Aranyos, ügye? Creative and humourous way to raise awareness about waste and recycling, right? Strangely but perhaps not surprisingly, the Kremlin protectorate did not agree. Check this story for a photo essay of his arrest.

Bad day to be a zionista

Way to go, Erdo!

The Turkish PM stormed off the stage of a Davos panel after telling Shimon Peres, 'You know very well how to kill people.' Photos here, Peres actually looks somewhat distressed. BBC has also posted a video of the incident.

Meanwhile, in Paris, another Blight of Zion was getting slapped down. At the Erez border crossing, the IOF actually shot at the French Consul General. Shooting at high level diplomatic officers is not, as far as i'm aware, de riguer on the intl circuit. Maybe they were waving a white flag, or had PRESS taped onto their cars, or had just called an ambulance - Israeli soldiers love to shoot at ambulances.

The French Foreign Ministry summoned Israeli ambassador Daniel Shek today over an incident in which a convoy of French diplomats, including the nation’s consul general were blocked from crossing the Gaza border for over six hours and shot at by Israeli troops. [read the rest here]

In London, uni students and others made a bold attempt to catch Israeli Colonel Geva Rapp, who's doing a speaking tour in the UK to discuss his recent killing spree in the Gaza Strip. The demo was organized on the fly, the Colonel was whisked away by the Mossad, et al. still a free man, relatively speaking. If caught, the plan was to have him arrested for war crimes. i followed this on facebook, no link at the moment.

Three fiascos in three different european countries on a single day. i'd say the pressure is definitely building. Is Obama going to come to their defense or use the momentum in Europe to force the Israelis' hands? For now, making them squirm in places where they'd normally expect to be casually sipping martinis is a very, very good thing.

Cell Phone Recycing

Explanation of Samsung's cell phone recycling program and their innovation in corn-based plastics.

Deep Intrigue on the Subcontinent

This post could also have been called 'Israel further endangers the world,' which would have been entirely fitting, except it doesn't grab one's imagination in quite the same way that 'intrigue' does. And this stuff is very intriguing, albeit scary and even a bit bizarre. What i'm referring to is Israel's relationship with right-wing Hindus and its increasing influence (read: profiteering) in India's 'security operations'. Came across this story in the UAE press about a 'radical Hindu group', Abhinav Bharat, best known for conducting a series of bombings last year in Maharashtra. The report claims that this relatively small group of fascists - let's be honest here - has been preparing to set up a shadow government based - you guessed it - in Tel Aviv. Helping a group that uses extreme violence to cleanse India of its muslims seems like an obvious step for Isreal. They could surficially justify it as the best way to assist Washington in rounding up all the genetically bad guys, since Israelis in military uniform io Pakistani soil would definitely not go over very well; on the periphery of the al-Qaeda-Taliban Wilderness Reserve, build up a strong Hindu buffer and make it that much harder for India and Iran to sustain progressive relations. Makes perfect sense, right? Israel aids fascist terrorists who have as their objective the elimination of supposedly fascist terrorists.

A couple of years ago, i came across mention of how Israelis had sold India on the need to construct a barrier between Jammu and Kashmir. Not only did they generously promote the idea (using their monstrosity in the Palestinian Territories as a model for what's possible), they also offered to help them build it, which was oh so kind and of course, very, very profitable. Researching this again, i learn that in fact, India followed Isreal's lead in unilaterally deciding where the border lies; in both cases, doing this violates international law but as we have learned, when it comes to fighting terrorism the law gets pretty simple, i.e. 'whatever we decide'. The law of the jungle has become the law of the desert; be careful what you wish for, chides a grinning Osama bin Laden. And this isn't the only thing that's familiar. According to a NY Times story from 2004:

In places, the fence has created divisions within a division. Some farmers have been separated from their grazing lands, and a few houses and hamlets that have been in Indian-held Kashmir since 1947 are now outside it because the fence could not be built around them without crossing into Pakistani territory. There are gates for cattle and people, with proper identification, to cross back into India.

It's easy to toss out cynical rhetoric about this, but what it means in very real terms is that Israel has set up yet another system in which people are daily subjected to humiliation and true hardship in the interests of financial and political greed. This is not occurring in an otherwise peaceful, idyllic setting. Tens of thousands of people have been killed in Kashmir in the past decade or so, there's been a huge amount of suffering and now there is a wall. Indian commanders claim that successful attacks have decreased, but it's understood there still need to be some attacks, otherwise people will start to question whether the fence is really needed and maybe the time is right to make a political settlement.

People who want to come and are determined to come, they will come," said Umar Farooq, a political leader in Indian-held Kashmir who opposes Indian rule. "They have routes and maps, and they will use them." "It's a waste of money,'' he said, adding that it was better to pursue a political settlement. With the fence, he said, the Indians are "trying to sort of legitimize their claim day by day" to Kashmir.

This sure sounds like a day in the West Bank to me. Now here's where it gets both familiar and creepy. The NY Times story about Abhinav Bharat, which details the history of their prosecution for the Maharashta attacks, includes this update on the status of the case against them:

The investigations into the blasts were dealt a blow after the death in the Mumbai terrorist attacks in November of Hemant Karkare, who was head of Mumbai’s antiterrorist squad. Many people, including a federal minority affairs minister, demanded an inquiry in to the circumstances that led to Karkare’s death, alleging a right-wing Hindu group might have been behind it.

The last time the head of a terrorist unit was killed, it happened in NYC on 'that date' - you, know, the one that will be carved into Rudolph Giuliani's tombstone. But think about it, ok? India is now Israel's third largest customer in the arms market, with a growing Hindu nationalist movement that Israeli commandos work with as partners in the war on terror [sic]. A series of terrorist attacks is carried out by a group which at the very least, has been getting moral support from Israel as part of the latter's intensifying partnership with the politically-based Hindu nationalist movement - the one holding political power - and then the chief anti-terror investigator is killed in another attack, carried out by people whose identities and allegiances are not entirely clear. Dr. Vijay Prashad, in an excellent analysis of this relationship, makes a very good case that India is foolish employing Israel to advise them on security, since the Israeli record of success actually stinks. But my guess is that it's all much more diabolically orchestrated than what's been muckraked to date, and that Israel is influencing the political machinations in New Delhi in just as reprehensible ways as they've been doing for years in Washington. That Jews were killed in Mumbia now makes a lot of sense, doesn't it? We shouldn't ever believe for a minute that the State of Israel is unwilling to sacrifice the people it claims it exists to protect, in the interests of a higher goal. Back home, these deaths feed the monster, who in turn feeds on Muslim blood. The Hindu right loves Netanyahu; Netanyahu would just as soon nuke Gaza, and on and on and on.

To my mind, these are all very, very high stakes. Consider the decoupling of India and PakGhanistan in Richard Holbooke's mission statement. Evidently the Indian government had a very effective lobbying operation which succeeded in getting Obama (and presumably, Killary) to agree to keeping India out of the operations profile. India, perhaps under Israeli guidance, wants to remain an independent partner, a rogue operator, if you will, carrying out its own anti-terror (read: anti-muslim) agenda, which apparently is all about provocation but that is, after all, what fascists have always done best. What i find truly mind-boggling is why huge contries like the US and India are organizing their agendas according to what one of the smallest, most racist, countries ever tells them to prioritize. Whether Obama at some point takes the leap and says 'enough' remains to be seen, but this much is certain: Israel's agenda is totally corrupt and is magnifying conflicts which could otherwise be headed towards some measurable resolution. Intrigue can be a positive rush, but not this kind, if i choose to be honest about it.

Inaugural Zeitgeist

NO, i never thought i’d live to see the day when a black man would become ‘The Man’ - nearly everyone in the world cheering him on, no less. My scenario for that had entailed a total collapse of the US as currently constituted, enabling smaller states led by regional leaders to rise out of the ashes. So, i’m totally jazzed to see the Obamas move into 1600 Pennsylvania Ave and feel an almost childlike glee at the possibility of MLK and Malcolm X portraits hanging on the walls of the oval office. Long, long overdue. i hope that a few years from now, people will wonder why they feared changing government leadership as long as they did, and that this will lead them to a deeper understanding of the self-destructiveness of racism. It’s certainly a plus that something has replaced ‘Where were you when the towers were hit?’ as the definitive personal trivia question of our times, although where i live, people are mostly asking for assurance that things are – really – going to change. With so much economic insecurity in Europe, watching W lead [sic] the US to near total collapse has been like hearing that your boat’s going down AND all the life rafts have been punctured. Clearly, the inauguration didn’t come a moment too soon and judging by the enthusiasm, the new prez apparently came to town with a boatload of patch kits.

On Day Two of the First One Hundred Days (can they make it sound any more epic?) Obama's announcement at the State Dept that he’d signed the order to close Guantanamo received enthusiastic applause, which, given the international orientation of that audience, cemented for me how terribly the whole enemy combatant/extraordinary rendition policy has weighed down international attitudes towards the US. i can say unequivocally that this has been the most-criticized activity of the Bush junta that i, personally, have encountered – even from Iraqis. While it’s something of a discrete problem, that Obama dealt with it on day one was more than welcome. Bombing Pakistan – well, the US has been bombing one country or another for decades, most people don’t like it but they didn’t like the whole Guantanamo-rendition system more. The next big global issue to address is climate change; Europe wants fast, smart action from the US in setting aggressive CO₂ reduction targets and the newest industrial, coal-breathing behemoths like China and India need emissions control diplomacy from the US in a big way.

It’s been interesting reading views and hearing Europeans discuss the inaugural event, itself. i think the masses of people in DC served as a kind of confirmation that most americans really did not support the Bush regime; at the same time, the huge show of unity was a bit disconcerting. All those people fired up and ready to go… good for them, let’s hope they stay in their own neighborhood. Actually, that’s not really true. Here’s a hilarious appeal from the former Hungarian ambassador to the US after a rumor was floated that Whoopie Goldberg (yes, the dancing nun) was interested in becoming the new US ambassador to Hungary.

It feels like i should write more about Obama this and Obama that, but i really don’t have it in me. i watched the inauguration with one of my students, and though her English is not proficient enough to follow a political speech of that nature, i saw that it didn’t really matter to her what he said because he looked so confident and kool and that’s exactly the kind of political celebritidom she and (i think) a lot of people on this side of the pond have been looking for in US leadership. To me, the speech was somewhat disturbing because i actually don’t agree that americans never have to apologize for our way of life: that line could have been lifted from the Reagan Library or some other repository of offensive exceptionalist rhetoric. But i’m hip to the zeitgeist - it’s not what he says but that he says it – not what people hear, but how they feel. In a post-modern world, asking for anything beyond that is just silly and defeatist.

Women in Resistance

Speaking of Vietnam (see previous entry), i’ve just finished reading Last Night I Dreamed of Peace: The Diary of Dang Thuy Tram. Dr. Thuy grew up and went to medical school in Hanoi, North Vietnam in the 1960s. She was intensely committed to supporting the revolution in the South, eventual reunification of her country, and standing tall against the american devils. The diaries chronicles her experiences working in hidden clinics, trekking through mine fields to treat resistance fighters in the middle of the night, etc. - all acts of incredibly bravery; she also chronicles her struggle to obtain party membership and show her leadership worth and self-learning as she was given more and more responsibilities by the party. The majority of entries are about her personal relationships, particularly psychic withdrawal from the great love that was not meant to be. After giving it her all for nearly 4 years, she was killed by an american soldier in 1970. The contents in her pack were sent to US military intelligence, eventually the diaries surfaced and were published in Vietnam in 2005.

One of the striking things was her unwaivering belief in a future Vietnam that would be nothing less than utopian. She had such a clear vision of where it all was going, and used that as a source of power to not crack when things got really hairy. Her constant self-chidings about having bourgeois emotional responses to a variety of events is absolutely charming, and because the diaries are so personal, they provide an incredible lens into how/why she felt her own development was an integral part of the development of her country. No hubris here, she simply believed that the decades-long struggle, all the blood it had shed, the political vision it harboured, demanded nothing less from all of them. As the bombing intensified in her area and the clinic had to keep relocating, what she writes conveys a sense that there was a very blurred line between civilians and resistance; everyone living there was effected by the US invasion and understood that survival meant resistance… an almost biologically logical response.

Here’s her entry on 16 January 1969, following a quick evacuation of the clinic. Thuy had stayed with patients who could not be moved.

The whole house is empty. The Clinic is silent and oddly somber. There are only a few wounded soldiers and some staff left. I can hear the murmurs of the stream outside.

I am already twenty-six years old, no longer a naïve girl. Why do I let this gloomy scene color my feelings? In fact, it’s the other way around. Ngyuen Du says, ‘When one is sad, the scenery can never be cheery.’ What joy is there when the American bandits are trampling on our nation and killing our countrymen? What joy is there when our country is still divided, when family members are still scattered in all directions? But, Thuy, does your heart recognize only yearnings and sorrow? Our struggle demands that the people have great joy and a strong will and belief in our cause. Nurture these positive sentiments and wipe away the cloud of sadness from your eyes.

Can anyone out there explain the difference between dropping white phosphorus on people and gassing them to death? i'm not real clear on that.... how easily we forget.

i think we can all agree that if this is what the "only democracy in the Middle East" [sic] considers legitimate self-defense [sic], it's time to re-evaluate the pro-democracy agenda. Excerpted from this story on Al-Jazeera:

The following quote from an interview with Major-General Gadi Eisenkot that appeared in the Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth in October, is telling:

"We will wield disproportionate power against every village from which shots are fired on Israel, and cause immense damage and destruction. From our perspective these [the villages] are military bases," he said.

"This isn't a suggestion. This is a plan that has already been authorised."

Causing "immense damage and destruction" and considering entire villages "military bases" is absolutely prohibited under international law.

Eisenkot's description of this planning in light of what is now unfolding in Gaza is a clear admission of conspiracy and intent to commit war crimes, and when taken with the comments above, and numerous others, renders any argument by Israel that it has tried to protect civilians and is not engaging in disproportionate force unbelievable.

Top Fun: Plane Stupid Sued by RyanAir for millions

If i were 25 years old, hanging out with a bunch of folks fed up with the juxtaposition of climate scientists’ data - let’s call them the ‘facts’ - against announcements about airport expansions, locking down on a local runway would seem like an obvious way to vent. The UK group, Plane Stupid, did exactly that last month at Stansted Airport, one of London's three international air hubs. Reported thus by The Independent: "Sixty militant environmentalists staged a dramatic protest on a taxi runway at Stansted yesterday morning, forcing the cancellation of dozens of flights and prompting a review of airport security." Militants? Please, spare us the bogus terrorist-leaning spin. When militants close down airports, we get something more like this (definitely check out the link, the arabic means DANGER). A bunch of early 20s climate catastrophe obsessives weighted down with fence cutters and carabiners hardly matches the level of danger posed by RPG-carrying renegades patrolling an airport in looted Ethiopian jeeps. Nevertheless, people who depend on functioning airports are right to be concerned: these floating direct action cells do have the potential of making shutdowns on behalf of the atmosphere look like irresistible, guilt-allaying fun. They may not be militant, but they definitely heightened the tension.

Last week, 49 of the 57 arrestees were sentenced to 50-90 hours of community service and must pay various costs arising from damage to airport fencing and legal prosecution. Not a huge amount, but more than any of these people probably have in a bank account. On the heels of these punitive measures from the state, Ryan Air has filed a £2 m (€2.5m) suit against them for financial losses incurred due to 57 flights being grounded and ‘reputational damages’. These latter are claimed to be €500,000, rather remarkable given that the company is also reporting an 11% increase in passengers for the month of December 2008. If the airline thinks it can subsidize rising jet fuel costs this way, all i can suggest to them is be cautious when talking with shareholders.

Plane Stupid has received both kudos and criticism for their action, and it would have been great to email them some questions for this piece (Have you devised a way to get onto tarmacs without damaging fences? Have you considered interfering with military flights?) However, checking their website for contact info, this is what we now find: ‘The Plane Stupid website is currently down for legal reasons.’ Oh well. Among their detractors, there’s this report on a very misguided blockade of EasyGroup – mistaken for the parent company of EasyJet – and a post on Jawa Report that one of their financial backers is the owner of Lush Cosmetics, which has airport shops all over Europe… or so the writer claims (couldn’t find any airport locations in the countries i checked). While i can agree that shutting down a Stansted runway is hardly in the political punch league of Gandhi’s salt march, trashing these folks for engaging in non-violent direct action to make a very important point doesn’t cut it, either. The way things are going with a proposed expansion at Heathrow, we may see MPs, the Mayor of London, and some EU emissions regulators following their lead. It’s simply impossible for the UK to meet its air pollution reduction requirements if it continues to fill the friendly skies with more and more planes.

Air travel in Europe has risen to new heights in part because train travel is now more expensive than flying, thanks to the plethora of budget airlines that have been popping up over the past 10 years. The one exception to this is Spain, where planners continue to excel in creating the most livable country of the 21^st century. Otherwise, there’s been something of a positive feedback system in motion: as more people fly within the EU, train travel goes up to counter the reduction in ticket sales; higher train prices drive more people onto budget flights…. duh. A NY Times story published last summer cites these figures from the European Low Fares Airline Association: “…the growth in passengers on European low-cost airlines has been phenomenal, almost doubling to 120 million per year in 2007 from about 60 million per year in 2005.” They further point out that the doubling of ticket sales includes workers from the newest and poorer EU members to Western European countries happy (or at least willing) to obtain cheaper labor. Mediterranean, Black Sea and similar “we’re only going there because it’s cheap” vacation sites have benefitted to the extreme from companies like Ryan Air connecting them to northwestern population centers. The feedback system is here also operative in encouraging air travel: the cost and time needed to reach places like Varna, Bulgaria or Almeria, Spain by land are prohibitive for most of the tourists traveling to them for a mere 3 days of escapism, and the destinations are investing more money in promoting themselves as ideal cheapo vacation spots. Forget about ecotourism with these crowds: we’re talking suburbanites frying themselves on ‘hotel guests only’ beach chairs and then feasting on cheap paella or whatever. Nobody seems to really care where they are, it’s all about faux jetset vacationing in which one isn’t supposed to be thinking about climate change, Gaza, or whatever else ails the real world.

Just today, british news agencies have been reporting on a grab bag of celebrities and Greenpeace purchasing 1 acre plots of land located precisely where Heathrow’s expansion is to be sited. A great idea, and one which supports in principle the message from Plane Stupid: do whatever you can to keep greenhouse gas reductions on track. More airports are definitely not the answer. Here’s a wild thought: instead of rewarding people for racking up frequent flier miles, start setting limits on air mileage for non-essential purposes. We all get to go once around the earth, and after than you start paying fines – or simply aren’t allowed on a plane without a specific waiver for family emergency, business, etc. Granted, this is not an idea that RyanAir and its peers are likely embrace, but with all that lawsuit money, at least their owners would still be able to fly off into the sunset.

Gaza: Wipe them all out

Just watched Democracy Now's report on the pro-israel demo in NYC this past weekend, held in front of the israeli consulate there. Let me state for the record that amerisraelis are totally insane. The title of this post is a quote from one of them, and she was not alone in expressing that sentiment. Blow 'em off the map, the world will be a better place. It's so strange to find upper middle class white people being so spiteful. i mean, they have lovely homes, probably more than one, lots of space and amenities, kids in all the best schools, so can't they just be satisfied with that and let the Palestinians have their little plot of territory, too?

On principle, no society should be forcefully displaced. Pure pragmatism in the 21st century forces us to accept that one group of people can't keep pushing other people off their land because now, there's nowhere else to go. The planet is as contracted as it's ever been, relative to human occupation. Viva Palestina! Folks, there is no other viable option. What gives these people the right to be so fucking selfish? i have yet to meet one of them, excluding a single member of my own extended family, who would be able to endure physically as well as psychologically what the vast majority of palestinians have had to endure. These people (said in the same spirit as 'that one') have created a whole society of spoiled children. Palestinians are practical, tenacious and very well-disciplined, by comparison. i'd say roughly 80% of the palestinian men i have personally met have spent time in israeli prisons or detention centers, a significant majority subjected to heinous methods of torture, some when they were teenagers. It's been horrific, for a very long time. Seymour Hersh likes to quote his general friend as saying, "We can't be as rough as the americans are, because we know that eventually we're going to have to live with them." This is total bullshit, Hersh should know better than to so dismally misrepresent the truth. The israelis have treated the palestinians like animals, both officially and in what they would probably describe as a neighbourly way. US passport-holding jews who say things like "WE have intelligence" and so forth, in order to justify civilian slaughter, reflects anything *but* an accurate understanding of what life is like in places like Jabaliya. i want to think they really have no idea of the depth of suffering and inhumanity they are responsible for, but my optimism has been rapidly waning.

Definitely check out this video for an excellent window into the israeli proposanda machine The rationale employed goes as follows: we have a right to protect ourselves, our rights are unlimited, therefore the methods of protection are without bounds. Also notice that every reference to palestinian anything must include 'hamas'. Oooh, they are so clever, aren't they? But a superb effort on Alex Thomspon's part to not let the barbarity of it all off the hook. He probably still hasn't learned that one thing you'll never catch an israeli official saying is 'we're sorry.'

Deconstructing W? Why bother?

Just did a google blogs search for 'W Bush final press conference' and it coughed up 117, 548 hits. i know the majority of these writers are glad to see W leave DC, and i do support blogging as a form of self-therapy for depression or whatever else ails you, but what more is there to say about this guy after 8 dreadful years of "misunderestimating" him? (In case you're wondering about the non-word there, this was the term W used yesterday when queried on his relationship with the press.) i actually did watch the press conference - yes, all of it and definitely a first for me - a somewhat surreal event, it appeared that W was trying to do an imitation of Josh Brolin imitating him as a down to earth, infantilely reflective kind of guy. He said a lot of ridiculous things, which i'm sure most of those 117, 548 bloggers have all deconstructed ad infinitum; listening to his walk down presidential memory lane was like reliving a bad dream that started in Florida and finished up in the bowels of the US Treasury. The only segment in which he seemed truly sure of himself was in talking about security threats to the US and stamping out terrorism, bringing to mind a psychoanalysis i'd read years ago in which W as an inherently pathological personality was gone over with a finetooth comb. What the psychologist had said was that he is most sure of himself when talking about alpha male priorities: war, revenge, carrying the big stick. Is this what W himself had in mind yesterday when he described himself as a Type A personality? One can only speculate, but why bother? The only truly relevant comment i can offer on the occasion of George and Laura's relocation to Houston is this: have a nice trip and see you in court, and if he's not sure what his new business cards should look like, TV3 in Australia has already solved that problem:

Gaza: Multi-tasking the Outrage

There are so many reasons to be irate about Israel's current assault on the Gaza Strip, and a whole other set of outrages about the way officials and hawk pundits (aka Israeli apologists) are processing the current situation, that i've been mentally multi-tasked into a state of mesmerization. Where does one start to dissect all this insanity? Yet continued silence is not a viable option; after recently living in Palestine for 2 years, now is hardly an appropriate time to bail on my support for an end of Israeli occupation and establishment of a viable Palestinian state. So i'm just going to pick one or maybe two points to address right now and deal with other aspects of this debacle in later posts. Unfortunately, this is a conflict that keeps on giving...

This evening there's a story in the Jerusalem Post about attacks on jews in various european countries. Oh no! anti-semitism on the rise in Europe, we all know where that leads. Concurrently, i've been coming across random blogs where people are noting threats and attacks on individuals who've been expressing their criticism of Israel, as well as invectives unleashed by zionists (or maybe just arab/muslim haters?) on mainstream media comment boards that are just as hateful as anything spewed out by a neo-nazi. The thing i 've always noticed about zionists and israelis in general, is that they are expert in throwing tantrums that shut down any possibility of rational dialogue. i don't support hate crimes, but the way that israelis deal with criticism is so infuriating that it hardly comes as a surprise that people outraged by the situation in Gaza are choosing to lash out in these ways. Blaming the victim here? To some extent, yes, i am. As long as world jewry continues to support Israel as their haven, their property, their private little playground in which they are free to commit war crimes on a daily basis, they have very little grounds for complaint when people the world over decide to crash this delusional party. Unfortunately and predictably, attacks on jews in Europe only feeds zionist logic, so not only are such hate crimes morally wrong, they are also counter-productive. What i'd like to see are large groups of jews protesting outside israeli embassies covered in anti-zionist grafitti.

On the flipside, the demonization of Hamas is so out of control that it makes anti-jewish anti-semitism look absolutely mild. Personally, i don't support Hamas as any kind of liberation movement, but i do support the right of Palestinians to choose the lesser of two evils when it came time to vote in 2006. The crazy thing about what's happening now is that Israel has controlled this history from the very beginning. They funded the islamic movement at its inception in order to drive not a wrench but an abyss between palestinian political factions, and then worked with the US to so corrupt their supposedly preferred lackeys, Fatah under Abbas, that Hamas' victory in the elections was more or less assured. i know lifelong Fatah supporters who, in spite of having extremely low opinions of Hamas leaders as competent government officials, still voted for them with the hope that giving them a chance to govern (and hopefully tone down the islamic rhetoric as a result) was a better option than acquiescing to the self-destructive rule of Fatah. Now we've got Tzipi, Condi and everyone in between screaming about how they have to keep killing kids until Hamas is destroyed - what the hell are they talking about? They need Hamas - otherwise the whole premise of palestinians as israel-hating fanatics is going to collapse on their cute little New Jersey doppelganger settlements.

i say this because i think most of the world has had enough of israeli bullying and now supports a free palestinian state. That is a change in global consciousness that is not going back into any closet - ever. i was glad to read that israeli diplomats have been expelled from Venezuela and would like to see more countries follow Chavez' lead. Personally, i'm renewing my commitment to boycott israeli goods and services, and to not casually socialize with zionists, (which i've tried to do in an effort to be even-handed). These people need to be isolated and punished in all the ways that nonviolent resistance can come up with. Gary Kamiya offered an analogy to how the US has treated Native Americans, and rightly concludes that although there are differences, if the US tried to conduct a campaign similar to what Israel's been doing, people would not accept it. Certainly if whites in South Africa said the post-apartheid govt's been a failure so let's go back to the way it was before, we know what the global response would be the minute that first bullet was fired into a Soweto child. Outrage, pure and simple, and very creatively multi-tasked.

i stand corrected

In a recent post, i wrote that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have cost the US $3 trillion. This number was based on an analysis done by Joseph Stiglitz last year, but is apparently incorrect (or may be correct, depending on the line items Stiglitz used in his calculations; for example, medical treatment for veterans). According to an article today on The Raw Story, which also cites Stiglitz' study, a report from the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments states that the US will have spent nearly $2 trillion on military operations including Iraq and Afghanistan over the next decade. The difference is obviously substantial, although one has to admit that $2 trillion is still a lot of money to spend on a global endeavour which has succeeded in accomplishing very little in the way of security, peace and those other lofty goals the W Dick junta claimed they were on top of, though in fact they were just scraping the bottom of the 'evil is as evil does' barrel of misguided policy.

Quickie World News Roundup

As hundreds of bloggers continue to explore the deeper meaning of Iraqi size 10's, Bush has moved on to Afghanistan to shake (rather than hold) hands with President Select Karzai. Some time ago, The Onion did a nice report about W visiting places in the US his policies and incompetence have destroyed (first stop: New Orleans); it seems he's now doing the same for entire countries he's pushed over the proverbial cliff... or maybe he's just trying to get as far away from Obama as possible? (No doubt the Obamas' request for an early move into Blair House sparked a reality check freak out, or maybe it's just that W isn't keen on mixed race neighborhoods.)

The media have finally discovered that drugs provide a way to cope with the tension of living in a war zone, with the high number of Gazans addicted to painkillers and sedatives making the front page on every major daily. (Next week expect an update on heroin addiction in Iraq: Nodding Out While the Conquerers Do Noel.) The Israeli siege of Gaza is apparently continuing in order for the jewish state to make relevant the Hanukah story wherein there rebel warriors had only enough oil to light one little candle a night. Christian zionists like to think that their scriptures will eventually see the light of day in jewish cannon; one supposes that Israelis believe Hamas will eventually embrace the Macabees. Speaking of being holed up in temples, there have been 7 fires in Istanbul mosques over the past 3 days. Although no one has been hurt, it's unclear whether the causes are electrical or arson. Muftis are praying for calm while their prayer books are going up in flames.

Weather events are taking a toll in New England, where 800.000 still don't have electricity, and in France as well, where an estimated 100.000 are without power and at least 3 have died. England and Italy are dealing with floods, Australians are recovering from floods, and Papua New Guinea was struck by flooding brought on by extreme tidal surges. All of these events are, of course, designed to make a martyr out of George Monbiot and an idiot out of Andrea Merkel. While many have touted GPS-phones as one way to reduce the loss of life in natural disasters or other emergencies, the Egyptians are forcing Apple to remove the GPS function from its new iPhone 3G in order to prevent users from engaging in effective terrorist attacks. This is undoubtedly a strategy thought up in the aftermath of the India's 'Not 9/11' Mumbai attacks and is in no way connected with Egypt's on-going crackdown on civil rights of bloggers, gays and whomever else Mubarak doesn't like.

In miscellaneous news, the US entertainment media is apoplectic over Jennifer Aniston's bare all cover for GQ, either because it's taking attention away from her ex's latest interview with Rolling Stone or has redefined the nature of the power tie. Hugh Jackman has been announced as 2009 host for the Oscars, apparently in an effort to reduce the comedy and increase ratings in Australia. With many predicting Sean Penn will win best actor for Milk, the last thing the Academy wants is a lot of gay humor and anti-Prop 8 rants running roughshod over its family value ratings. This segues nicely into the quote of the day, from Adrián Dárgelos of the Argentine group, Babasónicos: Mi arrogancia es una decisión póética. Go Hugh! Go Oscars! And George, have a nice visit in slippered Islamabad.

Romania: Ruins delay ecological ruin

Last week, Gabriel Resources' plans to tear up a sizable section of the Carpathians in Romania was set back yet again, when the Supreme Court annulled the company's archaeological "discharge" permit. The Rosia Montana project, in which Canada-based Gabriel is the principle investor, is located in the area of Europe's oldest gold minds: ruins from Roman period mining activities are still to be found and must be thoroughly excavated and catalogued before Rosia Montana can go forward. The news has driven down Gabriel's stock by 18%, though the company apparently sees this as another setback in a project which eventually will reap them billions of euros. Cyanide extraction has already caused a fair amount of damage to Romanians and others, i.e. those living in the Carpathian Basin watershed, and much of that has been from stripping tailings. Gabriel is going to use mountaintop removal open cast pits, and if i remember correctly, expect to extract about 1 ounce of gold and silver for every 1-2 tonnes of ore.

Tibor Kocsis made an excellent documentary about this in 2002, New Eldorado: The Curse of Rosia Montana, and later followed it up with Gold Futures, which received an apparently powerful rebuttal from industry backers. (An interesting controversy, worth looking into if i could manage to get hold of both films.) The Carpathians are the LAST EUROPEAN WILDERNESS and the ecological health of its numerous watersheds (feeding at least 5 countries directly) depend on development being sound and sustainable. The Rosia Montana project is going to create havoc, no matter how much integrity the company may have relative to following its own environmental parameters.

Anyone still busy with the xmas shopping, pls take a moment to consider that most gold extraction is at serious odds with fragile environments and human cultures, and that the majority of new gold 'produced' is used for jewelry. Buy something else, i'm sure there are better options.

Duck U Lame Phuck

While i'm sure every other W-disdaining blogger has posted this link, i've gotta add it here. We now know you are more likely to be completely mauled for throwing shoes at an elected official than you are if you smash a pie into their face. i guess this is because shoes are a terrorist weapon, whereas pies are merely wasted calories? Maybe it was the camera angle, but it looked to me like W was actually kind of smiling as he ducked. "I don't know what his cause is.... this is what happens in free societies." That W cannot imagine why someone would do something that, in arab culture, is incredibly insulting, illustrates how totally clueless he is about why people are angry at him. i hope when he gets home from this trip, he'll have a night off to watch Frost/Nixon and think about what it means when a president doesn't take responsibility for any of his actions.

Hand me that bottle of ouzo

Seems like the ideal time for a Greek holiday... Guardian reports:

"It is unclear what measures the government is considering in response to the unrest. With a general strike over economic policy planned for tomorrow, its position is looking increasingly precarious. [i'll say] Violence has resumed in the northern city of Thessaloniki and in Ioannina, and Greek demonstrators occupied the country's consulate in Paris."

Here's a photo from Le Monde, which says the consulate occupation lasted for a few hours. On the heels of opposition victory in Thailand, it would seem that the best way to get rid of a corrupt govt in this century is turning out to be the old fashioned way. Qu'est-ce qui se passe, O Canada??

<

No Time to Play Girly-man: Legalize It!

The State of California is having a fiscal emergency that could be solved in the quasi-near-term with the stroke of a pen. Legalize cannabis and tax it liberally. Let the growers and leaf pickers work legally, tax their income. Allow mail orders and tax the shipments. People should be willing to roll with it, even if it means giving up the thrill of being underground. The economic benefits to the state would be significant. Governor Schwarzenegger stated, "In an emergency like this, we have to take quick action to avoid even worse problems, even if they include decisions we don't like." Legalizing cannabis is an environmentally friendly, economically sound and socially beneficial means of easing the economic crunch. The Governator cannot be blind to this fact nor to it being an option he can and should take seriously.

The arguments against legalization center around 3 principle issues: health, crime and social rectitude (for lack of a better term). NORML’s site offers a pretty thorough FAQ page, so you should go there if you crave a more thorough pro legalization argument to go along with whatever else you might be craving if you’re reading this stoned :-) The issue of negative health impacts in a world full of alcohol, PCBs and fossil fuels seems, relatively speaking, like a non-issue. If you have asthma, you probably wouldn’t opt to smoke pot anymore than you would decide to spend your holiday in Beijing or Mexico City. The idea that government should protect people from all things bad is farcical: this requires either totalitarianism to eliminate all free will (itself an ultimate badness) or consistency, which cannot come from states that make things like nuclear weapons and torture people. We live in an imperfect world, and we should respect individual choices to engage in whatever form of self-medication or recreational substance use one prefers, so long as they don’t involve violence against someone else. If you are afraid being around a bunch of pot smokers presents a clear and present danger to your health, then instead of buying tickets to the next Chemical Brothers concert, go into your local pub to hang out in an inebriation safe zone.

The issue of crime is self-construed. That is to say, growing, selling and using cannabis is criminal not in any moral universe sense, but only in that criminalizing the drug per force turns your peaceful Pink Floyd loving or migraine prone neighbor into an outlaw. Take away the illegal nature of a substance which history has proven millions to be committed to using in spite of the law, and we remove the whole stigma of criminal from our list of cannabis-related problems. According to NORML,

More than 700,000 Americans were arrested on marijuana charges last year, and more than 5 million Americans have been arrested for marijuana offenses in the past decade. Almost 90 percent of these arrests are for simple possession, not trafficking or sale. This is a misapplication of the criminal sanction that invites government into areas of our private lives that are inappropriate and wastes valuable law enforcement resources that should be focused on serious and violent crime.

I’ve left the last sentence in because it points to the main thing people should consider about the criminal status of cannabis: the costs of law enforcement. An editorial in the Australian Drug and Alcohol Review about the potential impacts of legalization noted the following: Reclassification of possession of up to 1 ounce (28 g) of cannabis to a misdemeanour rather than a felony in California in 1976 achieved law enforcement savings of $US 100 million annually. In 2005, a study conducted for the Marijuana Policy Project by Harvard University economist, Jeff Miron, reached the following conclusion:

“… legalizing marijuana would save $7.7 billion per year in government expenditure on enforcement of prohibition. $5.3 billion of this savings would accrue to state and local governments, while $2.4 billion would accrue to the federal government.

These figures are, in fact, lower than those in a 2003 study by the US Office on National Drug Control Policy, which estimated “the United States was spending $12.1 billion on law enforcement and court costs, and $16.9 billion in corrections costs, totaling $29 billion.” Of course, the W Dick administration was in 2003 on the verge of throwing away $3 TRILLION dollars prosecuting their bogus war in Iraq, so it’s no surprise they never considered a mere $29 billion as something worthy of reform.

Although i’d suspect that anyone reading this blog already appreciates the point being made here, for the record, allow me to state the obvious: in a time of fiscal emergency, wasting billions of dollars on an area of law enforcement that (1) does not curb real violence, (2) puts productive, nonviolent people in prison, and (3) has absolutely no deterrent effect whatsoever MAKES ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE.

Doug Benson’s hilarious film Super High Me, shows the further idiocy inflicted by law enforcement in their raids on medical marijuana dispensaries, and brings us to the third major issue which is undoubtedly the one Schwarzenegger should consider most seriously as he tries to arrive at budgetary solutions in California. What impact would legalizing cannabis have on the economy? In particular, on the economy of a state which grows about a third of all cannabis produced in the US? Taking the US as a whole, Miron estimated that “marijuana legalization would yield tax revenue of $2.4 billion annually if marijuana were taxed like all other goods and $6.2 billion annually if marijuana were taxed at rates comparable to those on alcohol and tobacco.” Zeroing in on California, on top of the $981 million savings in law enforcement expenditures, the state could earn up to $105.4 million a year in tax revenue. Put these two figures together and we top $1 billion, approximately 10% of California’s current budget gap of $11.2 billion. If the Governator chose the path of emergency legalization, he could turn San Francisco into a west coast Amsterdam, inevitably reaping further economic benefits for the state.

Political courage is not political suicide. That comes straight from the horse’s mouth, the Governator himself. Legalizing marijuana would be a sanely courageous and highly non suicidal act. Aside from diehard Reefer Madness believers and politicized elements within the Jehovah Witnesses, Californians are unlikely to storm Sacramento protesting such an executive order. In fact, i’d harbor a guess that the only reason thousands might go to the state capitol would be to invite the Governator to a celebratory smoke-in. The Australians who looked at this issue also understood the sanity of such a move: “Allowing demand to instead be met from taxed and regulated sources is likely to reduce the harms from cannabis as well as the financial and other costs of cannabis control policies.” Arnie, your state is having a fiscal meltdown, its medical marijuana dispensaries are here to stay, one of the state’s major agricultural industries is operating completely underground. If you’ve still got those body-builder balls, now is the time to show them off. Don’t be a girly-man, be an innovator. This is the moment and it should be seized.

Quickie World Round-up

The Thai PM is resigning, stranded air travellers finally free to fly home. One small step for tourism, one large step for ousting leaders by popular revolt. In Zimbabwe, soldiers attempting to violate the 18p bank withdrawal limit are now fighting against Harare police; this cannot be good for Mugabe, whose military supporters were key to his election fraud earlier this year. Christians and Muslims have agreed to stop killing each other in Nigeria, while Nkunda's "negotiations or war" ultimatum to Kabile's govt in Kinshasa fell off the media's radar in the wake of the attacks in Mumbia. Bahrain just celebrated its first National Women's Day and the Saudi govt has decreed that volatile books must be removed from circulation. Hillary and Gates are in, respectively replacing change and hope as cornerstones of the incoming administration. Condi Rice serenaded the Queen while W spent his list bit of Presidential Mastercard (TM) credit on the new Hank Williams 10 CD Deluxe BoxSet and is now wandering the White House humming the refrain from My Main Trial Is Yet To Come. Fidel meanwhile has been blogging about the collapse of capitalismo as his amigo on the continent makes another push for indefinite presidential terms in Venezuela. The american consumer subconscious is contending with death by shoppers; the Italians continue to contend with their garbage. Picture of the day comes from TimesOnline, taken by Antony Crossfield, winner of the 2008 Terry O'Neill Award.

Buy Nothing Day

Shameless plug here for Adbusters and others organizing events to raise consciousness around excessive consumerism. Check out Adbuster's here to see some of the things going on internationally: i particularly like the 'credit card cut up' idea, though i'm guessing that few people will join it off the cuff. You might also enjoy checking out The Story of Stuff, by Annie Leonard, and of course Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping, who somewhat ironically have a CD out now called The Shopocalypse. Buy it over the internet and avoid the public disgrace of purchasing. Here's the trailer for Morgan Spurlock's hilarious film about Reverend Billy's movement, What Would Jesus Buy? Even if you don't buy the message, you gotta give him points for the massage.