Jeff Matthews Is Not Making This Up points us to the most important news story that you did not read this week.
From National Review comes a story of a Coptic priest who is rumored to have a 5 million dollar bounty on his head.
And from Washington Post comes the story of how a big chain decided to try to buy pig meat from Joel Salatin and all the work they had to go through to make that work.
A pair of hoax ads on Craigslist cost an Oregon man much of what he owned.
The ads popped up Saturday afternoon, saying the owner of a Jacksonville home was forced to leave the area suddenly and his belongings, including a horse, were free for the taking, said Jackson County sheriff’s Detective Sgt. Colin Fagan.
But Robert Salisbury had no plans to leave. The independent contractor was at Emigrant Lake when he got a call from a woman who had stopped by his house to claim his horse.
On his way home he stopped a truck loaded down with his work ladders, lawn mower and weed eater.
“I informed them I was the owner, but they refused to give the stuff back,” Salisbury said. “They showed me the Craigslist printout and told me they had the right to do what they did.”
The driver sped away after rebuking Salisbury. On his way home he spotted other cars filled with his belongings.
Once home he was greeted by close to 30 people rummaging through his barn and front porch.
The trespassers, armed with printouts of the ad, tried to brush him off. “They honestly thought that because it appeared on the Internet it was true,” Salisbury said. “It boggles the mind.”
Sometimes a story that uses cliches and does not get the characters quite right and is a little too popular to be really very good still is a good story.
H/T YouTube 2007 awards.
History is grinding forward if this news report is correct…..
But the food situation, which has mostly been felt in rural areas where rations have been suspended since November, has now spread to the city, according to the South Korean aid agency.
“Even ranking officials have run out of their (rationed) food supply, while a ban on (private) trade is strictly maintained,” said an unidentified city official quoted by Good Friends.
“It is nothing but a death sentence.”
The agency also said farm labourers were staying away from work because they were not getting any food. This was said to be affecting the planting of new crops.
Thats right. Don’t feed the people who are supposed to plant your crops.
Poem of the week is Psalm 22. It is our small concession to Easter.
A rant for all those who rent or might have to rent from Tanta at Calculated Risk. Be sure to check out the comments as well.
It will be a struggle for most people to get through this week’s essay of the week. The essay entitled “The Israel defense forces in the Second Lebanon War: Why the poor performance?” is a seriously academic essay. In practice this means that it is poorly written and full of hard to understand jargon.
Nonetheless, it is worth reading. It is worth reading if you are an admirer of Israel and you think that their military is endlessly capable for it explains the difference between what Israel military is today and what it was in the past. It is worth reading if you have a sick fascination with the MBA culture and its conception of leadership because the essay explains how modern business theory has infected Israeli military thinking.
But most importantly, it is a reminder that technology alone is not enough to ensure the superiority of western cultures. Western cultures must also retain their culture superiority. Failing that, the barbarians will be knocking down the gates.
This is an incredibly successful walker robot. I think it is still being controlled remotely, but its level of mobility is still astonishingly life-like.
H/T Discovery.com. Robot from by Boston Dynamics.
I knew that snakes climbed trees in warmer climates. But I never thought I would see a snake climb up into a pine tree. And I never thought that a snake would do that just to get away from a rabbit.
Poem of the Week: 3/16/08-3/22/08
There are two parts to a great poem. The first is a compelling imagery that should draw you in even before you can quite figure out what it is all about. The second is skillful allusions that bring a whole world of thought to life with a few sparse lines.
The Consolations by Adam Kirsch falls a little short when it comes to the department of compelling imagery. But it makes up for this deficiency by working hard on the department of skillful allusions. On the balance, it does not quite rise to the heights of a truly great poem, but as mediation on America’s current economic problems it has no poetic peer as of yet.
Unfortunately, if you don’t get any of the illusions, this poem can be dismissed out hand. So we recommend that you read up on Boethius before you read this poem (Catholic Encyclopedia and Wikipedia both have good short biographical pieces on him). If you really have time, it would not hurt to read a translation of Boethius’s The Consolation of Philosophy.
But if you have not the time for that, at least read the three places that Adam Kirsch draws direct quotes from. Here is a translation of the song that quote that heads the first section Mr. Kirsch’s poem comes from. Here is a translation of the song that the quote that heads the second section of Mr. Kirsch’s poem comes from. And here is a translation of the song that the quote that heads the last section comes from.