I wonder what cultural anthropologists would add, but Papascott links to an interesting and funny essay by Eamonn Fitzgerald’s Rainy Day regarding the relative importance of celebrating birthdays in Germany and Anglo-Irish countries.
Archiv der Kategorie: quicklink
Georgy Buzz.
As far as my sitemeter tells me, Georgy Russell must be doing some pretty good PR over in California – or she has bribed someone at Google.
Yesterday, she apparently was on the cover page of USA toda. And now someone has even set up a domain featuring a very likely fake picture of her. She writes in her blog: “As I see it, if people are talking about me, that’s better than not saying anything.” She’s right, it would certainly do more harm than good to go after the person who has set up georgyrussell.net/org –
Beacon of Liberty.
Der Spiegel’s cover this week, headline: “Powerless Superpower. Appearance and Reality of the USA.” The story is not available for free, unfortunately. For an American perspective of the same subject, check this Atlantic special “The Real State Of The Union”.
Georgy Watch.
Now look at this. Not only are more and more people coming to this site in order to find something about the Calfornian Gubernatorial candidate Georgy Russell, which I recommended recently, there is also a blog devoted monitoring her campaign – Georgy Watch. The author believes it’s pictures most people expect to find at his page, which might well be true. So just to let you know – there aren’t any. I don’t know what the motivation behind this blog is, or if it’s actually pro or con for that matter – but it seems the author knows your candidate in person.
Larry Flynt, a smut peddler who cares
and wants to be taken seriously as a gubernatorial candidate, writes Michelle Goldberg on Salon.com.
Japanese For Runaways.
Did you know that the Japanese adapted German words for “gypsum-corset” (Gipskorsett – gipusukorusetto), “dry-construction” (Trockenbau – torokkenbau), “potence” (Potenz – potentsu) and “stroll” – (Wanderung – wanderungu), only to name a few? To bridge this and similar gaps in geography and lifestyle, go and grab one of Die Zeit’s daily knowledge-bites.
Mainstream Blogging.
Maureen Dowd reflects about the mainstreaming of blogging –
“Don’t get me started on the Blaster virus sabotaging Microsoft systems, or the cram of spam reminding us that the average American is an impotent, insecure, overweight, tired, depressed loser desperately seeking to refinance. The most telling sign that the Internet is no longer the cool American frontier? Blogs, which sprang up to sass the establishment, have been overrun by the establishment.” (from the NY Times)
Lazy? And Happy?
The Economist ponders about a self-regulation mechanism adjusting the European work/leisure trade-off in favour of work. Even in lazy Germany.
But it also reviews this year’s LSE Lionel Robbins Memorial Lecture by Richard Layard [pdf] who presented new insights into the hypothesis that more doesn’t always, in fact, usually, make you happier.
So working more might not add to your personal utility if you’re simply doing it for the stuff you can buy with more cash. Having more, he claims, is only important as long as it means – “having more than Jane Doe down the road.”
Poor Tony.
Today’s NY Times editorial looks at Tony Blair’s credibility crisis and decides that opposing Washington on a number of important issues would be helpful for him right now. I disagree.
Opposing will not be enough. He will need substancial evidence that supporting the US administration against one’s own voters’ opinion does pay off eventually. If the American administration does not want to find itself completely unilateralized the next time it needs a hand from Whitehall, Bush needs to give Blair something that is costly and thus credible. I’m thinking Kyoto, or stepped up pressure on Israel. Whatever has lower opportunity costs for Bush.