There’s an old story variously ascribed to any number of inscrutable Chinese men: how do you get the cat to bite a hot pepper? Zhou En Lai (or Mao, Chiang Kai Chek, or possibly that bloke who taught Grasshopper on the TV) asks his students. Fool 1 (for such stories always require at least two ...
If the Dow plunges a thousand points in 10 minutes, what should we do about it? Other than scrape that brown stuff off the insides of our underpants as we contemplate the wreckage of our retirement plans? How about this as a truly radical suggestion? Let’s do nothing about it. Bupkiss, sweet ...
Yes, it’s Earth Day again, the day we’re all supposed to think about Mother Gaia and what we can do to worship her in the correctly communal and communitarian manner. One little tip for you though (stolen shamelessly from PJ O’Rourke, as most peoples’ good jokes are): Have a ...
No, you don’t have to be clever or intelligent to either get or be rich. Some achieve great wealth via the Lucky Sperm Club, others through just being in the right place at the right time. Michael Jordan, for example, would not have made a great fortune in the 1920s when basketball players ...
Good looking man who can sing and dance is gay: well, that’s a shocker really, isn’t it? “I am proud to say that I am a fortunate homosexual man. I am very blessed to be who I am.” And with that Ricky Martin shocked, well, shocked almost no one really. While ...
What’s wrong with American trade? In short, the people America has negotiating its trade agreements. One Robert E. Lighthizer, a deputy trade rep under Reagan, took to the New York Times this week to tells us all what was wrong with current and recent trade policy. What he managed to show is ...
Kate Winslet and Sam Mendes: Hollywood power couple marriage ends up on the trash heap. Does this come as a surprise to anyone? There are those of us who thought such was inevitable right from the start. The chance that two self-absorbed narcissists (as artists almost inevitably are) were going ...
Much as it pains me to do so I fear that I must praise a left leaning economist. Dean Baker, please stand up and take your bow. He’s told the truth, always a bad career move in the political arena, about the current financial crisis and recession. We’re not deep in the economic doo doo ...
Much of international discourse, international politics, is all about how they should become more like us. Quite how they should become more like us depends upon the speaker: if it’s Hillary then more attention should be given to strong, hefty, and mature women who’ve never had an ...
I think we’ve found the secret of Paul Krugman you know. No, really, an excellent little piece in the New Yorker gives us what we need to analyze the great man. Yes, he is indeed a great man but like all of us he has his flaws and this piece gives us the necessary clues to them. Actually, ...
