Wonkette
- Chinese officials have put a lid on protests in the Xinjiang capital, Urumqi, and now they’re just waiting to see see if the Muslim Uighurs get restless on their prayer day (Friday). [AP]
- The unofficial surge in Afghanistan is proving to be, as George Bush might have once plaintively yelped from his podium, “hard work.” [Christian Science Monitor]
- Ah yes speaking of the state quashing of dissent, Iranian authorities are telling folks not to even THINK about rallying or protesting today, or else. It’s the tenth anniversary of another time that people staged major demonstrations and got beaten and sent to jail. [New York Times]
- Two and a half years ago the US detained five Iranian diplomats in Kurdistan, and we’ve finally turned these people over to the Iraqis, who will turn them over to Iran. [Los Angeles Times]
- Least fun conference ever: the NIH’s swine flu summit. [CNN]
- Not even tiny West African villages have escaped the ravages of the housing market collapse. [Wall Street Journal]
This news is all too depressing. No Franken, Barry, Palin or Sanford news to cut it with? It’s too early here on the West Coast to face this real-world stuff…
The swine flu conference wouldn’t be the first conference where someone porks a coworker.
Message on Hu Jintao’s answering machine: “You put me out in Urumqi cause I wouldn’t suck your dick.”
Hmmmm, just wondering what the APR on a mud hut goes for these days. Sure the neighborhood might have ethnic strife/genocide and the commute would be a bitch, but if the price is right then I’ll think about it.
Every great military power to have tried has failed in Afghanistan. The only question is whether Obama will recognize this sooner and get out or later and have it doom his presidency like LBJ & Vietnam. Escalating the conflict will undoubtedly fail to change anything. Soon Obama must choose: guns or butter? It may already be too late to withdraw with anything approaching honor.
Please, please find something on Mark Sanford. maybe he can be the ambassador to North Korea?
Turning once again to sports, Jack Armstrong is pedaling away toward Barcelona, surrounded by his usual coterie of sycophantic dope fiends.
hobospacejunkie: Yes, every power in the past has failed. But we can’t allow the Taliban to set up shop again, especially since Pakistan has nukes. 9/11 did NOT ‘change everything’, but it definitely changed that situation.
Somehow, Afghanistan has to start functioning as a real government/country. (Which means we might have to invade Pakistan, too!!! Defense contracts for everybody!)
Damn. This IS the most depressing Thursday in a long time. No more Republican love notes? Psychotic twats from the Land of the Midnight Sun?
Bill Clinton was on Elvis Costello’s cable show talking about his saxophones. That’s all I got.
ProfessorJukes: I agree we can’t allow it. I just also believe there’s nothing we can do about it. Nothing that will be ultimately successful in any but the most ephemeral of ways. If we must, invade Pakistan, take their nukes, destroy their capacity for making more and come home. Any other strategy is doomed to failure and pointless loss of American life.
The pig sneezers are downstairs.
They took all the parking too, well us metro riders don’t park here anyway.
But least fun? Oh au contraire this one will be lively just like some of the upcoming events here at NIH.
How could you possibly skip the upcoming “Workshop on Hydrodynamic and Thermodynamic Analysis of Macromolecules with SEDFIT and SEDPHAT”? Unless you instead go to the seminar on “Structural Insights into the Ubiquitin-Binding Domains of Translesion Synthesis DNA Polymerases” a bit later that morning.
For the esoteric there is a seminar on “Neural Basis of Song Syntax in Songbirds”
The three day “NIH Consensus Development Conference: Vaginal Birth After Cesarean: New Insights” has got to be a hoot.
I work in biology geek heaven. I am not a biology geek.
Hey, wouldn’t it make sense for us to, rather than chase the Taliban into caves, jsut take over security on Pakistan’s nukes?
Maybe we could buy them for a few billion or something?
zenferret: I work for science too. I just reviewed something for a Phd whose first name is Tequila- I swear! I guess youcan overcome your parents’ mistakes
VBAC- popular subject among those who think the first is so much better than the second. Having had both- not.
Anything I write with the combined letters ‘charles de goal’ simply will not post. How very strange. And trivial.
So in reference to ‘C de G’ — “Jack” Armstrong? Barcelona? Cyclists doping? Has the world gone mad, or merely you, sir? Good day!
Those African workers rented their huts instead of buying them. That is smart in a boom/bust economy. That should keep the village from ending up like Detroit.
hobospacejunkie: So its not just about me?
And why is he ragging on “The All American Boy”?
To American foreign policy experts: the enduring lesson of Rambo III is not “Afghanistan resistance fighters are pussies without a shirtless Sylvester Stallone.”
Apparently the Chinese population isn’t quite homogeneous enough not to have unrest.
WestEdEd: lets just buy all their poppies for dried floral arrangements and the many uses in universal health care.
Mud-huts on way to HUD-huts?
Before today, I would have sworn that the mud hut industry was recession-proof.
WestEdEd: I just reviewed something for a Phd whose first name is Tequila- I swear! I guess youcan overcome your parents’ mistakes
Heh. If that had happened to me, I guess “Johnny” wouldn’t be such bad name. And “Walker” as a middle name is sorta klassy.
hobospacejunkie: You must not have been paying attention. Charles has been offering us word-salad sports reports for some time now. I’m starting to enjoy them (I love sports!) But we need more baseball coverage, Charlie,; how many touchdowns did Federer shoot today?
Lascauxcaveman: how many touchdowns did Federer shoot today?
None, of course. He passed the ball. To win. For the troops.
“It’s the tenth anniversary of another time that people staged major demonstrations and got beaten and sent to jail.”
It’s nice when countries celebrate these traditions together.
Min: Eh, sod that.
hobospacejunkie: Aren’t “gun & butter” issues those that appeal specifically to hardworking, Real Americans®? Relatedly, would butter guns—like those favored by said hardworking, Real Americans®—help progress the terrorists to obesity, and us to victory?
Or are you saying that achieving success in Afghanistan is matter of knowing on which side one’s gun is buttered? I’m so confused. And hungry.
Mmm, butter guns…
Lascauxcaveman: Ha! Guess who won the 1997 Nobel prize in chemistry?
Swine Flu conferences can be plenty of fun. Once people are released from the idea that their time on earth matters a fuck, there’s no telling what they won’t dream up to do in the isolation of their hotel rooms.
Tequila PhD’s for all!
http://www.journalism.sfsu.edu/flux/eatBeat/tommys.html
For the tequila PhD (or the Tequila Ninja if you prefer that) see next to last para.
As for the Wedgie people in China (snark off) what’s happening to them is exactly what’s happening to the Tibetans (snark on). That ‘Tequila Masters’ doesn’t sound too hard.
Why does the tee vee keep talking about Wiggers rioting in China? I just saw some Wiggers driving a sweet Chevy Caprice with rims and really skinny tires. They seemed really happy, frankly.
Also, they keep calling them “Wee-gers.” Jeez, these old fart news anchors need to get out more.
Oh, you mean….you don’t say?