isn't this what they're already doing?

planting stories and the like? of course this takes it one step beyond (GREAT song by the way). it's frightening to think of the truth being CONTROLLED, isn't it?

America's war on the web
While the US remains committed to hunting down al-Qaeda operatives, it is now taking the battle to new fronts. Deep within the Pentagon, technologies are being deployed to wage the war on terror on the internet, in newspapers and even through mobile phones.
Investigations editor Neil Mackay reports
IMAGINE a world where wars are fought over the internet; where TV broadcasts and newspaper reports are designed by the military to confuse the population; and where a foreign armed power can shut down your computer, phone, radio or TV at will.
In 2006, we are just about to enter such a world. This is the age of information warfare, and details of how this new military doctrine will affect everyone on the planet are contained in a report, entitled The Information Operations Roadmap, commissioned and approved by US secretary of defence Donald Rumsfeld and seen by the Sunday Herald.
The Pentagon has already signed off $383 million to force through the document’s recommendations by 2009. Military and intelligence sources in the US talk of “a revolution in the concept of warfare”. The report orders three new developments in America’s approach to warfare:
Firstly, the Pentagon says it will wage war against the internet in order to dominate the realm of communications, prevent digital attacks on the US and its allies, and to have the upper hand when launching cyber-attacks against enemies.
lSecondly, psychological military operations, known as psyops, will be at the heart of future military action. Psyops involve using any media – from newspapers, books and posters to the internet, music, Blackberrys and personal digital assistants (PDAs) – to put out black propaganda to assist government and military strategy. Psyops involve the dissemination of lies and fake stories and releasing information to wrong-foot the enemy................

i'm not embarrassed. i'll admit it, i'm addicted

to kingdom of loathing

a sort of parody of rpg. in kol you get to be an accordian thief or turtle tamer or a few other things. you get to drink all sorts of liquor and eat all sorts of nasty foodstuffs and go on all sorts of quests. you get to take goofballs and have a 20 pound mosquito or sabre toothed lime as a familiar (rather similar to a pet). you get to fight wacky fruit monsters and dress up in dirty hobo gloves and bloody clown pants.

(i first heard about it through jodi's weblog.)

IF THE LINK DOESN'T WORK GOOGLE KINGDOM OF LOATHING!!!

looks like her sweater puppies*** are a pussilicient mess

i cannot do ms harris the amount of justice rex kramer, DANGER SEEKER does as in this posting harris-palooza (***sweater puppies mr kramer, danger seeker?????)



Harris' Senate campaign 'imploding'
With more key workers set to flee, it could be the final lap for the troubled race. New hires are expected.
Jim Stratton Sentinel Staff Writer April 1, 2006
The last of U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris' key staffers appear ready to abandon her campaign for the U.S. Senate in a wave of resignations expected to start this weekend.Sources close to the campaign said Friday that the defections would touch virtually every level of her operation.Harris, who is running against Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson, is likely to lose her chief political strategist, her campaign manager, her spokeswoman, her director of field operations and even a traveling aide who helps hand out stickers at campaign appearances.It is the latest and most dramatic indication so far that her campaign is on the verge of collapse............

yup, there is no civil war.........

the GOOD news is it appears american casualties are down, the BAD NEWS IS they seem to be concentrating on killing one another. would they have a civil war if we didn't interfere? i don't know. i DO know, we did NOT help. we did NOT help them at all. we went over with our big boots and started kicking up the dust

Civilians in Iraq Flee Mixed Areas as Killings Rise

By EDWARD WONG and KIRK SEMPLE
BAGHDAD, Iraq, April 1 — The war in Iraq has entered a bloodier phase, with American casualties steadily declining over the past five months while the killings of Iraqi civilians have risen tremendously in sectarian violence, spurring tens of thousands of Iraqis to flee from mixed Shiite-Sunni areas.
The new pattern, detailed in casualty and migration statistics and in interviews with American commanders and Iraqi officials, has led to further separation of Shiite and Sunni Arabs, moving the country toward a de facto partitioning along sectarian and ethnic lines — an outcome that the Bush administration has doggedly worked to avoid over the past three years.
The nature of the Iraq war has been changing since at least late autumn, when political friction between Sunni Arabs and the majority Shiites rose even as American troops began to carry out a long-term plan to decrease their street presence. But the killing accelerated most sharply after the bombing on Feb. 22 of a revered Shiite shrine, which unleashed a wave of sectarian bloodletting.
About 900 Iraqi civilians were killed in March, up from about 700 the month before, according to the Iraq Coalition Casualty Count, an independent organization that tracks deaths. Meanwhile, at least 29 American troops were killed in March, the second-lowest monthly total since the war began.
The White House says that little violence occurs in most of Iraq's 18 provinces. But those four or five provinces where most of the killings and migrations take place are Iraq's major population and economic centers, generally mixed regions that include the capital, Baghdad, and contain much of the nation's infrastructure — crucial factors in Iraq's prospects for stability.
The Iraqi public's reaction to the violence has been substantial. Since the shrine bombing, 30,000 to 36,000 Iraqis have fled their homes because of sectarian violence or fear of reprisals, say officials at the International Organization for Migration in Geneva. The Iraqi Ministry of Displacement and Migration estimated at least 5,500 families had moved, with the biggest group, 1,250 families, settling in the Shiite holy city of Najaf after leaving Baghdad and Sunni-dominated towns in central Iraq.............

believe it or not, some people DO have castration fantasies

and some DO carry it further.............than a fantasy, some fetishes go well beyond shoes or latex. there are many websites out there on this subject (castration). of course i am NOT going to link to any of them.

Three men charged in 'dungeon' castration

Updated: 9:10 p.m. ET March 31, 2006
CHARLOTTE, N.C. - Three men accused of running a sadomasochistic "dungeon" in rural Haywood County were in custody Friday, charged with performing illegal castrations.
Investigators from the office of Sheriff Tom Alexander said the men admitted performing at least eight surgeries on six consenting clients over the past year, including castrations and testicle replacements.
None of the men — identified as Richard Sciara, 61, Danny Reeves, 49, and Michael Mendez, 60 — is licensed to practice medicine, officials said.............

buzzflash names ann colter gop hypocrite of the week

the audio is here

Welcome back to the BuzzFlash GOP Hypocrite of the Week.
While real circus entertainment may be in decline, we always have Ann Coulter around for a few laughs.Coulter is sort of a mix between caged tigers and dancing bears, the difference being that people pay her for her performance instead of the circus owner.Coulter's expertise is outrageous, terrorist-sounding threats and claims, rapaciously indulging in every sort of stereotype in her arsenal, one of them being racism. For example, she once implied that one reason Al Gore lost the 2000 election was that minority voters in Florida were too stupid to vote correctly.However, it turns out that Ann Coulter is being pursued by the Palm Beach County Election Supervisor for being registered to vote at an address at which she doesn't reside -- and voting using false information about her place of residence. She's been sent a letter, prior to having the incident possibly referred to legal authorities, but it's going to the address at which she doesn't live............

lily you didn't steal MY picture or MY story

Antonin Scalia gestures inside the Cathedral of the Holy Cross. (Herald exclusive photo by Peter A. Smith)

it was out there for ALL of us to use or post if we saw fit

NOW we have this, the photographer WAS FIRED BY THE ARCHDIOCESES OF BOSTON (surprise surprise surprise)

Church fires photog over Scalia picture: Freelancer pays for ‘right thing’

By Jessica Heslam Friday, March 31, 2006 - Updated: 01:24 PM EST
A freelance photographer has been fired by the Archdiocese of Boston’s newspaper for releasing a picture of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia making a controversial gesture in the Cathedral of the Holy Cross on Sunday.
Peter Smith, who had freelanced for The Pilot newspaper for a decade, lost the job yesterday after the Herald ran his photo on its front page. Smith said he has no regrets about releasing it.
“I did the right thing. I did the ethical thing,” said Smith, 51, an assistant photojournalism professor at Boston University.
Smith snapped the photo of Scalia flicking his hand under his chin after a Herald reporter asked the conservative jurist his response to people who question his impartiality on matters of church and state.
Smith wouldn’t give up the photo earlier this week but chose to release it when he learned Scalia said his gesture had been incorrectly characterized by the Herald. Smith, who was standing in front of the judge, said the Herald “got the story right.” ..........

i'd rather be known as an anti-war BEATNIK or a NUTCASE than a big stupid asswipe

from rawstory

i was directed to the website of representative jack kingston’s website

where he seems to get off on calling cindy sheehan a nutcase and other things.

From: Kingston Press Office Kingston.Press.Office@mail.house.gov Date: March 31, 2006 11:44:45 AM EST To: Subject: SHEEHAN IS A NUTCASE//KINGSTON v. LIBERALS
Jack's Blog
Cindy Sheehan IS A "Nutcase" March 31st, 2006 by Press Staff
In today's CongressDailyAM (full story after the jump due to subscription), Sue Davis reports that Congressman Kingston got into a "discussion" yesterday in a closed-door meeting with two liberal Democrats regarding anti-war beatnik, Cindy Sheehan.
A closed hearing of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee turned contentious Thursday as Rep. Jack Kingston, R-Ga., Subcommittee ranking member Jack Murtha, D-Pa., and others sparred over the meaning of anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, heroes and military service.
According to one Democratic source present at the hearing, Kingston commented that Sheehan was "a nutcase" and lamented that too many of the human interest stories coming out of the war in Iraq center on anti-war activists like Sheehan and filmmaker Michael Moore and do not give proper service to heroic tales of U.S. soldiers............


what person in their right mind thinks a lot of GOOD stories come out of war? what person in their right minds think there isn't death and misery and torture and pain and suffering during war? i'm talking ANY war and ALL wars not just this one. i'm not just talking 'our' side either. i'm talking our side, their side and ALL sides. why do you think viet nam vets (most of them) do NOT like to talk about BEING IN VIET NAM? i'm guessing it isn't because they have an abundance of GOOD stories to tell us

be here to love me

i just came across this trailer for a new documentary on townes van zandt. looks like it might be pretty darn good

wow, industrious little punk-assed kids here

Pupils import torture tools to highlight UK arms loopholes · Teenagers set up Irish company to evade bans· Export control minister has asked for report
Richard Norton-Taylor Thursday March 30, 2006 The Guardian
Schoolchildren have exploited loopholes in Britain's arms controls by importing torture equipment including thumb and wall cuff restraint devices and a Chinese "sting stick" - a metal bar covered with spikes.
All that teenagers from Lord Williams's school in Thame, Oxfordshire, needed was a letterhead, a mobile phone, an email address, and a little money. They also set up a separate company in Ireland to avoid British controls on the sale of small arms.
The government says it is opposed to any trade in torture equipment, but bans only those items mentioned on a published list. The wall cuffs from Poland, thumb cuffs from Taiwan, and sting stick from China do not appear on the list.
The pupils set up two companies, Williams Defence and Williams Defence (Eire). Through their Irish company they arranged deals to destinations covered by British and other national trade embargos, including the sale of Pakistani grenade launchers to Syria, Turkish guns to Mali, and South African rifles to Israel..........

.........The pupils presented Malcolm Wicks, minister responsible for export controls, with the sting stick outside the Commons. He has asked them for a report on how they managed to import the torture equipment so easily................

so, we have a supreme court justice who LIES?

say it ain't so

Antonin Scalia gestures inside the Cathedral of the Holy Cross. (Herald exclusive photo by Peter A. Smith)
Photographer: Herald got it right

By Marie SzaniszloThursday, March 30, 2006 - Updated: 09:39 AM EST Amid a growing national controversy about the gesture U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia made Sunday at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross, the freelance photographer who captured the moment has come forward with the picture.
“It’s inaccurate and deceptive of him to say there was no vulgarity in the moment,” said Peter Smith, the Boston University assistant photojournalism professor who made the shot.
Despite Scalia’s insistence that the Sicilian gesture was not offensive and had been incorrectly characterized by the Herald as obscene, the photographer said the newspaper “got the story right.”
Smith said the jurist “immediately knew he’d made a mistake, and said, ‘You’re not going to print that, are you?’ ” .........

i'm NOT bas-italia (sicilian) but i AM of italian heritage. one doesn't make that gesture unless one means bid-nez. at least he has a cute lil' smile on his face

over and over and over again we're presented with evidence

the bushwhacked administration lied to us. plame was fried because wilson told the TRUTH. the good ol' white boy network's pockets are being lined with money procured with the blood of our men and women fighting an unjust war in iraq. YET, the congress does nothing, the senate does nothing for the most part. how many people are standing behind senator feingold? NOT my senators or congressman that's for sure. speaking of which, i received an email from senator dodd yesterday (mass emailing, i wasn't special). in it he listed some of the things he has done regarding the budget and soldiers. all of which were good BUT here is the email i sent back to him:

First of all, I had more than one topic, but I selected Iraq.

While I appreciate and agree with your positions on the budget AND
national security AND our soldiers, sailors, airmen (and anyone I missed) not
having the proper equipment while deployed in Iraq AND how our service members
are treated when (and if) they return home.........

I am concerned
about you not standing up to censure President Bush (and of course supporting
the position of Senator Feingold). He LIED to get us into the war, he continues
to lie about almost EVERYTHING AND he is spying on his OWN citizens WITHOUT
obtaining proper warrants.

I am also taken aback that you are
supporting Joe Lieberman.

short and sweet. i just had to let senator dodd (once again) know how i feel. oh yes, and forgive me for using caps and calling bushwhacked 'president bush'. i figure you can catch more flies with honey.......

now for this article i originally wanted to post, but got very sidetracked

PREWAR INTELLIGENCE Insulating Bush

By Murray Waas, National Journal© National Journal Group Inc. Thursday, March 30, 2006
Karl Rove, President Bush's chief political adviser, cautioned other White House aides in the summer of 2003 that Bush's 2004 re-election prospects would be severely damaged if it was publicly disclosed that he had been personally warned that a key rationale for going to war had been challenged within the administration. Rove expressed his concerns shortly after an informal review of classified government records by then-Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen J. Hadley determined that Bush had been specifically advised that claims he later made in his 2003 State of the Union address -- that Iraq was procuring high-strength aluminum tubes to build a nuclear weapon -- might not be true, according to government records and interviews.

Hadley was particularly concerned that the public might learn of a classified one-page summary of a National Intelligence Estimate, specifically written for Bush in October 2002. The summary said that although "most agencies judge" that the aluminum tubes were "related to a uranium enrichment effort," the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research and the Energy Department's intelligence branch "believe that the tubes more likely are intended for conventional weapons."
Three months after receiving that assessment, the president stated without qualification in his January 28, 2003, State of the Union address: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa. Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production." ...........

i'm seething with anger

what sort of decision is this? was it made because no one's pockets are being lined when dragonskin armor is purchased? i have no more to say (for now), i'm stunned

Army Bans Use of Privately Bought Armor


By LOLITA C. BALDOR, Associated Press Writer Thu Mar 30, 6:19 PM ET
Soldiers will no longer be allowed to wear body armor other than the protective gear issued by the military, Army officials said Thursday, the latest twist in a running battle over the equipment the Pentagon gives its troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Army officials told The Associated Press that the order was prompted by concerns that soldiers or their families were buying inadequate or untested commercial armor from private companies — including the popular Dragon Skin gear made by California-based Pinnacle Armor.
"We're very concerned that people are spending their hard-earned money on something that doesn't provide the level of protection that the Army requires people to wear. So they're, frankly, wasting their money on substandard stuff," said Col. Thomas Spoehr, director of materiel for the Army.
Murray Neal, chief executive officer of Pinnacle, said he hadn't seen the directive and wants to review it.
"We know of no reason the Army may have to justify this action," Neal said. "On the surface this looks to be another of many attempts by the Army to cover up the billions of dollars spent on ineffective body armor systems which they continue to try quick fixes on to no avail."
The move was a rare one by the Army. Spoehr said he doesn't recall any similar bans on personal armor or devices. The directives are most often issued when there are problems with aircraft or other large equipment.
Veterans groups immediately denounced the decision. ........

whew!!!!!!!!!!!!!

NOW i can FINALLY enlist in the army! maybe i can be in special forces. whaddya think?

MSNBC.com
U.S. Army relaxes tattoo rules to attract recruits Soldiers can now have designs on hands, necks, ‘permanent makeup’
Updated: 9:40 p.m. ET March 29, 2006
WASHINGTON - The U.S. Army, which missed its recruiting goal last year, has relaxed its policy banning certain types of tattoos in a bid to attract new soldiers who otherwise would have been barred from serving.
The Army will now allow new recruits and all its current soldiers to have tattoos on their hands and back of their necks as long as they are not "extremist, indecent, sexist or racist," Army officials said Wednesday.
The Army said it continues to prohibit tattoos anywhere on the head, face or throat area.
But it will allow women recruits and soldiers to sport "permanent makeup" in the form of indelible eye-liner, eyebrows and lip makeup. The Army said this permanent makeup "should be conservative and complement the uniform and complexion in both style and color, and will not be trendy."
‘America’s sons and daughters are getting tattoos’Officials said the policy change was made because the Army understands that the number of young men and women with tattoos or permanent makeup has grown in recent years.
"The Army is America. We are America's sons and daughters. America's sons and daughters are getting tattoos. That means that American soldiers are getting tattoos," said Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty, an Army spokesman at the Pentagon..........

so now they're saying tony soprano has sent a delegation of family members to baghdad?

it's not that i'm cold and uncaring. i DO care what happens to innocent people. it does keep me up at night to know children are being abused everywhere around the world and all sorts of countries with populations of all hues are fighting each other over their gods or land or who has a bigger weenie (well what ELSE COULD it be?). i want our troops to come home and come home now. we don't belong there. yeah, saddam effed up the country BUT we have NO idea if there would have been this type of violence if he was simply removed from office and we never went in there to begin with. our king blames it ALL on saddam. to that i say peeeeeeeshaw. nope oh noble one. it be ALL on YOUR shoulders NOW (and in the history books too)

A dangerous war makes a staggering shift
With signs of organized crime, attacks on businesses, war enters new phase


NEWS ANALYSIS
Updated: 7:17 p.m. ET March 29, 2006
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Fourteen shot at a trading company. At least 90 kidnapped at other businesses. Bodies dumped nightly, bound hand and foot, some tortured. A new brand of violence — a deadly mix of organized crime and sectarian murder — is tearing at Iraq.
Its origins are murky. But the savagery has turned March into a pivotal month in the three-year war — a month of gruesome news, mixed with some good. A sharp decline in American deaths appears to be the payoff for handing more duties to the Iraqi army, leaving U.S. forces less exposed to attack.
At the same time, there has been the rise in the slayings of civilian Iraqis, the reasons for which are hard to find.
Not so many weeks ago, this was a conflict with straightforward, if brutal, terms. Sunni insurgents and al-Qaida terrorists used car bombs, roadside bombs, suicide bomb belts and sniper rifles to target U.S. troops, Iraqi soldiers, police and civilians — mainly Shiites, the newly ascendent majority after years of Saddam Hussein’s oppression.......

look out belowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww

(watch out mr kramer and the WHOLE danger seeking family)

AP) The area around Lake Eola has it all _ a sparkling fountain, waterside cafe, swan boat rides and a bevy of bird droppings.The foul smelling white film cakes lamp posts, covers sidewalks and park benches and stains the bushes and trees around a 100-foot stretch of the lake. Drivers who dare park their cars do so at their own risk. Within minutes, a car can turn from black to spotted along "bird poop alley," as residents call it.The problem, triggered when some trees thousands of cormorants used were removed from an island, has gotten so bad city officials posted four signs last week to warn passers-by. But the signs, which read "Caution _ Entering Bird Dropping Area," don't really do the situation justice.Cormorants, which dive into the water to catch fish and migrate south annually, are such prolific poopers that their South American cousins helped create Peru's guano islands.Angie Martinez parked her red Honda Civic under a tree for 20 minutes Tuesday when it was hit by the poopstorm."I went straight to get my car cleaned," she said. "I think it was kind of funny. As soon as a turned away, I saw my car bombed from the birds."..........

(i think i'm going to 'appropriate' the term 'hit by a poopstorm' when i speak of our country under this adminstration)

here is a bit more on tce (i posted on it the other day)

if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck.........IT IS A DUCK. these residents don't NEED scientific approval. they see everyone around them sick and dying. members of their families are sick and dying. why are we allowing this? WHY WHY WHY (love canal anyone?)

Cancer Stalks a 'Toxic Triangle'
Scientists disagree about the risks of TCE. But residents near a former air base are dead certain.
By Ralph Vartabedian, Times Staff WriterMarch 30, 2006
SAN ANTONIO — On nearly every block surrounding the former Kelly Air Force Base, small purple crosses sprout from front lawns, marking the homes where cancer has struck.The residents call their neighborhood the "toxic triangle," alleging that the Air Force poisoned it with an industrial solvent, trichloroethylene, or TCE. It was casually dumped at the base for decades and spread for miles through a shallow aquifer under 22,000 nearby houses.

Texas health authorities have found elevated rates of liver cancer among residents, as well as higher-than-normal rates of birth defects. Though state health officials say it is impossible to prove that TCE causes the sickness here, this blue-collar community has little doubt about the connection."We are dying day by day," said Robert Alvarado Sr., who has lived in a small clapboard home for 36 years that sits about 14 feet over the TCE plume. "I have kidney failure, my wife has thyroid cancer, my neighbor just died of breast cancer."........

i would imagine if this happened in south dakota

the TWO MONTH OLD would have been forced to give birth to the two fetuses inside her (well i'm making a point. in reality the fetuses were not 'alive')


Surgeons Remove Fetuses That Grew Inside Baby
POSTED: 8:44 am EST March 29, 2006
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Surgeons operated on a 2-month-old Pakistani girl Tuesday to remove two fetuses that had grown inside her while she was still in her mother's womb, a doctor said.
The infant, who was identified only as Nazia, was in critical condition following the two-hour operation at The Children's Hospital at Pakistan Institute of Medical Science in the capital, Islamabad, said Zaheer Abbasi, head of pediatric surgery at the hospital.
Abbasi, the chief doctor who led the operation, said the case was the first he was aware of in Pakistan of fetus-in-fetu, where a fetus has grown inside another in the womb.
"It is extremely rare to have two fetuses being discovered inside another," Abbasi told The Associated Press, adding that he did not know what caused the medical abnormality. "Basically, it's a case of triplets, but two of the siblings grew in the other." .......

big big big GIANT national news...........

i posted an article on lewis, HERE yesterday, but since he made NATIONAL news today, i'm posting it on THIS blog as well

from msnbc

we get:

Psycho kitty terrorizes Connecticut neighbors
Town orders house arrest on 'Lewis' after he ambushed the Avon lady

FAIRFIELD, Conn. - Residents of the neighborhood of Sunset Circle say they have been terrorized by a crazy cat named Lewis. Lewis for his part has been uniquely cited, personally issued a restraining order by the town's animal control officer. "He looks like Felix the Cat and has six toes on each foot, each with a long claw," Janet Kettman, a neighbor said Monday. "They are formidable weapons." The neighbors said those weapons, along with catlike stealth, have allowed Lewis to attack at least a half dozen people and ambush the Avon lady as she was getting out of her car.................. .......Animal Control Officer Rachel Solveira placed a restraining order on him. It was the first time such an action was taken against a cat in Fairfield............

i too think james joyce is incomprehensible

BUT DON'T YOU BE DISSIN' MY CHUCK DICKENS!!! (i agree with his hemingway comment though. well not the comment just the sentiment. i never liked hemingway and think him HIGHLY overrated)

from the bbc news

Naipaul attacks literary giants

Novelist Sir VS Naipaul has lambasted literary greats from Jane Austen and Charles Dickens to "the worst writer in the world" Henry James.
Naipaul said Thomas Hardy was "an unbearable writer" who "doesn't know how to compose a paragraph".
And Ernest Hemingway "was so busy being an American" he "didn't know where he was", he told the Literary Review.
The Trinidad-born UK writer, who was knighted in 1990, said his own writings had been neglected in his home country.
"England has not appreciated or acknowledged the work I have done," he said.....

....The author slates Dickens for his "repetitiveness" and cites the experience of reading Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey as a revelatory one.........

...In 2001, he accused EM Forster of being a sexual predator and described Irish author James Joyce as incomprehensible. ......

i've never read mr naipaul (and i sure am leaning toward NEVER reading him) but i can tell he sure has a BIG FAT HEAD