Friday, March 18, 2005

How wonderful it is...

Amazing how people always miss the main point, and just repeat, thoughtlessly, after others. On the title page of "Anne Frank Center" there is a quote from her book:

"How wonderful it is that nobody need to wait a single moment before starting to improve the world"

On the website only the bold part is present, I just happen to remember the rest. But the missing part changes the meaning completely! She wasn't leaving us instructions about what to do. The most amazing thing about what she said is, to me, how happy she was about her discovery. Lets not kid ourselves. Everybody knows that about the world without Anna's help. Nobody cares.

Monday, March 14, 2005

Imagine Apollo 11

Talking about movie sets (see the post below).

There is a conspiracy theory which states that there was no Apollo 11 landing on the moon. It was, the theory claims, staged by Stanley Kubrick, appropriately the guy who shut the "Space Odyssey".

A friend of mine got me thinking. If there was no landing, then how come Soviets never said anything? The telescopes were good enough to confirm or deny the landing. The Soviets sure as hell must have monitored the entire event. And there is no chance on earth they would have let the "capitalist empire" to get away with winning the space race without actually winning it.

Sure enough, Soviets reported the landing. Not even a peeps came from the TV when it was airing photos of American astronauts making their big step for humanity. Not a peeps. Uncle Sam won. We give up.

Not so fast. Turns out, there is a theory Gagarin never went to space too. He was chosen for his smile over the first pilot, Titov (indeed, you don't have to be a pilot to be an actor), got a movie star shot next to rocket, smiled, said "poehali !", and the rocket was lunched. By that time, soviets have already lost dozens of dogs and several pilots trying to beat the Americans. They needed a victory. They could get pictures of taking off rocket easy enough, it just kept falling back after a while. Can be a problem, if you need to show pilot smile after successful landing. So, Gagarin never stepped inside.

Now imagine that Americans found out about this. Imagine, they decided to get even. Imagine, they came to Soviets and said. "Look. You got your movie. Fine. Now let us do ours. Or else."

Just imagine.

Wednesday, March 09, 2005

There are no evil deeds 2

Pictures of dead leader of chechen rebels, Mashadov, all over the web. Russian authorities report that he was killed in a besieged bunker from a friendly fire by one of his own bodyguards. Maybe he should have hired lifeguards, or something.
Very soon after Mr. Putin proclaimed that warriors that killed Mashadov should get medals.
I really want to watch him clipping the medal to the bearded pal's heroic Muslim chest.

UPDATE 1: now there are reports that Mashadov wasn't even killed in that bunker but elsewere, and that the bunker wasn't even a bunker but a basement. Or maybe they should call it a movie set?

UPDATE 2: undisclosed source in russian ministry of internal affairs claims that the entire thing was staged. Mashadov, according to him, died of a liver problems.

UPDATE 3: Mashadov's son says Mashadov died in the bunker, but not from bombs. He claims Mashadov died fighting.

UPDATE 4: FSB claims they payed 10 m. $$ for his head. Other reports say he was tortured before killed. I bet.

Funny. So many ways to die. At least, it is one terrorist less.

Monday, March 07, 2005

There are no evil deads. Only evil people.

Reading reports about a raid of two dozens well armed young sportive men on compound called The Bunker, Moscow.

The Bunker is where the headquoters of the Russian National Bolshevik party are located. It is well armored, with an iron door, filled with agitation material, the Bolsheviks themselves, and who knows what else. I am also guessing, in true Bolsheviks party spirit, it is strategically positioned to ease the takeover of the post, the phone, and the telegraph, during the upcoming Bolshevik revolution.

Now, for the irony to live up to it's full potential, one needs to know that "bolshevik" derives from the russian word "bolshe" which means "more". That's because there were more of them, in 1917. The other day it took 25 men to take the Bolshevik Party Bunker. No embrasures were reportedly covered with bunker staff's own bodies in a heroic act of self sacrifice. A shame.

Who were the unsang heroes, cleansing the world of the remnants of the Bolshevik revolution? Depends. They are said to be "concerned citizens in search for their friend, who has disappeared IN (?) the Bolshevik party". Or at least that's how Pravda.ru ("truth" in Russian) puts it. They are also said to be Mr. Putin's young followers from the "Nashi" ("Ours") orde...ganization. The same people behind the "Walking Together" pro-Putin org... whatever. Both sponsored from Kremlin's deep pockets. It is unfortunate that exactly the same people are known as Moscow's infamous skeenheads and football hooligans. Or, as some describe them, the PutinUgen.

So, am I happy that bolshevik's ass was kicked by a bunch of government-sponsored Nazis? It is a mixture of joy and eager anticipation. I am waiting for the Bolsheviks to return the favor.