Letter of Last Resort

Check out this odd article in Slate about the "Letter of Last Resort", a doomsday verdict from the British prime minister instructing his country's nuclear subs, in the event of a nuclear apocalypse devastating Britain, to either annihilate back or just sort of let it slide. The rationale for the latter would be that killing tens of millions more civilians - i.e. the guys on the other side - might be the beyond-the-pale kind of mass murder (as opposed to more garden variety sorts of wartime mass murder).

The money quote is from Denis Healey, former defense secretary to Labor PM Harold Wilson, who'd choose "letting it go":

"I would find it very, very difficult indeed to agree to use a nuclear weapon—and I think most people would."

That's admirable. To many people, it might sound like crazy talk; and, for reasons well-articulated by the article's writer, a dangerous attitude to put out there regardless of actual policy. But can someone walk back Mr. Healey through less horrific weapons which cause slightly lower kill tallies, and determine at which point civilian death tallies become acceptable in revenge attacks? 

I mean, if you're going to take an ethical stand, that's fantastic. But once you do - once you concede that death is worth avoiding on the basis of its sheer moral repugnance - doesn't the floor drop out from under any hawk-ish stance at all? An alarming prospect indeed for those who don't take deadly carnage lightly.

WSJ on Scooter Libby

A few days ago I recommended Vanity Fair's piece on the Bush presidency, Here's a remarkable Wall Street Journal editorial, mostly about the Scooter Libby pardon, which presents, um, a different picture. Some excerpts:

"If Iraq fails, history will mark down the Bush presidency. If by fits and starts Iraq grows into the Middle East's first large, functioning democratic republic, a more likely result, the Bush presidency will be one of the great building blocks of the new century's political order."

...and

"The Bush team righted itself and assembled a tough response to the attack: the assault on the terror strongholds of Afghanistan and the Patriot Act. Then, in astonishingly short order, the political unity of 9/11 dissolved. Mr. Bush and his team found themselves embattled by the opposition party, much of the Beltway press corps and a leaking national-security bureaucracy. The goal of the domestic opposition was to thwart the Bush antiterror policy, or take down the people shaping it."

...and

"In my many years of writing about Washington's politics, I thought that the Plame affair, its long, mad hunt for the leaker, and then the Libby trial, was one of the most fantastic, preposterous events I've ever watched."

...and

"Yes, a pardon would set the anti-Bush chorus to howling. So? They've done plenty to turn the city into a viper's nest."

It's almost quaint to see someone still plowing these fields, no? The utter irrelevance of this bizarre clinging elicits a pang of genuine nostalgia, sort of like how I felt when I saw old people in Galicia still dressing up in their finest on Franco's birthday.

The Frank Zappa Cafe (sic)

I'm staying two blocks from a place called the Frank Zappa Cafe here in Budapest. Having been a Zappa fan since high school, I've been in such a trembling state of awe and excitement that I waited a few days before making my first pilgrimage, to be certain I was fully primed for the head rush. One part of the overall superior culturedness of Eastern and Central Europe is the fact that there's always been a strong undercurrent of Zappa fans here. And Hungary is somewhat outside the reach of most intellectual property actions, hence the continued existence of this Cafe in spite of Frank's widow's notorious tightness with the trademark.

Well, it's 11pm, and I just walked over. The well-lit room was filled with well-groomed yuppie couples sitting at nice blonde wood tables. Some music was playing over the sound system, too soft and too tinny to identify (though it may well have been Zappa). No jukebox full of bootlegs, no Zappa connection whatsoever aside from a pretty poor mural of the original Mothers of Invention painted on an interior wall, which I imagined to be decorated with potted ferns.

I headed to the bar, were the vacant-eyed server told me to sit at the tables, because the bar, with three stools, isn't "nice". So I sat down at a large table table for four, reached for what I assumed to be the drinks menu, and found myself staring, instead, at a shiny card listing peppy-sounding Bailey's-branded drinks. Because, after all, what says Frank Zappa like a Bailey's Latte?

I fled, and am still rattled and traumatized as I write this.

Singapore's Last Rural Village

Incredibly sad article about the last bit of rural space in Singapore, currently on the verge of being paved over.

New Words

In searching for a synonym for "conciliatory" in order to improve the Slog's clunky tagline (above), I discovered that there really is no apt synonym. The nearest the language comes are powerless, aggrieved terms like 'compromising', 'placatory', 'appeasing', 'pacifying' or 'mollifying'. These words evoke hen-pecked husbands and Neville Chamberlain. If there's no word for it, what hope is there?

Here are some new terms I've whipped up, for starters:

Unisan: opposite of partisan
Concurrent (noun): opposite of dissident
Zionlest: a non-Zionist Jew
Neo Christian: a devout Christian who follows the principles of love, tolerance, and stewardship of the Earth

Farewell to All That: An Oral History of the Bush White House

Farewell to All That: An Oral History of the Bush White House, a long piece in the new issue of Vanity Fair, very thoroughly runs through a litany of controversial (and just plain ignorant or sinister) actions of the Bush administration, with high level administration figures contributing startlingly frank commentaries about why and how it all happened. It's eye-opening even if you kept up with events as they unfolded. And it's jaw-dropping, even if you thought you couldn't be more appalled.

Greetings from Budapest

Post-Coldness

Budapest, I was assured, is no colder than New York City in the winter. Usually. Except every five or six years, when Budapest is as cold as Warsaw. Well, guess which kind of winter I'm enjoying, here on lovely Gresczeszenczesbrushszesmezo Utca where I sit attempting to digest nineteen pounds of rich creamy pastry?

Ever since a traumatic night at University of Rochester that was so freezing I've never entirely warmed up, I've had a thing about being cold. It's partly psychological. I learned something that long-ago night about Cold that a person is not supposed to grok until advanced old age. I won't pass on the insight, as it's downright crippling. But in spite of aggressive countermeasures ranging from grad school in sunny Miami to frequent thirty minute sweat-outs in health club steam rooms to a drawerful of thermal underwear, I endure winter chills with frigid fraughtness.

The standard defense - aggressive layering of protective gear - leaves one sweaty and miserable, dreading transitions to indoor settings, and yet still, in key body places, cold. But finally, after decades, I've found the answer. As I stride down wind-swept Hungarian streets, late at night in single-digit weather, I laugh at the cold. I've beat this thing. Here's how I managed it:

Obviously, there's got to be a sweater or sweatshirt under the top coat. Those who simply throw a coat over their shirted torsos deserve to suffer. But, beyond that, I'm packing three add-ons, none particularly ingenious or creative. No gadgets or gizmos, just a certain optimal and harmonious combination of age-old solutions. It required spending a bit more than I'm ordinarily comfortable with, but the return on my investment has been mammoth (in the woolly sense).

First, Gorgonz Ear-Grips Ear Warmers (in this case relabeled "EarPros") keep ears warm-not-hot without crushing them or matting hair (you wear them behind the head, not over the top). Their size and angle is perfect. They are adjustable, though you must figure that out on your own (the things don't come with an owner's manual). These ear warmers absolutely rock. So much better than alternatives. Here's a differently branded version of the same product.

I've never been the type to buy or wear $45 gloves. But then again, I've previously been the type to shiver miserably on cold days. J Crew's leather cashmere-lined gloves offer instant-on warmth. No need to huff in to preheat the finger holes. Cold digits never languish coldly. These things are toasters. If you feel too non-yuppie to don cashmere-lined gloves, you clearly have not frozen your ass off sufficiently. Go out into the winter and come back when you're serious - prepared to fully fight frigidity.

Finally, an oversized cashmere scarf. Yes, it's a bit Mr.-And-Mrs.-Howell-ian to garb oneself in multiple iterations of pricey cashmere. But scarfs are on deep sales right now. And between the gloves, the scarf, and the earmuffs (plus a prudent sweater or sweatshirt), you will be untouchable. You will be unaffected by howling sub-freezing winds, yet neither will you wind up an over-swaddled sweaty mess. I look and feel completely composed upon unwrapping in warm cafes (only the foggy eyeglasses give me away). I am astronaut-like in my seamless transition to and from an alien and menacing environment. I've nailed it.

Now With Even More Conciliation....

FWIW, I've rewritten and beefed up my entry on "The Route of Escalating Conciliation". You know, the one with the shmancy graphic.

The First iPhone Musical Instrument

Turn your iPhone into an ocarina for, naturally, 99 cents.