What has happened to Iraq's missing $1bn? "The money missing from all ministries under the interim Iraqi government appointed by the US in June 2004 may turn out to be close[r] to $2bn... Many Iraqi soldiers and police have died because they were not properly equipped. In Baghdad they often ride in civilian pick-up trucks vulnerable to gunfire, rocket- propelled grenades or roadside bombs. For months even men defusing bombs had no protection against blasts because they worked without bullet-proof vests. These were often promised but never turned up."
posted by Rothko at 11:15 PM PST - 20 comments Jets meet-up suggest that George Bush really does
not like black people. A post over at Grabthar's Hammer analyses a recent photo-op of the President with the New York Jets, and figures out that the probability of the black players having been kept out of the immediate vicinity of Dubya (as you can see is the case in the photos supplied on the post) was 0.4%.
posted by noizyboy at 9:36 PM PST - 38 comments Okay, I admit it. I have a DVD player, and I even have a TV ... that I watch! I didn't find myself buying many DVDs though, until I discovered that I could waste my money buying TV shows on DVD, finding the ones I like usually through word of (mostly analog, sometimes digital) mouth. When deciding whether or not to Netflix and/or buy Smallville, I came across DVD Verdict, and I found the site's conceit--to present each review of a particular DVD as one would present evidence in a trial, then deliver a verdict--to be charming rather than annoying. Chalk it up to generally good and entertaining writing, and very in-depth DVD reviews. Oh, the site's authors like Smallville. But then their motto is "truth, justice, and the digital way"...when it's not "making the jump from heroin to digital smoother since 1999".
posted by WolfDaddy at 9:20 PM PST - 16 comments Hey God, are you there? It's me flamingbore.
An Indirect Line to God, for the Godless.
posted by FlamingBore at 6:59 PM PST - 37 comments Consensus View
New Yorker columnist James Surowiecki's book The Wisdom of Crowds "explores a deceptively simple idea that has profound implications: large groups of people are smarter than an elite few, no matter how brilliant¡ªbetter at solving problems, fostering innovation, coming to wise decisions, even predicting the future." Now this idea has been put into practice with Consensus View, a site where you can enter your predictions on stocks, commodities, and currencies, and view the group consensus. (from wsj.com)
posted by reverendX at 5:52 PM PST - 46 comments Left Behind: Bush's Holy War on Nature. Chip Ward enumerates the bizarro-world logic and Orwellian language of current American environmental policy.
Even as Katrina's aftermath is focusing attention on links between global warming and more severe hurricanes, and studies of arctic sea-ice suggest that we may be 'past the point of no return' of climate change, the Department of "Justice" seems intent on blaming the flood of New Orleans on environmental groups.
This War on Terra may not end in our lifetimes (despite the number of lives it will end...)
posted by dinsdale at 5:36 PM PST - 33 comments QuickTime panoramas from the annual Sziget pop festival. I love getting these things and spinning them around at full speed but it can be a bit disconcerting with the The Boom Family Snuff Puppets surrounding you. And hey! spot the guy caught lighting up a doobie at the Yann Tiersen concert.
posted by tellurian at 5:17 PM PST - 2 comments "If time has to end, it can be described, instant by instant," Mr. Palomar thinks, "and each instant, when described, expands so that its end can no longer be seen." He decides that he will set himself to describing every instant of his life, and until he has described them all he will no longer think of being dead. At that moment he dies.
In memoriam of Italo Calvino, who died exactly 20 years ago.
"Calvino's novels" by his friend Gore Vidal. Calvino's obituary by Vidal, il maestro William Weaver's essay on Calvino's cities, Jeanette Winterson on Calvino's dream of being invisible, and Stefano Franchi's philosophical study on Palomar's doctrine of the void. More inside.
posted by matteo at 3:45 PM PST - 18 comments 