The Top 10

In light of fast approaching 400 posts on ProseBeforeHos, I’ve decided to compile a ‘best of’. Maybe you’ve missed these or if you’ve seen them, they’re worth a second viewing:

Top 10 PBH Posts

1. The Domino Effect by Jesse. If this is an original piece, this is one of the funnier observations on modern melodramatic romance to be written.

2. A Commentary on Transitional Iraq by International Relations. A piece done by me (Alec), so I guess this stinks of self-selection. However, I wrote this in a painstaking fashion and is one of the more well-crafted of my ideas regarding our involvement in Iraq.

3. Life is and always will be unfair by Anonymous Banker. On the theme of modern romance, what spells success better than boinking a girl you met on MySpace after a few drinks?

4. DaDa Bot by Kit. The most creative endeavor PBH has seen so far.

5. Creeping from under your desk! by Depths of My Soul. Nothing’s worse then when you’re fratty roommates find out your deep, dark secrets, and then post it on the internet.

6. Campaign Contributions, Contracting, & the Reconstruction of Iraq by Government Employee. A careful critique of the spoils system revolving military spending in the government by evaluating intelligence firms since 2001.

7. I hope they buy it by Piercing Glares, Enticing Stares. A pitifully confused young man finds love in all the wrong places and does his best to deny it.

8. Distancing myself by Chairman Mao. A politically disenchanted hamster explores the roots of his beliefs.

9. Exposed: Little Pete by Beetle. What’s better than photoshopping a red headed friends face onto Little Pete?

10. Mao the Actor by Chairman Mao. A hilarious pst with Chairman Mao having his life threatened and then retracted (with smoochies).

News to Throw Your Views Askew

Blaine Harden at the WP writes an excellent expose on the socio-economic realities facing the post-Katrina rebuilding of New Orleans.

“I am not a conspiracy person,” said William Quigley, a professor at Loyola University Law School in New Orleans and director of its Gillis Long Poverty Law Center, “but it is pretty hard to argue with the facts on the ground. If you are black in the Lower Ninth and you don’t have electricity, water or a FEMA trailer and nobody is giving you a timeline when you will, that is a hell of a lot of conspiracy dots to connect.”

If there was a draft day for philosophers, Spinoza would make for an excellent late second round pick. Atheist in the 17th century? Good work. Salon has a review on a recent biography on him by Rebecca Goldstein. My response was great article (but); Has anyone picked up on the movement of orthodox and right-wing Jews in general to claim every “Jewish” figure as their own? Spinoza may have been born into a Jewish family, but it was birth not by choice. All of his thoughts were of an articulate, intelligent HUMAN, not some isolated credo that manifests itself in Jewish people only. And is it surprising that Rebecca Goldstein, someone raised obviously in an orthodox family, wants to elaborate on Spinoza as a ‘Jewish thinker’, as if it that differentiates him from the rest of the world in the most Oriental of ways.

My basic rational being: he’s a human, he was a philosopher, and he lived in Europe, don’t label his life as Jewish because of your trite 21st century perceptions. In the words of Daniel Johnston: Do yourself a favor, be your own savior.

Also, I am bibliophile. Does anyone want to make me an official Communist Party Member by the way?

Jean Shorts Expo

From a WP Chat:

Dupont Circle, Washington, D.C.: Just a quick note to the O’s fans coming down for the games this weekend — at the D.C. Armory on Saturday and Sunday they are having a giant jeans-shorts expo. You might want to skip the game and stock up on these Baltimore summer fashion staples, for the Nats are going to give your team a terrific drubbing!!

News to Spit on Your Antiquated Views

BBCNews has an excellent report on what states are under the microscope for the 2006 midterm election. The one saving grace for the Republicans, associated with an unpopular war and an even more unpopular President, is that they get to run against Democrats, who are perennial experts at proving their incompetence at running campaign.

The UN has released a list of the top 10 most underreported stories concerning the world. In the ‘obvious’ section: “Every year, the U.N.’s Department of Public Information (DPI) unveils its list of the world’s 10 most under-reported stories, implying that politics, murder and sex scandals still take precedence over poverty, peace-building or economic developments.”

Coming Anarchy has a good post on the recent violence that has swept through San Paolo, Brazil, mainly from one of the world’s largest and best managed criminal organizations. Plus it references one of the best movies made in the past 25 years, City of God.

The Washington Post also has an article about the health concerns associated with teenage sex. The most telling quote:

“They tend to agree that the mixed message America sends to teens about sex — authorities say “don’t” while mass media screams “What are you waiting for?”– endanger our children.

The outcome? Levels of teen sexual activity look remarkably similar here and abroad, but U.S. rates of teen pregnancy, childbirth, abortion and sexually transmitted diseases are among the highest of all industrialized nations…”

In a less serious and spiteful tone, where else can you read “Ah, Adama, it’s the penis. The wooden penis. Once, I feared it. Now it calls to me in my dreams and tells me to carry it everywhere.” Only on Salon, which has a book review of a post-abroad white boy story. Also, from the same review, this sounds exactly like me: “Adama’s love life, it must be said, is much like that of the average American male in his 20s: flailing, contradictory and unconsidered. He is teased mercilessly by the local flirt, launches a formal courtship of a regal herdsman’s daughter (only to chicken out after he wins her hand) and falls in love with two women — one married, the other a prostitute — neither of whom is foolish enough to take him too seriously.

Today’s history lesson: it’s the 40th anniversary of the Cultural Revolution in China. BBCNews has a collection of eye witness accounts from what became one of the biggest acts of genocide and mob-violence in human history.

Oh, and Bill O’Reilly is still a piece of shit.

3rd World Farmer

Give it a try.