The Olympics' Moment of Zen

During the high bar finals Aleksei Nemov, a Russian gymnast, scored much lower than he deserved. The crowd went berserk and booed the officials for good 15 minutes until Nemov himself asked them to calm down.
Everybody I have heard talking about it so far, says it has never happened before like that.
Nemov, how had received 11 medals at previous two games, didn't get the medal this time but one can think of no better farewell than this.

American Dream vs. Eurofantasies

Today's article in the Globe and Mail was quite indicative of the way in which academics of all kinds create "good,future-lookin', example-setting Europe" vs. old, obsolete, selfish U.S.
Communism used to be that alternative to the alleged U.S. culture of unabashed individualism and greed. Now it's the EU.

Keep on dreaming, here's my letter to the Globe which I am sure won't be published:

So let’s juxtapose the two Dreams of which Mr. Rifkin is speaking. (Re: Worlds apart on the Vision Thing – August 17) The American one had been around in the minds of ordinary people long before it became the subject of academic endeavours, while the European Dream seems to exist mainly in the writings of the academia’s Ivory Tower occupants, like Mr. Rifkin and his ilk. Not to mention, of course, the tiny difference between the U.S. being a viable nation-state and the ‘United States of Europe’ which is still no more than just a loosely organized confederation of sovereign countries already fraught with bureaucratic inaptitude. Indeed, only time will tell whether the contrived products of wishful thinking presented as the European Dream can successfully seize the hold of the EU’s fragmented masses. Meanwhile Mr. Rifkin, in true postmodern fashion, can continue to make a living writing books and articles about the social phenomenon that is yet to occur.

Books to read

There are two books I am going to read, and believe, I have so much readings for my studies that it leaves no room for other types of readings most of the time.

First is The Tears of the White Man . The author who is French "lambasts Western attitudes toward the Third World as being characterized by guilt, hypocrisy, and paternalism."

The second is just recent and sums up what's wrong USAphobia
Anti-Americanism by Jean Francois Revel, DIARMID CAMMELL, more Frenchmen.

I'll return to this subject once I'm through with them.