The current issue of Columbia Magazine carries a profile by Tim Warner of New Republic editor Franklin Foer celebrating him as "the fixer" who is resuscitating the magazine. . . . Oh, he "fixed" it, all right!
If not the most poorly timed article in the history of journalism, it is nevertheless laughable in light of the ordeal inflicted on the magazine by its Baghdad fabulist and will to believe him on the part of "the editors."
As Hugh Hewitt noted, Mr. Foer is more interested in 'influencing the influencers' than in getting the facts right.
Warner attributes the decline of the magazine's circulation from 101,000 in 2000 to 60,000 before the reign of Foer to disenchantment with the magazine among its hate-consumed barking moonbat liberal readers: "The magazine's stance on Iraq and its support of Connecticut senator Joseph I. Lieberman in 2004 brought vehement criticism and open disdain from liberal critics, especially those in the blogosphere, who have treated the New Republic as their personal piñata." Foer notes that the magazine is making up lost ground in its strident opposition to Bush "on a whole array of views."
Circulation is up to 66,000 since Foer took over. Six thousand new subscribers and another Stephen Glass remarkable job he's doing. Dean Barnett has more here.
Posted by: Mike ||
08/22/2007 09:45 ||
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Posted by: Frank G ||
08/22/2007 9:27 Comments ||
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#3
It goes back further than that. It's the definition of the Yiddish word chutzpah. (Pronounced with the hard, throat-clearing kh sound, not the soft French sh.)
Interesting bit of work. Intriguing that it is being done in part by Saudi Arabian universities. At least somebody over there realizes the oil will run out soon, but the sunshine won't - and they have LOTS of sunshine in Saudi Arabia. Lots of silicon too.
ANYTHING related to Saudi Arabia is ultimately somehow related to the war with Islamism.
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. Placing a film of silicon nanoparticles onto a silicon solar cell can boost power, reduce heat and prolong the cells life, researchers now report. Integrating a high-quality film of silicon nanoparticles 1 nanometer in size directly onto silicon solar cells improves power performance by 60 percent in the ultraviolet range of the spectrum, said Munir Nayfeh, a physicist at the University of Illinois and corresponding author of a paper accepted for publication in Applied Physics Letters.
A 10 percent improvement in the visible range of the spectrum can be achieved by using nanoparticles 2.85 nanometers in size, said Nayfeh, who also is a researcher at the universitys Beckman Institute.
In conventional solar cells, ultraviolet light is either filtered out or absorbed by the silicon and converted into potentially damaging heat, not electricity. In previous work, however, Nayfeh showed that ultraviolet light could efficiently couple to correctly sized nanoparticles and produce electricity. That work was reported in the August 2004 issue of the journal Photonics Technology Letters.
To make their improved solar cells, the researchers began by first converting bulk silicon into discrete, nano-sized particles using a patented process they developed. Depending on their size, the nanoparticles will fluoresce in distinct colors. Nanoparticles of the desired size were then dispersed in isopropyl alcohol and dispensed onto the face of the solar cell. As the alcohol evaporated, a film of closely packed nanoparticles was left firmly fastened to the solar cell.
Solar cells coated with a film of 1 nanometer, blue luminescent particles showed a power enhancement of about 60 percent in the ultraviolet range of the spectrum, but less than 3 percent in the visible range, the researchers report. Solar cells coated with 2.85 nanometer, red particles showed an enhancement of about 67 percent in the ultraviolet range, and about 10 percent in the visible.
The improved performance is a result of enhanced voltage rather than current, Nayfeh said. Our results point to a significant role for charge transport across the film and rectification at the nanoparticle interface. The process of coating solar cells with silicon nanoparticles could be easily incorporated into the manufacturing process with little additional cost, Nayfeh said.
With Nayfeh, the papers co-authors are graduate student and lead author Matthew Stupca at Illinois, professor Mohamed Alsalhi at King Saud University in Saudi Arabia, and professors Turki Al Saud and Abdulrahman Almuhanna, both at the King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia.
The research was funded by the National Science Foundation, the state of Illinois, the Grainger Foundation and the University of Illinois. {HT Glenn Reynolds}
#3
Fine, except that the oil *isn't* going to run out in the lifetime of anyone alive today. Think of the nifty solar panels they'll be making in 100 years!
#5
The media trots out the improving photovoltaics efficiency myth on a regular basis.
Efficiency means bugger all (except perhaps it's effect on size). The issue is cost. Solar energy is just too expensive and oil would have to go to several hundred $ per barrel for it to be competitive, or photovoltaics would have to get dramatically cheaper (extremely unlikely)
#6
Phil, there are CIGS solar cells that can be painted/printed on plastics (e.g. Nanosolar, Konarka). Their efficiencies currently are low (6%) but will improve, with latest R&D cells at 20% (better than polycrystalline silicon cells) and cost can come down to less than $1/watt.
Posted by: ed ||
08/22/2007 21:07 Comments ||
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#7
If nothing else, alternative energy sources are useful to provide marginal increases in available power, such that additional power plants need not be built at great cost. Especially in areas where the alternative source is consistently available. I've no idea how photovoltaic cells would survive sandstorms, though.
According to the CEO, Martin Roscheisen, the conversion efficiency (percentage of incident light energy converted to electrical energy) of the Nanosolar SPV cell is above 12 per cent for its first product prototypes.
...
The company is now offering solar panels at below $1 per peak watt.
Will pay more attention to them in the future.
Posted by: ed ||
08/22/2007 21:17 Comments ||
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#9
Not to be overly pessimistic but if Saudi Arabia keeps on like it has, long before the oil runs out most of their abundant silion will be fused
#2
...long-term migration from the country reached 385,000 in the year to July 2006.
A number of long-term migrants who arrived in the UK in the same period was 574,000
Peru's Expreso newspaper carries a photo of a tin with a label sporting photos of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Peruvian opposition politician Ollanta Humala, who lost to Alan Garcia in last year's presidential election. According to a report in the Los Angeles Times, a message on the label reads: "The Peruvian government acts in an inefficient, slow and heartless manner, notwithstanding the pain of the victims, leaving them to the mercy of hunger, thirst and delinquency."
Ingredients: 1 part seething, 2 parts despair.
Directions: Mix well, cover, let stand for two or three weeks without a shower or a hot meal. Wear eye protection when opening, contents may be explosive.
Not surprisingly, the offending cans have stirred up a political storm.
Among the well-fed and properly domiciled chattering class, of course. The actual victims are still trying to figure out if *this* rock can be piled on *that* brick.
Humala's Nationalist Party - whose logo also features on the label - has denied responsibility, blaming a "weak and cowardly" campaign to damage its image, according to the Miami Herald. President Garcia said he didn't believe Humala was behind the fishy propaganda. But the Expreso newspaper said the cans were handed out from Nationalist Party trucks, fuelling the theory they could be the brainchild of local Humala or Chavez supporters.
The Venezuelan ambassador to Peru was quick to disassociate his government from the controversial labels. "This is a damaging manipulation, a vile manipulation because Venezuela has brought humanitarian aid, not party politics," he reportedly told Lima's CPN Radio.
"Such calumny! Venezuela's honor has been impugned! I shall write Turtle Bay at once and register a case! You could go to Den Haag for this!"
The LA Times said the row was symptomatic of a wider divide between South Americans who support the policies of powerful socialist leader Chavez and those who disapprove of his anti-U.S. rhetoric.
President Garcia is a Washington ally who has accused his Venezuelan counterpart of interfering in Peru's affairs. During last year's presidential campaign, he also branded Humala "a Chavez lackey", according to the newspaper. But while there's no love lost between Garcia and Chavez, the Peruvian president has publicly thanked Venezuela for the quake aid it's sent.
As long as the perpetrators of "tuna-gate" remain shrouded in mystery, it's hard to know whether the cans were a roaring a success or a political own-goal.
Either way, the controversy makes Bolivian President Evo Morales look like a saint in comparison. He and his cabinet have promised to donate between 25 percent and half of their pay this month to the tens of thousands of families left homeless by the devastating Peru quake.
Sorry, Evo. Chavez outflanked you. You can't put Citizen Hugo's face on half your salary, and your noble sacrifice has already been spent in brothels in Buenos Aires.
"International aid is not always enough when there is a natural disaster, but a small contribution will always help the families affected by the earthquake," Morales said.
Just ask millions of satisfied Red Cross donors.
Big natural disasters can make or break governments. They can make a town mayor a hero who'll go on to be president, or they can expose the faultlines of state corruption and fuel a revolution. Sometimes tragedies persuade long-standing enemies to unite and help each other out. Other times governments score goals by giving aid to traditional enemies to highlight their weakness.
In the case of Peru, some quake survivors have got so fed up waiting for help to arrive that they've packed up and left town. According to a report in the Christian Science Monitor, aid workers say there's actually plenty of relief to go round, but the problem lies with distribution bottlenecks.
Some have criticised a decision to put ministers in charge of the relief effort. "Local authorities, the ones who know the area best, and titular head of the civil defense system, have no role. They have been replaced by ministers," Frank Boeren of Oxfam International told the paper.
To those still waiting for relief to trickle through, the tuna scandal must seem like a cruel and cynical sideshow.
#4
Big natural disasters can make or break governments. They can make a town mayor a hero who'll go on to be president, or they can expose the faultlines of state corruption and fuel a revolution.
Jeebus, is somebody gunnin' to have Mayor Nagin on the 2008 Donk ticket? Or is this a RWC (Right Wing Conspiracy) jab at the incompetence that is the most corrupt city in the most corrupt state in our Union?
Posted by: BA ||
08/22/2007 19:47 Comments ||
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#5
Bart Simpson calls Apu: You got Hugo Chavez in a can? ...
Posted by: ed ||
08/22/2007 20:36 Comments ||
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Venezuela's National Assembly, dominated by allies of President Hugo Chavez, gave unanimous initial approval Tuesday to constitutional reforms that would allow him to run for re-election and undoubtedly possibly govern for decades to come.
Assembly President Cilia Flores said Chavez's proposed changes to the constitution, including the lifting of presidential term limits, were approved by all 167 lawmakers after about six hours of debate. Final approval is expected within two or three months, and voters will then decide whether to approve the changes in a referendum.
Peanut One is cleared for landing...
The assembly has been solidly pro-Chavez since the opposition boycotted a 2005 vote and had been expected to sign off on the changes proposed by Chavez in Tuesday's first reading. The reforms, if approved, would extend presidential terms from six to seven years and allow Chavez to run again in 2013.
Government opponents have attacked the reforms, saying they will weaken democracy by permitting Chavez to become a lifelong leader like his ally Fidel Castro of Cuba. Ismael Garcia, one of the assembly's few dissenting voices, criticized pro-Chavez lawmakers for excluding opposition groups from the discussion, arguing that Venezuelans of all political leanings must be included in the debate before the proposed reforms are put to a national vote. Garcia, who voted for the initial approval despite his criticism, said issues "such as the economic path of a new society" must be discussed. "This isn't just any debate," he said.
Other reforms would create new types of property to be managed by cooperatives, give neighborhood-based "communal councils" administrative responsibilities usually reserved for elected officials and create "a popular militia" that would form part of the military. The workday would also be reduced to six hours.
Flores said government-friendly lawmakers have the right to approve the reforms without changing the proposal that Chavez presented last week. "We are not imposing anything," she told state television.
Vladimir Putin announced ambitious plans to revive Russia's military power and restore its role as the world's leading producer of military aircraft yesterday. Speaking at the opening of the largest airshow in Russia's post-Soviet history, the president said he was determined to make aircraft manufacture a national priority after decades of lagging behind the west.
The remarks follow his decision last week to resume long-range missions by strategic bomber aircraft capable of hitting the US with nuclear weapons. Patrols over the Atlantic, Pacific and Arctic began last week for the first time since 1992.
Presidential aides hinted yesterday that Russia could shortly resume the production of Tu-160 and Tu-95 strategic nuclear bombers, now that the aircraft are again flying "combat missions". The bombers would be used as a "means of strategic deterrence", a presidential aide, Alexander Burutin, told Interfax.
We could always crank out a few more B-2s. Any chance some of the older B-52s in the boneyard could be rebuilt?
Mr Putin said Russia would also resume the large-scale manufacture of civilian planes. "Russia has a very important goal which is to retain leadership in the production of military equipment," he said.
Boy howdy, Airbus versus Tupolov, there's a real choice ...
The new emphasis on Russia's revived military prowess comes against a backdrop of deteriorating relations with the west. Mr Putin has denounced the US's missile defence plans in Europe, scrapped an agreement with Nato on conventional armed forces, and grabbed a large, if symbolic, chunk of the Arctic.
Yesterday a senior Russian general warned the Czech Republic it would be making a "big mistake" if it permitted the US to use its territory. Yuri Baluyevsky, Russia's military chief of staff, said Prague should hold off any final decision on the shield until after next year's US presidential elections. "I do not exclude that a new administration in the United States will re-evaluate the current administration's decisions on missile defence," he said, after a meeting in Moscow with the Czech defence minister, Martin Bartak.
Unfortunately he's right about that; Hildebeast would be certain to cancel it.
Speaking at yesterday's MAKS-2007 international airshow, Mr Putin said: "Russia, as a state that has acquired new economic capabilities, will continue to attach special importance to high technology and development."
Analysts, however, took issue with Mr Putin's claim that Russia was already the leading producer of military aircraft. However, they acknowledged that Russia had developed some impressive "technologies". These include a new S-400 missile and aircraft interceptor system, similar but better than the US Patriot, and a lethal new supersonic cruise missile, the Meteorit-A. "They have some very good kit," one industry observer said.
Russia also used yesterday's airshow - held at Zhukovsky, a former Soviet airbase on the leafy outskirts of Moscow - to show off its latest generation of jet fighters. These include an upgraded Sukhoi jet, the SU-35, which has a new engines and a new radar system, and a revamped "vector thrust" MIG, the MIG 29-OVT. "They are good aircraft. The MIG can do a very lovely flip," the industry observer added.
Wonder if can see an F-22? And if so, can it run away fast enough?
One analyst said Mr Putin did not want confrontation with the west but was determined to restore Russia's strategic parity with the US. "Russia wants balance. It wants a strategic balance with the US," Ivan Safranchuk, a Moscow-based expert on defence, told the Guardian.
Russia once again wants to be a "Malaysia with Missiles" ...
"Russia wants to do this as cheaply as possible. But with the Bush administration withdrawing from arms control treaties, Russia is saying it is also ready to keep the balance at a high level of cost."
Asked about Russia's resumption of long-range bomber patrols, Mr Safranchuk said: "It's significant. For 15 years the political leadership was constraining the military on this. Now it isn't."
In the 1960s and 1970s the Soviet Union produced more civilian planes than any other country in the world apart from the United States. After the collapse of communism, Russia's impoverished government drastically cut spending on its aircraft industry. Factories producing military planes fared better than those building civilian aircraft, mainly because of buoyant sales to India and China. But Russia started to fall behind the west in the design of advanced fighters and other military aircraft.
Mr Putin is now determined to make Russia the world's third-largest manufacturer of passenger jets - after the United States, with Boeing, and the European Union, with Airbus. Russia's passenger airlines own about 2,500 ageing aircraft - of which just 100 are western-made models - although they fly one-third of all Russian passengers.
Last week Russian officials said they planned to build 4,500 civilian aircraft by 2025, while the Kremlin has pledged £125bn to boost the civilian industry. As part of the plan to boost significantly Russia's civilian aircraft industry, a new state-controlled organisation, the United Aircraft Corporation, has been created. It is led by Sergei Ivanov, Russia's hawkish first deputy prime minister, who sat next to Mr Putin during yesterday's airshow - and the leading candidate to be Putin's mouthpiece succeed him after next year's presidential elections.
#1
KOMMERSANT > AFFORDABLE SPACE PROJECTS FROM RUSSIA; whilst WORLDNEWS > RUSSIA TO MAINTAIN/ EXPAND AEROSPACE LEADERSHIP. Ditto similar dedicated efforts by CHINA as per lunar exploration-surveying.
#2
The article ignores the fact that most of the world dumped the Soviet/Russian aircraft as soon as the Soviet Union went away, at least in the commercial aircraft field. And the airlines that kept the Russian planes have the worst safety records in the world. Most Russian airlines have gone with either Boeing or Airbus aircraft, when they could afford them.
Other than China, who are the Russians going to sell the bombers to? As far as the jet fighters go, the MiG-29 is a good aircraft but not the one I would want to be flying against the latest F-15 or F-22. Sukhoi build really good CAS aircraft and that is a pretty open field - Sukhoi should make some good sales IF they can keep the service and support up to par, which has been a BIG problem for a lot of Russian equipment.
Besides which, Putin and Russia should be more concerned with the Russian Far East and the demographic implosion in the country - Siberia has to look awful tempting to the Chinese about now. And with a decreasing population and fewer divisions to protect the Russian Far East, the temptation to redraw boundaries may become overwhelming to the Chinese in the next 20 years.
#3
Russia wants balance. It wants a strategic balance with the US
What for? It's not like we need to or want to invade Russia. Nah, this is just sign of a Russkie inferiority complex: bring back the good old days when someone was scared of us!
#4
The Russians have demonstrated that even if you have all the tanks, guns, and wings your generals want, it won't make an effective fighting machine. However, I guess, if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Just remember, this time you won't have the Germans invading Poland from the West when you go in from the East.
#5
Any chance some of the older B-52s in the boneyard could be rebuilt?
Sadly, no. Several of them - about 10 - may be able to come back but the rest are basically spare parts bins for the rest of the fleet.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
08/22/2007 9:02 Comments ||
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#6
Don't look at the man behind the curtain.
Meaning, yes in public and the press Russia is harping against the US. It is something that their public understands well. But they want to be strong against the Chinese and muzzie aggression. They know we aren't going to invade. They just want to make sure that if they do nip off pieces of territory from the muzzies, that the US will think twice about interfering.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe called on Wednesday for a "broader Asia" partnership of democracies that would include India, the United States and Australia, but omit the region's superpower, China.
Abe's comments came in an address to a joint session of India's parliament at the start of a visit that aims to boost trade between Asia's largest and third largest economies, and counter China's growing strength.
"This partnership is an association in which we share fundamental values such as freedom, democracy and respect for basic human rights as well as strategic interests," Abe said.
"By Japan and India coming together in this way, this 'broader Asia' will evolve into an immense network spanning the entirety of the Pacific Ocean, incorporating the United States of America and Australia."
His speech did not mention China in relation to the "broader Asia." While Abe has improved ties with Beijing, he has also stressed the need to forge closer links with democracies in what analysts have called a tacit criticism of Beijing.
Tokyo's navy is due to take part for the first time in U.S.-India exercises in the Bay of Bengal next month.
India also used the visit of Abe and 200 businessmen to woo investors for infrastructure projects ranging from transport to nuclear power.
New Delhi is aiming to seal an economic partnership agreement -- expected to include a free-trade accord -- by the end of this year, Indian Trade Minister Kamal Nath said. Abe pledged to double bilateral trade to $20 billion by 2010.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is facing a political crisis because leftist allies are trying to block a civilian nuclear deal with the United States that the government says is crucial for India's economic development.
The communists say the government should not push ahead with the deal which will entail talks with the 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) of which Japan is a member.
"My sincere hope is that when the matter comes forth to the Nuclear Suppliers Group that we will have the support of the Japanese government," Singh told a joint news conference.
The Japanese premier said he understood the plans of India -- armed with atomic weapons -- to use nuclear energy to cope with global warming and help meet its fast-growing economy's demand for power.
"But, at the same time, as the only nation to suffer an atomic bombing, we attach special importance to nuclear non-proliferation and nuclear disarmament," Abe said.
"From that perspective we have to carefully look at its effect on the nuclear non-proliferation framework."
India's poor transport network and frequent power shortages are the Achilles' heel of its economy, hindering its ability to compete with China.
Tokyo is considering offering low-interest loans to help build a high-speed freight rail link between New Delhi and Mumbai as well as funds for a $90 billion industrial corridor between the two cities, Japanese officials said.
"These projects are critical to India's aspirations of wresting the manufacturing space that at present is dominated by China," said a report prepared by KPMG consultancy group and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.
Posted by: john frum ||
08/22/2007 22:08 ||
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A leading Jewish community representative said the incident made clear that the government had failed to do enough to stop extremists from creating "no-go areas" for foreigners in the east.
Yet one more thing that Muslims and Nazis have in common: Exclusive enclaves.
It's long past tea to make this entire world a "no-go area" for Islam and Nazism.
Rome, 22 August (AKI) - Police in Rome have halted the construction of a new controversial mosque because of irregularities with building laws. "Certain rooms were being enlarged and a partition wall knocked down without authorisation", police officer Carlo Buttarello was quoted as saying by Rome-daily, Il Messaggero.
But Rome's city council manager for security, Jean-Leonard Touadi, said the stoppage was temporary, and it "just needs for regulations to be respected", for work to resume. The site for the planned mosque whose opening was scheduled for 7 September, is adjacent to the Roman Catholic Church of San Vito in Rome's multi-ethnic Esquilino neighbourhood.
The mosque's location next to a Christian site and concern with Islamic extremism associated with some Muslim centres in other parts of Italy including Milan has incensed those opposed to its construction.
But Touadi dismissed the criticism. "Rome, the city which hosts the Vatican and the largest mosque in Europe (inaugurated in 1995 and shown in the photo), cannot and must not fear a new place of worship which instead must be guaranteed", he was quoted as saying by Il Messaggero. The "Vatican" is a sovereign state, Touadi. It is not "hosted" by "Rome" or by Italy. Speaking of "fear", why does Saudi Arabia forbid the construction of Christian churches within its borders?
Two of those opposed to the mosque are right-wing city councillors, Federico Mollicone and Stefano Tozzi, both of the opposition Alleanza Nazionale party - a member of former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right coalition.
"While we respect every sort of religious freedom, we find it inexplicable that [Rome mayor Walter] Veltroni and the city's Prefect can authorise and accept such a move in a district where cohabitation between Italian and foreigners is very difficult," they said in a joint statement issued Tuesday before the police's intervention at the site.
"In addition choosing that site in front of one of Christianity's most ancient churches is a serious religious provocation which would never be possible in Islamic nations," Mollicone and Tozzi said. Reciprocity
The Esquilino mosque which aims to serve Rome's Bangladeshi community was to open with prayers led by Sheikh Ubeidulhaqq, a prominent Muslim cleric who serves as imam of the Beit al-Mukarram mosque in Bangladesh's capital Dhaka.
Posted by: mrp ||
08/22/2007 09:07 ||
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#1
Something tells me this will move the dedication back to ... September 11.
#4
The Esquilino mosque which aims to serve Rome's Bangladeshi community was to open with prayers led by Sheikh Ubeidulhaqq, a prominent Muslim cleric who serves as imam of the Beit al-Mukarram mosque in Bangladesh's capital Dhaka.
Somehow, the idea of old Italy hosting a large community of bengladeshi strikes me as unsettling. Seems like we (europeans) have not only been thrown out of whatever foreign land we were in, up to today (see zimbobwe and Sa), and are being besieged in our own homeland.
TALLINN - An Estonian is to be charged with genocide. According to charges brought by the Estonian western circuit prosecutor's office, 88-year-old Arnold Meri is alleged to have taken part in the March 1949 mass deportation of Estonians to Siberia as well as supervising deportations to Hiiumaa Island.
A total of 251 civilians were detained in Hiiumaa on March 25, 1949. They were taken to the port of Paldiski by boat the next day and later loaded into railroad cars and transported to Siberia for life.
In 1949, Arnold Meri was a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Estonia, a member of the Central Committee of Komsomol [the youth wing of the Communist Party] and first secretary of the Estonian branch of Komsomol. Meri, born in 1919, served in the Red Army in World War II and was awarded the Gold Star of Hero of the Soviet Union in August 1941. He was awarded the Order of Lenin in 1948. Meri served as deputy minister of education of the Estonian SSR in 1961. Ironically, he is a cousin of Estonia's former president and independence leader Lennart Meri (1929-2006).
During the deportations of March 1949, 20,702 residents were taken to Siberia from Estonia. The deportees were allowed to return in the years after Stalin's death, by which time 3,000 had perished.
Reacting to the charges, Meri said it is unlikely that he will live long enough to stand trial, Eesti Paevaleht newspaper reported. Meri said that while he had never denied his participation in the deportations, his role was not what he was being accused of. "I was sent to Hiiumaa as a commissioner of the Central Committee and my task was to make sure that no excesses took place during the deportations and that the entire activity corresponded with the laws of that time. During the week that I spent there I was not able to check anything, as I was actually never shown the relevant documents," Meri claimed.
Meri described himself as being in very bad health. " I do not believe that I've got more than two years to live I'm virtually deaf and blind. I just measured my blood pressure, which was slightly over 200. That should do to describe my health condition," he said.
As recently as this May, Meri donned his Soviet-era uniform and joined commemorations of the Red Army's sacrifices. And to celebrate the Revolution's many glorious victories over saboteurs and class enemies.
Meris activities in 1949 have been under investigation for more than a decade. Given his own estimation of his parlous state of health, it seems that there is little likelihood of a conviction ever being recorded. In view of that fact, the decision to prosecute looks more like an attempt to record a symbolic charge against him for posterity than a genuine desire to see the legal process through to the bitter end. A more cynical observer might see this move as a well-deserved response to Putin's effort to rehabilitate the butcher, Josef Stalin.
Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has called on the army to stay out of politics following months of tensions between the Islamist-rooted government and the staunchly secular military.
Let us not mix the TSK (Turkish Armed Forces) up with politics. Let it stay in its place. Because all our institutions conduct their duties in line with what is set out in the constitution, Erdogan told Kanal D late on Monday.
If you draw them into politics, then why are we here? Erdogan asked in the interview. For us the armed forces are sacred. They have a special place. The army, which has ousted four governments in the past 50 years, has voiced its opposition to Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul becoming president because of his Islamist past. Gul won most votes in the first round of a presidential election in parliament on Monday but fell just short of securing the two-thirds majority needed to become the European Union-applicant countrys next head of state immediately. The secular elite, which includes army generals, blocked Guls first bid to become president in April, triggering a parliamentary election in July which was intended to defuse the crisis over the presidency.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/22/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
then quit mixing religion and politics, asshole
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/22/2007 7:40 Comments ||
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NEW DELHI - The Indian government formally approved the US$100 billion Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC), the country's largest infrastructure project, ahead of the three-day visit of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe this week.
Japan was made the official partner in the DMIC project during a visit by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Tokyo last December. The Japanese government and corporate sector are expected to provide up to $30 billion in loans and investments to support the initiative, in what would be one of Japan's biggest financial contributions to a single foreign project of this nature.
The first phase of the 1,500-kilometer project from next January to 2012 will include six investment mega-regions of 200 square kilometers each. The second phase will span 2012-16 and will aim to strengthen the industrial hub and integrate the areas further.
The Congress party-led federal government is rolling out the red carpet for Abe, recognizing the growing strategic and business importance of Japan to India. Abe, who arrived in the country on Tuesday, is scheduled to address a joint session of the two houses of Parliament, a courtesy not even extended to US President George W Bush when he visited India in March, because of opposition by the left-wing parties. Abe met with Manmohan on Tuesday evening.
Abe, like Manmohan, faces serious domestic political problems, but it is strongly believed that a momentum in India-Japan relations has already been established. New Delhi sees Japan as a natural ally, given mutual historical suspicions about China and close workings with the United States. Abe has said that Japan's relations with India may become more important than with the US or China.
Abe heads a strong delegation of senior executives from companies that include Toyota, Canon, Mitsubishi, Matsushita Electric, Hitachi, Fujitsu Ltd, Suzuki Motor Corp, Japan Airlines and the Japan Bank for International Cooperation. Most of these companies are looking to tap the growing Indian market further.
On the agenda is a Japan-India comprehensive economic-partnership agreement, including free trade in goods and services and investment-promotion measures that the two governments are looking to fast-track and implement in the near future. Manmohan and Abe are scheduled to take up the issue in detail. When Manmohan visited Tokyo in December, the two countries spoke about a free-trade agreement within two years.
"Our goal is to try [to] increase our trade volume considerably," Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon said this week. According to the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Japan's trade with India was $6.5 billion in 2006, less than 4% of its trade with China. India too generates far higher trade figures with China and the US. Between 1991 and 2006, Japanese companies invested $2.15 billion, or just 6% of the total foreign direct investment into India.
The $100 billion investment in the DMIC is a big chunk of the estimated $320 billion in the short term and more than $500 billion in the medium term that India needs in the infrastructure sector and that the government has committed to generate. New Delhi has been keen to support infrastructure projects, including facilities for manufacturing.
The Japanese have been shy of investing in India, given its weak infrastructure that includes power, ports, airports and roads. Japanese institutional investors have been actively involved with the Indian stock markets, but direct investment has not been substantial.
However, with the Indian economy clocking more than 9% growth for the past few years, and prospects of improved infrastructure, Japanese industry and investors are in serious rethink mode. The CII has predicted that two-way trade between India and Japan could double to $14 billion by 2012 from an estimated $7 billion in 2007.
And certainly, the DMIC is one big area of involvement. The DMIC will run through the northern states of Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Maharashtra, following a proposed Delhi-Mumbai dedicated rail freight corridor and an Arabian Sea port.
The corridor envisages a freight rail network, industrial parks, special economic zones, airports, seaports, power plants, food-processing parks and other infrastructure along the stretch between the two major commercial hubs of Delhi and Mumbai.
This year, an Indian delegation led by Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath visited Japan and had talks with potential investors such as Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Itochu and Suzuki. Most of the infrastructure work connected to DMIC will be executed in public-private partnership format.
A corporate entity, Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor Development Corp, is to be formed to implement planning of the project, development of its various segments, coordinating with all investors and the two governments, monitoring of implementation, and raising funds.
Business apart, India and Japan are also seeking each other as strategic partners in making a combined pitch for a permanent seat at the United Nations Security Council and military and security cooperation in East Asia to check the influence of China. Beijing has been anxious about the "Quadrilateral Initiative" (Quad) involving India, the US, Japan and Australia.
India is looking to host its biggest multilateral exercise with navies of the four countries as well as Singapore in the Bay of Bengal next month. Twenty-five warships will include the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Nimitz and the US nuclear submarine SSN Chicago. The US, Japan and India held similar exercises off the Japanese coast last year; this is the first time that the Australians will take part.
Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi has conveyed Beijing's concerns to Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee over China not being kept in the loop about a forum that will relate to issues in East Asia.
Though the four countries in the Quad have said disaster management remains the focus of the Japan-promoted exchange, China is anxious that such dialogue could broaden into a deeper military and security cooperation among the four "democracies".
New Delhi is also looking at Tokyo to back its civilian nuclear deal with the US in international forums such as the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Nuclear Suppliers Group, which need to endorse the pact. Japan's support could tilt the balance, since it is a major civilian atomic power and the only nation to have been attacked with nuclear weapons.
Tokyo is also considering the possibility of a nuclear-energy cooperation with India, with the business potential of setting up nuclear plants in India estimated at $100 billion. Accompanying Abe are top executives from Mitsubishi, Hitachi and Toshiba, deeply involved in the global nuclear-power business.
Posted by: john frum ||
08/22/2007 18:05 ||
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#1
The ghost of Chandra Bose smiles on.
Posted by: Gary and the Samoyeds ||
08/22/2007 22:09 Comments ||
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Two Christian girls, little more than children, were kidnapped from their families recently, forcibly converted to Islam and then married off to strangers. Both of the kidnaps took place in Faisalabad, the third largest city in Pakistan, and both were completely ignored by the police. The phenomenon is not a new one however, underlined numerous human rights activist, but it is dangerously on the increase.
On August 5 Muhammad Adnan, a Muslim from Zulfiqar colony Faisalabad and his sister kidnapped Zunaira, an eleven years old Christian girl from her home in Warispura. After the kidnap, they forced her to convert to Islam and marry her kidnaper Muhammad.
The small girls mother, Abida, told AsiaNews: When I was roaming in streets in search of my daughter two Muslim men of the area told me that they saw Adnan and his sister taking my daughter. Abida decided to go to the kidnappers house, from which however she is thrown out. Returning home, she was contacted by two men who revealed the kidnappers identity and offer to act as negotiators for her daughters release in exchange for money.
Despite being desperately poor, Abida gives them 12 thousand Rupees (200 Euro): I didnt want to inform the police, because my daughter was engaged and I didnt want my relatives to know. Unfortunately I found out too late that those men who said they would help me only want money: I have sold all I have, but it wasnt enough and now I am alone. Abida then turned to the police, but they refused help. The fact that the marriage is invalid given the age of the bride, is not a matter for the police said the officers.
In the second case Shumaila Tabussum, (16), was kidnapped from her home on August 16 by a Muslim man Mazher and some other unknown people. They told Shumaila that her father had been seriously injured in an accident and offered to accompany her to the hospital where he had been taken. The girl, without waiting for her mother, got into Mazhers car: on the way she met two uncles at shouted the news of her fathers accident to them. These made their way to the hospital but found no-one.
Salamat Masih, 37, Shumailas father, immediately reported the abduction to the police. He told AsiaNews that he is very worried because cases such as these are on the increase: Christian girls abducted, forcibly converted and subjected to becoming the wives of complete strangers.
Khalil Tahir, chairman of a free legal aid organization Adal Trust and a well known Christian lawyer confirms this: the growing number of attacks against Christians is worrying. We try to aid the victims families and at the same time help those who are subjected to this violence legally and practically, but the government must intervene with force if this is to be stopped.
#4
The September National Geographic features an article titled "Islam's Fault Line - Pakistan" in which the story is told of a girl who is raped by a gang of thugs as a warning to her family to vacate a plot of land that the thugs want and how the thugs, cops and courts are all in cahoots.
Rantburgers will likely take issue with the article's claim that the majority of Pakistan's muslims are moderates who do not want violence. It tells of Pakistan's founder Mohammed Ali Jinna who envisioned a country in which Islam, merged with democratic ideals, would embrace the future. But the fault line is now between the moderates and a handful of fundamentalists who are spreading talibanization.
The impression is that this is an ugly, impoverished and dangerous little cat box.
#5
But you don't understand Islamomolest culture?... This is a holy act to save those two fortunte girls from being stoned as apostates. This is not kidnapping and rape it is a sacred rite...
How dare we interfere. It is not politically correct...
Senator Prof Khursheed Ahmad of the MMA has said that the NWFP Assembly would be dissolved before Musharrafs re-election. He told Geo News he hoped the Balochistan assembly would follow suit. If MMA members resigned from NA and provincial assemblies, he said, credibility of the presidential election would become questionable without a complete Electoral College.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/22/2007 00:00 ||
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#3
Nichole Kidman had better seriously consider firing her agent, because even though she works a lot, the only movies of hers that get any "buzz" stink on ice. She is close to getting a "Jonah" reputation.
The Invasion.
Bewitched.
The Stepford Wives.
The Hours.
Moulin Rouge.
Eyes Wide Shut.
#8
"we need all the things the Kingdom of Heaven used to promise us but failed to deliver."
-someone doesn't understand their scripture or at least distorts it. My $.02 -- The kingdom of heaven or heaven on earth was a parable to describe if all men treated each other as brothers, i.e. love thy neighbor as thy self (one of Jesus's two big commandments)...the kingdome of heaven would be on earth. I.E. - the onus was on us to bring about that change through riteous action thus creating a very caring society, it was not up to God just to intervene because he thought it was time. Also, it didn't mean that the clouds would fall to earth and everyone would piss lemonade, shit skittles & eat all the orang pushups they wanted......in contrast, you'd have the best caring society possible by following Jesus' ethical construct, not some hocus pocus about angels running around on earth. No one ever said there still wouldn't be bad things on earth going on......hence free will in a dynamic environment. God I hate some atheists (hahaha, I love that line).
#10
I liked Eyes Wide Shut, but then I'm a Stanley Kubrick fan. Nicole is attractive in a skinny pale girl sort of way, but the movie would have been fine with just about anyone else in her role.
It may be that her agent is doing the best he can with what he has to work with.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Venezuela's National Assembly, dominated by allies of President Hugo Chavez, gave unanimous initial approval Tuesday to constitutional reforms that would allow him to run for re-election and 
Vladimir Putin announced ambitious plans to revive Russia's military power and restore its role as the world's leading producer of military aircraft yesterday. Speaking at the opening of the largest airshow in Russia's post-Soviet history, the president said he was determined to make aircraft manufacture a national priority after decades of lagging behind the west.
TALLINN - An Estonian is to be charged with genocide. According to charges brought by the Estonian western circuit prosecutor's office, 88-year-old Arnold Meri is alleged to have taken part in the March 1949 mass deportation of Estonians to Siberia as well as supervising deportations to Hiiumaa Island.
Two Christian girls, little more than children, were kidnapped from their families recently, forcibly converted to Islam and then married off to strangers. Both of the kidnaps took place in Faisalabad, the third largest city in Pakistan, and both were completely ignored by the police. The phenomenon is not a new one however, underlined numerous human rights activist, but it is dangerously on the increase.
