no soup, no clouds
I sometimes – often – despair of the Beeb. Here's a little news teaser about a US sniper who killed 255 'insurgents' – or terrorists, as the rest of the world prefers to call them.
Devil or hero? asks the Beeb.
Well, hero, BBC. What else? In what world could an allied sniper who shot dead 255 enemies be thought anything other than a hero?
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Just got added to the mailing list for the Copenhagen Centre for Neoplatonic Virtue Ethics. Now to see if I can understand what on earth real academic ethicists and philosophers say to each other.
He could write songs, that Schubert. Der Leiermann
Vikram Seth's on Desert Island Disks and the introduction's talked only about A Suitable Boy as if The Golden Gate never happened.
Pro tip: everyone I know who's read The Golden Gate has tried writing iambic tetrameters. Example:
John looks downwards, as if admonished,
Then slowly lifts his head, and sighs.
Half fearfully and half astonished,
They look into each other’s eyes.
The waiter, bearded, burly, macho,
Says, “Madam, though it’s cold, gazpacho
Is what I’d recommend. Noisettes
Of lamb, perhaps, or mignonettes
Of veal to follow….” Unavailing
Are his suggestions. Nothing sinks
Into their ears. “Ah, well,” he thinks,
“They’re moonstruck. It’ll be plain sailing.
Lovers, despite delays and slips
And rotten service, leave large tips.”
Not everyone likes the idea of a novel in verse, mind you:
An editor at a plush party
(Well-wined, -provisioned, speechy, hearty)
Hosted by (long live!) Thomas Cook
Where my Tibetan travel book
Was honored – seized my arm: “Dear fellow,
What’s your next work?” “A novel…” “Great!
We hope that you, dear Mr Seth – ”
“In verse”, I added. He turned yellow.
"How marvelously quaint,” he said,
And subsequently cut me dead.
Note, incidentally, the rhyming of his surname. That's how it's pronounced. He does it several times in the book.
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Such a long time since I messed about with XSLT / XPATH. Isn't the iTunes Playlist xml rubbish?
+Tim Harford makes a few excellent points about Nick Clegg's vision of a 'John Lewis economy' of widespread employee share ownership and profit sharing.
He observes that employees have already taken a risk that, should their company perform badly, they may find their salaries reduced, their perks cut or their jobs lost. To ask them to accept some part of their remuneration in company shares, tied to company performance, increases their financial exposure to the one particular company that happens to be their employer.
They might well be better off insisting that that part of their remuneration be paid in cash which they can invest in other companies' performance – because the chance they just happen to be working for the best-performing company they could invest in is rather slim.
And of course…
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