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The increasingly inaccurately-named blog of journalist and futurist Chris Taylor. Either the most sporadically brilliant amateur blog, the most brilliantly amateur sporadic blog, or the most amateur sporadic brilliance on the Web since 2001.
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Daily Blah FAQ
Who are you?
I'm the newly-appointed Future editor at Business 2.0 and the former San Francisco correspondent for Time Magazine.
Wow, so does this mean everything you write reflects Time Inc's opinion? Or do you perhaps have some sort of standard disclaimer to the effect that it doesn't?
Naturally, the opinions contained in this blog are not those of my employers. In fact, some opinions may be the polar opposite of my employers. Some may be the same, for all I know. Hey, it's not like I ask my employers their opinions about everything in the news, okay? Let's just say that if this were a Venn diagram with one circle marked "my opinions" and the other one marked "my employers' opinions", there would doubtless be some overlap. But neither I nor my employers are able to pinpoint exactly where that overlap is.
What is this Daily Blah thing?
An experiment for a column I wrote about blogging back in December 2001. All these years later, I haven't been able to kick the habit.
Do you write any other blogs, by chance? Could that have something to do with the fact that Daily Blah isn't always Daily?
Yes -- the Future Boy blog for Business 2.0. And yes. If you want true, editorially-mandated daily coverage from me, that's probably the best place to look.
Mister, you talk funny. Are you one of them furrners?
Why yes I am, as it happens. I was born, raised and educated in Great Britain. I've been living in the U.S. since 1996 and identify as British.
I say, old chap, you forgot the "u" in "colour."
No I didn't. I may identify as British, but I am also an American journalist writing for an American audience about mostly American issues. These two different sides of me are a constant source of tension. Nevertheless, Daily Blah will adhere to American English grammar and spelling.
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Daily Blah for... Monday, April 12, 2004
Disturbing Quote of the Week
"The US troops view things in very simplistic terms. As far as they are concerned, Iraq is bandit country and everybody is out to kill them."
-- anonymous British officer, quoted on ABC Australian Radio, bemoaning the recent military crackdown
So what is that? Post-9/11 jumpiness? Too many military types who grew up watching Westerns? A lack of calm, reflective stoicism in the American character? Or simply a cross-cultural misunderstanding on the part of my countrymen? If we Brits have an Achilles heel when dealing with Americans, it is a tendency to seek the most simplistic explanation for their behavior. Pretty ironic, that.
Although in this case, I think the officer's probably right. Have you seen the private bodyguards that swarm around any official American figure in Iraq? All sunglasses and unnecessarily revealed biceps? These WWF-wannabes piss me off, never mind the Sunnis and the Shiites. It's about time the U.S. high command understood that perception is more than half the battle; it's important in Iraq as it is during an election back home.
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