links for 2008-07-01

• Olympic nightmare: A red tide in Yellow Sea - International Herald Tribune
  Media reports estimate that as many as 20,000 people have either volunteered or been ordered to participate in the operation, while 1,000 boats are scooping algae out of the Yellow Sea.
  (tags: china olympics pollution)
• Michael J. Totten: The Road to Kosovo, Part II
  “We're Americans!” I said in a cheery voice. “We rented the car in Belgrade, but we're Americans.” “Aha!” he said and laughed, as if that explained everything.
  (tags: blogs europe kosovo)
• Grim proving ground for Obama's housing policy - The Boston Globe
  ...Grove Parc Plaza, in a dense neighborhood that Barack Obama represented for eight years as a state senator, hold 504 apartments subsidized by the federal government for people who can't afford to live anywhere else. But it's not safe to live here.
  (tags: obama politics election)
• FOXNews.com - British Student Writes Nothing but Expletive on Exam, Gets Credit for Spelling - International News | News of the World | Middle East News | Europe News
  he gave the student — who wrote an expletive starting with f, followed by the word "off" — two points out of a possible 27 for the English paper. Buckroyd said the student would have received a higher mark if the phrase had been punctuated.
  (tags: humor news uk)
• China orders 'rioters' to surrender: dissident website - Yahoo! Singapore News
  The incident comes at a sensitive time for China's Communist Party rulers as they seek to showcase the nation as harmonious and stable ahead of the Beijing Olympics in August. (GZE2 - even the AFP uses that word...harmonious. Ughghh)
  (tags: china olympics protests)
• Algae clean-up at sailing venue to take weeks - report - Yahoo! Singapore News
  In total, the algae has affected 13,000 square kilometers (8,080 square miles) of sea, the report said. Algae blooms are common in heavily polluted China, particularly in freshwater lakes. (GZE2 - Enjoy the windsurfing, boyz).
  (tags: china olympics pollution)
• Vodkapundit » Wen Jiabao
  Premier Wen Jiabao saying Monday he was impressed that the first foreigners he saw providing help when he toured the province were Americans.
  (tags: china earthquake)