Fun with Numbers

Well, it has been something of a slow news cycle. Apparently no one is interested in making much international or political news in the dead of winter (or Australian summer). Strikes in Lebanon and Guinea, State of the Union address by President Bush, it's all pretty much more of the same.

But the CIA has just put out their 2007 World Factbook. Understandably, their information is somewhat flawed and often at odds with other information and intelligence agencies (no I will not get into any political discussions here). With the Factbook this is largely due to them relying on local censuses and official statistics to fill out their information on every independent state and dependency. But their information is still a very useful rough guide, and seems to immediately and directly flow into Wikipedia. And of course once wikified, information is gospel truth.

So here is one of my latest graphics, showing the population and religion of every African country. This was just something I was thinking about, and slapped together. For the record, the population total for that continent is somewhere around 909,000,000 to put things in pespective.

Obviously it is a little difficult to read this graphic...it looks much better as a spreadsheet than as a cut-and-pasted picture, for that I apologize. The countries are in alpabetical order. This is a work in progress - welcome to the internet, ladies and gentlemen.

Anyway, one reason why I say that this is a work in progress is because this graph has been a little lesson for myself in using OpenOffice, a suite of open-source programs offered by Sun Microsystems. OpenOffice operates more or less like Microsoft Office, but the coding is open source and it is offered to all for free. I recommend everyone give it a try.

Political and Civil Freedoms Across the World

With the January news cycle being relatively slow, it is time for the talking heads and thinking bodies to create some buzz.

Perhaps one of the more interesting and relevant reports to come out this week has been the 2007 update of "Freedom in the World", released annually by the think-tank Freedomhouse. They have been gathering information on political and civil freedoms across the world since 1972. The following is a self-made map cataloguing the status of freedom this year (Green covers the "Free" states, Yellow "Partly Free" and Red "Not Free").

A major theme this year is how the number of countries in each status has remained approximately the same in the past 15 years or so (although the number of free countries is much higher than, say, in 1981, largely owing to political developments in Eastern Europe, Latin America, Southern Africa and East Asia).

You can check out the report for an explanation of their methodology and scores. Their compiled comparative data can be seen here. I confess that playing with this information was a passtime of mine in whiling away the long hours in Peace Corps.

It is interesting to compare the scores with the Economist Intelligence Unit's new Democracy Index Survey. Their ratings of countries is a bit more graded, and as a result a great deal fewer countries get to stand next to Sweden and FInland near the top. Here is a self-made map of their results (Dark green for Full Democracy, Light Green for Flawed Democracy, Yellow for Hybrid Regime and Red for Authoritarian Regime).


Some similarities, some differences. Nevertheless, one can see that, as mentioned above, Latin America, Eastern Europe, Southern (and parts of Western) Africa, and parts of East Asia are seeing some political gains. Much of the rest of the world is not, or is in some sort of quasi-authoritarian limbo (but much less of it ruled by military regimes or one party states than before 1991). And, despite all the best efforts of its populace and leaders to the contrary, North America, Western Europe, Japan and Australasia still rank at the top of the list. As they say, democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others. Maybe that is the scariest lesson!

Rule of Law in Iraq

I was hoping to avoid comment on the issue of Saddam's execution, as it occured over the holidays when I was absent from this blog, but the bizarre executions of Barzan Ibrahim and Awad Hamed al-Bandar, two of Saddam's aides and relatives, brings me to comment.

The Iraqi government apparently released footage today showing the execution by hanging, resulting in the decapitation of Barzan. I cannot say I am an expert on human anatomy, nor on execution, but I find this a rather unusual and ghastly event.

It is, in a larger sense, a sort of microcosm surrounding the whole trial and execution of Saddam and the top leaders in his regime. Granted, they were bloodthirsty and brutal rulers whose rise to power resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands and the torture or rape of a goodly number more. But both Saddam and his aides were tried and executed for the killing of some 148 Shias
in 1982. The Iraqi courts have even gone to far as to drop all charges against Saddam posthumously for his role in the 1988 Anfal campaign against the Kurds, which resulted in ethnic cleansing, gassing of civilian populations and arguable genocide. Furthermore, the details of Saddam's execution (that the Iraqi government sought to suppress) show that it resembled something more of a lynching, with Saddam being the one showing fortitude while he is taunted and the names of Shia firebrand Moqtada al-Sadr and his father are chanted by the entirely Shia audience. These latest executions seem to also have at best a tinge of incompetence, at worst a feeling of Shia revenge in a style of Mesopotamian justice that seems little far removed from Hammurabi and the Assyrian Empire.

Saddam and his top circle are clearly guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity. It must also be said that at the very least some semblance of an impartial court was attempted in their trial. However, quite frankly at the end of the day these figures have not been held accountable for their most heinous misdeeds, and their killings promise something more of martyrdom and sectarian violence. One wonders if a greater punishment would have been to leave Saddam, abandoned by his wife and with his sons dead, sitting in a cell, far from the centres of power and the palaces he once enjoyed. The trial and execution also seem like a duck of responsibility on the part of the Americans, who (regardless of political affiliation) say that this justice "is the business of the Iraqis", and yet also say in almost the same breath that the Iraqis are doing a good job of murdering each other in civil war.

All in all, these executions show to me that perhaps Saddam was not so unusual after all. It seems to be Mesopotamian tradition to dispatch of one's enemies in as gruesome a method as possible. So much for the hope of a new dawn in Iraqi political tradition.

France a la Anglais? Non!

I found this article on the BBC amusing. Apparently historical documents have come to light showing that in 1956 then-French Prime Minister Guy Mollet proposed to his British counterparts some form of "union" with Great Britain. His second proposal was that if a union was unacceptable, then France would join the British Commonwealth (which meant accepting Queen Elizabeth II as the titular head of that body).

The idea apparently went nowhere, but French pundits and historians are apparently tripping over themselves to denounce Mollet and state that were he alive today and he proposed such a plan, he would be tried for treason. It is too bad that the French political elite have such a hatred towards Great Britain and any thought of unity with them - they seem to have accepted Mollet's third-best plan of a European community centred on partnership with Germany rather well. This is despite the shared history and - yes - culture and language between France and Britain. I suppose the Hundred Years War still leaves a bad taste in the collective mouth of the French establishment.

In my opinion a French - British union would be in many ways a natural and strong partnership...but there would be huge political obstacles to overcome. The French approach to the state has gone in a much different direction from the English since, well, since the Hundred Years War.

Tackling the Middle East

I would like to point out that I am going to write on this issue once, and once only.

I noticed in my time at university that a cause celebre among politically-active young people (especially in the years 2000-2004) was their stance on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Jewish students and Arab/Muslim students would frequently engage in debates, demonstrations, protests, and performance art (which I promise I will allude to in a later entry) on this issue, as if handing out flyers at Georgetown or Harvard Yard was the final remaining key in solving some 70 years of ethnic, religious and communal conflict. I cannot tell you how many times I was subjected to polemics and speeches on censuses from the 1930s, individuals from this or that side that met untimely (yet symbolic) ends, this and that injustice committed, etc. American students would often side with a group based on their political affiliations, roughly speaking conservatives being pro-Israel, liberals being pro-Palestinian (and with the politically active yet irrelevant often taking the most detailed positions). Nevermind that most American Jews are Democrats, and most Palestinian Arabs live in a socially conservative culture that would make your average college student cringe: these are just some of a litany ironies that surround this sad struggle.

In any case, I mention all this as the Economist has published what I think is a fine and succinct editorial and article on the subject of Israel's international image, especially among the Jewish diaspora. The article correctly points out that too often groups that are organized to support and promote Israel in other countries (such as in the US) often wind up masking the great social and political debates actually occurring in Israel in favor of touting the rhetoric of Israel's political right, and lazily accusing any dissenters from this ideology of being anti-Semitic. As the editorial notes, "Helping Israel should no longer mean defending it uncritically. Israel is strong enough to cope with harsh words from its friends." Especially in America, the relationship with Israel is distorted by the existence of AIPAC, a large lobbying group, and Christian evangelicals, who (in another ironic yet to me repugnant relationship) support Israeli hawks and settler groups in the believe that their reconquest of Zion will bring about the Second Coming, and of course actually causing all the Jews to either convert to Christianity or perish in flames. Talk about Israeli Jews bedding with the Devil! And I wonder why these strident Christians are not a little more concerned over the fate of Palestinian Christians...but once again the ironies abound. The end result on the American end is that we support Israeli politicians in some of their occasionally less-than-sensible ventures, and lose all credibility as an impartial arbiter.

At the same time, America has acquired a most unusual ally (and a non-official ally at that - there are no treaty obligations defining either party's rights or responsibilities). Despite its size, it seems that Israel calls the shots in this relationship in a way Americans would allow no other country of 5 million to do. Israel acts, and America responds. American criticism is very light towards Israeli disacknowledgement of its nuclear program, or military incursions to densely-populated Palestinian areas resulting in heavy civilian casualties, or the issue of the wall being built through the West Bank, and this is while the American government heavily subsidizes the Israeli military. Even more bizarre, America finds itself subject to occasional espionage by its smaller ally: witness the 2006 guilty plea of Col. Lawrence Franklin and the 1987 plea of Jonathan Pollard to passing classified information to Israeli officials. Such scandals should be the stuff of conflict between America and Russia or China, not the means to build a strategic friendship between a large power and a small recipient of aid. No staunch ally of anyone's should engage in such behavior.

However, I do agree with the pro-Israel side that often too much is played up over Israel's shortcomings while the Arab side's shortcomings are played down. Groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah are pledged to destroy a Jewish state and use methods that attack civilians (which constitute acts of terrorism, but once again a discussion of that politically-charged term is best left for another time) , and I will not bother to get into Iranian President Ahmadinejad's antics. Nor shall I go into the details about how anti-Zionism is used by Middle Eastern governments as a political safety valve for their crushing of internal political debate.

Furthermore, I would like at this juncture to point out that I feel that Israel is a necessary good for the world. I think history has proven that the Jewish people need a separate state of their own in which to live freely, and that this state might as well be in their ancestral and holy lands (rather than Uganda, Madagascar or Paraguay, as some Zionists a century ago tried). One could argue "why are the Jews so special?", to which the proper response is that they have directly and indirectly shaped the morals and moral history of the world's Abrahamic religions, to which in various guises a majority of the world's population adheres. As Thomas Friedman pointed out in From Beirut to Jerusalem, one reason why Israel envinces so much international criticism is precisely because the Jews helped to invent the concept of universal justice. And as for why should they get their own country, well, it is an idea that they made a fact and have kept so for almost a century. If all the Gypsies moved to Voivodina and declared it an independent country for their people's defense, the world could not argue with that. But the fact is that the "wandering" Jews actually succeeded where other international minorities have not. They should not be penalized as a result.

But at the same time, the Palestinian Arabs deserve some sympathy, as they have been likewise turned into a stateless people, and in their homelands are deprived of life, liberty and property, and are subject to a great deal of social disorder and violence (some of their own making, some the making of the opposing side). They likewise have expressed a desire for an independent state, and should be allowed to achieve so, free from oppression and violence. The world should not wait for them to magically become an enlightened, peaceful democracy before granting them a state, as their current chaos, self-tyranny and ghetto-like rule is intricately connected with the conflict at hand.

I agree with the Economist and moderates on both sides, in that a lasting peace settlement between Israel and the Palestinians is actually quite straightforward: a shared capital of Jerusalem, a Palestinian state roughly following the pre-1967 "Green Line" (but one that leaves the biggest Jewish settlements in Israel in return for land elsewhere), no "right of return" for Palestinian refugees to Israel, no claims on Judaea or Samaria by Israel on Palestine. To this a mix of reparations payments could be added, potentially a demilitarization and an economic union (another good idea proposed by Thomas Friedman in the above-mentioned book, written at a time when he was still a serious writer). The only problem with this peace plan is actually going through the torturous political landscape needed to make it a reality. It seems at times that the political (and military) fight is at its bitterest when it is Israelis vs. Israelis or Palestinians vs. Palestinians.

This seems to actually be a common factor in war: a warring people are more concerned with fighting their enemies at home than in effecting a decisive victory against the stated enemy. Witness the whole "surge" debate among Americans. In any case, there will be a lot of rough dealing with extremists in Israel and among Palestinians in order to achieve peace, and apparently such courage is at the moment lacking.

And finally, I must admit that until Israeli and Palestinian leaders can summon that political courage, I have found myself largely washing my hands of this conflict. I am not a Palestinian Arab, nor a Jew, and the endless arguments and bitter conflict seem typical of an internal family feud (which this arguably is, between the children of Isaac and his half-brother Ishmael). Both nationalities are very cosmopolitan, very well-educated and have a collective historical memory of legalism and trade, as well as a hard habit of forgetting injustices. This does make for one difficult and protracted conflict. Another familiy's problems are sometimes best left to the relatives to sort out, without taking sides in the affair. Furthermore, although Jerusalem is for many the spiritual center of the world, one must put this conflict in perspective: a grand total of 6,385 people have been killed to date in 20 years of Israeli-Palestinian conflict (including 1322 in the first Intifada). Although this leaves out the six other Arab-Israeli wars, this is still small potatoes when considering some 300,000 killed in Darfur since 2003, or the 4,000,000 killed recently in Congo in the most destructive war since World War II. These conflicts get no space in the international mind, while UN resolutions, hilltop settlements, rights of return, uses of the River Jordan's water etc. abound ad nauseam.

In any case, I hope for peace, hope for a more open and constructive dialogue between America and its Israeli allies, and steadfastly avoid college demonstrations and students with flyers.

Women Problems for China

I must confess that I enjoy the Pocket World in Figures that the Economist gave me as part of my subscription offer: I love information comparing the nations of the world on a wide variety of subjects. One which the book lists is the male - female ratio in countries across the world.

I note this because a recent BBC article suggests that China will face a shortage of tens of millions of women within a generation. All this while the over-60 population will rapidly increase to around a third of the population, and while the overall population increases another 200,000,000 to around 1,500,000,000 in the next quarter century. To put things in perspective, the Chinese population is expected to increase by a number almost equalling the sum of all Americans. And to put things in greater perspective, this is a phenomenal increase considering that the Chinese population when Mao assumed power was a mere 400,000,000 (closer to our projected population by this midcentury). Ironically, the one child population and a preference for boys is to blame for the overrepresentation of males and seniors in Chinese society, and yet seems to have only gone so far towards slowing population growth there. It is truly beyond my comprehension how so many people can live sustainably in that country.

But I digress from the main point of this post: male female ratios. Here are some countries' breakdowns (number of men for every 100 women), courtesy the boffins at the Economist:

UAE - 214 (!!!)
Saudi Arabia -117
China, Pakistan - 106 (already pretty high)
India - 105
Bangladesh, Taiwan - 104
Cote d'Ivoire, Iran, Malaysia - 103
Algeria, Nigeria, Turkey - 102
Egypt, Peru, Phillipines, Singapore, South Korea, Venezuela - 101
World (average) - 101
Indonesia, Kenya - 100
Canada, Chile, Israel - 98
Brazil, USA - 97
Japan, EU (average), Mexico, South Africa, Thailand - 96
Switzerland - 94
Kazakhstan (CIA Factbook) - 93
Hong Kong - 89
Lithuania, Russia - 87
Estonia, Ukraine - 85
Latvia - 84

So what can we learn from this breakdown? We of course should always be wary of statistics, but nevertheless a few things become clear to me. First, a large majority of the world's countries have ratios somewhere between 100 (or a man for every woman) and 95 or so (a few women extra). Anything beyond this range seems like a recipe for trouble and turmoil. There are some exceptions: South Korea has more men than women (but has one of the highest population percentages on the internet ... perhaps a necessity for the extra men?). However, by and large, you can see that countries with an excess of men either have problems or are out looking for them. Likewise for countries that have a dearth of men - these are mostly former Soviet republics, the lack of men there having to do with their smoking, drinking and killing one another (the average Russian man lives to 60, the average Russian woman to 75). And also, now you can see why women from the former Soviet republics are so interested in meeting some nice, sober Western guys. If you have the means, I highly recommend it.

As for the extra Chinese, Indian and Saudi men, well, I leave that to the reader...any suggestions?

Somali Strikes

I suppose my mention of Black Hawk Down was a little ironic, because probably the most interesting news these days (in an otherwise boring news patch of the month for those of us not interested in Rosie O'Donnell) has been this week's American airstrikes on targets in southern Somalia. The targets were three suspects thought to be the masterminds behind the 1998 East African Embassy bombings. Reports have been all over the place in the past week: originally it was claimed that al-Qaeda second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahiri was among the targets (quite a feat considering that Predator drones were attempting to target him in a village in northern Pakistan this time last year). Now reports are saying that none of the suspects were actually hit.

The airstikes have brought the usual international criticism. Let us look past any resurrected, tired rhetoric to analyse what is occuring. One the one hand, these strikes can be seen as a potential success: as in Afghanistan, they are providing strong air support to local ground forces pursuing targets of the American national interest. In this sense, it is a good example of well-applied force for national gain (on America's part). It also provides useful support to the Somali Transitional Government that the American government wishes to succeed.

Speaking for myself, however, I question the value of this intervention. One, the current administration is appearing to fall for its same traps all over again as in Afghanistan. When Bush made it clear so many years ago that hunting individual terrorist masterminds (like Bin Laden, or OBL once you get your security clearance) is a waste of military resources, why then go at it all over again, with potentially the same limited results? With all this talk of a decisive troop surge in Iraq, do we need naval and air forces committed to Somalia (they could surely provide our troops on the ground with some strong support in the upcoming weeks in Baghdad).

Foremost, as I have questioned time and again concerning the Iraq strategy, what exactly is the intended end result? The Islamic Courts Union has been routed from Mogadishu, and in its place the local warlords have returned to their bad old ways, complete with a resurgence of the qat narcotic (Afghanistan, anyone?). An allegedly democratic and secular, UN-recognized government now sits in Mogadishu, but these descriptive terms are essentially just promises invoked in hope of expected international aid. The writ of this government doesn't extend far beyond the capital (Puntland is a self-governing region, and Somaliland is a fully functioning - if unrecognized - independent country). Unlike Afghanistan, the new government exists almost solely through the military efforts of Ethiopia, a veteran of bloody conflict against Somalis. This is more akin to the US supporting Russian troops in taking Kabul from the Taliban. One look at some of the images of Ethiopia's armed forces should show that this regional power isn't at a Russian level of professionalism (the troops more closely resemble day-laborers armed with 50 caliber machine guns). Furthermore, there appears evidence that Somalia is being used as a proxy conflict between Eritrea and Ethiopia, while Ethiopia's own local civil wars are mixing into Somalia as Somalis in Ogaden attack the Ethiopian military, and the Ethiopian military rounds up Oromos (a long-fighting and oppressed plurality ethnic group in Ethiopia) in Mogadishu. Anyone the least bit familiar with armed conflict in Africa knows that this chaotic maelstrom is par for the course.

Despite an American desire, (from the American right as well as left) to see all Islamists as one global enemy, I am not sure what is to be gained by encouraging the current situation in Somalia. The US is ill-equipped to undertake another nation-building task, and as far as I can tell not likely to convince any capable power to undertake such a feat. I can quickly foresee the Somalis tiring of Ethiopian rule and giving greater and greater aid to an ICU insurgency against the foreign invader, especially more so to one now openly backed by the US (we have not been so popular in Mogadishu since 1993). More to the point, this is exactly what ICU leaders have planned from even before their "defeat" (and what many Somalis worldwide expect). Ethiopia itself is a less-than ideal partner in this endeavor, as beyond the traditional hostility to it in Somalia it is an autocratic country accused of fixing elections, massacring demonstrators and sending political opponents to labor camps (but for whatever reason is a darling of international donors, as well as the headquarters of the African Union, and therefore apparently beyond reproach). The region, furthermore, is terribly environmentally degraded and overpopulated, which makes it an even worse ticking bomb to tinker with. This seems like another mess that the US has gotten involved in with little clear idea of what is at stake, or what a desired yet realistic outcome would be. I thought we learned enough of that in 1993.

In any case, the picture above is of a Lockheed AC-130, used to target enemy ground forces with massive amounts of fire power, and supposedly used in the strikes in Somalia. There are 21 in active service, mostly used by the US Air Force Special Operations Command. It was first brought into service over Nha Trang, Viet Nam in 1967. They can provide one hell of a suppressive firepower, but admittedly their usage would seem limited when trying to specifically find and target three suspects in mangrove swamps. Ironically, one of two AC-130s lost in service exploded over Somalia in 1994 (the other was shot down in 1991 in Iraq...).


fg

And Now For Something Completely Different...

Following in Tim's footsteps, some pictures from New Year's in Washington, DC. These are all from the National Zoo:

Giant Panda in a Tree

Golden Tamarin Monkeys


Is that an Ewok? Just a Sloth eating lunch...


One of the Zoo's Sumatran Tigers out for a walk...


...and a Mexican wolf out for a swim.

A view up to the roof through the indoor rainforest in the Amazonia exhibit. It was a pleasant 35 degrees C in here, with plenty of humidity. Much like how I remember Southeast Asia when I was there.

A Book Review for Half a Book

I recently have been reading my way through a book called The Long Walk, by Slavomir Rawicz. It is a gripping story of seven Polish and Eastern European Prisoners of War who escape from a Siberian gulag in 1941 and walk through Mongolia, China and Tibet to reach British India.

Why do I say this is a review of half a book? Because halfway through the book I read about Slavomir Rawicz on Wikipedia and BBC News, and was more than a little stunned by the news: the story is not true! He was actually released from a camp in 1942 and sent to Iran, eventually making his way with other Polish emigres to England, but even there not performing the military role he claimed to have done.

I must say that I am more than a little disappointed by this news. The story is a fantastic story...although with the benefit of hindsight perhaps too fantastic (can seven overworked and undernourished men really escape from a Gulag and walk through metre-deep snow for six weeks going 30 miles a day on starvation rations?). The story also includes sightings of Yeti in the Himalayas, but alas apparently even that was added by the British ghost-writer who sought to validate their existence (I believe that they could exist, but like Mulder or Houdini on their personal quests the blatantly falsified information angers me all the more for the bad reputation it gives to such a search).

I am also more than a little disappointed because I would very much like to read an account that describes Stalinist Russia and its gulags as Elie Wiesel's "Night" describes Auschwitz. It is ironic that the Holocaust is such a well-documented and (despite the rantings of some such people as I described in my EuroParliament post) reasonably well-understood and well-studied event, while the Stalinist atrocities going on literally right next door are so poorly understood. Even the numbers are debated. There seems to be pitifully few accessible works in English for us Westerners to read on Gulags, and even less that is not written by those with political axes to grind (Soviet emigres and all varieties of Eastern Europeans at differing stages of war with the Soviet Union). I guess my search continues.

And I shall hopefully finish this work of fiction I set out reading as a piece of history. Churchill was right: Russia continues to be a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.

At the Movies Again...

...Or more correctly, watching DVDs from the library. This time it was "The Prince and Me", starring Julia Stiles, a film about a young woman who is preparing for medical school but instead falls in love with a prince from a fictive royal family of Denmark. In the tradition of Hollywood movies copying plots I believe that this film was already made as "The Princess Diaries" (yes, I watched that one with my little sister because I'm a good older brother). Well, this one was terrible. The plot was all over the place, not terribly romantic (or comedic), sort of set at the University of Wisconsin, sort of set in Copenhagen (which from a little checking on the internet appears to be a beautiful Prague in springtime). The acting was subpar. And, humourously, the entire constitution and society of Denmark has been reinterpreted for the silver screen. First (obviously), Danes speak English as their first language, even the royal family at home. Second, enough with all this nonsense about Queen Margaret - Denmark is ruled by a King whose wife seems to resemble Zsa Zsa Gabor. Also, the Crown Prince is a Prince William type playboy with a 12 year old sister... so much for the two real princes in their 30s (who married an Australian and Hong Kong woman, respectively, not Americans...). I (and probably the people of Denmark) was also unaware that the monarchs of Denmark personally convened and chaired Cabinet meetings. What a load of crap.

Long and short, if anyone has Black Hawk Down, let me please borrow it and watch it. It may be a depressing film, but at least its somewhat based on reality. That plus there comes a time when I can't take any more romantic comedies...it's time for something to cleanse the filmgoer's palate of all that artificial movie saccharine.

Surge

That blog entry before this was the first in almost a month, so I feel it was a little messy and rambling, but I needed to get something out there (Talk amongst ya'selves..). I promise to keep the next batch short and to the point, with some taut prose.

So I just watched the Bush speech, like I'm sure many political junkies and foreign affairs fans have done. I found it interesting. To the point, and actually rather well-spoken (a point journalist James Fallows has raised is that Bush seems to mis-speak more often when talking to his "Base" than when seriously dealing with a bipartisan audience). He was correct that whatever happens, there will be more violence in Iraq, and so people need to be prepared to deal with that. He also mentioned that America cannot afford to appear to lose in this conflict there: I would agree with him on that point too. As Paul Kennedy pointed out in The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, that is the bitter irony of power: once a committment has been made, there is no way to withdraw from that committment without losing relative power. However, often these committments are expensive in terms of blood and treasure, and can likewise diminish power (talk about a prisoner's dilemma). As I have said before, this is why the debate on invading Iraq in the first place should have been taken more seriously - now it is far too late for the politicians to be squabbling on when and how to minimize an American presence there.

But on to this "surge", the new buzzword for 2007. Ultimately, it is a slight of hand and seems to be done for political reasons. The extra troops are troops already stationed in the Middle East - timetables have just been fiddled with. The whole debate over troop levels seems to be too much of an inside-the-Beltway game at the moment. Strategists need to seriously discuss the best means to secure a victory, or at least a stable situation, rather than the political horsetrading occuring at the moment.

Identity, Tradition and Sovereignty

The new year has brought the European Union two new members, Bulgaria and Romania. These two countries are the latest intakes in the EU's expansion this decade, and their presence could point to future difficulties in the European project.

For all the techno-jargon about "absorbtion capacity" and whatnot, the fact of the matter is that the two newest members are much poorer, have poorer infrastructure and a more corrupt society than the EU's more venerable members. Romania and Bulgaria are in quite a different world than, say, Ireland, Sweden or the UK, let alone Germany, or even Poland or Slovakia. The promise of EU membership has forced these countries to undergo reforms, but it is far from a finished project.

I mention Bulgaria and Romania because their addition has caused a small stir in the European Parliament (and it obviously takes something unusual to bring notice to the EUP). European Members of Parliament now include representatives from Romania's Greater Romania Party and Bulgaria's National Attack Party. In the world of EU politics, these two parties are considered rather unsavoury, what with their anti-minority, nationalist overtones. Their membership has allowed the formation of a new Pan-European political group: Identity, Tradition and Sovereignty, which will include Le Pen's French National Party, the Freedom Party of Austria (formerly led by Joerg Haider, until he tried to reinvent his political career), the Flemish Nationalist (and anti-immigrant) Vlaams Belang, and various far-right politicians from Italy, including Alessandra Mussolini, the granddaughter of Il Duce and niece of Sophia Loren (for details on her career as a topless model please consult, as always, wikipedia). No word yet on any support coming from the Danish People's Party or any of the late Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn's followers. These parties share a common distrust of the EU, especially regarding attempts to write an EU constitution, support stricter anti-crime measures in their home countries, oppose any EU membership for Turkey, and generally oppose immigration into the EU. Opponents can point to antisemitic histories of some politicians in this group, as well as a few national irredentists (just let the name "Greater Romania" sink in for a minute ... sadly I'm not sure how great it would be).

Quite a few have had some electoral successes in years of late, and a number have participated in or supported national Cabinets in their home countries. To traditional supporters of liberal democracy, such politicians are fascists, pure and simple. I remember a Professor of mine, a former high level State Department employee, remarking to my class that of course the EU must shun Austria and force it to change its government if its government included Joerg Haider! Such people must not be tolerated!

And there in lies the secret of such parties. European politics especially are dominated by something of a political elite...something that might seem quite familiar to the US State Department. All members of this "elite", despite their rhetoric or hairsplittting campaign promises, largely offer the same thing: parliamentary democracy with the same social democratic economics and values. So well and good if people want it, but if they are looking for something different then there is precious little on offer in the mainstream. As a result, these parties appeal to certain needs and fears felt by European voters. Attempts to exclude them only seem to prove that the system is rigged (and it is true that supporters of liberal democracy, whether Republican neoconservatives or UN-minded liberal internationalists, seem to expect a pretty narrow range of acceptable results from democracy despite the world's great variety of cultures, historical experiences and problems - one can see this in calls for Palestinian democracy followed by an international boycott once Palestinians elected a hardline Hamas government). The growing popularity in Europe has led mainstream politicians, such as Sarkozy in France, to address some of their voters' concerns about immigration and crime.

Socialists and communists seem to fit in to democracies and even have a hard left organization in the European parliament - the Party of the European Left, which includes as observers the unreconstructed members of some former Eastern European Communist regimes. It seems that "establishment" opinion seems more tolerable of them than of suspected fascists. In a true democracy, it is better to give everyone a voice ... usually the better to debate them and let them show their own failings (the European far right is an especially fractious lot).

So I say good luck to the Identity, Tradition and Sovereignty Party. I disagree with what you say, but defend your right to say it. Just please do not try to deprive people of fundamental civil and political rights, or try to overthrow your governments and carry out genocide (admittedly, I am not too worried about the latter - professional politicians seem much more harmless than professional militaries, intelligence services and secret police forces that dabble in politics). Ultimately, all politics really is is a means to for the rest of us to humour the politically insane.

As a final warning, I would point to our far right European politican associates that the attempt to organize a Fascist International in the 1930s was a dismal failure (so much so I cannot even find reference to it on Wikipedia). Strident nationalists ultimately do not seem to get along with other strident nationalists ... especially when they are trying to deport each other's populations and control each other's territories. The only common enemies they gather are people favoring democracy... and eventually everyone gets a little tired and wants to throw the old bums out. So the Far Right bums beware of their antics, because they too will meet the same fate.

Some (Further) Oppression in Kazakhstan

I must admit that I am not a terribly great fan of Hare Krishna adherents, but I view them much as Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy rates Earth: Mostly Harmless. I do remember them being a visible community in Almaty, but they certainly never got in anyone's way.

Therefore I find it somewhat shocking to read this latest news of a literal attack and destruction on a Hare Krishna community by local authorities in Kazakhstan. As this article points out, this heinous action seems to belie the Nazarbayev regime's claim that it is a religiously tolerant and diverse nation. Apparently some religions are to be better tolerated than others.

It reminds me very much of a sad discussion I had with a Kazakh student two years ago, upon my first arriving in my city where I worked. This woman was an ethnic Kazakh, with a very good command of English and who has since become a teacher in that town. We were talking about religion, and she stated that she considered herself non-religious, and that Kazakhstan should be tolerant of many religions. But she then followed this statement with a strong condemnation of the city of Uralsk, not far from us. The reason? Uralsk has a Russian Orthodox church in its city center, and Kazakhstan is supposed to be the nation of Kazakhs, and Kazakhs must be Muslim. Despite my protestations, she apparently did not get the complete contradiction in her viewpoints. And this was a member of the educated youth!

I am not trying to slam the people of Kazakhstan. Probably all nations grapple with issues of religious freedom. Nor, to press the point home again, will I say that I am a great friend of those who seek to publicly push their religion on others, especially through missionary activity (and, although I am probably by their own definition no longer Catholic, I still take some comfort that my religion of origin has turned from pure missionary work to social justice programs and inculturation). To be honest, one wonders how much politics have to do with this act. Pentecostal missionaries are much more widespread - and obnoxious - than Hare Krishnas, but undoubtedly Kazakhstani authorities realize that an attack on them would mobilize religious zealots not least in the United States.

However, at the end of the day, it is not the business of a government to act more violent and obnoxious than this religious groups. If the groups are behaving peacefully, and not attempting to undermine the society that they live in, then the state should allow them to openly live their lives and speak their piece. Debate and cohabitation is the best possible test for the rest of us and our beliefs.

The rightness or wrongness (on a religious level) of their acts is not for political authorities to decide or to punish. And this oppression does not just extend to persecution, but to legal restrictions on the voicing of religious opinions. Kazakhstan, much like other countries in the Middle East and its environs, places strong restrictions on any political organizations advocating a religious or ethnocentric point of view. While this may seem necessary for cohesion in a young and fragile state, the suppression of any such sentiments will only make them come back in worse versions (just ask Algeria and Egypt). The government of Kazakhstan would do well to stop meddling one way or another with religion and with Hindu converts and get about their sorely-neglected business of attempting to improve their people's lives.

Another 20th Century Figure Passes from the Scene

Whatever your opinion of Augusto Pinochet, it must be admitted that the nation of Chile, and perhaps the world, has turned a small historical corner with his passing at the age of 91. As the Economist relates, even those on the political spectrum inclined to agree with Pinochet and to appreciate his policies had come to see the General as something of an anachronism.

This appears to be a new problem of our age. With ever better health care and ever better scientific understanding, lifespans have increased dramatically. This has meant that a large number of world leaders (mostly from the World War II and post War generations) have remained on the scene long after their careers had either formally or effectively ended. Think of Ariel Sharon, Yasir Arafat, Ronald Reagan, King Fahd of Saudi Arabia, Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan of the United Arab Emirates, and these deaths have all been in the past couple years. Fidel Castro is also fading from the scene (with his slightly younger brother Raul waiting in the wings).

Old leaders from a previous era seem to have a habit of hanging around longer than, perhaps, for the good of any. Italian politics is especially noted for its gerontocracy. When one starts playing hisotrical games, however, one begins to wonder if history is slowing down these days, despite all the claims of the world speeding up. One often hears the lament that World War II vets are dying out every day, but who was lamenting the demise of Mexican War veterans in Theodore Roosevelt's years? John Kerry's and George W. Bush's Vietnam records were hotly debated in the 2004 election, but a century ago Civil War veterans had already faded from the Presidency (McKinley was an enlisted man, and the last Civil War officer-turned-President was Benjamin Harrison). Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson were children in the 1860's, but where are the Presidential contenders today who were mere children in the 1960's (I know Barack Obama meets these age requirements, but I am wondering where the more heavy hitting statesman of such an age are).

Granted, our lifespans have increased, but has our wait to a mature age also increased? Our lives seem faster these days, and our politics seem influenced by minute-by-minute changes on 24 hour news channels. Yet we still debate the 1960's and Vietnam, and glorify the living veterans of a war that ended almost 2/3 of a century ago. We seem to forget so much of our history, but at the same time it seems like we have trouble letting our history go.

With the passing of Pinochet in Chile, it seems that hopefully everyone in that country can be relieved that more than a little of their history has left them.

Energy Efficiient?

Today was bill-paying day for me, which is an unpleasant yet necessary act for all of us without capital liquidity. In any case, I was on the NStar website paying my electricity bill, and I found this little nifty graph, displaying the energy consumption in my apartment over the past year. We moved into our place in September, and from what I gather the apartment was more or less vacant over the summer for renovations. You can see an obvious difference in the electricity consumption before the summer and after September, almost by a factor of three!!!

Considering that this is the same base apartment, with presumeably the same number of people and the same appliances (which from what I can tell are not rated as anything specifically energy-efficient), this seems like an interesting experiment. What on Earth were these people doing that their energy consumption was three times as high? We watch television, use the computer and cook and wash our clothes. But we turn things off when we do not use them. Maybe someone can explain just how we manage to be more energy efficient than the average American, and why more people cannot achieve this.

Another Grand Design

My recent posts seem to have focused on the grandiose, dare I say baroque and extravagant, plans of world leaders. This latest one comes from my adopted second home, Kazakhstan. President Nursultan Nazabayev has decided to build a domed city in his pet project, the capital city Astana. Ironically, this is an idea that I had proposed to people during my time there (perhaps under an inebriated state). The climate of Astana faces 80 degree C swings over the course of the average year, and so I had thought that if possible one might as well just dome the entire capital. Apparently the Kazakhstani President will settle for a luxury neighborhood.

However, this idea, I must point out, is purely a stupid one. While building model cities is all well and good, at its very heart Astana is a Stalinist dream. The difference between it and Dubai is that Dubai actually accords some space to efficiently-run private business (Emirates Airlines and Dubai World come to mind), while Astana is President Nazarbayev's personal whim financed by state oil revenues dished out to contracters in a very post-Soviet fashion of corruption. Furthermore, the President believes that he can bully and cajole foreigners and locals alike into making his dream a reality, ie that Astana will be the "true" center of Kazakhstan, ie the national capital, largest city and business center ("not like Canberra", Nazarbayev's advisers have stated). This strategy has extended into even the attempt last year to force international airlines to fly into Astana rather than Kazakhstan's actual largest city, Almaty.

Like the steppe empires of Attila and Chingis Khan before him, I believe that this city of Nazabayev's, with all of its wonders, is nothing more than a modern Xanadu, that will vanish with his passing from power. Meanwhile, despite - or perhaps because of - all this oil wealth, Kazakhstan's teachers and doctors are among the nation's lowest paid professionals. Recently scores of children in the southern city of Shymkent were infected with HIV by incompetent healthcare providers. The education system is a disaster, lacking even a proper grading system (the Soviet grading system of 2,3,4,5 remains, but no one receives 2's - the worst - and bribes are paid for 4's and 5's). The cities of Kazakhstan are filled with banks and casinos, but few independent businesses, indicating to me that there is a lot of money sloshing around this economy but with no real purpose. Better to invest this money in strengthening Kazakhstan's future potential economy than to waste it on such unnecessary luxuries.

Lunar Plans

No sooner do I write about the building of British nuclear weapons as a wasteful prestige project, then news comes from NASA of their firmed-up plans to build a moonbase by 2020. This seems to more or less follow the plan for a permanent presence on the Moon and manned exploration to Maras as laid down by President Bush in his "vision" speech of 2004. No cost has been stated, but expect something in the tens of billions.

I will state my reservations about such an enterprise. This project will be costly, and of dubious scientific value. Further, the expenditure of such funds will likely stifle the attention needed by more useful yet small-scale projects. A government-agency mission to the moon seems overly inefficient and old-fashioned, and raises potential fears of the weaponization of space.

Yet when all is said and done, I would still rather oppose this project and see it go ahead anyway. At some point humanity must begin to explore and inhabit its solar system on something of a more permanent basis. The fact that to date no human has left the immediate orbit of earth for anything more than a few hours, despite the thousands of pages written and thousands of hours filmed on the subject (both fiction and non-fiction) indicates to me that a permanent settlement on the moon in itself would possess some scientific value. Just how will the human body adapt to life on another heavenly sphere? Surely a moonbase has more lasting value to science and humanity (by capturing the imagination and providing facilities for experiments as yet unplanned) than the obsolete International Space Station and space shuttles, two super-expensive Cold War relics.

I say good job to NASA for finally scrapping the shuttle with plans for a new bold step forward. And I wish even more luck to Virgin Galactic. Carl Sagan once stated that he considered the hybrid government-private business model of the Dutch and English East Indies Companies to be the prime means to further space exploration. I cannot urge the greater participation of business in space travel more strongly.

A Modern Pharaoh and his Pyramids?

Although he may be ideologically closer to Clinton, Tony Blair has shown himself to be a true soulmate of George W. Bush in a number of ways, one being his governmental tendency to throw good money after bad. His latest demonstration of this has been his latest proposal to spend 20 billion pounds (at the current moment something in the range of $40,000,000,000) to upgrade Britain's ageing nuclear deterrent. This money will go to building a new class of ICBM-armed submarines to replace the Trident system in about 17 years' time. The system is deemed necessary owing to such threats to nuclear nonproliferation as the North Korean atomic programme (in a poverty-stricken country whose ballistic missiles, if not exploding on launch, could currently barely reach Alaska), and the potential for state-sponsored nuclear terrorism (a fear whose basis in reality some specialists are beginning to question). Apparently money spent on such prestige projects is a better line of defense than money spent on conventional forces (Britain's are already stretched to the limit, as its top officers are stating) or better intelligence.

But what is ironic is how questionable the use for a nuclear-armed Britain has ever been. As a member of NATO, the UK has been under the American nuclear umbrella for over 50 years. Even during that time, a country with something like 2% of the world's population faced guaranteed nuclear annihilation at the hands of the Soviet Union (with over four times the population and many more times the area), and could at best incinerate a handful of Soviet cities. Since the Cold War the very need for a nuclear umbrella struggles to be proven.

Yet much like the American Anti-Ballistic Missile defence system, such anachronisms continue to be built. In my opinion the singular failure of Donald Rumsfeld was his inability to hold to his promise to end Cold War-era money pit projects and streamline and modernise the American military. Blair seems to have taken note of Rumsfeld's failure. As some MPs have pointed out, this very proposal is being rushed, perhaps in an attempt to build a nuclear Blair legacy.

Whatever the value of nuclear weapons, it seems redundant for such a country as the United Kingdom to spend billions on their maintenance and updating. Blair has shown some political courage in attempting to address unorthodox yet pressing problems of our time, such as Global Warming, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and societal collapse in Africa. It is a shame that as his time draws to an end, he too has decided to throw some military pork into the works in the name of a political legacy.

Another Movie Review

Not so many years ago I had a dislike ofBrad Pitt. It was one of those irrational dislikes. I considered him a bad actor in bad movies. However, after I began to view his films the "exceptions" (Interview with a Vampire, Se7en, Fight Club, Snatch, 12 Monkeys) began to be the rule. Now I will not hesitate to say that he is generally a good actor in good movies.

I have come to the reverse conclusion about Nicolas Cage. For some reason I always gave him the benefit of a doubt, but especially after seeing such garbage as Wicker Man I realise that he is generally a terrible actor in terrible films. This newfound opinion of mine has been justified by my recent viewing of Lord of War.

Although that last film came out a year ago, I wish to review it, as it connects to international politics and other topics often addressed in this blog. This film was produced by and stars Cage, and was directed by Andrew Niccols of Gattaca. It is a film purportedly "based on actual events" that follows the life of Yuri Orlov, a Ukrainian immigrant to America who enters the international small arms trade. Long and short, he gets into the business with his brother, they prosper (most notably in the former USSR and Liberia) despite the dubious morality of their business, and then the dream falls apart with Yuri losing almost everything (including his family) before being bailed out by the US government to continue their dirty business. This is a movie with a moral to tell, and a strong agenda.

And in my opinion, it's absolute garbage. It fails to make a convincing sell: is it supposed to be a factual account? If so, then why does it take such egregious liberties with reality? The most outstanding of such errors involve such things as Interpol. Ethan Hawke plays an Interpol agent who is Cage's nemesis, pursuing him and attempting to bring him to justice. First of all, small arms dealing is hardly a criminal offence, but to push home the fact that the director thinks it is, we see an Interpol armed with the powers of search, seizure and arrest, not to mention warships and jet fighters!!!!! And silly me for thinking it was a database and information-sharing program. Apparently the audience is to believe that our hope and salvation relies on some sort of World Police to protect us from such horrors as arms trafficking. Further, large liberties are taken with Liberian history, geography, and reality. Why even mention the country if it is to be given a fictitious president, complete with a rapper-wannabe son and a Monrovia so rundown that even Cage's character, a guest and friend of the president, stays in a two-star prostitute-infested roach motel? Surely this has more to do with Americans' perceptions of Africa more than anything else, but more on that later.

Besides not being sure whether the film is fact or fiction, it is not sure whether to be a drama or a documentary. We are forced to sit through the pointlessness of Cage's character's family struggles, namely with the screwup younger brother with the heart of gold, and the beautiful wife who (somehow) doesn't know Yuri's true business and whose parents were killed in a violent crime with an illegally-purchased gun (liberals, high five!). Yet at the same time Cage narrates the entire film with lots of "did you know" facts that bore us and don't weave together a bigger picture (and the last shot's statement that the five biggest arms sellers are the five UN Security Council members is flat-out wrong, but presumeably numbers five and six, Germany and Canada, are too ideologically close to Hollywood to merit finger-pointing).

But finally, I disliked the film's message. The movie basically goes beyond a simple "guns are bad" and reaches a Michael Moore-ish "the American military industrial complex makes wars to sell guns and kill people". Hawke's character even goes on a tiresome rant about how even detaining Cage for one day will save countless lives in Africa, because of course Africans do not fight wars with each other unless white people tell them to, and are unable to acquire guns or other weapons from other sources (the movie never points out that the AK-47 has been officially copied and produced in 11 developing countries, and unofficially produced in many more). The film takes a very patronizing attitude towards Africa and the developing world: those people are beasts when armed, and its up to the enlightened members of the developed world to keep capitalists from manipulating these otherwise innocent children for evil.

There are other pointless political jabs - Cage's literally shadowy guardian angel is a Col. Oliver Southern (har har), and the otherwise admirable Ian Holm (Bilbo Baggins) wastes a role by being an arms trader different from Cage because he"chooses sides" and cares about outcomes - without ever explaining what this means, much unlike a similar but better debate in Spy Games (there is Brad Pitt again), and is promptly shot in the head. During a brief respite, when Yuri goes legitimate selling African timber and minerals, he makes a dig about being able to "legally exploit developing countries". Likewise, there's something about Cage doing drugs and having unprotected sex with prostitutes in Africa that is obviously supposed to lead to him contracting HIV, but apparently the director forgot to film that last scene.

Long and short, this film tries to do everything, and falls far flat. The strongest attempt at a moral decision it takes is when Yuri's wife calls for him to quit his work. Yuri responds "but someone will just fill my place anyway", to which his wife's response is "yes but you won't be doing it". So if we can't save the world, we should just wash our hands of it? That sounds like a message hearkening on left-leaning European international relations! This film draws on stereotypes and cliches, as well as pure unrealities (the Sierra Leonian RUF apparently operates in the desert, and has all its intended victims kept in a refugee camp right next to the purchase point for the machine guns to kill them with - how convenient! too bad the RUF operated in a jungle and used machetes in real life...) in order to make America feel guilty for being evil. And admittedly, most of today's weapons come from North America. But this is the real world, and arms sales is a real business (and is often in the realm of international relations and not at all being as clearly an evil as this movie would have us believe), and as even Cage points out, if we don't arm these militaries, it is not like someone else will.

A Modest Proposal

This is just me thinking out loud on this one...

On Friday I had the dubious honor of dropping my wife off at her sales job...at five in the morning. Her place of work was already swarming with eager shoppers, and was such a notable event that the television camera crews were already filming it for the evening news. Thus began "Black Friday", the day of frenzied shopping resembling ever so much a school of sharks around fresh meat. Economic sources indicate that this day of mayhem is likely to be matched in sales on "Cyber Monday" (when apparently millions of slackers use their companies' internet connections to purchase Christmas presents) and the last Saturday before Christmas (which is generally when slackers like me - men? - go shopping).

All this leads me to wonder: are people overdoing this Christmas (sorry, Holiday) shopping/giftgiving thing? I wonder because the fact that everyone does it at the same time makes me feel like ultimately it is a meaningless gesture. Everyone gets so many purchased presents from everyone else that they know that I think it's lost all point. I long ago stopped telling people "what I want for Christmas".

Here is my modest proposal: people should get back to enjoying Christmas, or whichever other Solstice-themed religious holiday will stand in. Feast and be merry. If you want to give people presents, give your family and friends gifts in January or February, which is the bleaker, more un-festive part of winter that needs some cheer. And the after-Christmas sales of surplus mean that the shopping will be cheaper. Or you could *gasp* make something special for your loved ones, rather than purchase various goods made in factories in China as a means to symbolize your love and generousity. Of course, some people would be offended that you are not giving them presents specifically ON Christmas, but if so those people obviously aren't that close to you and do not deserve presents anyway.

I would like to put this modest proposal into practice, but something tells me I will give in to the herd mentality, like everyone else.