sundry items

1.from mighty Skimble: Impeachment would be a buy signal.

Funny thing that Bush's record-breaking stock market failed to materialize, in direct contrast to his predecessor who oversaw a broad 350% expansion of wealth in the US in his eight-year administration...

2.the other day I told myself I was so clever for inventing the phrase scorched-earth capitalism, but predictably enough I was wrong.


3.from Dutch cosmopolitician Frans Groenendijk:

Kind of a shame, killing the people you're trying to democratize, but after awhile, says the same lieutenant, "It gets to the point where you can't wait to see guys with guns, so you start shooting everybody..."

"There's a Peter Cook-Dudley Moore routine, one of their woolgathering dialogues, where Dud asks Pete, "So would you say you've learned from your mistakes?" and Pete replies: "Oh yes, I'm certain I could repeat them exactly."
That seems to have been the Bush administration's approach to Iraq. Take the mistakes of Vietnam and repeat them exactly. And at that you can't say they haven't succeeded. "

[James Wolcott commented on an article in The Economist]
(FG only links to the homepages, and I couldn’t find the specific url(s))

4. a shaggy dog story from Haroon Moghul:
“don't watch porn, especially if you're a terrorist”

5.Chinese firepower at fire-sale prices(from the BBC):

China may have lost its reputation for making low-cost goods, but when it comes to weapons, there is no doubt which end of the market its sights are still set on. Some of the poorest and most unsavoury regimes on earth, which either cannot afford or are not allowed to buy sophisticated Western arms, are turning to the world's newest superpower to buy guns, leg-irons, anti-riot equipment and armoured vehicles.

Military specialists contacted by the BBC News website have confirmed the main findings of a report issued this week by Amnesty International, which said Chinese arms sales were fuelling conflicts and human rights abuses in countries such as Sudan and Burma.