Nausea

I am going to do my best to keep my radio and television turned off tomorrow. I will try to remember quietly the tragic deaths of the people killed on that date, many of them a couple of miles away from me. But I do not want to hear the nauseating, self-serving, back slapping, self congratulatory, complacent, hypocritical, bathetic, crass, exploitative, ghoulish rhetoric of our shallow political class.

The Road Back

I am reading the final chapters of 1812:Napoleon's Fatal March on Moscow. Reading about the last stages of Napoleon's retreat in subzero termperatures, I have never been so attached to my nose as when reading how the noses and toes of Napoleon's soldiers broke off in the cold. Soldiers who did not freeze were in many cases burned alive in overcrowded huts, starved to death, murdered for their supplies, or, in some cases, killed in combat or picked off by the Cossacks. By the end of the march, Napoleon's 650,000 man Grande Armee had essentially ceased to exist.

Morocco Foundation and Macy's Pair Up in Fundraiser

The Morocco Foundation announces:

When you shop at Macy's on September 16th, 2006, you help the Morocco Foundation fund its various humanitarian and educational projects in Morocco .
Purchase the Macy's Discount Pass from MF ($5.00) and enjoy a wide array of discounts up to 20% throughout the store.

To take advantage of this unique offer, email us at:

info [at] morocco-foundation.org

To directly purchase your tickets:

Nadia.Serhani [at] morocco-foundation.org

The Common Touch

HOV Traffic Waits for No Man, Even the President

The Secret Service spent nearly a day trying to convince Virginia traffic officials to shut down the HOV lanes — including bus service — for six hours during rush hour. Why? So that the President could drive to a fundraiser for embattled Republican Senator George Allen. Finally persuaded that stranding 22,000 commuters was not a good idea, the President took a helicopter instead.

No Private Life on the Web

A recent story in the Guardian confirms once again that there is no such thing as anonymity on the Internet. This is a shame, because the Web is much richer for the candid commentary that sometimes only exists under a nom de plume. In this case, blogger Abby Lee was a major figure in the blogosphere, and not only because she wrote mostly about sex. The Guardian comments:

The blog tootled along for about six months, and then suddenly went crazy. People were Googling for it at a rate that was measurable by the minute. Girlwithaonetrackmind.blogspot.com has had more than 2 million visitors, gets 100,000 readers a month, won Best British or Irish Blog at the 2006 Bloggies, and was published as a book last week (for which she got "six figures"). The book is already in the bestseller lists. So far, so successful, but so still anonymous; all anybody knew about Abby Lee was that she worked in the film industry, lived in London and got laid a hell of a lot. Oh, and we knew that she had size eight feet - much has been made of this, in the press, as if she were deliberately trying to out herself, whereas, in fact, I can personally vouch for the fact that big feet are not all that rare.

In her candid depiction of an active woman's sex life, Lee counted on anonymity to protect her job and her relationships — with co-workers, friends, family, and lovers. After being "outed" by the Sunday Times, Lee recounts on her blog that she has lost her job and faced the humiliation of having her friends and family know the intimate details of her sex life. The Guardian, meanwhile, recounts that she has been hit with a wave of sexual prudery that would have been unthinkable a couple of decades ago. But it is not necessary to approve of frequent sex with more than one partner to believe that a culture that will not tolerate anonymous writing will be poorer for it. (For example, perhaps the most famous anonymous author was Sir Walter Scott, who did not wish to reveal that he had abandoned poetry for a less reputable art form — the novel.)

While I try not to put anything on the web to which I am not willing to sign my name and which I am not willing to have my mother read, I do not pretend that my writing is necessarily richer for it.

Gay Papers Should Not Be Homeless

The Volokh Conspiracy reports that gay civil rights pioneer Dr. Franklin Kameny has a website featuring selections of historic papers and photographs from the early history of the gay rights movement, of which Kameny was an integral part. The avowed purpose of the website, beyond educating people about Dr. Kameny's work, is to find a sponsor for a permanent home for the collection in a museum or library.

Coffee Not So Bad

Coffee as a Health Drink? Studies Find Some Benefits - New York Times

“I wouldn’t advise people to increase their consumption of coffee in order to lower their risk of disease,” Dr. van Dam said, “but the evidence is that for most people without specific conditions, coffee is not detrimental to health. If people enjoy drinking it, it’s comforting to know that they don’t have to be afraid of negative health effects.”

Other things being equal, I should have a very low risk of liver disease and Type II diabetes in light of my coffee consumption. I just need to avoid running at high altitudes — as if.

Depressing News from China

Chinese Rights Activist Stands Trial After Police Detain Defense Team

BEIJING, Aug. 18 -- The blind rural lawyer who exposed forced abortions and sterilizations in eastern China last year stood trial Friday without his lawyers, while supporters said the case made a mockery of any effort in China to impose the rule of law.

In the face of China's complete disregard for human rights or due process, the courage of a few lawyers at least offers a ray of hope.

Time to Go, Joe

Lamont Defeats Lieberman After Tight Race - New York Times

Ned Lamont, a Connecticut millionaire whose candidacy for the United States Senate soared from nowhere on a fierce antiwar message, won a narrow but decisive victory tonight over the storied incumbent, Joseph I. Lieberman, in the race for the Democratic nomination.

Hopefully, this represents the beginning of a new chapter in the history of the Democratic Party, one in which the Democrats are finaly willing to challenge the Bush machine.

Minuteman's Moment

Morgan Spurlock is back with his show 30 days. Today's episode places a member of the Minuteman anti-immigration movement with a family of undocumented immigrants in L.A. for 30 days. Not surprisingly, he comes to the conclusion that the people he is trying to keep out of the country are also human beings, but the process is worth watching.

WordPerfect on Linux

By making sure that my "obsolete" glibc libraries were installed. I managed to get Corel WordPerfect 8.1 working on SUSE Linux 10.1. Hoorah!

Miscellania

Not much blogging in recent weeks for many reasons. I've been busy both at home and at work, but my free time has also been directed elsewhere. At some point, I mean to post at length about my readings on the Peloponnesian War. I've also picked up the first volume of Dewey Lambin's naval series: a little raw but generally rewarding. At present I am reading about Napoleon's invasion of Russia in 1812.

In addition, I have been playing with Linux. I finally abandoned Fedora and installed SUSE 10.1 instead, whch has worked remarkably well. I still have some work to do to get SAMBA working so that I can share files with my wif'e's Windows machine, and I spent some time configuring spam filters, but generally the configuration process has not been overly painful.