Sounds like a Hillary Swank movie coming up

Boyfriend of girl, 14, revealed as woman, 30 - Unusual Tales - Specials

On Pelosi's trip

Captain's Quarters

Demonstrating to President Assad that the America government is bitterly divided and fractious seems an obviously bad idea. But surely that was always going to be the effect of the Nancy Pelosi trip to Syria. From what I have seen of her on television, Mrs Pelosi does not impress me in the slightest.

The Captain's commentary linked above is spot on. He points out that even the Washington Post is critical of her trip. As he says:

The Democrats, led by Pelosi, have tried to undermine Bush for years. Now that they have the majority in Congress, they can give full vent to their schemes. The efforts of the past couple of months show that the Democrats want to turn the Constitution upside down, strip the executive branch of its power, and make Congress the supreme power in the American system.

Well, sorry, but that's the British system. Perhaps Pelosi would be more comfortable there or in Canada, but here in the US, the elected President has all of the Constitutional authority to conduct foreign policy and command the military.

Holiday in Iran cut short

Telegraph Blogs: Toby Harnden: April 2007: Humiliation for the Navy and Marines

Expect more commentary along the lines of that above. Those British sailors and marines showed a distinct lack of dignity and good judgment in the way they interacted with the Iranians; especially the one who thanked Ahmadinejad for his "forgiveness".

Bugs to keep you happy

Bacteria and depression | Bad is good | Economist.com

Bacteria might play a role in depression? I hadn't heard that one before. Here's the story:

Dr O'Brien was trying out an experimental treatment for lung cancer that involved inoculating patients with Mycobacterium vaccae. This is a harmless relative of the bugs that cause tuberculosis and leprosy that had, in this case, been rendered even more harmless by killing it. When Dr O'Brien gave the inoculation, she observed not only fewer symptoms of the cancer, but also an improvement in her patients' emotional health, vitality and general cognitive function...

The theory is that it causes serotonin to be produced i the brain. Studies with mice seemed to support it.

As an added bonus, the article tells me something I didn't know about mice:

The consequence of that release is stress-free mice. Dr Lowry was able to measure their stress by dropping them into a tiny swimming pool. Previous research has shown that unstressed mice enjoy swimming, while stressed ones do not. His mice swam around enthusiastically.

For the Easter weekend

VATICAN - The Board Game

From the website:

VATICAN, historically accurate, is more compelling than the depictions of the Catholic Church in popular culture. Reality and truth are always more interesting than fiction.

VATICAN is a fascinating way for all to understand a central point of Catholic identity, and will appeal to a wide variety of audiences, whatever their religious preferences.

VATICAN is sophisticated, filled with nuance that makes replays as enjoyable as the first time you play it.


Kids love board games "filled with nuance."

Hicks sticks around

There's no pleasing some people. David Hicks gets back to Australia soon, effectively serving what I have heard even right wing commentators say may be a fair enough time for what he did, but the cries of "farce", or worse, continue.

Robert Richter's column in The Age said:

The charade that took place at Guantanamo Bay would have done Stalin's show trials proud.

Comments like that make me yearn to have a TV reality show where lawyers or commentators who make odious comparisons of Bush to Hitler and Stalin actually have to live for 6 months in a re-created old Gulag or concentration camp.

As for Australia's possible role in seeking the sentence deal Hicks got, all I can say is that last night's interview on the 7.30 Report with Major Mori, and then Phillip Ruddock's interview on Lateline, both indicated that direct political involvement was not very plausible at all, despite the good timing for the government. Major Mori was most interesting, in that he was promoting the gag order as a benefit to Hicks himself, so that he wouldn't be harassed by the media. This seemed his genuine, and somewhat surprising, take on the matter. He also seemed enormously happy with the result, as if to indicate he couldn't care less if it was a political deal anyway.

Mori also denied ever having used the word "torture" in describing Hick's treatment. He also saw no issue with how the deal was negotiated. Kerry O'Brien's problem seemed to be a complete lack of familiarity with American military tribunal procedures, so that what surprised him seemed to be of no great significance to Mori.

Ruddock expressed the view that the gag part could not be enforced by the Australian government, and that there was no prospect of extradition back to the USA for breaching it either. That would seem to mean that only if Hicks voluntarily re-entered that country that he would be at risk (if he contravenes the order.) Somehow, I don't see Hicks wanting to visit Disneyland in the future anyway.

I think The Age must be really upset about the finalisation of the matter, as it means they will have to start finding about a 2 pages a day to fill with other stories for a change.

Rosie cops a blast

The 'queen of nice' goes nuts - Los Angeles Times

It seems Rosie O'Donnell is indicating that she is a 9/11 conspiracy believer. Jonah Goldberg gives her a gigantic blast in this column, which you really should read.

The bureaucracy at the end of the world

Comment is free: The history at the end of history

Francis Fukuyama spends a lot of time lately defending himself from the neo-con label, and this article is along those lines. It is interesting, though, what he says about democracy.

Towards the end, Fukuyama makes this discouraging claim:

I believe that the European Union more accurately reflects what the world will look like at the end of history than the contemporary United States. The EU's attempt to transcend sovereignty and traditional power politics by establishing a transnational rule of law is much more in line with a "post-historical" world than the Americans' continuing belief in God, national sovereignty, and their military.

The world would die under that paperwork, though.

Thus typed ZarAthustra

The Typing Life: Books: The New Yorker

A curious snippet from the above article:

Nietzsche used a typewriter. This is hard to imagine, but in the effort to stem his migraines and his incipient blindness—symptoms, some scholars say, of an advanced case of syphilis—he bought one of the new contraptions.

It is hard to imagine.

Miracle stories

Did late pope cure nun's Parkinson's? - washingtonpost.com

The Washington Post's version of the claimed miracle indicates that, at the very least, it's an interesting story.

As far as I know, I am in good health and don't need a miracle cure. However, I am prepared to declare that if $300,000 appears in large notes in an unmarked box in a secret location I have now emailed to myself, I will contact the Vatican and urge them to take it as the second miracle. John Paul II, this is your chance!

What a surprise

Redfern speech still resonates - National - smh.com.au

Phillip Adams asks Radio National listeners to nominate their most "unforgettable speech", and Paul Keating's Redfern Park black armband oration is up near the top.

A long post on gay children of the modern world

Accepting Gay Identity, and Gaining Strength - New York Times

Talking about sexual self identity is a tricky business. Everyone brings their own life experience to it, and it can seem churlish to question the way others claim to have experienced it. There also seem to be some cases where children do genuinely seem to be far outside of the "usual" gender range of behaviour from a very young age, and no one is surprised when they do turn out to have same sex attraction as adults.

But, having said all that, I still think there is a strong case to be made that the current Western popular conception and understanding of all things gay comprises large elements of what is really just intellectual fashion.

Believe it or not (since he is far from a conservative favourite), I reckon the otherwise fairly loopy Foucault might have been onto something when he dealt with the evolution of the idea of sexuality. Have a look at this article purporting to summarise some of Foucault's ideas. An extract:

Historically, there have been two ways of viewing sexuality, according to Foucault. In China, Japan, India and the Roman Empire have seen it as an "Ars erotica", "erotic art", where sex is seen as an art and a special experience and not something dirty and shameful. It is something to be kept secret, but only because of the view that it would lose its power and its pleasure if spoken about.

In Western society, on the other hand, something completely different has been created, what Foucault calls "scientia sexualis", the science of sexuality. It is originally (17th century) based on a phenomenon diametrically opposed to Ars erotica: the confession. It is not just a question of the Christian confession, but more generally the urge to talk about it. A fixation with finding out the "truth" about sexuality arises, a truth that is to be confessed. It is as if sexuality did not exist unless it is confessed. Foucault writes:

"We have since become an extraordinarily confessing society. Confession has spread its effects far and wide: in the judicial system, in medicine, in pedagogy, in familial relations, in amorous relationships, in everyday life and in the most solemn rituals; crimes are confessed, sins are confessed, thoughts and desires are confessed, one's past and one's dreams are confessed, one's childhood is confessed; one's diseases and problems are confessed;..."

This forms a strong criticism of psychoanalysis, representing the modern, scientific form of confession. Foucault sees psychoanalysis as a legitimization of sexual confession. In it, everything is explained in terms of repressed sexuality and the psychologist becomes the sole interpreter of it. Sexuality is no longer just something people hide, but it is also hidden from themselves, which gives the theological, minute confession a new life.

This post was prompted by the New York Times article at the top, about how one nice liberal family encouraged their gay teen son to be out and proud. The boy's psycho-sexual history is given as this:

From the time Zach was little, they knew he was not a run-of-the-mill boy. His friends were girls or timid boys.

“Zach had no interest in throwing a football,” Mr. O’Connor says. But their real worry was his anger, his unhappiness, his low self-esteem. “He’d say: ‘I’m not smart. I’m not like other kids,’ ” says Ms. O’Connor. The middle-school psychologist started seeing him daily.

The misery Zach caused was minor compared with the misery he felt. He says he knew he was different by kindergarten, but he had no name for it, so he would stay to himself. He tried sports, but, he says, “It didn’t work out well.” He couldn’t remember the rules. In fifth grade, when boys at recess were talking about girls they had crushes on, Zach did not have someone to name.

By sixth grade, he knew what “gay” meant, but didn’t associate it with himself. That year, he says: “I had a crush on one particular eighth-grade boy, a very straight jock. I knew whatever I was feeling I shouldn’t talk about it.” He considered himself a broken version of a human being. “I did think about suicide,” he says.

His coming out to himself and his family (I think the article indicates at the age of 13) is what "cured" him of his depression:

...in the midst of math class, he told a female friend. By day’s end it was all over school. The psychologist called him in. “I burst into tears,” he recalls. “I said, ‘Yes, it’s true.’ Every piece of depression came pouring out. It was such a mess.”

That night, when his mother got home from work, she stuck her head in his room to say hi. “I said, ‘Ma, I need to talk to you about something, I’m gay.’ She said, ‘O.K., anything else?’ ‘No, but I just told you I’m gay.’ ‘O.K., that’s fine, we still love you.’ I said, ‘That’s it?’ I was preparing for this really dramatic moment.”

Doesn't this perfectly illustrate Foucault's idea that the West is obsessed with a need for a confession of sexuality?

I indicated earlier in the post that I don't deny that there may well be some boys who are virtually biologically determined to only ever have any sexual attraction to men.

But that NYT article is written in such a way that it sends subtle encouragement to boys (not just the ones who may end up gay, but the majority "straight" ones too) that stupid things like not being good at sports and not getting being accepted by the "jocks" in school is a sign of sexual destiny. The article notes that after his coming out:

He still wasn’t athletic, but to the family’s surprise, coming out let out a beautiful voice. He won the middle school’s top vocal award.

Let's keep the gay stereotypes coming, shall we.

If I haven't convinced you yet that this liberal family was trying just too hard to make their son feel comfortable, try this:

His father took him to a gay-lesbian conference at Central Connecticut State in New Britain, and Zach was thrilled to see so many gay people in one place. His therapist took him to a Gay Bingo Night at St. Paul’s Church on the Green in Norwalk that raises money for AIDS care. Zach became a regular and within a few months was named Miss Congeniality.

“They crowned me with a tiara and sash, and I walked around the room waving,” he recalls. “I was still this shy 14-year-old in braces. I hadn’t reached my socialness yet, and everyone was cheering.

Bloody hell!

It seems to me that the liberal (or simply modern Western?) attitude to sexual identity as being the vital core of one's being is actually the thing that is likely to be causing many children unnecessary uncertainty and worry about who they are.

I reckon it is the hidden assumptions behind modern Western thinking about this sort of stuff that needs airing, and a historical view is helpful in this regard, whether or not Foucault got it right.

On British comedy

Comedy ain’t what it used to be (but don’t tell foreigners)-Richard Morrison-TimesOnline

I'm not sure I totally agree with Morrison on his analysis, but he has some fun along the way:

...amazing though it may seem to those of us struggling joylessly to pay a huge mortgage for a tiny piece of this fractious isle, the world regards the Brits as the funniest nation on earth...

This anecdotal evidence is confirmed by a survey that Reader’s Digest did a couple of years ago. They asked 4,000 Europeans to rank each other’s nationalities according to traits such as bossiness (the Germans came top), efficiency (the Germans came top), and loveability (the Germans came last). The British ended up mid-table for everything except “sense of humour”, where we soared to the top. Oh, and “sexiness”, where we plunged to the bottom. (In every sense, if you went to a private school.)

As I mentioned a few posts ago, I came late to "Extras", but did find it very funny.

Generally, I don't find much British TV comedy worth watching anymore. I suspect that a large part is to do with the way it seems nearly all shows are written by just one or two writers, often the stars of the show. (Yes, I know, this was true of "Extras" too, yet I liked it.) But generally, what seems to be lacking is someone to tell the writers that a sketch has gone on long enough, and they need to cut it. This is especially the case with Little Britain, which loves to repeat or push an idea so far that it finally does become in offensively bad taste.

(Repetition can itself become part of the joke -"Get Smart" is the best example of that - but it has its limits.)

For me, I still count the finest and funniest sketch show writing ever to come of Britain to be Not the Nine O'Clock News. (It makes me feel old to think that anyone under about the age of 30 has probably not even seen it.)

The show had a whole raft of writers, as do most US Comedy talk shows that I like (Letterman and Conan O'Brien). I also think that few US sitcoms that have been successful have ever been sole writer effort.

If only there was currently such a talented team as that on Not the Nine O'Clock News. Here's a prime sketch:

A trip through Asia

Centauri Dreams - Emerging Asia

Science fiction author Gregory Benford has a post here about a recent trip through Asia. There's a picture of him with a rather frail Arthur C Clarke.

By the way, Gregory Benford looks to me a lot of that writer on David Letterman who seemed to have left the show a year or more ago (Letterman interviewed him as a farewell), but seems to be back doing bit parts now. Don't know his name, sorry.

Cold fusion still under consideration

Cold fusion is back at the American Chemical Society

The story above about cold fusion from news@nature is interesting for what it says about the open-mindedness of science. Some extracts:

After an 18-year hiatus, the American Chemical Society (ACS) seems to be warming to cold fusion. Today that society is holding a symposium at their national meeting in Chicago, Illinois, on 'low-energy nuclear reactions', the official name for cold fusion....

Mosier-Boss presented her team's latest results with a technique called co-deposition, where they electrochemically deposit palladium onto a cathode in the presence of deuterium — a heavy isotope of hydrogen. During their electrochemical reactions they have seen mini explosions, evidence for neutron and tritium production, and a warming of the cell that can't be accounted for by normal chemistry, they say — although they are careful to avoid the 'CF' words.

"We have shown it's possible to stimulate nuclear reactions by electrochemical methods," says Gordon. Others say this conclusion is premature. But they have published some 16 papers over the past 18 years, including one earlier this year1.

Miles is also careful to avoid using the words 'cold fusion'. "There are code names you can use," he says. In 2004 Miles and colleagues were granted a US patent for a palladium material doped with boron for use in low-energy nuclear reactions, but if the patent application contained the CF words it would never have been granted, Miles says. "We kind of disguised what we did."

There was also a 2004 review by the Department of Energy that was inconclusive.

It puzzles me that some scientists are so sceptical about this. If there are experiments still showing inconclusive results, aren't they curious to get to the bottom of what is causing the anomalies?

The path of science is not immune from the influence of the personalities who conduct it, but I feel there are many who don't like to admit this.

Alan Ramsey breaks a story - mark your calendar

Stop the presses: the story Rudd tried to kill - Opinion - smh.com.au

It's a remarkable day when Alan Ramsey uses his Saturday column to actually tell us a story we did not know before. (As opposed to his usual schtick of cutting and pasting enormous tracts of other peoples words.)

Well, this is sort of a new story. Or at least, it's the insider journalist's background to a story we already knew. As told to him by another journalist....

Anyway, anyway...

The point is that there is actual insight to be gained into Kevin Rudd and his adviser's attitudes and character in today's column, and you must read it.

Bad career moves of Gillian

More X-rated than X Files-Arts & Entertainment-Film-TimesOnline

Aw, it's so disappointing to read interviews with stars when they reveal themselves to have none of the charms of their most famous character. Case in point: this interview with Gillian Anderson. She also seems to have strange tastes in selecting movies to advance her career:

In a tiny trailer, in a clearing in a cold and wet Worcestershire forest, Gillian Anderson is swearing like a docker. “Movies should be whatever the f*** they are!” says the 38-year-old actress and one-time TV icon from The X Files. “If they are f****** disturbing, then let them be f***** disturbing!”....

The movie, about a young urban couple, Alice (Anderson) and Adam (Danny Dyer), who are brutalised by a gang of country yokels before extracting even more gruesome revenge, will not be everyone’s cup of tea. “It’s dark, but it’s brilliantly dark,” Anderson says about a movie in which gang rape, torture and the near lethal intrusion of a rusty gun barrel into the rectum of a major character are key features. “We can’t pretend that there isn’t violence in the world, that it doesn’t f****** happen!”.....

“Look, I swear a lot normally,” she admits, before shifting the blame on to her co-star, the notoriously potty-mouthed Dyer. “But working with Danny exacerbated it. I mean, we all absorbed the word c*** into our vocabulary thanks to him.”

She sounds like a natural for that very amusing "Extras" show, I reckon.

Imagining Iraq

Lies and memories: When stories read a little too good. - By Jack Shafer - Slate Magazine

Read the Slate article above about how the New York Times reported on one woman's complete fabrication about suffering while in Iraq. Fascinating.

Eat up all your isotopes, kids

Research suggests fortified food could help resist ageing

This has to be one of the oddest ideas I have ever heard:

Fortifying food with specially developed proteins could make our bodies more resistant to the ageing process, according to a former Oxford University scientist.

Steaks and chicken fillets laced with rare, heavy forms of elements - "isotope-enhanced" proteins - could strengthen cells and protect them against oxidation, caused by highly-reactive particles, free radicals, that are released in the body as a by-product of biological processes in our cells. Many researchers believe free-radical oxidation is a major cause of ageing.

In small-scale studies, Mikhail Shchepinov found nematode worms - used extensively in ageing research - lived 10% longer when fed nutrients enriched with a heavy isotope of hydrogen, deuterium.

Yum.

Cancer and the Left

White House spokesman faces new battle with cancer - International Herald Tribune

Tony Snow, the Fox News host who moved to the White House as the press secretary not so long ago, now has liver cancer too.

I wonder why liver cancer is so difficult (or impossible?) to treat.

As you might expect, there are some on the left who see this as fitting example of karma. There's a column at Huffington Post
which seems to run the line "I really don't wish him ill, but part of me still feels he deserves it." That's left wing compassion for you.