Toasterhead's Blogosphere - طابة البلوج طوسترهاد

Did Glenn Beck REALLY rape and murder a young girl back in 1990?

2009-10-05T16:04:00.002-04:00

The Internet blogoscape is currently abuzz with revelations that Fox News lunatic Glenn Beck has been accused of the rape and murder of a young girl in Cape Coral, Florida in 1990. As yet there have been no denials of these allegations from Beck, nor has the basic-cable crybaby made any attempt to prove his innocence.

Although this in and of itself does not indicate guilt on Beck's part, it certainly does put him under suspicion. I, for one, join the rest of the bloggotrope in calling for Mr. Beck to set the record straight, once and for all.

Africa to Greenhouse Gas Producers: Pay Up!

2009-09-02T07:47:00.001-04:00

Usually the costs of climate change are discussed in very indirect terms, such as land lost to rising sea levels or increased wildfires or resource insecurity. However, a new proposal before the African Union may introduce a new, more direct cost of climate change - cold (well, warm) hard cash.

The nations of Africa contribute less than one percent of all global carbon dioxide emissions, but is home to 15 of the 20 countries most vulnerable to the effects of climate change. If approved by the African Union, the nations of Africa will be demanding up to 200 billion dollars in annual compensation at the UN Climate Change Conference in December.

Although the details of the plan have not been released, the primary outcome of the effort will be a unified African voice on the issue. According to the concept note for the Conference of African Heads of State and Government on Climate Change:

The decision of the AU Summit regarding the climate change negotiation structure is premised on the fact that there had been major limitations on African negotiating structure; thus it has not been able to achieve optimal results for the continent. One key gap has been dismal coordination of the African negotiation process. More importantly, there has not been visible continent wide political leadership on climate change negotiations in the UNFCCC process. The technical competence of the negotiators needs to be backed with the political weight at the highest level in the continent to have the desired impacts at global level. Secondly, the positions taken by the AU Assembly of Heads of State and Government need to be interpreted technically by the negotiators and translated into negotiating positions and texts. This will be one way of ensuring that the African voice on climate change negotiations is taken with the seriousness it deserves.

Water Scarcity On Horizon

2009-08-19T00:22:00.002-04:00

As we near the hump day of 2009's World Water Week, Worldwatch Institute reminds us that we are entering a time of water scarcity around the world, as population growth, climate change, pollution, and poor management conspire to put some 1.4 billion people in regions where water supply can not keep up with demand:

"Water scarcity" has several meanings. Physical water scarcity exists wherever available water is insufficient to meet demand: parts of the southwestern United States, northern Mexico, North Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, northern China, and southeastern Australia are characterized by physical water scarcity. Economic water scarcity occurs when water is available but inaccessible because of a lack of investment in water provision or poor management and regulation of water resources. Much of the water scarcity of sub-Saharan Africa falls into this category.

Somalia: World's Worst Humanitarian Crisis

2009-04-14T07:10:00.002-04:00

Despite the recent surge in media coverage, pirates and foreign toxic waste are hardly the most pressing issue facing the fledgling Somali government. In fact, according to a recent Refugees International report, Somalia presents a near perfect storm of failed-state conditions: a barely-functioning central government, a plethora of opposition groups, rampant crime and corruption, a persistent drought, a dependence on imported food aid, and a displacement of almost two million refugees and IDPs - about one-fifth of the population:

Somalis live in some of the worst conditions imaginable -- from the slums of Aden to the cramped camps in Dadaab, from drought-stricken villages in south central Somalia to teeming neighborhoods in Nairobi. Somalis die at sea while trying to reach Yemen, are threatened by boys and men with guns in Mogadishu, and face demands for bribes and harassment while trying to find asylum in Kenya. Almost nowhere can vulnerable Somalis receive the humanitarian assistance and protection that are their rights.

HRW: Extensive Evidence of Israeli War Crimes in Ghaza

2009-03-28T13:06:00.003-04:00

Human Rights Watch has released a new report documenting Israel's indiscriminate use of white phosphorous against civilian populations.

The unlawful use of white phosphorus was neither incidental nor accidental. It was repeated over time and in different locations, with the IDF "air-bursting" the munition in populated areas up to the last days of its military operation. Even if intended as an obscurant rather than as a weapon, the IDF's repeated firing of air-burst white phosphorus shells from 155mm artillery into densely populated areas was indiscriminate and indicates the commission of war crimes.

The dangers posed by white phosphorus to civilians were well-known to Israeli commanders, who have used the munition for many years. According to a medical report prepared during the hostilities by the ministry of health, "[w]hite phosphorus can cause serious injury and death when it comes into contact with the skin, is inhaled or is swallowed." The report states that burns on less than 10 percent of the body can be fatal because of damage to the liver, kidneys and heart.

The HRW report was not the only documentation of war crimes released this week - a collection of videos released by The Guardian highlight the use of unmanned drones, human shields, and deliberate attacks on medical personnel during this winter's genocide in Ghaza.

Food NGOs: Tilting at the Wrong Windmill?

2009-03-27T12:42:00.000-04:00

A coalition of organizations, led by Food & Water Watch, is urging Congress and President Obama to reform commodities markets to prevent excessive speculation, which the group cites as a primary cause of last year's global food security crisis. According to the authors, the food crisis “could have been stopped with sensible rules that, if enforced, would have staved off the malnutrition and starvation that was caused by excessive gambling of food prices. Important reforms are needed now to prevent mega-investors from viewing the futures market like a casino where they can gamble on hunger.”

While regulation may indeed be a good idea, there's certainly not a consensus that price speculation was a primary cause of the crisis. Economists are extremely divided (surprise, surprise!) over the cause of the crisis, and the role speculators play. Some argue that short-term speculators actually reduced volatility and moderated price increases. Others, like Paul Krugman, find a lack of evidence of hoarding that would suggest that speculators are to blame. And then, of course, there are those who place most of the blame on biofuel-fueled demand.

Fixing The Facts Around The Idiocy

2009-03-25T07:21:00.004-04:00

Now that's just cute.

Those infamous science-deniers at the Cato Institute are at it again, planning to publish an advertisement in major U.S. newspapers citing the number of scienticians and climatationists who disagree with President Obama's statement that "the science [of climate change] is beyond dispute and the facts are clear."

So far they've got only one signatory. His name is Name Here, and he apparently has a lot of similarly-named relatives also in the science-denial business.

Perhaps most infuriating is the cherry-picked pretzel logic of citations the author used to justify ridiculous positions like "there has been no net global warming for over a decade now" and "computer models forecasting rapid temperature change abjectly fail to explain recent climate behavior." Both of these examples no doubt take advantage of American public perception that we've just been through a particularly cold winter, even though globally it has in fact been the ninth-warmest winter on record. Thankfully, the folks at RealClimate have thoroughly destroyed the ad's premise with a vigorous hot fact injection:

The "global warming stopped" meme is particularly lame since it relies on both a feigned ignorance of the statistics of short periods and being careful about which data set you use. It also requires cherry-picking the start year, had the period been "exactly a decade" or 12 years then all the trends are positive.

The use of the recent Swanson and Tsonis paper is simply opportunism. Those authors specifically state that their results are not in any way contradictory with the idea of a long term global warming trend. Instead they are attempting to characterise the internal variability that everyone knows exists.

Pwned.(Pichlmair, 2007)

Adam Smith Was A Socialist?!?

2009-03-21T17:39:00.002-04:00

In a new article in the New York Review of Books, economist Amartya Sen discusses the current financial crisis in the context of seminal economists Adam Smith, John Maynard Keynes, and Arthur Cecil Pigou.

Though Sen lauds the Keynesian approach of economic stimulus in combating the crisis, he cautions that the social welfare aspects of Pigou and - yes - Adam Smith in ensuring access to non-market public goods such as education and health care:

While Keynes was very involved with the question of how to increase aggregate income, he was relatively less engaged in analyzing problems of unequal distribution of wealth and of social welfare. In contrast, Pigou not only wrote the classic study of welfare economics, but he also pioneered the measurement of economic inequality as a major indicator for economic assessment and policy. Since the suffering of the most deprived people in each economy—and in the world—demands the most urgent attention, the role of supportive cooperation between business and government cannot stop only with mutually coordinated expansion of an economy. There is a critical need for paying special attention to the underdogs of society in planning a response to the current crisis, and in going beyond measures to produce general economic expansion.

Tree Unemployment On The Rise

2009-03-18T13:12:00.002-04:00

According to a new report by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization the global economic crisis is not only impacting people around the world, but forests as well. Reduced demand for wood products as a result of the collapse of the housing sector is decreasing investment in forest management, diluting long-term green policies, and increasing illegal logging. The hardest-hit forests are in Africa, where forest recourses are being used as a coping strategy in the face of high fuel and food prices, and in Asia and the Pacific, where demand for wood products and rapid industrialization is far outpacing forest regrowth and development.

And just like the Chinese term wēijīhuì (危机会) is a linguistically-nonexistent mashup of "crisis" and "opportunity" often misquoted by Simpsons and lazy scholars alike, this economic crisis presents a "crisitunity" for the world's forests:

It is impossible to know when the global economy will begin to recover. However, such crises also offer opportunities to chart new paths of development. The forest sector could benefit from the pursuit of a “green path” to development – through building up of natural resource capital (e.g. through afforestation and reforestation and increased investments in sustainable forest management), generation of rural employment and active promotion of wood in green building practices and renewable energy. Certainly, this change of path will require fundamental institutional changes, but the crisis may bring about greater willingness to accept and implement long-overdue reforms.

Surprise! The Surge Didn't Work After All...

2009-03-12T06:21:00.001-04:00

According to an Oxfam survey of 1,700 Iraqi women, a reduction in violence since 2006 has not translated into improved living conditions. Poverty is rampant, electricity is sporadic, and nearly halfdo not have access to clean water.

"Women are the forgotten victims of Iraq. Despite the billions of dollars poured into rebuilding Iraq and recent security gains, a quarter of the women interviewed still do not have daily access to water, a third cannot send their children to school and since the war started, over half have been the victim of violence. And to add further insult more than three quarters of widows, many of whom lost their husbands to the conflict, get no government pension which they are entitled to," said Oxfam International Executive Director Jeremy Hobbs.

New Plan To End the Food Crisis: Stop Making Plans to End The Food Crisis

2009-01-29T21:08:00.002-05:00

A statement by members of the International Planning Committee for Food Sovereignty posted on the GRAIN web site presents an alternative to the usual initiatives being proposed by the usual suspects at the High-Level Meeting on Food Security for All. While the big donors, in collaboration with big agrobusiness, are pushing for comprehensive neo-liberal solutions such as a Green Revolution in Africa, the IPC is urging the international community to think small, with food soveriegnty replacing food security as the new (well, very retro) paradigm:

Contrary to the impression that is given by confused officials, a solution to the crisis exists and is easy to implement if there is sufficient political will. Peasant based agriculture and livestock raising and artisanal fisheries can easily provide enough food once these small-scale food producers can get access to land and aquatic resources and can produce for stable local and domestic markets. This model produces far more food per hectare than the corporate model, enables people to produce their own food and guarantees stable supply.

Endorois Demand a Better Slice of the Tourism Pie

2008-11-14T06:46:00.003-05:00

In an event marking World Responsible Tourism Day, November 12, Minority Rights Group International shed some light on the plight of Kenya's Endorois people, evicted from their traditional lands in the 1970s to make way for a nature reserve frequented by tourists.

The traditional lands of the 60,000 Endorois lay in what is now Lake Bogoria National Reserve, a 41-square mile river basin in the Rift Valley. The Endorois now no longer have access to vital grazing land or ceremonial sites, and receive only a pittance in tourism revenue.

Leader of the Endorois people, Wilson Kipkazi, says, "We welcome visitors to our country. But loss of our lands has forced my community into poverty. It is high time that we benefit fully from the income generated through tourism."

While in Lake Bogoria, tourists can visit reconstructions of typical Endorois village and watch locals perform traditional dances, yet they remain oblivious to the dispossession of the Endorois.

MRG has started the Trouble In Paradise campaign to right this injustice for the Endorois.

I Got Yer Conditional Cash Transfer Right Heah

2008-11-13T09:11:00.002-05:00

In the latest International Poverty Centre working paper, Michelle Morais de Sá e Silva offers a qualitative analysis of New York's controversial Opportunity NYC program. Based on conditional cash-transfer (CCT) programs in Latin America such as Brazil's Bolsa Família and Mexico's Oportunidades programs, Opportunity NYC provides cash rewards to students and families in low-income areas of the city for good attendance, participation in parent-teacher conferences, and obtaining a library card.

In a controversial departure from the Latin American models, Opportunity NYC also provides rewards for proficiency in standardized tests. This, as e Silva explains, may have some unintended consequences:

First, that may entail “leakage” of programme benefits to students who would achieve those grades regardless of the programme incentives. Second, in many cases the programme may come to reward not school effort but differences in family background and English-language proficiency, which is an important issue in a place like New York City with many immigrant families. That would ultimately mean that, if there is significant diversity of characteristics among the beneficiaries (which may be the case with Spark), the programme might actually be “rewarding the fittest”.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the program from a policy standpoint is its funding. Since the program is privately funded, it effectively bypassed any democratic oversight by the City Council or the court of public opinion. This may have significant impact on any future attempts to scale up the program from its current pilot phase.

HRW: More Peackeepers Needed in DRC

2008-11-12T11:50:00.000-05:00

Human Rights Watch has called on the UN Security Council to dramatically increase the number of peacekeepers in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo in order to protect civilians from violence in the ongoing coltan war. The already-overstreteched UN Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) estimates that an additional 3,000 soldiers and police officers are needed to slow the rising violence and protect vulnerable civilian populations.

As if the current situation weren't bad enough, a cholera outbreak is threatening tens of thousands of internally-displaced persons in camps around Goma. Medecins Sans Frontiers reports that there have been more than 80 cases so far, a number that could rise sharply if infected individuals flee camps due to continued violence.

Step-By-Step Guide To Becoming a Foreign Policy Expert

2008-09-22T14:16:00.004-04:00

Step 1. Visit the Alaskan island of Little Diomede, situated in the middle of the Bering Strait. Can't make it in person? No problem! This handy web-cam has made the trip for you!

Step 2. Look across the westernmost side of the island at neighboring Big Diomede. That's in Russia!

Step 3. Congratulations! You're now a foreign policy expert, qualified to run for Vice-President of the United States!

Reexamining the September 11 Attacks

2008-09-18T22:45:00.000-04:00

Forrest Hylton has created a Bolivia-For-Dummies-style synopsis of the 9/11 massacre of as many as thirty campesinos in Bolivia's oil-rich El Porvenir region. The culprit appears to be paramilitaries serving corrupt local government officials in the heart of the anti-Morales enclave. Though, as IPS' Haider Rizvi writes, much of Bolivia's opposition may have a very different funding source.

Bottled Water Demand Slowing in US

2008-09-12T22:03:00.002-04:00

According to the Worldwatch Institute, the demand for bottled water in the United States may be leveling off. The U.S. bottled water market is expected to grow by 6.7% this year - the smallest increase since the turn of the century. WI attributes much of this demand shift to changing consumer preferences resulting from public education campaigns and municipal bans:

While cities recycle about 23 percent of their plastic bottles, some 2 million tons of the bottles are sent to landfills each year, the Worldwatch Institute reported in 2007. Corporate Accountability International estimates that the annual cost of disposing of water bottles is $70 million.

These concerns are beginning to cause a shift in consumer choices. Following the lead of U.S. cities such as San Francisco and Salt Lake City, the majority of the 250 mayors at the annual U.S. Conference of Mayors in June voted to phase out government use of bottled water when possible. Bans on selling bottled water at city functions are also being considered across Canada, the United Kingdom, and Australia, according to Deborah Lapidus, the national organizer for Corporate Accountability International's Think Outside the Bottle Campaign.

Filmmaker Deported Exposing True Cost of Nigerian Oil

2008-09-11T22:13:00.001-04:00

Filmmaker Andrew Berends has been deported from Nigeria after he and his translator were detained and interrogated by the Nigerian State Security Service on charges of espionage. Berends was in the country documenting the daily life of residents of the Niger Delta, living in the environmental shadow of oil giants Chevron and Shell.

This is not the first time Nigeria has attempted to squash unfavorable coverage of their oil industry - in April, Nigerian authorities detained filmmaker Sandy Cioffi and her crew as they filmed the documentary Sweet Crude.

The Shame Index

2008-09-08T13:08:00.000-04:00

In a paper presented at the "Missing Dimensions of Poverty Data conference last year, Diego Reyles of the University of Oxford makes a compelling case for a new poverty indicator - shame and humiliation. Although economists from Adam Smith to Amartya Sen have written about the role of shame and stigma as a social dimension of poverty, there are no current standard indicators being used to measure these feelings of shame and humilation on an aggregate level.

Reyles proposes a matrix of eight questions, ranging from respondent's perception of poverty and poor people, to experience with ethnic and socioeconomic discrimination, to general perceptions of social barriers to economic advancement.

A Whole Lotta Duh

2008-09-04T14:33:00.000-04:00

A panel of developmentistas at the Accra High-Level Forum in Accra have agreed on the blindingly obvious: recipient countries need to listen to recipients now and then. The roundtable came up with the following recommendations:

Donors need to reduce conditionality, shifting away from unilaterally imposed policy conditions towards accountability on results, stronger dialogue between partners and medium term assessments of performance.
Donors need to make greater use of country systems to support their on-going strengthening. Partners need to continue their efforts to improve such systems country systems. When these are of quality, they must be used.
Aid must be made more predictable through multi-annual commitments on a rolling basis and innovative financing and delivery modalities.
Donors and partner countries must address the legal and administrative constraints limiting their capacity to meet the 2010 targets. The political support needed for these reforms calls for discussions on alignment to be opened up to all relevant stakeholders, such as CSOs and national Parliaments.

Bangkok: Dangerous?

2008-09-03T13:01:00.000-04:00

Amnesty International is urging the Thai government to lift free speech restrictions imposed as part of their declaration of a state of emergency in Bangkok. The emergency declaration comes after a week of protests calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej.

“The government is ultimately responsible for the security of all Thai citizens, regardless of their political views,” said Benjamin Zawacki, Amnesty International’s researcher on Thailand. “But the government should not use this state of emergency to silence free speech or infringe on other human rights.”

“International law is clear that even under a state of emergency people have the right to voice their opinions on all issues affecting them - including on the emergency decree itself - and to articulate viewpoints that differ from those of the government or groups they oppose”.

There's a Man Going Round Taking Names

2008-09-02T08:03:00.001-04:00

Thanks to a joint effort by UNICEF and international and local NGOs, a quarter of a million indigenous children in Nicaragua will soon have the most fundamental of all human rights - an identity. The Right to a Name and Nationality program works in the indigenous areas of Nicaragua's Atlantic coast to register children and adolescents who do not yet have a legal identity - a figure that may be as high as 40% of all Nicaraguan children.

Name and nationality is a fundamental human right enshrined in Article 7 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Official identity entitles children to health care, education, and civic participation, and helps prevent trafficking while also enabling the government to compile accurate census data and budgets. Plan International, one of the NGOs involved, has expanded the effort into a global program.

The root cause of the problem, according to UNICEF, is poverty:

UNICEF staff and municipal authorities with whom IPS spoke agreed that the main cause of the problem, besides the lack of education, is the extreme poverty plaguing the country’s indigenous people, 80 percent of whom live on less than a dollar a day, according to United Nations figures.

"People can’t afford to miss a single day of work in their fishing or farming activities, to leave the villages to register their children," said Marley.

Yow! That's a Lotta Elephants!

2008-08-18T17:39:00.000-04:00

OneWorld and the WorldWatch Institute highlight the growing issue of overpopulation, the 6.7-billion strong elephant in the room that development folks don't like to talk about. Over-population and high fertility rates play a significant role in increased poverty, food shortages, water competition, and climate change, issues that will only continue to get worse as the world population nears 9 billion in 2050. And while the Bush Administration has made some significant efforts at population reduction in the United States and Iraq, the consensus among development professionals is that educating women is a much better alternative to pointless war.

UNHCR: 100,000 IDPs Result of Georgia-Russia War

2008-08-14T08:12:00.000-04:00

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that the recent escalation of long-simmering tensions between Georgia and Russia has uprooted as many as 100,000 people. This figure is in additon to the 275,000 in the region already stateless and displaced from prior conflicts. UNICEF warns that women and children have been disproportionately victimized by the war, and that the region's children are at risk of long-term psychosocial impact:

We are trying to ensure that all children have basic health and hygiene needs taken care of,” Mr. [Benjamin] Perks [Deputy Representative of UNICEF in Georgia] says. “We have a particular problem… with institutionalized children and children with disabilities who have also been affected by the conflict and we’re making sure that social services are able to provide support for the especially vulnerable children who do not have the protection of a family.”

Mr. Perks says he’s also concerned about the psychological impact on children of the escalation in violence.

“Aerial bombardments, snipers, tanks – these are devastating for children and this is a number one concern that the huge escalation in violence and conflict will have a psychological impact not only on children but on their parents as well.”

Report: Shin Bet Extorting Espionage from Ill Ghazans

2008-08-06T13:37:00.002-04:00

Palestinian patients seeking necessary treatment are increasingly being denied exit visas by Israeli security forces, according to a new report by Physicians for Human Rights - Israel. In one of the more troublesome findings of the report, patients are being asked to act as collaborators and spy on Hamas activists as a condition for permission to exit Ghaza. This violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention comes in addition to the illegal blockade of Ghaza that has decimated the region's medical facilities, forcing patients to seek treatment in hospitals in Israel, Jordan, or the West Bank.

The following excerpt illustrates a typical experience of one of the denied patients:

Since the month of August or September 2007, I began feeling pain in the upper part of my right thighbone, as well as pain in my legs and back, constantly. In the past, about two years ago, I suffered from the same pain, but infrequently. ... In October, I was examined by physicians in Gaza, and x-rays were done on my right thigh. A tumor was found on the upper part of my right thighbone, but the type of tumor was not identified.

At the physicians’ recommendation, I was referred for an MRI test to diagnose my illness, at Al-Raiyeh al-Arabieh in Ramallah in the West Bank, as it was impossible to conduct the exam in the Gaza Strip. Therefore, I submitted a request to the Palestinian side, according to an appointment that was set for me at the Ramallah hospital for 4 December 2007. On 3 December 2007, I was informed by the Palestinian side that the Israeli side had approved the request I submitted, and that I was to go to Erez Crossing the following day.
....
At about 7:00 a.m., I reported at Erez Crossing with my mother... ,who escorted me, and received permission from the Palestinian side.

At 14:00, I was approached by two Israelis in civilian dress, who held my ID card. One of them asked my name. I was then taken to an examining room, where I was asked to remove my pants and shoes. They recorded my voice as well. I was led through corridors underground, and they put me in a waiting room for about twenty minutes.
...
I was then questioned about the Kataib Shuhada al-Aqsa organization. I responded that I had no connection with this organization, but the interrogation was focused on this point. Then the interrogator began accusing me of lying, and said that we in the Gaza Strip did not deserve to live, and that if he had the power, he would have disconnected us from electricity and water, and even prevented entry of food into the Gaza Strip.

Then the interrogator informed me that it was impossible to allow me to enter Israel, but I said I had no intention of entering Israel but rather Ramallah. He replied, “It is impossible for us to approve your entry. Security issues are in our hands, and your entry into Ramallah requires passage through Israel, and I am sorry but I cannot approve it for you,” although he had reviewed all my medical documents and I had explained my medical condition to him. He was not convinced by my documents and claimed that I did not appear to suffer from any illness.

Aid Groups Demand More Protection for Afghan Civilians

2008-08-05T10:43:00.002-04:00

The recent escalation of violence in Afghanistan has caused a surge of civilian casualties in recent months, according to a statement issued by the Agency Coordinating Body for Afghan Relief (ACBAR), a coalition of 100 NGOs working in Afghanistan. There were over 260 civilian casualties in July of 2008, more than any other month in the past six years. And, as Helena Cobban writes, these civilian casualties are at best a footnote in Western media. According to ACBAR, there's plenty of blame to go around:

Around two-thirds of the reported civilian casualties can be attributed to insurgent activities, especially the increasing use of suicide bombings and other indiscriminate attacks in civilian areas and the use of civilian property from which to launch attacks. The increased number of air strikes by international military forces, which are up by approximately 40 per cent on last year, has also contributed to the rising civilian death toll.

Searches conducted by Afghan and international forces have on some occasions involved excessive use of force, extra-judicial killings, destruction of property and/or mistreatment of suspects.

Adapting Development Policy to Rapid Urbanization

2008-08-04T12:37:00.000-04:00

A new paper by economists Michael Herrmann and Haider Khan examines the growing urbanization trend in the least-developed countries in Africa. Although Africa's population is still 75% rural, urban migration is accellerating, far outpacing the rate of job creation or infrastructure development in urban areas. This leads to increased crime, poverty, and social exclusion in urban areas.

Although the obvious response of development policy must be to encourage job creation in the urban formal sector, Herrmann and Khan suggest that a far more holistic approach is needed:

The data examined in this paper is showing that urban centers in African LDCs are witnessing a large influx of people, but that the cities in most African LDCs are suffering from a lack of jobs. Urban centers continue to be characterized by a rapid increase of un- and underemployment, and associated with this a rapid increase of poverty and slums. To use the picture of the u-shaped curve of urban development, many cities are at the downward slope and the challenge is to encourage a transition to the upward slope. Although this transition requires a better management of urban centers, it goes well beyond a narrow focus on the urban centers alone. It is important that the anti-urban bias, which has characterized development efforts in recent years, is not replaced by an anti-rural bias in the years to come. Indeed, we are arguing that successful urban development is closely linked to and cannot be separated from successful rural development. In accordance, we are encouraging development policies to focus on the strengthening of three linkages between informal and formal enterprises in the urban areas, linkages between small-scale farms and large commercial farms in the rural areas, and finally linkages between farms and firms across geographic locations.

Propulsionists Publish Planetary Pulse Projections

2008-08-03T12:57:00.001-04:00

A new web site produced by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory provides a snapshot of our planet's vital signs, as measured by Earth-observing satellites such as Jason-2 and AIRS and Terra. The prognosis, as reported on Gristmill, isn't too good - a current rate of sea level rise of 1.3 inches per decade that could accelerate to 6 in/decade by the end of the century.

DRC Peace Agreements Unraveling

2008-07-31T12:23:00.000-04:00

OnewWorld reports that the peace treaty signed in January in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is beginning to come apart as violence continues to plague the war-torn country. Recent outbreaks have killed 200 people and displaced 150,000. Child conscription are rape are once again being used as weapons of war, with over 2,200 rapes reported in North Kivu in June alone.

"Catastrophe In The Making" Looms in East Africa

2008-07-29T15:02:00.001-04:00

Oxfam America is warning that the global food crisis is reaching catastrophic proportions in parts of Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Tanzania. Recent droughts, food price inflation, pest infestations, and rising fuel costs have combined with already-chronic poverty and insecurity in the region to put as many as 13 million people in urgent need of humanitarian assistance:

In Somalia, the cost of imported rice increased by up to 350 percent between the beginning of 2007 and May 2008. In areas of Ethiopia, the price of wheat has more than doubled over a six-month period and food prices are expected to remain prohibitively high for many until the next harvest in October. In the areas of East Africa heavily dependent on food imports, such as Somalia, global food price rises are making food more expensive.

Although factors such as weather, pests, and biofuel food stock diversion certainly play a role, Africa's World Bank and WTO-enforced dependency on imported goods is by far the biggest culprit for the crisis, according to a new report by Food & Water Watch. Since the WTO went into effect in 1995, staple cultivation slowed while arable land was diverted to inedible cash crops. As an illustrative example, the growth in acreage of cocoa beans and cotton outpaced corn three to one, and millet three acres to two.

Sexual Harassment and Impunity Rampant in Egypt

2008-07-25T14:31:00.000-04:00

Nearly half of all women in Egypt, both foreign and local, are subjected to sexual harassment, according to a new study by the Egyptian Center for Women's Rights. Harassment happens most often in public places such as streets or public transportation, and the vast majority of the victims are veiled, according to the study:

31.9% of women who reported sexual harassment were dressed... wearing a blouse, long skirt and veil. 21.0% of women were wearing a longer blouse, pants, and veil... Figure 4 was third, where women were wearing a cloak and veil (20%) then figure 6 [wearing a full headcovering and cloak] (19.6%). These results disprove the belief that sexual harassment is linked to the way women dress (women are sexually harassed when dressed "indecently" or are not veiled - in the words of some participants), since 72.5% of victims surveyed were veiled.

We Can't Drill Our Way Out Of This One, Either:

2008-07-23T14:46:00.000-04:00

OneWorld has an excellent article today on the looming global water crisis, a threat that will make the food crisis and oil crisis and climate crisis pale in comparison. At this moment, over 1 billion people lack access to clean drinking water, and half of the world lacks access to basic sanitation. Yet despite efforts to bring this issue to public attention the water crisis is not mentioned by either U.S. presidential candidate. Why? Money, according to the authors:

The water crisis is not on the presidential agenda because there is no easy solution. Water is not free. The UNDP Human Development Report estimates that an additional $4 billion will have to be spent on clean water and sanitation projects each year for the next seven years to reach the Millennium Development Goal of halving the number of people without access to safe water by 2015. This is a conservative estimate. The British Department for International Development predicts that an additional $9.5 billion needs to be invested each year until 2015, while the World Health Organization believes an additional $11.3 billion needs to be spent on water projects each year for the next seven years.

Monckton Gets Moncktowned!

2008-07-22T15:30:00.003-04:00

Famed science denier and upper-class twit Viscount Monckton of Brenchley is adding even more comedy to his recent science-denying stunt in the non-peer-reviewed newsletter of the American Physical Society. After attempting to spin the fact that the APS printed his debunked, half-baked argument as "proof" that the American Physical Society had suddenly changed their views on the scientific consensus on climate change, the Viscount had the rug promptly pulled out from under him when APS added the following disclaimer to his article:

The following article has not undergone any scientific peer review. Its conclusions are in disagreement with the overwhelming opinion of the world scientific community. The Council of the American Physical Society disagrees with this article's conclusions.

After having been thoroughly trounced by the weight of his own poor argument, the Viscount is now fighting this injustice using the tried-and-true science-denier technique of whining about it in uproariously twittish fashion:

If the Council has not scientifically evaluated or formally considered my paper, may I ask with what credible scientific justification, and on whose authority, the offending text asserts primo, that the paper had not been scientifically reviewed when it had; secundo, that its conclusions disagree with what is said (on no evidence) to be the "overwhelming opinion of the world scientific community"; and, tertio, that "The Council of the American Physical Society disagrees with this article's conclusions"?

Iran Urged to Release Detained AIDS Experts

2008-07-21T14:28:00.001-04:00

Human Rights Watch is urging the government of Iran to either release or charge Kamiar and Arash Alaei, two prominent physicians who have been fighting AIDS and drug use in Iran for the past two decades. Since June 22, when they were seized by authorities, Kamiar and Arash Alaei have been detained in an undisclosed location, without access to counsel and without any charges being brought against them. These actions are in blatant violation of Iran's responsibilities under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. From the HRW press release:

Arash and Kamyar are well known in Iran and internationally for their contributions to HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment programs. For more than 20 years, the Alaei brothers have been active in addressing problems relating to drug use, with a focus on the spread of HIV/AIDS, and have played a key role in putting these issues on the national health care agenda. They have worked closely with government and religious leaders to ensure support for education campaigns on HIV transmission, including those targeting youth, and for HIV and harm reduction programs in prisons. They have also worked to share their expertise with neighboring countries by holding training workshops for Afghan and Tajik health care professionals.

RI: U.S. Aid to Africa Increasingly Militarized

2008-07-18T12:37:00.001-04:00

According to a new report by Refugees International, U.S. engagement with Africa is increasingly being dominated by the Pentagon rather than civilian diplomacy and aid agencies, with dire consequences for Africa's development and the already-tarnished U.S. image around the world. The report finds that the Department of Defense has had a major role in in directing foreign policy priorities and funding towards security activities, rather than the far more urgently-needed antipoverty and institutional development activities, while AFRICOM's humanitarian assistance activities dangerously blur the line between the military and civilian aid workers:

Although several high-level task forces and commissions have emphasized the urgent need to modernize our aid infrastructure and increase sustainable development activities, such assistance is increasingly being overseen by military institutions whose policies are driven by the Global War on Terror, not by the war against poverty. Between 1998 and 2005, the percentage of Official Development Assistance the Pentagon controlled exploded from 3.5% to nearly 22%, while the percentage controlled by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) shrunk from 65% to 40%.

This civil-military imbalance has particular ramifications for Africa, where Global War on Terror imperatives do not address the continent’s biggest needs for security assistance. The U.S. is only helping four African countries transform their armies and security agencies into professional organizations that protect citizens rather than abuse them. Resources are allocated in a manner that does not reflect the continent’s most pressing priorities. For example, the U.S. has allocated $49.65 million for reforming a 2,000-strong Liberian army to defend the four million people of that country. In contrast, it only plans to spend $5.5 million in 2009 to help reform a 164,000-strong army in the DR Congo, a country with 65 million people where Africa’s “first world war” claimed the lives of over five million people.

GWOT 2.0: A Peer-to-Peer Approach to Rebuilding Afghanistan

2008-07-16T16:44:00.000-04:00

Bob Spencer has an interesting essay in a recent Just World News entry. Spencer pronounces that the NATO-led effort to stabilize Afghanistan and defeat the influence of the Taliban is doomed to failure unless NATO and the Afghan government co-opt the peer-to-peer relationship building tactics of the Taliban. By mobilizing the weakest in society, rather than the elites, Spencer argues, NATO could reduce the Taliban's influence over peasant farmers:

NATO and the Afghan government are in danger of losing the conflict and causing severe and inept death and suffering to the Afghan people because: In a peasant-based insurgency, the side that is least politically effective is the side that will escalate the violence. Also, the side that is least politically effective will most often lose the conflict.

To test this hypothesis, an outside facilitator could use the “Developmental Approach to Community Change” as a strategy to achieve the following goals.

1.Organize long lasting political functions: recruitment, coalition building, conflict resolution, interests articulation, etc.
2.Displace the Taliban’s poppy production political advantage with more profitable products
3.Build community and national assets
4.Cause military and security operations to focus upon human, business and political networks instead of geographic objectives such as villages, districts and provinces.

The Not-So-Revolutionary "Green Revolution" in Africa

2008-07-15T16:57:00.002-04:00

The global food crisis has proven successful in raising a bumper crop of one commodity - repeated calls for a Green Revolution in Africa. Developmentistas like Jeffrey Sachs rail about the need to increase food yields in Africa, and throw heaps of praise on initiatives like the Rockefeller Foundation's Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) program.

However, as Naomi Klein warns us on today's Democracy Now, this revolution may benefit the agribusiness and biotechnology industries far more than African farmers and consumers. As Mariam Maryet of the African Centre for Biosafety warned last year about AGRA:

The Rockerfeller Foundation prescribes a fundamental transformation of Africa’s agricultural economy, premised on a brutal departure from the use of traditional seeds and local knowledge and exchange systems. Drawing heavily on Conway, the Foundation recommends the application of modern laboratory made seeds and inorganic fertilizers as being key to Africa’s agricultural development and food security. These prescriptions are principally based on the ‘old’ Asian model of adopting high-yielding agricultural techniques. However, the Rockerfeller Foundation also promotes the production of crops that are drought tolerant and resistant to pests and diseases, and which provides greater nutritional value.

The Foundation also supports the use of GM seeds, both as a means to increasing crop yields and representing a ‘greener’ revolution that is less dependent on chemical inputs. The promotion of GM seeds and crops is thus an integral part of the new Green Revolution project. The emphasis of Africa’s Green Revolution on avoiding the shortcomings wrought by the use of agricultural chemicals by the Asian Green Revolution makes the role of GM seeds crucial ingredient in the project.

With governments under pressure to "just do something" about the food crisis, the temptation to introduce more GM crops as a solution to increasing food supply will be great, despite the fact that GM crops do not increase crop yields and often lower crop yields.

Cough Cough Cough, Cough Cough Iran

2008-07-14T14:20:00.003-04:00

The political punditry is having a bit of fun over Senator John McCain's latest attempt at foreign diplomacy. While discussing a survey that reported increased cigarette exports to Iran, McCain responded by saying,"Maybe that's a way of killing them," as if carpet-bombing a strip between the Persian Gulf and the Natanz reactor won't be quite enough.

Of course, the tobacco industry is already way ahead of the warmongering Senator. A recent WHO report highlights the aggressive targeting of the greater Middle East by Big Tobacco in the last few decades, including a 1984 Brown & Williamson campaign to use the holy cleansing month of Ramadan to get Muslim smokers to switch to low-tar cigarettes:

Lights Ramadan creative brief

The Holy Month of Ramadan is a time of fasting, in order to practice self restraint and cleanse the body. It is therefore a time when Muslims try to live a healthier life and it is believed that many people may try to give up smoking.

Smoking during daylight hours is banned until the Iftaar canon goes off around 6:30pm. Therefore smokers will not have had a cigarette for around 14 hours.

This being the case it is reasonable to assume that after such a period of abstinence the tar/nicotine levels of a Lights/U.L.T. brand may be more acceptable to consumers than at normal times. This coupled with a desire to lead a healthier life may provide an opportunity to get smokers to switch.

In addition, during Ramadan the level of support/activity for competitive brands are significantly reduced (both in advertising and at point of sale) allowing us to be more prominent with lesser funds.

By some WHO estimates, the campaign has been a resounding success, with tobacco use among 13-15 year olds reaching 25% in Iran, 30% in the UAE, and 40% in Lebanon. Cigarette smoking is highest in Jordan and the West Bank, where almost 20% of teenagers are current smokers. Additionally, some 50% of Iranian teenagers are exposed to secondhand smoke in public places, and 40% exposed to secondhand smoke at home.

The unanimous Declaration of the fifty united States of America

2008-07-04T12:23:00.004-04:00

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

“Tired of living, but afraid of dying. What can I do?”

2008-07-03T20:47:00.001-04:00

Amnesty International has issued a very critical report on Mauritania's illegal detention of migrants and asylum-seekers, often at a nameless and legally-ambiguous detention facility in Nouadhibou that's been dubbed "Guantanamito" by migrants and human rights advocates. Mauritania's proximity to Spain's Canary Islands has made it a major launching point for West Africans seeking to escape poverty and conflict in their home countries. As a result, Mauritania has come under increasing pressure from the government of Spain and the EU's FRONTEX agency to stop the flow of attempted migration to Europe. In direct violation of the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families, Mauritania continues to detain thousands of migrants each year, expelling them to Mali or Senegal or dumping them in a mine-laden no-man's land dubbed "Kandahar":

Amnesty International reiterates that international law states that detention must be an exception and not the rule. International standards expressly restrict recourse to detention and demand that prisoners and their fundamental rights are respected. They also affirm that special attention must be given to particularly vulnerable groups, notably women and children. In its fight to protect the rights of uprooted people, Amnesty International has adopted positions on several questions related to the fundamental rights of migrants and refugees. Anyone placed in detention must be promptly brought before a judicial authority and have the option of disputing the legality of the decision to imprison. In Mauritania, the right to appeal against the legality of their detention is systematically refused to migrants accused of wanting to travel to Europe irregularly and it seems clear that the intense pressure exercised by the EU and especially Spain on the Mauritanian government contributes to the violation of this fundamental right.

Then I heard someone saying the word ‘ambulance.’

2008-07-01T20:29:00.002-04:00

Khalid Amaryeh has a chilling account on Palestine Think Tank today about the beating and torture of Palestinian journalist Muhammed Omer of Rafah Today by Shin Bet agents at the Allenby Bridge border crossing into the illegally-occupied West Bank:

“Telling me I haven’t seen anything yet, they dragged me to another room where they interrogated me on my speaking tour in Britain, Sweden and Greece.

“’Oh, you have not left a place in Europe without speaking at… You know these Europeans, they hate Israel.’

“Then another Shin Bet officer began kicking me and pushing me. This lasted for more than ten minutes after which I fainted and lost consciousness. Eventually they began dragging me along the floor by my feet with my head banging on the floor.

“I don’t remember much of what happened to me during this period, but remember a Shin Bet officer piercing his finger right below my eyes and at the lower end of ears. Also, another Shin Beth officer was pressing his large boots against my neck as I was lying unconscious on the ground.

“I thought I was dying. I remained in a state of unconsciousness for up to 90 minutes until a medical doctor, who was carrying an M-16, performed an (electro-cardiogram) or ECG on me.

“Then I heard someone saying the word ‘ambulance.’

“However, before a Palestinian ambulance from Jericho arrived, a Shin Bet officer came to me and asked me to sign a form that I was not being maltreated by the Shin Bet.

The End of Beijing?

2008-06-30T20:47:00.003-04:00

Chinese environmentalist Dai Qing warns that Beijing's "Green Olympic" makeover, combined with a decline in rainfall, is straining the capital's water resources to the breaking point. According to Probe International, the city's 200 rivers and streams are drying up, reservoirs are being depleted, and If the current level of development and population growth continues, the ciy could collapse in five to ten years. To slake the capital's growing thirst, Beijing has begun draining water from neighboring provinces, and the proposed North-to-South Water Diversion Project will divert Shanghai-bound "surplus" water from the Yangtze.

Water Water Everywhere, Except Maybe Zambia Per Se

2008-06-27T22:49:00.002-04:00

Zambia provides a useful case study in how to make delivery of urban water services more efficient. As Hulya Dagdeviren writes in the latest IPC One-Pager, the solution is simple: jack up the price and provide less water. Sinze Zambia's water sector was commercialized in the mid-1990s, tariffs have increased by a magnitude of seven, while the percentage of the population with access to clean water dropped from 72% to 57% over ten years. What happened? Dagdeviren examined this in depth earlier this year:

A major study was funded by the government, the World Bank and the UNDP and undertaken by a private consultancy firm, Coopers and Lybrand Co., to assess the issues in the water and sanitation sector and inform the government about the possible reform strategies. The study found that the revenues of urban suppliers covered 83 per cent of total operational and maintenance costs in 1987. When this is compared to the average cost recovery of 67 per cent in 2005 it becomes pertinent to ask what has gone wrong in the process of commercialization.

Apart from the fact that each water and sanitation company has a different cost structure, the failure to cover costs after the commercialization of water services and variations in performance can largely be explained by two factors. First, and perhaps most important, all existing providers suffer from high levels of unaccounted for water (UFW) that make cost recovery a mission impossible. UFW reflects the difference between the amount of water produced and the amount that is billed.

But just what is UFW? Transparency International has some ideas. Corruption in the water delivery sector occurs everywhere from the design phase to safety regulation to under-the-table service delivery, adding 25-30% to the costs of water and irrigation.

Shit Piss Fuck Cunt Cocksucker Motherfucker Tits

2008-06-25T13:52:00.000-04:00

Amy Goodman has a great column today on the tragically late George Carlin. Although the obits have focused mainly on his Seven Dirty Words sketch, Goodman talks about Carlin the dissident, railing against the power of the political/corporate machine, and his seminal role in bringing listener-supported public radio to prominence:

It was neither accident nor coincidence that this iconoclastic comic would have some of his most controversial material broadcast over Pacifica Radio’s WBAI. The Pacifica Network was founded in Berkeley, Calif., in 1949, with KPFA as the first truly listener-sponsored radio station.

Back then, radio was so overwhelmingly commercial that Pacifica founder Lew Hill and others found it worthless. As Hill wrote in his “Theory of Listener Sponsored Radio,” “If we want an improvement in radio, the basic situation of broadcasting must be such that artists and thinkers have a place to work—with freedom.”

Hey America - How About Some Cheese To Go With That Whine?

2008-06-23T21:03:00.002-04:00

While the pundits are punding and the White House is wanding and certain Presidential candidates are itching to drive some long, hard shafts into some subterranean sex holes over the unprecedented $4.00/gallon price of gas nationwide, Kevin Ummel of the Center for Global Development provides a bit of much-needed perspective. First of all, drivers in the United States are still paying far less per gallon than drivers in many other industrialized countries. Secondly, the $4.00 we're paying at the pump doesn't factor in all the social and environmental costs of crude:

How much does gas really cost?

The answer is different than the one on the pumping station billboard. Let's try to discern the full cost of our addiction to gasoline: the healthcare costs associated with air and water pollution caused by the nasty compounds released from gasoline, the damage to crops, buildings, and forests, and the tax breaks and subsidies to oil companies. Terry Tamminen (energy advisor to California Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger) tallies these social and environmental costs in his book Lives Per Gallon and comes to the following conclusion:

So there it is, the final Devil's invoice, the amount we pay to keep the needle from hitting ‘empty’: well over $100 billion each year and perhaps closer to $1 trillion. That comes to as much as $2,700 for every man, woman, and child in the United States every single year. That works out to $1 per gallon and possibly as much as $6 per gallon added to the actual price of every gallon…For that kind of money, we could provide health insurance for the forty-five million Americans who have none and build fifteen hundred new schools in every state in the union.

Those figures don't include the sizable military costs of keeping the oil flowing in less than desirable places, nor does it include the impacts of future climate change in the U.S. due to the 20 pounds of planet-warming carbon dioxide released from every gallon of gasoline. But even this conservative estimate suggests that the true price of a gallon of gasoline right now is not $4 but at least $5 and as much as $10.

Before we give the oil industry a parting gift from BushCo that won't impact the price at the pump, we need to also look at the other effects of drilling in wildlife refuges, offshore ecosystems, national parks, and human lives. The people of the Niger Delta can tell you all about the impacts of oil drilling on human lives.

Instead of looking for new ways to feed our addiction, we need to be weaning ourselves off of the petrochemical teat. Measures such as switching to organic farming and better urban design and serious alternative energy investment.

Democracy Denied: Zimbabwe Edition

2008-06-23T07:33:00.002-04:00

In the wake of pre-election violence that has left 86 supporters dead and 200,000 displaced, Zimbabwe's Movement for Democratic Change has pulled out of the June 27 runoff election. This will guarantee President-For-Life Robert Mugabe a nearly uncontested victory in the sham election. Of course, this is just the latest slice of the human-rights violation pie that is Zimbabwe today, with torture, mass evictions, and economic insanity just a tragic part of daily life.

How About A Nice Ceasefire Sandwich?

2008-06-19T12:17:00.003-04:00

So first the good news - the day-old Israel-Hamas truce is holding, for now. However, while the rocket attacks and military incursions have halted, the massive food insecurity crippling Ghaza and the West Bank has not. Rising food prices, massive unemployment, restricted movement in the West Bank, and the complete closure of Ghaza are having a devastating effect on the Palestinian population. According to a new World Food Programme report, West Bank residents are spending on average about 56% of their income on food, while Ghazans are spending 66 agorats per sheckel to eat. With about 1/3 of the population unemployed, Palestinians are having to rely on dwindling credit, and international assistance to keep their families fed:

There is excessive use of negative coping strategies by the population. Having already sold disposable assets, 59 percent of households are now relying on credit to buy food. However this coping mechanism is increasingly exhausted and only available to those with a reliable income. There is progressively less informal credit availability (due to retailers’ own uncertainties) and traders are extending credit only for essential items.
The majority of Palestinians have not paid their utility bills (water and electricity) for many months. 31 percent still rely on this strategy, however almost half of Palestinian households have already exhausted this possibility.
...
Food aid and other safety nets have played a major role in preventing an even higher number of people falling into poverty and food insecurity. In the GS, 60 percent of households cite emergency assistance as a secondary source of income. The corresponding figure in the WB is only 1.6 percent.
76 percent of households in the GS have received some type of in-cash or in-kind assistance in the past three months, with higher levels of coverage for refugees, particularly amongst the poorest segments of the population. 23 percent of households have been assisted in the WB.
The majority of assisted households received food assistance (almost 90 percent). Health care and cash/job assistance were received by 59 percent and 51 percent of the households who reported receipt of assistance, respectively

To add injury to injury, Palestinians hoping to distract themselves from their massive unemployment and chronic food insecurity through religious, educational, or cultural activities are shit out of luck. According to a recent UN Human Rights Council report, Israel's restrictions on movement severely impede Palestinian cultural and religious rights guaranteed under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Geneva Conventions:

During the reporting period, the measures adopted by the Government of Israel to restrict freedom of movement of both people and goods in the Occupied Palestinian Territory severely impeded the population’s access to religious sites, notably in Jerusalem, cultural exchanges and events. The justification for the closure regime repeatedly cited by the Israeli authorities was the need to provide security and protection to all people within its jurisdiction. While the security of the population is undoubtedly an important consideration, the relevant measures should be proportionate to that aim and non-discriminatory in their application. A considerable part of the restrictions were introduced to ensure and ease freedom of movement for the inhabitants of Israeli settlements, which have been established in breach of international law, creating intolerable hardship for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians attempting to exercise their right to freedom of movement inside the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

But hey, good luck with that whole cease-fire thing!

Justice Delayed: Río Negro Killers Sentenced

2008-06-18T16:40:00.001-04:00

Five former Guatemalan paramilitaries were sentenced to 30 years in prison for their roles in the Río Negro massacre, one of the most brutal events of the Guatemalan civil war. Although this sentencing comes as a relief to survivors of the event, it is unlikely that the real perpetrators will be brought to justice, according to The Advocacy Project:

The Río Negro massacre occurred after an indigenous community at Río Negro refused to relocate and make way for the Chixoy Hydroelectric Dam, a massive government energy project supported by The World Bank. After 74 villagers were killed in February 1982, most of the men fled to the hills. Early on March 13, 1982, army soldiers and a civil patrol from the nearby village of Xococ arrived at Río Negro, and murdered 177 women and children. Many of the victims were raped and tortured.
...
The sentences bring to eight the number of individuals who have now been jailed for the Río Negro massacre, and the new verdict represents a vindication for the persistence of ADIVIMA and the relatives of those who died. "Justice was served," said Juan de Dios García, the Director of ADIVIMA.

Ms [Heidi] McKinnon [Heidi McKinnon, a Peace Fellow from The Advocacy Project] agreed: "What I witnessed was a historic event in Guatemala. It was a victory for every survivor." But she also concedes that the victory was bittersweet: "When you are seated a few feet away from a murderer who is over 70, speaks no Spanish and has trouble even walking, it can make one pause and wonder whose definition of justice is being served by such a sentence. Who is more culpable, the man who pulled the trigger or the man who bought him the gun and told him who he should kill if he wanted to stay alive and keep his family safe?"

To date, neither the ranking officer who ordered the Río Negro massacre nor any soldiers have been tried, although there is an order for capture outstanding on an army colonel who participated in the violence.

Who's to Blame for South Africa's Power Crisis?

2008-06-16T23:04:00.000-04:00

Zimbabwe is not the only southern African nation undergoing a bit of a power struggle of late. In South Africa, it has become quite a struggle for the power to stay on for more than a few hours at a time. Blackouts have become an epidemic, wreaking havoc on health, education, and the nation's economy. Kate Bayliss discusses the origins of the crisis in the latest IPC One-Pager.

The crux of the biscuit, according to Bayliss, was the privatisation plan set in motion soon after the Breton Woods institutions and the GATT got their hands on the country's post-apartheid economy. The state utility Eskom planned a major restructuring and reform in the early 1990s, stopped construction of municipal power plants and infrastructure in the mid 1990s in anticipation of a massive influx of private sector investment in the power generation industry in the early 2000s that rather inconveniently failed to happen. What did happen, as Trevor Ngwane wrote in April, was the loss of 30,000 Eskom jobs, massive cost increases to residential consumers, and the purging of millions of customers who could no longer pay the now-inflated power bills. And now, with blackouts occuring daily, Eskom is finally planning to boost its generation capacity through a combination of loans and further price hikes.

Still, you can hardly blame Eskom or the South African government. It's not like anyone could have predicted the failure of the power grid. Or could they:

Eskom is the world’s fourth largest electricity utility, with an installed generating capacity of about 39 000 MW in 1997. The maximum demand in 1997 was about 28 330 MW. Eskom’s latest Integrated Electricity Plan forecasts for an assumed demand growth of 4,2% that Eskom’s present generation capacity surplus will be fully utilised by about 2007. Timely steps will have to be taken to ensure that demand does not exceed available supply capacity and that appropriate strategies, including those with long lead times, are implemented in time. The next decision on supply-side investments will probably have to be taken by the end of 1999 to ensure that the electricity needs of the next decade are met.

Immediate Debt Relief Urged For Haiti

2008-06-14T11:18:00.004-04:00

World leaders attending the G8 Finance Ministers Meeting this weekend in Osaka, Japan are being urged by a coalition of Members of Congress, religous leaders, and other concerned citizens to provide immediate debt relief to Haiti. The impoverished island nation, despite its recent addition to the HIPC initiative, is still saddled by over $1.3 billion in debt to the Inter-American Development Bank and International Development Association. This results in the country being forced to pay well over $1 million in debt payments weekly while its citizens suffer under growing food prices, inadequate health care system and crushing poverty.

In the words of Paul Farmer from the Jubilee USA press release:

Every day in Haiti we see the distal effects of the government’s crippling debt to international financial institutions in a lack of clean water, good roads, schools with no hidden fees, access to adequate nutrition, and scarce medical resources. The burden of hunger and disease continues to grow, advancing unnecessary suffering and increased mortality; the recent food riots are only one symptom of the chronic and inevitable underfunding of public sector social support in a country so constrained by its obligation to foreign banks. We urge Treasury and the G8 to immediately engage in canceling Haiti’s debt and debt repayments, so that the Haitian government can use its income to support those who need it most: the Haitian people.

World Day Against Child Labour 2008

2008-06-12T10:33:00.001-04:00

On this, the 2008 World Day Against Child Labor, the ILO’s International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) is announcing the blindingly obvious: that education is the "right response" to child labor. A new ILO report based on SIMPOC surveys of child labor and education finds the usual: that child labor affects attendance rates, dropout rates, enrollment ratios, and human capital formation, and that child labor is going to prevent the world from reaching either Education For All or Millennium Development Goals.

Encouragingly, IPEC is acknowledging the role of education quality as a driver of child labor. From the WDACL 2008 page:

More than ever today, children need a good quality education and training if they are to acquire the skills necessary to succeed in the labour market. However, in many countries the schools which are accessible to the poor families are under-resourced and inadequate. Poor facilities, over-sized classes, and lack of trained teachers lead to low standards of education.

Victory for Humanity in Egypt

2008-06-11T22:23:00.001-04:00

Egypt's Shura Council has recently passed several amendments to the country's child law that represent major victories for the rights of women and children. The new amendments raise the minimum age for marriage to 18, allow children born out of wedlock to receive a birth certificate, and criminalize the practice of Female Genital Mutilation. Although the measures have met with resistance from some conservative religious groups, they have been endorsed by Egypt's top Muslim cleric, the Mufti Ali Juma, who branded the practice of FGM as sinful and un-Islamic.

But What Shall We Do With All This Carbon Leakage?

2008-06-10T17:36:00.002-04:00

In an event held yesterday at the Brookings Institution on climate change, trade, and competitiveness, Harvard Kennedy School professor Jeff Frankel and Brookings Institution scholar Jason Bordoff presented papers on the issue of carbon leakage, the shift of CO₂ pollution from the developed to the developing world, with no net reduction in global CO₂ emissions, that can result from poorly-designed climate change policies.

Frankel focuses on the perverse and often baffling relationship between the World Trade Organization and the Kyoto Protocol. Although the WTO's establishing documents recognize protection of the environment as one of the organization's founding principles, there is an overarching legal conundrum in that greenhouse gases (GHGs) are Processes and Production Methods in the eyes of the WTO, and potentially outside the scope of import barriers. Frankel proposes, however, that border methods such as carbon permits or import tariffs need not necessarily violate WTO standards as long as they follow mutually-agreed guidelines for emissions targets, compliance is measured by independent bodies of experts, penalties are narrowly-targeted to specific energy-intensive industries, and are only applied by countries already participating in agreements such as Kyoto (hint, hint, United States).

Bordoff is a tad less optimistic on the utility of border adjustments, citing the fine line between environmental protection and carbon protectionism, and suggests some downright Keynesian measures such as auctioning of carbon allowances, promotion of green jobs through a carbon price displacement assistance program, and greater R&D investment via a progressive tax policy. :monocle:

NGO: Iraq Government Unprepared for Return of Refugees

2008-06-09T10:50:00.001-04:00

A recent press release from Refugees International warns of dire circumstances for more than 4.7 million displaced Iraqis should they attempt to return to their homes, due to the Iraqi government's lack of a concrete plan for resettling refugees and internally-displaced persons. Indeed, the Iraqi government is currently making the situation worse by evicting squatters on government property.

Although the security situation in Iraq is not stable enough to allow refugees to return to Iraq, according to RI many refugees may have no other option:

Refugees International is concerned that if Iraqis return they will join the ranks of the millions displaced inside Iraq, as sectarian cleansing will prevent them from going back to their original homes. The primary reason Iraqis are even considering returning home is because of dwindling resources in their countries of exile, not confidence in their future safety and security. Visa restrictions often prevent Iraqis from working, and after months in exile, many Iraqi refugees are running out of the savings that have provided food and housing thus far. Support of the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) and the host nations of Jordan, Lebanon and Syria would ensure that refugees will not face additional hardship.

Of course, if the Iraqi government is unable to help, Iraq's Hezbollah-like militias will be more than willing to fill the vacuum, a privatization of government services that should make Grover Norquist quite proud of his creation.

Research Finding: Hindsight IS 20-20!

2008-06-03T14:45:00.001-04:00

Jörn Birkmann's recent research paper on the United Nations University web site provides a shocking insight into the field of natural disaster vulnerability assessment: they're much more accurate if you conduct them AFTER a natural disaster.

Shocking!

All snarking aside, Birkmann does have some good points. Many of the livelihood impacts of a natural disaster are impossible to assess prior to the onset of a natural disaster, particularly in terms of infrastructure loss, market access, and complications caused by conflict. Impacts should also not be assessed in economic terms alone, but should also take into account social and environmental factors. However, Birkmann also seems to downplay the role of human-induced impacts on livelihoods following a natural disaster, such as the beachfront land-grabs by the high-end tourism industry that followed the 2004 tsunami in Sri Lanka:

Even though the buffer zone is generally considered an important instrument in preventing people from settling too close to the sea, the injustice generated by the handling of the matter (the lack of transparency and lack of reliability resulting from frequently amended rules) created tension and frustration, particularly for people still living within the 100 metre limit, or those being relocated. However, damage patterns in Galle and Batticaloa clearly indicated a strong correlation between risk exposure and damage. Thus, the proposed ban on construction within the immediate proximity of the sea should be taken into consideration in future development plans. However, various exemptions for hotels, for example, have undermined the logic and effectiveness of the buffer zone.

The King Relents! Long Live The King!

2008-06-02T15:03:00.001-04:00

Last week there was much rejoicing in the Kingdom of Burger, as the masked monarch finally agreed to pay its tomato pickers an extra penny per pound. As reported previously on the 'sphere, the King had been resisting the campaign by the Coalition of Immokalee Workers to increase the wages of its tomato pickers, a measure that would double the wages of the farm workers but cost the multibillion-dollar corporation a mere $300,000.

Forecast: Food Prices Will Stay High, Poor Will Get Screwed

2008-05-30T16:49:00.002-04:00

A new report from the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development and the Food and Agriculture Organization forecasts that food prices will remain high for the next decade, and may continue to increase, further straining the world's 862 million poor and malnourished people. Not surprisingly. biofuels get a large heap of the blame. To address this continuing commodity calamity, OECD prescribes more of the same policies that helped create the problem:

“The way to address rising food prices is not through protectionism but to open up agricultural markets and to free up the productive capacity of farmers, who have proven repeatedly that they will respond to market incentives,” said OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría at the Outlook’s launch in Paris. “Governments can also do more to foster growth and development in poor countries, so as to improve the purchasing power of the most vulnerable food buyers.”

"We're going to fuck you where it hurts most bitches."

2008-05-28T16:42:00.001-04:00

On May 25, the women of Nuestras Hijas de Regreso a Casa, a nonprofit organization calling attention to the rampant outbreak of unsolved femicides in the maqiladora town of Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, received this lovely, almost Trajan-esque anonymous email:

"Fucking old fools with making yourselves famous you already showed your arses with the film Bordertown. Don't carry on robbing the mothers who deserve help, leave Juárez now if you don't like it. Leave the people of Juárez in peace we're sick to death of your fucking bullshit complaints. We're going to fuck you, fucking gossips and exaggerators. Don't be surprised if one day we take your daughters and send them back to you in pieces. We're going to fuck you where it hurts most bitches. Most of all the whore Malu Garsia (sic) and the hypocrite Maricela (sic). Take care because soon you'll have unpleasant news."

This is by no means the first threat received by the women of Nuestras Hijas, who have been increasingly receiving phone, email, and text message threats in the run-up to the Mexican release of Bordertown, a movie based on the Ciudad Juárez killings. Amnesty International is appealing to the international community to demand an investigation into these anonymous threats, and justice for the women of Chihuahua.

The Sex-For-Food Scandal

2008-05-27T23:24:00.001-04:00

A new report from Save The Children UK exposes the continuing problem of abuse and exploitation of children by international aid workers. The STC report highlights the most frightening aspect of problem: the underreporting of sexual abuse and violence.

STC's researchers conducted interviews and focus groups with UN and NGO aid workers in Southern Sudan, Haiti, and Côte d’Ivoire. A full two-thirds of staff interviewed could cite as many as ten incidents of verbal sexual abuse and half could cite incidents of coerced sex or touching. Despite this anecdotal evidence of widespread abuse, very few cases of sexual abuse by aid workers are ever reported - in 2006, there were only 371 allegations of abuse reported against the staff of 41 UN agencies. This is a disturbingly small total, considering that there are more than 200,000 UN peacekeepers alone.

Among the obstacles to reporting are fears that reporting abuse will lead to cutting off of aid or other forms of retaliation, fears that reporting abuse will stigmatize victims and make them less valuable to future suitors, lack of effective law enforcement systems in the countries where abuse is taking place, and lack of knowledge by victims and their families of their rights and the procedures for reporting abuse. STC cites a series of recommendations for closing this gap in reporting:

Effective local complaints mechanisms should be set up in-country to enable people to report abuses against them.
A new global watchdog should be established to monitor and evaluate the efforts of international agencies to tackle this abuse and to champion more effective responses.
Tackling the root causes or drivers of abuse should become a greater priority for governments, donors and others in the international community, including the development of stronger child protection systems at the national level.

Honor the Fallen by Ending the War

2008-05-26T13:24:00.004-04:00

This Memorial Day, while the President and the Pentagon poop out their usual bland rhetoric celebrating the 4,082 pointless deaths and 85,000 injuries they've caused in a war over a lie, Code Pink proposes a better Memorial Day gift to our troops: an end to the Iraq War. And maybe some Freeway Blogging.

We do not honor our loved ones by accepting the continued loss of life in a reckless, irresponsible war that has no military solution. We do not honor the troops by standing by indifferently as members of the Congress give their sneering Commander-in-Chief a blank check to continue a war based on a tidal wave of lies and hubris.

We honor the fallen by beginning an immediate redeployment from Iraq and by showing our determination to stop a new war with Iran. We honor the fallen by making sure that those who return from Iraq and Afghanistan receive all the help they need for their education, and their physical and mental health. We honor the fallen by taking action, by making peace.

Global Peace Index: We're Number 97! We're Number 97!

2008-05-21T13:55:00.001-04:00

The 2008 Global Peace Index is out, and the United States has ranked 97th, in between Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago. This is a slight disimprovement over last year's ranking of 96. The index, which compiles 24 indicators including violent crime, relations with neighboring countries, potential for terrorist acts, and military expenditure, has been endorsed by the likes of Joseph Stiglitz and Muhammad Yunus.

Oh, well. Wait till next year!

A Jihad For Love: So They DO Have Gays in Iran!

2008-05-20T14:10:00.001-04:00

Democracy Now today interviews Indian filmmaker Parvez Sharma, director of the new film A Jihad For Love, a documentary exploring the lives of gay and lesbian Muslims in twelve countries. The profiled individuals and couples, including a South African imam, an Egyptian exile, and a "nonexistent" Iranian homosexual, all face daily struggles of isolation and persecution that make John Hagee sound tame.

In the interview, Sharma explains his film's title:

I mean, there’s this battle for the soul of Islam. “Jihad” is almost an English-language word now. And this whole idea of the Jihad al-Nafs, which is the struggle with the self, and the greater jihad within Islam is rarely spoken about. I feel there is a very major movement right now in Islamic thought for progressive Muslim voices to take back some of the discussions that have been taken away from us. So this whole idea of taking “jihad,” a very contested word, and putting it right next to “love,” I think is very powerful. Some of the critics think that the title is silly and ridiculous, but I think it really explains the film.

“America Don't Worry! Israel is Behind You!”

2008-05-19T16:34:00.001-04:00

Nadia Hasan's latest article in Palestine Think Tank is an insightful piece that merely scratches the surface of the U.S. corporocratic campaign in the greater Middle East. The seed of the story is a t-shirt she saw during a trip to Jerusalem several years ago that read "“America Don’t Worry! Israel is Behind You!”. At the time, she remarked that the names should have been reversed, given the United States's near-unconditional support for Israel at the urging of many powerful lobbying organizations. She then later realized the ironic truth of the t-shirt's slogan:

The recent events in Lebanon and in recent months in the Occupied Palestinian Territory of Gaza Strip proves that certain international and regional powers are continuing efforts to implement their “master plan” of chaos for the region as the first step in a greater plan to make their domination permanent.

This is not a conspiracy theory as many are saying, is just the result of decades of efforts from the imperialistic powers to gain the control of certain strategic areas in the Arab Homeland and to control Arab oil and monopolize their market. For that reason these incidents are not limited just to Lebanon. Sometimes we get so overwhelmed with the huge amount of propaganda that we are not able to see the whole picture, the clear chain of events with similar patterns from the Gaza Strip to Baghdad to Somalia to Darfur to Beirut. Some elements can be different in each case, but they have one thing in common, the master colonialist project of United States and the high security risks that these events cause to its main settlement in the region, Israel. These places are strategically interconnected and the success of the US plan in the region depends being able to control them.

Although the importance of oil and strategic control are certainly a huge motivator, the Friedmanesque economic dominance of the region should not be overlooked. It's no secret that since 2001, World Bank loans to the Middle East have increased, with a massive upsurge in privatization of state-run industries. Egypt has been the largest privatizer, selling off banks and other industries to the highest bidder. Israel is not merely a mercenary force in this globalization campaign, it is also a victim, with state assets being sold off while inequality and poverty increase. An aid-dependent Israel is no different than an aid-dependent Jordan or Egypt - they'll always put the profit of a few over the needs of the majority.

From Rats to Hurricanes: The Effects of Climate Change on Indigenous Populations

2008-05-16T13:15:00.001-04:00

Indigenous populations in Nicaragua bear the brunt of the effects of global climate change, despite comprising the least-polluting and least carbon-emitting segment of the population. Stronger storms, desertification, plagues of rodents and disease, livelihood disruption, and decreased access to clean water and traditional medicines are just a few of the devastating effects of climate change - and poorly-concieved environmental policy - on indigenous populations. The Center for Indigenous Peoples' Autonomy and Development (CADPI) recommends a few measures that may help mitigate this situation:

Taking into account the situation Indigenous Peoples face in terms of the imminent impact and affects of climate change on our traditional systems of life, as well as the measures of mitigation adopted by States, we consider the following recommendations to be necessary:

States, in cooperation with development organizations, should provide resources to strengthen the ability of Indigenous Peoples' institutions to participate in sustainable environmental management and in the definition and application of proposals for mitigation, and to respond to the impact of natural disasters.
States should adopt measures that ensure that the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples is the framework for discussing, agreeing to and implementing management processes for protected areas and concessions of resource extraction (this includes forest resources, hydrocarbons, mining, carbon trading, mitigation measures, etc.).
We must ensure the direct participation of Indigenous Peoples and our institutions in carbon trading markets through sustainable management of the forest resources of our territories and our right to autonomy and Free, Prior and Informed Consent.

Before Swords Turned Bodies Into Banquets

2008-05-15T14:26:00.003-04:00

Mine is the moon at the far edge of words
And the bounty of birds
And the immortal olive tree.
I walked this land before swords turned bodies into banquets.
I come from there
I Come From There... and Remember - Mahmoud Darwish

While world leaders gather in al-Quds to celebrate Israel's 60th birthday, many others in Palestine and around the world today commemorate the Nakba, the 1948 expulsion of up to 900,000 Palestinians from their homeland and forced depopulation of more than 500 Palestinian villages. After six decades of wars and apartheid, there are now an estimated 7 million Palestinian refugees and IDPs in and around Israel. While the usual suspects call for continued war, the number of new voices calling for peace and justice is indeed encouraging.

Y-YWL-R!!

2008-05-14T13:12:00.002-04:00

Taking a break from the serious blogernettery today cause this is too funny:

Nothing Is Certain but Death and Taxes.Well Not So Much Taxes Per Se.

2008-05-13T12:34:00.002-04:00

As reported on OneWorld today, a new study conducted by UK-based NGO Christian Aid calculates the cost to the developing world of corporate tax evasion and illegal capital flight. The numbers are staggering indeed.

The NGO calculated an annual cost to developing countries of $160 billion dollars in corporate tax revenue from just two methods of tax evasion: transfer mispricing - trade between corporate subsidiaries at manipulated prices, and false invoicing - manipulated-price transactions between unrelated corporations. These two methods are believed to account for a full 60% of all world trade. Furthermore, these figures do not include the marginally-legal but undoubtedly insidious practice of tax avoision - using offshore tax havens and other legal loopholes to avoid taxes.

This $160 billion swiped from developing countries annually far exceeds the combined total of official development assistance budgets from the developed world. Christian Aid estimates that the tax revenue evaded by these corporations, had the money been invested in health care, could have saved the lives of 350,000 children per year. In the 15 years between 2000 and the Millennium Development Goals' deadline of 2015, the total capital flight is $2.5 trillion. That's enough to meet the MDG targets three times over, cure world hunger, and pay for 5/6ths of an illegal war. If these broad figures are too large to comprehend, the study provides some more concrete examples of the problems caused by this illegal corporate greed:

The case studies in this report show the different impacts that tax dodging by companies can have. In Zambia and Tanzania, we show how poor deals in the past on copper and gold respectively have left these countries’ exchequers unable to capitalise on the recent huge surges in commodity prices. Yet when they have tried to renegotiate, they find themselves threatened with legal action. A more robust negotiating stance in Malawi illustrates how better deals can be reached.

In India, the government is giving some of that country’s biggest and richest companies a tax-free ride under the programme of Special Economic Zones, which were designed to bring more foreign investment into the country. Meanwhile, these developments are displacing tens of thousands of poor people – thrown off their land with scant compensation and denied the opportunity even to grow their own food. Life for them is getting worse, not better.

Rapid economic growth in Peru is also failing to deliver benefits for that country’s poor people. Preferential tax rates for asparagus producers, supplying most of the UK’s consumption, join those already enjoyed by mining companies. In Bolivia, on the other hand, raised royalty rates on gas extraction have enabled better healthcare and care for the elderly.

Round Up A Posse - We'll Head 'Em Off At The Lorenz Curve

2008-05-12T16:28:00.005-04:00

GDP per capita is antiquated and deprecated. The dollar-a-day has had its day. The Human Development Index is way passé. The Gini coefficient is old and busted (sorry, Amartya!). There's a new inequality sheriff in town - the Vast Majority Income (VMI).

According to authors Anwar Shaikh and Amr Ragab in the latest International Poverty Centre policy research brief, VMI combines the income-level-measuring power of per capita GDP with the inequaliy-measuring power of the Gini coefficient by looking at the ratio between the income of the bottom 80% of the population and the overall average income.

The resulting Lorenz curve can then be measured not just against a 45-degree constant, but against a shifting slope of overall equality. Testing this curve with income data from 69 countries, the authors found that many countries with a high national income ranking dropped considerably when ranked by VMI.

These results give rise to two broad policy conclusions and a research question. First, it is important to conduct international comparisons in terms of VMI or some similar measure of discounted real income per capita, because such a combination of the level of income and the degree of inequality places us on a common international scale. This validates the kinds of comparisons undertaken in the 1993 Human Development Report. Second, since the gross per capita income of any fraction of the population (except the very rich) depends directly on the product of GDP per capita and (1-Gini), both growth and inequality reduction (as measured by increases in (1 – Gini) contribute equally to improving the standard of living of the vast majority. Taxes and subsidies then appear as further means of adjusting the income distribution. Of course, this immediately gives rise to a perennial question: what is the relationship between economic growth and changes in inequality? Our measures and our theoretical results provide us with the means for taking a fresh look at this important debate.

يمكن أن عاش النور غير الشبكة

2008-05-11T23:38:00.007-04:00

مؤتمر الذي اختتم بالأمس من مصرف العالم في غانا استجلى الإمكان لالكهرباء بدون غير الشبكة ولهبات صمام ثنائي لإصلاح أغراض الكهربائيات هن بعض ناس الافريقيا ٥٥٠ مليون بدون الكهرباء. إنارة افريقيا ٢٠٠٨ يرغب أن أعطى إنارة إلى ٢٥٠ مليون الناس في افريقيا جنوب الصحراء قبل ٢٠٣٠ بدون إستعمل أن وقود أحفوري، حكم البنك إجار ٢٠٠٠٠٠ دولار على ١٦ شركات لالتنمية خطات لإنارة غير الشبكة من استعمل تقانات الضرطات والشمسيات والاخرات.

Let There Be (Off-Grid) Light!

2008-05-11T21:31:00.006-04:00

A recently concluded World Bank conference in Ghana has explored the possibilities of off-grid electrification and light-emitting diode (LED) bulbs as a means to address the power needs of some of the 550 million Africans without access to electricity. Lighting Africa 2008 aims to provide lighting to 250 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa by 2030 without use of fossil fuels, and the Bank has awarded grants of up to $200,000 to 16 companies to develop off-grid lighting schemes using biogas, solar, and other technologies.

The Bitter Taste of Sweet Crude

2008-05-10T12:59:00.006-04:00

On Democracy Now yesterday, filmmaker Sandy Cioffi discussed the intersection of politics, profit, poverty, and extreme marginalization that pervades the states of the Niger Delta. The world's eighth largest exporter of crude oil and holder of an estimated 35 billion barrels of proven supply sees surprisingly little benefit from its natural resource, with most of the country's share of the wealth lost to corruption and mismanagement, while Shell and other companies profit handsomely. The statistics are quite staggering:

Niger Delta unemployment is 40% for ages 15-24 and 70-90% for adults.
More than 6,000 oil spills have been recorded since 1976.
Less than 25% of spills are remediated.
Many Niger Delta residents suffer from oil poisoning.
More gas is flared in Nigeria than anywhere else in the world.
More than 15 million Nigerian children work.
36% of Nigerian kids enrolled in grade 1 reach grade 5.
Nearly all schools in the Niger Delta are in extreme disrepair.
Less than 20% of the Delta region is accessible by good roads.
Less than 20% of Delta communities are connected to the national electrical grid.
Oil revenues since the 1970s are estimated at US$300 billion.
80% of oil and gas revenues accrue to just 1% of the population.

France Surrenders in the Global War On Terroir

2008-05-09T15:12:00.007-04:00

According to a shocking report uncorked by NPR this morning, the Institut National des Appellations d'Origine is planning to expand by forty the number of villages that can produce champagne. This decision, a response to the increasing worldwide demand for the bubbly and competition from new wine-growing regions, would mark the first alteration to the champagne appelation since 1927.

The news isn't so good for growers in Germaine and Orbay l'Abbaye which will lose their champagne appellation under the change. Fans of Moët & Chandon's champagne will soon have to become fans of Moët & Chandon's wine-flavored sparkling beverage drink.

Go Tear It Down The Mountain

2008-05-08T10:31:00.006-04:00

Members of the Dongria Kondh tribe of Orissa state, India, are fighting for their survival. The threat they face is not famine or disease, but a British mining company that plans to turn the tribe's sacred Niyamgiri mountain into an open-pit aluminum mine. Sterlite, a subsidiary of extractive giant Vedanta Resources, is waiting for permission from India's Supreme Court to begin tearing down the mountain, which is the home of the 8,000-member Dongria Kondh and the basis of the tribe's culture and lifestyle.

This is the second legal battle being fought by the ironically-named Vedanta, their prior bid to displace the Dongria Kondh and dstroy Niyamgiri having been rejected by the Indian Supreme Court in November 2007. If the current proposal is accepted, Vendanta will run the mine as a joint venture between Orissa state and Indian subsidiary Sterlite.

Disability Rights In Effect, Now!

2008-05-03T00:01:00.007-04:00

As of this morning, human rights are now guaranteed to more than 650 million persons with disabilities worldwide. The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities, ratified April 3 by Ecuador, aims to combat discrimination in the workplace, schools, and public services. Ratifying states commit themselves to enact laws that will improve disability rights and abolish discriminatory practices.

You Mean It's Not Al Gore's Fault?

2008-05-01T15:34:00.007-04:00

Surprise surprise! Guess who's reaping windfall profits from the global food crisis?

I'll give you a hint: it's the global agribusiness and commodities industry!

According to a new report from GRAIN, while food riots and bread lines are breaking out worldwide, a handful of corporations are now reaping windfall profits, aided in no small part by three decades of World Bank and IMF policies that have made developing countries net importers of food:

Cargill, the world’s biggest grain trader, achieved an 86% increase in profits from commodity trading in the first quarter of this year. Bunge, another huge food trader, had a 77% increase in profits during the last quarter of last year. ADM, the second largest grain trader in the world, registered a 67% per cent increase in profits in 2007.

You Know What They Say About A Country With Big Feet...

2008-04-28T15:38:00.002-04:00

... they say we produce far more carbon emissions per capita share than anyone else.

Well, that's what a class of MIT students has calculated, anyhow. The class estimated the average carbon emissions of Americans of various lifestyles, from the ultra-rich to middle-class suburbanites to the urban homeless. They found that even the least consumptive lifestyles still produce an average of 8.5 tons of carbon dioxide per year, more than double the world average. The average American obliterates the world average, with 20 tons of CO₂ pumped into the stratosphere. Although part of this excessive carbonation is due to government services such as roads, police,courts, and the military, a large chunk of it is based in our own lifestyle choices: What we eat, how we commute, what we wear, and how we satisfy our retail therapy needs all add to our carbon footprint. We even carbonize when we think we're reducing carbon:

Unlike some other attempts to quantify carbon-emission rates, Gutowski and his students took great care to account for often-overlooked factors, such as the "rebound effect." That's when someone makes a particular choice--for example, buying a hybrid car instead of a gas-guzzler--but then uses the money saved from their reduced gasoline costs to do something else, such as taking a long trip by airplane. The net impact, in such a case, may actually be an overall increase in carbon emissions.

EFA Global Action Week: More Like Education For Some, Am I Rite?

2008-04-24T16:37:00.004-04:00

Inclusive quality education is the focus of UNESCO's Education For All Global Action Week this year, and participants are no doubt discussing the results of the 2088 Global Monitoring Report. Although there has been considerable progress since the 2000 World Education Forum in Dakar, Senegal, many countries are still lagging behind in their efforts to achieve universal primary education, and are facing a stagnant commitment from the donor community:

Uneven and partial though it may be, progress towards EFA has been considerable since 2000, especially among many of the countries farthest from the goals. Fewer children die before age 5 due to improvements in health services and immunization. Access to pre-primary education, while still out of reach for most children, is expanding. More boys and girls are entering primary school, completing a minimum cycle and making the transition to lower secondary education. Almost two-thirds of countries with data have achieved gender parity at the primary level, though at the secondary level disparities remain pervasive. Gender disparities in learning outcomes have declined. Attention to quality issues – for example, the need for better trained teachers, sufficient learning materials, effective use of instructional time, less absenteeism, better facilities and regular student assessments – is well established.

Despite these overall positive trends, enormous challenges remain, as this chapter illustrates. Many countries lack comprehensive programmes for children under the age of 3, and have done little to increase the number of qualified and trained teachers and caregivers. Access to ECCE among less advantaged children, especially in vulnerable contexts, is very limited, despite the clear benefits. More than 10% of the world’s primary school-age children, some 72 million, are still not enrolled. Regular school attendance and progression, weak learning outcomes and low completion rates remain critical issues in many parts of the developing world, especially in fragile states. Educational disparities within countries, disproportionately affecting children from rural, indigenous, poor and/or slum populations, are widespread. Most countries have yet to achieve the gender parity goal.