URLs du Jour

2008-12-04

  • They told me if I voted for John McCain, we'd have troops stuck in Iraq for an indefinite period, maybe a hundred years.

    Well, I didn't vote for McCain, but still

    [The Iraq] status-of-forces agreement remains subject to change, by mutual agreement, and Army planners acknowledge privately that they are examining projections that could see the number of Americans hovering between 30,000 and 50,000 -- and some say as high as 70,000 -- for a substantial time even beyond 2011.

  • For fans of The Hunt for Red October: the USS Dallas, in its non-fictional incarnation, arrived at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard yesterday, escorted by a seal pup, for routine maintenance and upgrades.

  • I don't know much about architecture, but I know what I hate: Brutalism, exemplified by the painful Boston City Hall. Yet some people take it seriously. A recent Slate article asks if the reputation of the leading Brutalist architect can be rescued. Lord, I hope not.

    (We previously blogged about how the District of Columbia was preventing a hideous, dysfunctional church from being torn down because it was a sterling example of Brutalism. Yeesh!)

  • In our occasional Aieee! We're all gonna die! category: Cracked presents "5 Cosmic Events That Could Kill You Before Lunch". As usual with Cracked, actual science-based reporting is salted heavily with R-rated language and general hilarity.