Tag: Decline and fall

Quote of the day

The Sanity Inspector:

In the 30s, serious intellectuals traveled to the Soviet Union to hail it as the future of humanity. In the 60s and 70s, writers, actors & other assorted glitterati went to Cuba to be schmoozed by El Jefe. And now North Korea has hauled in…a retired basketball player with a penchant for shock publicity. The quality of useful idiots is on a definite downward trajectory.

Fun with Google

What’s the secret word?

(Via Peeve Farm.)

Update: I’ve amused myself these past few days by guessing whether “climategate” will appear in the autosuggestions as I type it in the search box. Sometimes it will appear as soon as I type “clim;” a few hours later, we’re back to “climate guatemala.” Perhaps it really is just a flaky algorithm, but I can’t help being skeptical.

Hate crime?

Some Roman Catholic churchmen, meanwhile, have said that the words “hokey pokey” derive from “hocus pocus” — the Oxford English Dictionary concurs — and that the song was written by 18th-century Puritans to mock the language of the Latin Mass. Last year the Catholic Church in Scotland, concerned that some soccer fans were using the song as a taunt, raised the possibility that singing it should be prosecuted as a hate crime.

I suppose I should take umbrage at Focus, too.