"Coalition: Vast Majority of Iraqis Still Alive"

Another spoof article from Satirical American website The Onion:

Coalition: Vast Majority of Iraqis Still Alive

White House Had Prior Knowledge of Cheney Threat.

Cheney Threat

2006 Index of Economic Freedom

If this topic is your bag, please check it out. It's fascinating and surprising. (The clue is probably in the question, but who would you expect to rank higher, the UK or the US?) It's well worth reading the analysis - the list just gives you a snap shot of where we are now - the accompanying text gives some indication of where we are headed. Results go back to 1995 so there is a basis for comparison with previous administrations. It also provides raw data if you want to challenge their conclusions.

The index is published by a conservative think tank (the heritage foundation - you can read all about their history on the website) so it is not politically 'neutral'. However, that does not mean that their conclusions are invalid. Broadly they belive in a link between ecomic freedom and prosperity - however, it's not as simple as most free = most prosperous. There are other factors such as natural resources. e.g. Norway's oil reserves. Anyway, it's all there for you, if you want to explore it in more detail.

2006 Index of Economic Freedom

Beyond our ken...

So, the mayor has been suspended. Following the Danish cartoons and the Irving trial, this feels like another complicated free speech issue. Of course the situation is not exactly the same, but in the popular imagination it is very much about the personal consequences of saying something that is deemed unacceptable by a particular section of the community.

Personally, I do not think the mayor should have been suspended. We already have a mechanism for removing elected officials from office - it's called an election! I understand that there should be safeguards against corruption, but I am not convinced that making offensive remarks after (allegedly) a few glasses too many requires this particular measure. (A quick side note though - Ken's has said that his 'nazi' comment was to do with the Associated Press' record of anti-semitism and Moseley supporting in the 30s. He clearly didn't feel quite so strongly when he was the Standard's restaurant critic.
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4749688.stm)

Lastly though, a quick question - what limits on speech should there be for people in or seeking public office. I'm wondering what sanctions we would feel would be appropriate if the Mayor (or any other elected official) started making inflammatory / racist remarks about any given group. Do we want a law that would prevent (say) a racist mayor from mobilising (for example) anti-immigrant sentiment? Genuine question. Interested in the answers.

English school plans lessons in English shock!

I think we're in 'you couldn't make it up' territory.

Critics hail English-only lessons

Education campaigners have welcomed a school's decision to scrap a disputed bilingual teaching scheme.

Turkish pupils at the north London secondary school were being taught GCSE science in their native tongue.

But the new head of White Hart Lane school in Tottenham said pupils must focus on learning English.

Nick Seaton, of the Campaign for Real Education, said: "I fully support this move back to all English lessons and would think it is very overdue."

political compass

Ever wondered just how left or right wing you are? Complete this test and find out political compass

My score - economic left/right:4.00 Social libertarian/authoritarian: -3.33

Plagued by teenagers? You'll like the sound of this

Oh joy! Do you think they'll be available for home use?

Plagued by teenagers? You'll like the sound of this
Telegraph
16/02/2006

As a form of revenge against disruptive youth, it is almost too sweet - a device that annoys teenagers so intensely they have to disperse and loiter somewhere else. Police have given their backing to a gadget that sends out an ultra high-pitched noise that can be heard only by those under 20 and is so distressing it forces them to clutch their ears in discomfort. Eventually they can stand it no longer and have to move on.

But because the body's natural ability to detect some frequency wave bands diminishes almost entirely after 20, adults are completely immune to the sounds.

And if a siren doesn't work, try this

Church of England apologises for slavery

Starting this thread:

Church of England votes to apologize for its role in the global slave trade
Canadian Press
February 08, 2006

....only so I can include this interesting thought:

Church of England Synod confused about blame for slavery
Telegraph Letters
10 February 2006

Sir - There is a serious moral and logical problem with the apology the Church of England Synod has offered to those descended from the slaves owned by bishops and the Church in the 18th century. If the religion of Christianity and Anglican institutions owe a moral apology for actions done centuries before by other individuals, then we have a theory of doctrinal and institutional guilt.

But when suicide bombings occur, we are assured by all authorities that these things are done by a "tiny minority" of Muslim extremists and have nothing to do with Islam. If the Synod is right, then all Muslims ought to share the blame for suicide bombings. Conversely, if the Muslim community has nothing to do with suicide bombing (since nearly all of them reject such actions) then the Anglican Church is merely confused in its understanding of moral issues.

Labour's Authoritarianism

In the last election Wembley posted that he felt Labour was most vunerable on their record of social authoritarianism. I read on another website that the Government wants to bring in a Bill to give them the right to enact legislation without the need for parliamentary debate and wondered if Wembley felt this qualified as authoritarianism or that some of the reaction to the bill (see Rozenberg "Henry VIII powers" below) is an over-reaction and that this is something more innocent?


Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill


Here's a report on the bill by the telegraph's legal correspondent Joshua Rozenberg.

Japan likes killing whales but not eating them

Japan likes killing whales but not eating them
Telegraph
10/02/2006

The enthusiasm of Japanese for whaling has surpassed their appetite for actually eating the mammals, leaving retailers with a glut of unsold whale meat.

...

Whale hunting was largely confined to a few coastal areas of Japan for most of its history. Only after the Second World War, when a hungry populace desperately needed protein, did it spread nationwide. Then it was seen as a tough and rather unpleasant source of nutrition, rather than a delicacy.

Japan's Lies to Justify Whaling

Political Nasdaq - Election 2008?

I'm starting a thread that hopefully will run up to the next election. The idea is to track the rise and fall in the fortunes of the three main parties all the way up to election night.

Here's a report on the surprise byelection victory from the LibDems. Perhaps everybody has been a bit rash in writing them off!

LidDem Byelection win stuns Labour

Also, coincidently, here's a link to a news report that Labour is considering scrapping next years local election. Hmmm.

Council polls could be scrapped

'Back-door nationalisation'

Interesting article about how the state pension fund envisaged in the Turner Report could lead to nationalisation through the 'back-door'. Maybe Labour could bring back Clause Four after all!

State pension fund 'could allow back-door nationalisation'

By the way Brown's criticisms and concerns over the workability of the proposals outlined in Turner's Report position him to the 'right' of the Tories (who enthusiastically expressed their support for the report). Personally, I believe
Brown's judgement is as right on this one as it was in refusing to adopt the Euro.

'Cut a deal with the mullahs' - Polly Toynbee

Here's an article from Polly Toynbee on Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

No more fantasy diplomacy: Cut a deal with the mullahs

Israel & South Africa

Two countries of interest to a number of impdecers.

I haven't read this whole article yet, so can't vouch for its content, but have put it up for your collective perusal.


Worlds apart

Israelis have always been horrified at the idea of parallels between their country, a democracy risen from the ashes of genocide, and the racist system that ruled the old South Africa. Yet even within Israel itself, accusations persist that the web of controls affecting every aspect of Palestinian life bears a disturbing resemblance to apartheid. After four years reporting from Jerusalem and more than a decade from Johannesburg before that, the Guardian's award-winning Middle East correspondent Chris McGreal is exceptionally well placed to assess this explosive comparison. Here we publish the first part of his two-day special report

Monday February 6, 2006
The Guardian

Danes face fury over cartoons of Prophet

I'm sure you've all been following this story:

Danes face fury over cartoons of Prophet
Telegraph
31/01/2006

I've blogged my opinion of Jack Straw before, it hasn't changed with this:

Straw condemns cartoon row press
BBC News
3 February 2006

For me, I rank this with the Theo van Gogh murder as a key indicator of how (indeed, whether) the West will stand up for its own sacred principles in the face of the Islamist (note: IslamIST) threat. I wanted to post a lot more links, but work has intervened, so I thought it better just to get a thread going with a short posting.

Here are the cartoons themselves (thanks Dan):

Danish Imams Propose to End Cartoon Dispute

And just some food for thought:

Anti-Semitic Cartoons in the Arab Media

Major Anti-Semitic Motifs in Arab Cartoons

Inside the terrorist mind...

The following appeared in The New Republic online. I thought it was worth sharing as a reminder that not every voice from the Middle East is calling for jihad amd the destruction of the US. This piece by Egyptian playwright Ali Salem is a critical imagining of the terrorist mindset. (May require you to register in order to read it.)

IMAGINING THE INNER WORKINGS OF A TERRORIST'S MIND.
The War of the Hotels
by Ali Salem

In a culture of intellectual quiescence, the Egyptian playwright Ali Salem stands out for his courage, his willingness to break with the crowd. Born in 1936, in the time of the monarchy, he made his own way through life, and educated himself in the classics. Some years ago he provoked a storm by openly journeying to Israel and writing about his experience in that country. This led to virtual ostracism by his peers. But he stood his ground, and in the crucial years since September 11 he has written scathingly and satirically of the pathologies of the Arab world--the anti-Americanism, the animus toward modernism, the refusal of the Arab intellectual elites to face the burden of Arab history. Salem is fierce in his denunciation of radical Islamism, and of the evasions and denials that sustain it in mainstream Arab life. What follows is a piece occasioned by the terrorist attacks on the hotels in Amman that took place last November 9. It appeared in Al Hayat, the London-based pan-Arab daily, from which I have translated it.

--Fouad Ajami

TNR also offered a link to the trailer for 'Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World' - well worth a look, as is the accompanying interview with Albert Brooks. The film seems to be a variation on Victor Borge's old adage 'laughter is the shortest distance between two people.'

The shadow of the Shoah...

Excellent:

We want to step out of the Shoah shadow, but we run into obstacles
As the Holocaust goes from memory to history, Jews have tried to move forward. But the deniers haul us back again

Jonathan Freedland
Wednesday January 25, 2006
The Guardian

[I was reminded also of Isaac Deutscher 'The Non-Jewish Jew' - hat tip, Alexis
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0850362741/026-7447200-1373263

From Wikipedia:

[Deutscher's] definition of his Jewishness was: "Religion? I am an atheist. Jewish nationalism? I am an internationalist. In neither sense am I therefore a Jew. I am, however, a Jew by force of my unconditional solidarity with the persecuted and exterminated. I am a Jew because I feel the pulse of Jewish history; because I should like to do all I can to assure the real, not spurious, security and self-respect of the Jews."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Deutscher]

The future is not Orange...

Remeber the SDP? Polly Toynbee does, and she argues that New Labour is now to the right of the old Gang of Four. She suggests that the answer for the Lib Dems is to stop facing both ways and mount an attack from the left. (She's no fan of the Orange Book stuff.)

Not sure I agree with her, but here it is:

New Labour is now to the right of the SDP we formed in 1981

The Liberal Democrats could be a force for good if they gave up fantasies of power and occupied the space to Labour's left

Polly Toynbee
Friday January 20, 2006

Genocidal Sudan awarded Chair of African Union

Outrage over the dictator poised to lead Africa
Telegraph
16/01/2006

Sudan's military dictator is likely to become chairman of the African Union and the continent's face to the world despite waging war in Darfur, it emerged yesterday. President Omar al-Bashir, who seized power in a coup and harboured Osama bin Laden for five years in the 1990s, will host a meeting of African leaders in Sudan next Monday. They are due in Khartoum for a summit of the African Union, an alliance of all 53 countries in the continent. They are likely to outrage human rights groups by electing Mr Bashir as their chairman and Africa's most prominent statesman for the next 12 months.

...

Mr Bashir is expected to be elected even though his Arab-dominated regime is conducting a brutal campaign against rebels in Sudan's western region of Darfur, where almost two million people have been forced into squalid refugee camps. ... Some 300,000 people, about five per cent of the population, are believed to have died in Darfur since the onset of war three years ago.

Will Jesus take the stand?

An interesting test of faith... [I've quoted a large chunk but it's really worth reading the whole thing.]


Prove Christ exists, judge orders priest
From Richard Owen in Rome

AN ITALIAN judge has ordered a priest to appear in court this month to prove that Jesus Christ existed.

The case against Father Enrico Righi has been brought in the town of Viterbo, north of Rome, by Luigi Cascioli, a retired agronomist who once studied for the priesthood but later became a militant atheist.

Signor Cascioli, author of a book called The Fable of Christ, began legal proceedings against Father Righi three years ago after the priest denounced Signor Cascioli in the parish newsletter for questioning Christ’s historical existence.

Yesterday Gaetano Mautone, a judge in Viterbo, set a preliminary hearing for the end of this month and ordered Father Righi to appear. The judge had earlier refused to take up the case, but was overruled last month by the Court of Appeal, which agreed that Signor Cascioli had a reasonable case for his accusation that Father Righi was “abusing popular credulity”.

Signor Cascioli’s contention — echoed in numerous atheist books and internet sites — is that there was no reliable evidence that Jesus lived and died in 1st-century Palestine apart from the Gospel accounts, which Christians took on faith. There is therefore no basis for Christianity, he claims.

Btw this article sits nicely alongside other faith related posts which you can find here.