How can you tell if there is or isn't a problem when there are no stats?

An interesting story about France's latest wake-up call on racism. The stories are what you might have expected in the US a few decades ago. One story reminded me of a friend here (who used to support the ridiculous "we're all equal under the law so we don't need affirmative action) also changed his name to "Laurent" to help his chances with jobs searches. Time to move forward.

When Lylia Kateb's French manager introduced her recently to the big boss, he added reassuringly: "But don't worry, she's a decent person." Despite being an Arab, was the implication.

Lylia's tale of the slights faced as a young French woman of North African descent -- even as a trained engineer -- was one of hundreds of accounts of everyday racism mailed in to Le Monde newspaper last week.

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Socialists win big in Greece

Coverage from the WSJ and the BBC. Good news, especially after the German results last week. Next year, it's Sweden's turn. Any other big European elections in the next year? Read More......

Water machines to replace bottled water?

London is the latest to jump on this new wave and it sounds great. In Paris, we have the Wallace Fountains all over (interesting history with them) and in northern Paris there are even natural spring water fountains where locals fill their water bottles with water from below the city. (Yeah, sounds a bit iffy to me too.) Having easy to use fountains with good water in commuter areas though would be a nice addition for those jumping on trains and subways.

The capital's first water stations will be set up this month in a move that could have serious repercussions for the £1.5bn-a-year bottled water industry, with companies finding it increasingly difficult to justify their carbon footprint as the quality of tap water improves.

Thames Water, Britain's largest privatised water company, with 13.6 million customers, has had talks with the Greater London Authority and Transport for London to install water machines in the capital. In the first trial, Hydrachills will be installed at Hammersmith bus station and at the Tower Bridge museum. The machines can fill bottles of up to 500ml with chilled water for a 20p charge. All proceeds will be donated to Waste Watch, a charity working to change the way people use natural resources.

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Nuit Blanche à Paris

One night a year Paris celebrates the Nuit Blanche. It means "White Night," but in French is also means "an all-nighter." The entire city erupts with outdoor cultural events, all night long (ALL night long). One such event was at St. Sulpice (Da Vinci code place). They put funky lights all over the inside of the church, and then turned off every other light. Imagine strobe lights in a confessional, and no other lights around.



Or a randomly blinking spot light on a statue of God knows who within one of those mini side-chapels the Catholics have in their big churches.



We went at 2am. Bizarre as hell. Creepy as hell. Kind of a like a Catholic haunted house, but as Philip Larkin might note, in this case real dead lie round. There were also some nice women playing with fire outside. Could only imagine doing that in the states, inside the entryway to a building that's 400 years old (if you don't count the 13th century church it was built on top of). I'll post the photos of them later (they're very cool). A quick glimpse of the fire people, below.



One weird thing, with it being 2am. The front door to the cathedral was wide open (bottom right of pic below). No one was there. Not security. No one from the church. Not the art curators. Nobody. Imagine a church in a large American city, doors wide open, pitch black inside, at 2am. Am I wrong to think the place would be cleaned out in 15 minutes, and the rest of us would be held up at gunpoint?



Young lovers were still flowing in, in the middle of the night.



Here's another of the confessional, this one in color:

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Exit polls show Greek socialists are winning, have enough margin to form govt

So a source tells me. But we know all about exit polls... ;-) Read More......

National Security Adviser: Obama won't lift gay ban until Iraq and Afghan wars finished - and even then, if there are more wars...

Never mind. Read More......

ABC on Greece elections - Socialists (the left) favored to win

But, it's not clear if they'll have enough of a majority. There may be run-offs. Don't even ask me to explain - I tried reading the Wikipedia page. Oh my God, what a confusing political system. More from Reuters. Read More......

Sunday Talk Shows Open Thread

A mixed bag of issues on the shows today. We've got a lot of foreign policy (meaning Afghanistan) with James Jones and Susan Rice from the Obama administration. Also, the House and Senate chairs of the Armed Services Committees are on CBS.

There's obviously going to be some health insurance reform chatter. Maybe we'll get some insight from Chuck Schumer. Perhaps John Cornyn, who chairs the GOP Senate campaign committee, can give us an update on Senator Ensign's significant ethical woes, which has also implicated Senator Coburn. Questions about that issue shut up Mitch McConnell.

Democratic Senators Evan Bayh and Bob Casey are on FOX News. Why? Why do Democrats appear on FOX? That network is a right-wing propaganda outfit. Its mission is to destroy Obama. And, last week, FOX exposed its homophobia, too.

The full slate is after the break.

Here's the lineup:

ABC's "This Week" — Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan; Sens. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and John Cornyn, R-Texas.
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CBS' "Face the Nation" — National security adviser James Jones; Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich.; retired Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni; Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo.
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NBC's "Meet the Press" — Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
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CNN's "State of the Union" — Jones; Sens. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and Jon Kyl, R-Ariz.; Gov. Jennifer Granholm, D-Mich.

"Fox News Sunday" _ Sens. Evan Bayh, D-Ind., Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., and Bob Casey, D-Pa.

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The Velvet Underground-Sunday Morning

Glorious ride yesterday with slightly cooler temperatures in the morning. The bike routes near the Longchamp race track are normally big open spaces but thanks to the stinkin' Qatar something-or-other race, roads were blocked so we had to jump on a busier than preferred road. If it wasn't for my riding partner I would have been lost about 20 times but Hank knows every path around the Bois de Boulogne after living nearby a few decades ago.

Heading out now for the 5K cancer charity walk. Our friend Jane is going through chemo right now but she's found a way to stuff herself with food (despite it tasting like paste thanks to the chemo) and is running the 10K. We're meeting her husband EOL and their son Evan for the walk. Read More......

Mugabe welcomes back familiar face

Which of course, is not good news for Zimbabwe. AFP:

Zimbabwe's former information minister, reputed to be the mastermind behind Zimbabwe's harsh media laws, has rejoined President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF, the party said Friday.

Jonathan Moyo, currently Zimbabwe's sole independent lawmaker, had been welcomed back into the fold, said Ephraim Masawi, ZANU-PF spokesman.

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US behind Japan, France, Germany, Italy, Britain, Spain, Taiwan, Korea, China and now Russia in use of high-speed rail

The US is expected to have its first high-speed rail train, perhaps, in 2020. We're falling behind, folks. We've fallen behind. Read More......