It’s both depressing and hilarious to hear what educators do in the name of “self-esteem’: Houston schools trying to boost self-esteem.

ATHENS (Reuters) – Iran’s world judo champion Arash Miresmaeili refused to compete against an Israeli Sunday, triggering a fresh crisis at the Olympic Games where race, creed or color are not allowed to interfere with sport.

“This is a general policy of our country to refrain from competing against athletes of the Zionist regime and Arash Miresmaeili has observed this policy,” [the Iranian National Olympic Committee in Tehran ] said.

I wonder how the IOC will deal with this, given the anti-Semitism predominant in Europe.

My first car: a ’99 Ford Taurus SE:
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MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Four members of a family have been arrested and charged with murder for allegedly killing and eating a relative during a wedding reception — and serving his flesh to unwitting party guests, police have said.
(From the Agitator.)

A bunch of countries from Europe are sending “observers” to the U.S. to tell us whether American elections are fair. A number of them have recently experienced civil war, massive election fraud, and de-facto dictatorships. Virtually all oppose the policies of the current administration.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — A team of international observers will monitor the presidential election in November, according to the U.S. State Department.
The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe was invited to monitor the election by the State Department. The observers will come from the OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights.
It will be the first time such a team has been present for a U.S. presidential election.
“The U.S. is obliged to invite us, as all OSCE countries should,” spokeswoman Urdur Gunnarsdottir said. “It’s not legally binding, but it’s a political commitment. They signed a document 10 years ago to ask OSCE to observe elections.”
Thirteen Democratic members of the House of Representatives, raising the specter of possible civil rights violations that they said took place in Florida and elsewhere in the 2000 election, wrote to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan in July, asking him to send observers.

Wondering what I’ve been doing for the last three weeks? Read this.

Update: more photos.