High-quality English language analysis and editorial writing on the news.
Heh. The Honorable Senator Emmanuel D, Pacquiao, Aka the world champion boxer Manny Pacquiao, aka Pacman, who recently found religion, is now under attack. Why? Well, it s seems that he has made a remark against gay marriage, and his website has some Biblical phrases that imply promiscuous gay sex is wrong. Since Pacman has […]
Way back in 1968 Peter Hain coined the phrase “You cannot play normal sport in an abnormal country”. He was talking about Apartheid South Africa – but the principle he was articulating then still gets to the heart of the issue of Sport and Politics today. The thing about sport is that if is essentially […]
Vancouver Police Chief Jim Chu was facing criticism for being too slow in building cases against participants in the Stanley Cup riot in Vancouver. Â So he held a press conference in August where he introduced Constable Lee Patterson to explain how evidence is collected. Â It was an odd choice of spokesperson, since Patterson is accused […]
What can only be described as a North Korean regime’s propaganda video is being promoted by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), a U.S. government agency charged with providing uncensored radio, TV, and Internet news to countries without free media, BBG Watch, a nongovernmental citizen watch group reported. Read From BBG website: Pyongyang is a […]
In case you are only aware of the “hits”, the movie Soul Surfer is a “sleeper”: a small movie that becomes widely seen by word of mouth recommendations. I usually dislike surfer movies (e.g. Blue Crush) but I do like the photography of the ocean in them, so I watched this one. The good news: […]
Although the last holdouts in Corrigidor didn’t surrender until May 1942, it is April 9th that is the anniversary of the surrender of Bataan. At dawn, 9 April 1942, against the orders of Generals Douglas MacArthur… Major General Edward P. King, Jr., commanding Luzon Force, Bataan, Philippine Islands, surrendered more than 76,000 (67,000 Filipinos, 1,000 […]
A couple weeks ago, I ran across a strange story about Zimbabwe: a couple of known terrorists were caught crossing the border from Zimbabwe into South Africa at Beitbridge. 33 year-old Imran Muhammad…was arrested last Sunday while trying to get through Beitbridge border post to South Africa on what officials believe was a fake Kenyan […]
Shame the sponsors. That sums up the remedy advised by Vancouver Olympics Organizing Committee member and Vancouver City Manager Penny Ballem on Wednesday Jan. 13, after she was briefed at City Hall on evidence of persecution of bloggers and other computer/internet users by the City of Vancouver. Ballem (in photo above outside City Hall) encouraged […]
 When in 2002 the Benetton Formula One team morphed into Renault it was clear that what the French car giant was seeking to do was to secure brand value from the move, in return, of course, for funding. Constructors’ and Drivers’ championships in 2005 and 2006 will undoubtedly have given the brand a major […]
Not only have the French gotten their knickers in a knot about Muslim girls wearing modest costumes to public swimming pools, but now an Italian city plans to ban it completely. Women wearing the garment made up of a veil, a tunic and loose leggings face a fine of 500 euros ($850) if spotted at […]
 Judy Rogers has been fired after ten years as Vancouver’s City Manager. While Rogers acknowledged to the media that it had not been her choice to leave the job she “loved”, Mayor Robertson was twisting his tongue into euphemisms: “Technically, it’s a cessation of her duties by mutual understanding.” The firing has swept Rogers […]
David Schussler This is a story of a brave American hero Lindsey Carmichael, 2008 Paralympic bronze medalist archer. Hailing from Lago Vista, Texas, Lindsey has McCune Albright Syndrome, a disease that creates severe weak spots in her bones. After struggling for years in and out of wheelchairs and therapy, Lindsey has attained a goal she […]
I wonder how many of those going to the boxing at the Beijing Olympics remember the opening ceremony of Atlanta 1996 when the shambling figure of Muhammed Ali struggled nobly to light the Olympic flame. In Atlanta, and since, Muhammed Ali’s suffering from “Pugilistic Parkinson’s syndrome†was visible for all to see. Like other great […]
Wally Olins, one of the most knowledgeable writers and thinkers on brand management in modern times, wrote back in 1989 in his seminal book on “Corporate Identityâ€, that “…oil companies are poor retailers.†The irony was that then, as now, the brand identities of Shell, BP or Esso were amongst the most ubiquitous in the […]
For four years in the late 1980s I lived and worked in Hong Kong – it was an exciting time. Hong Kong’s political future had been decided by the signing of the Joint Declaration with China in December 1984 and the Territory would revert to Chinese sovereignty with effect from 1st July 1997. But although […]
The great anthropologist Margaret Mead always described the formal rituals of the societies she studied as a way of illustrating the core values and mores of those societies. Had she studied the Britain of modern times the Wimbledon tennis fortnight would have been an essential ritual for her to examine – indeed sport and sporting […]
The popularity of Cricket in India has been a matter of global attention. Many say Cricket is a religion in India. In fact it may be true. What else can justify a temple of “Cricket Ganesha” where a special “Sahasranaama” pooja is offered invoking the names of cricket legends such as Sachin and Saurav in […]
You get a strange feeling reading the different links cited in this article. See if you get the same impressions as the ones I will list. They are only impressions, not necessarily facts, but they do form a pattern. “Haas ‘was not poisoned.’” The suspicious illness of German tennis star Tommy Hass was thus dismissed […]
If you have been following the antics of the Americas Cup you will not be surprised by this court ruling. For those of you not familiar the thumbnail sketch is as follows. Allinghi really like winning the Cup, so much so, that they tried to set up the next one heavily favored in their direction, […]
Here’s a news story you could have missed. What happened is something of a mystery as of this writing. Maybe you can figure it out or guess the truth. Frankly, I cannot. Arguments on both sides of the controversy seem full of holes, yet obviously this either happened or it didn’t. First, here are the […]
The Rugby World Cup quarterfinals got underway today, and what an unbelievable way to do so. Just days ago, there was even money at least on the Southern Hemisphere taking all four semifinal spots, with Australia, Argentina, New Zealand and South Africa favored to move on. Today, at least half of that equation has changed, […]
The America’s Cup is the oldest sporting competition in the modern world. With almost 160 years of history behind it, it is the iconoclastic battle of nations for dominance of speed and tactics in sailing. Well it used to be anyway! This battle for no prize money and possibly the worlds ugliest trophy (oh and […]
Scales Sports Project:Latest News on Gambian sports!! Gambia’s under 20 team By Our Chief National Correspondent Landing Badjie, Banjul. Paid for And Commissioned by the Freedom Newspaper. Soccer fans across The Gambia would in less than one hour troop down to various stadia in the country for scintillating and earth-trembling matches in the GFA 2nd […]
Football might save Zimbabwe where others cannot. The situation in Zimbabwe got some press when a prayer rally was broken up by thuggish police and photos of Morgan Tsvangarai was posted on all the networks and newspapers. Alas, since then Mugabe got approval by his fellow African presidents and has been busy arresting dissadents, while […]
Attention – Due To Allegations of Plagiarism, This Article Is Highly Suspect Two Sports headlines, both pertaining to cricket caught my headlines his morning. One pertained to Anil Kumble announcing his retirement from one day cricket. And the other was Ian Chappel’s call to Sachin Tendulkar to retire. Ian’s comment, especially barbed was that Tendulkar […]
One of the penances of living in the Philippines is that we no longer get CNN or Fox. We now get “CNN INTERNATIONAL” and BBC. And unlike CNN, CNNI is full of people with british accents who sneer at anything that makes the US look bad. About the only US slanted news seems to be […]
1997 German Tour de France winner and ewiger Zweiter (always second – five times) to high-tech secret agent drug fiend Lance Armstrong, Jan Ullrich has decided to retire from cycling while he is still behind. Caught in a Spanish doping investigation fiddling around with performance enhancing drugs again, Ullrich was denied participation in last year’s Tour […]
Attention – Due To Allegations of Plagiarism, This Article Is Highly Suspect Congress president Sonia Gandhi declared the 33rd National Games open here Friday evening amid clamorous cheering from the 30,000-strong crowd at the Indira Gandhi Athletics Stadium. For once the rejuvenated spirit of the culturally vibrant state of Assam came to the fore, brushing […]
 Attention – Due To Allegations of Plagiarism, This Article Is Highly Suspect Not willing to take any chance after Indian team coach Greg Chappell’s assault in Bhubaneswar, the West Bengal Government has made ‘fool-proof’ security arrangements for the Aussie in view of the first India-Sri Lanka ODI at the Eden Gardens here on Friday.”Fool-proof security […]
Today’s (24 Jan 2007) one-day match between the Indian and West Indies cricket teams was a thriller, low-scoring, but an absolute thriller. Sometimes the match does not have to have 300 plus runs scored by each side to be a thriller, there is a different pleasure when the match is evenly poised with wickets gone, […]
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