ESPN3 - Brilliant

I have been using ESPN3.com a lot lately and this is a brilliant site. Easy to use, excellent adaptive video quality, multiple screen option, and of course the best commentators.


Image quality has been reduced because I watched 3 matches at the same time.

World cup boredom

This World Cup is probably the worst one I have ever seen since 1982. With the exception of Germany, who played well, with a good offensive and fast motion, all the other teams play slowly, defensively and do their best not to be beaten, which leaves most games to a 0:0/1:1 draw or a 1:0 fluke. What a bore. I think FIFA should start addressing this problem and come up with a way to compensate losing teams if they scored many goals. Otherwise, with the growing number of players and their ever improving athletic capabilities we will doom ourselves to 0:0.

End of the academic year

Today marked the beginning of the final exams week for the spring quarter at UC. In other words, the end of the academic year is here, and what a year it was. Congratulations to D who is graduating in a few days with an M.Sc..

I managed to teach an entirely new class for which no available textbook existed, taught 4 other classes and two will come in the summer, and completed 5 courses towards my degree. Most importantly, I passed the Ph.D. qualifier exam, which is a mandatory step on the way to a degree. In all, this was a very busy and rewarding year for both of us.

Human rights hypocrites

Israel is being denounced by the whole world for stopping a flotilla of ships carrying humanitarian aid to the blockaded Gaza Strip. The fact that the flotilla was organized by a known terrorist organization makes no difference to the enlightened world. The fact that human rights and peace activists were using knives, machetes, metal poles, broken glass bottles to attack soldiers fails to strike people as odd, perhaps puzzling - pacifists are known to be pro-violence, are they not? The fact that convoys upon convoys of food and medical supplies are being delivered to Gaza daily, again, is not part of the comfortable narrative, so let's just forget it.


The question is why this whole scam is being done? What is the motive? The motive is, in the end, to cast doubt over the legitimacy of Israel. It is a well orchestrated attack on Israel, with major organizations taking part in it. For example, the BBC with its one-sided depiction of the news, the United Nations, whose human rights section found only one nation guilty of human rights infractions, etc. It is not new, either. When Israel destroyed the Iraqi nuclear facility near Baghdad in 1981 the whole world condemned it, only to thank the Israelis 10 years later when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait and the international community came to rescue the oil fields there.

So, in order to let some human rights activists on some of the most known secrets in the world I decided to compile a short list of human rights infractions that Israel is *gasping* not involved in, yet they are still happening in our beautiful world:

• There is this small issue of a so-called genocide in Darfur, Sudan. Not sure if it is worth mentioning.
• I heard some rumors that protesters in Iran were killed and tortured by the regime, but I find it very hard to believe knowing how humanitarian they are.
• Workers in factories in China might be driven to work to death, to the point of slavery, but who wants to hear about the way his iPod/iPad was manufactured? And, besides, who lets them speak up about it?
• I can't believe it's true, but I heard claims that Turkey was involved in a genocide of their own. Naaah, can't believe them, such a nice people the Turks. Probably a Zionist propaganda this thing.
• There is a nice little island just to the west of England. For some reason, it seems that some of the settlers there are not originally Irish and the northern part is interestingly enough under British rule. I wonder when the English will remove all the settlements from Northern Ireland as Israel withdrew from Gaza in June 2005 (ah, yes, did you know that Gaza has been under Palestinian rule for the last 5 years?).
• While at it, how are the Basque and the Catalan states doing? I would really love to visit the free Catalan capitol of Barcelona soon.
• I heard the Belgians had some minor misunderstandings of human rights as well. The fact that Congo and this region is still in turmoil a century later can be attributed to the successful Belgium policy there. Hey, but human rights are not violated anymore, right? Everyone lives there peacefully?
  

This list, by the way, can go on and on forever. I just wanted to point out some matters, that in my humble opinion might be more pressing than the Israeli-Gaza conflict. After all, the people in Gaza live, eat food, get electricity, and have fresh water. All of that is due to Israel, which still supplies them with everything they need, even after 5 years of independence.