As you teach, you learn*

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'You're fired' – Edinburgh University is panned after Apprentice's error
The university's academic standards were called into question in front of about seven million viewers in the wake of a major error by one of the show's competitors, an Edinburgh graduate. The insult came after Michael Sophocles, a history and classics graduate, was shown to believe that poultry he bought in a Moroccan market was kosher because it had been blessed by a Muslim shopkeeper.

The embarrassing moment was seized upon by Sir Alan Sugar and Margaret Mountford, one of his advisers, who declared that Edinburgh University had clearly lost some of its academic lustre.
Old Jewish saying.

Chinese food

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China eyes overseas land in food push
Chinese companies will be encouraged to buy farmland abroad, particularly in Africa and South America, to help guarantee food security under a plan being considered by Beijing. A proposal drafted by the Ministry of Agriculture would make supporting offshore land acquisition by domestic agricultural companies a central government policy. Beijing already has similar policies to boost offshore investment by state-owned banks, manufacturers and oil companies, but offshore agricultural investment has so far been limited to a few small projects.


A piss-poor leader AND they're skint too!

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Labour seeks £10m loans delay
Labour is in emergency talks to renegotiate more than £10m of loans from wealthy businessmen to prevent itself running out of money. Most of the millionaires who secretly lent money to Labour in the run-up to the 2005 election ought to be repaid in the coming months but the party – which is £20m in the red – is in no position to do this. As a result, it is holding combined talks with all the lenders to find a single agreement that would allow the party to stagger repayments over up to nine years. An announcement is just weeks away, according to sources on both sides of the discussions.

All politics stink

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Fairness, idealism and other atrocities - P J O'Rourke
Get politically uninvolved! All politics stink. Even democracy stinks. Imagine if our clothes were selected by the majority of shoppers, which would be teenage girls. I'd be standing here with my bellybutton exposed. Imagine deciding the dinner menu by family secret ballot. I've got three kids and three dogs in my family. We'd be eating Froot Loops and rotten meat.
Via Kottke


Big Sister is watching you

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Memphis Principal Accused of Outing Gay Students
In September 2007, Daphne Beasley, the principal of Hollis F. Price Middle College High School in South Memphis asked her staff to give her the names of students who were couples, heterosexual and homosexual, because she wanted to keep an eye on them to cut down on public displays of affection.

She's accused of publicly posting the names of those students, including two boys, Andrew and Nicholas, who had just started dating. The ACLU says that in doing so, Beasley revealed their relationship to other students, teachers and even their parents.


How do I lead thee? Let me count the ways...

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Cameron needs a fourth way
Ordinary British citizens are exasperated with contemporary politics: they voted in Mrs Thatcher to revive the economy and New Labour to revive the public sector, and now neither the market nor the state seems to work.

The free market has hugely enriched the top 10 per cent and forced everybody else to work harder for less money while our public services subject us to ever larger amounts of taxation for an ever more incompetent service.

The trouble for Cameron is that he has aligned himself with the New Labour project just as the voters have so demonstrably rejected it. Indeed, until Brown's 'election that never was' fiasco in the autumn, the Conservatives were essentially just promising to deliver - in a more professional and competent manner - an entirely New Labour agenda.


Fore!

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Hey. The Brits did achieve something in Iraq after all...

Golfing the Green Zone
The nine-hole Crossed Swords Golf Course is closed in by 15-foot concrete blast walls and watched over by humorless Gurkha guards from Nepal. Black Hawk helicopters buzzed overhead. Bursts of gunfire interrupted backswings. The threat of incoming rockets and mortars was ever present.

The course - a total of 479 rugged, dusty and nerve-fraying yards - was created a year ago by a British military officer who was part of a NATO training mission. Its name comes from one of Saddam Hussein's eccentric architectural legacies that's now a Green Zone landmark: two giant hands holding curved sabers that served as an archway for the late dictator's parade grounds.

The course "is the sole entertainment that we have here in Iraq," said Air Force Maj. Al Geralt of San Diego as he finished a round. He reported his score was somewhere between "abysmal and miserable." "But it's loads of fun," he said. "The NATO boys that came up with it - it is one of the best things they could have done for morale out here."


Roll out the barrel

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Analyst warns of oil at $200 a barrel
Crude oil prices could surge to $200 a barrel in the next two years, according to the Goldman Sachs analyst who three years ago correctly predicted a price “super-spike” above $100 a barrel. The warning by Arjun Murti came as oil prices hit a fresh high above $122 a barrel, boosted by supply disruptions in Nigeria, lower output in Russia and continued robust demand in China ahead of the Olympics.

Mr Murti said the energy crisis could be coming to a head as a lack of adequate supply growth was becoming apparent. He said: “The possibility of $150-$200 per barrel seems increasingly likely over the next six to 24 months.” He added that the spare capacity of OPEC to cushion against unexpected supply shocks was very low. Last month, Chakib Khelil, president of OPEC, also warned oil could reach $200 a barrel. The number of oil option contracts betting on oil hitting $200 a barrel in December has tripled since the beginning of the year.


Running The Numbers

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Will Brady was one of the very first bloggers to link to me and include me in his blogroll. I'm still there, although that may be because he hasn't got around to updating it! He's a really interesting guy who's been blogging for years and comes up with some great stuff. I feel guilty for not having linked to him for ages. So,  to put that straight...:)

will brady's ruminations:
Chris Jordan's Running the Numbers makes use of everyday objects in gigantic assemblages. Reduced down to coffee-table book size, they appear as curious abstracts, but they are not. The materials used to produce his images are also inextricably connected to the final image.

Shown to the left Skull with cigarette, is composed not of daubs of paint, but the tops of cigarette packages, chosen for the colors needed for those "daubs".


Throw Momma from the Peace Train

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Throw Momma from the Peace Train

The smallest squeak or spark of pacifism must be stamped out, not to preserve the honor of the Good War or Winston Churchill (could Churchill's standing be any higher?), but to ensure that present and future wars can be waged with full-throated bluster and fist-clenched resolve. Not even imaginary opposition must be allowed to impede and tarnish our glorious mission!