Democratic Convention Clown

If you watched the Democratic Convention coverage, like I did, you know there’s no point complaining about it. That’d be like going to the circus and saying, “This is a horrible place, absolutely infested with clowns.”

And then going back to the circus the next three days in a row. No sympathy for you, you twisted clown-lover!

So, skipping lightly over how grotesque these proceedings always were and still are, let’s get to the final score: How’d it go? Did the Democrats win?
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They drove like people to whom the motorcar was new. They drove as they walked; and a stream of Tehran traffic, jumpy with individual stops and swerves, with no clear lanes, was like a jostling pavement crowd.

—V.S. Naipaul

Naipaul wrote these lines about Iranian drivers in revolution-gripped Tehran in the late 70s. But he might as well have been writing about Russian drivers today. The drive as they walk; on the sidewalk, through red lights, bumping into pedestrians. But that’s not what I’m here to talk about. See, while America’s auto sales have gone into a nosedive, Russia just surpassed Germany to become the largest automobile market in Europe this year. Russians bought as many cars in the first six months of 2008 as they did in the entire last year, 1.65 million to be exact. The luxury category has posted the biggest growth, adding hundreds of thousands of uber-expesive automobiles to Russia’s decrepit roads. (more…)

I just flew back to the U.S., just in time to watch the Democratic Convention’s opening night. I’m amazed by how Soviet my country has become, or always was. We love these hokey big ceremonies just as much as any totalitarian country. I flipped the channel away from the Convention coverage and wound up on the opening day of the US Open, and there it was again—more ceremony, with all the hokey Soviet nostalgia that comes with it. Jesus, even the US Open has succumbed, (more…)

Hezbollah explains ‘Arab Spring’ to residents of West Beirut

Now that the Beijing games have wound up, we can get on to a sporting event with real significance: a Neocon Olympics to decide the most grossly wrong, stupid prediction by a Neocon pundit post-Iraq. Of course, it’s a very rich field. Being totally wrong about absolutely everything is the Neocons’ job, and they’ve been working overtime on it. Their proudest moment had to be in the lead-up to the Iraq war when Kenneth Adelman assured America that democratizing Iraq would be “a cakewalk.” Indeed, early Neocons like Adelman and Richard Perle (who predicted that Iraq would settle down “at the first whiff of gunpowder”) set the bar for disastrously wrong predictions so high that some have suggested that the trophy be retired in their honor. (more…)

Attempts to prove Barack Hussein Obama isn’t really an American citizen have gone about as well as the search for the footage featuring Michelle Obama excoriating “whitey.” Freethinking 100% Americanos like swift-boater Jerome R. Corsi and No Quarter’s Larry C. Johnson have no doubt been interviewing birth certificate-forgers and Muslim midwives and so on, looking for the ultimate proof of Obama’s un-Americanness. Silly of them, because we’ve had the proof staring at us from a million screens and glossy magazine covers for ages now. Here it is:

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Man discovered by apes

When I think of the 1990s, it’s the Ice Man I remember. He was found in 1991, in an Austrian glacier melting from global warming. At first the authorities took him for a murder victim (it was Silence of the Lambs time). They hacked his body out of the slush with a jackhammer, eager for their CSI moment, then started to realize he didn’t fit the profile of a Hannibal Lecter scorecard. His shoes were made of bearskin and deerskin and stuffed with dry grass; his cloak was woven of grass; he carried a flint knife that looks like a folded, dented can lid tied to a stick with twine. It began to dawn on the investigators that this guy was old, (more…)

Russia got into the social networking game a little late. The industry still isn’t very hi-tech and doesn’t have all those dorky Facebook plugins that people in the West are used to. But Russia’s got a natural resource that Facebook’s dumpy audience can never provide: people (as in chicks) that you actually want to get to know (as in biblically).

Take a look at our cultural exhibit. It shows how the girls on Russia’s premier social networking site, Odnoklassniki, compare to their American counterparts. (more…)

We’ve been getting a lot of complaints lately. It seems many of our readers have been jonesing for their daily dyev fix ever since The eXile was taken offline by the Kremlin. Well, our policy at EXILED ONLINE is that the desperate customer is always right. While EXILED ONLINE does not have the resources to provide our deprived readers with 24/7 coverage, we can give you a weekly dyev fix. We can, and we will. And we’re calling it “Tyolka Tuesdays.”

• Tyol • ka n [Russ, a chick; a young woman, especially one who is sexually desirable and in heat]

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If you haven’t seen Tropic Thunder yet, go now. There are scenes in it so hilarious the whole audience goes into laugh-convulsions for minutes at a time, and you’re only going to participate in that “maybe-humanity-isn’t-so-bad-it-does-comedy” phenomenon about a dozen times in your life, so why are you still reading this review? Go! Go!

For those of you who’ve seen it already, is there some way, do you think, to get Robert Downey Jr. an Oscar for this thing? (more…)

Five days after Georgia invaded and seized the breakaway separatist region of South Ossetia, sparking a larger-scale Russian invasion to drive Georgian forces back and punish their leaders, Russia surprised its Western detractors by calling a halt to the country’s offensive. After all, the mainstream media, egged on by hawkish neocon pundits and their candidate John McCain, had everyone believing that Russia was hellbent on the full-scale annihilation and annexation of democratic Georgia.

But then came Tuesday’s cease-fire announcement–and we’re now forced to ask ourselves serious questions about the recent conflict: what really started it, how dangerous was it and what, with serious careful consideration, could be done to prevent it from turning into a worst-case scenario? (more…)

No dramatic photo compositions here, just grim pictures of burnt-out tanks, spent RPGs, charred human remains and columns of Russian armored machinery on patrol in South Ossetia and Georgia. Now updated with graphic photos straight from the battle scene. (more…)

Today, August 14, Dmitri Medvedev celebrates 100th day as President of the Russian Federation. What conclusions can be made about the new president? Well, not many. Other than the fact that Medvedev is trying really, really hard to be the best protege he can be. Sure, he’s a little shorter, a little meeker and much less manlier than his mentor, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t trying his best. (more…)

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I woke up to discover a weird link to a Digg post sent over by a friend of mine. It was a poll conducted on CNN’s website asking readers:

Do you think Russians actions in Georgia are justified?
1) Yes — it’s peacekeeping
2) No — it’s an invasion

Surprisingly, 92% of readers thought that the Russians were justified. Taking into account CNN’s boneheaded and overwhelmingly pro-Georgian coverage, the poll didn’t make any sense. Were sheepish CNN viewers actually using their brain? It didn’t seem likely. Well, the poll no longer appears on the site. It was taken down after charges of manipulation started surfacing. Apparently, Russian bloggers circulated the poll and called on Russians to let their voice be heard. And if there’s one thing CNN doesn’t like doing, it’s hearing what those damn Russkies have to say.  CNN had no idea that this seemingly innocuous poll would demonstrate the huge rift in opinion between the West and Russia and underline the importance that information warfare has played in this conflict, not to mention show whom CNN was really rooting for. (more…)

There are three basic facts to keep in mind about the smokin’ little war in Ossetia:

1. The Georgians started it.
2. They lost.
3. What a beautiful little war!

For me, the most important is #3, the sheer beauty of the video clips that have already come out of this war. I’m in heaven right now.

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