Leaders of the Crimson Guard:

Fun fact of the day -- did you know that the President and Prime Minister of Poland are identical twin brothers? (They also co-starred, at age 13, in a children's movie called The Two Who Stole the Moon.) Query: If both of them are evil, would it be appropriate for one of them to call the other "my evil twin"?

Deskmerc (mail) (www):
Actually, if only one of them were evil, it is likely both would refer to the other as "my evil twin".
8.31.2006 1:43pm
Anderson (mail) (www):
They should do a call-in radio show about car repair, concluding each episode with "And don't drive like my evil twin"; "Don't drive like *my* evil twin."
8.31.2006 1:44pm
Thief (mail) (www):
Heh. I instantly knew who the title of the post refers to: twin brothers Tomax &Xamot from GI Joe - who, in addition to leading the Crimson Guard and Cobra's legitimate business dealings, are also experts in "infiltration, espionage, sabotage, propaganda, and corporate law."

Here's even more.

Query: why is it that Cobra had a pair of lawyers on retainer, but (to the best of my knowledge), no JAG officers were ever assigned to the GI Joe team? ;)
8.31.2006 2:06pm
Matt22191 (mail):
Probably because, sadly, bad-guy lawyers are more believable than good-guy lawyers. And anyway, Joe don't need no stinkin' lawyers: He instinctively obeys the law, and no one would dare try to prosecute him.
8.31.2006 2:29pm
Anonymous Coward 2:
If both of them are evil, would it be appropriate for one of them to call the other "my evil twin"?

Certainly. Evil usually recognizes that being perceived by the public as good, or at least the lesser of two evils, is an advantage, and evil, being greedy, wants every advantage.
8.31.2006 2:47pm
Falafalafocus (mail):
I shall now endeavor to take this whimsical post and treat it way to seriously:

I humbly disagree with Anonymous Coward 2 at least in part. Evil people usually perceive themselves as good. Aristotle and Plato wrote extensively about this. The classic example is Hitler, who thought that he was making Germany better through conquest and extermination of the "subhumans". Hitler therefore believed that he was good.

But I think that "evil" requires that the twin have some difference of opinion. After all, how can the twin be evil if he/she agrees with you on all matters? Wouldn't you therefore be calling yourself evil (which I posited above is not the norm).

As a result, if Hitler had a twin (as opposed to a child), and the twin had a less blood thirsty opinion, I'd wager that he would call his twin the "evil twin".
8.31.2006 6:01pm
Tom R (mail):
Already ahead of you on this, Sash. See "Until the coalition split because one mocked the city walls the other had built..." (posted September 27, 2005).

I like to closely monitor all sets of hyper-achieving Slavic brothers around the globe.

But not these guys, because they're Scots, not Slavs.

BTW, Slate deserves a gold star for this title: "Marbury vs. Madison Avenue: Can Stephon Marbury's $15 sneaker revolutionize the sports-shoe business?" It's nearly as good as the "John duns SCOTUS" title that I expected from Dahlia Lithwick right up until the day that Ashcroft quit as AG.
8.31.2006 7:11pm
Syd Henderson (mail):
We used to have identical twins in our science fiction club. We promptly elected them President and Vice-President.
8.31.2006 8:00pm
Nobody special:
Isn't referencing your "evil twin," when in fact both of you are evil, a Gricean implicature?
8.31.2006 8:39pm
Pio:
Only the premier is evil. The president is just dim-witted. They're both, however, incompetent, which will hopefully limit the damage they'll do to the country.
8.31.2006 9:30pm
Bleepless (mail):
It not only would be honest, it might be fond.
9.1.2006 12:36am
Tom R (mail):
Hey, this reminds me... I have a vague recollection that, when Lech Walesa was still President of Poland, he proposed at one time to appoint himself as his own Prime Minister. Although this would not have been legally unconstitutional, it was denounced as politically improper so he backed down. However, I can't find any sources or further details for this -- not Wikipedia, not Google, not anywhere else on the Web. Could anyone here confirm or deny? Thanks, TR
9.1.2006 12:57am
zooba:
Matt22191: You missed the episode where Duke needed to detain Destro as an enemy combatant and used GI Yohn Joo to write a persuasive memo authorizing it under Article II.
9.1.2006 5:19am