First Estonia, then Georgia and now America:

“Suspicions of Russian involvement … Military electronics experts have not pinpointed the source or motive of the attack.”

War on Drugs Blowback: A bullet-riddled body found stuffed upside down in pot used to cook pork… A body tied to a fence in front of a police station… Reporters wearing bullet-proof vests… 4,500 dead in one year…Dozens executed in one week.

I sure didn’t expect to be spending Thanksgiving morning sucking down instant coffee and flicking channels between CNN and the BBC. But the attacks in Mumbai are so big and, like they keep saying, “brazen,” that I stayed up late and got up early.

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Cop groupies, naval warfare nerds and gas-starved SUV moms around the world all had the same hero last week: the Indian Navy. The Subcontinental squids announced that they had struck the first blow for law’n’order on the high seas by sinking a Somali pirate “mother ship” off Yemen.

Their timing was perfect. The pirates had been looting every ship in the Indian Ocean for weeks with no retaliation. Once again, the Somalis were doin’ it old-school, on the cheap, making the rich countries look weak by facing them down armed with no more than our old friend the RPG. (more…)

The problem with Twilight isn’t that it’s an embarrassing fantasy for teenage girls—hell, I was a teenage girl myself once, so whatever celluloid dreams get the poor addled kids through seventh grade are okay by me. No, the problem is that Twilight has already made so much money it’s now considered bigger than that. It’s a phenomenon. Movie industry types are making fatuous pronouncements about its significance, as in this CNN report quotiing Paul Dergarabedian, president of Media by Numbers:

Teen girls rule the earth. If you look back at the ‘Hannah Montana’ movie, how well that did, and now this movie, the teen girl audience will never be ignored again or underestimated. It was always teen boys who were the coveted ones, but someone finally caught on to the idea that girls love movies, too, and if you create something that they’re into, that they’re passionate about, they will come out in big numbers and drive the box office.

This chilling statement tells us we’re in for Twilight sequels and retreads till we beg for mercy.

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Russian companies know that sex sells. They also have a ridiculous amount of hot chicks working in them. Putting tyolka and tyolka together, they had a light bulb marketing moment: “Let us not imprison our talent in offices and simply waste it on paper pushing (and the occasional extra-marital blow job). Let us be proud and show them off to the world.” The girls couldn’t be more pleased. In fact, everyone was pleased. And that’s the story of how every Russian company got to have their own “Girls of [Insert Company Name Here]” calendar series. (more…)

The eXile: Sex, Drugs and Libel in the New Russia

By Mark Ames and Matt Taibbi

Yea, the Lord has heard thine prayers, and He, in His infinite Sadism, has answered thee: back on sale, newly printed up, is the record of The eXile’s early beginnings. It’s The eXile: Sex, Drugs and Libel in the New Russia (Grove), first published in 2000. Click the cover to order it through amazon, or order buy it from your favorite overpriced neighborhood bookseller. (more…)

Despite what they say, this sure looks like a stroke to us. (more…)