The Useless Tree

Current Affairs

  • Is the US failing its children?

         Robert Samuelson has an op-ed in today’s Washington Post (which has been mis-posted; a full and clean version can be found here), "Behind the Birth Dearth," in which he discusses Ben Wattenberg’s new book, Fewer.    Wattenberg continues… Continue reading

  • …Doomed to Repeat It.

        I just have to comment on this (link via ESWN).        It seems that some students in New Zealand satirized Mao Zedong by making him a "cover girl:"           Fairly tame, and funny,… Continue reading

  • Immoral Acts of War

         Last year US marines in Haditha, Iraq, killed innocent civilians.  The numbers are still in dispute but an official investigation is due to come out soon, and one military official has stated: "This one is ugly."   And so… Continue reading

  • “We’re more popular than…”

         On March 4, 1966, a British newspaper, The Evening Standard, published a story on the Beatles, in which John Lennon made his famous quote: "We’re more popular than Jesus now…"  Controversy ensued.  Christians burned Beatles albums and demanded… Continue reading

  • Confucius in the Modern World

        An commentary ran in yesterday’s China Daily by Qin Xiaoying entitled: "Confucius can survive in this modern world."   Qin wonders why so many Confucius Institutes, which are PRC-sponsored offices for learning Chinese langauge and some "Chinese culture," are… Continue reading

  • Forgetting the Cultural Revolution

          By some historical accounts, 40 years ago today the Cultural Revolution began in China.  I say "some historical accounts" because the Cultural Revolution is a big, sweeping series of events, stretching over years, with debatable beginning and ending… Continue reading

  • Advice for Bush before his Big Speech Tonight

    The Master said: "The ancients spoke little.  They were too ashamed when their actions fell short of their words." Analects, 4.22 Continue reading

  • It’s Official: China is a Taoist, not a Confucian, Society

         Not completely: but a survey of Chinese university students, which asked them how to define "cool," suggests that their attitudes are closer to the Taoist end of the spectrum than the Confucian.  Let’s start with this excerpt: …When… Continue reading

  • The Ancients on the Web

         The new Google Trends feature provides an insight, perhaps not wholly accurate but interesting nonetheless, of what people search for on the web.  You can even compare two or more terms to see which is more widely searched. … Continue reading

  • Branding Korea: Goodbye Confucius

         The Marmot points us toward this article in the Korean Times:  The Korea Tourism Organization (KTO) and the Corea Image Communication Institute (CICI) held a forum yesterday in southern Seoul to collect opinions about a symbol with which… Continue reading