If there is one science fiction author whose works disturb me, it is Phillip K. Dick. The first work of his that I read was an essay entitled "How to Build a Universe That Doesn’t Fall Apart Two Days Later." I was expecting a tome on how to construct an universe in a science fiction [...]
What with the lack of real diplomatic relations between the United States and Iran, a significant portion of what I have read in the past couple of months about Iran has focused on the hostage crisis. Back in January, I stumbled across Mark Bowden's article in the May 2006 issue of The Atlantic about Operation [...]
Earlier this evening, I ran across materials relating to retirement when I was cleaning my room. I will be 65 in 2050. At first, I thought 2050 was not that far away, but then I considered the events of the 20th century. If it was April 20, 1907, the Great War[1] would still be seven [...]
Thursday, November 30, 2006
I was in the midst of an essay about Adam Cadre's satire on Wikipedia, where I went to Wikipedia to look for a good logo and got distracted. I just finished reading the entry on the War of the Pacific, where Bolivia lost its access to the sea, an event that still has repercussions in [...]
Wednesday, October 25, 2006
After my dinner plans fell through last night, I found myself in Harvard Square with a bit of wanderlust and $1.25 burning a hole in my pocket. I rode down the Red Line to Park Street, ate at McDonald's (first "restaurant" I saw), and then headed to Loews Boston Common to see what movies were [...]
I found Robert Harris' op-ed in Saturday's New York Times interesting. It focuses on the fall of the Roman Republic, an event that Harris believes was caused by Roman overreaction to a pirate raid on Rome's port at Ostia in 68 BC:
An intelligent, skeptical American would no doubt scoff at the thought that what has [...]
Although Adlai Stevenson has been dead for more than 40 years, he came alive for me again earlier this week when I heard his song, named after the Democratic presidental candidate in 1952 and 1956. Although Pitchfork did not like it, I found it uniquely compelling. A relatively short track at just under two minutes, [...]
Wednesday, December 28, 2005
A review of Phillip Roth's bestselling novel, The Plot Against America. With spoilers.
From the blog Lawyers, Guns and Money comes a series of posts about the German Moltke-class battlecruiser Goeben, which became part of the Turkish navy during the Great War. You could just read the Wikipedia entry, but Robert Farley's writing is far more engaging (the subheadings given below, however, are mine).
Part I - The Rise [...]
Today, April 17, is the thirtieth anniversary of the end of the Khmer Rouge's revolutionary struggle, and the beginning of their bloody rule over the country. The New York Times has two Op-Eds written byCambodians that survived: A Birthday Wrapped in Cambodian History and The Karma of the Killing Fields.
I was sort of surprised by [...]
Sunday, September 5, 2004
To the Editor:
Re "In Western Sudan, Fear and Despair Are the Ever-Growing Enemy" (front page, Sept. 2):
The endless tragedies and decades of war in Sudan and other African states clearly illustrate the need for border changes in Africa.
Thus begins the most ridiculous letter to the Editor that I have ever read:
Africa's giants - Sudan, Nigeria [...]
Wednesday, August 11, 2004
The BBC interviewed a number of Sengalese World War II veterans who helped liberate Paris sixty years ago. The piece detailed the French government's "crystallization" legislation passed at the end of the war, which froze African veterans' pensions and prevented their widows from collecting money after their death. While these laws have been repealed, the [...]
Pitchfork has reviewed the Conet Project, a collection of recordings from "numbers stations" - shortwave radio trasmitters used by the world's intelligence services to send coded messages. They gave it an 8.0, which in the old Pitchfork ratings key, means "very good." I disagree.
I first heard of the Conet Project when I read a Wired [...]
Wednesday, August 4, 2004
I was randomly looking at Wikipedia articles when I noted that August 4 is the date that the Gestapo arrested Anne Frank and her family in Amsterdam. Even though it occurred only sixty years ago, Occupied Europe seems like another planet.
After discussing Neutral Milk Hotel in the July statistics post, I decided to do a [...]
Just fifteen minutes after I posted about The Conqueror, a film starring John Wayne as Temujin, later known as Genghis Khan, the movie started on AMC. It was a decent 1950s adventure film, by which I mean to say that I found its "suckiness" relative. A 15-second Emergency Alert System test interrupted the final battle [...]
Obviously, I was not alive while World War II was taking place. The closest I have come to the beaches of Normandy has probably been the "Operation Overlord" mission in Medal of Honor: Allied Assault. However, if Omaha Beach was only half as confusing, nervewracking, and deadly as the MOHAA level was, I am certain [...]
Friday, February 13, 2004
Military medals are supposed to honor those who have been especially courageous. Most of their descriptions include reference to "valourous service benefiting our wondrous nation of X," or somesuch. This idea of national benefit is the end-all of medals; courage is the most important component.
Wednesday, January 7, 2004
This article from the New York Times talks about how virtually all Khmer Rouge leaders have not been convicted for the crimes they committed during their reign.
Saturday, January 3, 2004
I found this New York Times article especially compelling. It is about the Manthey brothers, Polish Germans expelled at the end of the Second World War. The writer, Richard Bernstein, noted that the brothers are much richer than the the Polish couple that now own their ancestral farm and most of the other [...]