Sacre Bleu! – Er, Make That Red White And Bleu!

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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There has been a lot of activity in France lately concerning the United States government spying on three French Presidents.

The current President of France even called an emergency meeting of the Conseil de la Défense, the country’s highest national security forum to discuss the emergence of documents that appear to implicate the US National Security Agency (NSA) – now who’da guessed that? –  spying on Jacques Chirac and Nicolas Sarkozy, who ruled France from 1995 to 2012.

The documents further indicate that the NSA may have also targeted the personal communications of Francois Hollande, France’s current head of state.

The files were published by WikiLeaks, which described them as “top secret intelligence reports and technical documents”, detailing NSA spying operations against the French presidency, as well as espionage directed at several French government ministers and at France’s ambassador to the US.

The documents include intelligence briefs, which detail the thoughts and diplomatic maneuvers by French presidents and other senior officials, on subjects such as the Greek economic crisis, the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, and the United Nations.

This is further evidence of more disgraceful and arrogant behavior by US spy agencies.

The thing is, however, no one is surprised any more.

Since Edward Snowden’s revelations the world has come to expect illegal and bad behavior from Americans. It is as simple as that. And for the reputations of Americans it is as bad as that. Which is a great pity because these activities do not represent in any way the vast majority of the American people.

So, if they aren’t a surprise to anyone, will the latest revelations cause trouble between America and France? I think the undoubted answer is “Oui”, but only a “petit oui”.

As befits normal protocol in these kinds of things, the American ambassador to France was summoned for what was called ‘an official protest’, but little or nothing more happened apart from President Obama getting on the phone with the French President, groveling and apologizing and assuring him in no uncertain terms “that the US is no longer spying on France”.

No, I don’t believe him either, but there it is.

There was no need for America’s snooping. As with Germany, French and American intelligence agencies cooperate with each other regularly. They jointly monitor international issues of mutual concern, such as what is happening in Syria, Iraq, the Ukraine, Libya, and even the financial catastrophe that is Greece.

For now that will continue, but the road ahead looks bumpy.

Wikileaks has already made good on its promise that its “French readers can expect more timely and important revelations in the near future”.

The latest release from the whistleblower website contains more documents that indicate that the National Security Agency (NSA), under orders from Washington, were tasked with collecting secret information not only about the economic policies of the French government and the country’s financial sector, but on export contracts by French companies.

In fact every French-registered company involved in negotiations for international projects or other sales contracts valued at over $200 million, like car makers Peugeot and Renault and financial institutions like BNP Paribas and the agricultural credit union, were also subjected to US government secret snooping.

Washington’s pathetic statements that none of this information is ever used to benefit American companies competing for international contracts rings mighty hollow with the French, and the rest of the world come to that.

This latest information is a lot more damning and may necessitate a much stronger response from the French – even if it is just to save face.

Like their attitude over the invasion of Iraq, I think any further reaction would include little or no cooperation in any future American interventions in the Middle East and maybe the use of a veto or two in the United Nations.

We might be at the start of a new meaning to the term “non” cooperation?

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A Right Old Mess!

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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It seems there is no end to the political hypocrisy that has taken over our well surveilled world.

I wrote a post a few days ago about the Belgian government wanting Skype to hand over confidential customer data. I called it ‘Taking A Swipe At Skype’ (if you want to read it click here )

In a previous post called, ‘What Is The German Word For Hypocrite?’ (if you want to read that one click here) I had a bit of rant against the hypocrisy of Germen Chancellor Angela Merkel who professed great anxiety publicly about the Americans snooping in on her phone calls while she and her intelligence agencies were in cahoots with the US to spy on other European countries.

Now a week or so later the two stories have merged with yet another piece of hypocrisy, this time by the Belgians who have announced that they are starting an official investigation into allegations that Belgium’s telecommunications networks were spied on by a consortium of German and American intelligence agencies.

In other words, it is okay for the Belgians to snoop on Skype users, but not okay when someone else wants to snoop on the Belgians.

If that’s not another good example of hypocrisy I don’t know what is.

Specifically the targets in Belgian sights are the United States National Security Agency and Germany’s Bundesnach-richtendienst (BND) and an operation that they referred to as ‘EIKONAL’.

The Belgians found out about the snooping when Austrian politician Peter Pilz blew his whistle at a press conference in Bern, Switzerland, saying that EIKONAL had targeted European telecommunications carriers for at least four years, from 2005 to 2008.

Spokesmen for the Belgian government have said that if the alleged espionage is confirmed, it would have “not only legal implications, but will also affect relations between Belgium, Germany and the US”. It also threatened to “take appropriate action” but didn’t specify what that would be – they probably don’t know yet.

Needless to say, the governments of Switzerland and the Netherlands were not amused by the revelations either and immediately launched their own investigations into this thing called ‘EIKONAL’.

It’s all turning into what they call “a right old mess”.

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What Is The German Word For Hypocrite?

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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Remember the big furor a while ago when Edward Snowden revealed that American intelligence agencies had been spying on their friends and allies as well as their enemies? I even commented on it myself here and there.

One of the politicians most outraged by the unwanted and unnecessary snooping was German Chancellor Angela Merkel. “Spying among friends, that’s not all right at all,” she said very publicly in 2013. And in July last year in an unprecedented move she expelled, from Germany the CIA station chief, who in plain language is the top American spy in the country.

The German media jumped all over it too, with heavy moralizing tones and whipping up the German public’s natural reaction against what America had been caught doing.

Hmmmm.

That was good stuff.

At least it would have been, but for more recent revelations that Germany’s own spy agency, the BND, have for years been collaborating with America’s National Security Agency (NSA) in spying on Germany’s friends in Paris and Brussels.

What???

Yes, you read it correctly.

While Merkel was whining on about privacy this, and privacy that, her spooks were operating hand in glove with the Americans to spy on supposed friends. And Merkel knew it. As Chancellor she is in charge of overseeing what the BND is up to.

And specifically what the NSA was up to was using the electronic eavesdropping facilities of the BND in Bad Aibling, a town in Bavaria, by giving the Germans phone numbers, search terms or internet addresses they wanted to monitor. The scale of the snooping was huge. In 2013 alone, the Americans snooped in on 690,000 phone numbers and 7.8m search terms.

As investigations and revelations continue we will no doubt hear phrases like “national security’ and ‘terrorist threats’ being cited as the reasons for all this snooping being necessary. That would be fine if it were true. But it isn’t.

The thing that negates all the good elements that those who have been caught red-handed and red-faced will try to emphasize now that the proverbial cat is out of the bag are revelations that the American snoops were also targeting certain commercial companies which, if true is industrial espionage and nothing to do with terrorism.

Airbus, the European aircraft maker and chief rival to America’s Boeing, has already filed a criminal suit with German prosecutors and demanded clarification from the German government.

Of course that doesn’t mean they’ll get it. Since these revelations a lot of ass-covering has started. Several investigations are apparently underway, investigations that will find whatever the government wants them to find. In other words they will only reveal what they think they have to and little else.

So to answer the question posed in the title of today’s post, ‘Heuchler’ is apparently the German word for hypocrite. So ‘Heuchlers’ they are!

Auf Wiedersehen.

Until tomorrow.

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Significant Number Factoid Friday – Today The Number Had To Be 1776

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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Hello everyone.

And a very happy Fourth of July to everyone, particularly my American friends.

Independence Day again, and no sign of invading spaceships so I’m assuming its safe to do another number factoid.

And what else could it be today other than 1776, the year America became an independent nation.

Here we go.

Enjoy

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And where else to start but with….

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American Revolutionary War

• On January 1^st, 1776 Gen George Washington hoisted the Continental Union Flag. The same day the town of Norfolk, Virginia, was destroyed by the combined actions of the British Royal Navy and occupying Patriot forces.
• On Jan 5^th the Assembly of New Hampshire adopts its 1st state constitution.
• On January 10^th Thomas Paine published his pamphlet Common Sense “written by an Englishman” in Philadelphia arguing for independence from British rule in what were then the Thirteen Colonies.

• On Jan 16^th the Continental Congress approves enlistment of free blacks.
• On February 27^th Scottish North Carolina Loyalists charge across Moore’s Creek bridge near Wilmington to attack what they mistakenly believed to be a small force of rebels. Several loyalist leaders are killed in the ensuing battle. The patriot victory virtually ended all British authority in the province.
• On March 2^nd and 3^rd the American Continental Navy and Marines made a successful assault on Nassau, Bahamas, and in the Battle of the Rice Boats, American Patriots resisted the Royal Navy on the Savannah River effectively ending British control over the Province of Georgia.
• On March 4^th American Patriots capture Dorchester Heights thereby dominating the port of Boston, Massachusetts. Threatened by the Patriot cannons on Dorchester Heights, the British evacuate Boston on March 17^th.
• On April 12^th the Royal Colony of North Carolina produced the Halifax Resolves making it the first British colony officially to authorize its Continental Congress delegates to vote for independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain.
• On May 4^th Rhode Island became the first American colony to renounce allegiance to King George III of Great Britain.
• On June 7^th Richard Henry Lee of Virginia proposed to the Second Continental Congress (meeting in Philadelphia) that “these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states.”
• On June 11^th the Continental Congress appointed a Committee of Five to draft a Declaration of Independence.

• On June 12^th the Virginia Declaration of Rights by George Mason was adopted by the Virginia Convention of Delegates and three days later on June 15^th the Delaware General Assembly voted to suspend government under the British Crown.
• On July 2^nd the final (despite minor revisions) U.S. Declaration of Independence was written. The Continental Congress passed the Lee Resolution.
• And as we all know, on July 4^th the United States Declared Independence: The Continental Congress ratified the declaration by the United States of its independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain.
• On July 8^th the Liberty Bell rang in Philadelphia for the first public reading of the Declaration of Independence and the following day an angry mob in New York City toppled the equestrian statue of George III of Great Britain in Bowling Green.

• On August 2^nd most of the American colonies ratify the Declaration of Independence.
• On August 15^th the first Hessian troops land on Staten Island to join British forces.
• On August 27^th in the Battle of Long Island, Washington’s troops were routed in Brooklyn by British under William Howe.
• On September 1^st the Cherokee Nation was invaded by 6,000 patriot troops from Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina begins. The troops destroyed thirty-six Cherokee towns.
• On September 7^th saw the world’s first submarine attack when the American submersible craft Turtle attempted to attach a time bomb to the hull of British Admiral Richard Howe’s flagship HMS Eagle in New York Harbor.
• On September 11^th an abortive peace conference took place between British and Americans on Staten Island.
• On September 15^th British troops landed on Manhattan at Kips Bay.
• On September 16^th in the Battle of Harlem Heights, the Continental Army under Washington are victorious against the British on Manhattan.
• On September 22^nd the British hanged spy Nathan Hale in New York City for espionage.
• The following month, on October 11^th on Lake Champlain near Valcour Island, a British fleet led by Sir Guy Carleton defeated 15 American gunboats commanded by Brigadier General Benedict Arnold. Although nearly all of Arnold’s ships are destroyed, the two day-long battle gave Patriot forces enough time to prepare defenses of New York City.
• On October 18^th in the Battle of Pell’s Point, forces of the American Continental Army resisted a British and Hessian force in The Bronx, whilst on October 28 in the Battle of White Plains, British forces attacked and captured Chatterton Hill from the Americans.
• On October 26^th Benjamin Franklin departed from America for France on a mission to seek French support for the American Revolution.

• The last day of that month, October 31^st saw King George III make his first speech before British Parliament since the Declaration of Independence that summer, in which in perhaps the understatement of the year, told the British Parliament that all was not going well for Britain in the war with the United States.
• On November 16^th Hessian mercenaries under Lieutenant General Wilhelm von Knyphausen captured Fort Washington from the American Continentals. The captain of the American navy ship Andrew Doria fired a salute to the Dutch flag on Fort Orange and Johannes de Graaff answers with eleven gun shots.
• On December 7^th the Marquis de Lafayette attempted to enter the American military as a major general.
• And on December 21^st the Royal Colony of North Carolina reorganizes into the State of North Carolina after adopting its own constitution. Richard Caswell becomes the first governor of the newly formed state.
• On December 23^rd Thomas Paine, living with Washington’s troops, began publishing The American Crisis, containing the stirring phrase, “These are the times that try men’s souls.”
• At Christmas 1776, Gen. George Washington ordered the first issue of The Crisis to be read to his troops on Christmas Eve, then at 6 p.m. all 2600 of them march to McKonkey’s Ferry, crossed the Delaware River and land on the Jersey bank at 3 a.m.
• And finally December 26^th saw the Battle of Trenton, in which Washington’s troops surprised and defeated the 1500 Hessian troops under the command of Col. Johann Rall outside Trenton, taking 948 prisoners while suffering only 5 wounded.

 

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In other things and other places in 1776

• The year 1776 was a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar and a leap year starting on Friday of the 11-day slower Julian calendar.
• In Roman Numerals 1776 is written as MDCCLXXVI.
• On January 2^nd Austria ended interrogation torture
• On February 17^th Edward Gibbon published the first volume of his famous work, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.

• On March 9^th Scottish economist Adam Smith published The Wealth of Nations in London.
• On March 28^th Juan Bautista de Anza found the site for the Presidio of San Francisco.
• On April 15^th the Duchess of Kingston was found guilty of bigamy.
• On May 1^st Adam Weishaupt founded the Illuminati in Ingolstadt, Bavaria.
• On June 17^th Lt. Jose Joaquin Moraga leads a band of colonists from Monterey Presidio, landing on June 29^th and constructing the Mission Dolores of the new Presidio of San Francisco.
• On July 12^th Captain James Cook sets off from Plymouth, England, in HMS Resolution on his third voyage, to the Pacific Ocean and Arctic, which would turn out to be fatal.

• On July 21^st Mozart’s Serenade No. 7 (the “Haffner”) is first performed in Salzburg, Austria.
• On July 29^th Francisco Silvestre Vélez de Escalante, Francisco Atanasio Domínguez, and eight other Spaniards set out from Santa Fe on an eighteen-hundred mile trek through the American Southwest. They were the first Europeans to explore the vast region between the Rockies and the Sierras.
• On September 6^th a hurricane hit Guadeloupe, killing more than 6000 people.
• On September 24^th the first of the now very famous St Leger horse races were held at Doncaster, England.
• On October 7^th Crown Prince Paul of Russia married Sophie Marie Dorothea of Württemberg.
• On October 9^th Father Francisco Palou founded the Mission San Francisco de Asis in what is now San Francisco, California.
• On October 18^th in a New York bar decorated with a bird tail, a customer orders “cock tail”.
• On December 5^th the first US fraternity, Phi Beta Kappa (William & Mary College), is formed.

• The Standard Practice for Conditioning and Testing Textiles is Active Standard ASTM D1776
• The Standard Specification for Eye Protective Devices for Paintball Sports is Active Standard ASTM F1776.
• MTE M-1776 is a Surge Protective Device
• P1776 is the code for solenoid stuck in low/reverse which is a fairly common problem and can be prevented most of the time by keeping the fluid clean.
• The 1776 Premier Program offers a venue for highly-committed, elite players to receive professional, year-round coaching and to seek competition at the highest levels of US Youth Soccer.

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The Last Monday In July Means The Last Quiz For July!

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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Welcome to another quiz day on the fasab blog.

As usual a random selection of questions, some quite difficult, but some that you should find easy enough.

When you are done check the answers which are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay down below – but NO cheating!

Enjoy.

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Q.  1:  What is the name of the art form that translated means ‘beauty writing’?

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Q.  2:  The Blue Fairy is a kindly figure in which Disney classic? (Now you knows this!)

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Q.  3:  What is the name of the Spanish soup served cold?

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Q.  4:  What is the longest poisonous snake in the world?

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Q.  5:  Eric Weisz is still believed by some to have made the first successful powered flight in Australia on March 18, 1910. Weisz was better known around the world under which stage name?

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Q.  6:  Which region in the Pacific ocean is also the name of a character in the Dr. Doolittle stories?

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Q.  7:  What is the name of the world’s oldest licensed whiskey distillery and in which country is it located? (a point for each answer)

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Q.  8:  Contestants from which three countries have won the most Miss Universe titles? 

(Take some bonus points if you know how many titles they have won.)

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Q.  9:  Which word, used in the world of espionage, stems from John Le Carre’s 1974 novel ‘Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy’?

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Q. 10:  ‘Kristal’ and ‘Krug’ are examples of which wine?

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Q. 11:  In space an ‘Event Horizon’ surrounds what kind of region?

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Q. 12:  Who was the first Hollywood actress to appear on a postage stamp?

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Q. 13:  When the definition of a desert is ‘an area with an average annual precipitation of less than 250 millimetres per year’; on which continent is the largest desert in the world?

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Q. 14:  ‘Varig’ is the national airline in which country?

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Q. 15:  Name the American artist who uses Campbell’s Soup cans in his pop art?

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Q. 16:  What did American POW’s call the Hoa Lo prison camp in North Vietnam?

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Q. 17:  Widely used to orient buildings and even furniture, the term ‘Feng shui’, what is the English translation of this term? (Two words.)

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Q. 18:  Which breed of horse is also the name for a kind of bean?

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Q. 19:  Who was the only heavyweight champion to finish his boxing career with a perfect record? (49 wins-0 defeats).

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Q. 20:  Which film producer with a vegetable as a last name, was, until his death, involved in most of the James Bond films?

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ANSWERS

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Q.  1:  What is the name of the art form that translated means ‘beauty writing’?

A.  1:  Calligraphy.

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Q.  2:  The ‘Blue Fairy’ is a kindly figure in which Disney classic? (Now you knows this!)

A.  2:  Pinocchio.(Did you get the clue? ‘Knows’ = ‘nose’, whoops, not pun day, sorry!)

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Q.  3:  What is the name of the Spanish soup served cold?

A.  3:  Gazpacho.

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Q.  4:  What is the longest poisonous snake in the world?

A.  4:  The King Cobra.

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Q.  5:  Eric Weisz is still believed by some to have made the first successful powered flight in Australia on March 18, 1910. Weisz was better known around the world under which stage name?

A.  5:  Harry Houdini.

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Q.  6:  Which region in the Pacific ocean is also the name of a character in the Dr. Doolittle stories?

A.  6:  Polynesia. In the series of books, Polynesia is Doctor Dolittle’s parrot.

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Q.  7:  What is the name of the world’s oldest licensed whiskey distillery and in which country is it located? (a point for each answer)

A.  7:  Old Bushmills Distillery, located at Bushmills, County Antrim, Northern Ireland.

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Q.  8:  Contestants from which three countries have won the most Miss Universe titles? 

(Take some bonus points if you know how many titles they have won.)

A.  8:  USA (8: 1954, 1956, 1960, 1967, 1980, 1995, 1997, 2012),

Venezuela (6: 1979, 1981, 1986, 1996, 2008, 2009), and

Puerto Rico (5: 1970, 1985, 1993, 2001, 2006).

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Q.  9:  Which word, used in the world of espionage, stems from John Le Carre’s 1974 novel ‘Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy’?

A.  9:  Mole.

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Q. 10:  ‘Kristal’ and ‘Krug’ are examples of which wine?

A. 10:  Champagne.

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Q. 11:  In space an ‘Event Horizon’ surrounds what kind of region?

A. 11:  A Black hole.

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Q. 12:  Who was the first Hollywood actress to appear on a postage stamp?

A. 12:  Grace Kelly.

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Q. 13:  When the definition of a desert is ‘an area with an average annual precipitation of less than 250 millimetres per year’; on which continent is the largest desert in the world?

A. 13:  The Antarctic. (Most people would say ‘The Sahara’ which is the largest ‘hot’ desert area in the world.)

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Q. 14:  ‘Varig’ is the national airline in which country?

A. 14:  Brazil.

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Q. 15:  Name the American artist who uses Campbell’s Soup cans in his pop art?

A. 15:  Andy Warhol.

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Q. 16:  What did American POW’s call the Hoa Lo prison camp in North Vietnam?

A. 16:  The Hanoi Hilton.

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Q. 17:  Widely used to orient buildings and even furniture, the term ‘Feng shui’, what is the English translation of this term? (Two words.)

A. 17:  Feng shui translated into English means ‘Wind-Water’.

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Q. 18:  Which breed of horse is also the name for a kind of bean?

A. 18:  Pinto.

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Q. 19:  Who was the only heavyweight champion to finish his boxing career with a perfect record? (49 wins-0 defeats).

A. 19:  Rocky Marciano.

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Q. 20:  Which film producer with a vegetable as a last name, was, until his death, involved in most of the James Bond films?

A. 20:  Albert R (Cubby) Broccoli.

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So how did you do?

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It Always Surprises Me How One Thing Leads To Another!

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

 

I have no idea why that should be, I mean why it always surprises me how one thing leads to another. After all, where else can one thing go? It’s the logical sequence, it has to happen that way. I think what I really mean is, the surprise is what you are led to. It is hardly ever the thing you were expecting.

Every one of us knows from hours of experience how difficult it is to switch on the computer or log on to the internet on a smart phone or other device and be self-disciplined enough to just search for the thing we initially wanted to look for. Countless times in my experience I have gone on to the internet with the sole purpose of maybe checking some stats or looking up some information relating to a business problem, or a health issue perhaps, only to find an hour or so later that I’m on a completely different tack, forgotten completely about why I started, and now absorbed in some other information that has nothing to do with the job originally at hand.

Entertaining it certainly is. Enjoyable too, without a doubt. Informative, yes it can be (although you shouldn’t believe everything you read on the internet – unless it appears in this blog of course). And a waste of time? That one is debatable. I think not. Nothing is a waste of time if it is providing any or all of the above attributes – entertainment, enjoyment or information.

One of my favorite sayings is, “It’s a sad day you don’t learn something,” and I am glad to report that in that regard I do not have any sad days. Every day I learn something, usually not what I expected and sometimes the lessons can be very harsh, but it all counts towards bettering oneself and providing valuable experience for the future.

So when I looked at my blog today I had a very different subject in my head to write about. Then I read a comment from my blog-friend coastalcrone on yesterdays blog post “Today Is A Beautiful Day”, part of which sparked off what you are now reading.

Coastalcrone said, “For me words are so visual… they have to look right for me too.”

Now one can analyze any writing from a grammatical viewpoint, or the construction of sentences and paragraphs, or the balance and rhythm of the words, or on its aesthetic content, or on many other different levels. That’s what they do when they study literature at universities, tearing apart and analyzing writing and writers. Sometimes I think that is valuable and informative; at other times I think that they don’t have a clue what they are talking about and have read far, far more into a piece than the writer originally intended. (Most writers, though, are happy to go along with such academic pronouncements because it makes them appear a bit more clever that they would be if they denied them.)

However, all that academic stuff aside, the part of coastalcrone’s comment that promoted all this was really the first part,

“… words are so visual”.

Words are visual. Indeed they are. A good description of a person, or a scene, or an incident, conjures up the image in the reader’s mind, and so it should. The better the writing and the writer, the better the visuals the reader experiences.

But, and it’s a big bold BUT, the visual experience is not the writer’s, it always belongs to the reader. The writer is simply the catalyst.

No matter how precise and detailed a description is, if it is a description of something we have not personally witnessed (in other words someone describing a fictitious person or place, or even for example a valley or lake in Australia or India which most of will never have seen, as opposed to a $10 bill or a laptop computer) a different image will be conjured up in the minds of each individual.

I’m sure you have read a book and then later gone to see the movie. Very seldom if ever does your own visual image agree with the film maker’s. At the moment I can only think of one occasion when my own visual interpretation of a book almost exactly matched the movie interpretation. That was Alastair MacLean’s “Where Eagles Dare”, an excellent World War II espionage thriller and an equally excellent movie. That was probably because MacLean wrote the book and movie screenplay more or less at the same time. (Btw, I don’t mean that I had Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood in my visual picture – that would have been too crazy, even for me!)

Of course the converse is easier to come to grips with. If you see the movie and then read the book, the movie-maker’s visuals, rather than your own, are already in your head. Sometimes that’s okay, if the movie has been a reasonably close interpretation of the book. If they don’t gel well then the one can easily spoil the enjoyment of the other.

Visual interpretations also hold for the spoken as well as the written word. If one hears something described on the radio, for example, it produces visual images in one’s mind. Not only that, however, but one often gets an imaginary picture of what the person speaking looks like. It can sometimes come as a bit of shock when you see the person on tv or in real life. I’ve heard people remarking on more than one occasion that so-and-so “isn’t like his voice”.

Even when you meet people, you can have preconceived ideas about them in the few seconds between seeing them and hearing them speak. Some say that that is conclusive proof that light travels faster than sound, i.e. that most people seem bright until you hear them speak.

Of course one should be mature enough to accept people as they are. What one should definitely not do is laugh at some unfortunate with a voice that doesn’t fit them. Admittedly it can be funny, as this talk show host found out when carrying out a tv interview some years ago.

Let’s have a little experiment and see how good you are. You know you shouldn’t laugh but I rather think you might. I did! Quite a lot 😦  But at the show host, naturally 🙂

Enjoy!