I found this self-identified map of Major League Baseball loyalties at Common Census:

Bears more than a little resemblance to the “United Countries of Baseball,” doesn’t it? Aside from just being nice to look at, the self-identification going on right now is very interesting. Where do people’s loyalties lie? Savannah-ite, Georgian, Southerner, or American? Etcetera. The metro area loyalties map is here.

– More on Robert Kaplan and the PLAN at The Coming Anarchy. Mao Zedong, meet Alfred Thayer Mahan.

– Johann Hari on how “Our Leaders are Staging a Scam.” Specifically, in Copenhagen. Does this whole charade of doing as little as possible so we don’t have to change strike anyone else as a behavioral version of the ‘Red Queen‘ hypothesis? It takes all our effort to not do anything at all.

– “Backwards Southerners, Frigid Northerners“: the real divide in Germany is not east-west, after all.