As a one time anthropologist, I got to know a bit about the rather extreme body modifications primitive people practise. The Kayan women with their permanently distorted collarbones and ribs, extreme Female Genital Mutilation in the Horn of Africa, and not least, what is called "secondary" circumcision among Australian aboriginal men (basically, slit open the urethra from the base of the penis on up, to make the penis "look like a kangaroo's").

How on earth are we to deal with "primitive" peoples and their un-modern behaviours, short of putting them in a zoo? And modern subcultures that do really nasty things to their bodies? Is it OK if the extreme body modifier is a middle class north american rebel, but bad if it someone living in a southeast asian hut? Should we civilize them? Honor them? Hold them up as objects of ridicule? Treat them as object examples in our own internal political wars?

This stuff is hard. But caging them and putting them on display does not seem particularly helpful.

I don't want to get into the whole sex/rape debate. But I do want to say, this particular male type person does not get erections when angry, scared, faced with death, or any such nonsense. Erections may have a mind of their own, and they do, but for this Y chromosome holder, that penile mind doesn't react well to fear, anger, and power trips. Just saying. (Maybe tina should pontificate just a wee bit less on how erections work.)

But back the article at hand: boxing has produced some of the best and worst athletic moments of all time. It is a deeply corrupt sport, and yet, at its best almost the most pristine. Tyson, well, whatever about his behaviour outside the ring, was a brute and monster inside it as well. He was no hero, he shocked the boxing community deeply with his almost insane aggression. I don't really see how he can be held up as any kind of hero to anybody, because what he represents isn't even a win at all costs mentality, it is gangster kill anybody in your way. There was very little science to all his wins, and he was taken down in the end by a not terribly talented boxer who refused to be intimidated and used a modicum of intelligence.

And whatever, I can see some political outrage at putting two putative rapists in a celebratory crowd, SA has its politics too, and they don't have to give a damn about what a bunch of Americans think about it.

It has nothing to do with being Aboriginal, it has to do with being a highly stressed, poverty stricken, discriminated against, and displaced marginal population. Such populations everywhere have higher rates of all diseases, not just STDs, family breakups and violence, addictions, crime, and all the rest of the ills humans are subject to. Better than medical technology interventions would be dealing with some of the stressors and social issues. But that would be a lot more expensive that handing out more pills and shots.

What I particularly enjoy about this insane deficit boosting budget is the ratio between money spent on bullets and money spent on condoms. Almost as much fun as the comparison of what US military are allowed to do and say (enhanced interrogation anyone?) vs what women's health providers are.

Sort of puts a whole new spin on "pro-life" don't it?

The democrat totals don't make any sense. For the Dems, who won a state doesn't really matter, we aren't talking Electoral College here, what counts is delegates, and this page is insanely slow to show those. You've got 99% of precincts reporting, but can't count more than 10% of the delegates?

And the caucus states, it is not correct to bow to the fiction that delegates have not been sent until the caucuses (caucusi?) meet and select delegates, pretty good estimations of that can be made before hand. Since you are willing (albeit at the deep dark dungeon of the bottom of the page) to include the stupid CNN superdelegate counts. Salon's "frequently update it" page is really not terribly useful.

But at the end of the day, I am a hard core Barak supporter, if for nothing else, simply that I fear family dynasties, and women getting into power a la Bhutto on the coattails of their family name. Obama did it all on his own, extremely unelectable name notwithstanding. (I would dearly love to see a woman do that.) Not that all is not fair in politics, but I think it is very unhealthy, the whole experience/connections thing yielding dynasties.

But my, it was a powerful thing to say. And hear.

(Me, I'm still waiting to see how my particular constituency of expat votes went. I'm betting heavily Obama, he is what the rest of the world wants in the next "Leader of the Free World" but gets no vote in.)

So Obama is showing some "experience" at manipulating the system because he know how it works? Single issue lobby groups aren't particularly loyal?

What news.

Still hanging in there with Obama.