Neale Hunter’s “The Three Hundred Percenters” in the Far Eastern Economic Review’s 7/13 April 1968 issue offers insights to the values and ideologies of foreigners living amidst the Cultural Revolution in Shanghai during 1967 and 1968.
This split continued into the Red Guard groups that were formed by foreigners. Before long a paper war was raging in the Friendship Hotel, and big-character posters chronicled the “crimes” of each faction. Accusations ranged in depth from “betraying the world revolution” to “sleeping with Mrs X”. What the Chinese thought of all this is not on record.
When Japan’s pacifist constitution was drawn up in 1947, United States occupation authorities led by Gen. Douglas MacArthur heavily influenced the final draft. Six decades later, the Americans appear to want it edited. The pressure started on July 22 when Japanese media reported that Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage had met Japanese politician Hidenao Nakagawa in Washington and told him that Article Nine, the provision in the charter renouncing war as a sovereign right, is hindering Tokyo’s ambitions to become a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. A day later, John Bolton, U.S. undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, told reporters in Tokyo that “the decision by Japan to modify that constitution would be welcomed and accepted by the United States.” America’s desire for another close friend on the Security Council is understandable. In the run-up to the Iraq War, the five permanent members of the council — Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States — were hopelessly at odds.
— Far Eastern Economic Review, Intelligence, 4 August 2004. (Paid subscription required.)
It’s a Bit Much, Really has obtained the schedule of the Republican Convention which is to be held in New York on 30 August–2 September. Here are the highlights of the august proceedings:
Day One:
6:35pm — Burning of the Bill of Rights (Excluding the Second Amendment)
6:45pm — Salute to the Coalition of the Willing
Day Two:
8:15am — John Ashcroft Lecture: The Evildoer Homos Are After Your Children
Day Three:
5:00pm — President George W. Bush Demonstration: “Deer In Headlights” Stare
Day Four:
7:35pm — Blame Clinton
But whatever you do, don’t miss the Closing Prayer on Day Four at 8:20pm! (Hint: It’ll be conducted by a toga-wearing white guy with long hair and a preference for all-male suppers.)
Full schedule is now available.
Wired has highlighted a development that has been the unspoken secret in the design circles for quite some time: the eye-candy design that doesn’t do anything for functionality.
Not that I’m a saint in these matters: the best of the worst website fronts I have done was for a well-known international energy giant that incorporated (on client’s request, I haste to add to my defense!) a photomontage of an oil super tanker, petrol station, fighter jet, and an oil rig. Plus the compulsory regional map, corporate logo, and live stock feed. And, of course, the 3-D bevelled buttons. Not to mention the animated GIFs’ galore. Afterwards I heart the client was rather pleased with my efforts… Try to top that!
Tiger Airways A320-200
© Eric Pajaud
Tyger, Tyger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare seize the fire?
And what shoulder, & what art,
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & what dread feet?
What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?
When the stars threw down their spears
And water’d heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?
Tyger, Tyger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
— William Blake (1757–1827)
Singapore’s new low-cost carrier, Tiger Airways, got its Airbus A320 jet into proper livery. Spotted at Toulouse airport on 14 July by Eric Pajaud (via JetPhotos.Net).
So, now this whole Iraq fuck-up is the fault of the United Nations and other countries — and not at least of the United States and the so-called Coalition of the Willing?
These Republican spin doctors surely know how to turn black into white: “The report found that US intelligence relied too much ‘on foreign government services and third-party reporting, thereby increasing the potential for manipulation of US policy by foreign interests‘”. [My emphasis]
As The Guardian reports:
Pat Roberts, the Republican chairman of the Senate intelligence committee, insisted the war was still justified on humanitarian grounds, to liberate the Iraqi people. He also argued that the intelligence failure was not solely the fault of the CIA.
“While we did not specifically address it in our report, it is clear that this group-think also extended to our allies and to the United Nations and several other nations as well, all of whom did believe the Saddam Hussein had active WMD programs,” Mr Roberts said. “This was a global intelligence failure.”
The report found that US intelligence relied too much “on foreign government services and third-party reporting, thereby increasing the potential for manipulation of US policy by foreign interests”.
It is unfortunate that the majority of the U.S. electorate laps up this sort of misinformation without a single question, and most probably will agree with the conservative indoctrinators — Rush Limbaugh et al. — that the god-privileged true-red U.S. of A was hoodwinked again by those “Uropeans” to sacrifice its best and brightest (what an oxymoron since we are talking about the U.S. Army) on the distant battlefields of the Middle East.
For all the Macheads out there, Andy Hertzfeld’s Folklore.org goes back to the future of Mac’s conception, development, and delivery. With 115 articles on latest count ranging from software design to personality clashes to “reality distortion,” there’s a cornucopia of Mac folklore and trivia for those old enough to remember the original 128k beige Mac. And, yes, real artists ship!
