Clik here to view.
Our Modern World
One of my laptop computers has finally died, after three+ years. Always a bittersweet moment: sad for the expense and hassle, quietly excited for the excuse to shop around and see what the intervening...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Pigs Fly. Also, I Agree with Charles Krauthammer
1) The TSA excesses are creating strange bedfellows. Charles Krauthammer writes today about the "idiocy" of the TSA's approach to airline security, including the nuttiness of body-searching the same...
View ArticleClik here to view.
'All Fears Are Not Created Equal'
Several days ago I quoted a letter from a former airline official in Minnesota to his senator, Amy Klobuchar, asking her to support a less fear-based overall approach to the ongoing threat of...
View ArticleClik here to view.
'Destroy the Town to Save It'
Via my Atlantic colleague James Gibney, a pointer to the astonishing, deadpan final words of Rajiv Chandrasekaran's article in the Washington Post yesterday, about the deployment of M1 Abrams tanks to...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Chalmers Johnson
I have just heard that Chalmers Johnson died a few hours ago, at age 79, at his home near San Diego. He had had a variety of health problems for a long time. (Photo source here.)Johnson -- "Chal" --...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Better News About TSA
1) Congratulations to TSA officials on the (reported) common-sense decision to exempt uniformed airline pilots from full-body scans or enhanced pat-downs, as long as they have two forms of...
View ArticleClik here to view.
More on Chalmers Johnson
(See update below.) When I got the news in the middle of last night that Chalmers Johnson had died, I put up a very brief commemoration, intending to do more later.It turns out that that will not be...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Today's Security Saga: 'Show Me the Blankey'
Reader Andrew Metcalf, fresh off a trans-Atlantic flight, has this report. >>I just came back from London to Atlanta with my 2 year old daughter and wife. My daughter was randomly chosen for a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
More on 'Destroy the Town'
Two days ago I mentioned the similarity between a powerful Washington Post article by Rajiv Chandrasekaran, about the introduction of heavy tanks to Afghanistan, and the "destroy the town to save it"...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Reading List
For the year-end issue of Foreign Affairs, also the last one under the editorship of James Hoge, its staff asked a number of people to recommend a book to put on a "Reading List for the 21st Century."...
View ArticleClik here to view.
'Like a Full-Body Massage': Thinking About the TSA
A reader writes: >>Yesterday I deliberately opted out of the back-scatter machine at Toronto airport so as to see what the enhanced pat-down is about. I must say I have thoroughly enjoyed the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
A Way Out of the Security Theater Impasse?
I mentioned earlier today that I was fatalistically resigned to the security-theater "ratchet." Politicians or security agencies can keep loading on extra "security" features, but politically they...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Talk About Reasons for Giving Thanks!
Hyundai has signed up ... Pomplamoose ... for its new TV campaign. Previously on Pomplamoose and the Pomplamoose wars, here, here, here, here, etc. Inside-advertising intriguing detail: Pomplamoose...
View ArticleClik here to view.
More Thankfulness (Asian Beer Dept)
As attentive readers have noticed, I have complained a few million times about the crappiness of beer in Asia, where a whole lot of the world's beer is brewed and consumed. Previous essays on this...
View ArticleClik here to view.
More Thankfulness (Mobile Operating System Dept)
Any day now, I will get back to some long-pending "software week" entries (best browsers; best new "thinking" software; the joys of moving to an all-cloud work style; etc) plus some hardware notes...
View ArticleClik here to view.
True Thankfulness -- Plus, Christmas Comes Early
From the NYT just now: Merciful heavens, we give praise and thanks -- if we are indeed saying goodbye to this: What is wrong with the familiar monotone "The Department of Homeland Security has...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Libyan Nukes Scoop
About an hour ago Max Fisher, of the Atlantic, published a genuine scoop about a US-Russian-Libyan showdown over "loose nukes" one year ago. I am emerging from previously announced Thanksgiving Weekend...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Security Theater: The Ripple Effects
I mentioned recently that the Japanese postal and express-shipment authorities had decided that parcels weighing more than a pound and headed for the United States would have to go by sea mail, which...
View ArticleClik here to view.
In Which I Become a Conservative
Ross Douthat, an Atlantic alumnus, contends in the NY Times that the recent controversy over "enhanced" TSA procedures illustrates the dominance of partisan reflex in today's politics. Liberals...
View ArticleClik here to view.
It's Almost Like Being Back in Guomao
As I can't say often enough, my favorite paper in the whole world is China Daily. It's the state-controlled, English-language, unfailingly earnest and on-message official voice of China to the outside...
View Article