Ousted Thai PM takes 'deserved rest'

This CNN story reads like something out of the Onion: "Ousted Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said Thursday he would take a 'deserved rest,' and urged the military leaders of the country to quickly arrange for new national elections."

The story closes with a memorable paragraph: 'Heading toward a minibus, Thaksin disclosed that "I am going to buy some groceries.' "

Islamist Assassins

John McIntyre, in You Don't Say: Language and Usage, arguing that the term "Islamofascism" is inaccurate and misleading, suggests an alternative:

But perhaps a better parallel is with the Hashshash, the Nizari sect or cult of Ismaili Islam that is more familiarly known in the West as the Assassins. Thriving in the 11th to 13th centuries, the Assassins conducted a campaign of terrorism against the Abbasid caliphate in Baghdad and the Fatimid caliphate in Cairo. (You can look it up in Britannica, as I did.) Though they operated out of strongholds, they did not constitute a state; their aim was to unsettle established regimes, and they succeeded in making a great deal of trouble until the Mongols crushed them.

For anyone interested in history rather than cheap and inaccurate rhetorical brickbats, there is a parallel to be drawn with Osama bin Laden that is more compelling than Hitler or Mussolini or Franco.

Not a bad point. And referring to al-Qaeda as a band of assassins seems apt.

On designing logos

At Creative Guy , Jim Dempsey posts a number of Rules of logo design. I've been bitten in the butt every single time I've ever violated the first: "Do NOT show a client any logo design that you don't really love."

Now one downside of working for a large agency, as I did for many years, is that work that would normally be under your control is occasionally assigned to others for one reason or another, usually for deadline reasons.

As a particular example, I once had a logo project where the client was being excessively picky about the typeface. I submitted many samples, avoiding one typeface I particularly dislike for practical and aesthetic reasons.

I was at a photo shoot one day, and another art director was assigned to fill in for me. He picked that particular typeface, and naturally the client loved it. So I had to live with it for as long as we had the client.

[Via Logopalooza .]

9/11, five years later

My stomach still churns when I think about the al-Qaeda attacks on this country five years ago. It was two years before I stopped compulsively checking news sites to make sure nothing terrible had happened in the last five minutes, and some mornings I still wake up with an unreasoning sense of dread that another attack has taken place somewhere. Thank goodness, nothing on the scale of 9/11 has yet occurred.

I'd like to believe that similar attacks haven't taken place because our political leaders and Homeland Security are doing their jobs with the enthusiasm, courage, vigilance, and acumen required. If that's not the case, then God help us all.

Godless liberalism?

Someone I know might find this story interesting:

Statue of baby Jesus taken again

Amazing what apparently legitimate news-gathering organizations choose to cover.

Arthur Lee update

More on Lee from NYT, USA Today, and Tim Cain. I've seen a few TV obits, too. Lee is apparently destined for greater fame dead than alive.

Please, God, this can't be true...

FromThe Raw Story :

Former Ambassador to Croatia Peter Galbraith is claiming President George W. Bush was unaware that there were two major sects of Islam just two months before the President ordered troops to invade Iraq, RAW STORY has learned.

Arthur Lee is dead

Reuters obit on CNN.com

Lee, with Love, created the unique and ineffable Forever Changes, still one of my very favorite albums of its time. The albums Love and Da Capo are also very good; later albums are at best spotty.

Not like I'm expecting the good folks at Rockstar: Supernova to have this level of taste and knowledge, but it would be cool to hear somebody do "7 & 7 Is," and I'm sure Mssrs. Lee, Clarke, and Newstead would dig the heck out of it.