Below are simple links to other interesting stuff I've come across on the web in the last day or two; they may or may not concern literature or photography, or indeed the arts at all. You can click here to learn more about how I compile this list and what software I use, if you're interested.

Regarding the post-Bush "one-party bipartisanship"
A recent editorial in the Kansas City Star agrees with what I've been predicting for the last nine months now; that in the wake of the GOP paleocon meltdown of the Bush years, we are more and more becoming a society being ruled by just one party, with it in actuality now being the liberal Democrats versus conservative Democrats making the real decisions that govern the US, and angry screaming Republicans being left out of the decision-making process entirely. There's a historical precedent for this too -- just look at the way the old Federalist party fell apart after the War of 1812 (after supporting the British in that conflict, and being branded traitors after the US won the war), and how for almost 50 years it was actually the liberal versus conservative members of the other party (the "Democratic Republicans," who eventually split during the Civil War into our modern Democrats and Republicans) who essentially made all the decisions. The wingnuts can scream and yell all they want; but when you take a close look at who's actually drafting and passing the literal laws in this country right now, you'll see that the debate has shifted almost entirely to people who identify themselves as Democrats, whether liberal or moderate in nature.

Joe Wilson once belonged to a white supremacist group
Did you know that Joe Wilson (the guy who screamed "You lie!" during President Obama's speech last week) was once a paying member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans? And did you know that in 2006, white supremacists took over the executive board of this once benign organization (they started as a group of Civil War re-enactors) and turned it into a front for a new version of the Ku Klux Klan? And did you know that it still isn't clear whether Wilson continued to pay his dues and be an active member even after the group became a white supremacist one? No, neither did I! Now, to be fair, there's no proof that he remained a member after the organization turned into a hate group, although no proof that he quit either; but let's not forget, this is also the man who spearheaded the campaign in 2000 to keep the Confederate flag flying above the South Carolina state capital, and who has been quoted as saying in public, "The Confederate heritage is very honorable." Maybe there's some truth to the charges that his outburst during Obama's speech last week was partly motivated by racism?

Buenos Aires is rapidly becoming one of the world's great tech hubs
A fascinating article from the always great GlobalPost.com, on the ways that Argentinean city Buenos Aires is rapidly becoming the tech-startup capital of South America, and also one of the most "wired" cities on the planet.

Roger Corman to receive lifetime achievement Oscar
And thus does the fourth sign of the Apocalypse come to pass.

Harley-Davidson enters India motorcycle market
Interesting article on motorcycle manufacturer Harley-Davidson's recent entry into the crowded India market (there are already 100 million bikes on the road there as we speak), including the fact that the extra-heavy "hogs" couldn't even be ridden on most roads there until recent years, what with their government's newfound emphasis on long-distance infrastructure and heavy-duty highways.

Google teaches you how to free your data from Google
Did you know that the snarky-sounding "Google Data Liberation Front" is actually funded and run by Google itself? The group exists to teach people how to make local backups on their home computers of all their important Google data, including old emails, blog posts, online documents and more; and along the way, they also teach you how to easily import such data from other online services. This is an incredibly important thing, for those of you who aren't yet doing this; if you run a personal blog, for example, and wish to hold onto your posts for future reference, you should absolutely be backing up those posts to a home-based hard drive on a regular basis.

Flickr now lets you build virtual galleries of other people's photos
This is such a cool idea, I almost taught myself Flickr's API a few years ago so I could build it myself, but now don't have to; Flickr is now officially offering a new service there called "galleries," in which users can now creates bundles of up to 18 themed photos, picked freely from the two billion-odd public images now in their database. Just like how YouTube lets anyone become an amateur film editor, think of this as an opportunity for anyone to become an amateur exhibition curator, an activity that I think a lot of people out there will have a tremendous amount of fun doing. I'll certainly be building my own galleries there soon!

Are conservative muckrakers finally learning the lessons of credible journalists?
Say what you will about their motivations, but it's hard not to be impressed by amateur investigative journalists James O'Keefe and Hannah Giles' flat-out busts recently of multiple ACORN offices; and by following the traditional rules of legitimate journalism (provide factual evidence, make this evidence public for close scrutiny, corroborate your story multiple times before going public), for one of the first times in history they have provided fodder for conservative muckrakers that absolutely cannot be denied or blown off by their detractors. Here, an intriguing article recently published at Tina Brown's "The Daily Beast," on whether this signals the beginning of a new era of legitimate evidence-gathering on the part of the conservative right, and a decline soon in the amount of fact-free wingnut conspiracy theories.

Two nerdy Muslims document 30 New York mosques in 30 days
A fascinating project by two nerdy, videogame-playing Muslims in New York, who spent this past Ramadan visiting thirty urban mosques in thirty days, then blogging their experiences. Surprisingly charming, no matter what your personal religious beliefs.

Sarkozy: "It's time to measure national economic health by more than just GDP"
This is bigger news than I think a lot of people realize: Last week, French President Nicholas Sarkozy went on record saying that simply tracking the gross domestic product of a nation might no longer be the best way to judge the economic health of that nation, in light of the recent global financial meltdown, but that we should also be factoring in what he calls the "politics of civilization" -- the quality of public services, the amount of family time the average worker has, and other factors that in the past have seemed unimportant to traditional economists. Here, CCLaP friend Pete Anderson takes a closer look at Sarkozy's speech, and adds some thoughts of his own.