August 7, 2004
Awake, hobbitses.
Re-emergent American Eugenics Movement looks to unfinished business - The Tennessee primary win of an avowed Eugenicist Republican Congressional candidate underscores the longstanding association of the Republican Party with a resurgent American Eugenics Movement deeply linked to Nazi racial ideology and championed by the Manhattan Institute and the Nazi-associated Pioneer Fund
Puzzles Galore.
Puzzles.com (Flash)
meow
Yes, it's Geocities. But, it's also text-only. I figure it's safe.
Check that random selection of classic screenplays. I'd like to thank that other girl.
Right Wing Pundits, and the Billions that Support Them
Michelle Malkin and the Big Hustle Matt Stoller does a good job explaining the right-wing noise machine backing up author Michelle Malkin, whose new book promotes the virtue of Japanese internment camps and racial profiling. Eric Muller, UNC law school professor also does a pretty good job ripping up her arguments. As Stoller says: "Right-wing institutional support, with places to house people to create ideas, outlets to distribute and promote them, and the tactics and relationships to turn these ideas into the mainstream, is breathtaking".
The Battle for Najaf
The Battle for Najaf -- a first-hand account by the only Western reporter in Najaf as major fighting broke out this week.
Willy-Nilly?
Coalition of the Willy. [via abuddha's memes]
Just as the eyes may be averted from full frontal public displays of male nudity, is it possible that the unconscious association to phallic symbols like "weapons of mass destruction" may effectively lead the eyes to be "averted", thus frustrating any search.
(NOTE: This essay isn't really 'logical,' but it's a fun ride anyway, pun intended)
Just as the eyes may be averted from full frontal public displays of male nudity, is it possible that the unconscious association to phallic symbols like "weapons of mass destruction" may effectively lead the eyes to be "averted", thus frustrating any search.
(NOTE: This essay isn't really 'logical,' but it's a fun ride anyway, pun intended)
Atlantis = Ireland?
Atlantis has been found, and it's... Ireland? So says Swedish geographer Ulf Erlingsson, who thinks the sinking of the island in Plato's story may have referred to the inundation of Dogger Bank, which connected Britain and Denmark. Sorry Spain. [Via MonkeyFilter.]
Devil in the White City
I've just finished reading a copy of Larson's Devil
in the White City sent to me by a relative who heard of my love for
Isaac's
Storm. Devil is a biography of two men who were
central to the 1893 Chicago World's
Fair. One, Daniel
H. Burnham would become one of the most influential architects and
city planners of the early 20th century. Burnham organized a crew of
the architectural, engineering and artistic elite including landscape artist Frederick Law Olmstead
(famous for Central Park and Biltmore) in an effort to better the Paris
world's fair of 1889. The Chicago exposition would be profoundly
influential for American culture introducing Arabic Dance (the tune for "There's a place in France/where the naked ladies dance" was created in Chicago), the Ferris
Wheel, Shredded Wheat, and helping to settle the Battle of the Currents
between Edison and Tesla. The fair drew a large variety of larger than
life figures including Archduke Ferdinand, Elizabeth B. Anthony, Buffalo Bill Cody and the
mostly forgotten master of self promotion Citizen
Train.
Devil is also a biography of the man given credit for America's first recognized serial murders, the self-named H. H. Holmes. At the start of the fair, Holmes changed his modus operandi from marrying and killing women as part of insurance and real estate scams, to running a hotel from which an unknown number of his female tenants never checked out. Although information on Holmes's activities is scanty, he serves as a mirror of the utopia of civic safety created by Burnham. Larson makes the argument that the contrasts between optimisim and pessimism, well-intentioned virtue and depravity, urban utopia with a few blocks from slums, would set the tone for the 20th century.
Devil is also a biography of the man given credit for America's first recognized serial murders, the self-named H. H. Holmes. At the start of the fair, Holmes changed his modus operandi from marrying and killing women as part of insurance and real estate scams, to running a hotel from which an unknown number of his female tenants never checked out. Although information on Holmes's activities is scanty, he serves as a mirror of the utopia of civic safety created by Burnham. Larson makes the argument that the contrasts between optimisim and pessimism, well-intentioned virtue and depravity, urban utopia with a few blocks from slums, would set the tone for the 20th century.
End of an era
It's official. The Hubble Space Telescope is blind, and probably won't be resuscitated.
Oiled, but not nude
If you don't expect the Olympics to keep it real, you may appreciate the Nemean Games.
the mile of the century
the mile of the century Fifty years ago today, Roger Bannister, the first man to break the 4-minute mile, and John Landy, who beat his record a month-and-a-half later, squared off in Vancouver BC to determine who was the fastest runner in the history of the world, in what is arguably the most dramatic sporting event of the 20th Century. The record for the mile has gone down astonishingly through the years, but are there limits on how low it can go? (View video of the historic Bannister vs. Landy matchup here.
HollowEarth
Voyage to our hollow earth. "Steve Currey's Expedition Company has chartered the Russian Nuclear IceBreaker YAMAL, to take 100 adventurers to the North Pole for an expedition to conduct scientific observations that could resolve once and for all whether the Hollow Earth theories have any validity!"
Idle hands do God's work?
The virtue of idleness is lost upon our modern society with its Puritan work ethic. Perhaps a little idleness is good for the soul and the mind. Some would say Ben Franklin is spinning in his grave, but he also enjoyed his idle hours as much as any man, at least according to the recent biography, "Ben Franklin: An American Life" by Walter Isaacson.
An Interview with Bin Ladin's former bodyguard
Bin Ladin's Former 'Bodyguard' Interviewed on Al-Qa'ida Strategies. An interview taken by the Al-Quds al-Arabi newspaper in London with one of Bin Ladin's former bodyguards brings out many interesting things, such as him admitting that Al Qaida is no longer an entity, but an ideology. Another strong point of the interview is his summary of Al Qaida tactics: Al-Qa'ida pursues a method or principle that calls for "centralization of decision and decentralization of execution.".
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