Across Difficult Country

I lack the progressive fervor for buggery, so if I were President I would never call and congratulate someone for being a homosexualist. I would, however, call and congratulate someone for  squandering his life savings on a carnival game in exchange for a giant-stuffed-Rastafarian banana with dreadlocks. Partly for reminding us there is little at all done among men that is not full of folly, as Erasmus put it, and partly because just look at that banana.

As a disinterested observer of the papal election, I’m struck by demands for a “ more modern ” pope. Isn't there enough modernity in the world? Look around, it’s everywhere. A man can’t take two steps in his talking sneakers without stepping in it. If anything what’s needed is more antiquity. At the very least for novelty‘s sake, but also because it would be an improvement in so many areas. The advice given by a sacred bull, for example, would surely be better than the bull dung supplied by those the modern world calls experts.

In Zimbabwe the beheading of an overly demanding goblin went awry, producing  an explosion which destroyed a house  and killed five people. In other Zimbabwe news, six women were arrested after a bag they had stolen attracted the attention of a crowd by talking. Zimbabwe used to look like this , back when it was called Rhodesia and run by evil racists. I've joked about Whitby falling into the sea , now Whitby is falling into the sea . Painter Georg Baselitz reminds me of a Bernhard character. Sad news from Timmanakumeri , where  Ramakrishna Acharya  drowned while bathing in a stream.  Research indicates nothing else has ever happened in Timmanakumeri. Children in Catterick Garrison, have been reading to dogs to boost their confidence, the Northern Echo reports . Why the dogs lack confidence the article does not say. Stanley drivers can check if their child car seats are fitted correctly at clinics sponsored by the Good Egg Ca...

Daniel Henninger notices  American politics has become racialized. To remedy this he thinks the GOP should instruct ethnics not to be racially motivated. Henninger is: deputy editor of The Wall Street Journal's editorial page. His weekly column, "Wonder Land," appears in The Wall Street Journal each Thursday. Mr. Henninger was a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize in editorial writing in 1987 and 1996, and shared in the Journal's Pulitzer Prize in 2002 for the paper's coverage of the attacks on September 11. In 2004, he won the Eric Breindel Journalism Award for his weekly column. He has won the Gerald Loeb Award for commentary, the Scripps Howard Foundation's Walker Stone Award for editorial writing and the American Society of Newspaper Editors' Distinguished Writing Award for editorial writing. A native of Cleveland, Mr. Henninger is a graduate of Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. I'm reminded of what Keynes observed about Ber...

The Earl of Longford :  My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, said that he thought he was. He did not exactly think that, but when a journalist said to him, " Sir William , are you the cleverest man in England?", he paused and then he said, "Well, inductively perhaps yes, but deductively Maynard has it". So he did not exactly think that he was God because he had limitations. Maynard Keynes was ahead of him. That was Beveridge. I was with him for three years and I have dragged him in only because he has been mentioned. He did wonderful work with the foundation of the welfare state. The morning after it was completed I went into a newsagent to try to buy a paper. The lady said, "It's no good trying to buy a paper here. That Sir William Beveridge is going to abolish want, so all the papers were sold out". Later that day or the next day I asked him to come to lunch. I was meeting with Evelyn Waugh, an old friend and famous writer. They did not get on...

Communist gun control laws have forced New York city residents to improvise weapons to defend against looters : “I would take a looter with a boa . If I felt threatened I would definitely use it,” said Keone Singlehurst, 42. “Its like the Wild West. A borderline lawless situation.” Using a snake as a weapon is something  I've remarked upon before . Meanwhile in Mexico, a mile long cylindrical UFO was filmed flying into the Popocatepeti volcano . If you have a mile long cylindrical UFO and want to zoom it around without being bothered Mexico is a good place to do it, no one pays attention to what goes on down there.

Those who called my proposal to put oldies in lava tubes cruel will have to reconsider now that there is a hotel which puts trendy travelers in concrete tubes. I’m reconsidering as well - I now think lava tubes might be too luxurious an accommodation.