Chinese Menu Translated Into English

Now this is funny! Check out this Chinese steakhouse restaurant menu translated into English. Thanks SO MUCH to Diana for the link. This page is so popular, at present it has over 500 comments!

Read the entire menu at the link above... I guarantee you'll be laughing. There are a few that involve foul language, so you are warned. Those are some of the funniest, but even those aside, there is much to laugh at here. Yes, they got a few items translated correctly... one assumes... like "Tuna Salad". But the rest... no so well.

Some of my favorite menu items are the following, though it is hard to choose just a couple from the 100+ items:

• Slippery meat in king's vegetables in pillar
• Fragrant bone in garlic in strange flavor
• Big bowl gold mushroom cowboy meat
• Fried beef rice w/scorn and egg
• Man fruit braise the north almond
• Sydney and White tree fungus braise pig heart
• Carbon burns black bowel
• Gold silver lotus root silk fries shrimp fucks
• Benumbed hot vegetables fries fuck silk
• Fuck the salt (beautiful pole) duck chin
• category name = Cashew Not
• category name = Every form rape

Crazy Chinese Subtitles for Revenge of the Sith

Gotta laugh at these crazy chinese translation subtitles for Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith. No comment necessary!

Goodbye Eudora... Hello Outlook 2007

After 10+ years using Eudora Pro as my email client application, I'm finally moving on. Like so many people, I'm going to be using Outlook. In fact, as of this weekend, I am now switched over to the new Outlook 2007. The reasons for this are several:

1. Eudora hasn't had much in the way of new features added to it in a long time. While I've long liked the program (obviously!), it seems to be falling further and further behind. And as Qualcomm recently decided to stop developing the app and selling it, and instead turn it into an Open Source app, well, I'm not sure whether that will be a good thing for it or not. Afterall, there are already some good open-source/free email clients out there.
2. While I considering going to web-based email, like gmail or hotmail or Yahoo! mail, I wanted loads of features. While those are getting better all the time, they don't compare to a good client app yet.
3. I already had Outlook 2007, since I bought Office 2007 Professional shortly after it was released, as an upgrade for us from the increasingly ancient Office 2000. So starting to use Outlook at this point would only cost me some time to switchover, not any additional money.
4. I like the new interface that Office 2007 provides, with the ribbon and so on. Even though Outlook is a hybrid and still uses the old-style menus interface for the main screen, I wanted to use an email client that uses the new interface for at least some things -- as I really like and will be getting more and more accustomed to it going forward through Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Access use.

So in recent weeks I've been cleaning up all my Eudora stuff, preparing for the switchover to Outlook. In doing so I've archived thousands of emails sent and received since 1997, and re-organized how I structure email folders and so on. Having done all of that upfront, the switch over has been relatively smooth.

With Outlook I plan to use a great many more features than I was able to get with Eudora. A while back I already started to use Outlook for RSS feeds for blog-reading. There too the tool I had been using, the web-based Newsgator site, served me well for a couple of years, but I decided I wanted to read blogs in the same tool that I read email -- so that was going to be Outlook.

I've already switched over all my Contacts data into Outlook too, info which had formerly been stored in a custom Access database I had designed. And I intend to start using Outlook's item categorization features, the Tasks feature, the To-Do Bar, and perhaps Calendaring. I doubt I'll use its Journal or Notes features, as I use Microsoft OneNote for that sort of thing already.

For long-time Outlook users, all of this "ho-hum" no doubt. But for someone who had been using Eudora for 10+ years, it has been a major switch-over! So far, so-good...

Baseball Lists, Part 4: Walks and HBP

Here is Part 4 in my series of baseball entries that note what I am finding interesting as I go through the newly released SABR book The SABR Baseball List & Record Book (available at Amazon). (Here is a link to Part 3 in this series.)

List 078 "Most Career Hit by a Pitch" reminded me that Craig Biggio is on the verge of breaking the all-time HBP record! Going into 2007 he had 282, just five behind turn-of-the-century player Hughie Jennings' 287. So far this season he has been hit once, so he needs 4 more to tie. Seems likely he'll get it this year, as he had 9 last year and 10+ every year from 1995-2005. His career high was 34 in 1997. Jennings' career total is what it is because he got nailed a large number of times in three seasons from 1896-1898: 51, 46, and 46. In fact, as list 253 Most Hit By Pitch in a Season indicates, those are three of the top four single-season tallies of all time (Ron Hunt's 50 in 1971 comes in at second place all-time).

List 079 "Most Career Batter Walks" shows that Barry Bonds is just padding his all-time lead in this category at this point. He had 2,426 before the 2007 season started, and has 52 already this year. Second place is Rickey Henderson with 2,190 and third place is Babe Ruth with 2,062. We all thought it impressive when he broke the record for walks in a season in 2001 with 177, and then again in 2002 with 198. But in 2004 he shattered those marks with 232! Will Bonds play long enough and keep get free passes long enough to put his all-time record realistically out of reach... kinda like Henderson's career SB total seems to be, or Nolan Ryan's career strikeout record seems to be?

And speaking of out of reach career totals, list 083 "Most Career Batter Intentional Walks, since 1955" reiterates just how many of Bond's free passes truly are free. Going into 2007 he had 645, while Aaron is second (post-1955, which means only his rookie season is missing) with 293, and Willie McCovey is third with 260. Going into 2007 only 10 players were on this list with a career total of 200 IBBs or more. Like his string of record-breaking single-season walk totals, since intentional walks are a component of total walks, it should be no surprise he did the same thing a few years ago for IBB. The record (since 1955) had been Willie McCovey's 45 in 1969, but then Bonds got 68 in 2002, slipped a bit with "only" 61 in 2003, and then got an incredible 120 free passes in 2004! Will anyone reach Bonds' level in this category? I doubt it.

And then consider the very interesting list 270, Batters who Led the League in Hits and Walks in the Same Season. There are six such players, five in the NL and only one in the AL. Can you name them? Two are old-timers, from pre-1900. Ross Barnes in 1876 had 138 hits and 20 walks, both good enough to lead the NL, so that isn't very impressive really. Then in 1891 Billy Hamilton had 179 hits and 102 walks. The great Rogers Hornsby did it in 1924 with 227 hits and 89 walks. Richie Ashburn managed this feat in 1958 leading with 215 hits and 97 walks. Then Carl Yastrzemski is the lone player to ever do it in the AL, getting 183 hits and 95 walks in 1963. And lastly, Lenny Dykstra did it in 1993 with 194 hits and 129 walks. An interesting group of guys!

Three-way Battle in the Wild

Check out this 8-minute video at YouTube, showing what turns out to be a three-way battle in the wild -- though mostly between lions and water buffalo, with some crocodiles only entering for a bit when they had an opportunity. I don't know how common it is for water buffalo to act this way (at the end of the video), but based on the comments from one of the voices (a guide of some kind), it sounds like it is rare.

Baseball Lists, Part 3: RBI-Related Lists

Here is Part 3 in my series of baseball entries that note what I am finding interesting as I go through the newly released SABR book The SABR Baseball List & Record Book (available at Amazon). (Here is a link to Part 2 in this series.)

On pg. 28 is list 066 "Longest Gap between 100-RBI Seasons". Number one on the list is someone I might have guessed: Harold Baines. He had 105 in 1982, 113 in 1985, but then didn't top 100 again until 1999 when he 103 (while playing for two teams, the Orioles and the Indians). So that is a 14 year gap, during which time he had three seasons with 90+ RBIs.

Second on the list is Willie Horton, whom I would never have guessed, but it makes sense. A slugging OF for the Tigers for the first half of his career, he played mostly DH during the latter half. In 1965 he had 104 RBI, then in 1966 he had 100. From 1970-78 he only topped 140 games played once, but then in 1979 he played all 162 games as DH for the Mariners, and still swung a powerful bat, hitting .279, with 29 HR, and 106 RBI. So that is a 13 year gap.

And third on the list is Ken Keltner with a 10 year gap. He smashed 26 HR and 113 in his rookie season in 1938. Although a regular All-Star for the Indians, his power numbers didn't reach such heights again until 1948 when he hit 31 HR and had 119 RBIs. FYI - He missed 1945 due to the war.

List 067 is "Retired Players with Fewest Career RBI that Had a 100-RBI Season". Tops on this list is OF Ray Pepper who had 101 RBI in his full season in 1934 for the St. Louis Browns. Amazingly, he achieved this total while only hitting 7 homeruns. He only played two more partial seasons after that, and hence ended up with 170 career RBI.

A bunch of little-known old-timers from the 1920s to 1950s are next in this list, so I'll just mention some more recent names that caught my eye -- players that readers of this posting are more likely recognize. Slugger Phil Plantier had 100 RBI for the Padres in 1993 (along with 34 HR), but only had 293 for his entire career. Fernando Tatis has 107 RBI in 1999 for the Cardinals (also hitting 34 HR that season), but accumulated only 339 RBI for his career. Geronimo Berroa managed 106 RBI for the A's in 1996 to go with 36 HR that year. He also had 88 RBI in 1995 and 90 RBI in 1997, but ended up his career with 382 total. And Butch Hobson had 112 RBI for the 1977 Red Sox, his first full season when he also hit 30 HR. He had 80 RBI the next year, and 93 the year after that, but then retired in 1982 with only 397 RBI for his career.

It seems there are only three players who had two 100-RBI seasons but ended their careers with less than 400 total RBI. They are Smead Jolley (1930-33) with 313 RBI, Luke Easter (1949-54) with 340 RBI, and Del Bissonette (1928-1933) with 391 RBI.

List 069 is "Players with 500 RBI in Two Different Leagues". This is a fascinating one for sure. There are six such hitters. It was easy to guess the top three of them: Dave Winfield (1207 AL, 626 NL), Frank Robinson (744 AL, 1068 NL), and Fred McGriff (664 AL, 886 NL). Those are obvious. But the other three are much less so, in part because they had fewer career RBIs.

Lee May played from 1965-74 in the NL, with the Reds and Astros, accumulating 737 RBI. Then he was traded to the Orioles and played there for many years and finally ended up for two seasons in Kansas City, retiring in 1982. He managed to get 507 RBI during these years in the AL.

Next is Ellis Burks, who most remember as a promising and then productive OF for the Red Sox from 1987-92. He spent one year with the White Sox in 1993, and later returned to the AL with the Indians from 2001-2003, and even had 33 final at-bats for the Boston (though only 1 RBI) in 2004. That totals 655 AL RBIs. But from 1994-2000 he played for the Rockies and Giants in the NL, and managed 551 RBI in that league. Most importantly of course was his career year in 1996 hitting in the light Colorado air, when he smashed 40 HR, 128 RBI, and batted .344. He also scored 142 runs, had 45 doubles, and stole 32 basis -- all of which added up to placing third in the MVP balloting that year. For being a career .291 hitter with 352 HR, 181 SB, and 1,200+ Runs and RBIs, it is somewhat strange that he only made two all-star teams in his career.

And the last of the six to make this list is Reggie Smith. The first half of his career was as a Red Sox (1966-73), and there he had 536 RBI. Then he played for the Cardinals, Dodgers, and one final season in 1982 with the Giants. In the NL he had 556 RBI. To note how relative raw offensive numbers are in baseball, Smith had about the same number of career at-bats as Burks. But he played in a different era. While he had somewhat lower career totals -- 314 HR, 1,092 RBI, 1,123 Runs, 137 SB, and a .287 AVG -- he was an all-star seven times. Oh, and both Smith and Burks had one Gold Glove Award each, so its not as if Smith was a far superior defender compared with Burks. What was different was the eras, e.g., the league batting average for Burks was 12 points higher than for Smith over his career.

And lastly, for now, list 070 is "Most Career RBI without ever Leaning League". Who is tops on this list? Just Willie Mays! He had 1903 RBI, but never led the league. In fact, he only came in second twice and third three times. He scored more runs (2,062) than he drove in, leading the league twice and coming in the top three 11 times (including ever year from 1957-65).

Next on this list are Rafael Palmeiro (1835) which is not a surprise, and then Cal Ripken (1,695), Tony Perez (1,652), and Harold Baines (1,628) -- also all not surprises to me.

Classic Humor, Part 5: World's Easiest Quiz

Here is another in my series of classic humor bits from the Internet (here is Part 4), which I'm posting as I clean out my old Humor email box.

The World's Easiest Quiz... the questions:

1. How long did the Hundred Years War last?
2. Which country makes Panama hats?
3. From which animal do we get catgut?
4. In which month do Russians celebrate the October Revolution?
5. What is a camel's hair brush made of?
6. The Canary Islands in the Pacific are named after what animal?
7. What was King George VI's first name?
8. What color is a purple finch?
9. What country do Chinese gooseberries come from?
10. How long did the Thirty Years War last?

ANSWERS:

1. 116 years, from 1337 to 1453.
2. Ecuador.
3. From sheep and horses.
4. November. The Russian calendar was 13 days behind ours.
5. Squirrel fur.
6. The Latin name was Insularia Canaria - Island of the Dogs.
7. Albert. When he came to the throne in 1936 he respected the wish of Queen Victoria that no future king should ever be called Albert.
8. Distinctively crimson.
9. New Zealand.
10. Thirty years, of course. From 1618 to 1648.

Jamestown and Individualism

A few weeks ago Eric Daniels wrote a nice op-ed celebrating Jamestown, titled "Jamestown: Birth of America's Distinctive, Secular Ideal." A good read... including:

Though the Virginia Company found little gold and no sea route to Asia, they soon discovered something vastly more important--that economic opportunity lay wherever men were left free to work and create new wealth. In contrast to the rigid class structure and static economy of Jacobean England, America promised rewards based on individual merit. It was this spirit, and not the Puritan belief in cosmic predestination and unthinking duty to God, that attracted men to pursue their own earthly success in the New World.

"Here every man may be master and owner of his own labor and land," Smith noted in one of his many promotional books intended to attract new
settlers to America. "If he have nothing but his hands," he boasted, "he may set up his trade, and by industry quickly grow rich." For Smith and the other early settlers of Jamestown, the profound significance of America lay in the possibility that a man could choose, pursue, and realize his own destiny--it lay in a new ideal of individual liberty.

Of Firemen and Closers

Gabriel Schechter, a research associate at the National Baseball Hall of Fame, has done some interesting research recently on the changing nature of short relievers -- those who have been variously called "Firemen" and then more recently "Closers". His work was published in issue 35 of The Baseball Research Journal, with an article title of "All Saves Are Not Created Equal". I emailed Gabriel about it, and he said this article was based on two other shorter columns he wrote, which are available online at the HOF site. The first is The Evolution of the Closer, and the second is Top Relievers in Trouble.

One of the basic points he makes is something I have long known intuitively, but it is great to have the data he provides to back it up. The point is that the great "closers" of the 1970s and early 80s -- Fingers, Sutter, Gossage, even Quisenberry -- worked longer innings and more often came in the game in tough situations than the latest great closers such as Trevor Hoffman and Mariano Rivera. Any serious baseball fan knows that the roles of the relief pitcher have changed greatly in the past several decades, with various distinct roles now being given names and uses by managers. The "closer" role is now almost always a one-inning-per-game affair. This wasn't the case for the likes of Fingers, Gossage, et al. For instance, Fingers had 135 saves in which he pitched 2 or more innings, Sutter 130, and Gossage 125. Compare that with Hoffman with 7 or Rivera with 11. And when you look at really long save appearances -- those that were 3 innings of work or greater, the difference is even more striking: Fingers 36, Gossage 24, Sutter 15, but Hoffman and Rivera 0 each.

Gabriel also does a good job of noting how Lee Smith can be seen as a transitional figure, as his career can be split into a part one (1981-90) in which his workload more closely resembled that of Fingers, Gossage, and Sutter, and a part two (1991-end) where his workload more closely resembled that of the contemporary closer.

Gabriel's analysis goes far deeper than just number of innings pitched to get the save, as he considers other factors for these hurlers such as how many runs-lead the team had when they were brought in, how many runners were on base, and how many outs there were. Gabriel notes "the difficulty of devising a unifying formula to evaluate all save performances in their situational context." But his work is getting us much closer to that goal. Well done!

Darth Vader Hot Air Balloon

Check this out for a laugh... three photos of a Darth Vader hot-air balloon.

Nearly 50 Hours of Ayn Rand on audio - for free!

This week the Ayn Rand Institute unveiled a major collection of audio and video recordings of Ayn Rand. Included are more than 48 hours of audio and video taken from 54 of Ayn Rand's public appearances (at the Ford Hall Forum), interviews, and lectures. There is a wide range of topics covered, and many are rather famous amongst fants of Ayn Rand's work, e.g., "Philosophy: Who Needs It?"; "Faith and Force", "The Nature of Rights", and many more. Though you have to be registered on the site to access them, registering is free. Once registered, this library can be accessed here.

Although these most (all?) of these items have been long available in print (in the various non-fiction collections of Rand's work), until now the audio recordings were only available on tape or CD and were rather expensive and hence not widely heard. So I think this is absolutely brilliant marketing on the part of the ARI, and I think it is a wonderful resource for anyone interested in studying Ayn Rand's ideas, or those who are new to them and find they can more easily listen to audio than read books (a growing number of young people I suspect, given the podcast culture that is developing). So major kudos to ARI on this one!

Say on Pay?

Yaron Brook has written an Op-Ed attacking the Say On Pay bill that has passed in the US House of Representatives. The Op-Ed ran in modified form here at Investment News. The bill would force all corporations to allow shareholders a non-binding vote on CEO compensation, the idea being to shame directors in lowering CEO pay. While this bill itself might not do much -- since it forces only non-binding votes -- this bill would appear to be only a first step. As Brook notes, the Rep who proposed it, Barney Frank, has supported outright caps on CEO pay and "has threatened that if 'say on pay' does not sufficiently reduce CEO compensation relative to that of other employees, 'then we will do something more.'"

Brook's piece is a good read, and he notes several things that shareholders can do already if they are unhappy about the pay of a CEO, none of which require further regulation of business by government:

1. "Vote with his dollars" by selling his shares
2. Accumulate a controlling interest in the company (typically 51%) and impose a new board of directors
3. Persuade a majority of shareholders to replace the board with people sympathetic to their concerns.

Rachel Carson and "Silent Spring"

Keith Lockitch has written a powerful indictment of Rachel Carson, her 1960s classic "Silent Spring", and the horrific impact it -- and the events that followed -- had on the use of DDT to combat malaria. Millions have died as a result, pure and simple. Read this article to learn things like:

• Though nearly eradicated decades ago, malaria has resurged with a vengeance because DDT, the most effective agent of mosquito control, has been essentially discarded -- discarded based not on scientific concerns about its safety, but on environmental dogma advanced by Carson.
• The scientific case against DDT was, and still is, nonexistent. Almost 60 years have passed since the malaria-spraying campaigns began -- with hundreds of millions of people exposed to large concentrations of DDT -- yet, according to international health scholar Amir Attaran, the scientific literature "has not even one peer reviewed, independently replicated study linking exposure to DDT with any adverse health outcome."
• Estimates put today's malaria incidence worldwide at around 300 million cases, with a million deaths every year.
• We should seek, Carson wrote, not to eliminate malarial mosquitoes with pesticides, but to find instead "a reasonable accommodation between the insect hordes and ourselves." If the untouched, "natural" state is one in which millions contract deadly diseases, so be it.
• Earth First! founder Dave Foreman writes: "Ours is an ecological perspective that views Earth as a community and recognizes such apparent enemies as 'disease' (e.g., malaria) and 'pests' (e.g., mosquitoes) not as manifestations of evil to be overcome but rather as vital and necessary components of a complex and vibrant biosphere."

Near the end of his article Lockitch notes: "In the few minutes it has taken you to read this article, over a thousand people have contracted malaria and half a dozen have died." Wow.

Baseball List, Part 2

Here is Part 2 of my postings on what I find interesting and worthy of comment while browsing through the recent SABR (Society for American Baseball Research) book The SABR Baseball List and Record Book. For non-SABR members it is available at Amazon, currently at a nice 32% discount price of only $12.21.

See also Part 1, focused in part on the A's from the 1970s.

List 033 is "Highest Career Batting Average by a Switch-hitter (min. 1,500 hits)" (pg. 15). So how many switch-hitters have career BAs over .300? Just four it turns out. Frankie Frisch (.316), Chipper Jones (.304, through 2006), Pete Rose (.303), and Roberto Alomar (.300). Upon reflection, I guess I find it mildly surprising that there are so few, and that only Frisch is over .305. As a switch-hitter, they can't specialize on just RH or LH, but... they also can switch sides to get an advantage based on the pitcher being RH or LH. Of course the pool of candiates for this list is much smaller than for comparable lists for RH or LH batters, but still... I found this interesting.

Similarly, list 037 is "Highest Career On Base Percentage by a Switch-hitter (min. 5,000 PA)" (pg 16). So how many are over .400? Just three: Mickey Mantle (.421), Lu Blue (.402), and Chipper Jones (.402).

And then next is list 041 "Highest Career Slugging Average by a Switch-hitter (min. 5,000 PA)" (pg. 18). So how many are over .500? Just two, though they are well over that threshold: Mickey Mantle (.557) and Chipper Jones (.542).

Of course we all know how great Mantle was, but this raises the question of Chipper Jones and how we should consider his career -- and his HOF prospects. He has been a key part of a winning team, the Braves, so that surely helps. And he is still going strong at age 35. After some injuries the past few years, as of now he is batting .307 with 12 HR (tied for second in NL) in 2007 in only 153 ABs so far. Wow.

Take a look at Chipper's complete statistical resume. It is quite impressive: 369 HR, 1,223 RBI, 1,221 R, .305 BA, .402 OBP, .544 SLG. He took home the MVP in 1999, and has been an all-star five times. Actually, I hope he makes it this year too, as five times seems a bit low for him. More of a "gray-ink" hitter than a "black-ink" hitter, Chipper hasn't often led the NL in key offensive categories, but he has often been amongst the leaders. He had a little speed in his youth, and was a smart runner as in 1996 he had 14 SB vs. 1 CS and then in 1999 he had 25 SB vs. 3 CS. From 1996-2003 he had 100+ RBIs -- that is 8 consecutive seasons!

In his ample post-season experience he has had his good series and bad (like most Braves during his playing years). He has batted .288 with 13 HR in 333 post-season ABs.

If he can stay healthy and continue to be productive for several more years, he should easily get into the Hall of Fame. I guess I wouldn't quite vote for him yet, but it won't take much more. Consider Chipper's "Similar Batters through Age 34": Gary Sheffield, Duke Snider, Dick Allen, Billy Williams, Jeff Bagwell, Frank Thomas, Bernie Williams, Mike Schmidt, Rafael Palmeiro, and Reggie Jackson. Pretty good company to be in (though not all HOFers).

Classic Humor, Part 4: Imponderables

Here is another in my series of classic humor bits from the Internet (see Part 3 here), as I clean out my old Humor email box. This is yet another item that was forwarded to me back in 1997 from my friend David Saum. No doubt similar lists exist all over the Internet, but here you go:

Things that make you go hmmmm...:

• If you throw a cat out a car window does it become kitty litter?
• If corn oil comes from corn, where does baby oil come from?
• How do a fool and his money get together?
• How do they get a deer to cross at that yellow road sign?
• If it's tourist season, why can't we shoot them?
• Why do they sterilize the needles for lethal injections?
• What do they use to ship styrofoam?
• How do you know when it's time to tune your bagpipes?
• Is it true that cannibals don't eat clowns because they taste funny?
• When you choke a smurf, what color does it turn?
• Does fuzzy logic tickle?
• Do radioactive cats have 18 half-lives?
• If you shoot a mime, should you use a silencer?
• What was the best thing before sliced bread?
• Why is it so hard to remember how to spell MNEMONIC?
• Why is it called a TV "set" if there's only one?
• Why does your nose run and your feet smell?
• Why does an alarm clock "go off" when it begins ringing?
• If pro is the opposite of con, is progress the opposite of congress?
• Why does "cleave" mean both split apart and stick together?
• Why is it, whether you sit down or sit up, the results are the same?
• Why is it called a "building" when it's already built?
• Why do they call them "apartments" when they are all stuck together?
• Why is there an expiration date on sour cream?
• If you keep trying to prove Murphy's Law, will something keep going wrong?
• How can you "draw a blank"?
• Shouldn't there be a shorter word for "monosyllable"?
• Why did the kamikaze pilots wear helmets?
• Why do 'tug' boats push their barges?
• Why do we sing "Take Me Out To The Ball Game" when we're already there?
• Why are they called 'stands' when they're made for sitting?
• Why is there only one Monopolies Commission?
• Does a fish get cramps after eating?
• Why do 'slow down' and 'slow up' mean the same thing?
• Why is it when two planes almost collide it's called a 'near miss'.Shouldn't it be called a 'near hit'?
• Why are there Interstate Highways in Hawaii?
• Why do light switches say on/off? When it's on you can see it's on, when it's off you can't see to read.
• How do you know when it's an ENDLESS LOOP?
• Why is FOOTball played by hand?
• Why are there flotation devices under plane seats instead of parachutes?
• Why are cigarettes sold in gas stations where smoking is not permitted?
• Why do 'fat chance' and 'slim chance' mean the same thing?
• If you can't drink and drive then why do you need a drivers license to buy liquor, and why do bars have parking lots?
• Have you ever imagined a world without hypothetical situations?
• How does the guy who drives the snow plow get to work on snowy mornings?
• If the 7-11 is open 24 hours a day and 365 days a year then why are there locks on the doors?
• If a cow laughs real hard would milk come out of its nose?
• If nothing ever sticks to Teflon, how do they make it stick to pans?
• Why do they put Braille dots on the keypad of the drive-up ATM?
• Why is it when you transport something by car it's called a shipment, and when you transport something by ship it's called cargo?
• Why is it they can't make an airplane out of the same material as that little black box data recorder?
• Why do you get "on" a bus, and "in" a car?
• Lighthouse for the blind? Do blind people need a lighthouse?
• Why is civilization so uncivil?Why call it a "meeting" when everyone knows everyone else?
• Why aren't 3 1/2 inch floppies floppy?

Baseball List, Part 1

About a week ago I received in the mail a copy of the new SABR (Society for American Baseball Research) book The SABR Baseball List and Record Book. For non-SABR members it is available at Amazon, currently at a nice 32% discount price of only $12.21.

For someone like me, this book is loads of fun. It is nearly 400 pages of baseball leader lists of all kinds. Some are traditional, but many are things you'd have trouble finding anywhere else, not in the large print baseball encyclopedias or even online resources.

As I browse through its data-packed pages, I'm marking anything that jumps out at me as interesting or surprising. I plan to blog about these as time permits.

Today I will start with list 014, found on pg. 7, "More Career Games Played than Plate Appearances by Non-Pitchers, since 1900 (min. 100 G)", which is as follows:
Matt Alexander 1973-1981, Games = 374, PA = 195
Charles Gipson 1998-2005, Games = 373, PA = 358
Glen Barker 1999-2001, Games = 235, PA = 197
Jack Reed 1961-1963, Games = 222, PA = 144
Allan Lewis 1967-70, 72-73, Games = 156, PA = 31
Ross Moschitto 1965, 1967, Games = 110, PA = 39
Herb Washington 1974-1975, Games 105, PA = 0

Now, how does this happen one might ask? Well, two major ways as far as I can tell. If you are often put into a games a defensive replacement late in a game, and then either don't come to bat or are pinch-hit for when you do, then you'd be in the game without batting. The second way is if you are regularly used as a pinch-runner, and then don't take a position in the field in the next inning (and so can't bat at all the rest of that game).

I don't remember much about Gipson (OF with a .237 BA with 16 SB in career) or Barker (OF with a .232 BA and 30 SB) , and I can't tell just from their stats what their strengths were. With 17 SB in 81 games in 1999, I guess Glen Barker might have been a pinch-runner often?

Jack Reed was an OF for the Yankees, and hit .233 in his career, but only had 7 SB. Ross Moschitto was also a Yankee OF, but hit only .167 in his 36 career at-bats (with 0 SB). So I don't know from these numbers what their story was.

But the other three players, Alexander, Lewis, and Washington, were definitely pinch-runner players for the great Oakland A's experiment of the 1970s. Starting with Lewis, we see that he had 14 SB in 1967 for the KC A's, playing in 34 games but only having 7 official ABs. He had 8 SB in 1968, 7 in 1970, 8 in 1972, and then 7 more in his last season. His last season was the most extreme along these lines: 35 games, 0 at-bats, 16 runs, 7 SB. For his career, that's 44 SB (with 17 CS) in 156 games, with only 31 plate-appearances (29 at-bats). Oh, and of those 156 games he played, he was only used in the field 10 times (all OF).

The A's carried one or two "designated" pinch-runners on their rosters for much of the 1970s. Herb Washington was perhaps the most extreme of these, at least in my mind: in fact, he is the one player on this listing that I might have been able to guess. 1974 was his big year, as he played in 92 games, but none in the field. He had 0 plate appearances, but managed 29 runs scored, 29 SB, and 16 CS. Then in 1975 he got into only 13 games, scored 4 runs, with 2 SB, 1 CS. So that is how he played 105 games and never batted.

In 1975 Don Hopkins took over for Washington as the primary pinch-runner. He played in 82 games, had only 6 ABs, but scored 25 runs, with 21 SB and 9 CS. Like Washington, he then played very little the next year.

Another pinch-runner during these years was Matt Alexander, the last guy from the list above. He obviously had a longer career than Washington or Hopkins, playing 374 games, with 1995 PA, 168 ABs (a .214 hitter), scoring 111 runs, with 103 SB and 42 CS. He did play various positions in the field, including OF 93, 3B 22, SS 13, and 2B 10.

Another player worth noting in this regard is Larry Lintz. After a few seasons in Montreal (including 1974 when he had 50 SB in only 113 games!), and then a brief stint in St. Louis, this middle-infielder joined the A's in 1976 and became a pinch-runner for them. He played in 68 games, but had only 1 AB. He scored 21 runs, with 31 SB and 11 CS.

In doing this research, I uncovered a few other interesting tidbits. First, the 1976 A's were a running team! They didn't hit many HR (113), with Bando smacking 27 and Tenace 22. But they stole an amazing 341 bases and were caught 123 times. Regular team-leader Billy North swiped 75, and Bert Campaneris had 54. Don Baylor managed 52, by far the most of his career (though he did swipe 20+ in eight consecutive seasons, something I had forgotten). Claudell Washington had 37, and Phil Garner 35. All that running must have been contagious, because even Sal Bando chipped in with 20 SB, one of only two seasons in which he managed double-digit steals. It was almost overkill then that pinch-runners Alexander had 20 and Lintz had 31.

So were those 341 SB a record? No. For this I was able to turn to page 338 of this book (see what a great book it is!), where we learn that since 1898, the top SB total was the Baltimore Orioles... of the National League. Yes, the Orioles of 1899 were of the NL. They had 364 SB led by Jimmy Sheckard with 77 and the immortal John McGraw with 73. Well, that was a long time ago, so moving down the list to second place we find the NY Giants of the NL with 347 in 1911. They were led by Josh Devore with 61 and Fred Snodgrass (gotta love that name) with 51. But then in third place is in fact the 1976 A's with their 341 SB. In fact, the only non-ancient team to come close was the 1985 Cardinals who stole 312 bases, led of course by Vince Coleman with his amazing 110 SB in his rookie campaign. Willie McGee had 56, Andy Van Slyke34, and Ozzie Smith and Tommy Herr had 31 each.

The other tidbit I noticed in doing this analysis of the A's in the 1970s... was Mitchell Page's rookie numbers. He came in second for the AL ROY that year, losing to Eddie Murray. Mitchell batted .307 with 21 HR and 75 RBI. But he also stole 42 bases, versus only 5 CS -- quite a good percentage! The next season he wasn't as fortunate, stealing 23 versus 19 CS, and then in 1979 he slipped further with 17 SB and 16 CS -- not good success rates at all!

Anyway, future entries on lists from this interesting book will not be as long as this one was, but I just found the Herb Washington entry in that list fascinating and deserving of some comment.

Finally, I've Joined the iPod People

Today my iPod Nano (8GB) arrived from Amazon. This is my first MP3 player, as I tend to be very slow to pick up the latest technologies when it comes to media and media players. I was slow to switch from tapes to CDs, slow to switch from VHS to DVD, and obviously I've been slow to switch from a CD-walkman player to an iPod. I finally decided to get one though, because the benefits just became to great to ignore. I have two primary uses in mind, as I'll use it while running (I purchased the Belkin Sports Sleeve that is intended to go with the iPod Nano to better enable this) and also at the office to listen to both music and podcasts. I don't travel often, but obviously it will come in handy when I do -- no more packing up a larger CD player and a CD case with a dozen or more CDs!

So far, so good. I have connected and sync'd up the 40 or so songs I had previously purchased from iTunes. Alas, the bulk of my music was recorded using Windows Media Player, so it will take some time to get it all switched over to iTunes and then onto the iPod. Fortunately, while some was recorded in windows media format, some was MP3 format, so that will help a bit I think.

Which song got the honor of being the first played for me on this device? "Call Me When You're Sober", by Evanescence -- arguably my favorite new song in several years.

Classic Humor, Part 3: Translation Problems

Following up Part 2, here is another bit of classic humor that I've been saving in my Humor email box over the years. This collection of marketing translation issues was forwarded from a friend back in 1997 -- I don't know if these are all true marketing problems or not, and there are no doubt similar and much longer lists on the Internet. But here you go... my favorite from this list has to be the Pepsi issue in Taiwan!

• Cracking an international market is a goal of most growing corporations. It shouldn't be that hard, yet even the big multi-nationals run into trouble because of language and cultural differences. For example:
• Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an American ad campaign: "Nothing sucks like an Electrolux."
• The name Coca-Cola in China was first rendered as Ke-kou-ke-la. Unfortunately, the Coke company did not discover until after thousands of signs had been printed that the phrase means "bite the wax tadpole" or "female horse stuffed with wax" depending on the dialect. Coke then researched 40,000 Chinese characters and found a close phonetic equivalent, "ko-kou-ko-le," which can be loosely translated as "happiness in the mouth."
• In Taiwan, the translation of the Pepsi slogan "Come alive with the Pepsi Generation" came out as "Pepsi will bring your ancestors back from the dead."
• Also in Chinese, the Kentucky Fried Chicken slogan "finger-lickin' good" came out as "eat your fingers off."
• The American slogan for Salem cigarettes, "Salem - Feeling Free," got translated in the Japanese market into "When smoking Salem, you feel so refreshed that your mind seems to be free and empty."
• When General Motors introduced the Chevy Nova in South America, it was apparently unaware that "no va" means "it won't go." After the company figured out why it wasn't selling any cars, it renamed the car in its Spanish markets to the Caribe.
• Ford had a similar problem in Brazil when the Pinto flopped. The company found out that Pinto was Brazilian slang for "tiny male genitals." Ford pried all the nameplates off and substituted Corcel, which means horse.
• When Parker Pen marketed a ballpoint pen in Mexico, its ads were supposed to say "It won't leak in your pocket and embarrass you." However, the company's mistakenly thought the spanish word "embarazar" meant embarrass. Instead the ads said that "It wont leak in your pocket and make you pregnant."
• An American T-shirt maker in Miami printed shirts for the spanish market which promoted the Pope's visit. Instead of the desired "I Saw the Pope" in Spanish, the shirts proclaimed "I Saw the Potato."
• Chicken-man Frank Perdue's slogan, "It takes a tough man to make atender chicken," got terribly mangled in another Spanish translation. A photo of Perdue with one of his birds appeared on billboards all over Mexico with a caption that explained "It takes a hard man to make a chicken aroused."
• Hunt-Wesson introduced its Big John products in French Canada as Gros Jos before finding out that the phrase, in slang, means "big breasts." In this case, however, the name problem did not have a noticeable effect on sales.
• Colgate introduced a toothpaste in France called Cue, the name of a notorious porno mag.
• In Italy, a campaign for Schweppes Tonic Water translated the name into Schweppes Toilet Water.
• Japan's second-largest tourist agency was mystified when it entered English-speaking markets and began receiving requests for unusual sex tours. Upon finding out why, the owners of Kinki Nippon Tourist Company changed its name.

Classic Humor, Part 2: Facts of Life

Like my Part 1 post about Student Answers, here is another list of humor that I found while cleaning out my old "humor" email folder. This one is titled The Facts of Life:

• Psychiatrists say that 1 of 4 people is mentally ill. Check 3 friends. If they're OK, you're it.
• Nothing in the known universe travels faster than a bad check.
• It has recently been discovered that research causes cancer in rats.
• Always remember to pillage BEFORE you burn.
• If you are given an open-book exam, you will forget your book.
• COROLLARY: If you are given a take-home test, you will forget where you live.
• The trouble with doing something right the first time is that nobody appreciates how difficult it was.
• It may be that your sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others.
• Paul's Law: You can't fall off the floor.
• The average woman would rather have beauty than brains, because the average man can see better than he can think.
• Paranoids are people, too; they have their own problems. It's easy to criticize, but if everybody hated you, you'd be paranoid, too.
• A diplomat is someone who can tell you to go to hell and make you feel happy to be on your way.
• Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.
• Vital papers will demonstrate their vitality by moving from where you left them to where you can't find them.
• Law of Probability Dispersal: Whatever it is that hits the fan will not be evenly distributed.
• Supplement: A .44 Magnum beats 4 aces.

A quick Google search turns up many similar "facts of life" listings, such as this one. This "Laws of Life" page is longer, and has different ones from the above.

Judge: What is a Web Site?

This story almost seems too ridiculous to be true. It begins: "A British judge admitted on Wednesday he was struggling to cope with basic terms like "Web site" in the trial of three men accused of inciting terrorism via the Internet." Read the article for more details...

Images of America from Arcadia Publishing

I wanted to give readers a brief recommendation of a paperback book series from Arcadia Publishing, which describes itself as "the leading local history publisher in the United States, with a catalog of more than 4,000 titles in print and hundreds of new titles released every year." The series is titled "Images of America". Follow the link for it from the homepage, or visit this page, and scroll down to the intereactive map to find books in the areas that interest you. There are thousands of titles, many focused on specific cities, towns, or regions of the USA -- or even just a city in a particular era.

I was introduced to the "Images of America" series because my uncle, George Stone, co-authored the book on Bristol, Tennessee/Virginia, and he sent me a copy a few years ago. Since then I've also gotten a copy of the "Perinton, Fairport, and the Erie Canal", since we live in Perinton (there is also a separate one "Perinton and Fairport in the 20th Century", which I hope to get a copy of sometime soon). These books are about 120 pages or so, and are composed of historical photographs with descriptive captions for each. They are interesting reading, and certainly serve well as coffee-table books. And with so many already published, you are just about guaranteed to find one or two that will be of interest to you: just search for the town/city where you live now, or the ones where you grew up, or any others of interest. And check for multiple titles in your geographic area -- for instance, the city of Rochester, NY, with a population of just over 200,000, has 12 separate titles in this series -- plus over a dozen more for surrounding suburbs like Fairport. That is a lot of historical coverage for just one metropolitan area!

I'll add that there are also over 100 in the similar "Campus History" series, though none yet it seems for my alma-mater, The University of Rochester. The Sports in America series also looks interesting, and it boasts nearly 100 titles at present. Other series include Then and Now, Black America, and Postcard History.

All of these books generally have a cover price of $19.99 - $24.99, so visit their site or Amazon, or visit your local B&N or Borders and go to the local books section to browse around (I assume they'd carry these).

Google's PigeonRank Technology

This April Fools Day item was put up in 2002, but if you haven't seen it, check out the technology behind Google's great results.

Classic Humor, Part 1: Student Answers

Because I am converting from Eudora to Outlook 2007 as my primary email application at home, I've decided to take this opportunity to trim back my saved email folders. This is no small task, as I have thousands of emails in dozens of folders. One folder I have is for Humor, where I have kept the funny bits that people have sent me over the years -- going back to 1997 it seems! So as I clean out this folder, I post some of the stuff that I still find very funny for my blog readers to enjoy.

Here is installment number one, from an email forwarded to me by David Saum back in 1997... a list of what are presented to be humorous student answers and descriptions for things.

"When you breath, you inspire.When you do not breath, you expire."
"H2O is hot water, and CO2 is cold water."
"To collect fumes of sulfur, hold a deacon over a flame in a test tube."
"When you smell an odorless gas, it is probably carbon monoxide."
"Water is composed of two gins, Oxygen and Hydrogen.Oxygen is pure gin. Hydrogen is gin and water."
"Three kinds of blood vessels are arteries, vanes and caterpillars."
"Blood flows down one leg and up the other."
"Respiration is composed of two acts, first inspiration, and then expectoration."
"The moon is a planet just like the earth, only it is even deader."
"Artificial insemination is when the farmer does it to the cow instead of the bull."
"Dew is formed on leaves when the sun shines down on them and makes them perspire."
"A super-saturated solution is one that holds more then it can hold."
"Mushrooms always grow in damp places and so they look like umbrellas."
"The body consists of three parts--the brainium, the borax and the abominable cavity.The brainium contains the brain, the borax contains the hear and lungs, and the abominable cavity contains the bowls, of which there are five--a, e, I, o, and u."
"The pistol of a flower is its only protections agenst insects."
"The alimentary canal is located in the northern part of Indiana."
"The skeleton is what is left after the insides have been taken out and the outsides have been taken off.The purpose of the skeleton is something to hitch meat to."
"A permanent set of teeth consists of eight canines, eight cuspids, two molars, and eight cuspidors."
"The tides are a fight between the Earth and moon.All water tends towards the moon, and nature adhors a vacuum. I forget where the sun joins in this fight."
"A fossil is an extinct animal. The older it is, the more extinct it is."
"Equator: A managerie lion running around the Earth through Africa."
"Germinate: To become a naturalized German."
"Liter: A nest of young puppies."
"Magnet: Something you find crawling all over a dead cat."
"Momentum: What you give a person when they are going away."
"Planet: A body of Earth surrounded by sky."
"Rhubarb: A kind of celery gone bloodshot."
"Vacuum: A large, empty space where the pope lives."
"Before giving a blood transfusion, find out if the blood is affirmative or negative."
"To remove dust from the eye, pull the eye down over the nose."
"For a nosebleed: Put the nose much lower then the body until the heart stops."
"For a drowning: Climb on top of the person and move up and down to make artifical perspiration."
"For fainting: Rub the person's chest or, if a lady, rub her arm above the hand instead. Or put the head between the knees of the nearest medical doctor."
"For dog bite: Put the dog away for several days. If he has not recovered, then kill it."
"For asphyxiation:Apply artificial respiration until the patient is dead."
"For head cold: Use an agonizer to spray the nose until it drops in your throat."
"To keep milk from turning sour: Keep it in the cow."

You can see similar lists here and here (with some duplicates of the above). The first of these two links is from laughbreak.com, a site that seems particularly full of good humor.

My Enya-Centered Radio Station

I've blogged before about the wonderful site Pandora, a service provided by the so-called Music Genome Project. This is the online "radio" station (I hate referring to Internet music streaming sites as "radio", btw) that lets you indicate an artist or song (or a few) and then it will play songs that its search engine considers musically similar. As I've said before, this didn't work so well when I tried Pink Floyd or Jethro Tull, but I think that is because what I like about those groups is unique to those groups (or nearly so). But this approach works quite nicely for the one "station" I've created that I use regularly, namely my Enya-related collection of music. My intention here was to create a playlist that was heavy on Enya's music, but that included soothing music from other artists, mostly women vocalists, that is good to listen to as background music while working at my desk or reading. Doing a few searches at Pandora, its seems several other Enya fans have done exactly the same thing!

My results as of now are as follows. I've "approved" 55 songs as being ones I like -- so these get repeated now and then in the playlist. I've rejected 61 songs as being ones I don't like -- so these will never be played again on my "station". Then many more -- perhaps 100 or so -- have been played at least once and I didn't vote them up or down: either I was ambivalent at that point about them, or more often, I was just busy and didn't have time to stop what I was doing to click yeah or nay.

Of the 55 songs I've "approved", 18 are from Enya. Since I like every one of her songs, that is no surprise. And I hope it helps to reinforce to the system what I am looking for. The "Theme from Harry's Game", by Clannad, was an early and obvious song to be included in this playlist -- though for some reason it gets played an inordinate number of times (perhaps it has been approved by so many people out there that it gets weighted in the system a bit too much?). Then there is Annie Lennox's famous "No more 'I Love You's'", which I like enough to include in this playlist. There is one Loreena McKennit song ("Blacksmith") so far, and even one Crosby and Nash ("Where Will I Be?") which I was glad to hear as I really like CSNY of course. And then the song "May it Be", by Lisa Kelly (and also a version by Hayley Westenra), which is a song I know from one of the Lord of the Rings movies. Most of the other artists on my "approved" list have been new ones for me, which is great.

But the one new song that sticks out as one I really like a lot is from an artist I had heard of previously, but that I wasn't very familiar with: Sarah Brightman. Her song "Free" is incredible. I'm probably going to plunk down the 99 cents to buy it outright from iTunes. Her song "Beautiful" has also made my playlist.

A few arists have songs on both my approved and rejected listings so far. The aforementioned Annie Lennox is one, and the famous Yanni is another. A group called Secret Garden is also batting .500 for me so far. A few famous artists that have a tune on my reject list include Abba, Enigma, Heart, Linda Rondstadt, and Phil Collins.

Anyway, if you have broadband, are interested in expanding your musical interests, and have a specific idea for a playlist theme -- or just want to experiment with the suggestion system to see what happens -- then I strongly urge you to give Pandora a try!

When Trade is Outlawed, Only Outlaws Trade

The following letter to The Economist ended with a great line, that I've used as the title for this posting:

SIR -- Your article on tigers outlined the cost to their conservation of refusing to countenance markets ("Market failure", April 21st). I have argued that the only way to save the tiger is to sell it, but conservationists have maintained that commerce and conservation are antithetical. Their principal strategy has been to prohibit tiger hunting and the trading of tiger parts. Policing has thereby become the cornerstone of conservation polices and, predictably, it has failed to stave the decline of tigers in the wild.

Some of the poorest people in the world live in close proximity to valuable resources like tigers, yet they have no incentive to conserve and manage the resources sustainably, allowing criminals and smugglers to profit from poaching. This is bad for the people and very bad for tigers. In contrast, 2m crocodiles are harvested each year from facilities as far apart as Australia, South Africa and the United States. The international availability of farmed crocodiles has virtually eliminated crocodile poaching. Clearly, when trade is outlawed, only outlaws trade and the only market failure here is the failure to let markets operate.

Barun Mitra
Liberty Institute
Delhi

That great line -- "When trade is outlawed, only outlaws trade" -- surely that is not new? Well, I looked it up on Google, and found only two other references. And guess who those are from? The same person, Barun Mitra: see "Commerce for Conservation" from April 17, 2007 in the Hindustan Times, and also "Environmentalists Can't Save the Tiger" from 2005. Both are on the same topic as the letter above, but go into more detail, and give examples beyond crocodiles.

So thanks for this great line Barun!

Memjet and the Future of Printing

The May 22 issue of PC Magazine has an interesting article, The Future of Ink Jet Printing, about a new prtiner technology called "Memjet", introduced at the 2007 Global Ink Jet Printing Conference. The technology replaces the standard approach to ink jet printing, which involves a printhead (with the ink cartridges) moving back and forth across the page, with a wider printhead which spans the entire page. There are thousands of tiny nozzles that fire the ink onto the page. Assuming no technological hurdles arise to keep this from happening, Memjet seems like an outstanding innovation (which took over 10 years of research from Silverbrook Research). Compare 9 pages per minute that you might get with a traditional printer, with 60 pages per minute thta Memjet can deliver! And one might assume that the overal printer is more stable and would require repairs less often since there isn't this physical device constantly shooting back and forth, back and forth. This Memjet technology just seems to make a lot of sense!

If they can perfect it and license it to various producers, so that prices will become reasonable, this could really change the ink jet printing world for the better.

More On the United Nations and Individual Rights

I've written many times in the past with my criticisms of the United Nations. A few weeks ago I watched a couple of videos of UN Watch speeches at the UN, and I was blown away. This sat in my queue to blog about for a few weeks, but as followup to my posting this morning about individual rights articles in The Economist, you can consider this one Part 2 posting of recent items on individual rights.

First, some videos from YouTube that are worth seeing:

• UN Watch Confronts UN on Sudan - Wow. A thorough bashing of the inaction on the situation in Darfur.
• UN Watch Confronts UN on Human Rights - Wow. A thorough damning of the council on human rights. Examples given of the massive hypocrisy of condeming Israel time and again, but doing nothing about far more severe issues in so many other countries around the world. Simply amazing. Then the speech is deemed "not admissable"... on that, see the next video.
• UN Watch: What is Admissable and What is Not - A litany of examples of things that have been accepted as speeches at the UN, to be compared with the above statement from UN Watch that was not "admitted". (Includes duplicate of the above video as second half.)
• UN Watch on Canada - A generally positive report about Canada's efforts, but examples given of how it could do more. Presumably much the same could be said about the other countries that rate highly on the UN Watch report card.

Then the second item I wanted to mention here is an April press release from the Ayn Rand Institute, The UN Human Rights Council's War on Human Rights. This is focused on the recent UN "resolution urging nations to pass laws prohibiting the dissemination of ideas that 'defame religion.'" Read their press release to see a principled response that defends freedom of speech as the crucial individual right that it is.

And the third item is the article "Bad Counsel: The UN Adrift on Human Rights" from the April 7th-13th issue of The Economist. It is critical of the same religion defamation resolution, but also has the following general criticisms of the UN Human Rights Council:

In its fourth regular session, which ended in Genevea on March 30th, the 47-member council again failed to address many egregious human-rights abuses around the world. Even in the case of Darfur, on which one of its own working groups had produced a damning report, it declined to criticise the Sudanese government directly for orchestrating the atrocities, limiting itself to an expression of "deep concern". Indeed, in its nine months of life, the council has criticised only one country for human-rights violations, passing in its latest session its ninth resolution against Israel.

This obsession with bashing Israel and turning a blind eye to so much else has disappointed those who hoped that the new council might perform better than its predecessor. Now alarm is growing that its anti-Israel bias is going to becompounded by an excessive zeal to defend the good name of religions, and especially that of Islam, at the expense of free speech.

...

A central task for the new council was supposed to be regular reviews of human rights in each of the UN's 192 member states. But nine months since its founding, nothing has happened. A key test of whether the council would prove any better than its derided predecessor would be to get this "universal periodic review" under way, Louise Arbour, the UN's respected High Commissioner for Human Rights, told the Geneva meeting. The council has now given itself a year to establish such a mechanism.

Predictions on what we will see resulting from this a year from now?