Volume 2 of a book you probably won't read

A while back, I wrote about Volume 1 of H.P. Wilmott's Last Century of Sea Power. I finished Volume 2 a couple of weeks back, and remain impressed. Among other things, how many respected historians do you know of who include the names of their dogs, living and dead, in the dedications of their books? Or use the phrase "beloved woofers" to describe them? Plus, the book contains more of Wilmott's snarky comments on events and people, usually delivered at the end of a paragraph, like a punch line.

More than that, the book is full of delightfully obscure analyses of the first use of this and that to do the other thing; viz, the note to the effect that in August, 1941, the Japanese used aircraft to bomb the house where Chiang Kai-Shek and staff were staying. Perhaps unfortunately for later US involvement with China, they missed, but as Wilmott says, this " ... was the first deliberate use of aircraft in an attempt to kill a head of state." (And by the way, if you're shocked by such an attempt, recall that we, deliberately and successfully, sent a batch of P-38s to shoot down the planes carrying Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto; this was just three years later. Yamamoto, of course, wasn't a head of state, but his loss to the Japanese war effort was probably greater than if he had been.)

Another example? Did you know that prior to WWII, while the Spanish Civil War was going on, the German and Italian help provided to Franco's Fascists sank -- not just damaged but sank -- 11 British merchant ships, on and around the coast of Spain? Britain, the greatest naval power in the world, theoretically, responded forcefully -- by sending the Spanish government bills for the cost (which were never paid, by the way.) Of course, there are no parallels to this shameful appeasement going on these days, none, except, well, there is this place, Somalia, see, where they have a minor issue with pirates ... (or Detroit, now that I think of it, where they're tearing down houses and sending the bills to the houses.)

I closed my bit about Volume 1 by saying that I'd be interested to hear Wilmott's opinion of US Admiral Halsey, the guy who fell for a Japanese decoy of largely aircraftless aircraft carriers and left the Philippine invasion's landing areas virtually undefended. Wilmott did not disappoint:

"(The) version of events in Halsey's autobiography seems to be mendacious and wholly self-serving and one suspects for obvious reason -- to deflect attention from his own ill-considered decisions, which could have had very unfortunate consequences and for which he was never held to account."

Couldn't agree more, although "unfortunate consequences" is a bit mild, considering that except for timidity on the part of the Japanese commander in question, a task force including the Yamato, Japan's biggest, baddest battleship, could have run amok through a huge collection of US transports, tankers, and other vessels with big red targets painted on 'em. Fortunately for a lot of US sailors and soldiers, a handful of Escort Carriers and Destroyer Escorts stood in the way until Admiral Kurita (who, admittedly had seen the Yamato's sister ship, Musashi, sunk by aircraft the day before, lost his nerve and turned back. In most flaming disasters, it's hard to assign blame to a single man, but in this case, had the Japanese wreaked havoc, it would have been Halsey's fault, virtually alone.

Anyway, very nice book, from my perspective. I'm fully aware that among the three or four people who read this blog, I'm the only one who gives a damn about this sort of thing, but as I've said frequently, it's my blog and I'll post anything I want to.

Place your bets, Ladies and Gentlemen

A bit of background: Ann Arbor is a relatively small city, with, in particular, a small footprint of retail space that is suitable for start up, entrepreneurial foodie businesses. This makes it something of a lab for short-lived trends, especially if the underlying business plan calls for walk-in trade.

Over the years, booms have occurred in shoppes selling:

• High end ice cream
  
• Yogurt in a wide range of physical states (frozen, not frozen, gaseous, etc.)
  
• By the slice pizza
  
• OTC sushi
  
• Doggie supplies
  
• High end chocolate and other candies
  
• Tea
  

And the list goes on. You can probably think of more that I've missed.
Today, the focus seems to be, for reasons I don't really understand, on cupcakes. The clinical progress of the disease usually follows this pattern: one shop, heralded by articles in the Observer, opens in cheap space somewhere and sells its wares through random channels such as a booth at the Farmer's Market or counter displays in established stores. They gather up some capital and move into a retail space of their own. Somewhere along in there, two or three other enthusiasts jump on the band wagon, and by the end of the opening cycle, have their own storefront efforts going, in their own right. By this time, the public has discovered that, in fact, oversized, over-frosted, cupcakes (or whatever the product is) are kind of a one-time treat, and sales, for everybody in the sector, drop off. Other things are tried to extend the product line (expect savory cupcakes any day now, or perhaps sushi flavors.) After a year or so, only one shoppe remains, surviving (if it does) by operating as a much more mainstream provider of whatever its original category was -- a bakery, for example, instead of just a cupcake joint.

The question, though, is what next? By diligent reading of New York Magazine and mining my own imagination, I came up with the following possible concepts which we could see taking up retail space on Liberty or North Fourth by this time next year:

• Fancy Fritatas
  
• High end sliders (Try the ground lamb and rattlesnake - to die for!)
  
• Vampire snax
  
• Lobster rolls (trendy in NY right now due to a glut of lobster on the market)
  
• Mary's Fabulous locally-raised, organic, free-range Amish fried chicken and fish
  
• Side by side, separate but equal kosher/non-kosher hot dog places, where you can sit where your conscience dictates and wave to your friends on the other side
  
• Meatballs R' Us -- On a Stick!
  
• Glaswegian Vegan: cruelty-free soy based haggis
  
• Y'all like locally-raised, organic, free-range kimchi? Korean locovore buffets, franchised as ICBINJRC, or I can't believe it's not just rotten cabbage.
  
• No Damn Kimchi, Either, a companion restaurant, next to Fourth Ave's eponymous No Thai.
  

So take your pick and line up your funding now. The cupcake thing should be over by January, freeing up a couple of storefronts.

Mission accomplished!

I knew if I just kept at it long enough, posting sarcastic remarks here about Detroit's leadership, the situation would right itself. Rejoice, Detroit! Geoffrey Fieger will save you!

Fieger for Detroit! Vote for the goofy-looking lawyer party! In your heart, you know he'll sue ... um, somebody.

Perhaps not completely disastrous

It's been a long time since a primary election in Michigan mattered as much as this one did, and the outcomes were pretty reasonable, all in all.

On the Governor's race, the two least objectionable candidates took their parties' nominations, Virg Bernero for the Dems and Rick Snyder for the GOP. What's more important than either of them winning is who lost, including the neanderthal Pete Hoekstra and our beloved State Attorney General, Mike Cox, neither of whom could find his way to the capital with both hands and a compass.

The materfamilias of the Kilpatricks, Carolyn Cheeks K., mother of Inmate #such-and-such, Kwame Kilpatrick, ex-mayor of Detroit, is out as well. She lost her primary race for another term as 13th district rep. Objectively, this is not necessarily a good thing -- generally, her service to the state seems to have been ok, but her lack of parenting skills apparently caught up with her. I've written elsewhere about what a great parenting state Michigan is.

Locally, there was a challenge to the entrenched Democratic establishment in Ann Arbor by a group of, um, other Democrats (belonging to the GOP is actually illegal in Ann Arbor, along with having a couch on your porch and keeping more than six chickens in your backyard.) The Other Democrats were a strange cabal of people whose main talking points were inaccurate or simply libelous statements about the current administration; they lost their shirts, ensuring us another several years of boring, slow, marginally-competent city government, instead of a diet of fascinating, agile, utterly-incompetent and childishly petulant city government, the latter being what Pat Lesko and friends seemed to offer.

In the State Senate run from round these parts, two progressive women were contesting the Democratic candidacy, and the one with the better web site won. Rebekah Warren did seem to have an edge over Pam Byrne on the sheer number of social issues she listed herself as supporting, and that seemed to be sufficient for a win.

So all in all, not a bad set of outcomes for a primary. One guy, running for something local, lost by a single vote. Haven't heard if he's going to do a recount or not. Looking forward to November.

Decline and fall

Can't tell the players without a scorecard. MLIVE reports:

First, Warren Evans, until his recent, requested, resignation, Chief of the Detroit Police. Next, Detroit Police Lt. Monique Patterson, with whom Evans was alleged to be having a relationship, contributing to his resignation. On deck, Assistant Chief Ralph Godbee, who is the new acting Chief of Police, and who is (or was -- damned if I can tell) allegedly having a relationship with ... of course, Lt. Monique Patterson. Godbee, by the way, is married, although not to Evans, which would be just too perfect. Unfortunately, we don't have a same-sex marriage law in Michigan; if we did, things would be even more amusing, but you'd need entity-relationship diagrams to figure them out.

More on this from today's news.

By the way, somehow, Detroit is still not scoring lower on the places-to-live metrics than Cleveland, which makes me wish this blog had a correspondent there, just to help explain what in hell could be going on that would be worse than the amateur hour we have here.

Listen up, you oenophilic pukes!

If I catch so much as one of you children looking at the color of a glass of wine again, I will rip your head off and use your body for a decanter, do you read me, people?

I can't hear you!

The horror ...

This week, while riding around beautiful Ann Arbor in a car, wasting precious non-renewable resources and being inconvenienced right and left by the idiots, morons, halfwits, and imbeciles that are licensed to operate motor vehicles here, I had a truly frightening epiphany: what if somehow the town was magically transformed into a Dutch - style bicycle city? What if all these dolts were on bicycles?

Consider: you don't frequently see people in cars switch randomly from driving in the street to driving on the sidewalk to driving across lawns and back again, and if you do, it usually shows up on the evening news. Most people driving cars don't strap their young children into car seats placed outside the car, well above the center of gravity, wearing protective clothing that wouldn't protect a squirrel from a bad fall off a bird feeder -- and again, if you do, it shows up on Fox. Although many people in cars (especially mini vans) do drive the wrong way on one-way streets, when they do, it's at least frowned upon by police and passerby. All of these things are practiced daily by our bicyclists, as a matter of course, and the only reason complete mayhem doesn't result is that there are relatively few of 'em.

I don't want to contemplate what it would be like if we all parked our cars and took to two wheels -- the horror, the horror.

I haven't really been paying attention

I saw something in the news about some guy named James LeBron ... leaving somewhere, going somewhere? Is he one of the spies we're trading to Russia?

And while we're at it, did anybody hear whether we're getting anything good in the swap with the Russkies? A few cases of vodka, at least?

Hard to adjust

With the rise of Twitter, the word "twit" as an adjective is coming to mean "from or related to Twitter" as in "Twit Pictures," pictures sent over Twitter.

This makes it hard for us older dogs to read headlines like "Celebrity Twit Pics" on sources like the Daily Beast without grinning if not actually cracking up. And if you have the time on your hands to look at the underlying content, some of the shots really are twit pics, in both the new and old senses of the word. Not all, though, unfortunately.

In the interest of fairness

After listing a few of the Detroit public figures who are in jail, under indictment, or being acused of aggravated beastiality (any day now, you just wait), I suppose in all fairness to the rest of the state, I should point out that Detroit is not alone in this regard.

• Former Southwest Michigan Congressman Mark Siljander is beginning his trial for having allegedly taken money from a terrorist group who wanted to be removed from a list of terrorist groups.
  
• Former state House Speaker Craig DeRoche, who was just charged with drunk driving, was arrested again for running around his neighborhood, according to police, his wife, children, mother-in-law, and neighbors, drunk (again) and carrying a gun.
  

Neither of these gentlemen is technically from Detroit although DeRoche did represent part of the Detroit metropolitan area at one point.