"Jesus? He would have been just one of many Jewish sect leaders of his day, had he not had St. Paul to proselytize and the Roman Empire to finish the job."

"Genghis Khan? The mere beneficiary of heavy rainfall. Adolf Hitler? 'Hitler’s own life before the age of 30 gave no hint of his subsequent qualities as Germany’s leader,' Diamond writes. 'How, then, can we claim that no one else could have become the mature Hitler?' How indeed? Figuring out how to separate historical forces from human agency has puzzled scholars since the days of Herodotus and Thucydides.... Now, [Jared] Diamond proposes a new tool for assessing leaders. Rather than using 'the biographic method' of studying leaders in their own context, he suggests the 'natural experiment.' Social scientists have used natural experiments — finding occasions where life allows them to run comparative data studies — to analyze things like the economic impact of the minimum wage. Diamond claims that natural experiments also have significant potential in political history, religious studies and sports. The problem is, they don’t really work.... Can the natural experiment help us figure out the historical effect of a president being assassinated — or narrowly escaping such a fate?"

I'm reading "What Is It About Jesus Christ and Genghis Khan? In “Profits, Prophets, Coaches, and Kings,” Jared Diamond considers the impact leaders might have had on the course of their civilizations" (NYT gift link).

That's Dan Jones — author of "The Plantagenets: The Kings Who Made England" — reviewing the new Jared Diamond book (commission earned).

"[Elon Musk] is reported to have told one of his children’s mothers he wants to use surrogates to 'reach legion level.'"

"In the meantime, he has goaded the competition. In response to a post about [Russian billionaire Pavel] Durov notching triple-digit offspring, Mr. Musk replied, '"Rookie numbers lmao" — Genghis Khan,' a nod to the Mongol leader’s supposed millions of descendants. What drives these men to reproduce at an industrial scale? Mr. Musk’s reference to Genghis Khan holds one clue.... Like kings of earlier eras who claimed divine lineage, many of these men hold their own bloodlines in exalted regard. Mr. Musk, who in 2021 changed his job title at Tesla to 'technoking,' has said he wants smart people — or even just rich people, according to a report in Business Insider — to have more children. One of the mothers of his offspring, an executive in his business, told his biographer that he encouraged her to have kids and suggested he be her sperm donor...."

From "Is Kidmaxxing the Ultimate Status Symbol for Ultimate Wealth?" (NYT).

"Technoking" is not a gerund. I can't believe I spent time trying to understand "to technok" as a verb. The "ing" goes with the K. It's "Techno King."

You know, "nok" isn't just the NYSE stock ticker for Nokia. It's the genus of the bare-faced bulbul (Nok hualon). The Nok were an ancient African people, known for their terra cotta sculptures.

And never forget the Nixies — Danish: nøkke, Norwegian: nøkk, Swedish: näck; Icelandic: nykur, Faroese: nykur; Finnish: näkki. These were "male water spirits who play enchanted songs on instruments, luring women and children to drown in lakes or streams." 

So, ladies, resist the nøkk, the techo-nøkk, the technoking. No kings! No nøkkings. Maintain a no-nøkk policy.

"It’s fine for her to work, but she should not be getting other people involved. Everyone is in bed at that time of day. It’s a very sad attitude for the top leader of the country to show."

Said Yoshihiko Noda, a former prime minister, quoted in "Japan’s Leader Started a Meeting at 3 A.M. Then Came the Backlash. Sanae Takaichi drew criticism for requiring staff to work in the wee hours in a country scarred by 'death from overwork'" (NYT).

Kenji Koshio, chief executive of Shindenki, a small electronics company in the city of Kobe, wrote on his blog that troops, police officers, firefighters and medical workers were expected to work around the clock. Why not Japan’s prime minister?

Responding to the uproar over the meeting, he wrote: “Why don’t you just stop being so lame and be grateful to the people who are working hard for the people of Japan?”

Any other leaders calling meetings this early? Not just starting work themselves but imposing it on others. I found a few historical figures who did: Napoleon, Frederick the Great, Oliver Cromwell, and — in the summer when first light came early — Genghis Khan.

"'Mongol' might as well be called 'Braveheart in a Yurt.'"

Ha ha. So writes Michael Phillips. That's what I thought: This is like "Braveheart," right down to the deep, minimalistic love story.

There's a lot in this war movie — the coming of age of Genghis Khan — that women can love. Beautifully photographed landscapes. Fabulous fashion. (Those hats!) Horses galore. Feisty kids. Manly men who sing in that amazing overtone voice. Beautiful women who make the first move, stand their ground, and accomplish daring feats. Lovers separated and united. Bondage. (Do you know what a cangue is?) Tribal customs from the 12th century. Lots of eating and drinking. (Meat carved off the bone and eaten from a knife and endless bowls of (occasionally poisoned) liquid). Also a lot of knives, arrows, and blood.

"Mongol" should count as a law movie too. Temudgin (Genghis Khan) comes up with the big idea: "Mongols need laws." And that related idea: "I will make them obey, even if I have to kill half of them." He also happens to say: "Mongols have the right to choose."

Here's Stanley Kauffmann:

... Immediately we think of... John Ford's The Searchers ...

Other reminders of Ford abound, as well as reminders of David Lean's Lawrence of Arabia... Olivier's Henry V and Eisenstein's Alexander Nevsky must also be tucked away in [the director Sergei] Bodrov's head...

"Genghis Khan/He could not keep/All his men/Supplied with sheep."

Robert Christgau, utterly seduced by Maria Muldaur singing Bob Dylan songs, says: "I got a whole new idea of what those sheep are for."

Uh, yeah, but officially the lyrics to "You Ain't Going Nowhere" are:

Genghis Khan
He could not keep
All his kings
Supplied with sleep

Christgau's smitten. Touting Muldaur's sexiness, Christgau is pretty insulting to the Byrds -- "anything but sensual" -- and Linda Ronstadt -- "an ambitious ingenue at best."

(And if those "You Ain't Going Nowhere" lyrics made you think of John Kerry... should I be mean and say (Christgauchely): you're anything but sensual?)

Anyway, I've loved Maria Muldaur since the 60s, when I had all the Jim Kweskin Jug Band records, played them constantly, and made my friends care about them. On the clip at the first link, you can hear Maria singing "I'm a Woman," from back in those days.

Christgau's review is too much about how Maria found so much sex in Bob Dylan's lyrics, as if Maria and only Maria knows the true depth of sexuality. It makes him seem a little silly, but she still sounds great.

"As you build a free society in the heart of Central Asia, the American people stand with you."

The first President to go to Mongolia:

President Bush, buffeted by unrelenting criticism at home over Iraq, on Monday saluted Mongolia's "fearless warriors" for helping his embattled effort to establish democracy in the heart of the Middle East.

That's the first sentence of the AP report. I feel proud to see our President go to this remote place, to thank its people for standing with us in the war and to hearten them in the cause of freedom in their own country, where they have abandoned communism and adopted Western-style democracy. I'm disgusted that the editors saw fit to shoehorn the phrase "buffeted by unrelenting criticism at home over Iraq" into that sentence. The inability of news organizations to cover the President's trip without inserting commentary like that is embarrassing.

Being in Mongolia, Bush did some classic Mongolian things. He drank fermented mare's milk and listened throat singing. "He was greeted at the Government House by flower-toting children in traditional Mongolian robes and soldiers in bright red, blue and yellow overcoats." He met with the president, Nambaryn Enkhbayar, in a white tent -- a ger -- with "a red-and-yellow design on the roof and red wood doors."

Inside were red brocade chairs, tapestries, Oriental carpets and a towering, white statue of Genghis Khan, the legendary horseman-warrior and country founder whose empire once stretched as far south as Southeast Asia and west to Hungary.

Beautiful. I note that the AP declines to shoehorn in any criticism of Khan.