A national treasure, that's who

...though not my nation, Who Is IOZ? on Irene Nemirovsky and an idiotic review in The New Republic:

Franklin laments that the German soldiers in the second half of the book are treated as something other than monsters, an odd complaint, since Nemirovsky was there, and knew them. If Nemirovsky treated some of the Germans with relative sympathy in her portrayals, it is all the more remarkable because even were it not for the fact of the Holocaust, she was neverthelss writing about the occupying power that had just conquered her home. This is an authorial act worthy of praise and wonder, not a cudgel to bash her person or reputation.

Oh, and the same on the so-called stimulus package currently under discussion in Washington:

One-time tax rebates! Oh, awesome. Let me tell you, a few hundred bucks is going to restore my confidence like a clock-eating drive late in the 3rd Quarter. So what if our entire economy is a landfill of unrecoverable debt sitting on top of a lot of second-rate infrastructure with an energy crisis looming on the near horizon? Blood under the bridge, baby. I'm a-gonna buy me some consumer electronics and save America!