Peter’s Blog

The Olympic flame, for now, burns bright in Britain - International Herald Tribune

Britain, it seems, is desperately short of heroes, and the minute any sporting figure reaches even modest altitude in the foothills of the champions, they are feted beyond all proportion. In 2005, for instance, when England’s cricketers beat Australia to win a coveted cricketing trophy called the Ashes, they were deified with a Bacchanalian victory tour of London in an open-topped double-decker bus followed by the bestowing of august honors at Buckingham Palace.

Then their fortunes fell. Only now, with a new skipper, the South African-born Kevin Pietersen, leading the cricketers to unaccustomed victory have they clambered from the abyss - a mythological mixing of Icarus and the Phoenix.

Across the sporting spectrum, it sometimes seems, post-imperial Britain has never quite gotten used to the idea that its teams and individuals may be less than the best. Every four years, for instance, the England team gears up for the World Cup soccer tournament, and its followers are filled with enthusiasm for the fray and glory. But, hardwired into the national memory is the knowledge that the English have not won the World Cup since 1966.

So true.

Los Angeles’ carbon footprint is a light one — sort of - Los Angeles Times

“The Mississippi River roughly divides the country into high and low emitters,” it says. “In 2005, all but one of the 10 largest per capita emitters were located east of the Mississippi.”

Proof again of the inherent superiority of the West Coast! =)

What Belgium was to paedophilia in the 1990s, Austria is to female sex slaves in dungeons in the 2000s.
Dungeons & Austrians - International Herald Tribune

A.O. Scott likes Harold & Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay

But they’re not stupid, and to the extent that the movie is, its idiocy serves the cause of good sense and intelligence. And no, I’m not smoking anything.

The USA Today, of all papers, has a good summary of worldwide suburbanization trends: Modern suburbia not just in America anymore

This article is just amazing: cityofsound: Transport informatics

And Jack, you’ll like that Boston is doing some cool stuff with biking.

Bike network 2.0
Boston appointed a ‘bike czar’, Nicole Freedman, and her team has used Google Maps to create a set of bike routes across the city, based on the aggregated data from actual routes that cyclists took across the city“We found out where the actual desire lines are,” said Freedman, and has since extended the network to enable users to rate streets for bikes. It’s a little rudimentary at the moment, but shows the promise of such systems. Boston are building the city’s first official bike map from the results of the system.

Condoleezza Rice Must GO

You can make a good argument that most senior members of the Bush Administration are war criminals. It’s small consolation that Alberto Gonzales can’t get a job.

BBC NEWS | UK | ‘Bring on the property crash’

I understand that it’s hard to buy a house in the UK when you’re young and making a basic salary. But what’s unsaid in this article is that you have people earning £20k a year (like one IT worker profiled) and people thinking it’s a good salary. It’s long been my conviction that British purchasing power is shit: numerical costs are only slightly lower, thanks to the strong pound, but wages are much lower. I would MUCH rather earn $40k in the US than £20k in the UK.

The triumph of ugliness - National - smh.com.au

“Political correctness wants us to believe that democracy and good taste are compatible, but they are not.”

Japan whale experiments bizarre: report - Breaking News - National - Breaking News

A review of the controversial scientific research conducted by Japan and its whalers has uncovered a list of “bizarre” and useless experiments, including how to cross breed cows with whales.Scientists have analysed 43 research papers produced by Japan over 18 years, finding most were useless or esoteric.

The scientific research included injecting minke whale sperm into cows eggs, and attempts to produce test-tube whale babies, News Limited newspapers report.

Oh, and the whales killed for ’scientific tests’? Their meat ends up in markets but apparently most of the population has lost interest in it – apparently it doesn’t sell well (I’m afraid I don’t have a link right now).