The NYT’s Maureen Dowd comes up with a rather counter-intuitive explanation for Obama’s recent success in the Democratic primaries: voters aren’t tired of feminity or scared of estrogene in their commander in chief, they seem to want more. But they just don’t believe they can’t get enough of it from Hillary…
Bill Clinton’s libido is responsible for Iraq.
Well, at least in the sense that he caused the Presidency of George W. Bush. And it’s his fault, too, if his wife won’t be nominated or elected president. Sounds farfetched? Well, not to Bob Herbert. NY Times columnist, who argues, apparently seriously, that Bill Clinton’s famous touch has always been poisenous for other Democrats and that
“[w]hen Mr. Clinton left office in 2001, … , … the Monica Lewinsky scandal and impeachment had opened the door to the era of George W. Bush.”
A little too reminiscent of the tale of Sex, Lies, and Dossiers which a young Texan student called Amber told me in June 2003 on the train to Prague, the myth that Bill’s unsatiable libido can be blamed for just about everything from global warming to Abu Ghraib. Maybe that’s some kind of conservative Godwin’s law equivalent, but I just wouldn’t have thought this kind of thinking has made it into the NY Times. Well, maybe the Times are a changing.
Oddly enough: Hungarian toilets edition
I suppose no one of you, gentle readers, will be able to deny that the internet has immensely increased humanity’s ability to deal with boredom. Whenever we’re not exactly sure how to productively spend our time, or aren’t willing to do so for some reason or another, we no longer need to stare at empty walls or zap through hundreds of tv channels not knowing what to expect.
In the internet age, there is at least one source of immediate gratification that will never disappoint: It’s Reuters “oddly enough” news section. This is where we learn about everything we always wanted to know about human life in the 21st century but never dared to ask. Thus, it’s the perfect source for a couple of easy reading Friday afternoon links.
Accordingly, let me regale you today with a link to a Reuters’ video about a Hungarian national contest to identify the best public toilet east and west, north and south of Budapest…
Australia will be next – ‘Tokio Hotel’ in New York.
When I had a drink with friends in Sydney’s Darling Harbour quarter, no one native to the red continent understood why I had to chuckle when I read the bar’s name – Tokio Hotel. Well, they may soon, as Kelefa Sanneh, writing in the NY Times about Tokio Hotel’s first concert in New York City (‘A wild welcome to German teen-pop band’), believes that the number of teenage girls screaming the name of the East German teen band’s singer will rise dramatically following the band’s US album release in April.
“If this concert was oddly delightful from start to finish, thank Bill Kaulitz, who should, with any luck, be thrilling and perplexing young Americans for the rest of the year.”
If the French experience is worth anything (links in German), I suppose the German foreign ministry is already busy allocating additional funds to pay for more German teachers at the Goethe Institute in New York. It seems, German is indeed getting sexy again. Even if not popularized by the likes of Grass or Jelinek, but by
“that gender-bending singer, who answers to the disappointingly unglamorous name of Bill Kaulitz.”
The New York Post’s Danica Lo even sat down with the band and, lovingly, but still true to the paper’s style, asked what their plans for world domination are. Have a look at her video report, it also features some interesting fangirl statements…
Snowball fights in the Demographic Winter
I guess this should go on afoe, but I don’t have the time for a profound comment – The Nation’s Kathryn Joyce looks at the American Christian Right’s alleged concern about the impending demise of Europe due to a relative lack of “the right babies” and a relative abundance of the wrong ones, also known as those whose parents immigrated from other (whisper: Muslim) countries. Joyce argues that those in the American Christian Right who are lobbying for this kind of thinking aren’t really concerned about Europe as such, but rather excited about the possibility of exploiting a diffuse xenophobia in Europe to find an entry point for their “family friendly” agenda. Now really.
I suppose we should be grateful though – if there’s one thing that will keep Conservative Politicians in Germany (and probably elsewhere in Europe) from advancing that kind of thinking, it is telling them that they are arguing “just like the American Christian Right.”
More on British sex (or the lack thereof)
Today, Reuters offers a possible, yet likely unrelated, explanation for the NHS’s attempts to help her majesty’s citizens to ‘sexercise’ sufficiently. According to the news agency
“half of UK men would swap sex for 50 inch TV.”
According to a survey of 2000 Britons, conducted by the British Electrical retailer Comet, asking what they would give up for a large television, it was allegedly found that 47 percent of men, yet only about a third of women would give up sex for half a year.
Questions of scientific and statistical validity notwithstanding, published just before Valentine’s day, even as a joke, that’s not exactly a compliment for British women…
Her Majesty’s Government recommends “sexercise”
According to this article on BBC online, the British National Health Service, NHS, is trying a new way to make people enjoy preventing illnesses rather than having to pay to cure them later. Its NHS direct website apparently briefly offered a document explaining how having regular sex is scientifically considered to be
“a workout worthy of an athlete.”
At least when it’s done with
“a little energy and imagination,”
apparently, a formulation which, alas, leaves one age-old question unanswered – is bad sex better than no sex at all?
On the other hand, if the BBC is quoting the document correctly, maybe the concept of “bad sex” is a little off.
“Forget about jogging round the block or struggling with sit-ups. Sex uses every muscle group, gets the heart and lungs working hard, and burns about 300 calories an hour.” The advice suggests “regular romps this winter” could lead to a better body and a younger look.” [And adds that i]ncreased production of endorphins “will make your hair shine and your skin smooth.” “If you’re worried about wrinkles – orgasms even help prevent frown lines from deepening.”
I suppose at least for one half of humanity, this part of the story may be the best news- headaches and sex actually seem to go together rather well…
“The article goes on to say that orgasms release “painkillers” into the bloodstream, which helping keep mild illnesses like colds and aches and pains at bay.
It’s too bad that the NHS direct apparently had to take the document off their website following the BBC report. Given all those benefits and the NHS’ continuous problems to ration health services justly, the agency should not worry too much about publishing advice contra Victorian mores, but rather start investing in explicit online dating sites or offer discounts for courses on tantric exploration. But for all its benefits, I still somehow doubt they will take this advice…
Happy New Year.
Happy belated new year, gentle readers. For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been enjoying Australian hospitality. Unfortunately though, due to an unfortunate combination of hosting issues at home and lack of decent internet connectivity down under, I have not been able to blog my trip as I had planned to.
I will definitely recapitulate a couple of things over the next couple of days, but today I’m just content that I managed to get almostadiary back online without having to go through too much of a hazzle. So let me just wish you a happy 2008 before I’ll begin to reconstruct my sister’s blog, ‘boulot, métro, dodo‘, which, alas, has been just as affected by the server trouble.
Santa in Seoul.
After a couple of stressful weeks, I’m on my way to Australia, where I’ll be spending the next couple of hopefully far less stressful weeks. On the other hand, a journey that begins and ends with two consecutive ten-hour flights probably doesn’t count as completely stress-free. Right now, I’m spending the time between said ten-hour flights in the transit area at Seoul International airport. While this is most certainly not the best place to get an idea of South Korea, the country’s culture has managed to get into the duty free zone.
While there are, not entirely unexpectedly a couple of days before Christmas, quite a lot of Santa-inspired attempts to withdraw Dollars and Euros from bored transit passengers’ pockets – the Korean idea of “Santa” has not yet been assimilated by soft drink marketing. In South Korea – well, in the tiny part of South Korea I have now come to know – Santa is usually young, quite attractive (which implies the complete lack of Santa’s well known facial hair), wearing a green miniskirt and knee-high white leather boots.
I may be mistaken, but my guess is that over here there will be more 13 year old boys who still believe in Santa than at the North Pole.
Grünes Face-Lifting.
Spiegel Online: Moderner, klarer – und besser zu Kopieren: Mit deutlicher Mehrheit haben sich die Grünen auf ihrem Parteitag in Nürnberg ein neues Logo gegeben. Die Parteikomponenten “Bündnis 90” und “Die Grünen” werden jetzt in gleicher Schriftart dargestellt.