Re: Israel pushing for Kurdish state?
that may be true, but would you then agree with BBC's assessment that it started as an essentially indigenous and popular uprising? if so, that is all the more reason to ask the people. counterinsurgency warfare might be a dirty business (and i doubt you condone it), but it is all the more dirty when the actions are partially aimed at silencing the people or denying them a voice. --ravi --- I don't know enough about the issue to answer whether it was popular or not. But you do not need to have a majority of the population on your side in order to have an indigenous uprising. The Chechen population, for instance, voted overwhelmingly to remain part of the Russian Federation (then, the Soviet Union) in 1991. That did not prevent extremists in the Chechen population from doing their thing, and the moderates were either forced out or fled. I don't know if the Kashmiri case is parallel or not. __ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail
Re: India's HDI Improves, Ranking Doesn't
--- ravi [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: nothing unites like hate. and for that there is pakistan and/or muslims. the common language i share with my indian spouse is english. but not to worry with respect to commonality... advice from some relatives/acquaintances on both sides struck a common chord: marry someone soon, but just don't marry a muslim! even one of the those american boys/girls is ok... /facetious -- There must be more of a unifying Indian identity than just shared hatred of Muslims and Pakistan. Wasn't there a kind of pan-Indian nationalism that manifested itself during the struggle for independence? How do non-Kashmiri Indian Muslims view the Kashmir issue? Is it seen in religious terms? Russian Muslims (20% of the population) do not see Chechnya in religious terms (except insofar as they view Wahabbis as being false Muslims). __ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail
Diminishing Expectations
Michael Hoover wrote: but conversations here indicate that we sure do live in the age of diminishing expectations, which in itself gives people fewer reasons to spend time on political activism. That's interesting (as well as depressing). A speculation: Assuming the truth of this, the driving force behind that trend is a longer work day (not only at work but getting to and from work). It leaves people short of breath. There is one sentence in _Capital_ that has always haunted me: As soon as the working-class, stunned at first by the noise and turmoil of the new system of production, recovered, in some measure, its sense. . . . Stunned at first. . . .I think the the reduction in free time (by which I mean time in which one is neither burdened with the tasks of reproducing oneself nor with simple fatigue and tension) over the last 30 some years is perhaps the strongest argument against Chomsky's claim that the u.s. is incomparably more civilized today than 40 years ago. Civlization (in any of its positive sense) can only mean more spare time for sheer loafing. Carrol
Ukraine drops bid to join E.U., NATO
The Hindu Wednesday, Jul 28, 2004 Ukraine drops bid to join E.U., NATO By Vladimir Radyuhin MOSCOW, JULY 27. Ukraine has formally abandoned its goal of joining NATO in a sign of its growing tilt towards Russia. The Ukrainian President, Leonid Kuchma, signed a decree ordering changes in the country's defence doctrine to remove reference to membership in the European Union and NATO as the ultimate goal of Ukraine's foreign policy. Henceforth, Ukraine will only strive to deepen relations with the two organisations. Victory for Putin The decree, made public a day before the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, flew to Ukraine for an informal bilateral summit with Mr. Kuchma, is seen as a victory for Moscow in its tug-of-war with the West for influence in Ukraine. New doctrine The Ukrainian leader had just signed the new defence doctrine in June that stated the aim of joining NATO and the E.U. However, Mr. Kuchma badly needs Russia's crucial support for his bid to have his chosen heir, the Prime Minister, Viktor Yanukovich, win a presidential election in October against the more popular pro-Western Opposition candidate, Viktor Yushchenko. Mr. Putin has taken full advantage of his position as a king-maker to encourage a U-turn in Ukraine's foreign policy towards closer integration with Russia. Last September, Ukraine after repeated refusals, finally signed up to a Single Economic Zone pact with Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus. The accord provides for a customs union, free movement of goods, capital and labour, and a common tax, monetary and foreign trade policy. After his meeting with the Ukrainian leader on Monday, Mr. Putin issued a stern warning to the West not to get in the way of Russia and Ukraine forging closer ties. Their (Western nations') agents, both inside our countries and outside, are trying everything possible to compromise the integration between Russia and Ukraine, Mr. Putin said, speaking to businessmen from both countries. Copyright © 2004, The Hindu. Yahoo! India Matrimony: Find your life partner online Go to: http://yahoo.shaadi.com/india-matrimony
Re: Ukraine drops bid to join E.U., NATO
Yes. Ukraine is part of the Union of Four (Russia, Uraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus). The post-Soviet space is consolidating itself politically and economically. Armenia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgystan and Tajikistan are also tilting toward Moscow. Even Georgia, in its own strange way. --- Ulhas Joglekar [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The Hindu Wednesday, Jul 28, 2004 Ukraine drops bid to join E.U., NATO By Vladimir Radyuhin MOSCOW, JULY 27. Ukraine has formally abandoned its goal of joining NATO in a sign of its growing tilt towards Russia. __ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail
Re: Ukraine drops bid to join E.U., NATO
I wrote: --- Chris Doss [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yes. Ukraine is part of the Union of Four (Russia, Uraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus). The post-Soviet space is consolidating itself politically and economically. Armenia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgystan and Tajikistan are also tilting toward Moscow. Even Georgia, in its own strange way. This is a few years old, but I think this article from a Kyrgyz newspaper sheds some light on this process. Kyrgyz paper outlines Russia's interests in Uzbekistan, Central Asia Vladimir Putin's visit to Uzbekistan, his first foreign visit as president of Russia, is recognition by Russia that Uzbekistan is its strategic partner in Central Asia, `Slovo Kyrgyzstana' newspaper wrote on 19th May. The newspaper said that Uzbekistan was the only Central Asian state which is really able to counter the possible advancement of the Taleban army to north. It also said that Uzbekistan could fit most organically into the military and political axis between Belgrade, Minsk, Moscow, Delhi and Beijing which had arisen following NATO's actions in the Balkans. The following is the text of the newspaper article: [newspaper headline] A battle for Asia. Some thoughts about Russian President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin's visit to Uzbekistan Today [19th May], Putin is in Tashkent. This is his first visit abroad as the head of the Russian state. It is symbolic that just a few days after the inauguration and his advent to the post officially, the second Russian president headed for the republics of Central Asia (more likely, Putin will visit Dushanbe after Tashkent). Why namely Tashkent rather than Astana and Bishkek? It is needless to copy the Russian Foreign Ministry's protocols. The visit has been prepared in good time and carefully. Even as prime minister, Putin met the Uzbek leader, Islam Karimov, in Tashkent, and the sides outlined strategic ways of rapprochement back then, perhaps, for the first time after so many years of separation. The Russian president's visit to the Uzbek capital today is the logical conclusion to the first and, a priori, recognition of Uzbekistan by Russia as its strategic partner in Central Asia. It is namely Uzbekistan and not Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan or Tajikistan. Everything is clear with the latter. Tajikistan cannot survive without Russia. Tajikistan, which still suffers from the consequences of the civil war , is being torn by conflicts with the opposition and which feels a constant threat from its southern neighbour - warring Afghanistan, looks at the mouth of Moscow as at its beloved mother. Russia is increasing its economic and, what is the main thing, its military presence in Tajikistan and it is well aware that otherwise the external threat from Afghanistan will be more noticeable. Yet the unpredictable Taleban, should they suddently take it into their head, will go across the Pamirs like a knife through butter, and it is just the presence of Russian servicemen in Tajikistan that in the past few years has been the most powerful deterrent to the commanders and spiritual leaders of the Taleban movement. More or less everything is clear for Putin with Kyrgyzstan as well. Yes, you, too, are our strategic partner, Moscow has agreed in response to Bishkek's recognition of Russia as its strategic partner, but, all this is, very likely, as far as global politics is concerned. Russia is courteous and considerate to Kyrgyzstan and is helping with everything in its power, but there is a feeling that everything has been put off until a later time. The membership of the Customs Union of four [Belarus, Russia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan], in spite of the abundance of multilateral and bilateral documents which were signed within the framework of this union, has not opened for Kyrgyzstan the long-awaited safety valve. A window onto Europe did not pan out. Kyrgyzstan, which, with its destroyed economy, is hovering on the edge of an economic precipice, is of no interest at all for Russia in this respect. Moreover, official Bishkek must tackle the moot problem of its so-called Russian-speaking people on its own and as soon as possible. They may be given help to survive and remain in the republic or be squeezed out completely (this also is possible), but in this case, Russia will turn its back on Kyrgyzstan completely and take back the word strategic Russia has special relations with Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan, which has common borders with Russia, a comparatively stable economy and a powerful Slavonic stratum in its north, has really become a strategic partner for Russia. Relations between the two countries are close and they must and will develop coherently and dynamically, at least, for two to three decades to come. There remains Uzbekistan with its president who has been mysterious until recently. It appears that it is Islam Karimov whom, thanks to Putin's present visit [to Uzbekistan], Russia sees in the role of regional leader. What will Russia get from this?
Re: Diminishing Expectations
Carrol Cox wrote: the strongest argument against Chomsky's claim that the u.s. is incomparably more civilized today than 40 years ago. It just *can't* be true, can it? Everything is just awful, and getting worse by the day. Never acknowledge any progress, which can only come with The Revolution, which we can do little to promote now, but which can only come with some mysterious dispensation. And, by god, don't cite the full context of Chomsky's remark. Doug The closing of my interview with Noam Chomsky, broadcast February 10, 2002. I think he's wrong about intellectuals - take a look at the books and presses that thrive now that didn't in the early 1960s. But I don't want to quibble... [starts at 1:14:22] NC: There's plenty of dissent and opposition and concern. Plenty of grounds for optimism for people who are trying to organize and work. It's certainly far easier now than 40 years ago when Kennedy was launched his attack on South Vietnam. Then you couldn't do a thing. In the 1980s, the situation was better; you could organize for the wars against Nicaragua, the wars against El Salvador and Guatemala. But it wasn't that easy. Now there's considerably more opportunity, though the war drums are beating and people are scared. DH: You've said the country is more civilized than it was 40 years ago. What do you mean by that? NC: Incomparably more civilized. Things we take for granted now didn't exist 40 years ago. So for example, take say aggression. When Kennedy announced publicly that the U.S. was bombing South Vietnam in 1962, began using chemical weapons to destroy food crops, began programs to drive millions people into what were essentially concentration camps, there was no protest. We didn't talk about it. In the 1960s, there was barely a feminist movement. No environmental movement. In the 1960s, there wasn't yet, after hundreds of years, even the beginning of recognition of the original sin, what happened to the millions of people used to live here. That's all changed. It changed not so much in the 60s, but in the 70s, 80s, and since. That's when the major popular movements developed. They haven't carried out institutional change, but they've changed the culture and the moral level of the society very significantly. Those are real achievements. They make things very different than they were in the past. Among the intellectuals, I don't think anything's changed, but it rarely does. But among the general population, it's correct to say that the level of civilization is much higher things that would have seemed perfectly appropriate then are outlandish now. DH: That's a good note to end on. Thank you, Noam Chomsky. --- Download it yourself and listen: higher-fidelity (48kbps): http://shout.lbo-talk.org/lbo/RadioArchive/2002/02_10_17.mp3 low-fi (16kbps): http://shout.lbo-talk.org/lbo/RadioArchive/2002/02_10_17_16.mp3 Stream (but you'll have to wait an hour and a quarter): hi: http://shout.lbo-talk.org:8000/content/lbo/RadioArchive/2002/02_10_17.pls low: http://shout.lbo-talk.org:8000/content/lbo/RadioArchive/2002/02_10_17_16.pls
Re: Cuba: Dealing with the dollar
Diane Monaco wrote: How far Cuba can be regarded as an independent and socialist nation-state, if there is extensive dollarisation of Cuban economy? I'm not sure what independent really means, True, the Left no longer seems know what independence really means ! :) Cuba is communist/socialist in the mechanisms it uses to attempt to ensure that the means of producing goods and services are owned by the community as a whole, and that all citizens enjoy social/economic equality. Cuba invites and accepts foreign investment, encourages tourism and receives remittances from Cubans settled abroad. Cuba also trades with other countries. (I don't know what is Cuba's external indebtedness.) These things would erode Cuba's autonomy. Is Cuba's relationship with the World Economy any different from that of other developing countries? Dollarization is a mechanism that Cuba is forced to use to circumvent the US embargo against Cuba on all trade Cuba was forced to do it, but wouldn't that imply loss of control over monetary policy? including basic necessities to facilitate the acquisition the goods and services in sufficient amounts for all its citizens. It's my impression that Cuba wasn't able to reduce it's dependence on sugar between 1960-1990. I wonder why. Ulhas Yahoo! India Matrimony: Find your life partner online Go to: http://yahoo.shaadi.com/india-matrimony
Re: Cuba: Dealing with the dollar
Ulhas Joglekar wrote: Cuba invites and accepts foreign investment, encourages tourism and receives remittances from Cubans settled abroad. Cuba also trades with other countries. (I don't know what is Cuba's external indebtedness.) These things would erode Cuba's autonomy. Is Cuba's relationship with the World Economy any different from that of other developing countries? To start with, Cuba has no ties to the IMF. Furthermore, the Heritage Foundation, the key think tank of the ultraright, understands clearly why Cuba should not be confused with China, for example--let alone completely dependent entities such as Jamaica or The Dominican Republic. --- Those who favor lifting the embargo often point to the examples of Vietnam and China to justify their position, claiming that eliminating the embargo will encourage the growth of a free-market economy which will undermine the communist regime. Such comparisons are not valid. Capitalism is destroying communism in China, but the driving force is not international trade. It is a strong domestic market economy tolerated by the communist government. China's market economy is dominated by many millions of small entrepreneurs who are devouring the communist command economy. Moreover, China's market economy has been growing in depth and diversity since the mid-1980s. Free trade is promoting faster market growth and expanding the personal freedom of millions of Chinese, encouraged by entrepreneurs and investors from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and elsewhere who are providing the capital, entrepreneurial skills, and international trade contacts which are compelling China to transform its economy. In the process, a vast and prosperous middle class is being created. In Cuba, however, the Castro regime is not willing to liberalize the economy and create a free market. Cuban exile communities in the United States, Latin America, and Europe are not willing to work with Castro, and market initiatives by the Castro regime to encourage them to do so are very recent, dating from 1993 for the most part. The basic orientation of the hard-liners surrounding Castro is to contain and restrict all initiatives that unleash individual entrepreneurship and creativity. For example, the government has arrested people for earning too much money in the dollarized informal economy, the variety of legally permitted family businesses has been restricted, and tax rates on the income of self-employed Cubans have been increased. Moreover, Cuba's constitution and legislation specifically prohibit all private initiative, notwithstanding recent reforms allowing self-employment by Cubans in approximately 140 categories of economic activity from which all professionals (the core of any middle class) are expressly barred. For over three decades, the regime has operated on the basis of divide and rule. Castro's bitter enmity toward the Cuban exile community precludes the possibility of replicating in the Caribbean what China's exile community has accomplished in China. None of the alleged market reforms undertaken to date in Cuba are true free-market initiatives. Free enterprise remains highly restricted. Foreign investors doing business in Cuba today deal mainly with Castro's regime. Cuban partners in joint ventures and mixed companies are approved by Castro as safe. Moreover, unlike China, Cuba has barely started to open up its economy, and what little has been done to date has been permitted with great official reluctance and with the objective of assuring the communist government's political survival. China's economic transformation has been under way since 1978, when important agricultural reforms were introduced, including the right of peasant farmers to grow the crops they wished and retain some of their profit. Moreover, the government of China has encouraged the marketization of the country's coastal provinces, and since 1992 the Chinese constitution has incorporated the concept of the socialist market economy. Although China remains a communist nation where political freedoms are sharply restricted, the ruling regime has permitted vigorous development of the private sector, thus laying the seeds for its eventual demise and potential replacement by a politically pluralist, more open society. (From Backgrounder #1010 titled WHY THE CUBAN TRADE EMBARGO SHOULD BE MAINTAINED, By John P. Sweeney, November 10, 1994. This is not the trade union bureaucrat, btw.) -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
The Blind Swordsman Zatoichi
In Hollywood, the blind are represented in film either as pitiful victims, such as in Wait Until Dark, or as comic figures like Mr. Muckle, who tears apart W. C. Fields's shop in It's a Gift. Leave it to the Japanese to come up with somebody like Zatoichi, the blind master swordsman who was played by the beloved Shintaro Katsu in 26 films between 1962 and 1989, as well as 100 television episodes based on the character. The name Zatoichi is a conflation of Zato-No-Ichi, which translates literally into Ichi the Masseur. In feudal Japan, the blind were often enlisted as masseurs, but Zatoichi's fighting skills allowed him to transcend the rigid class restraints of Japanese society. After Katsu died in 1967, Chieko Saito, an elderly female strip-club owner who had acquired the rights to the character as collateral to a loan to the actor, proposed to Takeshi Beat Kitano that he write, direct and star in a new film based on Zatoichi. Beat Takeshi is one of Japan's most innovative directors, who specializes in ultra-violent films set in Japan's criminal underworld. Before launching a film career, he was one of Japan's most popular TV comedians and host of his own long-running show. Takeshi's The Blind Swordsman, which is playing now in New York City, can best be described as a happy marriage between the original product and his own uniquely off-kilter style. In keeping with the earlier films, Takeshi's Zatoichi is an itinerant masseur who happens on a town brimming over with villains in need of vanquishing. As is the case with classics such as Yojimbo or Seven Samurai, the powerful villains are busily exploiting the local peasantry. In contrast to these films, Zatoichi is not a samurai himself but a kind of feudal version of a lumpen element who supplements his income by gambling. With his super-sensitive hearing, he can detect whether thrown dice come up odd or even. Like nearly everything else in this narrative, this must be taken with a grain of salt. When Zatoichi cuts apart a small army of sighted assassins with his cane-sword, you have to accept his prowess as an article of faith. That being said, in the final moments of Takeshi's film, you are left with the impression that he might be sighted after all. Whether or not you are persuaded by the spectacle of a blind man carving up his foes, Takeshi's film is impressive solely on esthetic terms. As one of his most visually ambitious film, it includes an almost surreal tap dance production number at the conclusion. As postmodernist pastiche, it rivals the interjection of Janis Joplin's Freedom's Just Another Word into the conclusion to Fassbinder's Berlin Alexanderplatz. For comparison's sake, I also watched Zatoichi the Outlaw, a 1967 film--the first one directed by Shintaro Katsu himself. You can find this film and others in the series at your better video stores or on the Internet. They are also shown with some frequency on the IFC cable station on Saturdays, which are devoted to classic Japanese samurai films. Jazz musician and Zatoichi-enthusiast Tatsu Aoki writes in the notes to one of the DVD's, He is a blind wanderer who refuses to walk on the sunny side of the street, an outlaw-Yakuza who respects others regardless of rank within the feudal system. In this film, the blind swordsman once again finds himself in a familiar situation. The owners of a gambling den and corrupt officials are cheating innocent peasants out of their savings and throwing them off their land. While taking up their cause, Zatoichi joins forces with Shusai Ohara, a sword-less samurai based on a real-life, 18th-century peasant leader named Yagaku Ohara. Ohara persuaded his followers to give up gambling and follow efficient farming practices. The film is filled with exciting action scenes and droll humor. For example, a drunken overlord begins throwing gold coins at Zatoichi, who is focused on playing a shamisen (a stringed instrument used in Kabuki, etc.), in order to bribe him into crawling around like a dog. Without missing a beat, Zatoichi deftly swaps his pick for the coins in midair and keeps playing. -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
Re: Israel pushing for Kurdish state?
On 27 October 1991 the leader of the national movement, former Soviet General Dudayev, won the presidential elections in Chechnya. On November 2, the Russian Duma denounced the elections in Chechnya. On November 7, Yeltsin declared a state of emergency in Chechnya and ordered the arrest of Chechen president Dudayev. On November 9, 1991, Russian troops from the Interior Ministry flew into Khankala Airport outside the Chechen capital of Grozny. They were immediately blocked by the new Chechen national guard, while a huge mass meeting in Freedom Square in Grozny rallied around the Dudayev government. By evening, the Russian troops surrendered their weapons to the Chechens and were bused out of the airport and back to Russian positions. Thus ended the first Russian attempt to retake Grozny, a city they would later bomb the hell out of. Thus began a covert Russian war to recover Chechnya, leading to full-scale war in 1994, and on and on to the present. In July 2004, we are now informed that the majority of Chechens -- indeed, the overwhelming majority of Chechens -- opposed the national movement in 1991. Well, that's history a la Yeltsin Putin... That's occupier's history, history written with a bloody bayonet. The Duma denounced Chechen elections on November 2, so they never really occurred. Joseph Green [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chris Doss wrote: I don't know enough about the issue to answer whether it was popular or not. But you do not need to have a majority of the population on your side in order to have an indigenous uprising. The Chechen population, for instance, voted overwhelmingly to remain part of the Russian Federation (then, the Soviet Union) in 1991. That did not prevent extremists in the Chechen population from doing their thing, and the moderates were either forced out or fled. I don't know if the Kashmiri case is parallel or not. __ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail
Re: Israel pushing for Kurdish state?
No, that's history according to history. Supporting Dudayev in 1991 is not the same as opposing the national movement in 1991. Look, mister alienatethepublicwiththenameofmywebsite.com, I actually know Chechens. Real-live Chechens. They live in Moscow. I get drunk with them. They do not support the jihadis. I am not going to argue this you. In July 2004, we are now informed that the majority of Chechens -- indeed, the overwhelming majority of Chechens -- opposed the national movement in 1991. Well, that's history a la Yeltsin Putin... That's occupier's history, history written with a bloody bayonet. The Duma denounced Chechen elections on November 2, so they never really occurred. Joseph Green [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chris Doss wrote: I don't know enough about the issue to answer whether it was popular or not. But you do not need to have a majority of the population on your side in order to have an indigenous uprising. The Chechen population, for instance, voted overwhelmingly to remain part of the Russian Federation (then, the Soviet Union) in 1991. That did not prevent extremists in the Chechen population from doing their thing, and the moderates were either forced out or fled. I don't know if the Kashmiri case is parallel or not. __ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail __ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail
Re: Israel pushing for Kurdish state?
Diane Monaco wrote: That being said and I agree again with you, the Kurds are an oppressed nationality. Period. Does it mean that the Left should support the breakup of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey? Ulhas Yahoo! India Matrimony: Find your life partner online Go to: http://yahoo.shaadi.com/india-matrimony
Re: Israel pushing for Kurdish state?
Diane wrote: That being said and I agree again with you, the Kurds are an oppressed nationality. Period. Ulhas wrote Does it mean that the Left should support the breakup of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey? Ulhas Of course not. But I think your point is more along the lines of the foreign intellectual bases (both wings of the US intelligentsia) being almost always wrong about the components of local nationalism? Maybe? Being a Canadian, I have seen a steady stream of incorrect American reporting about Quebec, for instance. I think that sort of thing is what sets Canada apart from the U.S. Here, federalism actually exists... in that limited application of federalism versus local nationalism. I do not think ill of federalism, of itself. Ken. -- You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your fucking khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world. -- Tyler Durden
Re: Israel pushing for Kurdish state?
Whoops, my mistake. I was confusing the Chechen-Ingush republic with the republic of Chechnya. --- Chris Doss [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: No, that's history according to history. Supporting Dudayev in 1991 is not the same as opposing the national movement in 1991. Look, mister alienatethepublicwiththenameofmywebsite.com, I actually know Chechens. Real-live Chechens. They live in Moscow. I get drunk with them. They do not support the jihadis. I am not going to argue this you. In July 2004, we are now informed that the majority of Chechens -- indeed, the overwhelming majority of Chechens -- opposed the national movement in 1991. Well, that's history a la Yeltsin Putin... That's occupier's history, history written with a bloody bayonet. The Duma denounced Chechen elections on November 2, so they never really occurred. Joseph Green [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chris Doss wrote: I don't know enough about the issue to answer whether it was popular or not. But you do not need to have a majority of the population on your side in order to have an indigenous uprising. The Chechen population, for instance, voted overwhelmingly to remain part of the Russian Federation (then, the Soviet Union) in 1991. That did not prevent extremists in the Chechen population from doing their thing, and the moderates were either forced out or fled. I don't know if the Kashmiri case is parallel or not. __ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail __ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail __ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail
Re: Israel pushing for Kurdish state?
In a message dated 7/28/2004 11:41:00 AM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Look, mister alienatethepublicwiththenameofmywebsite.com, I actually know Chechens. Real-live Chechens. They live in Moscow. I get drunk with them. They do not support the jihadis. I am not going to argue this with you. Comment What is called the national factor and oppressed peoples (without quotes) and national movements and the right to self determination within a multinational state system is apparently a source of considerable disagreement. I personally do not consider the various modern nationalists movements to be the meaning of "national movement" or anti-colonial revolts . . . especially within the former Soviet Union. There are roughly 40 million African Americans and perhaps 30 million Mexicans (incorporating Mexican national minorities and Chicano's) . . . various Indian nations or what I would personally called advanced national groups of Indians . . . Puerto Ricans outside of Puerto Rico but within the multinational state structure and federal system of the American Union . . . the Alaskan Eskimo's . . . the Aleutian and Hawaiian peoples and then the Appalachians and Southern whites who define their heritage very different from Yankee whites and all these peoples are to varying degrees oppressed. The various ideologists of self determination are asked if they support a seperate state for blacks as more than less advocated as a form of self determination by groups like the Nation of Islam? I mention the Natin of Islam because it is one of the oldest and most influential organizations amongst blacks and its paramount leader . . . Minister Louis . . . called for a Million Man march and brought together one of the largest mass meetings and protest to Washington in the history of America. This singular action led by Minister Louis set the bar for mobilization and became a radically new form of protest . . . with trade union leaders now calling for a Million Workers March . . . and other segments of the population doing likewise. Time to get real and compare ones attitude towards their own country men with that of the world. I am simply interested in the proponents of self determination . . . Lou P . . . and Mr. Green and whether they have any material on their support of Regional autonomy for the Southwest in respects to Mexico and the Chicano. The sincerity of ones view is made manifest by their attitude toward the brethren in their own country. How does this self determination formula apply to the American Union in 2004. There are more African Americans in and around metropolitan Detroit than there are Chechens and the Nation of Islam was birthed in Detroit. Do you gentlemen support and advocate for the right of self determination of these real people . . . up to and including the formation of an independent state? Just curious. Personally . . . I do not support such a demand and recognize it as no more than the voice of the reactionary and conservative black bourgeoisie and an attempt to further subjugate the African American people and keep the under the heel of capital. Is self determination for the Indians up to the formation of an independent state supported by the self determination advocates and can they point to any writing on this subject advocating such? Is self determination for theMexican,the Alaskan Eskimo's . . . the Aleutian and Hawaiian peoples and then the Appalachians as somewhat distinct from the Southern whites who define their heritage very different from Yankee whites . . . up to the formation of an independent state supported by the self determination advocates and can they point to any writing on this subject advocating such? Melvin P.
Re: The Blind Swordsman Zatoichi
didn't straight-to-video fave Rutger Hauer star in a film about a blind swordsman once? dd -Original Message- From: PEN-L list [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Louis Proyect Sent: 28 July 2004 16:43 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: The Blind Swordsman Zatoichi In Hollywood, the blind are represented in film either as pitiful victims, such as in Wait Until Dark, or as comic figures like Mr. Muckle, who tears apart W. C. Fields's shop in It's a Gift. Leave it to the Japanese to come up with somebody like Zatoichi, the blind master swordsman who was played by the beloved Shintaro Katsu in 26 films between 1962 and 1989, as well as 100 television episodes based on the character.
Re: The Blind Swordsman Zatoichi
In a message dated 7/28/2004 12:16:54 PM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: didn't straight-to-video fave Rutger Hauer star in a film about a blind swordsman once? dd Comment Not sure but every since Rutger Hauer's incredible performance in Blade Runner . . . I have been in awe. "Its not often one gets a chance to meet his maker . . . If you could see what I have seen with your eyes . . . Po . . .lice. . .Man? . . . Time to Die!." Ouch. This guy set a new bar for the "European archetype" that left me breathless two decades ago. His eyes . . . his face . . . the contours of his mouth and passion was . . . incredible. Then we have the Mexican Factor asserting itself at the end of the movie . . . "Its to bad she won't live . . . but then again who does?" Damn. Twenty-one years ago Hollywood's stupidity was still in full force and Pam Greir would have been perfect in Blade Runner . . . balancing Harrison Ford and Rutger Hauer. What would Rutger Hauer's dialogue been to Pam . . . and the chemistry would have been electric. Our vision of 2017 is very different today . . . but Ridley Scott hit one out of the ballpark back then. Melvin P.
Nader to Kucinich
Title: Nader to Kucinich Dennis, We Thought We Knew You! By Ralph Nader http://www.votenader.com Dennis Kucinich has decided to endorse the Kerry-Edwards Campaign. Of course, since Dennis is a committed, life-long Democrat this is not a big surprise. But, in doing so he also urged Nader supporters to join Kerry-Edwards saying: There is a place within the Democratic Party for everyone, including those who may be thinking of supporting Ralph Nader. Sorry Dennis, but most Nader supporters would find it very difficult to support the Kerry-Edwards ticket. Here are ten reasons why there is no place in the Democratic Party for people who hold to their principles and progressive programs: 1. Kerry-Edwards supports the war in Iraq. The only promise that John Kerry makes regarding Iraq is that he will manage the war better than Bush. He voted for the war and will send more troops to Iraq if needed. He recently told The Wall Street Journal that he would keep the troops in Iraq longer than George Bush. 2. Unlike Senator Feingold, Kerry-Edwards undermines the Constitution and civil liberties in the U.S. They voted for the Patriot Act - an overly aggressive assault on our Constitution. John Kerry, a former federal prosecutor, has not often distinguished himself as a strong friend of civil liberties. Kerry supported the Clinton crime bills, including the expansion of the federal death penalty in 1996 legislation. 3. John Kerry represents corporations and the wealthy, not the working majority. When John Kerry met with major donors he promised them he was not a redistributionist Democrat - despite massive corporate welfare programs, and the vast rich-poor divide that exists in the U.S. today. The Washington Post reports that has received more money from corporations and their lobbyists than any other senator. For example, the Center for Responsive Politics reports that during this election cycle, Kerry took in $3,321,382 from the health care industry. Also, Kerry has received $7,568,630 from the finance, insurance and real estate industries. His anemic plan for the working poor is to raise the minimum wage to a mere $7 per hour by 2007 - when over $8 would bring the purchasing power up to that of 1968! He's called for even more corporate tax cuts as a prime part of his jobs program, despite record corporate profits and shrinking corporate responsibility for carrying their fair share of the tax burden. 4. Kerry-Edwards does not promise health care for all. Forty-five million Americans don't have health insurance and more and more can't afford to keep it. The U.S. spends more on health care per capita than any other country - 25% of our expenditures go to duplicative overhead caused by health insurance-based health care. John Kerry does not replace this system with a universal health care program; he builds on this faulty system by paying the catastrophic care health insurance costs of businesses - but tens of millions will remain without health care under his plan. 5. Kerry-Edwards supports the drug war. John Kerry was the lead sponsor of Plan Colombia, the devastating militaristic approach to addiction. The plan sprays herbicides in the rain forests of Colombia, poisons the land of peasants, uses the military against peasant farmers and spreads coca cultivation in the region. Domestically, Kerry has supported crime bills that have resulted in the United States becoming the leader in incarceration in the world. 6. John Kerry continues to support WTO and NAFTA. These trade agreements that are spurring the sending of jobs overseas to Communist China, India and other poor countries undermine the sovereignty of nations by putting profit of corporations before laws enacted by nations. As a result, environmental, labor, and consumer protection laws are undermined by trade agreements. But Kerry is not calling for withdrawal from and renegotiation of these agreements. 7. John Kerry supports testing instead of teaching and does nothing to make college more affordable. Kerry supported George Bush's No Child Left Behind law, that emphasizes high stakes, high frequency, multiple choice standardized formal tests and, through their narrow domination, undermines teaching. He initially supported subsidizing college education but has now backed away from that promise. 8. The Democratic Party is undermining U.S. Democracy with John Kerry's quiet blessing. The Nader/Camejo Campaign is facing an unprecedented attack to obstruct its ballot access in numerous states with dirty tricks. Through harassment of petitioners, efforts to spoil ballot access conventions, use of state workers to challenge our signatures and employing corporate law firms to challenge our ballot access the Democratic Party is weakening the vibrancy of our democracy and trying to limit the choices of voters--with the full approval of the Democratic National Committee. The Democrats are doing nothing to energize our democracy by making it easier for a
Networking in Boston
NY Times, July 28, 2004 An Aspiring Money Man Gets to Taste the High Life By GLEN JUSTICE BOSTON, July 27 - Owen Byrd had been on the ground less than two hours on Sunday when he made his way to the sumptuous Four Seasons Hotel here to pick up an envelope. Inside was a large gold ticket with a silver star in the corner and some magic words: finance honored guest. That pass to Democratic National Convention events was worth $50,000, at least to Mr. Byrd, a California lawyer. In return for raising that much money for Senator John Kerry's presidential campaign, he was given the opportunity to eat lobster claws with the Democratic National Committee chairman, Terry McAuliffe, at a private waterfront reception, lob questions at former President Bill Clinton at a downtown theater and meet the actor Ben Affleck for billiards and bowling in a local nightclub. Perhaps more important for someone who aspires to be an A-list fund-raiser, the pass put him in the same room - and sometimes at the same table - with some of the country's richest and best-connected political money people. Not bad for someone who made his first presidential donation and raised his first check less than two years ago. This is Owen's excellent adventure through the Democratic Party presidential process, Mr. Byrd said with a grin. So it goes for hundreds of people who have worked to raise more than $200 million for Mr. Kerry, making him the best-financed challenger in presidential history. More than 560 people brought in at least $50,000 each, and many, like Mr. Byrd, 41, are first timers, drawn in by a desire to oust the Bush administration and welcomed by a hungry Democratic fund-raising machine. At the convention this week, Mr. Byrd and others are getting their first taste of the rewards. People are coming here who have never come to a convention before, and they have raised really serious money, so they are keeping company with some of the party's biggest fund-raisers, said Kevin Metz, the Kerry campaign's deputy finance director for the Northwest and one of several people whom Mr. Byrd helped recruit into fund-raising. There are perks reserved for those above Mr. Byrd's level, people who raised hundreds of thousands of dollars. They are lavished with attention and invited to the most exclusive events, including a clam bake at the Kennedy compound in Hyannis on Sunday and a restaurant reception on Wednesday with Teresa Heinz Kerry. Mr. Byrd earned the title of co-chair, a mid-level money soldier. But still, he has been offered so many tickets to parties and receptions that his days are packed. Armed with a new suit and a spreadsheet of events, Mr. Byrd, a real estate lawyer and developer from Palo Alto, Calif., set out daily to sample the convention. After leaving the Beacon Hill house owned by his girlfriend's parents - and located about a block from Mr. Kerry's house - each morning, he made his first stop at the Four Seasons to pick up tickets for events honoring fund-raisers. Because Mr. Byrd is also a convention delegate from California, a second trip, to the Westin, was required to get tickets to a separate slate of parties. As a delegate, Mr. Byrd was treated to plenty of events, many of them fairly low key. California's delegates gathered at the Franklin Park Zoo on Sunday, for example, where they ate skewered chicken and sandwiches under a tent. A D.J. played music, spawning a conga line at one point. full: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/28/politics/campaign/28donor.html -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
Re: The Blind Swordsman Zatoichi
Daniel Davies wrote: didn't straight-to-video fave Rutger Hauer star in a film about a blind swordsman once? http://www.pulpmovies.com/Reviews/Action/blindfury.html Blind Fury Master of the sword. Avenger of the Truth. ... and blind as a bat! Rutger Hauer is a great actor. But he has appeared in some truly terrible films. Blind Fury - an Americanised version of the Japanese Zatoichi series of movies - is one such film. The premise is that Nick Parker (Hauer) is blinded while fighting in Vietnam. As so often happens in this situation, he is taken in by a Vietnamese village who teach him, not only to rely on his hearing alone, but also the art of blind swordfighting - evidently a common skill in Vietnam. We then jump forward twenty years to find Frank Devereaux in trouble with crooked casino owner and wannabe drug dealer, MacCready. MacCready wants Devereaux to run his new designer drugs operation and forces Devereaux to comply by threatening his ex-wife and son. By sheer coincidence, as this is happening, Parker is knocking on Lynn Devereaux's door. Parker explains that he is an old friend of Devereaux and Lynn lets him in and gives him a cup of tea while she explains that she and Frank are no longer together. This also gives us a chance to meet Deveraux's annoying kid, Billy (Brandon Call), and means that Parker is around when a pair of crooked cops, along with a character going by the name of Slag, turn up to try to kidnap Lynn and Billy. So Parker and his amazing swordstick save the day and send the cops to the great precinct in the sky. Slag, being a Major Villain escapes so he can harass Parker until the Climactic Battle at the end of the film. Unfortunately, Parker doesn't entirely save the day and Lynn Devereaux gets shot and fatally wounded during the battle. In her dying breath she makes Parker promise to take Billy to his father So Parker and Billy set off to Reno, Nevada to find Devereaux. There is an attempt to build an uncle/nephew relationship during this journey, but it doesn't really gel and instead we have a series of comic set-pieces interspersed with action sequences as Slag and his various unsavoury cohorts attempt to intercept Parker and the kid and take them to McCready in Reno the direction they're already headed in. At the start of this review, I called Blind Fury a truly terrible film. This isn't entirely fair. For a start, it has Ruger Hauer in it - and he does pretty much carry the entire film, bringing and enjoyable wry humour to the character of Parker. The fight scenes are well choreographed and the stunts are impressive - especially the all too well telegraphed Jacuzzi of Death scene (trust me, you have to see this!) On the downside, I found the premise a little too far fetched for me to be able to buy into it. The plot was entirely predictable - with the next stunt or action sequence being telegraphed well in advance. As for kids in films they have to be damn good to avoid just being annoying. Billy is annoying - so much so that even with all that he is going through in this film, I still had no sympathy for him. -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
Re: Israel pushing for Kurdish state?
--- [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: How does this self determination formula apply to the American Union in 2004. There are more African Americans in and around metropolitan Detroit than there are Chechens and the Nation of Islam was birthed in Detroit. Do you gentlemen support and advocate for the right of self determination of these real people . . . up to and including the formation of an independent state? Just curious. --- Of course! We should be calling for the mass Balkanization of the United States. Every Indian reservation should be a separate country. Afro-Americans can get Mississippi and Detroit. The Southwest can go to the Hispanics. We can form a White Nation in the Northwest (wait, I've heard that idea before). No, that's too general: Italian-Americans can take Nevada, Polish-Americans Utah, German-Americans Nebraska. We can find a land without a people for the Jews. All of these litle statelets will be economically prosperous, politically flourishing, and at peace with their neighbors. A brilliant idea. __ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - 50x more storage than other providers! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail
Re: Israel pushing for Kurdish state?
Diane writes; That being said and I agree again with you, the Kurds are an oppressed nationality. Period. Ulhas responds: Does it mean that the Left should support the breakup of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey? there are other options besides secession: Ken mentions federalism, while simply increased democracy (including civil liberties and affirmative action) may do the trick in other situations. What's necessary depends on _concrete conditions_, not general rules. What to do with the four Kurdistans, for example, is not something that can be solved without serious discussion, debate, and struggle, including the Kurds and non-Kurds affected. My feeling is that in general, we don't need any new mini-states except under extraordinary conditions. Partitions are bloody, and it's often very hard to draw the line between national states (cf. the Balkans). Inter-ethnic marriages make partitioning really hard. I also think that _ethnic nationalism_ is the wrong basis for any country's unity, encouraging ethnic cleansing and the like. (How about _working class_ solidarity instead?) Further, new, small, states are particularly vulnerable to the predations of the IMF and multinational capital. Of course, it is self-evident that the unity of the 6 counties of Northern Ireland and the 26 counties of the Irish Republic should be pushed for. ;-) Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
quote du jour
Title: Today's Papers saith right-wing nut-job Ann Coulter:"My pretty-girl allies stick out like a sore thumb amongst the corn-fed, no make-up, natural fiber, no-bra needing, sandal-wearing, hirsute, somewhat fragrant hippie chick pie wagons they call 'women' at the Democratic National Convention." (quoted in MS SLATE's Today's Papers, yesterday.) -- Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Re: quote du jour
Ann Coulter is channeling Dick Cheney again... ? Ken.
American know how
Title: American know how 200 Female U.S. Soldiers RAPED in Iraq by U.S. Troops Miles Moffeit / Denver Post, 2004-07-15 Rape kits call attention to assaults By Miles Moffeit Denver Post Staff Writer Wednesday, July 14, 2004 - Sexual-assault organizations across the country are shipping rape-evidence collection kits to each member of Congress in hopes that more of the investigative tools will end up in the war zone to help troops who are victimized. That move is in response to growing concerns among victim-rights leaders and several lawmakers that not enough kits are available to help soldiers. Nearly 200 U.S. women soldiers have sought assistance from civilian rape-crisis agencies since the war started, saying they were assaulted by fellow troops. Many have reported their cases were mishandled, in part because of inadequate forensic and medical treatment. We've got to get more attention on this issue, said Rita Smith, director of the Denver-based National Coalition Against Domestic Violence. If we send people into an unsafe environment, they need to be protected. Pentagon leaders have declined to discuss whether a shortage of the collection kits exists, with a spokesman saying only that there are rape kits available in theater at three combat-support hospitals. Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., and other women lawmakers say Defense Department officials need to be more candid about whether supplies are adequate to serve victims. But all members of Congress, which oversees the military, must understand how crucial the kits are in investigating cases and preserving evidence, according to leaders of state sex- assault coalitions. Part of the thought process is that most people have never seen them or understand why they should be used, said Kristen Houser, vice president of the National Alliance to End Sexual Violence. When you say 'rape kit,' it doesn't mean a lot to some people. The presence of these kits in their offices, we hope, will help wake some people up. A rape kit generally consists of testing supplies for blood and other bodily fluids - swabs and combs to collect DNA evidence left on the victim's body following a rape. If evidence is collected from a victim rapidly enough, it can bolster the chances for prosecution. The word from Capitol Hill, so far, is that the mailing effort is bound to make a statement. It's an effective tool in establishing whether a sexual assault happened, said Angela de Rocha, spokesman for Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., who has worked on behalf of Air Force Academy cadets to ensure their cases are properly investigated. Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., who has led a legislative effort to draft uniform policies for the handling of sexual assault cases in the military, said a massive effort to educate the military is needed over the short term and long haul. If we don't create a climate where women feel comfortable reporting their crimes to the military, they'll never come forward to get the rape kit, Slaughter said. That needs to happen. -- --- IMPEACHMENT: BRING IT ON NOW! NOVEMBER COULD BE TOO LATE. -- END OF THE TRAIL SALOON Alternate Sundays 6-8am GMT (10pm-midnight PDT) http://www.kvmr.org I uke, therefore I am. -- Cool Hand Uke I log on, therefore I seem to be. -- Rodd Gnawkin I claim, therefore you believe. -- Dan Ratherthan Visit Cool Hand Uke's Lava Tube: http://www.coolhanduke.com
Security Fences: Palestine and Kashmir
'Security Fences': Palestine and Kashmir: http://montages.blogspot.com/2004/07/security-fences-palestine-and-kashmir.html
How Mass is Mass Media?
What percentage of the adult population watches Fox News? What percentage of the adult population watches ABC and/or CBS and/or NBC but _not_ Fox? What percentage of the adult population watches Local News but no network news? What percentage of the adult population watches watches local news _and_ network news? What percentage of the adult population watches no or little news? What percentage of the adult population reads a local newspaper but no metropolitan newspaper? What percentage of the adult population reads a metropolitan newspaper? What percentage of the adult population listens to radio news? (How distributed among different sources of radio news?) What percentage of the adult population has watched and/or listened to more than one presidential address? What percentage of newspaper readers read the news section. What percentage of newspaper readers read the letters to the editor? What percentage of the adult population gets their news from conversation with friends, coworkers, or relatives? What percentage of the adult population do _not_ watch any of the top 10 tv programs? What percentage of the adult population reads political columns in the daily or sunday paper? What percentage of the adult population knows who O'Reilly is? What percentage of the adult population knows who Edwards is? What percentage of the adult population knows that H.Clinton ever had anything to do with health issues? What percentage of the DP voters know where Kosovo is? What percentage of the adult population watch 4 or more hours a week of tv programs _not_ in the top 50 programs? What percentage of the adult population watches Nick at Night? What percentage of the adult population have cable tv? Is there _any_ one event (program, speech, movie, headline) experienced by 70% or more of the population in a given six month period? Under what conditions would large numbers of non-voters vote? Would conditions that would (might) cause non-voters to vote leave their opinions the same as they are now? Is patriotism (in the u.s.) a positive attitude or an attitude towards those who ae (are thought to be) non-patriotic?* Carrol *Kenneth Burke repeats a conversation in which one party says, I'm a Christian, and the other party replies, Yes, but who are you a Christian AGAINST? P.S. This post was originally written in response to certain threads on lbo-talk, but then it occurred to me that some of the questions could best be answered by professional social-scientists. (Should I put a :-) after professional social scientists?)
Re: How Mass is Mass Media?
Kenneth Burke repeats a conversation in which one party says, I'm a Christian, and the other party replies, Yes, but who are you a Christian AGAINST? according to one observer, the following sign was seen at the DP convention. Which Way Would Jesus Vote? [sigh] jd
John Kerry and Hubert Humphrey
(The Atlantic Monthly is a centrist magazine.) Atlantic Unbound | July 27, 2004 Convention Dispatch | by Jack Beatty Humphrey Redux? Like Humphrey in '68, Kerry is out of step with voters on an upopular war . Unity is the regnant clich about this convention and this party. The Democrats are united as rarely before. But in fact, there is dramatic division herebetween the delegates and the candidate. According to a Boston Globe poll, ninety-five percent of the delegates think the Iraq war wasisa mistake. John Kerry disagrees: he believes the war was not a mistake, nor was his vote to authorize it. If he had been president, some of his statements imply, he would have gone to war toojust not the way Bush did. In other words, candidate Kerry won't challenge what Bush did, but how he did it. Kerry and the delegates also disagree about how long the U.S. should stay in Iraq. Forty-one percent of them want the troops out by the end of the year, or within eighteen months. Only two percent think the U.S. should stay from three to five years. Kerry appears to agree with that sliver of his party; the Democratic platform talks about staying until the job is done. Kerry is not only out of step with his delegates; sixty percent of voters also view the war as a mistake. And a plurality want the U.S. out now, or within eighteen months. A candidate out of step with his party and the country on the wisdom and course of an unpopular war? Who does that put you in mind of? Last night, on the NPR public affairs program On Point, Walter Shapiro, a political columnist for USA Today, compared Kerry to Hubert Humphrey, the Democratic nominee in 1968. But with this invidious difference: until the closing hours of the campaign (when it was too late), Vice President Humphrey backed the war policy of his own president, Lyndon Johnson. Kerry is backing the policy of the man he is running against. Politically, this is unilateral disarmament. With the economy recovering, Iraq should be the Democrats' best issue. But not with Kerry as their nominee. Kerry is trying to appeal to voters who still support Bush's policy in Iraq; at the same time, dispensing the moonshine that the Europeans, at the magic words President Kerry, will send their troops to Iraq so they can be blown up by car bombs just like ours, he is also trying to appeal to the plurality who want out soon. This is called having it both ways, as the Republicans will go broke explaining to undecided voters. If the Republicans are smartand they are, politicallythey will make Kerry's Iraq record (for the war and against the $87 billion to pay for it; against the president on the tactics of the occupation, with the President on staying the course) a character issue. And they will be right. John Kerry betrayed his reason for being in public life when he backed Bush's war. History had shaped him to stand up on the Senate floor and speak for the American dead in Vietnamto say, In their name, never again. Never again send young Americans to die in an unnecessary war. Never again, use lives as political cannon fodder. Never, again. Instead, having voted against Gulf War One and been burned politically, he cast the most political vote of his careerand the most shameful. Send me, Bill Clinton has Kerry, who could have avoided service, saying when it came time to go to Vietnam. But on Iraq, Kerry said, Send them. And soon one thousand will have died. How do you ask a soldier to be the last man to die for a mistake? asked John Kerry, the conscience of the Vietnam generation, speaking over thirty years ago before the Senate Foreign Relations committee. There are some things worth losing the presidency for, Hubert Humphrey declared in his acceptance speech in bloody Chicago. Humphrey meant he would not compromise on civil rights to exploit the white backlash that Richard Nixon stoked to victory that November. Perhaps the Humphrey-Kerry parallel is inexact after all. -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
Re: Diminishing Expectations
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 07/28/04 8:37 AM Michael Hoover wrote: but conversations here indicate that we sure do live in the age of diminishing expectations, which in itself gives people fewer reasons to spend time on political activism. above was yoshie... -- Please Note: Due to Florida's very broad public records law, most written communications to or from College employees regarding College business are public records, available to the public and media upon request. Therefore, this e-mail communication may be subject to public disclosure.
FW: Iraq's Labor Upsurge Supported by U.S. Unions
the article below seems of interest. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine Iraq's Labor Upsurge Wins Support From U.S. UnionsBy David BaconOnce the U.S. occupation of Iraq began over a year ago, Iraqi workers lost no time in reorganizing their country's labor movement. Labor activity spread from Baghdad to the Kurdish north, with the center of the storm in the south, in the oil and electrical installations around Basra, and the port of Um Qasr.Workers quickly discovered that the occupation authorities had little respect for labor rights, however. Once the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) took power in Baghdad in March of 20003, it began enforcing a 1987 law banning unions in public enterprises, where most Iraqis are employed. On top of this CPA head Paul Bremer added Public Order #1, banning pronouncements that "incite civil disorder, rioting or damage to property." The phrase civil disorder can easily apply to organizing strikes, and leaders of both the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU) and Iraq's Union of the Unemployed have been detained a number of times.David Bacon is a reporter and photographer specializing in labor issue and a regular contributor to Foreign Policy In Focus (www.fpif.org) (Ewa Jasciewicz, in Basra for Occupation Watch earlier this year, contributed to this report.)See new FPIF commentary online at:http://www.fpif.org/commentary/2004/0407upsurge.htmlWith printer friendly PDF version at:http://www.fpif.org/pdf/gac/0407upsurge.pdf
Outfoxed?
Outfoxed? (If conservatives exaggerate liberalism of the corporate media beyond recognition, liberals, too, are hyping the power of the Fox News Channel far more than its actual total viewership warrants): http://montages.blogspot.com/2004/07/outfoxed.html.
Re: The Blind Swordsman Zatoichi
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 07/28/04 11:42 AM In Hollywood, the blind are represented in film either as pitiful victims, such as in Wait Until Dark, or as comic figures like Mr. Muckle, who tears apart W. C. Fields's shop in It's a Gift. Leave it to the Japanese to come up with somebody like Zatoichi, the blind master swordsman who was played by the beloved Shintaro Katsu in 26 films between 1962 and 1989, as well as 100 television episodes based on the character. . check out 'zatoichi meets the one armed swordsman' (71 or 72) directed by kimiyoshi yasuda who directed several zatoichi films... the one armed swordsman of film is jimmy wang yu from chang cheh's 67 film of same name, here's what lisa odham stokes and i write about chang's film in _city on fire_: Chang Cheh's One Armed Swordsman (1967) is generally acknowledged as the movie that launched the 1970s' martial arts phenomenon [in hong kong]. While the film's title announces that this is a swordplay movie - nothing new in itself - the hero's disability (his sifu's jealous daughter has chopped off his right arm) produces a different type of character. Forced to undergo a strict and tough rehabilitative training program, the protagonist (Jimmy Wang Yu) becomes a 'lean mean fighting machine' with a blade. Notably brutal for its time, Chang's picture ushered in an era of the self-reliant individualist that according to [noted hk film critic] Sek Kei, simultaneously destroyed the image of the weak Chinese male by featuring 'beefcake heroes in adventure and violence.' (p. 91) in 'zatoichi meets the one armed swordsman, wang yu's character travels to japan where he intervenes to prevent a young boy's execution and has a bounty placed upoin him, meanwhile, the young boy's dying father's last wish is for shintaro katsu's blind swordsman to care for his son, communication difficulties between the two swordsmen lead to them fighting one another... trivia: tsui hark's 'the blade (95) is a remake of chang's 'one armed swordsman' by way of a detour through wong kar-wai's 'ashes of time (94) in which tony leung ka-fai plays a blind swordsman... finally: blind swordsman films inspired 71 entitled 'deaf mute heroine' directed by wu ma, one of number of hk martial arts films featuring women... michael hoover -- Please Note: Due to Florida's very broad public records law, most written communications to or from College employees regarding College business are public records, available to the public and media upon request. Therefore, this e-mail communication may be subject to public disclosure.
Re: The Blind Swordsman Zatoichi
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 07/28/04 5:38 PM finally: blind swordsman films inspired 71 entitled 'deaf mute heroine' directed by wu ma, one of number of hk martial arts films featuring women... michael hoover neglected to mention that helen ma had lead role in above... mh -- Please Note: Due to Florida's very broad public records law, most written communications to or from College employees regarding College business are public records, available to the public and media upon request. Therefore, this e-mail communication may be subject to public disclosure.
Re: quote du jour
Let's start a campaign to demand that Republican women officials denounce Ann Coulter. If this could be classified as an ethnic slur, wouldn't there be a firestorm? Why is this tolerated? Why is this person on TV? At 11:55 AM 7/28/2004 -0700, Devine, James wrote: saith right-wing nut-job Ann Coulter:My pretty-girl allies stick out like a sore thumb amongst the corn-fed, no make-up, natural fiber, no-bra needing, sandal-wearing, hirsute, somewhat fragrant hippie chick pie wagons they call 'women' at the Democratic National Convention. (quoted in MS SLATE's Today's Papers, yesterday.) -- Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevinehttp://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine -- Robert Naiman
Re: quote du jour
Just to get your blood boiling, here's another quote from Ann Coulter: Conservatives believe man was created in God's image, while liberals believe they are gods. All of the behavioral tics of the liberals proceed from their godless belief that they can murder the unborn because they, the liberals, are themselves gods. They try to forcibly create 'equality' through affirmative action and wealth redistribution because they are gods. They flat-out lie, with no higher power to constrain them, because they are gods. They adore pornography and the mechanization of sex because man is just an animal, and they are gods. They revere the UN and not the U.S. because they aren't Americans -- they are gods. When I didn't know who she was and so Googled her, I discovered a large list of list-serv posts commenting on the fact that she has an Adam's apple. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine -Original Message- From: PEN-L list [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Robert Naiman Sent: Wednesday, July 28, 2004 2:58 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [PEN-L] quote du jour Let's start a campaign to demand that Republican women officials denounce Ann Coulter. If this could be classified as an ethnic slur, wouldn't there be a firestorm? Why is this tolerated? Why is this person on TV? At 11:55 AM 7/28/2004 -0700, Devine, James wrote: saith right-wing nut-job Ann Coulter:My pretty-girl allies stick out like a sore thumb amongst the corn-fed, no make-up, natural fiber, no-bra needing, sandal-wearing, hirsute, somewhat fragrant hippie chick pie wagons they call 'women' at the Democratic National Convention. (quoted in MS SLATE's Today's Papers, yesterday.) -- Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevinehttp://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine -- Robert Naiman
Facing South/July 27, 2004
F A C I N G S O U T H July 27, 2004 * Issue 85 INSTITUTE INDEX * Elections at Risk Number of felons purged from Florida's voter lists in the 2000 elections: 173,000 Number that weren't felons and were wrongfully barred from voting: 50,000 Number of felons Florida had planned to remove from voter rolls in 2004: 47,000 Number on list that are African-American: 22,000 Number on list that have been granted clemency and shouldn't be on the list: 2,100 Percent of Florida's African-American population that live in counties with the most unreliable voting machines: 53 Number of presidential votes lost due to election system failures in 2000, in millions: 4 to 6 Sources on file at the Institute for Southern Studies. _ DATELINE: THE SOUTH * Top Stories Around the Region ALL EYES ON FLORIDA ELECTIONS Just weeks after defending both the quality and secrecy of a list of 47,000 suspected felons to be purged from Florida voting lists, the state's elections office is now scrambling to explain why the list was so flawed that it had to be scrapped. Among other findings, reporters discovered that the list only contained the names of 61 Hispanics, who tend to vote Republican, despite the fact that Hispanics make up 11% of the prison population. (Palm Beach Post, 7/24) http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/auto/epaper/editions/today/news_1410ed51d432d15200dc.html *** RELATED: New law adds hurdle to ex-felon voting in Florida http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/072404Z.shtml 40 YEARS LATER, FREEDOM MOVEMENT VETERANS GET RESPECT Forty years ago this summer, the Democratic Party convention was rocked by the spectacle of the party clashing over whether to seat white segregationists or integrated freedom fighters from Mississippi. This year in Boston, a delegation of Misssissippi movement veterans be honored at the Democratic National Convention. (New York Times, 7/25/04) http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/072604E.shtml OIL REFINERIES USE CLOUT TO HOLD OFF REGULATION Petroleum is not just the nation's No. 1 source of energy. Refineries are often the lifeblood of many communities. With battalions of top-gun lawyers and lobbyists, they have influenced the nation's energy policy and fought regulatory crackdowns on pollution. And their political action committees pump millions of dollars into the coffers of powerful elected leaders in Washington. (Star-Telegram, 7/19) http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/nation/9189098.htm?1c LEADER OF GOP SENATE EFFORT OUTED The man heading up the effort by Republicans to keep control of the United States Senate is the latest gay politico to be outed by local activists, who claim they are pointing to the hypocrisy of a party that opposes gay rights but has many gay leaders. The director of the National Republican Senatorial Committee who works for Virginia Sen. George Allen declined tocomment on efforts to publicize his sexual orientation. (Washington Blade, 7/23) http://www.washingtonblade.com/2004/7-23/news/national/leaderout.cfm THE LEGACY OF THE RAINBOW 20 years ago, progressives were electrified by the candidacy of Jesse Jackson, whose campaign registered millions of new voters and created a multi-racial coalition in a bid for the Democratic Party nomination in 1984 and 1988. What's the legacy of the Rainbow Coalition? (The Nation, 7/15) http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040802s=wypijewski CRUNK DOMINATES THE AIRWAVES Hip-hop from Dixie has been ascendant for years, but a glance at the Billboard charts reveals that the lurching beats and bellowed choruses of Southern crunk have become 2004's defining pop sound. But what is it? (Slate, 7/20) http://slate.msn.com/id/2103955/ -- Please Note: Due to Florida's very broad public records law, most written communications to or from College employees regarding College business are public records, available to the public and media upon request. Therefore, this e-mail communication may be subject to public disclosure.
Re: How Mass is Mass Media?
Kenneth Burke repeats a conversation in which one party says, I'm a Christian, and the other party replies, Yes, but who are you a Christian AGAINST? according to one observer, the following sign was seen at the DP convention. Which Way Would Jesus Vote? Only evidence available is who he threw out of the temple. He wouldn't attend either one of the corporate orgies. Dan Scanlan -- --- IMPEACHMENT: BRING IT ON NOW! NOVEMBER COULD BE TOO LATE. -- END OF THE TRAIL SALOON Alternate Sundays 6-8am GMT (10pm-midnight PDT) http://www.kvmr.org I uke, therefore I am. -- Cool Hand Uke I log on, therefore I seem to be. -- Rodd Gnawkin I claim, therefore you believe. -- Dan Ratherthan Visit Cool Hand Uke's Lava Tube: http://www.coolhanduke.com
North Korea: Open For Business -- A Bit
BusinessWeek Online JULY 26, 2004 . ASIAN BUSINESS North Korea: Open For Business -- A Bit North Korea remains poor, but Kim's reforms are bringing growth http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/04_30/b3893074.htm Yahoo! India Matrimony: Find your life partner online Go to: http://yahoo.shaadi.com/india-matrimony
Russia plays energy card
The Hindu Tuesday, Jul 06, 2004 Russia plays energy card By Vladimir Radyuhin As global energy demand soars, President Vladimir Putin wants to use oil and gas exports as instruments to speed up Russia's economic revival and enhance its geopolitical weight. RUSSIA HAS embarked on a new geopolitical game, playing its energy card to reclaim global clout. Its vast energy reserves and control over the markets in the former Soviet Union are to be leveraged to turn Russia into a superpower. As global energy demand soars, the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, wants to position Russia as a key broker in the international market and use oil and gas exports as instruments to speed up the country's economic revival and enhance its geopolitical weight. After dropping nearly 50 per cent from the Soviet era peak, Russia's oil output has soared again to exceed 450 million tonnes (together with gas condensates) by the end of the current year making it the world's second largest producer, behind only Saudi Arabia. Total oil reserves are a state secret in Russia, but the former Energy Minister, Yuri Shafranik, estimates that Russia may have 44 billion tonnes of oil, more than Saudi Arabia does. Russia currently exports over 6.5 million barrels a day, taking crude oil and product together, and plans to boost exports to about 9 million barrels a day by the end of the decade - roughly equal to Saudi Arabia's current exports. Russia is also the number one producer of natural gas in the world and has the biggest share - 32 per cent - of global reserves. Taken together, oil and gas make Russia the biggest energy producer in the world, and moreover, one of the few countries whose reserves are not shrinking yet. With the situation in West Asia destabilised in the wake of the Iraq war, the United States and other top oil-consuming nations have turned their eyes to Russia and energy-rich ex-Soviet republics. The U.S. made big inroads into what Moscow considers its legitimate backyard during the chaotic rule of Russia's first post-Soviet President, Boris Yeltsin. Mounting an aggressive drive for control over Central Asia and Caspian oil and gas flows, Washington has pushed through the construction of a $3.6 billion Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline from Azerbaijan's coast on the Caspian Sea via neighbouring Georgia to Turkey's Mediterranean port of Ceyhan and is canvassing for building a gas pipeline to run parallel. These pipes should bring oil and gas from Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and other Central Asian states to Western markets bypassing Russia. American and other Western energy giants control 60 per cent of oil extraction in Azerbaijan and 40 per cent in Kazakhstan. Washington also came close to gaining a foothold in Russia's energy sector, privatised during the biggest selloff in world history in the 1990s. Following the purchase by British Petroleum of a 50 per cent stake in the Russian oil major, TNK, ExxonMobil and ChevronTexaco came vying for a controlling 44 per cent share in Russia's biggest private oil company, Yukos. If the deal had come through, the West would have won control over one-third of Russia's total oil output and could have gained access to Russian export pipelines, which are currently controlled by the state. The idea was to mould Russia into an alternative supplier of oil free from OPEC-like state controls. Mr. Putin wrecked these plans. The arrest of the Yukos head, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, last October on charges of fraud and tax evasion disrupted the company's sale to the U.S. oil majors and sent a clear message to Washington: the Kremlin is reasserting control over the strategic heights of the Russian economy. In a further display of new tough rules, Moscow in January annulled the results of a 1993 tender for a Sakhalin-3 oil field in the Far East won by the U.S. giants, ExxonMobil and ChevronTexaco, citing the companies' failure to develop the field. Mr. Putin's proactive policy in ex-Soviet Central Asia helped Moscow consolidate its hold over oil and gas flows from the energy-rich region. Last year, Russia's natural gas monopoly, Gazprom, sealed a mega deal with Turkmenistan to buy up to 50 billion cubic metres - practically all of Turkmenistan's gas exports - in the next 25 years. Earlier this month, Russia's LUKOil major signed a $930-million contract to develop a 250-billion-cubic-metre gas field in Bukhara, Uzbekistan, while the Gazprom natural gas giant is finalising a $1.5-billion 45-year deal to exploit fields on the Ustyurt plateau, western Uzbekistan. A fierce struggle is unfolding for oil and gas exports from Kazakhstan, a land-locked Central Asian nation, which sits on the second biggest hydrocarbon reserves among the former Soviet states. Despite U.S. pressure, Kazakhstan may not give enough oil to the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline to make it commercially viable, as BTC transit tariffs are going to be twice as high as Russia's. Earlier this year, Kazakhstan's President,
Proposal to Up Minimum Wage Makes Florida Fall Ballot
Proposal To Up The Minimum Wage Makes Florida Fall Ballot POSTED: 6:14 pm EDT July 27, 2004 TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- A proposed constitutional amendment to create a state minimum wage that starts at $6.15 and is tied to inflation made the November ballot Tuesday when it cleared the signature threshold. The federal minimum wage, which hasn't changed in seven years, is $5.15. The minimum wage citizen's initiative has more than 531,000 verified signatures, according to the state Division of Elections. That's more than the 488,722 required of petition drives to make the ballot. The measure is backed by the national group ACORN, which has pushed for higher wages in cities across the country. Sponsors collected more than 900,000 signatures in their campaign. The state Supreme Court had already given the measure the go-ahead for the ballot, finding it was clearly explained in its ballot title and summary and dealt with only one subject. Four other proposed constitutional amendments are already on the ballot. One would open the door to a future parental notice law dealing with teen abortions and one would allow South Florida voters to decide if they want to permit slots at race tracks and jai-alai frontons. -- Please Note: Due to Florida's very broad public records law, most written communications to or from College employees regarding College business are public records, available to the public and media upon request. Therefore, this e-mail communication may be subject to public disclosure.
Farmers' suicides in the US
I recall reading a book, Wisconsin Death Trip, that discussed 19th C. farm wives depression. I think that farm suicides here might be relatively high, athough some farmers take their frustration out in voiolence of one kind or another. POULTRY GROWERS AT MERCY OF INDUSTRIALIZED AGRICULTURE AND SHORT, TENUOUS CONTRACTS DRAWN UP BY FOOD GIANTS MONTE MITCHELL, WINSTON-SALEM JOURNAL: Lee Mounce loved tending his chickens. It was relaxing, collecting their eggs and listening to them cluck. When he got off his third-shift job at R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., he would drink a cup of coffee, eat a bowl of cereal and tend his chickens. He retired early to spend more time with them and saw chicken farming as a way to keep making money. He knew many other folks in Yadkin County who raised chickens under contracts with big poultry companies. Jimmy Johnson loved his chickens, too. He grew up on a dairy farm in Chatham County and got a degree in beef and dairy management from North Carolina State University. It didn't seem like much of a stretch to start up a chicken operation on his own 59-acre farm off U.S. 64. Chicken farming seemed like a sure-fire source of income. It didn't turn out that way, though. Both men found themselves buried under a mountain of debt, caused in part by a series of company-mandated upgrades to their chicken houses. They also stared into the uncertainty of the industry's contract system. Perdue Farms cut Mounce's 12-month contract in 2001. Johnson was convinced that his short-term contract with Mountaire Farms of North Carolina would soon be cut. Both men had accumulated about $300,000 in past-due loans with no guarantee of income. When the bank foreclosed on his chicken-house loans, Mounce, 60, paid with his farm and the house he had already paid off. Johnson paid with his life. Despondent over his situation, he turned a shotgun on himself inside one of his chicken houses in October 2002. He was 48. We thought the world of Jimmy, said Jim Shepard, the live-operations manager for the local Mountaire complex. No one was pulling for him more than this company. Family members say that both men fell victim to a system of industrialized agriculture that leaves farmers with short, tenuous contracts hammered out with one of a handful of large, highly competitive corporations. When chicken farming went to a company-owned contract system in the 1950s, there were more than 1,000 companies competing to offer contracts to chicken farmers. Today there are fewer than 50, with just a few carrying the most clout. A 1999 survey of 1,000 chicken farmers by Purdue University showed that half of them had a total farm debt of more than $100,000. The 1999 study also showed that while 75% of the farmers thought that they had made a good decision to go into the business, 95% said that costs had risen faster than expected and just 35% would recommend chicken farming to others. Still, some farmers swear by chicken farming. They say that raising broilers - the chickens that end up in the freezer at your grocery --- or raising chickens for eggs are an excellent supplement to other farm income derived through row crops, dairy cattle or beef cattle. Lee Mounce learned a lesson about contract farming that he won't soon forget. Anybody that will go into the chicken business, spend $200,000 per house, and most people will build two houses and knowing before you start you only get 12-month contracts, they're crazy, Mounce said. But you don't think about it. I mean, it's something you don't think about, but it's foolish. Wilkes County is the state's biggest producer of broilers and the county's largest employer is Tyson Foods Inc., which has three chicken-processing plants at its Wilkesboro complex. Tyson does not own the more than 990 chicken houses in the area. The farmers do. At an average cost of $150,000 per broiler house -- not including land --- farmers have invested about $148.5 million, mostly in Wilkes County. Companies benefit from the capital outlay by farmers and from having farmers dispose of manure, but they say that the arrangement also benefits farmers because they are guaranteed a payment regardless of what happens to the market. The company absorbs the risk, allowing the farmers a steady income and the ability to stay on the farm. Lee Mounce was a chicken farmer for 22 years and hoped to pass the farm on to his son, Craig. Craig Mounce, 36, thought he was getting the opportunity of a lifetime in 1987 when he built a 400-foot chicken house beside his father's two houses. He dreamed of independence and a chance to own his own business. But he found out what chicken farmers in North Carolina and across the country have learned. There is little protection for the chicken farmer. The companies own the chickens, control what kind of birds the farmers get, control the feed, control the pay system and can cancel a contract at almost any time. The farmers take out the loans to build the houses they own, but the
leading indicators
If consumer confidence is increasing and purchases are flattening, which is the leading indicator? -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Adnan Abbas's Call to Humanity
Adnan Abbas's 'Call to Humanity' (about a young Iraqi artist): http://montages.blogspot.com/2004/07/adnan-abbass-call-to-humanity.html -- Yoshie * Critical Montages: http://montages.blogspot.com/ * Greens for Nader: http://greensfornader.net/ * Bring Them Home Now! http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/ * Calendars of Events in Columbus: http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/calendar.html, http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php, http://www.cpanews.org/ * Student International Forum: http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/ * Committee for Justice in Palestine: http://www.osudivest.org/ * Al-Awda-Ohio: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio * Solidarity: http://www.solidarity-us.org/
A good NY Times article on the World Bank
Dugger, Celia. 2004. World Bank Challenged: Are the Poor Really Helped? New York Times (28 July). Wealthy nations and international organizations, including the World Bank, spend more than $55 billion annually to better the lot of the world's 2.7 billion poor people. Yet they have scant evidence that the myriad projects they finance have made any real difference, many economists say. You must also measure whether those investments actually help poor people live longer, more prosperous lives. A small band of development economists, who a year ago founded the Poverty Action Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, have become influential advocates for randomized evaluations as the best way to answer that question. Such trials, generally regarded as the gold standard in social policy research, involve randomly assigning people eligible for an antipoverty program to get the help or not, then comparing outcomes to see whether those who got the help fared better than those who did not. The Poverty Action Lab scholars have made startling discoveries in their own randomized evaluations. Adding an extra teacher to classrooms in rural India did not improve children's test scores. But hiring high-school graduates who were paid only $10 to $15 a month to give remedial tutoring to groups of lagging students in a Bombay slum markedly improved reading and math skills. A series of education experiments in Kenya found that providing poor students with free uniforms or a simple porridge breakfast substantially increased attendance. But giving them drugs to treat the intestinal worms that infect more than a quarter of the world's population was more cost effective, with a price tag of only $3.50 for each extra year of schooling achieved. Healthier children are more likely to go to school. You can't answer the general question: Does aid work? said Esther Duflo, an economist and co-founder of the Poverty Action Lab. You have to go project by project and accumulate the evidence. The World Bank, a lumbering giant that employs more than 1,200 Ph.D.'s, is beginning to listen to critics like her. A recent in-house review of bank projects during the past four to five years found that only 2 percent had been properly evaluated for whether they made a difference, according to Mr. Bourguignon. [Franois Bourguignon, the bank's chief economist] A critical review of the bank's $7 billion portfolio of programs that involve local communities in their design and management concluded recently that there are, unfortunately, a dearth of well-designed evaluations of such projects. Another review of a $1.3 billion initiative in India found similar problems. Bank economists in New Delhi examined more than 200 studies of projects in India that ranged from teacher training to school construction, enrollment drives to textbook revision. They concluded that none of the studies were rigorous enough to measure whether the initiatives made a difference, except for one that found it increased enrollment by a disappointing 1.3 percent. The World Bank spent more than a billion dollars without knowing why they were doing what they were doing -- that's the tragedy, said Abhijit Banerjee, an M.I.T. economics professor and co-founder of the Poverty Action Lab. But even as aid agencies lagged in conducting stringent evaluations, Professors Banerjee and Duflo at M.I.T., Michael Kremer at Harvard and other economists associated with the lab have been conducting randomized trials of antipoverty programs in India, Kenya, South Africa, Peru and the Philippines. This rigorous testing has made a huge difference in medicine and has improved human welfare due to better drugs, said Professor [Michael] Kremer. If we could use randomized evaluations to really find out what works, foreign aid donors could implement better health and education policies and so could developing countries. Mr. Pritchett, a veteran bank economist, tried to explain why rigorous evaluations were such a rarity in the culture of the bank. Its highly trained, well-meaning professionals too often think they know the solutions. They have too little doubt, he said. They also worry that modest, proven gains for the poor will lose out to inflated, unproven claims for, say, tax cuts to the rich or a new weapons system -- a concern he shares. You want to know what works and what doesn't, but until you subject the full range of government spending to the same discipline, why are you disadvantaging things for poor people? he asked. But Professor Banerjee is optimistic that reliable evaluations will give advocates ammunition to lobby for increased foreign aid. He pointed to the success of a rigorously studied Mexican program that paid poor mothers a small sum if they kept their children in school and got them immunized. The model has spread across Latin America in large measure because a large randomized trial, published in 2001, showed that the children who participated were
HDI\PPP Michael,Ulhas and Michael
[See what happens with some encouragement - soon I'll be overposting! I'll try to make this the last.] 1)Uhlas writes: Paul was trying to show how PPP numbers overstate the economic growth in the developing countries. I am not sure I understand how he has reached that conclusion. For India, from 1992 to 2001, the GNI increased by 64% when calculated by the World Bank Atlas method (non-PPP). But for the same period GNI increased by 91% using PPP! For all low and middle income countries taken together the difference is even more extreme (22% growth vs. 44%!). It is not just that India is made to look less poor via developed countries (which would be a one time distortion). It is also that India (and poor countries as a whole) are made to look like they are also closing the remaining gap (a statistical bias because High Income countries are not affected). [All stats from the WB's WDI.] Furthermore, the discrepancy between the two methods grows - by as much as 4 or 5 times - during the neo-liberal period (tell me off-line if you want the chart for India, the change is dramatic). So, there is a bias in the bias which shows neo-liberalism as a great success. As I explained previous posts, this is built-in since the PPP model recalculates the numbers drawing from a neo-classical General Equilibrium model where market prices are assumed powerful and beneficial. But in fact the GNI/PPP are just numbers from a model driven by assumptions...although they are presented as if they are statistics. Then the statistics are used to prove correct the assumptions from the free market model. [BTW there are various flavors of PPP-type models. The Bank has chosen the most extreme version that has the most free-market assumptions. The other versions of PPP, logically, produce lower numbers. See below for examples.] 2) Michael Perelman writes: If we were go[ing] to try to make some sort of quantitative measure of a human development index, I think I [would] try to get a handle on how people at the bottom fared rather than looking at averages. I couldn't agree more. One catch is that - in another little noticed development - the World Bank has withdrawn its support for calculating income distribution figures. A quick look at the World Development Indicators shows that in most cases the last calculation is a decade old (and not capturing the radical changes of our era). One imagines that they will soon not be published at all. Income distribution is being replaced with the Banks own poverty measure. Their poverty measure combines the (flawed) PPP with a (flawed) measure of poverty. The two flaws combine to show great reductions in the number of the poor - a great theme of the World Bank publications recently (see comments about the Wade article below). This is why I often suggest people use numbers like the infant mortality rate so that the plight of the poor isn't erased by progress at the top (also these numbers are more accurate than most and respond quickly to changes). 3) Michael Lebowitz writes: In relation to questions raised by Paul on HDI, etc, a friend has directed me to a recent piece by Robert Wade in New Political Economy. I assume it's in the following issue: Volume 9, Number 2, June 2004 Looks interesting. (It will take me a long while to read it, people interested in an electronic copy should contact me off-line). Robert Wade (now at LSE) is often an insightful open minded liberal who is well informed (including several years working for the World Bank). The article is mostly about the World Bank's claims that world inequality and world poverty are diminishing. Although Wade does not spend much time on the statistics question he does make the point that the conclusions depend almost entirely on the particular choice of measurement. I am not truly familiar with the literature on the statistical issue (anyone out there who is?). Among the beleaguered non-mainstream economists who do write on these issues in a technical manner, I don't know anyone who has translated these issues into an applied context. But here are some links: a)For a non-neoclassical critique: Columbia University economist and philosopher team How Not to Count the Poor: http://www.columbia.edu/~sr793/count.pdf b)Other authors agree with neo-classical models but point out that PPP version used by the Bank (and hence internationally) has extreme free market assumptions (e.g. assuming no substitution bias in General Equilibrium models). One such author is Steve Dowrick of Australia Nat. Univ. and has written on such issues with Brad deLong (familiar on the internet as no great critic of the World Bank). Dowrick shows that relaxing just one of the extreme neoclassical assumptions produces a different PPP index that reverses the Banks conclusions about poverty and distribution. See http://ecocomm.anu.edu.au/people/info/dowrick/world-inequ.pdf and http://acsr.anu.edu.au/staff/ackland/papers/global_poverty.pdf C)An atypical World Bank
Harlem/Bangladesh
Regarding Paul's suggestion about infant mortality recall the recent study comparing infant mortality in Harlem and Bangladesh. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
