After an 18-day hiatus, I now have a new apartment, possibly a new job, and more importantly...

A NEW CABLE INTERNET CONNECTION!!!

Woohoo. The added bandwidth will help me flood your caches with more of my mindless chatter. I'm sure you just can't wait!

Other things worth mentioning:

• As I mentioned last time, North Korea is starting a Special Administrative Region, which would supposedly allow unfettered capitalism at the border town of Sinuiju, just across the Yalu River from China's teeming Communists with a capital 'C'. Well, the original choice to oversee the DPRK's little experiment, Chinese-Dutch Yang Bin, got arrested for tax evasion. There's a bit of a back-story to this, as it seems that Beijing wasn't consulted about this new economic zone, or the tapping of an ethnic Chinese (who does most of his busines in China). So the arresting of Yang is most likely no mere coincidence. So Pyongyang has responded with a new choice: Ex-South Korean Prime Minister Park Tae-joon. I guess the North Korean government is pretty desperate, cause putting a South Korean in charge is a pretty bold move considering the the two Koreas are still technically at war.
  
  
• Apparently, Congress has lost it's mind. This week the Senate gave President Bush authorization for use of force against Iraq under the War Powers Act. This Slate piece goes over the implications of this week's Congressional action.