Tom Lasseter

The FBI Investigated the Song ‘Louie Louie’ for Two Years

blogs.smithsonianmag.com — The song "Louie Louie" by the Kingsmen might not strike you as Federal Bureau of Investigation material. But the song was under investigation by the FBI for two whole years. The bureau's interest had to do with the lyrics of the song, which most listeners find either confusing or simply impossible to understand.

Russia’s Best Leader was… Brezhnev!

russianspectrum.com — In a recent poll conducted by the Levada Center, Leonid Brezhnev was revealed to be Russians' favorite ruler of the 20th century. Do you see his era as a Golden Age, or as a zastoi? Russian Attitud...

Settlers in Xinjiang

economist.com — MANY hours' drive along what was once the southern Silk Road, through a featureless desert landscape punctuated by swirling dust-devils and occasional gnarled trees, a curious sight eventually confronts the traveller: row upon row of apartment blocks with vivid red roofs, as if a piece of Shanghai suburbia has been planted in the wilderness (see picture).

Obama speech suggests possible expansion of drone killings

mcclatchydc.com — President Barack Obama on Thursday defended his administration's use of drone strikes to kill terrorists as effective, lawful and "heavily constrained," but he also appeared to be laying groundwork for an expansion of the controversial targeted killings.

Don’t mention the human rights abuses! When Gérard Depardieu and Liz Hurley went to Chechnya

independent.co.uk — In Russia, Gerard Depardieu is treated as something of a prince these days. Yesterday morning, he was delivered to the airport in the provincial city of Saransk in a limousine bedecked with flashing blue lights, enabling him to ignore all traffic regulations.

Death in Parched Farm Field Reveals Growing India Water Tragedy

bloomberg.com — Sachin Ingale slipped out of his family's two-room, white-painted mud hut about 4 p.m. and walked into their farm field where the 22-year-old took a deep swig of pesticide from a plastic bottle. He died later that evening. Four months later, the mercury is pushing 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit) in his village in India 's Maharashtra state.

Life and Politics in the Failed Stalinist Utopia: Andrei Lankov: 9780199964291: Amazon.com: Books

amazon.com — "[A] probing, clear-eyed study of the world's most irascible dictatorship. Lankov's is one of the best and most accessible recent accounts of this seemingly outlandish nation, and the book eschews North Korea's lurid stereotypes to reveal a stunted normalcy." -Publishers Weekly (Starred Review) "The Real North Korea is one of the best books about this isolated republic to appear in years.

Live Webcast | Asia Society

asiasociety.org — New Sufi Music of Pakistan: Arif Lohar with Arooj Aftab Saturday, April 28, 2012 at 8:00pm Watch live streaming video from asiasociety at livestream.com