SHAWCO

[ed: Pictures are sort of working now, this is a re-post.]
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This is the school building where I've been teaching a group of 8th Graders in Math and English. It's located in Khayelitsha, South Africa. The kids who attend are all native speakers of Xhosa.

I'm working with SHAWCO, through the University of Cape Town. It's a student-run organization for volunteering.


These are a few of the students. You guys will recognize yourselves - leave a comment.

This is hilarious: fun with senate candidates!

Do you know who this is? This is the woman who was running as the Republican candidate for Joe Biden's senate seat. Her name is Christine O'Donnell. She was going to lose so badly that no one even bothered to do a poll for the race.

Now Biden is VP and the Democrats must find someone who can run in his place to maintain the seat. While it's not likely, there's the off chance that this new person will collapse under the weight of gaffes or scandals or some other unforeseen consequence.

While it's likely that O'Donnell's senate career will end before it has begun, it would be a hilarious bit of political drama worthy of the attempted spin-off of the West Wing if O'Donnell managed to make her way to the senate. At least if she doesn't appear to be a politician, she's not as unsettling as:


Bob Kelleher, Republican candidate for Montana, who loves his kerchief.

This man's name is Bob Tingle. Tingle. Would you, as a voter, let him tingle you?[Republican challenger for Rhode Island]


Scott Kleeb, Democratic challenger for Nebraska. Since when did they start casting former stars of Dawson's Creek for unwinnable seats?


Tom Udall, Democratic challenger and likely winner of New Mexico's open seat, a Nicholas Cage look-alike who thinks that the best photos are always taken in front of pseudo-picturesque mountainscapes.

Black is white, up is down, Francis Fukuyama...isn't a Neocon?

What is going on in this world? An OG of Neocon theory (possibly partnered with Samuel Huntington for this title) and author of a book titled "The End of History and the Last Man," a very 1990s democracy/triumphalism/USA-as-world-police idea, has written, in the Wall Street Journal:

"Iraq may be stable but the war was a mistake"

Fukuyama seems to be good with provocative titles, but his op-ed is nuanced. Here's the money quote, coming from such a respectable voice supposedly in the community of war-supporters:

By invading Iraq in the manner it did, the U.S.
exacerbated all of the threats it faced prior to 2003. Recruitment into
terrorist cells shot up all over the world. North Korea and Iran
accelerated their development of nuclear weapons.
Indeed, Iran has emerged as the dominant regional power in the Persian Gulf once the U.S. removed its major rival from the scene...

Ouch! Those fight-em-over-there-so-we-don't-have-to-fight-em-over-here war supporters must be hurting.