2008 November «

This Will Have To Do

November 26, 2008 at 3:47 pm | In Miscellaneous | Leave a Comment

So, I’m told I won’t be able to tell you my important news from yesterday for a little while to come. Instead, here is a bungee jumper almost being eaten by an alligator:

And that will have to do.

News

November 25, 2008 at 1:33 pm | In Books, Middle East | Leave a Comment

I have big news, but I don’t think I’m allowed to share it yet. It’s (sort of) about Middle East diplomacy. Stay tuned.

Do You Have Problems Making Friends And Spelling?

November 24, 2008 at 1:37 pm | In Miscellaneous | Leave a Comment

If I know you at all, and I think I do, you’re the kind of person who can’t spell at all AND has trouble making friends. Well, today must be your lucky day, you alphabetically-impaired social leper!

Some clever/evil soul has developed a website just for you. Faecbook! No, not Facebook, you lonely idiot! Faecbook.

Just do your simple-minded best to type in www.faecbook.com, and the world is yours.

UPDATE (April 20, 2009): It has been brought to my attention that this site has now made the inevitable switch to pornography, and so is far less funny.

101 Bad Ideas: Idea Number Ten

November 24, 2008 at 10:14 am | In Middle East | Leave a Comment

I understand that the city of Jerusalem is an endlessly deep pile of history, such that everything is built on something else, and if you put up a 7-11, there’s a good chance you’re accidentally building on an older, holier 7-11. Still, this seems like a markedly touchy idea:

The Simon Wiesenthal Center will soon be building its Museum of Tolerance…on top of an old, Muslim cemetery. Hilarity is sure to ensue. [Jpost]

Related:

Eli Valley Is Going To Start A War

November 21, 2008 at 9:22 am | In Miscellaneous | 1 Comment

Remember how I reported a few days ago that rabble-rousing Friend of the Blog Eli Valley’s latest button-pushing cartoon had caused a minor controversy?

Well, then The American Thinker jumped on him as well, which is of course just funny, but the whole thing grew a little more interesting yesterday, when the Pakistan Daily ran an anti-Eli article too.

The new Global War on Eli has begun.

Related:

Eli Valley Is Going To Hell

Kind Of Like It

November 20, 2008 at 12:00 pm | In Books, International Relations | Leave a Comment

The other day I was a guest speaker at a college-age Model United Nations. The obvious joke, of course, is something along the lines of it being just like the real UN, except people just talk and don’t actually get anything done…

Anyway, when I was checking in at the hotel where the “delegates” were staying, the person at the desk asked me if I was there for the Model UN, and I told her that I was.

“That’s really interesting,” she said. “Have you ever done anything like this before?”

I nodded, and said, “Sort of.”

How It’s Gonna Be

November 20, 2008 at 10:43 am | In International Relations, Middle East | Leave a Comment

According to one recent poll, Israel’s Likud party is well ahead in popularity. Led by hardliner Benjamin Netanyahu, the party has recently been buoyed by several opportunistic pragmatic politicians who arrived from the Kadima Party. An interesting question is how a Netanyahu government would interact with the Obama White House.

I’ve run the numbers, and here is a projection of that dynamic: