Hitch is dead. RIP

For a self-defined "man of the left" Christopher Hitchens always showed a lot of integrity. Hitchens reminded me of his hero George Orwell. He had his principles and he never pushed them aside in the interests of supporting the left's current "party line". I know he was an avowed atheist but even so, rest in peace Hitch; your voice will be missed.

What I did on my summer vacation

Chris Jeon, a 21-year old UCLA math major went to Libya and "fought" with the rebel alliance to overthrow the government of  Col. Mohammar Khaddaffi. Admirable of Jeon and yet appallingly stupid. A nice story he'll have to tell his grandchildren some day themed along the lines of For Whom the Bell Tolls  no doubt. But holy smokes man.  It all could have went really bad for Jeon had Khadaffi's minions gotten ahold of him or he'd took a bullet through the neck as George Orwell did during his volunteer warrior service in the Spanish Civil War. Youth is wasted on the young as someone wiser than I once noted. But still I do kind of admire Jeon for being so ballsy and then getting away with it. But I don't recommend following his example though. To paraphrase every mother's advice: It's all fun until someone gets arrested and executed as a mercenary/spy or gets shot through the head by a sniper.

Weblog

Metal thieves starting to hit Ann Arbor area (annarbor.com/)
I suppose it had to happen eventually. They've been a bad problem in Detroit for a while now.

U.S. Rep. Tim Wahlberg (R-MI 7th) votes against Libyan war but then votes for funding it (Jackson Citizen-Patriot/MLive)
Wahlberg represents me in congress. You need to explain this one to us Timbo.

Mid-Michigan women ill after drinking raw milk (Lansing State-Journal)
Three women were reported to have Q fever an illness associated with consuming unpasteurized dairy products.

George Orwell and Ideology (Wilson Carey McWilliams, Front Porch Republic)
"Orwell was inclined to accept the theoretical superiority of smaller, simpler political societies. In modern regimes, the individual is weak and alone, and totalitarian states accentuate this isolation in order to increase their control. In 1984, Orwell’s description parallels Tocqueville’s prophecy: the Party aims to cut its citizens off from one another and from their past, until, in the end, 'All you care about is yourself.' ”

Utah Man Posts Facebook Updates During SWAT Standoff, Gets Help From Online Friends (Popular Science)
It's good to have friends. Too bad Randy Weaver or the Branch Davidians didn't have cellphones, Twitter, Facebook and other social media back in the day.

Ten Years Gone  (Stanton S. Coerr, Long War Journal)
"As in Vietnam, the war in Afghanistan was lost before it was begun: it is lost because it cannot be won. Again our massive and superior military force is losing a campaign to a tough insurgent force. Again we are spending tens of billions overseas, and collapsing under our own weight in the field. Again our strength is being used against us. And again, by providing military answers to political questions, we are in quicksand in the developing world."

weblog

Obscurity versus clarity in prose: Adorno vs. Orwell - Lingua Franca (James Miller)

Atheist Group Calls on Obama to Endorse ‘National Day of Reason' Instead of 'National Day of Prayer' - CNSNews

Now even atheists are proselytizing.

The Instapundit's notions about cyber-war and being overly dependent on the web - Wall Street Journal

weblog

Google now a major foreign policy actor - Bloggingheads.tv blog
Trouble in Raw Vegan Paradise? - Free The Animal blog
"At any rate, that post is pretty damning when you consider that it's the gurus themselves returning to animal products, combined with their admissions that a raw vegan approach requires great care and complex supplementation."
Will The iPad Change The Way We Consume Porn? - Fleshbot NSFW
Ex-USAF officer says failure to use airships to detect IEDs is criminally incompetent - Popular Science blog
Apple Doesn’t Own A Single iPad Related Domain Name - TechCrunch blog
Rumors suggest that the Obama administration won't fund NASA's lunar plans. - Delta-V blog
Orwell's Homage To Catalonia made into a serialized podcast - Another World Is Possible
The Mass Psychology of Misery by John Zerzan - The Anarchist Library
Finding a cheap, effective, and easy to use Food Dehydrator can be a challenge.