Some days the world just goes a bit crazy

Well folks, today I think that it is not only the reporting on the news which is insane, but the actual news today too. Let's take a swing around the world, shall we:

Taiwan MPs got into a fist-fight today over the timing of a bill to be voted on.


Yes, you see correctly: one MP's arm was bloodied following the legislative smack down. Honestly, I think the US should take their lead. Could you see Bush and Cheney coming to the Senate to brawl it out with Schumer and Kennedy? I think it would be a much better way of deciding the fate of the nation than whatever they are doing now, anyway.

Moving on.

North Korea, which seems to be at the center of a great many absurd new stories, is meeting with South Korea in an effort to finally implement the oft-delayed rail linking of the two States. So how to break the ice at a meeting between the two bitter rivals who have not had a rail link in 50 years? Tell a joke of course! Al Jazeera reports:

Shortly after the meeting began however, Lieutenant-General Kim Yong-chol opened proceedings by telling a joke at George Bush's expense.

"I recently read a piece of political humour on the internet called 'saving the president'," he was quoted as saying in pool reports from the talks.

Kim then went on to recount an often-told joke about the president out jogging when he a group of children save him from a sticky encounter with a speeding car.

(You can read the joke at the end of this page)

That's right! Offer the beginnings of the joke in the body of the article, but don't reveal the whole thing 'til they have read the whole article. But was the joke funny? Let's just put it this way: the article reports that "The South Koreans did their best to look amused":

Dude. Either the South Koreans really suck at looking amused, or that was one bad joke.

On to Little Britain, where the great people of Northern Ireland are celebrating a historic power-sharing agreement. Of course, for Tony Blair it is more like an ahistoric power sharing agreement. The BBC reports:

Mr Blair said that the day's events offered the chance for Northern Ireland to "escape the heavy chains of history" and "make history anew".

I'm not quite done formulating this thought, but there is something very interesting about the logic of history here. While I ramble, feel free to be amazed by the picture to the lefty According to this formulation, history, being a series of conflicts between political groupings, can do nothing but hold a nation back. But what is it being held back from? Surely it is not from violence, since Northern Ireland has been relatively peaceful for a decade now. Maybe it's just a report in The Economist of London that has me thinking it may be tied to the logic of capital. After all, capital by its very definition is not allowed to have a history. And the language of a nation being "chained down" and needing to restart are often associated with neoliberal structural reforms. Could this be an ideal of the neoliberal State slipping from Blair's lips? In that case, is the neoliberal state postmodern? Anyway, it's just some wild speculation. Like i said, the ideas aren't really quite formulated yet.

Finally, what crazy news wrap-up would be complete without a commentary on Israel? Israel today announced it will donate $5 million in aid to refugees in Chad and Dafur. Refugees closer to home will receive $5 million of bombs every day over the next few years. Oops.