Myanmar

NASA has before and after satellite shots of Myanmar that make Hurricane Katrina's effect on New Orleans look like a brief rainshower.

Interestingly, in that article NASA refers to Myanmar as Burma. Even more interestingly, this morning on WCRN, Peter Blute kept calling it "Minna-mar". And even more interestingly, Laura Bush was apparently tasked yesterday to forward some kind of political positioning, spinning the devastation in Myanmar as somehow being exacerbated by the government there...

Meanwhile, a couple of hours ago, "The information we are receiving indicates over 100,000 deaths," the U.S. Charge D'Affaires in Yangon, Shari Villarosa, said on a conference call.

Consequently, I have to say that being politically forbidden to call it Myanmar (at NASA), being intellectually incapable of pronouncing Myanmar (Peter Blute), or being used to forward a political agenda concerning the government of Myanmar (Laura Bush), all tends to evidence a political mindset that, in the face of such a horrific disaster, I simply cannot comprehend.