Neil Gaiman’s new book is out. It is set in the same universe as American Gods, in which the American ‘melting pot’ is also the melting pot for all the deprecated deities of our immigrant ancestors, living in exile and ‘retirement’ among us. Reading the blurbs about Anansi Boys, I am prepared to be disappointed and it will not leap to the head of the queue of books waiting to be read here, unlike what happens with the release of the latest book by many of my favorite authors. But then again, I was prepared to be disappointed by American Gods and didn’t buy it for a long time after its release, yet I ended up finding it an engrossing read some of whose images and conceits have stuck with me since. I am a follower of the trickster mythos (and related themes like the holy fool); perhaps Anansi Boys will please after all. Alas, I worry that Gaiman peaked with Neverwhere.
Daily Archives: 27 Sep 05
Whitewash Dept:
The buck stops here: Military jury convicts Lynndie England of six of seven counts in Abu Ghraib abuse case (Boston Globe)
First Aid on the iPod
“St. John Ambulance, a UK charity, believes that everyone should learn the basic First Aid techniques. They made short lectures available as mp3 downloads, podcasts or as streaming Real audio files.”
Does eating organic cause Parkinson’s Disease?
“Neurologist J. Timothy Greenamyre has shown, in animal studies published in the journals Experimental Neurology and Journal of Neuroscience in 2003, that rotenone — a pesticide often used in organic farming because it is made from natural products — is capable of inducing protein aggregation, killing dopamine–producing neurons, inhibiting cellular energy–producing organelles, and causing subsequent motor deficits.
The question arises: is organic safer, or simply a more expensive way of getting sick?” [via bookofjoe]
Related:
Cancer and Diet: the links are still unclear. “…Cancer patients, doctors say, almost always ask what to eat to reduce their chances of dying from the disease.
The diet messages are everywhere: the National Cancer Institute has an “Eat 5 to 9 a Day for Better Health” program, the numbers referring to servings of fruits and vegetables, and the Prostate Cancer Foundation has a detailed anticancer diet.
Yet despite the often adamant advice, scientists say they really do not know whether dietary changes will make a difference. And there lies a quandary for today’s medicine. It is turning out to be much more difficult than anyone expected to discover if diet affects cancer risk. Hypotheses abound, but convincing evidence remains elusive… ” (New York Times )
Reading Ed
From Ed Fitzgerald’s unfutz I learned that:
- Michael Brown, who recently resigned as FEMA head in ignomy, has been rehired as a consultant to the organization to assess the disaster response. Ed comments, “Now, in the abstract, this is not a bad idea, making sure you get the value of an employee’s experience before they leave to go elsewhere. In this particular instance, though, one has to think What experience? ” If I am not mistaken, this is what is usually called a ‘golden parachute.’ However, in this case, it is not gold but excrement-brown.
- The bus which caught fire killing twenty-three nursing home evacuees during the Houston evacuation was from a company which had had numerous difficulties with regulatory authorities in Texas and, according to a whistle blower, more serious problems with meintenance of its vehicles. “The bus, run by Global Limo of McAllen, Texas, was taken out of service in July after its registration expired. It was allowed back on the road because of a waiver signed last week by Gov. Rick Perry intended to make available as many commercial vehicles as possible for the hurricane evacuation.” Ed places this rightly in the broader context of Republican officials’ eagerness to set aside regulatory restrictions on business at any opportunity, which may be a bit of a reach here.
Pentagon-developed killer dolphins may be loose in Gulf of Mexico after Katrina
“It may be the oddest tale to emerge from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Armed dolphins, trained by the US military to shoot terrorists and pinpoint spies underwater, may be missing in the Gulf of Mexico.
Experts who have studied the US navy’s cetacean training exercises claim the 36 mammals could be carrying ‘toxic dart’ guns. Divers and surfers risk attack, they claim, from a species considered to be among the planet’s smartest. The US navy admits it has been training dolphins for military purposes, but has refused to confirm that any are missing.” (Guardian/Observer.UK)
Bush plea for cash to rebuild Iraq raises $600
“An extraordinary appeal to Americans from the Bush administration for money to help pay for the reconstruction of Iraq has raised only $600 (£337), The Observer has learnt…
…It is understood to be the first time that a US government has made an appeal to taxpayers for foreign aid money. Contributors have no way of knowing who will receive their donations or even where they may go, after officials said details had be kept secret for security reasons.
USaid’s Heather Layman denied it was disappointed with the meagre sum raised after a fortnight. ‘Every little helps,’ she said.” (Guardian/Observer.UK)
The myth of Iraq’s foreign fighters
“The US and Iraqi governments have vastly overstated the number of foreign fighters in Iraq, and most of them don’t come from Saudi Arabia, according to a new report from the Washington-based Center for Strategic International Studies (CSIS). According to a piece in The Guardian, this means the US and Iraq ‘feed the myth’ that foreign fighters are the backbone of the insurgency. While the foreign fighters may stoke the insurgency flames, they make up only about 4 to 10 percent of the estimated 30,000 insurgents.” (Christian science Monitor)
