Walter Jon Williams's Blog, page 232

We Caught the Terrorist, So Let's Have More Restrictions!

Some goofy terrorist wannabe named Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab set off an incendiary device in his own lap on an aircraft, and scorched the living fuck out of his thighs. (Of course "thighs" may be a euphemism here.)(He was on a watch list, apparently, so I have to wonder why he and his thighs weren't checked out before he got on the plane.)According to the FBI, Umar is in custody and singing like

Bollywood Christmas

It's beginning to look a lot like a Bollywood Christmas. [via Ellen Datlow:]

Can You Do the Fandango?

This isn't a holiday video, exactly, but it should put you in the holiday spirit.

Noir

Saw a couple of films noir recently, one a classic, the other more recent.Gun Crazy (1951) was the classic, and was a pure example of the film noir--- or, as we called them in America, B pictures. Made on the cheap, full of actors you don't remember ever seeing before, and filmed on the streets in natural light because it's less expensive than using a sound stage. Lots of gritty action,

Managers

Noam Scheiber blames the decline in manufacturing on . . . business schools. A lot of people talk about reviving the domestic manufacturing sector, which has shed almost one-third of its manpower over the last eight years. But some of the people I spoke to asked a slightly different question: Even if you could reclaim a chunk of those blue-collar jobs, would you have the managers you need to

The Pentagon Does a Good Thing

I occasionally use this space to talk about the military or the government, usually to point out their errors.Seems only fair that I congratulate the Pentagon when it does something right.The Pentagon used a multimillion-dollar grant to fast track the burgeoning art of face transplants, in hopes of helping the 200 or so veterans who came back with injuries too severe to benefit from conventional

Drones

The Army Times reports that Iraqi insurgent militias supported by Iran seemed to have early warning of U.S. actions, apparently because of their ability to hack U.S. drones."We noticed a trend when going after these guys; that sometimes they seemed to have better early warning" of U.S. actions, said the officer briefed on the raid. "We went and did a raid on one of their safe houses and found all

Relics

Some years ago Kathy and I were in Munich, and we found ourselves in the giant walk-in safe that holds the Wittelsbach family's personal collection of holy relics, almost all of which were neatly labeled. (The Wittelsbachs, you may remember, included [in chronological order:] Mad King Ludwig I, Mad Max, and Mad King Ludwig II. So you can believe that the eccentric family that built

Meepery in the First Degree

The word "meep" has been banned in a high school in Salem, which I'm sure I don't have to remind you was the home of the famous witch trials.Bob Thompson, a pop culture professor at Syracuse University, said he first heard students meep about a year ago during a class screening of a television show. "Something happened and one of them said 'Meep,'" he said. "And then they all started doing it."

ICE Castles

I haven't commented on the Peter Watts thing, partly because I've never met Peter Watts and don't know whether or not he's capable of trying to strangle a border agent after being pepper-sprayed in the face. (I know I am. If someone pepper-sprayed me for no reason, I'd do my absolute best to crush his trachea no matter how many of his friends were piling on.)Anyway, feel free to catch up with