*Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
Global Internet regulator ICANN on Friday approved a new multilingual address system which ends the exclusivity of Latin characters for Internet addresses. Domain names will be the first to be affected by the change.
What's in a name? More than you might think, especially when it comes to streets, which is why analysis of their names is a revealing exercise. A Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) project. Whilst in east Berlin, 20 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, many street names remain unchanged, monuments to almost 50 years of communism, most countries in the Balkans have rushed to rid themselves of these outward signs of their socialist baggage. In Bucharest, where once you might have marched down Victory of Socialism Boulevard, you can now take a stroll along Unity Boulevard.In Serbia, however, things are moving full circle. There are calls in Belgrade for streets renamed after Belgrade's Soviet liberators in the 1940s, and which reverted in the 1990s to their pre-revolutionary names, to revert once more to remember Lenin, the Red Army and Soviet military leaders.
Whilst in east Berlin, 20 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, many street names remain unchanged, monuments to almost 50 years of communism, most countries in the Balkans have rushed to rid themselves of these outward signs of their socialist baggage.
In Bucharest, where once you might have marched down Victory of Socialism Boulevard, you can now take a stroll along Unity Boulevard.
In Serbia, however, things are moving full circle. There are calls in Belgrade for streets renamed after Belgrade's Soviet liberators in the 1940s, and which reverted in the 1990s to their pre-revolutionary names, to revert once more to remember Lenin, the Red Army and Soviet military leaders.
Today's Romania is a democracy from Kafka's books, where rhetoric is mixed with demagogy and vulgar populism. This is the belief of Norman Manea, the writer who emigrated from Romania in 1986. He made the statement in an interview for Le Figaro.
(Methinks Romania is not the only democracy today that is straight out of Kafka's books...)
"Romania is a weird combination of burlesque and Byzantinism. (...) 20 years after the fall of the tiran, we discover, as the dossiers are opened, than many respectable persons were dishonest. We discover that 80% of the priests trusted by people with confessions were Securitate collaborators", the writer says. His book, "The Clowns. The Dictator and the Artist", has been recently translated in French. According to Le Figaro, Manea is the most translated Romanian writer worldwide. He lived both under the fascist and the communist dictatorships. His work is essential in understanding the Romanian tragedy from the 20th century, according to Bruno Corty, the writer of the article. Much unlike the extraordinary Romanian folklore, "the politics is a disaster", Manea opinionated. "Imagine that one day after Ceausescu's death, four million PCR [Romanian Communist Party] members became hysteric anti-communists, obsessed and armed with an extraordinary hate. They felt guilty and wanted to prove the entire world that they treasured their freedom."
According to Le Figaro, Manea is the most translated Romanian writer worldwide. He lived both under the fascist and the communist dictatorships. His work is essential in understanding the Romanian tragedy from the 20th century, according to Bruno Corty, the writer of the article.
Much unlike the extraordinary Romanian folklore, "the politics is a disaster", Manea opinionated. "Imagine that one day after Ceausescu's death, four million PCR [Romanian Communist Party] members became hysteric anti-communists, obsessed and armed with an extraordinary hate. They felt guilty and wanted to prove the entire world that they treasured their freedom."
(Tainted priests working on religious revival and commies turned anti-communists -- two realities ignored by triumphant accounts of the post-communist world.) *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
With four stories of chilling exhibitions, a museum in Hungary's capital Budapest is dedicated to those who were interrogated, tortured and killed during the two bloody periods of Nazi and communist rule.
(The article rather naively ignores the political background of this 'museum'. It was created by the then right-wing government ahead of the 2002 elections, and the political intent was rather clear when f.e. guides kept pointing out that one of the secret service guys on a photo is the father of a prominent liberal politician. Worse, the part on the Nazi past is a joke, which is no accident given that the director of the museum -- also interviewed in the article -- is an anti-semite. Besides, the black "frame" is an eyesore on Budapest's equivalent of the Champs-Élysées.) *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
One of the most important works in cinematic history is to be shown in its complete uncut version at next year's Berlin International Film Festival. The restored version of Fritz Lang's silent classic "Metropolis" is to hit the silver screen 83 years after it first premiered in Berlin.
(The lost 30 minutes.) *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
Reporting from Hayfork, Calif. -- Education has long been preached as a way to keep kids away from drugs. It's the walk to school that has Supt. Tom Barnett worried. This hardscrabble Northern California town has become a hotbed for medical marijuana farming. Kids stroll much of the year past pungent plants flourishing in gardens and alleys. The red-and-black clad Timberjacks football team moved its halftime huddle on a recent Friday night to avoid the odor of marijuana smoke wafting over the gridiron from nearby houses. Some students talk openly of farming pot after graduation, about the only opportunity in this depressed timber town. "It's not a subculture here," said Barnett, who heads the Mountain Valley Unified School District. "Marijuana is drying in their houses. It's falling out of their pockets." Los Angeles isn't the only place struggling with repercussions unleashed by its permissive medical marijuana laws. Here in Trinity County, cannabis cultivation is upending the rural culture and economy of one of the state's most hard-luck regions. .... The sheriff's office estimates 10,000 plants are growing in a single remote subdivision known as Trinity Pines. Lots on its southwest-facing slope sell for as much as $50,000, up from about $3,500 five years ago, according to Steven Hanover, an area real estate broker.
This hardscrabble Northern California town has become a hotbed for medical marijuana farming. Kids stroll much of the year past pungent plants flourishing in gardens and alleys. The red-and-black clad Timberjacks football team moved its halftime huddle on a recent Friday night to avoid the odor of marijuana smoke wafting over the gridiron from nearby houses. Some students talk openly of farming pot after graduation, about the only opportunity in this depressed timber town.
"It's not a subculture here," said Barnett, who heads the Mountain Valley Unified School District. "Marijuana is drying in their houses. It's falling out of their pockets."
Los Angeles isn't the only place struggling with repercussions unleashed by its permissive medical marijuana laws. Here in Trinity County, cannabis cultivation is upending the rural culture and economy of one of the state's most hard-luck regions. ....
The sheriff's office estimates 10,000 plants are growing in a single remote subdivision known as Trinity Pines. Lots on its southwest-facing slope sell for as much as $50,000, up from about $3,500 five years ago, according to Steven Hanover, an area real estate broker.
On Friday, only days after NASA tested its next big-ticket rocket, a ragtag group of space junkies in the Mojave Desert flew a bargain-basement rocket ship that could be the real future of spaceflight in the 21st century. Masten Space Systems sent its 10-foot-tall Xoie (pronounced Zoey) rocket soaring over a patch of scrub desert that stood in for the moon, a move that appeared to vault the company into the lead in the $2-million Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge. The contest is sponsored by NASA as part of its long-range effort to give a boost to private companies in the hope that they will someday take on such routine space tasks as delivering cargo to the International Space Station. Four teams registered for a total of six prize-winning attempts. The potential savings to taxpayers is significant: NASA's next-generation rocket, the Ares 1X, which was test-launched Tuesday, has cost tens of millions of dollars. Xoie and her predecessors have cost about $2 million. .... The Lunar Lander Challenge requires competitors to launch unmanned rockets from a pad, fly to a different pad and land, then repeat the process, all within a specified period of time....With just minutes to spare of the allotted two hours and 15 minutes, the rocket touched down on its return flight, settling only inches from the center of the landing pad.
The contest is sponsored by NASA as part of its long-range effort to give a boost to private companies in the hope that they will someday take on such routine space tasks as delivering cargo to the International Space Station. Four teams registered for a total of six prize-winning attempts. The potential savings to taxpayers is significant: NASA's next-generation rocket, the Ares 1X, which was test-launched Tuesday, has cost tens of millions of dollars. Xoie and her predecessors have cost about $2 million. .... The Lunar Lander Challenge requires competitors to launch unmanned rockets from a pad, fly to a different pad and land, then repeat the process, all within a specified period of time....With just minutes to spare of the allotted two hours and 15 minutes, the rocket touched down on its return flight, settling only inches from the center of the landing pad.
Interestingly, the Who Should Build Big Space Rockets, NASA or the Private Sector? poll at Space.com (even if non-scientific, not one I'd expect to be freeped) showed only 15% support for having NASA step aside, and 38% evedn want NASA to keep total control. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
Yeah, Ares-I doesn't make much sense -- other than as a byproduct of going for Ares-IV/V, with its LOX core. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
