2008 January «

Never Judge A Book

January 31, 2008 at 12:01 pm | In Books, Middle East, Miscellaneous | 2 Comments

My book comes out in April, but you can start judging it by its cover now.

More Eyeballs

January 31, 2008 at 11:30 am | In Miscellaneous | Leave a Comment

My friends at The Good Book – the communal internet writing project to which I contributed some claptrap some time ago – have some new chapters up. Go check it out, and tell them I sent you.

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Something Completely Different

101 Bad Ideas: Idea Number Two

January 31, 2008 at 8:12 am | In Miscellaneous | Leave a Comment

What better way to solemnly commemorate the Holocaust than through Samba dancing and all night drinking?

Or so thinks a Brazilian Samba school participating in Rio’s Carnival parade with a float depicting the Holocaust.

But don’t worry. Despite the fact that the drums and dancing girls will be accompanied by a pile of model dead bodies, the float’s artistic director said it would maintain the utmost respect for the gravity of what it is representing. In fact, it will be the only float without dancers on top!

“If we had people dancing on top of dead bodies, that would indeed be disrespectful,” he told a reporter. (Full story here)

Related:

101 Bad Ideas: Idea Number One

Image by Flickr user sfmission used under a Creative Commons License.

The Rat Island Diaries: Push Back

January 30, 2008 at 8:50 am | In Miscellaneous | Leave a Comment

Remember Rat Island, the rat-infested island paradise near Alaska where government biologists are planning to launch what Connecticut’s inexplicably-caring-about-this Waterbury Republican-American calls a “rat holocaust”? And you know how those anti-rat types even started a blog about getting rid of rats all over Alaska and promised to hand out “gummi rats” to anyone who turns rats in?

Well, not everything is smooth sailing. Turns out the rats have some friends, and the blog is proving to be a forum for dissent.

“K” in Alaska says:

I love my pet rats and I’m going to keep them and keep breeding them and selling them.

And trusty Anonymous adds:

No other rodent pet is nearly as friendly or intelligent as the rat.
Hamsters? Please. They bite.
Mice? Horrible smell, and they’re skittish.
Gerbils? They’re OK, but liable to jump out of your hands if you aren’t careful.
Guinea Pigs? Too big for me!

There you have it. Hamsters? Please! Get out of here. And Guinea Pigs are only for giants.

These people mean business and are not giving up their rats easily. Your move, government biologists. Your move.

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The Palestinians Are Like Britney Spears

January 29, 2008 at 1:52 pm | In Middle East | Leave a Comment

The Palestinians are like Britney Spears. (Get the full theory on that here)

Seriously, I missed this bit of news in more conventional sources of Middle East news and only saw it on Gawker – pretty embarassing – but it’s another very good example of media manipulation in the Middle East. A recent photo by a Reuters photographer supposedly showed a Palestinian governmental session lit by candlelight, but it was a staged photo-op, and it was actually daytime when it was taken. A lot of this sort of thing goes on, and some of it has had major repercussions.

Evil Jews

January 29, 2008 at 1:40 pm | In Culture, Europe | 2 Comments

Through the magic of cartoons, Jewcy’s Eli Valley points a finger at that most accursed of races.

Barack Obama and the Jews

January 29, 2008 at 9:00 am | In American Politics | Leave a Comment

I’ve been working on a piece about Barack Obama’s problems with some corners of the Jewish world – or, rather, their problems, with him – for some time, and now it is emerging more and more into the media and into his own statements, such as here. There is still time for my story to run without it being stale, because it has some interesting new things in it, and I spoke to an array of people in and connected with the Obama campaign for it, but I do hope it does run eventually. At the moment it is stuck somewhere in the editing process.

I’m optimistic that it will make it through in time, but if not, it would hardly be the first time that a delay has ended up with a news peg growing cold and an editor spiking a story for reasons beyond the writer’s control. Let’s cross our fingers.

101 Bad Ideas: Idea Number One

January 28, 2008 at 9:13 am | In Middle East | Leave a Comment

Apparently, Iran has offered to help Egypt deal with the crisis in Gaza. And Egypt has “welcomed cooperation between the two countries.”

This just sounds like a splendid idea. Soon everything will be totally fine.

Related:

Hamas’ Shawshank Redemption Caper

Dennis Kucinich Watch: The Fare-Thee-Well Edition

January 25, 2008 at 8:57 am | In American Politics | 2 Comments

If you haven’t heard, I’m sorry to be the bearer of the news: Dennis Kucinich, America’s Former Next President, has dropped out of the presidential campaign. We could have told you, Dennis, this world was never meant for one as beautiful as you.

But wait! The reason he left is because he has realized that if he wants to maintain his congressional seat, he’s going to have to fight for it - as someone called back in October. So that means there may still be Kucinich Watching to be done. Who knows what adventures our hero will get into in the future?

But until then, fare-thee-well, sweet prince…

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Image by Flickr user abstract plain used under a Creative Commons license.

Hamas’ Shawshank Redemption Caper

January 24, 2008 at 9:00 am | In Middle East | 1 Comment

So it turns out that the Gazan Palestinians were able to bust through the wall and get into Egypt early Wednesday morning because Hamas had been secretly sawing away at it for months. I can only assume that they hid what they were doing by putting 1950s pin-up posters on the wall to conceal this activity.

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