Catch-Up Week, Day 3: Big Willy Style's All In It

Hey, folks! First, the news, then another couple of catch-up items.

Afghanistan:

BBC: Al-Qaeda 'faces funding crisis'

BBC: Japan 'will end' Afghan mission

BBC: Now or never for Waziristan push?

Times: Afghan recruits 'turned into cannon fodder'

Times: [Balochistan refugee] camps are Taleban breeding ground

Times: Britain's success in Afghanistan is measured in small steps - An article by a battalion commander with The Rifles, one of the United Kingdom's best infantry units.

UPI: Feature: Outposts vital in Afghanistan - I differ with General McChrystal on the strategy of withdrawing from remote outposts. The remoteness of the outposts isn't the problem - the problem is that we don't have enough troops to effectively staff them. It's worthless to reinforce cities that are already largely safe, just to allow the Taliban to run wild in the countryside. If we're going to win this war, it will eventually require us to secure the countryside anyway. With more troops, it's possible. If we concentrate on the cities and leave rural staging and logistics areas to the Taliban, it's far more difficult.

AFP: Desert the enemy for US armoured vehicles

China in Africa:

China offers $4.4bn lifeline for Guinea 'massacre' junta (BBC, Times) - I think China also provided funding to the Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe. I've been collecting articles for month in anticipation of doing an article about China's growing pseudo-colonial operations in Africa, but with the end of my stint writing for my parallel writing endeavour, that article is indefinitely postponed.

BBC: All Chinese to me: Liberians take lessons - to read the deals they sign

Times: Tanzanian women in hunt for Chinese husbands

Everything Else:

Guardian: A damning verdict on Russia; BBC: Ingush attack suspects 'killed' - Apparently that UN report about last year's South Ossetia war wasn't so forgiving of the Russians as was originally advertised.

CNN: 'Mad scientist' aims to build greener future

CNN: Should Americans banish the burger? - Banish? No. Eat fewer of? Maybe. I don't think that hamburger is the problem, and the idiot in the story who hasn't let any of his daughters eat hamburger, ever, is a moron. Beef is not inherently dangerous to eat if it's properly prepared and cooked. I'm living proof: I've probably eaten thousands of hamburgers in my life, and I have yet to get E Coli. The danger of hamburger isn't E Coli, it's the same danger that Americans face in everything they do: doing it too much.

CNN: 'Digital dirt' can haunt your job search

CNN: [British] soldier dies after receiving [British] smoker's lungs in transplant - Chalk another win up for socialized health care: a British Iraq War veteran receives transplanted lungs after being diagnosed with a rare respiratory disorder, and the NHS gives him the lungs of a smoker. About a year later, he's diagnosed with lung cancer, and dies. This, ladies and gentlemen, is just one more reason to oppose socialized health care: higher costs and higher demand equal lower quality control.

BBC: Cold turkey: A Facebook addict cuts herself off from the site

BBC: Japan's new hi-tech 'graveyards' - Weird.

BBC: Assad decrees Syria smoking ban - Weird.

Guardian picture gallery: Sergio Leone: a tribute at the Rome film festival

Times: Marge Simpson to appear in Playboy - Weird, and certainly not enough to get people to start subscribing to Playboy again.

Times: Unionists walk out over Clinton's peace speech - Who sent Secretary Clinton to lead negotiations with the Irish? Senator Kennedy, I could maybe, sorta, not really see doing it because his family was definitely Irish. Since when does the American Secretary of State try to horn in on Irish negotiations? Very odd.

Times: If the future's worth having, it won't be free - Whine, whine, whine, bitch, bitch, bitch. When newspapers start doing the job that they claim they've been doing for decades, then maybe I'll pay for their content. Most of it's literary sausage: low quality, and poorly composed. The Internet has become the great equalizer and bullshit detector when it comes to mass information distribution. When newspapers start giving me steak instead of tripe, then maybe I'll consider paying for the content. As it is, news sites are essentially interchangeable save for a few exceptions, and if one starts charging, another will jump in to fill the void.

Times: Cleverness is no more. This is a dumb Britain - Jeremy Clarkson is becoming one of my favorite columnists. In this piece, he explains why Britons (and I'd venture to say Americans) are too stupid to understand good comedy, or good anything. Case in point? Chuck barely made a third season, and with a reduced budget, while Family Guy has been renewed by popular demand at least twice. And Sam-Wise, if you dare try to defend Family Guy, as God is my witness, I will IP block you from commenting for a month.

UPI: Walker's World: Obama's absurd prize - Yup. Pretty much.

Daily Mail: Britain is the worst place to live in Europe (despite our big pay packets) - England and Ireland are worse places to live than Italy? The folks who ran this survey will forgive me if I don't count "annual hours of sunshine" as an indicator of quality of life. France and Spain have better living conditions than the United Kingdom? Give me a break.

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Last week, I saw a link on YouTube, and out of a sheer desire for entertainment, I decided to take a quiz at the website of the Clinton Foundation, which was gauged at testing my knowledge of "urgent global issues". A mere sampling of the questions:

In New York City, approximately what percent of carbon emissions is generated by buildings? I wasn't aware that carbon in New York City was an "urgent global issue".

How many acres of tropical rainforest are lost to deforestation each year? Okay, I'll give him this one.

What is the leading cause of death worldwide among people ages 15-59? Uh... AIDS? Sorry, I don't consider a disease that's passed almost entirely by easily preventable behavior to be an "urgent global issue".

How many children and teens are obese or overweight in the U.S.? Yeah, 'cause Bill Clinton should be lecturing people on health and fitness after that bypass surgery of his a few years back...

Fill in the blank: More than half of all people in Africa live on $_ per day. Ehhhh, I'll give him this one, too, although "urgent global issue" may still be a bit strong.

The gap between the rich and poor is the largest in which region of the world? Urgent global issue? Oh, yeah, the haves and the have-nots. Apparently President Clinton still doesn't realize that life isn't a zero sum game.

How many people in the United States do not have a bank account? People having bank accounts in the United States is an "urgent global issue"? Seriously?

Since leaving the White House, President Bill Clinton has accomplished which of the following through his Foundation? Oh, right, I forgot: it's all about Bill.

The "answers" to each of these are used to plug Clinton's various philanthropic initiatives: the Clinton Climate Initiative, the Clinton HIV/AIDS Initiative, the Clinton Foundation Alliance for a Healthier Generation, the Clinton Hunter Development Initiative, the Clinton Giustra Sustainable Growth Initiative, and the Clinton Economic Opportunity Initiative. I'm sure that these things probably do some socially progressive things, some of which is probably a good thing. But seriously, it's obviously all about Bill, and some of this crap is just ridiculous. And, once you finish the "quiz" (which is to say, once you've been caught up on what President Clinton's been up to other than skirt-chasing since leaving the White House), you're shown the screen pictured above! You can get E-mail updates from Bill Clinton! As many pictures of scantily clad women as my buddies send me on occasion, I'm not sure my inbox could handle the amount of nudity that President Clinton is likely to forward when he's chillin' at his Dell.

Hilariously unbelievable.

Oh, and I ordered some stuff from the Stuff Fly Wants list on Sunday night: one pair of UDT/SEAL Team Swimmer Trunks, and a TAD Gear Pathfinder Jacket, both of which I hope to use in the coming weeks for one thing or another. More on that as it develops.

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No philosophical quotes today, so if you've been following my quotations of St. Augustine, check back tomorrow. After some initially boring passages, I've been starting to really get into some of the recent readings. I'm trying to do five chapters daily ("chapters" being sections - the "chapters" as we would call them are called "books", as was common in the ancient documents that contained successive sections on individual scrolls or folios), which is a tall order, but worth the effort. On Monday, the passages had a great deal to say about the interrelationship between science and legitimate religious faith. Today's section had a lot of relevance to heretical religious movements and cults, at least from my point of view. I'll try to post some of the relevant sections in the coming days. Until then, have a fantastic Wednesday.