Iraqi poet Muhammad Mahdi Al-Jawahiri: set Arab Revolutions to Verse

"Al-Jawahiri was born in Najaf at the turn of the Twentieth Century to a family of poets and traditional learning. His father, his two brothers, and other members of his extended family were poets."

"Perhaps no other modern Arab poet has captured in his poetry the tribulations of the entire Arab World in this century as faithfully and vividly as al-Jawahiri. His voluminous poetry alone reads as a monumental register of crucial events, social upheavals, wars of independence, and revolutions which both Iraq and other Arab countries have experienced since the 1920s."

On the evolution of Jewish humor and the idea that Jewish comedy is slowly dying out after a century of gradual assimilation: Looking at Larry David's "pretty complicated relationship with his Jewish background." " as Meredith Blake terms it.

"Some day in the not-too-distant future, lazy undergrad students will be writing lengthy essays about Jewish-American male identity based on little more than this episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Who needs Portnoy’s Complaint when you’ve got “Palestinian Chicken”?" "

"I’m not totally sure, but there’s something kind of brilliant about Larry’s hedonistic approach to diplomacy: negotiations, sanctions and suicide bombs won’t get Palestine anywhere; great sex and delicious chicken will." "

"Economy: An agreed upon excuse for passing questionable legislation that shifts power from the people of a society into the hands of corporate interests. Since our economy is based on pleasing the wealthy, we should probably just give them more money and hope for the best."

and so on and so forth.

"Syrian artist Fadi Yazigi’s devilish smiling faces portray his uncanny perceptions of how ordinary people feel."

The horrors of dentistry are worse in the slums:

"I had absolutely no idea something like this even existed until I watched the short film and couldn’t resist sharing it on the blog because it’s certainly worth knowing what the poor people in other parts of the world need to go through for treatments. But, I would like to warn you that it’s kind of gross and may not suit your stomach."