The pretense that the leader of a modest country like Kyrgyzstan can play his own little game in big league politics is shed with the ouster of the tulip revolutionary president Kurmanbek Bakiyev, after last week’s riots in the capital Bishkek that left 81 dead and government buildings and Bakiyev’s various houses trashed.
Bakiyev tried to have the best of both big power worlds, last year brashly threatening to close the US airbase, vital to the war in Afghanistan, after signing a cushy aid deal with Russia, and then reversing himself when the US agreed to more than triple the rent to $60 million a year and kick in another $100m in aid. As a result he lost the trust of both, and found himself bereft when the going got tough last week, as riots exactly like those that swept him to power erupted.
Democracy Now!
“This Is How These Soldiers Were Trained to Act”–Veteran of Military Unit Involved in 2007 Baghdad Helicopter Shooting Says Incident Is Part of Much Larger Problem
Thinking from the military mindset—and again, this is not trying to morally justify it, but to explain something from that perspective—that you have a lot of young, impressionable people that, I think, at one point were idealistic in why they enlisted and why they participated in the military, and they find themselves in this horrible situation where, again, it is acting out the training that we’ve been so instilled with to do things like this. And part of that training is the dehumanization of the people in whatever country we happen to be in. That’s, you know, been the process throughout the history of militaries, in general. So it’s a result of the training.
I knew I wouldn’t want other people doing similar things like this to me, and not only what’s in the video, but just day-to-day things of where we would go in people’s houses and rip through their houses.
- Families of Victims of 2007 US Helicopter Killing React to Leaked Video
- EXCLUSIVE: One Day After 2007 Attack, Witnesses Describe US Killings of Iraqi Civilians
- Massacre Caught on Tape: US Military Confirms Authenticity of Their Own Chilling Video Showing Killing of Journalists
- Triple Suicide Bombing Targets Foreign Embassies in Iraq
- Cindy Sheehan Sets Up “Camp OUT NOW” in Antiwar Protest
I reprint this here partially for your open-minded consideration and partially because the original post was almost immediately deleted from the site at which it was posted and I oppose censorship.
If you’re reading this, you’re no doubt asking yourself, “Why did this have to happen?” The simple truth is that it is complicated and has been coming for a long time. The writing process, started many months ago, was intended to be therapy in the face of the looming realization that there isn’t enough therapy in the world that can fix what is really broken. Needless to say, this rant could fill volumes with example after example if I would let it. I find the process of writing it frustrating, tedious, and probably pointless… especially given my gross inability to gracefully articulate my thoughts in light of the storm raging in my head. Exactly what is therapeutic about that I’m not sure, but desperate times call for desperate measures.
We are all taught as children that without laws there would be no society, only anarchy. Sadly, starting at early ages we in this country have been brainwashed to believe that, in return for our dedication and service, our government stands for justice for all. We are further brainwashed to believe that there is freedom in this place, and that we should be ready to lay our lives down for the noble principals represented by its founding fathers. Remember? One of these was “no taxation without representation”. I have spent the total years of my adulthood unlearning that crap from only a few years of my childhood. These days anyone who really stands up for that principal is promptly labeled a “crackpot”, traitor and worse.
If you’re reading this, you’re no doubt asking yourself, “Why did this have to happen?” The simple truth is that it is complicated and has been coming for a long time. The writing process, started many months ago, was intended to be therapy in the face of the looming realization that there isn’t enough therapy in the world that can fix what is really broken. Needless to say, this rant could fill volumes with example after example if I would let it. I find the process of writing it frustrating, tedious, and probably pointless… especially given my gross inability to gracefully articulate my thoughts in light of the storm raging in my head. Exactly what is therapeutic about that I’m not sure, but desperate times call for desperate measures.
We are all taught as children that without laws there would be no society, only anarchy. Sadly, starting at early ages we in this country have been brainwashed to believe that, in return for our dedication and service, our government stands for justice for all. We are further brainwashed to believe that there is freedom in this place, and that we should be ready to lay our lives down for the noble principals represented by its founding fathers. Remember? One of these was “no taxation without representation”. I have spent the total years of my adulthood unlearning that crap from only a few years of my childhood. These days anyone who really stands up for that principal is promptly labeled a “crackpot”, traitor and worse.
Some thought that David Baddiel and Omid Djilali's new film The Infidel, opening today in the UK, would offend with its premise that a Muslim finds out he was born Jewish. But so far, Muslims love it - and you will too.
Finding its arc through this cultural minefield, we see more conventional cultural wisdom turned on its head. Dancing niqabis, kids playing muhajideen and kafirs, hook-handed clerics dunking biscuits in their tea, and a washed-up New Romantic with anger management issues. With so much innuendo and cliché flying all over the place, it takes a rather absurd turn of events at the end to bring things back to earth. But you’ll be too busy laughing to care at that point. The Infidel is an enormously funny movie.
COMPUTER CHIPS INSPIRE NEW WATER PURIFIER
Developed by scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the new water purifier uses magnetic fields to separate harmful contaminants and produce clean water. Scaled up and mass produced, the new technology could save millions of lives in developing countries by preventing the transmission of water-borne diseases.
"This can remove bacteria and other particles from seawater and brackish water without suffering any clogging issues," said Jongyoon Han, a scientist at MIT and co-author of the Nature Nanotechnology article that describes the new purifier. "This won't be a big deal in the U.S. But in places like India, where the water is brackish and getting saltier, this could be important."
The new technique can so far only purify tiny amounts of water; a single channel cannot produce practical amounts of potable water. During the next two years, the MIT scientists plan to scale up their device with 16,000 channels squeezed onto an eight-inch wafer. It would use about 60 watts of electricity from a solar panel and could purify water as quickly as a Brita pitcher.
Skip the hard cell: Flexible solar power is on its way
John Rogers and his colleagues at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign make solar cells by using a rubber stamp to pick up a conventional cell structure etched onto a silicon substrate and imprint it onto a flexible polymer surface (Nature Materials, vol 7, p 907). The efficiency of the resulting cells is a respectable 12 per cent, and have a unique selling point: by spacing cell features more widely on the polymer substrate, the cells can be made virtually transparent. That makes power-generating windows a distinct possibility.
Indian Scientists Refuse To Patent Tuberculosis Genome, Encourage Anyone To Make The Drugs
"OSDD is a completely new formula across the world. Here we are making all our progress available to public. Anyone can take advantage and develop a drug based on our research. The aim here is not patents but drug discovery for a neglected disease," said Rajesh Gokhle, a senior scientist associated with the project.
Pfizer, Novartis & Eli Lilly Received A Bunch Of Illegal Pharma Patents In India
In 2005, India's new patent laws went into effect, and while the results of all of this are still being analyzed, one thing that politicians smartly put into the law were sections 3(d) and (e), "which restrict protection being granted to already known and long-ago patented drugs and their combinations."
Jamie Love points us to the news of a new report that found that the Indian patent office has gone against this law and issued such patents quite frequently and, no surprise, the main recipients are among the world's largest pharma companies, including Pfizer, Novartis and Eli Lilly. Is it any wonder that they've all been pushing to dump sections 3(d) and (e) all along? Remember, pharma patents are not about drug discovery, but about jacking up the prices on drugs.
Tuberculosis Worldwide
Tuberculosis kills more than 1.7 million people around the world each year, and this figure is growing as over-crowded conditions in poverty stricken areas can elevate transmission rates. The World Health Organization’s (WHO) recently published report, entitled “Multidrug and extensively drug-resistant TB (M/XDR-TB): 2010 Global Report on Surveillance and Response” outlines the prevalence of the disease and its potential global impact. In it, data from 114 countries around the world are examined to determine the extent of this “serious threat to global health.”
$250 million for abstinence education not evidence-based, groups say
The health care reform legislation that President Obama signed recently isn't only about insurance coverage -- there's also a renewal of $50 million per year for five years for abstinence-focused education.
Programs that receive this funding must "teach that abstinence from sexual activity is the only certain way to avoid out-of-wedlock pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases, and other associated health problems," according to the Department of Health and Human Services. To qualify, they must also teach that sex before marriage is "likely to have harmful psychological and physical effects." These are part of the "A-H definition," requirements for programs to receive abstinence funding under Title V of the Social Security Act.Medical professional organizations also criticize abstinence education on ethical grounds, for leaving out potentially lifesaving information. Abstinence-only programs "are inherently coercive by withholding information needed to make informed choices," the American Public Health Association said in a statement.
Abstinence programs have received federal funding through a program that grew out of welfare reform during the Clinton administration. The $50 million per year began in 1998 and expired in 2009, with restoration in the recent health care legislation from this year until 2014.
( Part of the pattern of bureaucracy growth through Job Security : repressive law designed not to work and with religious overtones to propel support from conditioned citizens, programmed by 'media pundits'. 'Change we can believe in ?' )
Food for thought for Qur’an bashers
Sometimes as a Muslim I feel suspect that the simplest, most effective way to begin to answer the many burning questions Westerners have about Islam and Muslims isn’t to give them a Quran or even the most erudite and engaging book on Islam. For many living in our postmodern world, such a discussion needs to start far closer to home, with a crash course in Western religious history and the basic ideas of the Judeo-Christian Tradition. Not only is that often a necessary remedial measure, but in this day of –to borrow an inspired metaphor once applied to U.S.-Iranian relations – “mutual Satanization” I think it is for many probably the only way to begin this critical conversation.
( What a Phrase !
Should we give Brownie points for observation to those who recall Obama - a Christian - was sworn in on Thomas Jefferson's copy ? )
I remember thinking, “My God, if these guys are so ignorant of their own tradition, what hope is there of explaining the yet more unfamiliar worldview of Muslims?” (For more on this trend, see Stephen Prothero’s stimulating Religious Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know–And Doesn’t.)
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