The Collected Writings of Sardonicus

Finally some down-time. Took my only important midterm yesterday, and now can coast for a little while. I have another one tomorrow, but I'm PDFing it, and don't think I can expend enough energy to make myself get a D or lower, so I'm sure I've fine. What I should get crackin' on is my senior thesis. It's going to be about cultural diplomacy and cultural integration between Japan and South Korea, and the potential impact of increasingly shared popular culture between the two countries. Initially I thought about including China and Southeast Asia into the mix, but my thesis advisor, Professor Laffan, advised that the Korea-Japan relationship was rich enough as it was. I'll probably throw the history librarian an email over fall break and see what happens. Other than a few contemporary news articles, I don't have much to run with yet.

The other day, the official number of U.S. troops who died in Iraq passed the 2,000 mark. I'm not sure what specifically this number represents- for example, does it take into account soldiers that have not yet been confirmed dead but are missing?- but I think the war is becoming increasingly tragic. The approval of Bush's decision to go into Iraq among the American public has sunken below 50% the other day, and this is hardly helpful for the morale of our troops. But now that so many troops have died, it's almost impossible to imagine Bush recognizing his missteps. But i'll refrain for the time being from being to critical of the President. My main concern is that there may not be enough attention paid to all of the US servicemen INJURED in Iraq. Thousands have died, but how many thousands- or tens of thousands- have been injured? The loss of limbs, senses, sanity, etc., is a huge concern of mine. Personally, I believe that a person can live under circumstances where death may be preferable to continuous suffering. I guess this sorta comes to the Terri Shiavo case. Did I spell that name right? Anyway, I wonder whether the Supreme Court will have a Right-To-Death case come before them in the next couple of years. It's hard to speculate how that would proceed, if indeed the situation does present itself.

Aced my Classics 219 midterm. Feel it in my gut. I can be such a smug bastard when it comes to my work. I always think everything is going gangbusters until I get the actual get my grade. Then I'm all: what the Heck? I deserve a friggin' medal for most of my papers and tests. But, sadly, it is not to be. Y'know, maybe if I was less self-confident about getting good grades, I would actually work harder, review, and edit my work to actually earn better grades. But I'm not too much of a conspiracy theorist to think that the graders are all out to get me. And I'm certainly not the smartest guy on campus, so I don't get too bitter when I don't think my marks reflect the quality of my efforts. The thing I HATE to hear people say is "I'm smart, but lazy," so I never say stuff like that. Every non-smart person says that. I'm sorry, but SOME PEOPLE in this world are actually stupid, and it's not just because they don't study. Anyone can get good grades if they study enough. People who think that they're really brilliant but lazy need to break the hardwiring from their parents that make them believe that they're "special." Yeah, fine, it's true that everyone is "unique," but that doesn't mean that everyone is exceptional. But maybe their unique quality is that they're uniquely idiotic. Food for thought.