18 September 2008: Afternoon

Russia expert Rice says U.S. and Europe should get tough, that "an acute sense of shame" in the '90s doesn't allow for "bullying behavior."

As violence ebbs, Iraq considers tourist possibilities--rides on Saddam's presidential train, bird watching.

Canada now is officially more free than the U.S.

Dude can descend like a lunatic. What it's like to ride bikes with John Kerry.

McCain mistakes the prime minister of Spain for a Latin American radical (was it a senior moment?).

Palin "got a passport for the first time in [her] life last year? I mean, I don't know what you can say. You can't say anything." Hagel on Palin's foreign policy experience.

The story behind Palin's email hack.

Gawker guide to the internet's more awful places.

Print-on-demand ATM installed in Melbourne bookstore.

Jokes for typographers.

Linguistic analysis of a favorite D.F.W. trope.

How to know a model when you see one; day in the life of a male model.

"I always thought 'retard,' which means slows and pretty in music, was actually a kind of nice way to express the condition." Why we use the word, and why we shouldn't.

Terrific review, with samples, of post-Katrina cinema pouring out of New Orleans.