2014-12-24T01:16:52-04:00

JUS IN BELLO: Marty Lederman on what is in the McCain Amendment and what it means: the good, the (potentially) bad, the ugly, the law. (Or start here and scroll down.) And Soviet dissident Vladimir Bukovsky: …As someone who has been on the receiving end of the “treatment” under discussion, let me tell you that trying to make a distinction between torture and CID techniques is ridiculous. Long gone are the days when a torturer needed the nasty-looking tools displayed... Read more

2005-12-20T00:12:00-04:00

I DON’T REALLY KNOW HOW TO DESCRIBE IT, but here is Terry Teachout’s description of his recent collapse and diagnosis with congestive heart failure. He is recovering, he could use your prayers, and he manages to describe the events with characteristic grace. Read more

2005-12-19T23:47:00-04:00

“CAPOTE”: Saw it on Saturday with a friend. Verdict: a strange movie, with flaws in unexpected places. The basic thing is that it’s about Truman Capote researching and writing (and promoting) In Cold Blood, his 1965 account of the murder of a small-town Kansas family; and either you think, Whoa, must see now! or, …And? The movie doesn’t work hard to shift people from category B to category A–characters talk about how revolutionary the book’s style is, how it will... Read more

2005-12-19T23:42:00-04:00

INSPIRING IRAQI VOTE. Seriously. At some point tomorrowish I will be looking through the Iraqi blogosphere, and will post here any especially interesting takes. Read more

2005-12-19T23:35:00-04:00

“WHY CAN’T HE BE YOU?”: I have a short story in the Advent issue of Dappled Things, a new Catholic online lit-mag. I note that a Holy Whapper and a Godsbodkin are also represented therein. [ETA: No, I’m wrong about Godsbody. Sorry!] Why not mosey on over for a look? (This is the story set at a conference for ex-abortion clinic workers. There are a lot of reasons someone might not want to read a story with that setting, so... Read more

2014-12-24T01:18:07-04:00

She’s laughing out loud And busy ’cause she’s minding somebody else’s blogwatch… Jane Galt: Fish in foil! And life after the farm dole, in New Zealand: …Granted, twin-island New Zealand is only the size of Colorado with a population of 4 million, and represents a mere thimbleful of the world’s agriculture. But the evidence is there, its farmers say: Since the government’s momentous decision to abolish all 30 agricultural subsidies, their productivity has grown, farming’s share of gross domestic product... Read more

2005-12-13T17:37:00-04:00

YESTERDAY’S TOMORROWS: R.J. Lehmann got a hold of a 1979 issue of Omni, including readers’ predictions: Predictions Shared By More Than 50% of Omni Readers…PREDICTION: By the late 1980s, cloned human beings will become a reality. OUTCOME: They clearly didn’t hit the mark, but how far off they were is tough to judge. If you count embryos as humans, then Advanced Cell Technologies claimed to have done it in 2001 and Hwang Woo-Suk definitely did it in 2004, making them... Read more

2005-12-13T17:33:00-04:00

Otar, her lover, said that when you walked behind her, and she knew you were walking behind her, the swing and play of those slim haunches was something intensely artistic, something Arab girls were taught in special schools by special Parisian panders who were afterwards strangled.—Pale Fire, hee. (Quicquid comments here.) Read more

2005-12-11T14:03:00-04:00

MAYBE LATER WE CAN MAKE A SNOWMAN/WE CAN MAKE THE SNOWMAN BE OUR SLAVE: Dreidl Dreidl DreidlI caught you in my teethDreidl Dreidl DreidlThe Void yawns underneath and more family favorites…. Read more

2005-12-11T13:59:00-04:00

But let me not pursue the tabulation of nonsense.–Vladimir Nabokov, Pale Fire (Eh, I’m on p. 101 of this now, and I have to say I’m not sure I know why we’re here. So far it seems cute and clever, but nothing more. What am I missing? —Lolita is really great, and I need to re-read it, and Invitation to a Beheading is fascinating though I thought it petered out toward the end, but this one I just don’t get.) Read more

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