Saturday, February 20, 2016

Link roundup

1. Junk mail in the 1800s.

2. "One of Iraq’s anti-corruption leaders sat in his office, waving his hands in exasperation."
“There is no solution,” he said. “Everybody is corrupt, from the top of society to the bottom. Everyone. Including me.”

...

“At least I am honest about it,” he shrugged. “I was offered $5m by someone to stop investigating him. I took it, and continued prosecuting him anyway.”

...

If, as projected, global oil prices remain at historic lows, Iraq will be unable to pay some of its civil servants, or honour pledges to build roads and power stations in the next financial year. The gravity of the crisis has created uncomfortable reckonings for Iraq’s political class, military leaders and some senior religious figures, who have led a staggering 13-year pillage that has left Iraq consistently rated as one of the top five least transparent and most corrupt countries in the world.
3. "A 20-meter-high slide descends inside a five-story shopping mall in Shanghai, China, on February 16, 2016."

4. Peyton Manning.