David Rafferty

The answer to 1 is always Alcibiades.

This has now become a meme.

Cut to Soviet sailors standing to attention and earnestly singing the Pokémon theme song.

That is, where you lose, and where you lose worse

This was when the Big Annual Discipline Conference (which for Classics they always held in the first week of January despite people getting snowed in) also doubled as Job Market Central because everyone was in the same place.

Strictly a North American thing, I believe.

So would it be fair to call it a fascist *project*? An incomplete one, to be sure, and which might go either way.

The end of the Fat Pizza movie, where the immigration cops finally arrest everyone and then loudly announce “It’s okay, we take bribes.”

Nah, you’re better than that. 😉

A separate question, and this is the point to be hard-headed: now that they’ve defected, do they bring anything? Influence? A base? If not, thank them and shove them away from public life forever.

Tom, you have better things to do with your time than argue about whether an inherently contested concept (in the technical sense) exists in *this* case.

You’re an historian with a platform. Start with “they will never give up power *willingly* - so what follows from that?” Go from there.

This is a great set up to a film. The next step is that the contract is taken over by a group of high school girls seeking vengeance.

The Age, 2042: “Older readers will remember that Red Vienna used to be known as Brighton.”

I think it tickles something deep in the Old Etonian brain: “Bossy Nanny”. Better do what she says.

Can’t beat teen logic!

You can, actually. I still paid board. 😂

(Click to expand).

The golden age of diversity and democracy in Oz.

It’s our equivalent of coals to Newcastle/owls to Athens.

‘Let’s choose which window’, that fun game well known to Australian children viewers of Playschool, and Russian officials not seen in public for a week or two

Caveat: I haven’t seen last ep of S3.

The hero of The Diplomat is Nicol Trowbridge. Because he is one of only two characters (with Stuart) who has a moral centre. His actions come from his moral reaction to events.

Therefore none of the US characters understand him.

Part of this week’s newsletter was inspired by the post below. Was there a way to show the distance between normal Americans and the super wealthy?
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Collections: Hoplite Wars, Part I: The Othismos over Othismos This week (and next) we’re looking at hoplites, the heavy infantry of the ancient Greek poleis in the (early? mid? late?) Archaic and Classical periods, into the Hellenistic. In particular, I…

This week on the blog: Hoplites! We're taking a crack at explaining the long-running debate over the nature and significance of the ancient Greek heavy infantryman, the hoplite, and the phalanx in which he (mostly) fought.

acoup.blog/2025/11/14/c...

Is this true, though? Set aside American fetishisation of constitutions and law more generally - what of the French or German attitude to their constitutions (historically)? Is it not much more malleable?

It fascinates me, the way that honour exists in our society and motivates people, and yet the way we talk about it…we have real trouble with it, with talking about it and understanding it.

you're not gonna believe where they lead

Don’t call Terence Stamp a giant wild pig.

I’m afraid the Trump-Bill Clinton thing won’t take hold (despite being very funny), because no one can seriously imagine Trump *giving* anything to anyone, ever.

Nancy Reagan inspired each of us in different ways.

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Bill’s response: “If you don’t ask, I won’t tell.”

This asbestos metaphor is brilliant.