The Week in Entertainment

DVD: A couple of Marvel movies - Dr. Strange and Iron Man. I didn't read Iron Man as a kid, but he was Marvel - and where and when I grew up you read either Marvel or DC . Not both. So I was familiar with him, even if he wasn't one of my favorites. (X-Men (the first time around, Beast and Angel and Marvel Girl...) and Fantastic Four and Spiderman and Thor and Hulk...) They're not at all bad. Nicely animated and good, solid stories with trademark Stan Lee depth of characters. Also the first of four Russian tv-miniseries (is that how to say it? I mean there are four separate miniseries in a sort of mega-series) Бухта Филиппа (Philip's Bay) starring Константин Хабенский (Konstantin Khabensky). It's what they call a детектив (detektiv), in this case a reluctant ex-lawyer turned boat repairman who has to prove his employee/friend didn't commit murder. His surname is Ронин (Ronin) - one of the underworld figures who aids him in discovering the real murder (a rival) calls him "samurai", which is cute. It's pretty good. Unfortunately, the version I have seems to be the only one available, and there are no subtitles at all, so if you don't understand Russian, you'll be lost.

TV: Heroes - so nice to see Nathan alive, if miserable, and Peter alive, if amnesiac. And Hiro - he has got his work cut out for him, doesn't he? But waaaaaaah! They killed George Takei! House - could that camera work have been any more annoyingly obtrusive? I mean, really. When you keep noticing the "arty" angles and shots in mirrors, you're not watching the story. I'm not at all sure I'm going to like this hunt for the new team ... especially since the old one is still there in the credits. Unless they're going to expand this cast from six to nine, the new Cottages will either never be hired or have nothing to do. I fear this will be this season's obnoxious and unbelievable six-episode arc-to-ignore. But we'll see. Dr Who - I forgot to mention last week (I was so caught up in the Captain Jack story) how wonderful it was to see Derek Jacobi as the Master. And I guess now we know what's up with Saxon and why he tried to warn Martha away from the Doctor... As for this week's episode, argh, poor Jack. He's just the right play-toy for a sadistic monster, but maybe the Doctor will get a break to fix himself up. He's got to lose those extra years - I've see the promos for next year! (And I know there's a second season of Torchwood.) Martha ... she's the one I'm worried about. She's not back in the next season of Dr Who... Surely she'll come through, but ... who knows? Still, I think I'm going to keep betting on her deciding she just can't do it any more; Rose wins. Next week can't come soon enough. Torchwood - I like the way the continuity keeps up - Canary Wharf and the Cybermen. I wonder if Ianto will be different next week, or their relationship with him? It's somewhat an episodic show, but something this important - I hope they don't drop it. ... And one sour note. My DVR - despite having assured me that yes, the program was indeed scheduled for recording, did not actually record the first ep of the new season of Stargate Atlantis. So I'll have to hunt it down somewhere. Grrr.

Read: The Gun in Daniel Webster's Bust - a light comic mystery from 1949 - and its sequel, The Green Plaid Pants. Picked up a collection of things by Rustam Ibragimbekov - some which have been turned into films and some which haven't (yet) - called Utomlyonnye solntsem (Утомлённые солнцем / Burnt by the Sun) . The films owe a great deal to Mikhalkov, of course, but I'm curious how the stories work on their own.

Get Sorted!

The Sorting Quiz Your Result: Ravenclaw You are smart, intelligent, and perceptive. You love information and flourish in facts. Though some Ravenclaws (like Luna) have an open mind, you might not have such an open mind, you might need proof for everything. But this isn't always a bad thing!

The Sorting Quiz Take More Quizzes

Carnival of the Godless

It's up at A Load of Bright - check it out.

Words from Robert Ingersoll - 13

The only good is happiness; and the only evil, is misery or unhappiness. Only those things are right that tend to increase the happiness of man; only those things are wrong that tend to increase the misery of man. That is the basis of right and wrong. There never would have been the idea except that a man can inflict suffering upon others.

—Religious Intolerance, 1879

Words from Robert Ingersoll - 12

Does an Infinite Being need to be protected by a State Legislature? If the Bible is inspired, does the author of it need the support of the law to command respect? We don't need any law to make mankind respect Shakespeare. We come to the altar of that great man and cover it with our gratitude without a statute. Think of a law to govern tastes! Think of a law to govern mind, or any question whatever!

—Human Rights

End of Summer Bumblebees

Getting the last of the summer's nectar before the cold comes.

"The" 40

I'm watching (sort of) this new War of the Worlds - no, not the Tom Cruise one, this I can already tell kind of cheesy 2005 Sci-Fi channel remake with C Thomas Howell. Anyway, supposedly they live in Virginia - in Greensboro. Our hero is trying to make it to DC to meet up with his wife, but the bridge is out and he can't get to Hopewell. As he stands there, all baffled, a woman walks up to him and informs him that the bridge is out, that "the terrorists got DC and the big cities first off", and that she herself is "gonna walk west, to the 40, and down to Tennessee."

And despite her quaint drawl, I don't believe for a minute that she's from around Greensboro. Not with that "the" in front of I-40's name.

Mad, Manic Mockers

Yesterday morning the mockingbirds were acting totally manic. Eight or ten of them were all over the little park, chasing each other in and out of the trees, across the paths and pond, and screeching the whole time. Every now and then they'd pause for a moment, and then start up again. Two of them nearly hit me - well, I suppose they'd have veered off and not really run into me, even if they hadn't made me jump. I got quite a few totally useless shots, several badly blurred ones, several of where the birds just had been - and these, in a rare few moments of rest.

Eleven Days ... and counting

Fergus Nicholl of the BBC this morning: "It's now quite clear that he was deliberately shot, in cold blood, by a soldier, as he lay on the ground." He is a Japanese journalist - Kenji Nagai of APF - who was filming the violence in Rangoon.

It shouldn't matter that a foreign journalist was shot. At least eight Burmese citizens were killed yesterday, another on Wednesday, and many more were injured. But it's always (still) shocking to me when a journalist is murdered - and this was murder, not merely a journalist caught in the cross fire - err. well. no "cross" fire in Burma, is there? - of the story he was covering.

The real story here, though, is the continuing courage of the Burmese people. It's true that the violence against the monks, the raids on monasteries and the assaults on and arrests of monks, and the blockades of monasteries to prevent the monks from joining, let alone leading, the marches, has thrown a chill into the crowds. The cutting off of the country's internet connection - belated, as if SLORC couldn't quite grasp the scope of the technology - is probably meant to shut the world out once again, but (I hope) it's too late. There are still bloggers passing on news, and photos and phone calls are still getting out.

But the chill hasn't stopped them. What all the calls are saying this morning is that the marching goes on. So, too, does the shooting.

The UN is sending an envoy, and SLORC (the name sounds so serial-movie evil, doesn't it?) has actually agreed to allow Ibrahim Gambari to come into the country. This is a good sign; perhaps the international outcry is having an effect on them.

one single policy - but which is it?

When Dan Damon observed that Cheney doesn't seem to believe the climate change is real, Kurt Volker, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, responded: "I would say that we have a single administration policy, which is set by the president and supported by every member of the administration, so you can't single out any one person."

And that policy seems to be "ignore the science," doesn't it?

Damon - in that polite but persistent BBC manner - kept pushing him to acknowledge that what he called "the private sector economic profit motive" is not enough to solve the problem, but he valiantly resisted admitting any need whatsoever for any kind of mandatory limits imposed by anyone at all and insisted that the private sector would find the solution without any need for government interference.

"Trust the Market - the Market will save us." Ah... maybe that's the policy.

Farsi. That's Farsi

In Maureen Dowd's otherwise excellent column Wednesday there's this line:

Even after the Iranian hostage crisis, America never really tried to comprehend the tribal politics in Iran — or Iraq — or bolster the Arab speakers in the intelligence community.

The Iranians don't speak Arabic. They don't even speak a Semitic language related to Arabic. They speak Farsi - an Indo-European language, also known as Persian.

She's right that we've never tried to understand Iran. Or the rest of the region, for that matter. And not even grasping that the Arabs, the Kurds, and the Iranians - and the Turks, too, for that matter - are different ethnicities, speaking different languages and having different histories, is just one dimension of that lack of understanding.

Ahmadinejad - let's not make a mistake about him

Newspaper headlines:

Iranian Leader Fails To Ease Tensions

Iran's leader courts Latin American leftists

New York: Iran's leader can't visit ground zero

NYC officials want Iran leader disinvited

Reporters:

Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad declared Tuesday that Iran’s disputed nuclear program is closed as a political issue and said Tehran will ignore a U.N. Security Council demand imposed by “arrogant powers” that it halt uranium enrichment.

Columnists:

Hey, people, he's the leader of Iran! He's news!.... Speech is a valuable tool against tyrants. We need to take full advantage of it, especially when tyrants can use it to discredit themselves.

I hold no brief for Ahmadinejad, but he is the ruler of a strategically important nation and it might be useful to hear what he has to say. It might be useful to tell him a little bit about what we think. It might even be useful to try to reach an accommodation with him, in the same way that we are trying to reach an accommodation with Kim Jong Il.

University presidents:

a petty and cruel dictator

and otherwise intelligent, informed bloggers:

I have to wonder exactly where a man who runs a police state gets off asking a question like this.

As much as I hate laws outlawing Holocaust denial, it is bizarre in the extreme to see the leader of a theocratic police state chastise European nations on this issue.

Iranian Despot to Speak at Columbia University

Some people get it. Anne Penketh, Martin Woolacott (in fact, most Brits), Nicholas Kirstoff, and even usually kinda shallow - though dead on funny - Maureen Dowd (though she does apparently think he's an Arab):

There are several problems with America's demonisation of Mr Ahmadinejad. Firstly, it confers on him a prominence in the Iranian power structure that he does not have in reality. It is not the Iranian president who wields the most power in Tehran: the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, calls the shots and decides nuclear policy. Secondly, scare-mongering has proved counter-productive by enabling him to portray nuclear power as a priority and a matter of national pride.

Ahmadinejad's equivalent disaster is internal. His inept domestic policies have led to discontent and even the occasional riot. In trying to regain popularity and keep the support of the real power in Iranian politics, the supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, how useful to be able to shake his fist at the US, or to disarm US critics with a display of wit and quick thinking.

The U.S. vice president and Iranian president, each the No. 2 in his country, certainly seem to be working together to create conflict between the two nations.

And on top of all that, we help build up the self-serving doofus Iranian president, a frontman with a Ph.D. in traffic management, into the sort of larger-than-life demon that the real powers in Iran — the mullahs — can love.

Are we getting the point? Ahmadinejad does not run Iran. He's very much a second banana. Here's a quick rundown on how the Iranian government actually works (thanks to Wikipedia for saving me the typing):

The political system of the Islamic Republic is based on the 1979 Constitution called the "Qanun-e Asasi" ("Fundamental Law"). The system comprises several intricately connected governing bodies. The Supreme Leader of Iran is responsible for delineation and supervision of "the general policies of the Islamic Republic of Iran". The Supreme Leader is Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces, controls the military intelligence and security operations; and has sole power to declare war. The heads of the judiciary, state radio and television networks, the commanders of the police and military forces and six of the twelve members of the Council of Guardians are appointed by the Supreme Leader. The Assembly of Experts elects and dismisses the Supreme Leader on the basis of qualifications and popular esteem. The Assembly of Experts is responsible for supervising the Supreme Leader in the performance of legal duties.

After the Supreme Leader, the Constitution defines the President of Iran as the highest state authority. The President is elected by universal suffrage for a term of four years. Presidential candidates must be approved by the Council of Guardians prior to running in order to ensure their allegiance to the ideals of the Islamic revolution. The President is responsible for the implementation of the Constitution and for the exercise of executive powers, except for matters directly related to the Supreme Leader, who has the final say in all matters. The President appoints and supervises the Council of Ministers, coordinates government decisions, and selects government policies to be placed before the legislature. Eight Vice-Presidents serve under the President, as well as a cabinet of twenty-one ministers, who must all be approved by the legislature. Unlike many other states, the executive branch in Iran does not control the armed forces. Although the President appoints the Ministers of Intelligence and Defense, it is customary for the President to obtain explicit approval from the Supreme Leader for these two ministers before presenting them to the legislature for a vote of confidence.

So, can we all agree that Ahmadinejad is a first class jerk at best and a horrible, bigoted, aggressive man, but acknowledge that he does not "lead" Iran in any substantive sense of the word? Which means he's not a ruler, he's not a tyrant, and he's not a despot. He's a figurehead, he's window dressing, he's a Potemkin village of a president. Okay?

I know the fact he's called "president" makes it tempting to think he's the boss of Iran. But he's a lot like the president of Israel, or Germany that way: he's not the boss of much. Somebody else is.

In Israel, a Prime Minister. In Germany, a Chancellor. And in the case of Iran, the rather pointedly named "Supreme Leader".

"They are killing our monks"

The military raided monasteries last night in Burma (aka Myanmar) and apparently arrested an undetermined number of monks. Schools are shut, and there are reports that the military is shooting in the crowds in Rangoon (Yangon) and possibly Mandalay as well.

As the BBC says,

A monk at Ngwe Kyar Yan monastery pointed to bloodstains on the concrete floor and said a number of monks were beaten and at least 100 of its 150 monks taken away in vehicles. Shots were fired in the air during the chaotic raid, he said on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

"Soldiers slammed the monastery gate with the car, breaking the lock and forcing it into the monastery," the monk said. "They smashed the doors down, broke windows and furniture. When monks resisted, they shot at the monks and used tear gas and beat up the monks and dragged into trucks."

Empty bullet shells, broken doors, furniture and glass peppered the bloodstained, concrete floor of the monastery.

A female lay disciple said a number of monks also were arrested at the Moe Gaung monastery, which was being guarded by soldiers. Both monasteries are located in Yangon's northern suburbs.

Nonetheless, and despite a smaller number of monks on the street, the marches continue. According to bloggers - unconfirmed still - and emails to the BBC there is shooting and tear gas. "Things are bad in Rangoon," one blogger says. "They are killing our monks," says another, "help us, please."

This time, unlike 1988, the world is watching - the Internet gets things out. What effect that will have, if any - Burma is already pretty well ostracized - and whether anything but watching will take place, remains to be seen.

Carnival of the Liberals - across the sea

Something new for the 48th Carnival of the Liberals: a transatlantic host! Yes, the carnival is at Liberal England, and our host has provided us with a bit of the UK as a bonus - ten extra posts of which he says "I don't expect the people who write these blogs would all call themselves liberals, but I hope you find them interesting and that they give a picture of political life over here." That's in addition to the ten selected Best of the Liberal blogosphere.

So that means twice as much good reading. Bookmark it and take your time - and explore the UK a bit while you're there.

from our Poet Laureate

by Charles Simic

Empire of Dreams

On the first page of my dreambook
It’s always evening
In an occupied country.
Hour before the curfew.
A small provincial city.
The houses all dark.
The storefronts gutted.

I am on a street corner
Where I shouldn’t be.
Alone and coatless
I have gone out to look
For a black dog who answers to my whistle.
I have a kind of Halloween mask
Which I am afraid to put on.


The Old World

I believe in the soul; so far

It hasn’t made much difference.

I remember an afternoon in Sicily.

The ruins of some temple.

Columns fallen in the grass like naked lovers.

The olives and goat cheese tasted delicious

And so did the wine

With which I toasted the coming night,

The darting swallows,

The Saracen wind and moon.

It got darker. There was something

Long before there were words:

The evening meal of shepherds ...

A fleeting whiteness among the trees ...

Eternity eavesdropping on time.

The goddess going to bathe in the sea.

She must not be followed.

These rocks, these cypress trees,

May be her old lovers.

Oh to be one of them, the wine whispered to me.

Happy Birthday, Thomas

Today in St Louis in 1888 TS Eliot was born. He wrote many poems, most famous perhaps "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" and "The Waste Land" - and of course "The Hollow Men", which begins "We are the hollow men" and ends

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

He also wrote the source poems for "Cats". And this:

Morning at the Window

THEY are rattling breakfast plates in basement kitchens,
And along the trampled edges of the street
I am aware of the damp souls of housemaids
Sprouting despondently at area gates.

The brown waves of fog toss up to me
Twisted faces from the bottom of the street,
And tear from a passer-by with muddy skirts
An aimless smile that hovers in the air
And vanishes along the level of the roofs.

More of his poems here

A Stone, A Leaf, A Door

Although Thomas Wolfe isn't thought of as a poet, back in 1945 John S. Barnes published a little book called "A Stone, A Leaf, A Door" which revealed the poetry inherent in the novelist's magical prose.

The Fading Light of Day

And the slant light steepened in the skies,
The old red light of waning day
Made magic fire upon the river,
And the train made on forever its tremendous monotone
That was like silence and forever—
And now there was nothing
But that tremendous monotone of time and silence
And the river, the haunted river,
The enchanted river
That drank forever its great soundless tides
From out the inland slowly,
And that moved through all men's lives
The magic thread of its huge haunting spell,
And that linked his life to magic kingdoms
And to lotus-land
And to all the vision of the magic earth
That he had dreamed of as a child,
And that bore him on forever
Out of magic
To all the grime and sweat and violence of the city,
And into America.

The great river burned there in his vision
In that light of fading day,
And it was hung there
In that spell of silence and forever,
And it was flowing on forever,
And it was stranger than a legend,
And as dark as time.

Webb vs Warner

Another quick pointer, this one to Jon Carroll's column on the Webb bill and John Warner:

The Iraq war has created soldiers who are distracted from their mission and disoriented when the job is complete. Not the soldiers' fault; anyone can crack under the strain, and adjustment to civilian life is inevitably difficult. Nevertheless, we are badly damaging two nations, and the effects will be felt for years.

The Bush administration's indifference to our fighting forces is legendary. They utter "support the troops" whenever possible, which they back up by not supporting the troops. Had the invasion force been the right size to begin with, the unfair tours of duty would not have been necessary. If the invasion had never happened, we might actually have had a chance to help in the quest for international peace.

But Webb's bill was narrow; it addressed only the issue of extending tours of duty and abusing "stop loss" policies. Naturally, the Pentagon was against it, saying it would "interfere with complex troop deployment schedules." Well, duh - that was the point. And the Bush administration, which sees everything it doesn't agree with as an attack on the heart of the presidency, lobbied hard against it.

Ahmadinejad in New York revisited

Go read Glenn Greenwald on Ahmadinejad at Columbia:

All of the hysteria over Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's speaking at Columbia University is so tiresome for so many reasons, beginning with the fact that it is all rather transparently motivated by exactly what Juan Cole says: "The real reason his visit is controversial is that the American right has decided the United States needs to go to war against Iran. Ahmadinejad is therefore being configured as an enemy head of state."

In their minds, we are at war with Iran -- even though, in reality, i.e., according to our Constitution, we are not -- and all of the ensuing hysteria is rooted in the fantasy world they occupy in which Iran is our Enemy at War. By their nature, such fantasies cannot be reasoned with.

...

Apparently, among the American press now, it is unchallengably true that the Iranian Government has the Blood of American Soliders on its hands and is a "terrorist state." I guess our "journalists" have decided that "only a fool -- or possibly a Frenchman -- could conclude otherwise." After all, even the left-wing Michael Gordon and the NYT admit this, and they couldn't be wrong about such matters.

And besides, our Top Military Commanders in Iraq are making these accusations, and we all just learned last week from Our Senate that we must never question "the honor and integrity . . . of members of the United States Armed Forces." Our media, of course, has been diligently following that Rule for many, many years.

Skepticism of government officials? Media objectivity? First Amendment freedoms? Due Process and Habeas Corpus and diplomacy? Ahmadinejad is Hitler, Our Enemy, and We are at War -- with him and forever. That's all we really need to know.

When he's right - as he so often is - he's terribly right.

And even if you don't go read the whole column, check this:

Scott Pelley wants Ahmadinejad to know that -- like all of us -- he "owes President Bush." Almost every word out of Pelley's mouth was a faithful recitation of the accusations made by the Bush White House. Ahmadinejad obviously does not watch much American news because he seemed genuinely surprised that someone he thought was a reporter was doing nothing other than reciting the script of the government.

Oh, snap.

Monday Science Links

This week's heaping helping of science:

• Mark Liberman at Language Log looks at a Professor Hodgins and his brain 'crockus' - with a follow-up here - and the neurological research that doesn't support anything Hodgins is saying.


• John Hawks in his Anthropology Weblog looks at a new look at climate and Neandertals and concludes they didn't die of the cold.


• Cfeagans at Hot Cup of Joe looks at the Bosnian Pyramid (remember that?) and how it collapsed.


• Stefan Scherer at Back Reaction looks at the equinoxes and explains how we know with such precision when they come.


• Pamela Gay at Star Stryder looks at Mars and its tantalizing promises that never quite come true.

Enjoy!

The Week in Entertainment

Film: Stardust, which I thoroughly enjoyed. (Momentary digression: what is it with Ebert? Every now and then I read a review by him that makes me say "Weren't you paying attention?" Like this line: "The dying king believes Yvaine can restore his throne to his living sons, although let's hope he doesn't try dividing the kingdom among them." No. No, he doesn't. He doesn't even know Yvaine exists.) Peter O'Toole is underused, but having seen Venus I wonder if this was an in-joke? At any rate, better underused O'Toole than someone not up to the part, I always say. De Niro was having too much fun in a part not exactly in the book - Johannes Alberic the lightning catcher was a rather different character - but it works in the movie, at least at the time. The whole movie works, though it does (of course) depart from the book, especially the ending, and I can recommend it without hesitation.

DVD: "Am I to understand that in order to save his contemptible life he dared to practice upon our credulous simplicity?" The Pirates of Penzance - the Kevin Kline version (stage, not movie, though that's good too). I love this one.

TV: Now I'm confused. I'm a fan of Dr Who and Torchwood, in that I watch them without fail. But I'm not in the fandom. So I was assuming that this multi-part Dr Who with Captain Jack would be the set-up for Torchwood. But... in last week's Torchwood he still had the hand, and in the first episode he told Gwen "maybe someday I'll find a doctor - the right sort of Doctor - and he'll explain" Jack's immortality. And then in the first part of this Dr Who he used the hand and found the Doctor and got his explanation... And now I note that the guide says Dr Who is 2007 and Torchwood 2006, so I guess he was in Torchwood (the institute) already. I suppose it will all be made clear, particularly how Jack dealt with nearly 140 years of waiting - and his genuine joy at the whole leaping-in-headfirst style of the Doctor's life. Meanwhile, I'm now wondering if the lingering presence of Rose, coupled with her (Martha's) insight into the Doctor's extremely temporary relationships with his Companions ("I make us sound like stray dogs... is that what we are?" she said, and listened to Doctor admitting that he'd left Jack behind because he has a "busy life, moving on"), is why Martha leaves him. This is really interesting - a bit confusing with the two shows out of sync on two networks, but I wouldn't want to have to choose between them. And oh, yeah - I did like the little look we got into Owen.

Read: Finished The End of Iraq. Kurd-centric, but very comprehensive and actually provides some plan for getting us out. A good read and highly recommended. Then Close Quarters by Michael Gilbert - his first, and a good puzzler.

The Humanist Symposium

An uplifting edition of the Humanist Symposium is up at Elliptica. It rhymes! And the posts are excellent reading for a Sunday morning.

I particularly like the host's look at the Rubiyat of Omar Khayyam (and Edward FitzGerald), but all the posts are worth reading and thinking about.

Happy Birthday, Euripides

This is the day we celebrate the birth of one of ancient Greece's greatest dramatists, Euripides. He reshaped Attic drama by featuring petty and uncaring gods, flawed but human heroes, strong women, and smart slaves.

Of his more than 90 plays, 19 survive (more than Aeschylus and Sophocles together), among them Alcestis, The Bacchae, Elektra, Iphigenia At Aulis, Iphegenia in Tauris, Medea, and The Trojan Women.

Happy Birthday to the Music

Today was a good day for music! John Coltrane (1926), Ray Charles (1930), and Bruce Springsteen (1946), all!

Carnival of Maryland

Once again, it's that highly eclectic Carnival of Maryland, this time over at the Abolition of Man. Widely diverse viewpoints - all we have in common is where we live. Something for everyone from the Maryland Blogger Alliance. Check it out!

Another silly quiz ... if coffee is silly, that is

I don't actually drink lattes, so I just skipped the question about what kind of milk...

What Your Latte Says About You

You don't treat yourself very often. You find that indulging doesn't jibe with your very disciplined life. You are a very serious person. You don't have time for silly antics. You have a good deal of energy, but you pace yourself. You never burn out too fast. You're addicted to caffeine. There's no denying it. You are a child at heart, and you don't ever miss the opportunity to do something playful. You are complex and philosophical, but you are never arrogant.

What Does Your Latte Say About You?

(I do find it interesting that I'm "a very serious person" with "no time for silly antics" and yet I "don't ever miss the opportunity to do something playful.")

You are not yet ready ... to be EATEN

I've always found commercials where the animals the food is made out of encourage you to eat them extremely strange, even a bit disturbing. (The Dish of the Day at Milliways satirizes this advertising concept beautifully.) I like the cows that climb ladders to paint "Eat more chikin" - that makes sense. Charlie Tuna was unclear on the concept. But Burger King's new commercial for their "spicy chick'n crisp sandwich" is beyond bizarre. The chicken is actually training - working hard - to get eaten. It's as weird as Charlie Tuna.

Three moons

Three of Saturn's moons and the edge of the rings are visible in this photo. The two larger ones are among the four discovered by Giovanni Cassini: Rhea (1672) behind Tethys (1684). He named them (along with Dione and Iapetus) the Sidera Lodoicea ("the stars of Louis") to honor King Louis XIV. Astronomers gave Saturn's moons numbers instead of names (Rhea began as Saturn III and became V when new moons were discovered closer to the planet, while Tethys was I and then III) until 1847, when John Herschel (son of the man who discovered Mimas and Enceladus, the new I and II) suggested that the numbers were cumbersome, and that the names of the Titans (Saturn's siblings in mythology) be used instead. With Saturn's moons now numbering over sixty, it's a good thing they took him up on the suggestion, though they ran out of Titans long ago and have branched out into lesser Greek figures and, in fact, other mythologies as well (such as Kiviuq, Paaliaq, Skathi, Fenrir, and Bebhionn). The third moon here is the outer F-Ring shepherd Pandora, tiny and discovered in 1981 thanks to Voyager I.

Check the Cassini-Huygens home for more details.

Ahmadinejad in New York

I'm not at all sure what Ahdmadinejad might have accomplished if he'd been allowed to lay a wreath at "Ground Zero".

I do know what forbidding him to do so will gain him.

What he wanted to accomplish, for the audience he wanted to impress, he's accomplished.

Why can't people just think for a minute?

Whose tree is it, anyway?

A large crow ought to own his tree, right? Not if a mockingbird is around and feeling territorial. Size isn't everything. The crow was driven from branch to branch and finally left with a small gray and white pursuer on his tail.

Look who's back!

I haven't seen the flicker in a while, but here he was, back again.

More fun with grammar checker

Just guess what grammar checker wants changed in this:

The poster wasn’t from Covent Garden, however, but La Scala. The diva, surely, though she didn’t know Callas by sight, stood in a simple white draping robe, white flowers wreathed on her dark head, her hand resting on a boulder barely distinguishable against the dark background.

I sincerely doubt you got it.

The diva stood in simple white draping robe, white flowers wreathed on her dark head...
or
The diva stood in a simple white draping robe, white flower wreathed on her dark head...

Amazing.

Who and the Bird? I and the Bird!

I and the Bird #58 is up at The Nightjar,
Where The Ancient World Meets The Modern World , and it's a doozy. To start with, a certain fellow with a police box drops in...

I'm especially recommending Reconciliation Ecology's post on the 11,000km+ flight - non-stop - of a godwit; I'm not sure which is most amazing: the bird or the satellite tracking that proves what the birds do! Also check out the baby owls at s The Friends of the Florissant Fossil Beds, Inc. My own Tree Full of Birds made it, and as always there are many, many more.

Maryland's court blows it

This week, Maryland's Supreme Court let us all down. As Kelly Brownington wrote in the Sun:

The court's majority opinion rejected the plaintiffs' claim that the 1973 statute discriminates on the basis of gender. In addition, the court concluded that while marriage is a fundamental right, it is not a right extended to gays and lesbians under current state law.

A fundamental right not extended to everyone.

How is that "fundamental"? Seriously. How?

Added because it's apparent people have been misinterpreting this. I'm not asking for a discourse on the legal definition. I'm rhetorically asking how we can call something "fundamental" when it is not extended to everyone. Okay? I know it's the law. To quote Mr Bumble, somewhat out of context: "If the law supposes that, the law is a ass — a idiot".

And how's this for a thundering non sequitur? (Though he doesn't slam the door on the idea, at least.)

In the majority opinion, Judge Glenn T. Harrell Jr. wrote that the state has a legitimate interest in promoting opposite-sex marriage. But he also reminded lawmakers that they have the right to consider a law permitting same-sex marriages.

"In declaring that the State's legitimate interests in fostering procreation and encouraging the traditional family structure ... our opinion should by no means be read to imply that the General Assembly may not grant and recognize for homosexual persons civil unions or the right to marry a person of the same sex," he said.

I got news for Harrell: procreation doesn't have to be "fostered". People will procreate anyway. And since when is "it's traditional" a good defense? A hell of a lot of things we view with horror have been "traditional" - a lot of of them right here.

More than that, would someone please show me how allowing gays to marry would "discourage" opposite-sex marriage, or whatever the opposite of "promote" is? In fact, a study reported in that not-exactly-liberal Wall Street Journal showed the exact opposite happens:

[T]here is no evidence that allowing same-sex couples to marry weakens the institution. If anything, the numbers indicate the opposite. A decade after Denmark, Norway and Sweden passed their respective partnership laws, heterosexual marriage rates had risen 10.7% in Denmark; 12.7% in Norway; and a whopping 28.8% in Sweden. In Denmark over the last few years, marriage rates are the highest they've been since the early 1970s. Divorce rates among heterosexual couples, on the other hand, have fallen. A decade after each country passed its partnership law, divorce rates had dropped 13.9% in Denmark; 6% in Norway; and 13.7% in Sweden. On average, divorce rates among heterosexuals remain lower now than in the years before same-sex partnerships were legalized.

In addition, out-of-wedlock birthrates in each of these countries contradict the suggestion by social conservatives that gay marriage will lead to great increases in out-of-wedlock births and therefore less family stability for children. In Denmark, the percentage of out-of-wedlock births was 46% in 1989; now it is 45%. In Norway, out-of-wedlock births jumped from 14% in 1980 to 45% right before partnerships were adopted in 1993; now they stand at 51%, a much lower rate of increase than in the decade before same-sex unions. The Swedish trend mirrors that of Norway, with much lower rates of increase post-partnership than pre-partnership.

Can we argue that allowing same-sex marriage helps opposite-sex marriage? Well, no; correlation isn't cause. But we can certainly say that there is correlation. We can say that there's no harm done.

Stopping people from getting married is what hurts marriage.

And we can argue the rational point of view that by continually saying, as some opponents do, that "gays can get everything they need without having to get married" does say that getting married isn't necessary. Perhaps not for anyone? Perhaps... "We don't need a piece of paper" was a heterosexual saying, after all.

And then there's this sophistry:

The majority opinion rejected the plaintiffs' claim that denying gay marriages is a form of sex discrimination. In fact, sex discrimination does not apply to individuals, only to groups, the court stated.

This is a group, guys. A pretty big group, too.

No, as far as I'm concerned there's only one valid argument, and that's the "it's against my religion" argument. But you know what? There is no church out there with a monopoly on marriage, not in this country. Divorced people can get married (just look at the leadership of the GOP). People can marry outside their faith. Atheists can get married - atheistically. No religious official has to be involved at all.

The state has to be involved; it's "by the authority vested in me by the state" that makes the religious "rite of holy matrimony" mean anything for your taxes, inheritance, kids, property, health care, etc. A marriage license is a legal document not a holy ritual. Nobody's saying that passing a law allowing same-sex marriage will force churches who only accept opposite-sex marriages to perform them. It's churches screaming about the law. (Some churches; others are happy to perform "rites of holy union" for any couple. Some are happy to perform them for a man and a bunch of women - or girls.)

The solution is to decouple this legal ritual entirely from the church. Entirely. If you want to conclude the civil contract of "union", do it civilly. Just like you can get "married" by a JP and not drag any clergy into it. But go all the way. Don't let that clergyman have the right to do anything legally binding. Make all couples go to the city hall, not just for the license, but also for the "ceremony". That way, if a church doesn't want to marry two guys, fine - just like you can't force one to marry a divorcee or heretic.

The thing is, those divorcees or heretics don't have to go to a church to marry. Why should anyone else?

I'm writing my state representatives. Civil marriage is a civil right. It shouldn't be hostage to religion.

added after reading Hax's chat today - a comment posted by someone there which sums it all up (responding to someone wondering what's the point in getting married, what with the rising divorce rate and all):

As someone not legally allowed to marry the woman that she loves, I've been forced to think about this a lot.

I have a will, but marriage would mean that if I died, she wouldn't have to go through probate court to inherit the car that's only in my name because owning joint property is harder if you're not married. Marriage would mean she could inherit my Social Security benefits. Marriage would mean I wouldn't worry they could keep her out of the hospital if I got sick.

It's true that lots of marriages end in divorce. But you know what? Having been married even means that when the relationship ends, there's a legal structure to protect both of you, divide up your joint resources, decide custody, etc. If you don't or can't get married, no protections there either.

It just burns me up to no end to hear straight folks whining about how marriage is meaningless. It's only meaningless if you've never really thought about what it would mean if you couldn't have it.

Happy Birthday, Stevie

Today in Hull, in Yorkshire, England, in 1902 Stevie Smith was born.

Was It Not Curious?
Upon seeing English children in the slave market, Aúgustin asked who they were. Being told they were "Angli", that is, English, he said "Non Angli sed angeli", that is, Not English but angels, and Pope Gregory I, hearing the story, promptly sent Aúgustin to England to convert the English.

Was it not curious of Aúgustin
Saint Aúgustin, Saint Aúgustin,
When he saw the beautiful British children
To say such a curious thing?
He said he must send the gospel, the gospel,
At once to them over the waves
He never said he thought it was wicked
To steal them away for slaves
To steal the children away
To buy and have slavery at all
Oh no, oh no, it was not a thing
That caused him any appal.
Was it not curious of Gregory
Rather more than of Aúgustin?
It was not curious so much
As it was wicked of them.

Email from Russ:

Got this yesterday. This is apparently the way to do it. If we can't get a veto-proof majority, just don't pass the funding. It can be done.

As you may have already heard, this week I plan to once again introduce binding legislation that uses Congress's 'power of the purse' to safely redeploy our troops out of Iraq. Last May, with your help, we saw a majority of Democratic senators support a similar proposal. Unfortunately, too many of my colleagues, on both sides of the aisle, continue to be recklessly timid when it comes to blocking funding for one of the biggest mistakes in the history of our country.

But after yet another week of the same old rhetoric from the White House, Republicans in Congress, and through the testimony of both General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker, my hope is that more of my colleagues will finally join the millions of Americans that agree - now is the time to safely redeploy our brave men and women in uniform out of Iraq.

Tell my colleagues to support Feingold-Reid

To be clear, my proposal blocks further funding for the war AFTER the troops have been safely redeployed. That emphasis is an important one to make, as some Republicans, and way too many Democrats, have time and again incorrectly made the false claim that they couldn’t support my ‘power of the purse’ proposal because 'we can't cut funding for our troops.' Any elected official or talking head who puts forth that dishonest argument when discussing my proposal, knows the truth and is simply too timid to take on misleading attacks by the White House. The Feingold-Reid legislation sets a timetable to redeploy our troops by June 30, 2008 - at which time further funding for the war would be terminated.

Let my colleagues know the truth about Feingold-Reid

While many in Congress have acknowledged that the President has the wrong strategy when it comes to Iraq, Congress has thus far failed to do anything about it. With our military at the breaking point and our ability to go after those who attacked us on 9/11 hampered by an Iraq-centric foreign policy, the time has come for Congress to use its constitutional power - the 'power of the purse' - to end this misguided war in Iraq. I will need your help to take another step in our fight. Please contact your senators today and tell them to support the Feingold-Reid legislation.

Sincerely,

Even a broken clock...

Back when we invaded Grenada, Maggie Thatcher said something very prescient (hat tip to Geoffrey Wheatcroft, NYTimes):

The Western democracies use force “to preserve our way of life — we do not use it to walk into other people’s countries.” If a new law is ordained that the United States will intervene wherever there is a regime that it dislikes, Mrs. Thatcher said, “then we are going to have really terrible wars in the world.”

No kidding.

When is a "vow" a "threat"?

And speaking of tiny disconnects in the media, how about this one? The teaser headline reads

Iran draws up plans to bomb Israel (AP)

but when you get to the page, the headline there reads

Iranian: Retaliation if Israel attacks

The story (by Ali Akbar Dareini of the AP) begins

The deputy commander of Iran's air force said Wednesday that plans have been drawn up to bomb Israel if the Jewish state attacks Iran, according to the semiofficial Fars news agency.

The announcement came amid rising tensions in the region with the United States calling for a new round of U.N. sanctions against Iran over its disputed nuclear program and Israeli planes having recently overflown, and perhaps even attacked, Iranian ally Syria.

The nerve of those guys. Saying they'll fight back. Really - I mean, how dare they?

The White House certainly bridled at it.

White House press secretary Dana Perino called Alavi's comment "unhelpful."

"It is not constructive and it almost seems provocative," she said. "Israel doesn't seek a war with its neighbors. And we all are seeking, under the U.N. Security Council resolutions, for Iran to comply with its obligations."

Of course, Iran says it is, and the recent unpleasantness that erupted when we insisted that Iraq "comply with its obligations" and Iraq said that it was, and we said that it wasn't and invaded, and then found out that, gosh, yes, I guess it was, can't be helping the situation.

Nor can labeling "plans drawn up to bomb Israel if the Jewish state attacks" as simple "plans to bomb Israel". There's a reason witnesses are told to tell "the whole truth", guys.

Nor can using scare words like "threaten" and "boast" when quoting Iranians (but not Israelis).

Iran has threatened in the past that Israel would be Iran's first retaliatory target if attacked by the United States. But Alavi's comments were the first word of specific contingency plans for striking back on Israel.

Many in the region fear Israel could launch airstrikes on Iranian nuclear facilities to prevent it from building a nuclear weapon.

Alavi also warned that Israel was within Iran's medium-range missiles and its fighter bombers, while maintaining that Israel was not strong enough to launch an aerial attack against Iran.

"The whole territory of this regime is within the range of our missiles. Moreover, we can attack their territory with our fighter bombers as a response to any attack," the general said.

An upgraded version of Iran's Shahab-3 missile has a range of 1,200 miles, capable of reaching Israel and carrying a nuclear warhead.

Alavi said Iran's radar bases were monitoring activities at the country's borders around the clock and boasted that it had the capability to confront U.S. cruise missiles.

"One of the issues enemies make publicity about is their cruise missiles. Now, we possess the necessary systems to confront them (the cruise missiles)," Alavi was quoted as saying.

Look. We all know why Israel bombed Syria. Let's start by dismissing the fantasies (Syria's developing nukes? Syria and Iran are working together to develop nukes? Syria's hiding North Korea's nukes for them?) and looking at geopolitical reality.

Simon Tisdall summed it up nicely in the Guardian:

Among the less convoluted explanations for Israel's action - that it was testing Syria's new Russian-made air defences, that it was intent on destroying terrorist training camps, or (as Syria claims) it was trying to destroy the peace process - the suggestion that the target was Iranian missiles and other arms stores bound for Hizbullah in Lebanon rings most true.

Iran says it offers only moral and financial support to its Shia allies. But there are persistent, credible reports predating the Lebanon summer war of Iranian weapons supplies transiting Syria via northern Iraq (and occasionally intercepted by anti-Iranian Kurdish guerrillas).

Government opponents in Tehran also say they believe some missiles fired into Israel by Hizbullah last year were obtained via the Syrian route - and that Tehran's action in supplying arms to proxy forces in Lebanon fits a pattern in evidence in Iraq and Afghanistan.

But while cutting Hizbullah's lifelines and reasserting its regional deterrence capabilities after last summer's humiliations may have been Israel's aim, its dramatic action - and its unusual silence since - suggests another purpose. The raid represented a deadly serious, silent message of intent - literally, a warning shot - to Tehran, fired with Washington's evident, equally tacit approval.

Stories about Korean-made nukes secreted in Arabian wastes will sound like fairytales to many. The real-time targets are, potentially, Iran's nuclear, military and command facilities. And Israel, no longer content with trial runs up and down the Mediterranean, just demonstrated how easily it could hit them.

And Iran wants Israel to know they'll hit back.

Sure, we don't like it when the Bad Guys say they'll hit back. But is that really a "threat"?

They tore down that wall

The New York Times paywall is down! You have to look at an ad to get to the Opinion section, but you can.

No more of me posting whole columns here.

Yay!

Oh, that's sweet

Headline: Israel declares Gaza "enemy entity" as Rice visits
Photo: Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (L) receives an olive branch pin from Israel's Foreign Ministry Chief of Protocol, Ambassador Itzhak Eldan (R), upon her arrival at Ben Gurion International Airport near Tel Aviv

So I guess Israel doesn't want to go to war with us, eh? What a relief!

Seriously - isn't there just the tiniest disconnect between the headline and the picture?

Gaza is one of those unfortunate cascading democratic elections that we thought we wanted when we invaded Iraq. Reminds me of the old Tom Lehrer song (they've got to be protected, all their rights respected, till somebody we like can be elected!), more bitter than funny.

For some facts, check the Reuters article by Jeffery Heller that accompanied the picture. It says, in part:

By formally defining the Gaza Strip as an enemy entity, Israel could argue that it cannot be bound by international law governing the administration of occupied territory to supply utilities to the population of 1.5 million.

A senior U.N. official, however, cautioned Israel against cutting essential services to Gaza.

"Any action to cut off electricity and other essentials is against international humanitarian law, and Israel should consider this very carefully before any actions that it takes," the official said.

Israel withdrew troops and settlers from the Gaza Strip in 2005. Palestinians say it is still under occupation because Israel controls its borders, air space and coastal waters.

According to Israeli and Palestinian officials, Gaza's population uses approximately 200 megawatts of electricity, out of which 120 are provided directly from Israeli power lines, 17 are delivered from Egypt and 65 are produced at a plant in Gaza.

The territory and its power station are also dependent on Israeli fuel supplies, some funded by the European Union.

Of course, Israel complains (rightly) about the rockets fired from Gaza into Israel. On the other hand, while these rockets are no doubt terrifying, only 14 people have died as a result of such attacks in the last six years - 14 for over 6,000 rockets - so they're not very effective, compared to the artillery, tanks, and air strikes that answer them - those probably don't get the guys who shot the rockets, but they kill three or four hundred a year and injure twice that.

Speaking of disconnects...

"Two very different issues"

"How will [Blackwater's loss of its license] impact the diplomats and those trying to rebuild Iraq?" asked Dan Damon.

"That's two very different issues," the correspondent (Sykes I think his name was) responded from Baghdad.

His point? That the diplomats rarely travel, in the first place, and that they aren't actually reconstructing anything when they do. Most of the reconstruction work, he said, is being done by Army Engineers. If the diplomats don't drive around, not much impact will be felt on reconstruction efforts.

He didn't mention that Iraq is getting so safe, post-surge, that heavily armed guards just aren't needed by diplomats anymore... funny, that.

Circles, Curves, and a Line

In this image, Cassini the spacecraft's cameras captured one of Cassini the astronomer's moons - Tethys - and the rings, edge-on. As the light strikes the rings from below, great sweeping shadows are cast on the planet's surface, revealing the complex structure of the rings which, in the picture, look like a straight line. Tethys, one of the larger moons (witness the early date of its discovery - 1684), orbits inside the E Ring (which is created by Enceladus's cryovolcanic activity) but outside the F Ring.

See the Cassini-Huygens page for details.

Study in Black & White & Gray

Enceladus - the most reflective object in the solar system - passes in front of its larger, dimmer sibling Dione (which reflects a mere 70% of the light that hits it). The picture was taken in July at a distance of approximately 1.9 million kilometers (1.2 million miles) from Enceladus and 2.2 million kilometers (1.3 million miles) from Dione. Check the Cassini-Huygens site for details.

Yay for the intertubes!

Thank ingenuity, we have streaming audio over the internet!

WAMU changed their schedule. Back in January I was so pleased to find that they'd picked up the slack from WETA's going all classical, but although WAMU is going more NPR and talk/news, they've moved Morning Edition to 5 am. I'm not a huge fan of Morning Edition and I certainly wasn't won over by yesterday's huge segment on Brownback ... and not Brownback now, but his first campaign.

So, it's back to BBC.co.uk and World Update over the internet. Just listened to Dan Damon discussing the monks' revolt in Burma - I doubt that was on World Update.

Happy Birthday, Sam!

Born this day in 1709 in Lichfield, England, that great lexicographer and writer, Dr Samuel Johnson, who was also the subject of the first great biography in English.

During a conversation with his biographer, Johnson became infuriated at the suggestion that Berkeley's idealism, the theory that individuals can only directly know sensations and ideas of objects, not abstractions such as "matter", could not be refuted. In his anger, Johnson powerfully kicked a nearby stone and proclaimed "I refute it thus!"

A much quoted man, he also said:

It is better to suffer wrong than to do it, and happier to be sometimes cheated than not to trust.

The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.

Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information on it.

And his Boswell (Boswell) reported this:

Patriotism having become one of our topicks, Johnson suddenly uttered, in a strong determined tone, an apophthegm, at which many will start: "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel." But let it be considered that he did not mean a real and generous love of our country, but that pretended patriotism which so many, in all ages and countries, have made a cloak of self- interest.

And I can't resist... lolxicographer Johnson (from Jeff Prucher):

For? or In?

Not that I'm complaining about Cardin (yet). But when you send out a mailing about your first 8 months as a senator, perhaps you should have a new header?

Monday Science Links

Your weekly dose of science:

• John McKay at archy on the Diamond Sychotron - and reading those fragile manuscripts


• Jennifer Ouellette at Cocktail Party Physics on Chagas disease - one nasty little parasite and paratransgenesis, a new way to fight many more.


• Larry Moran at Sandwalk on genome size and complexity - and while you're there, looking at his short series on the Freedom in the Classroom (2007) report from the American Association of University Professors.


• Judith Weingarten at Zenobia: Empress of the East on why the Romans always got in the first blow although the Sassanid Persians had one heck of an army.


• Brian Switek at Laelaps on the branching bush of horse evolution - long and copiously illustrated and well worth the reading.

Enjoy!

The Week in Entertainment

TV: The Doctor and Captain Jack, of course. Doctor Who was one of those occasional ones with only a bit of the Doctor, but it was good. I cried when Sally found Billy the second time... (And I confess I understand Larry's stunned "You've only got 17 DVDs???") The angels have the phonebox. I want that on a t-shirt, too! Torchwood continues to be good. I love that Toshi, Owen, and Ianto don't know anything about Jack. I love that Ianto doesn't care. (Hopefully Toshi will get a bit more personality - Owen has a bit too much already.) I watched a couple of episodes of Hotel Babylon Saturday - rather intriguing though I'm not sure I'll look for it again. Maybe. Also caught "Dark Passage," that most bizarre of all Bogart/Bacall films. And I found "After the Fox" on FLIXe. I love this movie and have for a long time, and I was so glad to see it's as funny as I remembered it being. Peter Sellers and Victor Mature, Neil Simon script, hilarious. "I suspect ... I suspect hanky-panky!" And the Gold of Cairo ... so funny.

Read: The Widening Stain, and started Peter Galbraith's The End of Iraq.

More fun with grammar checker

So, here's a sentence grammar checker didn't like.

"He didn’t regret what he’d done, what he’d let Jack and Martin do; he did wish they had won."

I dare you to guess what it wants fixed.

It wants "he'd let Jack and Martin" changed to "he let Jack and Martin would".

Yes. It wants

"He didn’t regret what he’d done, what he let Jack and Martin would do; he did wish they had won."

Honestly. "He let Jack and Martin would do."

Words fail me.

Carnival of the Godless

The Carnival of the Godless is up at Ain't Christian. Lots of good reading.

Wait, what - head toe?

I just caught the end of The Fantastic Four and noticed something I'd missed when I saw it in the theater: the ship that's taking Victor von Doom to Latveria at the end has a Cyrillic name painted on it: головка пальца ноги, golovka pal'tsa nogi. Which means "head toe". Is that something meaningful that I'm just not getting?

головка is actually 'little head', or any of a lot of words depending on the context, such as "cap, nozzle, stem, pommel, headpiece, front edge, face, tip, edge..." You get the picture. And пальца ноги is, literlly, "digit/finger of-the-foot", hence "toe".

Carnival of the Liberals

The Carnival of the Liberal is up, belatedly, at Plural Politics. Ali put up links to the also-rans, as well, so this carnival gives you plenty to read.

How many countries in Iraq?

Over at Talking Points Memo, the've looked into the president's claim that there are 36 members of the "coalition of the willing".

So there you have it: 26 in MNF-I; seven in the Nato non-combat force; and three guarding UNAMI. Thirty-six!

Only... not. First, Canada withdrew its single soldier to UNAMI in June. (New Zealand does contribute its own soldier -- that's soldier, singular -- to UNAMI, along with, one hopes, bootleg DVDs of Flight of the Conchords.) Second, the aforementioned CRS report (pdf) notes that Tonga has withdrawn its force from Iraq; and, accordingly, MNF-I no longer includes Tonga on its list of coalition members. Additionally, globalsecurity.org isn't sure whether Hungary has anyone in Iraq as part of the Nato force. (No one's answering the phones at the Hungarian embassy in Washington, either.) And, lest we forget, Iceland is sending its press aide -- apparently not really a soldier -- home from Baghdad on October 1.

But assume the White House is correct on Hungary. And also concede that Iceland isn't out yet. Still, by the accounting of the White House, at least two of the nations the president cited last night aren't in Iraq in any capacity anymore.

There's more; check it out.

Light Comes

It's fall, and the dark is coming, but the sun still rises.

Happy Birthday, Agatha!

Today in Devon, England, in 1890 Agatha Christie was born. So many of the now-familiar things in mystery novels were new with her - the "fake serial serial killer" the "they all did it!" the "the murderer faked his death as part of the series!" the "narrator did it!!!" - the little old lady sleuth, the eccentric private eye, all sorts of things.

Thanks for many hours of enjoyment - book and film!

Nizar Qabbani

John Lynch at Stranger Fruit posted a poem by Nizar Qabbani in his Friday Poem today. Not this one (so go read his), but I followed his links and found the man's work; I'll share this one because I love it.

Love Compared

I do not resemble your other lovers, my lady
should another give you a cloud
I give you rain
Should he give you a lantern, I
will give you the moon
Should he give you a branch
I will give you the trees
And if another gives you a ship
I shall give you the journey.

Others, mostly longer, are here - if you read nothing else, read A Letter from a Stupid Woman. But I bet you won't stop there.

Am I too weird?

I just saw a Sarah Silverman commercial, and immediately noticed that she's dressed in full English dressage riding gear, patting a horse on the nose - and the horse has a cavasson- (noseband)-less, long-shanked-bitted, western-style bridle.

Of course, I don't watch her show and it's entirely possible that this was deliberate.