Well, not totally unexpected but still an interesting development

Most recent and possibly the last successful Liberal leader speculates about Liberal/NDP merger.

The problem with letting one author modernize Shakespeare

Is that they will all want to do it.

Oddly paralleling a discussion in email: are NASA's two flagship programs exampels of Plan Bs?

From an old article

I was just reading Freeman Dyson's collection of essays, FROM EROS TO GAIA, and he touches on the processes that led to the shuttle being, as he called it, a turkey. If I recall correctly, that was in an essay from 1988.

The interesting bit, and I am not going to say that this gospel but just something that seems like it should be a story seed, is that communities faced with a choice between Plan A (a low prestige, low cost, fast, reliable pay-off project) and Plan B (its high-cost, time-consuming* and probably doomed cousin) will generally pick the latter. Sure, you might end up with a telescope made from used battleships in a region known for its cloud cover but the people making the decisions won't be using it and may well gain personal prestige from being associated with the shiny new program.

And from physorg:

The cost of NASA's two flagship programs - a new space telescope and its next rocket - is poised to devour much of the agency's shrinking budget in coming years, putting at risk everything from efforts to develop futuristic spacecraft to returning rocks from Mars, scientists and congressional insiders warn.

This will probably not be much like the Robert van Gulik Judge Dee novels

Free to a good home

The Boy of Steel: The Adventures of Stalin When He was A Teen! by, oh, whoever of the appropriate DC writers would be most funny. Did Robert Kanigher ever do Superboy?

Predictable

Harper says 'Islamicism' biggest threat to Canada
Prime minister says Conservatives will bring back controversial anti-terrorism laws

I believe Subterranean is in error here

Seen over on Subterranean's site:

I can't get the formatting to look not-ugly:

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If it wasn't probably copy-righted, I'd be quoting Charlotte Bronte: Stand-up Comedian

Chris Sims' FunkyWatch: August's Most Depressing (and Confusing) 'Funky Winkerbean' Strips