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2. Pakistan and Afghanistan

Jun-17-2011 | Comments (0)

Bird’s Eye: Alt.Muslim offers a fascinating perspective on the shared victim mentalities of these two countries. Juan Cole (whom the New York Times reported this week was illegally targeted by the CIA for reaching conclusions out of sync with the US government!) looks at the Pakistani Government’s arrest of the spies who told the US where Osama was hiding. Gee, why is Pakistan angry with the US? Meanwhile the Karzai Government (the one NATO is fighting to save), cuts off free media and is rated the worst place to live for women in the world. As Kenny Rogers sang, “You gotta know when to hold them, know when to fold them….”

* Afghanistan & Pakistan: Going Beyond Victim Narratives altmuslim –

More interesting than the rights and wrongs of my colleagues’ viewpoints was the fact that the Afghan narrative about Pakistan was uncannily similar to the Pakistani account of US foreign policy. Much in the same way that Afghans see a Pakistan hand in all their problems, Pakistanis have wholeheartedly subscribed to a fraught fantasy of American omnipresence and omnipotence.

…The point is not to reiterate the complicated dynamics of Pakistan-Afghanistan and Pakistan-US bilateral ties; it is to show that both Pakistan and Afghanistan seem to have subscribed to narratives of victimhood. When faced with their country’s myriad, growing security, political and economic challenges, they simply place the blame elsewhere. This was not a problem of our own making, the logic seems to imply, and therefore we can’t possibly be asked to fix it.

Such narratives of victimhood are dangerous for a variety of reasons. They allow governments to defer responsibility for contemporary problems, and dwell in the past, rather than plan for the future. And they are devastating when it comes to strategic planning: for a nation to define strategic, social, economic and political goals, it must articulate a vision of the future and single-handedly pursue it. However, if the nation is suffering from a victim complex, its strategic planning becomes reactive rather than active. Instead of setting targets for achievement, it dithers about, waiting for the professed villain (whether Islamabad or Washington) to make a move. Only then does it respond, and that too in a defensive manner.

* Pakistan Arrests CIA Informants in Bin Laden Case Juan Cole Informed Comment

The Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence has arrested five Pakistani informants who gave the CIA information leading to the raid on Usamah Bin Laden’s compound at Abbotabad, according to the NYT. …From an American point of view, that Pakistan arrested the informants rather than giving them medals suggests perfidy. But from a Pakistani point of view, they can’t be having nationals working for a foreign intelligence agency and enabling foreign special operations raids into the country from outside.

…US bad relations with Pakistan at the moment derive from using the CIA in paramilitary ways in a no-man’s land of covert action that lacks any framework of international or bilateral law. If Washington goes on like this, it will push Pakistan altogether into the arms of the Chinese and it will set up a negative situation for its likely withdrawal from Afghanistan, in which Islamabad has powerful perceived interests that the US has not respected. The US-Pakistan relationship is important and can be repaired, but it must be by the two countries acting like democracies, not cartoon spies.

* Gained By Blood, Threatened By A Declaration Al Jazeera (thanks, Gabe)

On June 1, Afghanistan’s Council of Religious Scholars known as the Ulema Shura met with President Karzai and unequivocally demanded the shutting down of two of the country’s most prominent media outlets.

Their crime? “Publishing material that is against religion, against national unity, and against the high interest of the nation,’’ declared the Council. Karzai’s office not only announced that the president listened to these demands carefully and praised the role of the Ulema, but also sent out their declaration to the media through its own channels.

Over the past two weeks, the two outlets - Tolo TV and Hasht-e-Subh Daily - have been locked in a battle for survival. While this is not the first time the closure of these outlets – and many others – has been demanded, the clear-cut nature of the demand by a social organisation extending its mandate speaks to the vulnerabilities of the press in Afghanistan.

* Afghanistan Worst Place In The World For Women The Guardian

Targeted violence against female public officials, dismal healthcare and desperate poverty make Afghanistan the world’s most dangerous country in which to be born a woman, according to a global survey released on Wednesday.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Pakistan, India and Somalia feature in descending order after Afghanistan in the list of the five worst states, the poll among gender experts shows.

The appearance of India, a country rapidly developing into an economic super-power, was unexpected. It is ranked as extremely hazardous because of the subcontinent’s high level of female infanticide and sex trafficking.

Others were less surprised to be on the list. Informed about her country’s inclusion, Somalia’s women’s minister, Maryan Qasim, responded: “I thought Somalia would be first on the list, not fifth.”

5. The War is Over, But the Battle Goes On

Jun-03-2011 | Comments (0)

Bird’s Eye: It makes sense to fight for a cause; that’s how change happens. But (as Albert Einstein may have said) insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. The war against drugs is not cutting down drug use; the war on Afghanistan (started, lest we forget, to get Bin Laden) is costing lives and doing nothing to defeat the Taliban, and as for the Harper government’s “War on Crime”, the facts show we’re winning that war without the punitive aspirations he espouses. What do these people fear – a 500 foot tall Bin Laden rising from the sea?

* War On Drugs Not Working, Says Global Commission The Guardian

The global war on drugs has failed and governments should explore legalising marijuana and other controlled substances, according to a commission that includes former heads of state and a former UN secretary general.

A new report by the Global Commission on Drug Policy argues that the decades-old “global war on drugs has failed, with devastating consequences for individuals and societies around the world.” The 24-page paper was released on Thursday.

“Political leaders and public figures should have the courage to articulate publicly what many of them acknowledge privately: that the evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates that repressive strategies will not solve the drug problem, and that the war on drugs has not, and cannot, be won,” the report said.

* Time to Begin Leaving Afghanistan Juan Cole Informed Comment

The protests in Lashkar Gah, Helmand Province, Afghanistan, against yet another alleged killing of 14 women and children in an airstrike that went awry, reminds us that the big counter-insurgency effort in that country still has not produced social peace, still has not yielded a government capable of taking over security duties. NATO has had to issue an apology. If Afghan police and soldiers could project authority and force in local areas, air strikes would be unnecessary. And after nearly 10 years since the overthrow of the Taliban, it is legitimate to ask when and how exactly local troops can be expected to take up this slack? (Editor’s Note: See also relevant “Get Your War On” toon.)

* The Truth About Canadian Crime Rates John Macfarlane The Walrus Thanks, Susie,

According to Statistics Canada, the crime rate fell by 15 percent between 1998 and 2007, but that’s only part of the story. In 2009, StatsCan introduced an index that measures not only the change in volume of a particular crime, but also its relative seriousness in comparison with others (for example, homicide and rape are assigned higher weights than, say, shoplifting and creating mischief). The index shows that for the same decade, 1998 to 2007, the severity of crime in Canada fell by 21 percent.

Why, then, do so many Canadians believe the situation is getting worse? How is it possible that there were 77,000 fewer crimes in 2008 than the year before — including fewer violent crimes, which account for one in five in Canada — and yet almost half of us continued to believe just the opposite?

1. Pakistan Masala

Apr-15-2011 | Comments (0)

Bird’s Eye: A ‘masala’ is a mixture, and Pakistan today is certainly that. It’s the US ally in the “War on Terror”, but the US is facing increasing hostility both from Pakistan’s people and from its government because of that war, and its cost to Pakistan in both lives and stability. Recent political killings (both US and Pakistani) highlight the precipitous decline from political stability, while the monumental literary achievements of recent years show the depth and range of the culture.

* US-Pakistan relations ‘face biggest crisis since 9/11’ The Guardian

Bitter disputes over covert CIA activities and drone attacks inside Pakistan, lack of progress over peace talks in Afghanistan, and rising Islamist-led opposition to the presence of foreign forces in the region are fuelling the biggest crisis in US-Pakistan relations since the 9/11 attacks, Pakistani politicians, army sources and intelligence officers say.

Pakistan is seen by Washington and London as a vital ally in the “war on terror”,…but harsh US criticism of Islamabad’s counter-terrorism campaigns in Pakistan’s western tribal areas, repeated in a White House report last week, and “blowback” from the US military surge in Afghanistan are testing the relationship to breaking point, officials warn.

“We will not accept the stigmatising of Pakistan,” said Salman Bashir, Pakistan’s foreign secretary. “We need to re-examine the fundamentals of our relationship with the United States to get greater clarity. There has been a pause. Now we must start again.” Rehman Malik, Pakistan’s interior minister, said the Americans should stop blaming others for their difficulties in Afghanistan, where violence has worsened in the past year and reconciliation efforts have made little progress. “If the strategy is not right, all the stakeholders have to share responsibility,” Malik said….

Pakistani anger focuses in turn on three main areas: unauthorised CIA activity inside the country, Pakistan’s perception that the US is keeping it “out of the loop” on Afghanistan, particularly in respect of mooted peace talks with the Taliban, and what Islamabad sees as the US failure to appreciate the full cost and impact of the “war on terror” on Pakistan’s economy and social cohesion.

* Spy game: The CIA, Pakistan and ‘blood money’ Al Jazeera

The case of Raymond Davis has all the trappings of a 21st century spy novel. It is a story of murder, prison and clandestine payments, starring a burly former US Special Forces soldier tangled in a murky web of intelligence agencies, competing diplomats and – differentiating his case from Cold War spy sagas – shady private military contractors.

Pakistani authorities released the CIA contractor from prison on Wednesday, after families of two motorcyclists he killed in January were paid a reported $2.3mn in “blood money”. Details surrounding the case are sketchy at best: a series of claims and counter-claims from various diplomats, agencies and organisations which are almost impossible to independently verify. And the stakes are high.

* The Pakistan Killings Are Not About Blasphemy Nick Cohen The Observer

The Islamist murders first of Salmaan Taseer and then of Shahbaz Bhatti show that what tiny scruples blood-soaked men possessed vanished long ago. The best way to describe the terror which is reducing Pakistani liberals to silence is to enumerate what the assassins did not allege. They did not say that Taseer and Bhatti must die because they were apostates – or, to put that “crime” in plain language, because they were adults who decided they no longer believed in the Muslim god. Taseer had not renounced Islam. Bhatti could not renounce it as he was the bravest Christian in Pakistan, who campaigned for equal rights for persecuted minorities with the dignity and physical courage of a modernMartin Luther King.

Nor did their assassins claim that their targets had committed the capital crime of blasphemy. Taseer and Bhatti had not said that the Koran, like the Talmud and the New Testament, was the work of men not god. They did not denounce Muhammad’s morality or offer any criticism of his life and teaching. If you wanted to reduce the whirling, brilliant narrative of Rushdie’s Satanic Verses to a single sentence, you could say that it was in part a “blasphemous” account of the early history of Islam. Taseer and Bhatti attempted nothing so brave. They confined themselves to making the modest point that Pakistan’s death penalty for blasphemywas excessive and barbaric, and that was enough to condemn them. Their killers murdered them for the previously unknown crime of advocating law reform: blew them away for the new offence of blaspheming against blasphemy.

* The Pak Pack Takes Over The Literary World? – Hindustan Times

Pakistani writing has certainly been on a high in recent years, with Mohsin Hamid being shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2007 for his novel The Reluctant Fundamentalist. Mohammed Hanif’s A Case of Exploding Mangoes won the overall Commonwealth Best First Book Prize in 2008. Daniyal Mueenuddin won the regional Commonwealth Best First Book Prize with In Other Rooms, Other Wonders in 2010; he was also nominated for a Pulitzer prize in the United States. Kamila Shamsie’s novels set in Karachi across various periods of history have been nominated more than once for the Orange Prize, the premier fiction award in the UK for women’s writing. Uzma Aslam Khan’s Trespassing was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Prize in the Eurasia region; and Aamer Hussein’s masterful short story collections paved the way for the novella Another Gulmohar Tree and its nomination for the Commonwealth Prize earlier this year.

Besides the “top five” – a construct that may or may not be artificially created by international publishers for the sake of packaging and marketing – many other Pakistani writers are working hard to establish themselves: Feryal Ali Gauhar, Shandana Minhas, Sehba Sarwar, Maniza Naqvi, Sorraya Khan to name a few (again, one has to wonder why the “top five” is predominated by men; and whether this is a deliberate or unconscious bias against Pakistani women writers).

3. The Spreading Revolts

Feb-25-2011 | Comments (0)

Bird’s Eye: As the lovely ‘toon “Uninstalling Dictators” makes clear, the revolution is spreading. We look at Al Jazeera’s role in the Middle east, at a prediction that it’s going world-wide (and as our next section will suggest, the US is not exempt) and at the start of the first ever serious protests in North Korea. We certainly do live in interesting times, don’t we?

* The Unstoppable Revolutionary Power Of Al Jazeera Mondoweiss

It’s hard to imagine the revolutions sweeping the Middle East happening without al Jazeera. Yes Tunisians started their revolution, taking the first steps, and it took Jazeera a couple of weeks before it focused on Tunisia. But once its started and Jazeera was on its war footing it could connect activists and demonstrators from around the country, it could disseminate information to other parts of country. Now middle class people in Tunisia who were told by their parents not to get involved in politics could learn about what was happening elsewhere and feel that somebody else was also expressing their grievances, or other grievances, and it was ok for them to express them too.

Once the revolution starts Jazeera shapes people’s political opinions and plans, it asks demonstrators and activists and leaders what they will do, will they form a political party, this is what one side says, what do you say in response, etc, thus shaping political dialogue and facilitating it. In Egypt, when established opposition parties and Muslim Brothers went to Umar Suleiman to cut a deal, Jazeera played a key role in scuttling this betrayal of the revolution by going back to the demonstrators and airing their demands and challenging the opposition leaders. Jazeera asked people what they wanted if Mubarak left, if they wanted Suleiman, etc and it pressured political leaders who were more inclined to compromise with the regime. Jazeera forced them to hear what the street was saying and prevented them from compromising.

* The New Face of Revolution Ted Rall’s Rallblog

After Tunisia and Egypt, the World

From the British newspaper the Independent: “Like in many other countries in the region, protesters in Egypt complain about surging prices, unemployment and the authorities’ reliance on heavy-handed security to keep dissenting voices quiet.”

Sound familiar?

Coverage by U.S. state-controlled media of the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt is too dim by half: they say it’s an Arab thing. So it is. But not for long. The problems that triggered the latest uprisings, rising inequality of income, frozen credit markets, along with totally unresponsive government, span the globe. To be sure, the first past-due regimes to be overthrown may be the most brutal U.S. client states—Arab states such as Yemen, Jordan and Algeria. Central Asia’s autocrats, also corrupted by the U.S., can’t be far behind; Uzbekistan’s Islam Karimov, who likes to boil his dissidents to death, would be my first bet. But this won’t stop in Asia. Persistent unemployment, unresponsive and repressive governments exist in Europe and yes, here in the U.S. They are unstable. The pressure is building.

Global revolution is imminent.

* North Korea First Public Protests Against The Kims’ Regime – Asia News

The wave of protests that began in the Mideast appears to have reached even North Korea. For the first time in the history of the Stalinist regime, groups of ordinary citizens have protested in three cities demanding food and electricity, sources say. The event is exceptional and confirms the economic difficulties, especially concerning food supplies, people have to face under the Communist government.

1. Tunisia

Jan-21-2011 | Comments (0)

ird’s Eye: We start with Amy Goodman’s interview with Juan Cole, available as a ten minute video, with written excerpts below. As always, Cole is knowledgable and insightful, arguing that the revolution is secular and populist, and exploring how that shapes reactions from other countries. That populism means (to many in power) that it has to stop, and Helena Cobban looks at how that is happening. And finally we link both to Big Picture’s excellent collection of photos, and Lucas Dolega’s final assignment: he was killed shortly after this picture was taken.

* “Spearheaded by Labor Movements, by Internet Activists, by Rural Workers; It’s a Populist Revolution” Juan Cole

One thing to keep in mind is that Tunisia is not an oil state. And it suffered from a kind of nepotism that was extreme. I mean, the U.S. leaked cables from WikiLeaks suggest that 50 percent of the economic elite of that country was related in one way or another to the president or to the first lady, Leila Ben Ali, and her Trabelsi clan. So, the combination of not having any extra resources to bribe people and buy them off and also of monopolizing the country’s economic resources in the hands of a few relatives was unique to Tunisia.

* ‘Delugist’ narrative on Tunisia Helena Cobban

There is a powerful constellation of forces in the Middle East that wants to see Tunisia’s current popular uprising fail. This constellation includes: (1) All the other U.S.-supported autocrats in the Arab world, now terrified that Pres. Ben Ali’s hasty departure from the country his family has looted for so long may foretell their own; (2) The U.S. securocracy, which for years now has relied heavily on inserting military “advisers”, “trainers”, etc into the highest levels of all these autocracies to help it pursue some of the most repressive portions of the so-called “Global War on Terror”; and (3) The Israeli establishment, which sees the rule of autocrats in Egypt, Jordan, etc as essential to the continued repression of pro-Palestinian activities in and by these countries.

How could the various portions of the region’s anti-democratic constellation respond? Mainly, they rushed to invoke (and also, perhaps, to help activate) an “Apres lui le deluge” kind of narrative designed to warn the citizens of other Arab countries that: (1) The downfall/departure of Ben Ali would lead only to chaos, instability, and social strife inside Tunisia, and (2) Therefore, the regimes of all the other US-supported countries where a Tunisian-style mass uprising might threaten should immediately be strengthened in their capacities to withstand any repeat of a similar uprising– including by being able to “point” to the Tunisian example as one of strife and chaos, rather than democracy and enhanced national unity, emerging from an autocrat’s overthrow.

* An uprising in Tunisia The Big Picture

* Eyewitness: Final assignment

Demonstrators outside the Tunisian interior ministry, photographed by Lucas Dolega of EPA. Dolega, 32, was hit by a teargas grenade in the protests and died of his injuries yesterday

2. Afghanistan

Jan-21-2011 | Comments (0)

Bird’s Eye: Why are we in Afghanistan? Why are Afghanis being killed by Western soldiers? Was it to stop them from hating us, or to get a more just government than the Taliban? Why are we still there when it’s clearly such an unmitigated disaster from any goal perspective? Juan Cole gives an excellent overview on dominant myths that we tell ourselves, Counterpunch looks at why we’re following a failing policy, and new (to Tikkunista) blog Registan (All Central Asia, All The Time) explores a specific story of how a village was razed, to protect it from the Taliban.

* Top Ten Myths about Afghanistan Juan Cole Informed Comment

10. “There has been significant progress in tamping down the insurgency in Afghanistan.”

Fact: A recent National Intelligence Estimate by 16 intelligence agencies found no progress. It warned that large swathes of the country were at risk of falling to the Taliban and that they still had safe havens in Pakistan, with the Pakistani government complicit. The UN says there were over 6000 civilian casualties of war in Afghanistan in the first 10 months of 2010, a 20% increase over the same period in 2009. Also, 701 US and NATO troops have been killed this year, compared to 521 last year, a 25% increase. There were typically over 1000 insurgent attacks per month in Afghanistan this year, often twice as many per month as in 2009, recalling the guerrilla war in Iraq in 2005.

* Killing Peace in Afghanistan Conn Hallinan Counterpunch

In spite of a White House declaration that “progress” is being made in Afghanistan, by virtually any measure the war has deteriorated significantly since the Obama Administration surged troops into Kandahar and Helmand provinces. This past year has been the deadliest on record for U.S. and coalition troops. Civilian casualties are on the rise, and, according to the Red Cross, security has worsened throughout the country. U.S. allies are falling away, and the central government in Kabul has never been so isolated. Polls in Afghanistan, the U.S. and Europe reflect growing opposition to the nine-year conflict.

So why is the White House pursuing a strategy that is almost certain to accelerate a descent into chaos, and one that runs counter to the Administration’s stated goal of a diplomatic solution to the war? It is not an easy question to answer, in part because the major actors are hardly being straight with the public.

*The Unforgivable Horror of Village Razing Joshua Foust Registan.net

Translated from obnoxious mil-speak, she is describing the village being intimidated by the Taliban, who are chased away by soldiers, then “cleared” by special forces, and leveled by massive aerial bombardment, apparently with no casualties. Nowhere in this account is there a sense that the villagers felt any ill-will toward the Americans beforehand—rather, Broadwell explicitly describes the village as being victimized by the Taliban first, then being completely obliterated by the Americans. In other words, rather than actually clearing the village—not just chasing away the Taliban but cleaning up the bombs and munitions left over—the soldiers got lazy and decided to destroy the entire settlement… “to give the men confidence.” This sounds bad enough—like a nightmare from before there was a Fourth Geneva Convention that prohibited the collective punishment and expulsion of civilians from conflict zones—but it gets worse.

4. Good News Stories

Nov-19-2010 | Comments (0)

Bird’s Eye: Some good things have happened recently, and they’re worth celebrating. In “Burma”, Aung San Suu Kyi has been freed from house arrest and bravely continues her fight for a change in Myanmar’s government. In Africa, a Chinese “Peace Ark” of doctors offering free medical services to people who would otherwise not have them, sails the coasts. And around the world, synagogues and mosques practice “twiningsm”, enabling Muslims and Jews to form better relationships.

* Myanmar Dissident Calls for Change New York Times

On her first full day of freedom after more than seven years of house arrest, Myanmar’s pro-democracy leader, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, demonstrated the enduring power of her popularity on Sunday, drawing thousands of jubilant supporters to a rally at which she pledged to lead them in a struggle for political change.

Though she spoke of reconciliation, the event itself was a challenge to the authority and control of the ruling military junta. The size and enthusiasm of the crowd — the kind of outpouring of public support that had led the government to cut short her previous period of freedom in 2003 — suggested that she had emerged with her popularity and moral authority intact.

*Thousands Get Free Health Care In ‘Floating Hospital’

Medical staff aboard the Chinese Navy hospital ship Peace Ark have been treating an average of 700 patients a day since last Thursday. The crew, which leaves the port of Mombasa tomorrow, has been doing an average of six operations, 80 physical examinations, 110 dental check-ups, 35 CT scans, 200 DR examinations, 240 ultra sound cases and 170 heart check-ups per day.

* Twinningsm Month

Throughout November and December, more than 100 mosques and 100 synagogues in 22 countries on four continents will participate in the Weekend of Twinningsm. On 31 October, the twinning kicked off with a worldwide virtual twinning event during which participants from around the world heard reports on Jewish-Muslim initiatives underway in various countries.

4. Global Warming Denial

Oct-29-2010 | Comments (0)

Bird’s Eye: One of the key points in the Tea Party’s belief system is that man-made global warming doesn’t exist and/or isn’t a problem. (Many of these are the same people who don’t believe in evolution, so reality-based arguments don’t work on them.) None the less, we offer examples of what China is doing, where climate change is taken seriously, and an excellent NASA summary of why 99% of scientists do consider man-made global warming critical.

* Global Warming Skepticism in Tea Party- NYTimes.com

“It’s a flat-out lie,” Mr. Dennison said in an interview after the debate, adding that he had based his view on the preaching of Rush Limbaugh and the teaching of Scripture. “I read my Bible,” Mr. Dennison said. “He made this earth for us to utilize.”

Skepticism and outright denial of global warming are among the articles of faith of the Tea Party movement, here in Indiana and across the country. For some, it is a matter of religious conviction; for others, it is driven by distrust of those they call the elites. And for others still, efforts to address climate change are seen as a conspiracy to impose world government and a sweeping redistribution of wealth. But all are wary of the Obama administration’s plans to regulate carbon dioxide, a ubiquitous gas, which will require the expansion of government authority into nearly every corner of the economy.

Lisa Deaton, a small-business owner in Columbus, Ind., who started We the People Indiana, a Tea Party affiliate, is supporting Mr. Young in part because of his stand against climate change legislation.“They’re trying to use global warming against the people,” Ms. Deaton said. “It takes away our liberty. Being a strong Christian,” she added, “I cannot help but believe the Lord placed a lot of minerals in our country and it’s not there to destroy us.”

* Aren’t We Clever?- NYTimes.com

“There is really no debate about climate change in China,” said Peggy Liu, chairwoman of the Joint U.S.-China Collaboration on Clean Energy, a nonprofit group working to accelerate the greening of China. “China’s leaders are mostly engineers and scientists, so they don’t waste time questioning scientific data.” The push for green in China, she added, “is a practical discussion on health and wealth. There is no need to emphasize future consequences when people already see, eat and breathe pollution every day.”

And because runaway pollution in China means wasted lives, air, water, ecosystems and money — and wasted money means fewer jobs and more political instability — China’s leaders would never go a year (like we will) without energy legislation mandating new ways to do more with less. It’s a three-for-one shot for them. By becoming more energy efficient per unit of G.D.P., China saves money, takes the lead in the next great global industry and earns credit with the world for mitigating climate change.

* Climate Change: Evidence NASA

Certain facts about Earth’s climate are not in dispute:

The heat-trapping nature of carbon dioxide and other gases was demonstrated in the mid-19th century. Their ability to affect the transfer of infrared energy through the atmosphere is the scientific basis of many JPL-designed instruments, such as AIRS. Increased levels of greenhouse gases must cause the Earth to warm in response.

The evidence for rapid climate change is compelling:

Sea level rise: Global sea level rose about 17 centimeters (6.7 inches) in the last century. The rate in the last decade, however, is nearly double that of the last century.

Global temperature rise: All three major global surface temperature reconstructions show that Earth has warmed since 1880. Most of this warming has occurred since the 1970s, with the 20 warmest years having occurred since 1981 and with all 10 of the warmest years occurring in the past 12 years. Even though the 2000s witnessed a solar output decline resulting in an unusually deep solar minimum in 2007-2009, surface temperatures continue to increase.

7. Talking With the Enemy

Oct-15-2010 | Comments (2)

Bird’s Eye: Conflicts start down the road to resolution when people on opposite sides talk to each other. So it’s a pleasure to offer three stories that are good news, as three major areas of conflict start to have enemies communicating. Every step forward helps.

* India Makes Major Shift in Policy in Kashmir New York Times

The Indian government announced a major policy shift in Kashmir on Saturday, calling for the release of jailed student protesters, easing security strictures in major cities, reopening schools and universities, and offering financial compensation to the families of the more than 100 civilians killed since the restive region erupted in protests in June.

Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram, who led a parliamentary delegation on a fact-finding trip last week, also said a high-level government committee would be established to open a dialogue with political parties, students and civil society groups in the state of Jammu and Kashmir, the Indian-controlled part of the disputed region.

* Settlers replace Korans burnt in West Bank mosque Haaretz

Settlers on Tuesday gave new copies of the Koran to Palestinians in a West Bank village whose mosque was burned in an attack blamed by Palestinians on settlers.

Several copies of Islam’s holy book were scorched in the arson attack and threats in Hebrew were scrawled on the wall of the mosque of Beit Fajjar early on Monday.

“This visit is to say that although there are people who oppose peace, he who opposes peace is opposed to God,” said Rabbi Menachem Froman, a well-known peace activist and one of a handful of settlers who went to Beit Fajjar to show solidarity with their Muslim neighbors.

* Taliban In Talks With Karzai Government Washington Post

Taliban representatives and the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai have begun secret, high-level talks over a negotiated end to the war, according to Afghan and Arab sources.

The talks follow inconclusive meetings, hosted by Saudi Arabia, that ended more than a year ago. While emphasizing the preliminary nature of the current discussions, the sources said that for the first time they believe that Taliban representatives are fully authorized to speak for the Quetta Shura, the Afghan Taliban organization based in Pakistan, and its leader, Mohammad Omar. “They are very, very serious about finding a way out,” one source close to the talks said of the Taliban.

3. China Now and Then

Oct-01-2010 | Comments (0)

Bird’s Eye: China continues to demonstrate how much more efficient despotism is than democracy, as they address climate change, and spend money on real economic plans rather than GWOT (Global War on Terror) fantasies. But despotism carries a dark side, as the fuller stories emerging about the “Great Leap Forward” offer a 45 million person best estimate of the death toll.

* China Resorts To Blackouts In Pursuit Of Energy Efficiency The Guardian

There are less than four months left until the end of China’s current five-year plan, during which the economy is supposed to have become 20% more energy efficient. That target (which measures energy use relative to GDP growth) is crucial for a nation that wants to move up the economic value chain and prove to the world that it is making a significant contribution toward tackling greenhouse gas emissions.

* Brazil’s huge new port highlights China’s drive into South America The Guardian

Then finally, 80 minutes on, the destination came into view: a gigantic concrete pier that juts nearly two miles out into the South Atlantic and boasts an unusual nickname: the Highway to China. Dotted with orange-clad construction workers and propped up by dozens of 38-tonne pillars, this vast concrete structure is part of the Superporto do Acu, a $2.5bn port and industrial complex that is being erected on the Rio coastline, on an area equivalent to 12,000 football pitches.(Editor’s rant: only the Guardian would measure land sizes in the unit “football pitches”. What is the &^$%% conversion from a UK “football pitch” into any sane unit?)

Reputedly the largest industrial port complex of its type in the world, Açu is also one of the most visible symbols of China’s rapidly accelerating drive into Brazil and South America as it looks to guarantee access to much-needed natural resources and bolster its support base in the developing world. …”There are many in Washington who worry about China’s growing presence in Africa and Latin America and claim that this poses a threat to America’s long-term strategic interests,” said Klare, noting, however, that the US’ “fixation” with Afghanistan and the war on terror meant there had been virtually no reaction.

* Germany seizes on big business in China Anthony Faiola Washington Post

As Americans fret over high unemployment and the prospect of another recession, an economic renaissance is putting Germans back to work and propelling the economy at a pace not seen since the fall of the Berlin Wall….Vilified in the United States as a great sucking sound on the American economy, China is courted here as a revered client. Fast-growing demand from Asia’s giant is helping to fuel the strong German recovery, and Germany now stands as proof that a rich nation can profit off China’s rise. Although the United States still exports more to China in total dollar terms, adjusted for the size of their economies, Germany is now out-exporting the United States to China by a factor of three to one.

* Mao’s Great Famine by Frank Dikötter The Observer

Frank Dikötter has written a masterly book that should be read not just by anybody interested in modern Chinese history but also by anybody concerned with the way in which a simple idea propagated by an autocratic national leader can lead a country to disaster, in this case to a degree that beggars the imagination. The basic narrative of the great famine that hit the People’s Republic around 1960 has been known outside China at least since Jasper Becker’s groundbreaking 1996 account,Hungry Ghosts. Its claims were doubted by those who could not accept the sheer monstrous scale of the calamity visited on the Chinese people as a result of the Great Leap Forward launched by Mao in 1958 to propel China into the ranks of major industrial nations. But now Dikötter’s painstaking research in newly opened local archives makes all too credible his estimate that the death toll reached 45 million people

2. Turkey: How Democracy Gets Spun

Sep-17-2010 | Comments (0)

Bird’s-Eye: There was an important vote this week in Turkey on the referendum, reported below by the Guardian. But while the vote and its implications (greater democracy, removal of blockages for Turkey joining the EU) it’s fascinating how many Western media saw this as a bad thing, because the democratic government is Islamic, and therefore bad. So not allowing military coups is wrong because the military is secular and therefore good. The Forbes article below is a typical example of this view. And then (thesis, antithesis, synthesis) Juan Cole offers a balanced and sane overview.

* Turkey Poised For Major Shakeup As Voters Back Constitutional Reforms The Guardian

Turkey stood on the brink of a ground-breaking political transformation tonight after voters in a referendum backed a constitutional shakeup designed to tame its once mighty secular establishment.

With more than 99% of votes counted, returns showed 58% backing for amendments that would drastically curtail the judiciary and make the armed forces subservient to civilian rule.

The result confounded earlier forecasts of a tight race and represented a stunning political triumph for Turkey’s prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and his ruling Justice and Development party (AKP), which is rooted in political Islam.

The government had called the vote to decide on a 26-article reform package that it said would give Turkey a democratic constitution fit for EU membership and mark a break with the country’s baleful legacy of military coups.

* Why You Should Care About Turkey’s Referendum Melik Kaylan Forbes

If Turkey goes Islamist, there’s no guarantee it will come out the other end. We have seen entire swaths of the globe emerge voluntarily out of secular despotic systems – even Castro is saying that the Cuban system no longer works – but we have not seen a comparable process with any Islamic system. And even the non-Islamic despotisms can last and last.

If Turkey goes Islamic voluntarily, that is through the ballot box, there’s a dangerous possibility that, as with Chavez in Venezuela and Putin in Russia, the country will not emerge for a generation, will not be allowed to, and by the time we next get a look the world will be a much tougher place. If things drift beyond control, Islamist forces from neighbors will flood in and keep things locked into turmoil. Could Turkey turn into another Iran?

* Turkey’s Constitutional Referendum Extends Range of Liberties Juan Cole Informed Comment

It is likely, it seems to me, that the outcome of these changes will in fact be a greater role for believing Muslims in Turkish political and public life. I can’t see what is wrong with that, or how it is contrary to democracy. The old Kemalist system of secularism imposed from above by an urban, educated elite, in such a way as to marginalize much of Turkish society, accomplished good but also created inequities.

Moreover, the constitution that is being amended was imposed by martial law. Letting the public weigh in on it, California style, restores a democratic character to at least some of it. Thus, the new constitution will allow much more in the way of union organizing by labor and restores the right to collective bargaining to public sector employees

1. Actions

Sep-10-2010 | Comments (0)

Beit Zatoun Photo Exhibit: Hyphen Islam-Christianity

Imagine a much older country on the other side of the planet where 19 religious communities are at home on a territory only 1/10 the size of Southwest Ontario….Be our guest for a guided tour by the artist who brings her native country in 100 stunning photographs. From 7:30pm – 9:00pm, Sep 11 to Oct 3 612 Markham Street (by Bathurst subway)

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