Saturday 6 March 2010

concensus

After a seemingly unremitting planning phase and calls that the hired help has skewed actually US jobless numbers, the American census process is picking up.  This decade it will be conducted under the friendly auspices of the Patriot Act and with a regular calvacade of entrenched, deputized bureaucrats.  I am sure that other countries accomplish the same feat with more accuracy, with more frequency and with less general bother.  What surprises are going to be revealed?  I doubt it would be anything that could floor anyone, nor significantly alter the political landscape.  If I still lived in America and one of the concensus-takers came calling, I would tell him that 60,000 people resided at this address, so I would qualify for my own congressional representative.

Friday 5 March 2010

I'm a Sozial!


There are quite a few campaign posters up for the next round of elections.  Many, like this one, promote the candidate as trustworthy, progressive and of course "Sozial."  In the context, I understand what they are trying to convey but it makes me think of that meme (and perhaps it was only me who thought it was such a bandwagon, per se, like saying "Rabbit, Rabbit" and doing a somersault out of bed on the first day of the month) that Michael Buckley made very funny, teasing some reality show star, I'm sure.  I am sure the committee to elect Burgermeister Meisterburger does not endorse this message.  In unrelated news, Germany has vowed that Greece will not see one euro from them until they bring their own house in order.  Germany suggested that the Greeks sell some of their uninhabited islands to raise cash.  This sounds less than optimal in practice.  After all, who is the buying spirit lately?  Dubai is not prepared to snatch up this real estate, and we would end up with Scylla and Charibdis and the Sirens named for sad old corporate maligners.

Tuesday 2 March 2010

wi-fight

To be commended for exercizing some common sense and restraint, the German high court voted to overturn a 2008 dragnet on personal communications, that allowed the government to collect data indiscriminately and retain it for an indefinite period, six-months at a minimum.  The justice ministers said that the government must be selective when trawling for data and that gathering such data violated secrecy and privacy laws.

Monday 1 March 2010

zephyr

Just as all the remaining pockets of snow melted--that dirty, crappy snow that lingers like a ticklish cough--a powerful wind storm tore across Western Europe, scouring France and our part of Germany very hard.  Gusts were in excess of 145 kilometers per hour with sustained winds of 80.  They also named the depression "Xynthia," which I think is doubly odd--for one, because German weathermen have adopted naming the slightest breeze, and secondly, because German law is very particular about how parents can name their children, and names have to be proper, real names and I don't think this one would necessarily hold up.  In the meantime, I was closely watching the little river, swollen from the snow melt, at the end of our street to see if it managed to hurdle its banks throughout the day, but I was really sort of frightened in the night to think about an invisible, creeping flood--supplanted somewhere underneath the din and howl of the storm.