Bob Sykes: This is US/UK/EU propaganda. Prior to the coup of 2014 that removed Ukraine’s democratically elected and legitmate president, Yanukovich, and that replaced him with the current paleo-Nazi junta, over 90 of Crrimeans were ethnic Russians, and they voted to join Russia. The vote was unauthorized, but there is no doubt it was accurate. The Russian military did not invade Crimea. They were already there by treaty. And Crimea (and all of Ukraine) had been sovereign Russian territory for over 300...
McChuck: Predators seek out dark, secluded spaces. Normal people avoid dark, secluded spaces. It really is that simple. There’s a reason parking garage stairwells are now built with top to bottom windows. Public spaces are designed with clear sight lines, no obstructions above two feet or below six feet. Remove the places predators can wait in ambush, and crime drops substantially.
Phileas Frogg: Makes sense, ease of access and utilization is improved for everyone by lots of those changes, not just the young, old and disabled. Reminds me of this excerpt: “The trail I walked lacked the geometric and artificial precision of the grand boulevards of the Städte I would later come to know so well. Here Nature did not bend to Man with such frequency or slavishness, but rather the two seemed to bend around one another at regular intervals, a grant of mutual dignity prevailing between...
Isegoria: This Kind of War: The Classic Korean War History, by T. R. Fehrenbach, makes the short list.
Gaikokumaniakku: Marginally relevant, but likely to be of interest to readers who may actually have seen it already: The Marine Corps Commandant’s 2026 Reading List.
Isegoria: I think The Dracula Tape is moving up in the queue.
Bruce: “Medicine in the 19th century was in a Hell of a state.” — Dracula in Saberhagen’s The Dracula Tape, where Dracula says Lucy was killed by van Helsing’s bungled blood transfusions.
Isegoria: I felt the same way about Dumas: Reading The Count of Monte Cristo in 11th grade clarified just how derivative most of the entertainment we consume really is — everything has been done better by Dumas, and he did it over a century ago — and it got me wondering why we don’t regularly enjoy the pop classics.
Isegoria: Apparently Saberhagen’s Dracula Series goes on for nine books!
Bruce: The Dracula Tape and The Holmes-Dracula File by Fred Saberhagen are extremely good, and Saberhagen knew the source material very well.
Benjamin I. Espen: Dracula is like the still center around which a whole constellation of pop culture orbits. You can see a lot of things that were clearly derived from it, yet returning to the original is a shocking and even a refreshing experience. None of the derivatives have its power and gravity.
Isegoria: When I read Frankenstein years ago, I immediately realized how little resemblance it bore to the version of the story I’d osmotically absorbed through the culture.
Phileas Frogg: I’ve returned to Dracula many times throughout the years, and I’m always amazed that each time I pick it up I become more and more aware of the genuine horror of the story. My most recent re-read a few months ago elicited the willies on several occasions, a phenomenon that I really only experienced a handful of times while reading. Excellent novel, and far superior to, Frankenstein, despite the fact that they are paired together so often, and the latter seems to be preferred...
Gaikokumaniakku: I got up this morning planning on having a productive and diligent day, but now that I have seen a single mention of skeleton, I suppose I will spend the next sixteen hours watching Alessia Crippa videos. Che ci vuoi fare? Così è la vita.
Gaikokumaniakku: 1961: The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded. 1971: Federal funding becomes normal. 1981: Defense funding becomes foundational. 1991: Dependence survives the Cold War. 2001: No civil rights for “enemy combatants” or “terrorists.” ; 2011: Grant-seeking becomes institutionalized. 2021: Government influence over entire economy is semi-concealed...
Phileas Frogg: The cost of civilization is the vicious, perpetual, and unapologetic enforcement of civilization. The refusal to pay that cost by our leaders is their insistence that we must forego the laws of civilization and be subject to the laws of the jungle once again. While the American experience of this seems to still be at the stage where institutional efforts could, maybe, still reverse our descent, in Europe, and the UK in particular and in light of the Belfast situation, it appears that they...
Bob Sykes: So, this yet another benefit of open borders and free migration. Evidently, this is an unintended (?) consequence of the wholesale, heavily subsidized transport of illegal aliens into the US by the Biden administration. Or did the anti-red meat crowd piggy-back a pet project on the Biden scheme?
Isegoria: Apparently “Descendant“ appears in his The State of the Art collection.
Bill: Eventually, the US Army will get to the logical conclusion of this line of development, namely, the smart suit from “Descendant” , a 1987 short story by Iain Banks. After a bad crash, the protagonist is badly injured; can he walk back to base? The suit stands up and starts walking, gripping me round the calves and waist, taking the bulk of my weight off my throbbing feet. The suit walks faster than I do. It reckons it is only twenty percent stronger than the average human. Something of...
JP Trenque won the BBC News Photographer of the Year 2005 competition for his underwater photography.