flickering pictures

From the inspirational self-authored obituary of Lasantha Wickramatunge, editor-in-chief of Sri Lanka’s Sunday Leader newspaper, written shortly before he was shot and killed on his way to work: It is well known that I was on two occasions brutally assaulted, while on another my house was sprayed with machine-gun fire. Despite the government’s sanctimonious assurances, [...]

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The quote of the day comes from Republican National Committee chairman Mike Duncan, who’s leading the GOP’s charge into social media: “We have to do it in the Facebook, with the Twittering, the different technology that young people are using today.” Is it just me, or does the phrase “do it in the Facebook” sound [...]

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Born on January 8, 1935, Elvis Presley would have been 74 years old today. Other notable events on this day: 1835: For the only time in U.S. history, the national debt is exactly zero dollars. Today’s debt is just over $10.6 trillion, or about $35,000 for every man, woman and child in the country. 1867: [...]

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The presidential pardon has got to be one of the strangest traditions in Washington. How exactly is justice served when an outgoing president hands out clean slates to a dozen or so convicted criminals, just because he’s a few weeks away from retirement? Why should a president have the power to bypass the courts and [...]

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Not that it’s any of my business, since I’m not American, but on behalf of the rest of the world, congratulations on choosing the best person for the job. We — and 52% of America — could be wrong about him, and we’ll have four years to find out, but in terms at least of [...]

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A comment on America’s financial woes, as reported in the latest edition of Harper’s Weekly: “The private market has screwed itself up,” said Representative Barney Frank (D., Mass.), “and they need the government to come help them unscrew it.” A close second, also from Harper’s Weekly: “My first instinct,” said President George W. Bush, “was [...]

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Not to be a jerk or anything, but it kind of seems like a stupid question: should we find new ways to feed and maintain our addiction to oil, or decrease our reliance on the fossil fuels that are empoverishing our people and altering our fragile climate? These folks think they have the answer: I [...]

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You likely know that just before the Beijing Olympics, Russia invaded the neighbouring Republic of Georgia. The move earned widespread international condemnation, and the resulting war of words with the West has been making headlines for weeks. You may not know that last July the International Olympic Committee (IOC) awarded the 2014 Winter Games to [...]

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The state-run AIDS Control Society in the southern Indian state of Kerala will reserve one government job for HIV/AIDS-positive applicants — the first time I’ve ever heard of a quota for people with a particular illness. The employee will help build government sensitivity to the disease and improve communication with its sufferers, and aims to [...]

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