AMMAN, Jordan (AP) State-run TV announces the resignations of 11 top officials, including the national security adviser, in the wake of Jordan bombings.
Best. Tablet Review. EVAR.
Ars Technica and Charles Jade deliver the goods on the Lenovo ThinkPad X41 Tablet.
Canned Vegetables and Sooper-Sekrit Vodka
Deborah Solomon always delivers the goods. The President's Chef has a new book out, and the NYT Questions feature pulls some of the strangest quotes we've seen. As if you needed help, the wierdest stuff is in bold:
...It doesn't sound as if the Bushes believe in dieting. No. It's a personal choice. I think we're too conscious about what we see and what we read in the newspaper, rather than thinking for our own.
Is that why some of your recipes call for canned vegetables?
Maple Syrup: It’s all Over New York
I smelled it, too. It's like you're in the kitchen, and someone's making pancackes with maple syrup. Maybe even vanilla coffee. If this is a chemical hazard, it's the most lovely chemical hazard I've had the privilege to ingest.
North Korea Sends a “Message to the World”
North Korea Sends a 'Message to the World' Secretive State Welcomes Visitors for Month-Long Celebration of Patriotism, Talent From Washington Post Foreign Service:
"You are about to see the true identity of our great nation," a North Korean guide proudly told a cluster of South Korean tourists as one evening session opened last week. "Please pay attention. This is our message to the world."Please, people, just pay attention. Hello? I'm talking to you Malaysia! Lebanon, please sit down, the lesson is about to begin... please! Angola, put down the rifle! Mongolia, don't wear your fur hat indoors. Saudia Arabia--- stop passing secret notes to Syria-would you like me to read that aloud to the class?
Friedman’s McDonald’s Theory, Redux
There has never been a war between two nations which both produce hysterically poor karaoke videos of American pop songs.
404: We Don’t Have Anything Called That Here
Sorry, the page you were looking for doesn't seem to be here anymore. It's probably because we've moved to new software. Maybe you want to try the search box at the top of the page?
City of God, E.L. Doctorow
In his workbook, a New York City novelist records the contents of his teeming brain--sketches for stories, accounts of his love affairs, riffs on the meanings of popular songs, ideas for movies, obsessions with cosmic processes. He is a virtual repository of the predominant ideas and historical disasters of the age.
NOLA Background
Times Picayune, June 8 2004
Scientific American, Drowning New Orleans,October 2001For the first time in 37 years, federal budget cuts have all but stopped major work on the New Orleans area's east bank hurricane levees, a complex network of concrete walls, metal gates and giant earthen berms that won't be finished for at least another decade.
"I guess people look around and think there's a complete system in place, that we're just out here trying to put icing on the cake," said Mervin Morehiser, who manages the "Lake Pontchartrain and vicinity" levee project for the Army Corps of Engineers. "And we aren't saying that the sky is falling, but people should know that this is a work in progress, and there's more important work yet to do before there is a complete system in place."
..."I can't tell you exactly what that could mean this hurricane season if we get a major storm," Naomi said. "It would depend on the path and speed of the storm, the angle that it hits us.
"But I can tell you that we would be better off if the levees were raised, . . . and I think it's important and only fair that those people who live behind the levee know the status of these projects."
...The Bush administration's proposed fiscal 2005 budget includes only $3.9 million for the east bank hurricane project. Congress likely will increase that amount, although last year it bumped up the administration's $3 million proposal only to $5.5 million.
"I needed $11 million this year, and I got $5.5 million," Naomi said. "I need $22.5 million next year to do everything that needs doing, and the first $4.5 million of that will go to pay four contractors who couldn't get paid this year."
A major hurricane could swamp New Orleans under 20 feet of water, killing thousands. Human activities along the Mississippi River have dramatically increased the risk, and now only massive reengineering of southeastern Louisiana can save the city.The American Prospect, May 2005, What would happen if a Category 5 hurricane were to hit New Orleans?
In the event of a slow-moving Category 4 or Category 5 hurricane (with winds up to or exceeding 155 miles per hour), it's possible that only those crow's nests would remain above the water level. Such a storm, plowing over the lake, could generate a 20-foot surge that would easily overwhelm the levees of New Orleans.
Hidey-Hole Fabrication
"I was among the 20-man unit, including eight of Arab descent, who searched for Saddam for three days in the area of Dour near Tikrit, and we found him in a modest home in a small village and not in a hole as announced," Abou Rabeh said. ... "Later on, a military production team fabricated the film of Saddam's capture in a hole, which was in fact a deserted well," Abou Rabeh said.
a technology job is no excuse 