I'm getting ready to put some verbs in my sentences.

This is hilarious, in a painful way: U.S. Concerned as Iraq Awards Power Contracts to Iran and China.

The expansion of ties between Iraq and Iran comes as the United States and Iran clash on nuclear issues and about what American officials have repeatedly said is Iranian support for armed groups in Iraq. American officials have charged that Iranians, through the international military wing known as the Quds Force, are particularly active in support of elite elements of the Mahdi Army, a militia largely controlled by Mr. Sadr.

“We are of course carefully watching Iran’s overall presence here in Iraq,” the military official said. “As you know, it’s not always as it appears. Their Quds Force routinely uses the cover of a business to mask their real purpose as an intelligence operative.”

“This is a free marketplace, so there’s not much we can do about it,” the official said.

At the same time, it is possible to view Iranian and Chinese investment as giving those countries a stake in Iraqi stability. The power plants could also boost a troubled reconstruction effort in Iraq. An American Embassy spokesman said, “We welcome any efforts to help develop Iraq’s energy infrastructure.”

“These proposals reflect the ongoing business opportunities that are arising in Iraq that American firms should be competing for,” said the spokesman, who asked not to be named because of standard protocol at the embassy.

Sigh. 

I identify with Hong Kong; this is why my senior thesis is what it is.

Resistance is immanent to power in the sense that the power mechanism engenders its very own transgression.  it is commonplace to say that colonialism produces a compulsive attachment to national roots.  In Hong Kong's historical context, however, colonialism has shielded the Chinese people living in the city from chauvinistic and violent outbursts of patriotic feeling, such as the Cultural Revolution in mainland China during the 1960s and 1970s; colonialism also has allowed Hong Kong Chinese to take up an abstract nationalist cause without directly and collectively participating in sociopolitical movements or paying the heavy political price that their counterparts in the mainland and Taiwan must pay.

Tsui, in his reinvented Wong Fei-Hung series, manages to take advantage of Hong Kong's in-between position by letting nationalism and colonialism play against each other.

- Kwai-Cheung Lo: "Knocking Off Nationalism in Hong Kong Cinema: Woman and the Chinese 'Thing' in Tsui Hark's Films" in Camera Obscura

one sentence (one moment of your time):

Lisey has three sisters, one of whom is kooky, and at times ''Lisey's Story'' feels like ''The Ya-Ya Sisterhood Goes to Hell.''

on the power of positive thinking

Green:  No wonder they call her the most hated bitch in America.
Cassidy:  You mean woman, right?
Green:  No, I mean bitch.
- Law & Order

The community ourhappyknees says: not many things in the world these days make you smile, so why not think about the good things?  in this community we would like to see the things that make you happy, for instance: - a fabulous thrift store find; - drawings, photographs, recipes, poems, pretty things; - songs, outfits, books, and many more creative ideas!   Their second rule is: nothing negative!  we hear enough of that. 

Aside from their ridiculous philosophy, I am quite puzzled by their definition of happiness-inducing things.  A fabulous thrift store find?  Outfits?  Pretty things?  If it weren't for the decidedly "funky" disposition, I would have thought they were a front for Bloomingdale's.  It does explain, however, the intense preoccupation of the pseudo-perfect girls - the ones who seem like they might be faking their intelligence, who are usually not out of high school - with polaroids, organic jam, and American Apparel.  The really perfect girls don't even talk about things that can be identified in the concrete world, except for Anaïs Nin and Johannesburg.  No, these are the girls who want to be seen as intellectual, cool, sweet, sincere.  Their camwhore pictures usually don't look the camera in the eye. 

Here are some more samples, from the community, of the good things in life: saturday mornings, morning sunshine, nice books, little gifts, fresh bread and pastries, organized desks, letter-writing, their pets, socks.  The Perks of Being a Wallflower - no joke.

I'm more inclined to believe the other, less intellectual and abstract entries: roses from my boyfriend, knowing my family will always support my musical ambitions, my nephew, my best friend. 

They feel so different from what I would list:  the smosh music videos to Mortal Kombat, watching Independence Day while eating kettle corn; outsmarting other political science majors when in the presence of Professor Cooley; seeing how many lines of Lord of the Rings I can say along with the characters; looking for negative book reviews; infuriating myself by researching Christopher Paolini and the like; watching DBZ AMVs while listening to Hole; making fun of Smallville and Supernatural.  A lot of what I would list would be considered negative by these people (yet it makes me happy - does that mean I'm abnormal or defective?).  But I also take joy in a story that I suspect most of these people would hate: "A Good Man is Hard to Find", by Flannery O'Connor, in which the grandmother, obsessed with the good old days "that only exist in the minds of us conservatives" (to quote the Simpsons), desperately keeps telling the serial killer that's killing her family that she knows he is good on the inside, he looks good, he looks like he came from good people.  And the serial killer essentially tells her, polite as ever, much thanks, but he is definitely not good.  Then he kills her.

The world isn't beautiful, nor is it ugly.  It just sort of is.  Of course, some happiness is nice, but discomfort is necessary (and this applies to me and my perverted list of things that make me happy too... I still have to look outside of that, deviate from that).  Otherwise you're not going to see the things that make you displeased, the negative things, and you're going to start believing they don't exist, at least to rationalize your ignorance.  And then you won't do anything about them.  And then they'll just keep being negative and ugly, and you'll be sitting in your little enclave of cross-stiched happiness, when the world ends, a waste of space and energy, and the people who could have used your help will be wishing you were never born, that someone with the capacity to stomach ugly things were born instead.

Maybe we should organize an exchange program.  People in these communities should go on an exchange program that lasts for the rest of their lives with people who are, say, living in a civil war, or in destitute poverty (or in North Korea).  And then we'll see if what really makes them happy is living in a capitalist, first-world democracy, or if they're just happy, happy people on the inside.  If it's the latter, then all the better - the people they'll have exchanged lives with will no doubt appreciate the chance to live in a first-world democracy.

Hey, I actually found a quote on a users' (joint account?  whatever) userinfo I agree with.  Amazing.  Ironically, the user(s) is a "friend" of one of those pseudo-perfect girls, although she's of a more ambitious breed, more Robyn Schneider-ish.  So although she still likes to write about how happy and lovely things are, they do have a sharper edge, because she got herself to NYU. 

There are all sorts of things that would be comforting. I expect an injection of morphine would be comforting – it might be more comforting, for all I know. But to say that something is comforting is not to say that it's true.
-Richard Dawkins

Apparently he's a biologist.  Darwin's Rottweiler.  Figures.