Increasingly I hear about people who are reading British newspapers because: 1. people can read news online and 2. British newspapers are in English. The Internet has ratcheted English up another notch as a lingua franca. In France, the preposterous Academie Francaise (think of the DMV run by philosophy professors) is fighting a losing battle against the rise of English. It creates mandated alternative words for things like ‘le Walkman’ (‘le Baladeur’), which nobody really uses and enforces laws which dictate that websites in France must not be only in English. Preservation of cultural diversity is a noble cause, but global heterogeneity does not stem from enforced regional homogeneity. i.e. instead of artificially propping up a language, how about promoting French culture and ideas? At this time more than ever it is important that France communicates its views to a wider audience – and on the web that means English…

Martin Amis had a character in a novel who was always smoking. In order to avoid having to write when the character lit a cigarette or drew a puff, he stated that the character was always smoking unless he stated otherwise. In order to avoid me writing or anyone having to read a huge tirade explaining my fickle view on the war, assume that I am in pefect agreement with whatever Richard Dawkins says. I’ll inform if otherwise. Dawkins’ post 911 article News about Dawkins The World of Richard Dawkins

The consumate diplomat, Bill Clinton vicariously supports the war by defending Blair. On the one hand too bad someone with his political skills isn’t in the White House. On the other, remember that operation Desert Fox, which had the undeclared aim of taking out Saddam, failed, leaving Clinton to stall over Iraq as the Lewinsky affair distracted both himself and the US. Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Bill Clinton: Trust Tony’s judgment

Tomorrow’s parliamentary vote in the UK will be a test of how much trouble Blair is in. The Independent has a handy guide to how to interpret the number of Blair’s own party voting against the government, my guess is around 125 will: “FEWER THAN 100 a relief for Mr Blair, who could claim the tide had turned his way since last month’s vote. MORE THAN 121 the biggest Commons rebellion by members of a governing party. 132 OR MORE a body blow to Mr Blair, as it would mean he could not command the support of more than half of Labour backbenchers. 173 OR MORE danger signals flashing for Mr Blair as, depending on the number of abstentions, he would have to rely on the votes of Tory MPs to win a Commons majority. Mr Blair could be in jeopardy if the war went badly. 206 OR MORE meltdown…

Regarding Gulf War II: “The only debate in the U.S. media is on the Web, according to Jon Dennis, Guardian Unlimited deputy news editor. ‘Weblogs are doing all the work that the U.S. media did in the past,’ he said.” Poynter Online – E-Media Tidbits