- Proverbs for Paranoids, 3: If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers.—Gravity’s Rainbow
‘Is it about a bicycle?’ he asked.—The Third Policeman
Monthly Archives: May 2006
Futility
Robert Scheer writes: “These days, even when George W. Bush is right, he’s wrong.” In his analysis of Bush’s proposals for dealing with illegal immigration, Scheer is quite even-handed—one might almost say kind. Not the usual image of the “hateful left” painted by certain commentators. The president’s “friends,” on the other hand, beat him up pretty bad. Things are [...]
Rhetoric
Well, it least someone is trying to remove the chill from the air. In an interview with the London Times, Putin’s chief of staff said: The problems that have been highlighted recently in the media and political circles have been wildly exaggerated. … Our biggest problem is the rhetoric. We do have differences with our [...]
Defense
Big headline today in Izvestia: Буш отправляет войска охранять южную границу США That is, “Bush sends troops to guard southern border of US.” Which is accurate (I even watched some of the address on “immigration reform” last night, out of morbid curiosity). Sounds as stupid in English as it does in Russian, doesn’t it? Oh, [...]
Sacked
Two days after declaring the elimination of corruption one of his government’s highest priorities, Russian president Vladimir Putin fired ten high-ranking officials. He said the dismissals were not timed to coincide with his state-of-the-nation address, although he said he knew they were in the works as he prepared his speech. He said there may be [...]
Blogology
I have this funny urge to do a taxonomy of blogs. Some of the distinguishing characteristics would be: Single author | multiple authors Multiple posts per day | multiple days between posts Blogger does | does not already have an outlet in traditional media Blogger did | did not acquire an outlet in traditional media [...]
Agenda
Yesterday Vladimir Putin delivered his yearly address to the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation—the Russian equivalent of the American president’s “state of the union” address. His basic themes were (in order of delivery): The need to eliminate corruption and ensure fairness; The need to stimulate the economy and make it competitive on a global [...]
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There are 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary and those who don’t those who are sick of this joke. (Google says there are about 452,00010 instances of it on the web.)
Indescribable
I had an Inca Kola today at El Pollo Rico. Man, is that stuff sweet! Tastes sort of like bubblegum, which made me wonder: what the heck is bubblegum flavor? I mean, it must be built out of something—some well-defined set of flavors in certain proportions. I know it has vanilla in it. My tablemate, [...]
Preacherman
Our beloved vice president has journeyed to Vilnius in the former Soviet Union to criticize the democracy being run by the current Kremlin-dwellers. The Russians, naturally, found him “completely incomprehensible.” (Welcome to the club, друзья.) Cheney also accused the Russian government of using oil and gas to intimidate or blackmail other countries. He then jumped over [...]
Velorickshaw