Dubya was in Poland yesterday. So the prime minister of Poland, whoever that is, turned to him and said, "Hey I just heard a great joke. How many George Bushes does it take...."

This is his first visit to Europe and I'm reminded of Reagan's first visit to South America, when he came back with the revelation that they were all like different countries down there. Bush has learned the opposite lesson. "I will express to President Putin that Russia is a part of Europe". I'm sure he'll be happy to hear that. Don't tell George that Russia is also a part of Asia; it'll just confuse him. His speech was one long geography lesson. "Our vision of Europe must also include the Balkans." (Headline elsewhere in the Times: US Doesn't Want to Join Any NATO Mission Into Macedonia). "The Europe we are building must include Ukraine". Poland is evidently at the heart of Europe. The Baltics, on the other hand, didn't get a look in.

All of Europe's new democracies, he said, should have the same chance to join the institutions of Europe as Europe's "old democracies." Well, I said it was a geography lesson, not a history lesson. Old democracies indeed. Bush thanked Poland for acting as a bridge to the new democracies of Europe. That's usually what people--Stalin and Hitler, say--call Poland before they send tanks across it. The autobahn of Europe. I trust you noticed that the "institutions of Europe" meant NATO. He assured Russia that NATO is not an enemy of Russia. I said it was not a history lesson. He also said that Poland was not an enemy of Russia. I believe I just said it was not a history lesson. He also said that Warsaw was "razed by the Nazis and destroyed by the Soviets. Its people were mostly displaced." All except the spleens, I guess. When exactly did the Soviets destroy Warsaw?

Amusingly, he defined Communism as materialism and said that man (for a speech presumably written by Condi, its language is consistently sexist; it would not have gone over well if it had been turned in for the Stevenson Core Course) must find goals greater than mere consumption. This is George "You'll take the gear shift of my SUV when you pry it from my cold dead hands" Bush talking.

His aides are telling the papers that behind closed doors Bush is actually a serious statesman. That's interesting, because behind closed doors I'm actually quite thin.

Hey, trust Bush to go to Sweden, Sweden mind you, and start riots and shootings.

A Japanese court rules that compensation to atomic bomb survivors doesn't apply to those living outside the country, like say Koreans brought to Japan as slaves.

British supermarkets are working on changing fruit in order to make it more appealing to children. They're going to carbonate it. Really. Oranges and grapes are said to taste quite good carbonated, but the tomatoes are a bit strange. And it doesn't work with bananas, which explode if you try it. Actually, that would appeal to children too.

Something that never occurred to me. Mein Kampf is still under copyright. The copyright is held by the Bavarian finance ministry, but the book is banned in Germany. In Britain, the money since 1976 has been going to a charity for Jewish refugees from Germany.

The likely next mayor of Berlin is openly gay--the most prominent German gay politician. In contrast, the British Tory party's next leader, at the very least, has had some gay experiences.

FAIR points out that the treasury secretary would like to abolish corporate taxes. Also Social Security and Medicare. I had noticed at the time, but hadn't realized that it was completely buried. This is the same guy who decided to hold on to stock he was supposed to have divested himself of until his boss's policies made their value go way up. And Karl Rove met the CEO of a company he has stock in to advise him on a merger which will make the value of that stock go up. Nice to know that this admin is as ethical as we expect from Republicans.

Incidentally, in 1951 British intelligence concluded that the US was planning a preventive nuclear strike on the USSR in 1952.

A LAY preacher who claimed that God would look after him yesterday failed to persuade magistrates that divine protection was a substitute for motor insurance.

Peter David, 66, who preaches in chapels and on street
corners across South Wales, tried to persuade police that he had the highest level of cover of all, and that it meant he did not need an MoT certificate or road tax either.

Feral

In the touristy part of Spain, the Catholic church has grappled with the problem of offering confession to non-Spanish-speaking tourists. The answer: multiple choice forms in several languages.

According to the Saturday NY Times (so it must be true, right?), the president of Friends of Animals is named Priscilla Feral.

British election

A fairly boring election, but I watched 5 hours of it today. It was too hot to do anything else.

Blair's favorite adviser Peter Mandelson, who's been disgraced, rehabilitated, disgraced and not-quote-rehabilitated since the last election, gives a victory speech talking about his enemies taking a pound of flesh. Euro of flesh, surely?

Normally, these speeches are fairly anodyne, but one Labour victor attacked his opponent for running an especially contemptible race. That opponent: Mark Reckless.

There is a man in a crab suit running for Parliament in Kensington.

One independent candidate wins on a platform of saving the local hospital--that's his whole platform.

Given the reform of the House of Lords, it is possible for the first time for a hereditary peer to be elected to the Commons, and one is, the Earl of Thurso (LibDem, Cairthness). That means that the Commons are no longer common (the giant crab would have done that just as well).

Maintaining calm

NY Times headline: "CIA Chief Going to Israel in Effort to Maintain Calm." Now most people would count to 100 or something. If he did maintain calm, he would be the first person to go to Israel and do so.

Ariel Sharon for example called Arafat a murderer and pathological liar this week.

Speaking of war criminals, I think I forgot to mention that when Henry Kissinger was in Paris last week, a court issued him a summons relative to some French citizens murdered by the Chilean junta in the 1970s. He decided he was too busy. I didn't know you could do that.

For the most tentative endorsement I've ever heard, click here for John Cleese's radio ad (a bit under 2 minutes) for the Lib Dems.

George "A Uniter not a Divider (especially long division)" Bush: "Those who worry about faith in our society, and government's willingness to stand side by side with faith, don't understand the power of faith and the promise of faith and the hope of faith," he said.

He also said, in a press conference about losing the Senate, that every day is a great day when you're president.

Yech. And also how John McCain is his bestest friend. The NY Times ran a headline a few days ago that the people of Arizona were telling McCain to "stick to his own kind," which I thought was very West Side Story of them.

Save the groat

Yet another Mugabe supporter dies. "Hitler" Hunzvi, dead of "malaria" (actually witchcraft, but there's a cover-up), turns out to have had a Polish wife. That's just too weird.

French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin, who looks more like Dr. Strangelove than any man alive, evidently first joined the Parti Socialist in 1971 as a Trotskyite infiltrator. Until this week he had always denied his Trot past.

The new Nepalese king's coronation time is still being determined by the court astrologer (also hereditary). In yet another cover-up, he is claiming to have "lost" the astrological chart of two-kings-and-five-days-ago Birendra, since someone who's supposed to be able to predict the future might right now have some 'splaining to do. He also denies knowledge of the prediction which caused Birendra to order Dippy not to marry before 35.

Another return-of-the-Reaganite-living dead: Richard Perle is back.

In case you haven't picked it up, Jenna Bush's recent drinking arrest was her third, counting one when she was 16.

British election in two days. Hague ran against Europe, Blair refused to discuss Europe. Hague said that this was the last chance to "save the pound," despite the promise of a referendum before Britain joins the single currency. The Tories say that Labour will "rig" the referendum, although Labour says it will probably be a really complicated question like "Do you favor adopting the euro?" or "Euro--you like?" The Tories want the question to be, "Are you willing to ditch the pound?" The Guardian has been running features on other currencies of the past. I had no idea the florin was still in use as late as 1993.

A thief took sleeping tablets to calm his nerves while robbing a Jordanian hospital pharmacy. He woke up to find himself in the hands of the police.

The Nepalese are claiming that the assault rifle went off by accident. Oops.

As I write, C-SPAN has the BBC Newsnight program on; a focus group has been asked to compare the party leaders to a beverage.

Earlier, Blair was interviewed and was asked if it was ok for the gap between rich and poor to increase. He refused to answer as the question was repeated maybe six times, but the answer is obviously yes.

The Tories have given up on winning, not that they ever had a chance, and are asking people to give Blair something less than a landslide to wipe the grin off his face. This strategy is likely to be more successful than asking people to vote for them. No one wants to see Hague in office, but no one wants to see Tony grin
either. The main problem in any sure-thing election is apathy.

The Times notes the counter-attractions:
Thursdays television schedule gives the apathetic voter plenty
of scope for staying on the sofa. Rather than heading for
the ballot box, the Royle families of this world will be able to indulge in Carol Smillies Holiday Swaps, EastEnders and Through the Keyhole on BBC1 or The Weakest Link and Ready, Steady, Cook on BBC2. Other terrestrial delights to keep them sprawled on their settees include Crossroads, Wheel of Fortune and Emmerdale on ITV, several Big Brother fixes on Channel 4 and Open House with Gloria Hunniford on Channel 5.

From the Post:

Chief Justice Earl Warren once signed an opinion in which a six-member majority of the Supreme Court referred to people "afflicted with homosexuality." His successor, Warren E. Burger, once wrote of gays as "sex deviates." The current chief justice, William H. Rehnquist, likened a university's refusal to recognize a gay student group to measures necessary to prevent the spread of measles.

Singing Dingoes Stole My Baby: The Sydney Opera House will stage an opera based on the famous event. And yes, there really will be singing dingoes.

The guy who invented Survivor got the idea at a British public school.

Speaking of which, Crown Prince, now King, soon Corpse Dipendra of Nepal was at Eton. Where they called him "Dippy."

Evidently the French are a little pissed that the new US ambassador doesn't speak French. He speaks baseball. 3 European nations are soon to get former baseball team owners as ambassadors. Can you name them all?

Last week Bush was telling graduating Yailies that if they were C students, they could still be president. Do you think he's saying the same thing to do his daughters about their drinking?

Timothy McVeigh has dedicated his life to "bringing integrity to the criminal justice system. So it will all have been worth it.

Many laws have provisions for citizens to sue to enforce them, including civil rights and environmental laws. They typically have provisions for the compensation for court courts to those who bring them and win. The Supreme Court brilliantly just decided that they don't get costs if a deal is done outside of court. So a government that doesn't want to enforce civil rights or environmental laws--not that such a thing is conceivable in this country--might drag a case out as long and expensively as possible, and then give in just before going to court. This is the most important of recent Supreme Court decisions, but not much attention has been paid.

The INS is introducing two-tier service, with faster work visas for those willing to pay more.

The Washington Post has articles on the Florida elections, again. My favorite detail: while a bunch of counties had machines that could detect voting errors, two decided to switch them off. Giving someone a new ballot would cost 25%. The article makes clearer than before how arbitrary and numerous were the differences in aspects of the election from one county to the other.

Trend you didn't need to know about:
THREE million Chinese drink their own urine to improve their
health. "It has no bacteria and is more sanitary than blood,"
said Prof Yang Liansheng, of the Liaoning Institute.

For a Labour poster of William Hague
looking strangely familiar, click here.

You might also enjoy the other posters of this election, and there are links to election posters from 1910 up as well.

I forgot to mention yesterday that Blair went to visit Microsoft yesterday and was promptly integrated into their marketing campaign for some new software (I assume the next version
of Windoze).

The Supreme Court spent this week deciding on the Original Intent of the Founding Fathers of golf. They ruled by 7-2 that involved hitting a ball a ball with a stick, and that therefore a handicapped person could ride a golf cart. Scalia, exercising his usual compassion towards the disabled, compared this with letting a kid with Attention Deficit Disorder have 4 strikes in Little League. Isn't this the guy who spotted Boy George the state of Florida?

Colin Powell, who is evidently black, goes on a 4-nation tour of Africa. If I have this right, he told the leaders of two of those 4 countries that they should step down. He might be right (Daniel arap Moi and Robert Mugabe) but isn't that just a touch arrogant?

Speaking of diplomacy, we're evidently conducting arms control negotiations by press release these days. The Bushie Administration said that it would overcome Russia's objections to our scrapping the ABM treaty by buying its S-300 missiles--for use in our missile defense system. It just hadn't made this offer to anyone in Russia before telling it to the AP. Or presumably running it through Jane's, since it seems that the S-300 only shoots down airplanes, not missiles, whatever the NY Times and Washington Post might think (they didn't do their homework either). That's what happens when you have a moron in charge: no one else feels they have to work very hard either.

The Washington Post today (Tuesday) has a piece on the international police program the UN put into place in Bosnia 5 years ago. It's been marked by massive corruption (the Ukrainians
are only in it for the stolen cars) and lots and lots of underage sex. The police all have diplomatic immunity, you see, exactly what you want in your cops. Many cops have been sent home and their stories carefully covered up. The US contingent are considered to be average. The FBI, which is a law unto itself, as we know, refused to participate. So the job of recruitment and training was handed over to a private corporation, which got a lot of retired cops, some with pace-makers and over 65, and
bored cops looking for sex with 13-year olds, and sent them over.
No matter what they do (one cop *bought* a prostitute), the worst
that happens to them is they get sent home.

I've come back from graveyards before

The Washington Post says that Elliott Abrams, one of the few people who always look more pleased with themself than does Dubya, will be the next National Security Council senior director for democracy, human rights and international operations. The position does not require Senate confirmation. This is bad because it makes the 1980s into a waste. I said that if one good thing came of the Iran-Contra affair, it was that Elliott Abrams would never have a government job again. This is just wrong, people.

Speaking of democracy and human rights, the Colombian Senate has passed a bill allowing the security forces to detain suspects without charges for a week, conscript civilians in some form, arrest people denounced by their neighbors, investigate their own
human rights violations and even perform their own autopsies on the people they kill. Our tax dollars at work.

The Post also says that the new bumper sticker in DC is "Don't mess with Vermont."

And from the same column:

Meanwhile, former president Bill Clinton was playing a charity
round of golf at Ballybunion, Ireland, a few days ago, the Irish Times reports. "There's a graveyard [literally] to the right," warned his playing partner, former Irish foreign minister Dick Spring. "Yeah, I've come back from graveyards before," Clinton said.

A blind man is the first to climb Everest. Well, they *told* him it was Everest.

The former president of Argentina Carolos Menem is marrying the former Miss Universe. Does that mean she out-ranks him?

Some Dutch doctors have set up a boat in international waters off Ireland to offer abortions. The head used to be with the Rainbow Warrior, so at least she's prepared...

Legendary

The Justice Dept has found yet more documents they failed to hand over to McVeigh's lawyers. But Atty Gen Ashcroft says he won't postpone the execution again because there is no doubt that McVeigh is guilty. No there isn't, but there is doubt
over whether he received a fair trial.

Testifying before a House subcommittee on Bush's plan to let religious groups run social services, the Evangelical head of one such drug group bragged about converting Jews into what he calls "completed Jews," which is the cute fundie Christian term for it,
although the rest of us might have images of them trying to tack a foreskin back on.

Predictable headline of the week:
Computer Vandals Clog Antivandalism Web Site.

Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill evidently said: "If you set aside Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, the safety record of nuclear is really very good."

One of the great disappointments of the Blair government was that despite coming to power with 102 female MPs--known as Blair's Babes--, very much a record in the UK, they haven't made much impact to date, although there have been amusing discussions
about whether to allow breast-feeding in Parliamentary committees (it was banned because so are other forms of "refreshment"). And the women have really been absent from the election campaign. This has been noted, so today Chancellor Gordon Brown appeared, not just with the usual silent token woman, but with two of them, at what was sarcastically labelled Ladies' Day. A reporter addressed a question to one of them about this very subject:
"Why has it taken until week three of the campaign for more than one token woman to appear on the platform . . . and I think it's the first time that one of them has been allowed to answer a question from the platform?"

At this point Brown couldn't help butting in to answer the question himself.

Opening paragraph of the week:
A COUPLE were jailed yesterday for taking their daughters headmistress hostage and threatening her after the girl was sent home for wearing a nose ring.

Headline of the day: Ministry 'failed to heed advice on pigswill'

Hail to the chief

Turkmenistan president Niyazov, already hailed as Chief of the Turkmens in one of those Central Asian leadership cults that always seem so unearned, has been promoted, if indeed there can be a promotion from Chief of the Turkmens. He is now being called by his spokesmen a national prophet with divine abilities.

Also, Jeremy Irons has painted his 15th-century castle in western Cork peach. The natives are not happy.

Monica (remember her?) wants The Dress returned to her. She says she won't sell it.

You won't have missed this story, but let's make sure (at least one of you currently being out of the country):
The Taliban plan to make all Hindus resident in Afghanistan wear a yellow star, or some such symbol. Oddly, the women will still have to wear Islamic clothing.

So when Al Gore uses his office for fund-raising, it's a crime against humanity, but when Cheney uses the vice-presidential residence to host large donors, it's a "thank-you" and
certainly not a fund-raiser.

Margaret Thatcher accuses Labour of being arrogant. She actually endorsed Hague for prime minister, which is more than Ted Heath is willing to do.

Headline of the day: British Diet May Be Cause of Depression. Because it is deficient in selenium, not because it is crap.

The Official Monster Raving Loony Party has come out with its manifesto: 4 blank pages. You can surely read them online.

http://freespace.virgin.net/raving.loony should do it. Their actual promises include smaller class sizes by making the kids stand closer together, draining Loch Ness to see if there's a monster, and ending the north/side divide by making it a square root.

I don't believe I've mentioned the conviction in South Carolina for homicide of a woman who smoked crack while pregnant. So that's homicide, and an 18-year term, for a fetus.

Colin Powell asked the Israelis not to do something stupid in response to, oh, whatever the last Palestinian atrocity was. Israel immediately sent in the war planes. American war planes. Bought from the US. Which are supposed to be used for defensive purposes only. So can we have them back, please?

Al Capone's lawyer just died, aged 107. Read the obit if you can.

I mentioned that deputy PM John Prescott punched out a protester yesterday. For wall-to-wall coverage that simply has to be seen to be believed, check out the Friday London Times.

For an actual gallery of photos commemorating the event, click here.

Also, more boxing and egg jokes than you would credit. Blair says he won't fire Prescott. Meanwhile, Sky TV is making this the most repeated footage since Elian was seized in Miami. Times sketch writer Matthew Parris says that William Hague was struggling to be interesting enough for anyone to want to hit him.

On Bush the Usurper's argument that those pesky gas prices can be taken care of by cutting taxes to help (wealthy) people pay for gas, Bill Maher asks why the government doesn't just write a check directly to Exxon and cut out the middle-man.

Favorite start to a news story today:

An actress has claimed an opera company sexually discriminated against her after it turned her down for the part of a virgin because she would be heavily pregnant by the end of the show's run.