put close to 5,000 workers on unemployment.
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You know who you are.
And… Full story »
THE DEPROLIFERATOR — President Obama’s appearance at the United Nations this week was intended as a show with a sideshow. First, he became the first U.S. president to chair an “extraordinary” session of the Security Council, with the nations represented not by diplomats but by actual heads of state, not diplomats. The council approved President Obama’s resolution legalizing military action against states daring to weaponize their nuclear power program.
The sideshow, at which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton represented the United States in a conference “complementary” — as opposed to extraordinary — to the Security Council session, produced a general recommitment to the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). Full story »
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