Sunday Paper Recap

A couple of things in today's paper that made us go "Hmmm":

First, it is a well-known fact that the United States has provided scads of military aid to Egypt over the years. It is also a relatively well-known fact that the Egyptian army is essentially a for-profit enterprise: In addition to providing for the common defense, the army is involved in all manner of money-making schemes. Now that the military is essentially running the country, its for-profit ventures are coming under scrutiny, especially those that are supported--whether directly or indirectly--by the foreign-aid largesse of the American government.

Whatever one thinks of the various arrangements undertaken by the Egyptian military and its American facilitators, we were struck by this tidbit:

"Last year, the American military awarded two Foreign Military Sales contracts to Chrysler in Detroit. One, for $26 million, was for 750 unassembled jeeps."

Now, according to the Jeep website, the Solipsist could purchase a 2011 Jeep Wrangler--fully assembled, we might add--for $22,045. Yet the US government is paying more than $34,000 apiece for disassembled ones.

What really upsets us is that, somehow, we know that teachers' unions are going to get blamed for this.

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Also in the news, a bill has been proposed in California that would ban the import and sale of shark fin, a prized ingredient in traditional Chinese cuisine. We can't argue with the law's sentiment: Shark fins are harvested from living sharks, which are then dumped back in the ocean where they sink to their deaths. At the same time, though, we find something ironic in the thought of great white sharks, nature's most efficient killers, needing legal protection.

Up next: The Godzilla Preservation Act.

Solipsistiography

"Egyptian Army's Business Side Blurs Lines of U.S. Miliary Aid"

"Soup Without Fins? Some Californians Simmer"