h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Only a short while ago I was told, the incident where Khrushchev banged his shoe on a table never took place. I'm sure you will find this interesting. Here is what I found:

http://www.politifact.com/rhode-island/statements/2015/jan/18/arthur-cyr/curious-case-khrushchev-shoe/

And another thing (or two):

I once heard the following story about how the US first learned about the Soviet missiles on Cuba (read chapter 5: "Panic over a soccer field led to the Cuban Missile Crisis")

http://edition.cnn.com/2014/06/05/us/cold-war-5-things/

I tried to find more about it, but the following Google link only tells me that the author has removed his article. Why is that, you think? Time to put on my tin foil hat (again)?

How Baseball Betrayed Cuba's Covert Ops — War Is Boring ...
https://medium.com/.../how-baseball-betrayed-cuba-s-...
On a few occasions, Cuba's unique fondness for baseball betrayed its covert activities ... in an article by legendary CIA photo analyst Dino Brugioni — begins in 1970. ... crisis, analysts counted on soccer and baseball fields to distinguish Soviet ... to American satellites — because of the baseball diamonds the Cubans built.

- - -

Then I checked old stories about how Danish military intelligence spotted Soviet ships sending nuclear missiles through Danish waters. Well, what do you know, those stories now seem to have belonged to some kind of smoke screen also. The ships in question only carried trucks and planes - and were photographed in December - maybe even not the same year...

I find it increasingly hard to believe anything I have heard about the cold war

Just one more link, then I'll call it a day:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/101644640

Check the first comment (made by vinny9698): 1. How was the US able to determine the amount of Soviets on the island? Soccer Fields

Hm, that's interesting about the soccer fields. Thanks, Pierce.

Here's another explanation of the shoe incident:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yho1Eydh1mM

Maybe Khrushchev was just used to a different level of debate, as in today's Duma:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZGaaqH2o6I

The US Congress is MUCH more civilised than that. There haven't been fights there since, oh, right before the Civil War. (But one senator did end up in hospital back then...)

Our legislature (the Folketing) is extremely civilized - bordering on boring - and its former chairman Mogens Lykketoft declared he was open to suggestions about how to liven things up a bit.

Lykketoft is presently acting as chairman of the UN assembly. He may reconsider his openness if anyone like Khrushchev enters the scene

Yeah. I doubt he had boxing matches in mind.

Only a few years ago members of the Folketing would be scolded publicly by its chairman if they forgot to refer to each other as "honoured members" during debates.

This happened frequently (and still does) because all danes usually refer to each other by first names (unless they are royals or the late ship owner Maersk Mc-Kinley Møller)

Now these politicians are allowed to call each other Mrs or Mr Hansen (Jensen, Sørensen, whatever) - but that *still* sounds absurdly convoluted and unusually posh to Danish ears

Sounds like what my Icelandic instructor said about Iceland - she said everyone said 'thou' to each other, but that they were supposed to call the President 'you' - although they usually forgot.

Exactly right. When I was a kid we still said "you" and Mr/Mrs/Ms to our teachers and other grown ups, but it changed soon after I left school in 1970. 20 years later absolutely no-one said "you" any more.

Just a few months ago a young journalist by accident said "thou" to our queen during a press conference. To which she smilingly responded "I don't believe we went to school together, did we?"

Took him a moment to realize why she would ask him that, but he caught up on it eventually

The red faced young man was the laughing stock of his colleagues, of course (still is, this will never be forgotten!) and of course a lot of elderly Danes were outraged

O tempora o mores!

I noticed with the Germans that there seems to be a shift towards informality that way. People say 'du' online who would never have dreamed of it before - it used to be a very serious decision requiring a commemorative toast...

I wonder if it IS the internet, or just the global village that's killing those formal pronouns? English lost the distinction centuries ago, when we all went to 'you' and forgot about 'thou'.

As you probably know there is a special love/hate-relationship between Germans and Scandinavians. For instance we love it that they are on their way to informality - some 50 years later than us