Weekendly clickables

Soon to come are little byte-link posts like at the other place. In the meantime, some things of which you ought not to be without:

• Fox News airs altered photos of NY Times reporters. Is this really true? Sounds like a hoax.
• My friends Ross, Ariel, and Silvia are temporarily in Vietnam, as apparently the Chinese government has unofficially made most expats unwelcome on its premises for the time surrounding the Olympics. It’s complicated, but they seem to be having a good time.
• Rex gets into a big argument with a commenter about “oversharing” on the internet. When my little online spats are linked on Gawker I shall be happy. Also: let’s have more smart trolls.
• Eye-popping photographs of John McCain and Barack Obama.
• Christopher Hitchens on: When the waiter pours the wine for you. Getting waterboarded (there’s a video on YouTube). And don’t even get him started about religion. Also, here’s what he said about someone who insulted John McCain: “He combines the body of an ox with the brains of a gnat. Indeed, if his brains were made of gunpowder and were to accidentally explode, the resulting bang would not even be enough to disarrange his hair.”
• Tyte is a geeky looking British bloke who has a series of beatboxing instructional videos on YouTube that are fascinating even if you have no interest in learning to beatbox yourself. Check out this one and go from there to see the others.
• In my town, it’s considered wrong to sue when an idiot at a concert throws a drumstick into the audience and hits your wife.
• Text of a 2005 university commencement address by David Foster Wallace. “So let’s talk about the single most pervasive cliché in the commencement speech genre, which is that a liberal arts education is not so much about filling you up with knowledge as it is about quote teaching you how to think.”
• A long and detailed talk on the state of cycling as transportation in the US and the world which is pretty depressing. (Thanks, Ralph.)
• New song/video by Tricky: Council Estate.
• Now if you’re the sensitive type you probably feel that I owe you an apology for that link. But perhaps what you really need is a suitable antidote. Grizzly Bear on La Blogotheque. (If you’re a GB neophyte then watch the second video first.)
• Kinsley’s proof that social security privatization won’t work. Homework: explain how he’s wrong.