SMITH AND JONES

Ya gotta wonder sometimes about the PR capabilities of certain organizations, like Japan's "Institute of Cetacean Research." It brings to mind an early seafarers' "Institute for Dodo Research." They think it's a slick name that gets them the respect they deserve while pulling the wool over the public eye, which seems to have worked well in Japan, where the public eye is pretty used to wool, but because of the ballpeen way the "Institute*" thinks, i.e., that they are so right they can't go wrong, they never realize they're a laughingstock to the rest of the world.

This same hammer-edged perception is evident in ICU's response to recent photographs and video footage of two harpooned minke whales being hauled up the stern ramp of the Nisshin Maru, the media claiming that they were a mother and calf: it was "emotional propaganda," there was no proof two were mother and baby, i.e., the two whales were unrelated. One was named Smith, the other Jones. Oh. Well. So that's ok then.

Moby Dick saw this day coming.

*"They bring along the stats for the number of calf, pregnant mothers, males, females, how big their eyeballs were - whatever - but there is never any analysis." [Excerpted from linked article]