Harlot's Ghost

Norman Mailer ... "donated his ego to the Harvard Medical School" (Woody Allen)

So I just waded through all 1,200 pages of Harlot's Ghost, Mailer's novel about the CIA which took the great man of letters 7 years to write.

It turned out to be absolutely excellent

With just one problem: the last line

"TO BE CONTINUED"

Thanks a bunch Norman!

(Norman Mailer 1923-2007)

These guys are on a hiding to nothing

In the home of socialism an 88 strong "bad behavior brigade" is tasked with preventing les citoyens de Paris urinating in the street. I don't think they will have much luck - public urination, together with cruelty to geese, are as close to the heart of your average Frenchman as gun ownership is to a Midwesterner.

And as for the "Brigade des Incivilites" I believe the French language has a word for them: Tosseurs!

How Times Change

Here is the Royal Navy, circa 1805



And here they are in 2009



The Navy of Nelson, Collingwood, Jervis, Cook and Cochrane has now lent its name to a tacky watch made in China

"I believe the mainstream Chicago media is tops right now"

Above is an example of their brilliant proofreading

Seriously though, what is she smoking?

If I wanted to know what was going on in Chicago the Sun Times and the TV is the last place I'd look.

Move over, Ben Bernanke

Her awesome money management skills make British woman Debra Wilson a shoo-in should the job of chairman of the US Federal Reserve become vacant

Truly the dead tree press has lost the plot. Thirty years ago the Daily Telegraph was a newspaper of substance and merit. Now it's more like US Magazine. And do their headline writers even read the headlines after they've written them?

It's been obvious to everybody that Jackson has been cracking up since the Reagan administration

I am shocked, shocked!

In the Trib today it says that Huron Consulting is restating 3 years of financial statements

The story doesn't mention that this firm was started by a bunch of ex-partners from Arthur Andersen after it folded in 2002 following the Enron bankruptcy.

Looks like a large network of contacts, shiny white shirts, gold cufflinks, Cartier watches and bouffant hair weren't the only things these guys brought with them!