The Washington Post is reporting that Margaret Thatcher’s condition is deteriorating and she now suffers from dementia. She forgets that her husband has passed and has to be reminded several times of this and other things. At times she is reportedly quite lucid and cognizant, but at others it seems she cannot remember simple things.
Chavs aren't born they're grown.
One thing I often notice about British expats to the US is the sort of ’shock’ at how US parents are involved in the lives of their children. Of course they love to ridicule the ‘helicopter parent’ (as do Americans) but once that formality is out of the way there is a second realization that comes as quite a punch. When they realize that their neighbor in the nicer house with the better job is actually taking three hours to help with the local school’s academic calendar, or a social function, or an extracurricular activity (instead of say going to the pub with their mates) they have a sort of ‘are we doing something wrong’ moment?
Of course with any expat there is the question of is this ‘better or worse’ which in reality usually equals just ‘different’ but today I read an article (inflammatory though it is) that points out some of the ‘differences’ with being a child in the UK and other countries. Suffice it to say the article is not at all pleased with either British parents basically leaving their kids ‘in the garden to grow on their own’ nor the social welfare state that has accepted nearly anything a UK parent can dish out without regard to the long-term impact on the children.
One interesting statistic and observation in an article full of them was this on ‘in the home’ in the UK:
Eighty percent of British children have televisions in their bedrooms, more than have their biological fathers at home. Fifty-eight percent of British children eat their evening meal in front of the television (a British child spends more than five hours per day watching a screen); 36 percent never eat any meals together with other family members; and 34 percent of households do not even own dining tables. In the prison where I once worked, I discovered that many inmates had never eaten at a table together with someone else.
Let me speculate briefly on the implications of these startling facts. They mean that children never learn, from a sense of social obligation, to eat when not hungry, or not to eat when they are. Appetite is all they need consult in deciding whether to eat—a purely egotistical outlook. Hence anything that interferes with the satisfaction of appetite will seem oppressive. They do not learn such elementary social practices as sharing or letting others go first. Since mealtimes are usually when families get to converse, the children do not learn the art of conversation, either; listening to what others say becomes a challenge.
Unfortunately, statistics in the US are still pretty poor for many a thing, from pregnancy to teen alcoholics so it’s not simply a matter of saying do this and all will be better. Materialism here is as great if not greater than back in the UK.
Anyway, worth a read.
UPDATE: Or you can just get the user’s guide to being a Chav now out on Amazon. ]]>
She’s been part of the Unified Team of the former Soviet States.
She’s been part of the Georgian Olympic team
It’s a great honor, voted on by the athletes themselves. She’s been living a bit of the American dream as have many other recent immigrants, and she’s said carrying the flag is as important to her as winning a gold medal.
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Sparing no expense for the coronation.
CNN is ready to splash out $100,000 for a NFL quality “SkyCam” that their going to use to swing in over Barrack Obama when he accepts the Democrats nomination.
As if the media needs another example of sparing no expense to making Barrack Obama more king-like. And they say the US election is about issues, not images? That the conventions are news worth events? Looks like a week of me watching coverage news from the BBC or France24 instead of the CNN Infomercial.
Expect to hear jokes and asides about this and the media’s love-in with Obama in the next week.
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Humanitarian aid ship
By now you’ve probably heard the USS McFaul has arrived in port in Georgia as part of a three ship convoy of humanitarian supply ships. What I didn’t know until checking the website of the vessel is that both the Captain and Executive Officer on the McFaul were graduates of Ohio State. Not entirely sure if that is a good or a bad thing. On the one hand, they are probably used to dealing with a lot of stubborn jerks (i.e. their fellow students) so that will help with some of the attitudes they may encounter from the Russians, but on the other hand they might have graduated from the OSU on the ‘football plan’ and gotten most of their academic credits for things like “light bulb replacement theory” and “Ikea Wicker Basket management” or something.
Interesting to note one of the next ships in port will be the USS Mount Whitney, flagship of the 6th fleet and which is a command and control and Intel vessel. One suspects the leaders in Washington would like a little more on the ground intelligence coming back from the region rather than hearing about things second-hand.
Mount Whitney can receive and transmit large amounts of secure data from any point on earth through HF, UHF, VHF, SHF and EHFcommunications paths. This technology enables the Joint Intelligence Center and Joint Operations Center to provide the timely intelligence and operational support available in the Navy.
In other news from the region,
* A train full of fuel blew up after hitting a mine left on the railroad tracks.
* Russian troops have pulled out of the Senaki military base
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After saying they would not be releasing the photos of Michael Phelps amazing .01 second win in the 100-m butterfly, official Olympic timekeeper Omega has finally changed their minds and released the close up photos of the finish. And if you look at them, you won’t really know yourself because it looks like a tie. But professionals in this sport can clearly see that Phelps is the winner.
]]>“In the third set of images, with Phelps on the left, it is clear he is really pushing hard, while Cavic, on the right, is just arriving,” Chianese told The Associated Press on Saturday.
Phelps’ time of 50.58 seconds was confirmed after a review down to the 10-thousandth of a second; Cavic’s time was 50.59.
Chianese explained that it requires 3 kilograms (6.6 pounds) of pressure to activate the touchpad. “Any less and waves would set it off,” Chianese said. “You can’t just put your fingertips on the pad, you really have to push it. We explained all this directly after the race to (Cavic) and his coach.”
The Honk Kong Standard is reporting that the little girl who was judged ‘not pretty enough’ to be the face of China will have a role in the closing ceremony in Beijing. Yang Peiyi, the voice behind Lin Miaoke’s lip syncing, has become a sort of symbol to many and demands that she be given a role in the closing ceremony have been growing throughout the Olympics.
Both will be in the closing ceremony.
Officials remain tight-lipped over the plans, but it is understood seven- year-old songbird Yang Peiyi – who was heard but not seen at the opening ceremony – will take a special place in a rousing closing bash in Beijing.
It is believed that a double bill of both Yang Peiyi and Lin Miaoke will be featured in the closing ceremony, but we’ll have to wait to see to be sure.
The Sporting News is also reporting their was quite an outcry from Chinese citizens about this as well.
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This is a fascinating story about how the Olympics were tainted in 1980 by Soviet ‘officials’ in track and field (yup, it is possible to cheat in athletics). One of the very few Western reporters who went to Russia for the games wrote this fascinating piece about the scandal that most in the US have never heard of before. How the top two triple jumpers in the world had 9 out of their 12 jumps ‘flagged’ for fouls, and how other events were rigged in favor of Warsaw Pact states:
]]>In previous Olympics, the members of the Council of the International Amateur Athletic Federation, which supervises Olympic track and field, had always stationed a red-coated member of the council on the field, one for each event, to keep an eye on the judging — a good idea since all the officials are from the home country.
But after the first day, the Soviets came to Adriaan Paulen, the IAAF’s president, and complained that their officials were upset and insulted because the IAAF officials were watching them so closely.
The unspoken message was that if Paulen would remove the IAAF council members from the field, the USSR and its allies would support Paulen’s bid for re-election as IAAF president in 1981. Whatever his motives, Paulen ordered the council members off the field.
Don't try this at home
Police and FBI officials are trying to get to the bottom of a homemade ‘Predator’-like drone they found in Long Island being tested by some fellows in the late of the night. WNBC is breaking this story about the unlicensed UAV (which doesn’t really look like a Predator to be honest) and how it could have carried 800lbs of explosives and was being designed by an Egyptian who entered the US on a Sudanese passport (red flags all around). Some of these facts may eventually change (i.e. a real Predator only carried 450lbs as a payload).
With a GPS interface to a remote control plane, making a ‘homemade cruise missile’ should not be all that difficult. I’ve often wondered if the GPS coordinates around the White House and other sensitive locations are intentionally scrambled to prevent against this sort of thing. It would seem even a person with simple R/C aircraft skills and computer programming could whip something together in no time flat. It does seem that Homeland Security has been studying this threat.
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