August 2005

sounds like everyone is pulling numbers out of a hat - but using airstrikes makes it clear the US doesn't have control of the ground

"Snow White and the Six Dwarves She Killed With Her Bare Hands and the Seventh Dwarf She Let Get Away as a Warning to Others"

"the government refuses to allow 80,000 to be connected to the power, water or sewerage infrastructure on the grounds that their villages are illegal - even though many have stood since before the modern Israeli state existed"

"When he and his men need cigarettes, one officer changes into civilian clothing and then buys provisions for the entire unit."

"the Rules Committee waives the three-day period as a matter of routine. This forces members of Congress to essentially cast blind yes-or-no votes to bills whose contents are likely to be an absolute mystery to them."

"There is, furthermore, a fourth kind of multilocation, which, however, has not been realized in the Eucharist, but would be, if Christ's Body were present in its natural mode of existence both in heaven and on earth."

"the bones of little toes from that time frame were much less strongly built than those of their ancestors while their leg bones remained large and strong"

fatwas banning "liberal Islamic thought, religious pluralism, inter-faith marriage, and women leading prayers attended by men"

"Banana experts disagree on when the Latin American and African crops will be hit by the Panama fungus. ... the Malaysian plantations went from full-scale commercial operations to 'total wipeout' in less than five years."

"Islamist guerrillas are the sole authority, running the town's security, administration and communications."

"the appropriate intellectual-property regime for a developing country is different from that for an advanced industrial country"

it's an offence "if a Web site targeting Australian users publishes an advert for a Web site offering online gambling services"

"Federalism? You can't eat federalism and you can't use it to fuel your car and it doesn't make my fridge work."

"mere anatomical speculation fuelled by the fact that very little is known about what the claustrum actually does"

the Arar case: lawyers claim that "Foreign citizens who change planes at airports in the US can legally be seized, detained without charges, deprived of access to a lawyer or the courts, and even denied basic necessities like food"

"The Brits explicitly view this as a police action. With that comes a 'law enforcement' outlook on the use of deadly force."

"Who stuck this lame badly animated sex in here? Where'd my soul-numbing ultraviolent racism go? I am outraged."

"This critical examination of the final Soviet strategic offensive operation [of WWII] seeks to chip away at two generally inaccurate pictures many have of the war."

"while the de facto death squads are not part of government policy, little is being done to counteract them"

"A provision tucked into the energy bill that Congress is poised to enact would ease export restrictions on bomb-grade uranium"

I can't understand aid agencies' obsession with young children: I'd feed the 50 year olds first every time. Do they prefer children they can indoctrine with Christianity to adults who will keep indigenous cultures and languages alive?

"global inflation, interest rates, bond yields, house prices, wages, profits and commodity prices are now being increasingly driven by decisions in China"