NASA is calling for suggestions for a “catchy, easy to say” name for the Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope, otherwise known as GLAST.

The article stipulates that “Any suggestions for naming the telescope after a scientist may only include names of deceased scientists whose names are not already used for other NASA missions”, and that each suggestion must be accompanied by a statement of 25 words or less about why the name would be appropriate.

The deadline is March 31, 2008.

Kevin Rudd’s Sorry speech is one of the best-written speeches in Australian political history. It may well be the best speech ever written on the subject of post-colonial reconciliation in any nation.

The 1998 Canadian Statement of Reconciliation is almost as good, but it lacks the precision of Rudd’s moral and emotional analysis and continually dances around specifics, for example mentioning the tragedy of Louis Riel without saying anything about it other than that it was “sad.” It was more than sad, it was judicially-sanctioned murder for political purposes. Riel was no saint; he had no qualms about exercising unforgiveable violence and may have been clinically insane for much of his life. It seems the Canadian statement was determined to avoid the complexities of the case, but in my opinion this is a mistake. Far better to address the complexities, even if in passing, than to leave them unacknowledged and unresolved like half-chewed bread.

The 1988 American apology to interned Japanese citizens and Aleutians is a Senate Bill and is correspondingly dry and legislative in tone and unlikely to rouse anyone to passion. On the plus side, the bill established a $1.3 billion trust fund to recompense the victims — and even more impressively, the trust fund was charged with actively seeking out eligible persons to give them compensation.

I can’t find the 1992 South African statement on apartheid.

I suggest that future parliamentarians consider moving Australia Day, currently 26 January to celebrate the landing of the First Fleet (an historical event of obvious divisiveness), either to this day (and wouldn’t it be something to have Valentine’s Day as a public holiday?) or to the date of the 1967 referendum (27 May).

Every year, Talking Squid tries to bring readers a list of recommended stories to consider nominating for the Ditmar Awards. This year we have run out of time (nominations close tomorrow) and motivation. Instead, we offer the recurring Ditmar nomination recommendations. This list will not need to be updated every year as we expect it to be remarkably stable over the near future.

NOVEL
Sean McMullen, “A Long Mediaeval Ballad, With Engineering Diagrams”
Garth Nix, “Sir Acclaim and Mr Coinpurse Go Back in Print”
Marianne de Pierres, “Tight Latex Suits and Shooting Things”
Joel Shepherd, “Shooting Things and Tight Latex Suits”

SHORT FICTION
Damien Broderick, “The Quantum Thingy”
Terry Dowling, “Something Creepy This Way Comes”
Margo Lanagan, “Horrible Events, Odd Words”
Margo Lanagan, “Everyone Says I’m a Nice Person ‘Til They Read My Stories”
Ben Peek, “Cool Musician”

COLLECTED WORK
Jonathan Strahan, “Best SF of the Year”
Jonathan Strahan, “Best Fantasy of the Year”
Jonathan Strahan, “Best Slipstream of the Year”
Jonathan Strahan, “Best Original Anthology of the Year”
Jonathan Strahan, “Best Career Retrospective Collection of the Year”
(other nominated works by Jonathan Strahan removed from the ballot at his request)
The Really Small Press Collective, “Please: We Need To Sell Fifty Copies To Break Even”

ATHELING (FOR CRITICAL REVIEW)
Rob Hood, “I Haven’t Written About Leprechauns Yet”
Chris Lawson, “Don’t These Idiots Know Anything About Orbital Mechanics or Cerenkov Radiation?”
Sean Williams, “I Am Not the Evil One”
Ben Peek, “Dammit, Now If I Complain About Awards I’ll Look Like a Dick”

PROFESSIONAL ARTWORK
Nick Stathopolous, “Echidna with a six-pack”
Shaun Tan, “Ceci n’est pas un Magritte”

FAN PRODUCTION
The 2008 Ditmar Award Committee, “The paradoxical nomination”

FAN WRITER
Grant Watson, “No One Read It, But the Awards Are In Perth And They Remembered My Name”
Robin Pen, “I Didn’t Write Anything At All Last Year, But the Awards Are In Perth And They Remembered My Name”

Feel free to add recommendations in the comments, but be warned: vicious personal attacks will be removed unless the target and the submitting author are the same entity. What counts for a vicious personal attack? Whatever Talking Squid deems to be so.