"The 15 months following the pope's elevation marked the high tide of Soviet communism and the nadir of the free world's post-Vietnam collapse. It was a time of one defeat after another. Vietnam invaded Cambodia, consolidating Soviet hegemony over all of Indochina. The Khomeni revolution swept away America's strategic anchor in the Middle East. Nicaragua fell to the Sandinistas, the first Soviet-allied regime on the mainland of the Western Hemisphere. (As an unnoticed but ironic coda, Marxists came to power in Grenada too.)" C. Krauthammer, April 3rd editorial
This right wing cripple seems to suggest that the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia was in some way a bad thing when in fact they were overthrowing Pol Pot's murderous regime. Khomeni overthrew the despotic Shah, whom we installed after killing the democratically elected leader of Iran. The vile dictator Somosa fell to the Sandinistas. And Grenada was a pathetic joke. It would seem that Krauthammer is saying that the deposing of some of the worst dictators in recent memory was somehow a defeat for the USA.
Friday, April 15, 2005
Khmer New Year
Excerpted from www.khmer440.com (I didn't write this)
So there I was (in the words of Martin Luther ‘I could do no other’), sitting in one of my favourite male orientated drinking establishments a couple of nights ago. The clock had chimed twelve and the bar was being run by a skeleton staff of one, and that one person really wished that she was in whooping it up in Svay Rieng rather than filling my glass with Bier Laos in Phnom Penh. ‘’It’s a special day now,’’ I offered up in the way of conversation. ‘’Yes it is,’’ replied the dusky waitress, with just the hint of a smile forming around her full Khmer lips. This part time university student paying for her studies through drink pouring was a full blooded Khmer from the boonies with the delightful lack of guile, large faun like eyes and the deep brown complexion that differentiates her provincial compatriots from their fairer skinned pointier nosed, mixed race Sino-Khmer brethren to be found so abundantly in Phnom Penh.
‘’It’s a very special day,’’ she emphasised. ‘’Of course,’’ I responded. ‘’It’s Thai New Year.’’ Sarcasm doesn’t go down so well in Cambodia and those full eyes narrowed. Nevertheless, she cheered up sufficiently to allow me to take her out for a late supper after work (small shellfish cooked with basil in case you’re interested) and now she really is in Svay Rieng back in the bosom of her family as all Khmers hanker to be at this most important time of the year. Yet, even as we hunted for a 2am noodle stall the water throwing idiocy made famous and typified by Thailand’s Songran had kicked off on a smaller scale in Phnom Penh. And guess what? The Khmer’s were innocent. It was the drunken deathpats, pantsniffers and other assorted white loudmouths who were tossing buckets of water onto passers by around the strip adjacent to the Heart of Darkness. For a second I considered cracking a hammer into the skull of the nearest deathpat, staying around just long enough to watch the blood pour from his head and blend in with the spilled water while his limbs malfunctioned and shuddered in a grotesque dance of death. Instead I did a 180 turn and found a quiet little noodle stall near Monivong and around the corner from the Billabong Hotel.
continue at www.khmer440.com
Gladhands/Brickbats etx to peter@khmer440.com
So there I was (in the words of Martin Luther ‘I could do no other’), sitting in one of my favourite male orientated drinking establishments a couple of nights ago. The clock had chimed twelve and the bar was being run by a skeleton staff of one, and that one person really wished that she was in whooping it up in Svay Rieng rather than filling my glass with Bier Laos in Phnom Penh. ‘’It’s a special day now,’’ I offered up in the way of conversation. ‘’Yes it is,’’ replied the dusky waitress, with just the hint of a smile forming around her full Khmer lips. This part time university student paying for her studies through drink pouring was a full blooded Khmer from the boonies with the delightful lack of guile, large faun like eyes and the deep brown complexion that differentiates her provincial compatriots from their fairer skinned pointier nosed, mixed race Sino-Khmer brethren to be found so abundantly in Phnom Penh.
‘’It’s a very special day,’’ she emphasised. ‘’Of course,’’ I responded. ‘’It’s Thai New Year.’’ Sarcasm doesn’t go down so well in Cambodia and those full eyes narrowed. Nevertheless, she cheered up sufficiently to allow me to take her out for a late supper after work (small shellfish cooked with basil in case you’re interested) and now she really is in Svay Rieng back in the bosom of her family as all Khmers hanker to be at this most important time of the year. Yet, even as we hunted for a 2am noodle stall the water throwing idiocy made famous and typified by Thailand’s Songran had kicked off on a smaller scale in Phnom Penh. And guess what? The Khmer’s were innocent. It was the drunken deathpats, pantsniffers and other assorted white loudmouths who were tossing buckets of water onto passers by around the strip adjacent to the Heart of Darkness. For a second I considered cracking a hammer into the skull of the nearest deathpat, staying around just long enough to watch the blood pour from his head and blend in with the spilled water while his limbs malfunctioned and shuddered in a grotesque dance of death. Instead I did a 180 turn and found a quiet little noodle stall near Monivong and around the corner from the Billabong Hotel.
continue at www.khmer440.com
Gladhands/Brickbats etx to peter@khmer440.com
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