The second and hopefully last beauty pageant-related story of the week deals with 22-year-old Tsering Chungtak, Miss Tibet in the 2007 International Miss Tourism pageant in Malaysia. After participating in the preliminary events this week, Chungtak was forced to drop out of the competition Wednesday for refusing to add “China” to her title of “Miss Tibet.” According to reports Thursday, the Chinese government insisted that Chungtak wear a sash labeled “Miss Tibet-China” and refer to herself as such during competition. Chungtak said of the request, “I felt that this was not acceptable to me at all.” The 33 international beauty queens arrived in Malaysia on November 23rd to visit various tourist destinations in Sarawak, one of two Malaysian states on the island of Borneo. After a week of publicizing the event, Chinese officials notified Miss Tourism organizers of the name change Saturday. Miss Tibet believed that her ability to participate in the preliminaries signified a change in the policy of the Chinese government. Wishful thinking.

While Chungtak, crowned Miss Tibet in 2006, objected politically to the name “Miss Tibet-China,” she could have just as easily objected on the grounds that it doesn’t make any sense. It sounds like a hyphenated last name. The official name of the region, if you ask the Chinese government, is the Tibet Autonomous Region, a name that wouldn’t fit on a beauty sash, isn’t recognized by the Tibetan people and doesn’t really characterize Tibet in any way. But the most ridiculous aspect of this story is that Chungtak isn’t the slightest bit Chinese. She’s ethnic Tibetan, a group that historically doesn’t recognize Chinese rule over the region. It would be like forcing Miss Palestine (if there is such a thing) to go by “Miss Palestine-Israel” or something. It doesn’t make sense. This is the not the first time China insisted a Tibetan beauty contest entrant go by “Miss Tibet-China.” In 2005, Tashi Yangchen pulled out of a competition for refusing to enter under this name.

•AP: Tibetan Beauty Quits Pageant
•Phayul: China Loses Temper at Miss Tibet
•Photo: BoingBoing

The mystery of China’s suspicious moon photo, the one that looks like every other unremarkable moon photo we’ve ever seen, has been solved. When the Chinese government released the first lunar image produced by its moon orbiter Chang’e 1 (photo left), internet space enthusiasts accused China of copying an image captured by NASA in 2005 (photo right). The rumors spread so fast and so far that Ouyang Ziyuan, head of the China Lunar Exploration Project had to issue a statement. The moon man said, “China’s first moon photo is absolutely not a fake,” and that while the images do look identical, “a careful examination will tell some small differences.” Ziyuan also claimed that the Chinese image illustrates a new lunar feature (circled in photo). I’ve done some digging of my own and my conclusion is that while the images look remarkably similar, every image of the moon I’ve ever seen looks the same — like a bird’s eye view of a patch of dirt in the rain.

Wednesday, MSNBC published a report from a astronomy blogger with an eye vastly more trained than mine who has issued conclusive evidence that China’s moon photo is not a fake. But it is Photoshopped. According to lunar expert Emily Lakdawalla at the Planetary Society, the Chinese image is actually a mosaic of 19 image strips taken on different orbits, not what Chinese officials claimed it to be. She wrote of the Chang’e 1 photo “the one released image is a processed product, and was altered slightly (the seams were blended away) to make it pretty. This alteration made it difficult for a scientist to realize that what appeared to be a new feature was in fact an artifact.” The “feature” in question was a supposed new crater that according to Lakdawalla, is merely a photo editing mistake on behalf of the Chinese. The Russians made a similar mistake in 1959 when they proudly labeled an apparent lunar feature captured by their technology “The Soviet Mountains.” This lunar mountain range turned out to be an emulsion smear on the photo’s negative. So while the image captured by China’s Chang’e 1 isn’t “a fake,” in the same way photos of Oprah on the cover of her magazine every month aren’t “fake,” it proves that a little bit of Photoshop can make everything a lot more beautiful.

•MSNBC Cosmic Log: Moon Photo Mystery Solved
•The Planetary Society Weblog: No, the Chang’e Image Isn’t Fake!
•Image: Telegraph

Don Imus, the grouchy 67-year-old disc jockey, returns to radio Monday morning after an 8-month banishment for making racially charged remarks. New York’s conservative talk radio station WABC-AM has hired Imus to fill its 6-9 morning slot with the “Imus in the Morning” program and like his old show on WFAN, the new show will be nationally syndicated and have a televised simulcast. Except not on MSNBC, the cable news network where Imus resided in the mornings from 1996 until April of this year. So what will be Imus’ television address for the next 5 years? No, not Fox News, but good guess. It’s RFD-TV, or Rural Free Delivery TV, “rural America’s most important network.” And if you’ve never heard of it, it might be because the network isn’t carried on either of America’s major cable providers. Only on satellite, what most of rural America has anyway, and a couple of lesser-known hillbilly cable systems. Suffice it to say, there’s no RFD-TV in New York City, where Imus will be taping his live radio show. Perhaps MSNBC, a more left-leaning cable station, was a bit too “urban” for the cowboy hat wearing Imus. It’s a safe bet that all those people who skewered the I-Man in April for calling the Rutgers women’s basketball team a bunch of “nappy-headed hos” won’t be tuning in to WABC, the radio home of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity, or to RFD-TV which features programs called “Classic Tractors,” “Cowboy Church” and “The Cattle Show.” Not only am I not joking, but all these shows are in primetime. While Imus has made a career of using racist, anti-Semitic, sexist and homophobic language during his broadcasts — in 1998 he referred to CNN’s Howard Kurtz as “that boner-nosed… beanie-wearing little Jew boy” — it is unclear to many whether the reemergence of the shock jock will bring a new, contrite, tamer Imus or whether he will merely transport his disregard for political correctness to a new studio and a new set of broadcasters. Because if he plans on picking up where he left off, his new platforms are perfect for this. His new radio station WABC affords its hosts extreme leniency with regard to racism (Limbaugh) and even drug use (Limbaugh), both terms very familiar to Don Imus. As for his new television station, well I’m certain Al Sharpton isn’t watching, unless he tunes into the “Gaither Gospel Hour” on Thursdays at 7pm. The average viewer of RFD-TV is over 55 years of age, lives on a farm or ranch, drives a pickup truck and owns more hogs than any other type of livestock. It looks like Imus has found himself a perfect new home.

•AP: Don Imus’ Return to Radio Sparks Protest
•RFD-TV Homepage

Saturday evening in Sanya, the capital of south China’s Hainan Island, a 23-year-old Beijing girl became the first Chinese winner of the international Miss World pageant, and in doing so, added fuel to my theory that China only wins competitions that don’t involve teams. Seriously, when was the last time you saw a Chinese team win anything? Yet, Chinese individuals — in gymnastics, weight-lifting, diving and now beauty — seem to win all the time. Zhang Zilin, a full-time (though probably now former) office assistant, beat out 105 other contestants to be crowned the 57th Miss World, one of three global beauty titles along with Miss Universe and Miss Earth. Apparently, “Miss Thang” is not internationally recognized. While fireworks exploded over Hainan Island in celebration of the first ever Chinese Miss World, to some, the legitimacy of China’s victory is questionable. This isn’t to say that Miss Zhang is not gorgeous. I would let her be my secretary any day. But as China has paid nearly $4 million USD annually for the last five years to host the pageant in Sanya and finance the organization running the competition, perhaps the judges decided to reward China with a title. Furthermore, this year’s pageant served as a big old advertisement for the 2008 Beijing Olympics. As an estimated 2 billion people worldwide watch the Miss World pageant, China saw Miss World as an opportunity to spread the Olympic spirit around the globe. According to a Telegraph story Saturday, the Chinese government “strongly suggested” the contestants sing the Olympic torch relay anthem during the event. The chairwoman of the Miss World Organization said of the song, ““We were asked to do it and we were happy to be part of it. They didn’t say, ‘You have to do it’.” Sounds like she’s been in China too long. While it’s unclear whether the fix was in, China surely stands to benefit from having a Chinese Miss World trotting around the globe drumming up support for the Olympics. And she’ll probably do this job really well. As long as she doesn’t join any sort of Chinese team.

•Telegraph: China Wins Miss World 2007 Title

A mentally-ill New Hampshire man walked into Hillary Clinton’s Rochester, New Hampshire headquarters Friday claiming to have explosives strapped to his chest and demanded to speak to Senator Clinton. However, Clinton was in Washington and the “explosives” turned out to be highway flares. But that didn’t stop 47-year-old Leeland Eisenberg from orchestrating a six-hour hostage crisis involving a SWAT team, New Hampshire police, an infant and a group of young Clinton staffers. According to the AP, Eisenberg entered the Clinton office at around 1pm with a pack of flares strapped to his chest with duct tape. He released a woman with a small infant and took the rest of the office hostage, making the workers lie on the floor. New Hampshire officials promptly sent Rochester students home from school, and Clinton’s Democratic opponents Barack Obama and John Edwards closed their New Hampshire offices. Eisenberg then slowly released hostages throughout the afternoon as though his motives were more recreational than violent, and surrendered himself shortly after 6pm. He detached the so-called explosives from his chest and was taken into custody by police. The hostage crisis ended peacefully and Clinton told the press in Washington, “It’s been a difficult but eventually gratifying day the way it worked out.” Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson characterized Friday’s events as “scary” during an appearance Friday evening on Larry King Live. And although I haven’t spoken with her, I also know how my Jewish grandmother reacted to the hostage crisis at the Clinton campaign office: “Oy vey.” I assume that all of her older Jewish contemporaries reacted similarly. Not because of the hostages or the explosives or the potential carnage or any of that. But because of the name “Eisenberg.” You see, when an older person of the Jewish faith hears “Eisenberg” or “Goldstein” or “Weiss” or “Weinstein” on the news, it becomes less about the event itself and more about hoping that some fakakte mishugina didn’t go do something stupid to bring down the Jewish name. So if by some chance, Grandma, you bought a computer, learned how to use it and are reading what you have referred to as my “newsletter,” I will join you in a solemn “oy vey” today. Let’s hope next time it’s a shegetz.

•AP: Hostage Crisis Ends at Clinton Office