The Gurkhas, who originally hail from Nepal, enjoy a pride of place in the pantheon of the British and the Indian armed forces. They still serve with dedication and loyalty the army regiments in these two countries. So it was a well-deserved victory in a British court for these Gurkhas who earned the right to settle in Britain after their retirement.

“For generations, they have shown great courage and loyalty, fighting for Britain in countless wars. Last night, the Gurkhas were celebrating one of their most famous victories – in a legal battle that has given them the right to settle in the UK,” reports The Independent.

“The landmark ruling by the High Court was an official recognition of the unswerving service that the fearless Nepalese soldiers had given to Britain, often at great personal cost. This, said the judge, Mr Justice Blake, earned them ‘an unquestionable moral debt of honour’ from the British people.

“Under current rules, former Gurkha soldiers who retired before 1997, when the Brigade of Gurkhas moved its base from Hong Kong to Hampshire when the city reverted to Chinese control, have to demonstrate ’strong ties’ with Britain to obtain permission to settle.

“The actress Joanna Lumley, whose father served with the Gurkhas in Burma during the Second World War, had attended the case to express her support. She said: ‘This day is more important than I can tell you because it gives our country the chance to right a great wrong and to wipe out a national shame that has stained us all’.” More here…

(The British Queen with the veteran Gurkha soldiers. A file photo courtesy AP/Richard Vogel)

While we have been focused on things here in the US, there have been a couple of somewhat-disturbing developments in Europe with regard to their laws and Islam.

In England it was decided that Islamic Court Rulings are enforceable by the force of the government.

In France a divorce was granted to a Muslim man because his wife lied about being a virgin.

I considered writing a commentary on these decisions but decided I’d rather hear what you all have to think.

I would just offer one thought for you to ponder. Try taking the words Islamic Court and Muslim man and replacing them with ‘Fundamentalist Christian Court’ or ‘Jewish Man’. Would your reaction be different ?

Just food for thought

Cross posted to The Square Deal

Reports from Pakistan indicate that Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf is losing ground fast. The Guardian states that British and American diplomats are attempting to find an exit for Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf, a staunch western ally, before he is dragged through a humiliating impeachment process.

“Musharraf has been one of the Bush administration’s closest allies. While Washington would prefer not to host his exile, as it would look bad politically, it would if he has nowhere else to go. His son lives in the US.

“Rumours that Musharraf is set to quit have been circulating in Pakistan for several days. He has suffered a collapse in support as three of Pakistan’s four provincial parliaments have passed resolutions, with overwhelming backing, declaring him unfit for office. The fourth province is expected to follow soon.

“The provincial votes were symbolic, but the formal process will begin early next week with an impeachment motion in the national parliament. It is clear that the ruling coalition now has the two-thirds majority needed to impeach him. Government insiders said that if Musharraf wants to quit, he must do so before the impeachment proceedings begin, leaving him with only a few days. His spokesman has rebutted any suggestion that he will step down.”

More here…

Note: There have been a number of posts at TMV during the last few days on the Russia-Georgia conflict. I’ve listed them at the end.

At The New York Times, Andrew E. Kramer discusses the peace plan brokered by the French (as the country holding the rotating presidency of the EU). According to him, it provided the Russians with a rationale for pushing further into Georgia as part of a “peacekeeping” role they demanded under the agreement. Mr. Sarkozy also “failed to persuade the Russians to agree to any time limit on their military action.” (NYT)

The Russians demanded that their troops be allowed “in a peacekeeping role” outside the separatist enclaves and “to implement security measures” while “awaiting an international monitoring mechanism.” (NYT) Rationale or no rationale, they seemed to have been determined to do this anyway.

Russian troops have the right to take any actions necessary to prevent hostilities, said a Kremlin spokesman, Alexei Pavlov, including inside Georgia.

Read the rest of this entry »

Among the joys of living in a laid-back and quaint place like Adelaide in South Australia, with its well-stocked council libraries, is the pleasure of reading books. In the past three months, apart from delivering guest lectures at the two universities here, I have been able to go through six books…accompanied with good beer and wine!!!

Here I wish to write about two fascinating biographies. First: American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin. Second: My grandfather’s secret by Jemima Khan (photo above). Both the books are about distinguished and brilliant Jews — who were part of the American and British establishment — but suffered, like many other ordinary Jews, from a seeming lack of identity. The past that continued to haunt them, and their sufferings.

First, the summing up about the Oppenheimer’s biography in The New Yorker: “J. Robert Oppenheimer, the physicist who oversaw the creation of the atomic bomb, was lauded as a patriot after the United States dropped the bomb on Japan, but nine years later he was disgraced, accused of Communist sympathies and ’substantial defects of character.’

“This commanding biography, the result of twenty-five years of research, reevaluates that character, and delivers the most complex portrait of Oppenheimer to date: a brilliant but insecure child prodigy who became a charismatic leader; a polymath who learned Sanskrit just so he could read the Bhagavad Gita; an aesthete who mixed infamously strong Martinis…

“A one-time fellow-traveller who was almost willfully naïve about politics. Drawing on thousands of pages of F.B.I. surveillance records, the authors contend that the scientist was never a member of the Communist Party.” (More here…)

Second, in the biography about her grandfather Frank Goldsmith, Jemima Khan (the former British wife of the celebrated Pakistani cricket star-turned-politician Imran Khan), vividly describes about the “English Jew and a Gentleman” who was born in 1878. She writes: “He was from Germany, where he lived until the age of 16. I knew that 500 years of Jewish ancestors could be traced back to the Frankfurt ghetto, but I had not realized my father was just one generation from Germany.

“He (Frank) told a biographer: ‘I think motivation comes from… disequilibrium in the personality. Perhaps my disequilibrium comes from the very fact that I’m a foreigner. I’m a Jew to Catholics and a Catholic to Jews, an Englishman to the French and a Frenchman to the English. I’ve never been neither one thing nor the other – which can be a very unsettling thing to be.’

“Jews are used to being treated as foreigners everywhere, and to an extent every Goldsmith had felt like an outsider right back to the early 1500s when Moses Goldschmidt of Frankfurt was compelled to wear a red peaked cap and a yellow ring on his coat to identify him as a Jew.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Times of London makes an interesting study of 10 political personalities who were involved in sex scandals. Of these 10 leaders, five got away with it and five couldn’t. Beginning with the Profumo Affair in Britain in 1963 to the latest one concerning John Edwards in the US, the affairs have attracted a lot of public attention. More here…

So far it looks like British PM Gordon Brown will hold on to power despite a recent series of election losses. The most recent loss was in a district that was considered one of the safest in the country for Labour but it went to the Scottish National Party.

With those losses there had been speculation that Brown would be tossed out as party leader but some MP’s are starting to hedge on that prospect, pointing out that they could lose even more seats if they tossed Brown.

Listening to the Labour leaders sounds much like listening to people in the US talking about the Republicans. The speculation is not whether or not they will lose power in the next election, that seems to be a given.

One official suggested that if Brown left on his own it could help them limit their losses to 50 seats instead of 150 with him in power, but if they force him out it could cost them as much as 250 seats.

One thing is for sure, the world of politics is a wild ride. Just as the center left party is set to take power here in the USA, it seems center right ones will take over much of Europe.

Britain and France are among European Union nations “discussing ambitious plans to harvest the energy of the Saharan sun, connecting a vast network of solar panels to electricity grids across the continent.” According to The Guardian, “the project, estimated to cost up to £35.7 billion, is backed by Gordon Brown and President Sarkozy of France.” More here…

In 2006 President Bush famously said: “America is addicted to oil.” The Washington Post wrote then: “This nation’s increasing reliance on oil and gas poses economic, geopolitical and environmental dangers to the country.” More here…

It is celebration time at my in-laws house in the hill State of Himachal Pradesh in India. A century-old Kalka-Shimla rail line that passes through their sprawling ancestral lower Himalayan farmland, has been finally chosen by the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) as a world heritage site. More here…

During holidays I often walk along part of the rail track which, the Guinness Book of World Records states, offers steepest rise in altitude in the space of 96 kilometers, and whose more than two-thirds of the track is curved, sometimes at angles as sharp as 48 degrees. The picturesque rail journey begins at 640 meters above sea level at Kalka to the lofty heights of Shimla (former summer capital during the British colonial days) at 2,060 meters.

A living example of the extraordinary engineering feat of the early mechanical age, this narrow gauge train track - 2 ft 6 in (762 mm) - climbs steep cliffs and the train huffs and puffs at a leisurely pace of maximum 22-km an hour through deodar, pine, ficus, oak and maple woods and completes its 96-km journey in five hours. (The rail track passes through my in-laws farms where they grow apple, plum, apricot, walnut and cherries.)

The memorabilia of the British Raj in the form of old wall clocks, semi-porcelain hand-painted crockery, vintage communication and track control system, called Neals Token Instrument System, is still in use on the rail stations en route. In 1827, Lord Amherst, the Governor-General of India, spent the summer at Shimla and found the place to his liking. It was under his successor, Lord William Bentinck, that Shimla became the summer headquarters of the government of (British) India.

The Kalka-Shimla rail was formally opened on November 9, 1903. (The same year when Orville Wright flew an aircraft with a petrol engine at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.) Read the rest of this entry »

The British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has emerged as the first leader in the world who seems to have understood the implications of the looming food crisis and taken a practical step. Brown has issued a clarion call to his countrymen to wake up and stop wasting food. Will the G8 leaders support him in making this a worldwide campaign?

(More than 1,300,000 tonnes of food grain - worth millions of dollars - went rotten in storage over the past decade in India, officials admit.) (Read the BBC report here…)

The Independent reports: “Supermarkets (in Britain) will be urged to drop ‘three for two’ deals on food that encourage shoppers into bulk-buying more than they need, often leading to the surpluses being thrown away. The scandal of the vast mountains of food that are thrown away in Britain while other parts of the world starve is revealed in a (British) Cabinet Office report today. It calls for a reduction in food waste: up to 40 per cent of groceries can be lost before they are consumed due to poor processing, storage and transport.”

Ironically, a top British leader is now acknowledging the accuracy of the vision of Mahatma Gandhi, the arch foe of the British empire, that mindless consumerism would create a crisis sooner than later. Gandhi’s oft quoted words: “There is enough for everyone’s need…but not enough for everyone’s greed.” (For more on Gandhi pl click here…)

Let’s get back to The Independent story: “The (Cabinet) report says UK households could save an average of £420 per year by not throwing away 4.1 million tonnes of food that could have been eaten. The Government is to launch a campaign to stamp out Britain’s waste food mountains as part of a global effort to curb spiralling food prices.

“Gordon Brown said he would make action to tackle the soaring cost of food a priority at the G8 summit starting today in Japan. At his first G8 summit as Prime Minister, Mr Brown will argue that the world’s richest nations must do more to tackle the food price crisis. He will urge them to halt the decline in funding for agricultural projects in Africa, so the continent can boost farm production by 6 per cent a year.” More here…

And here is the The Times report… And here…

“World leaders are not renowned for their modest wine selections or reticence at the G8 summit’s cheese board. Shortly after calling for us all to waste less food, Gordon Brown joined his fellow G8 premiers and their wives for an eight-course Marie Antoinette-style ‘Blessings of the Earth and the Sea Social Dinner’.” More here…

As I noted yesterday, the Iranians have announced that their policy on uranium enrichment remains unchanged despite attempts by several nations to persuade them to cease and desist.

Barring a complete capitulation by the Iranians, which no one really believes is on the cards, is it possible that Bush and Cheney will leave office without opening a third military front in Iran? Is there really any doubt that Bush fully expects the diplomatic efforts to persuade Iran to comply with the demands of the US and Israel to fail?  And that when the failure inevitably occurs, he is highly or at least quite likely to take or enable military action?

Bear in mind that I’m just a simple citizeness trying to piece together the signs in the media so I at least know what direction we’re rolling in. I don’t have any specialist knowledge in international law or military defense. I’m not about to get into a fight with anyone about which country is most in the wrong here.

But I do prefer to have some idea where those who have been drunk-driving the car for the last several years are taking me now. It’s not as if they have a great record of going in the right direction. At least I want to brace myself for the next teeth-rattling jolt toward the brink.

I mean…Take a look at the road signs we’re hurtling past.

Read the rest of this entry »

If the title of this post has you befuddled, you are not alone, but please bear with me.

My hometown newspaper this morning carried a story by Eunice Moscoso, on whether Senator John McCain is a natural born U.S. citizen, and whether he is eligible to be U.S. president.

This is not the first time that this issue has been raised and, I am sure, it will not be the last time.

At the heart of this “controversy” lies the fact that McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone–not within the 50 United States–and that the Constitution restricts the presidency to “natural born” citizens.

Among other factors, pro and con, playing a role are, according to Moscoso:

1. Whether the Panama Canal Zone was part of the United States at the time (1936) when McCain was born there. Some scholars, such as law professor Jonathan Turley claim that “military installations, such as the one in Panama, were sitting on leased land and were never part of U.S. Soil.” Others, such as Harvard’s Laurence Tribe and former Solicitor General Theodore Olson claim that there is “substantial legal support”–including a 1986 Supreme Court opinion–that the United States “exercised sovereignty” over the Panama Canal Zone.

2. The fact that both of McCain’s parents were American citizens and that, according to Tribe and Olson, the framers never intended to exclude children of military officers serving outside the continental United States from the presidency.

3. The fact that “Federal law defines a natural born citizen in various ways, including one that clearly includes children of military officers overseas.”

Overarching all this, the fact that the framers of the Constitution never defined the term “natural born.”

Personally, I don’t think this needs to be such a big issue. Especially when there are so many other issues–such as qualifications, character, ability, judgment, etc.–that are much more important when assessing candidates for the presidency.

Also, I am somewhat biased on this issue. You see, my daughter was born on an American military installation in Germany. Both her mother and I are, and were, U.S. citizens. And–I know this is a loving father talking and hoping–should she ever want to run for the highest office, I would not want to see her disqualified just because her father was, as we say, serving his country overseas at the time of her birth.

Now, back to the title of this story, “Can Egyptian Born McCain Be President?“

Actually, that is the title eventually given to a translated article that appeared in March of this year at “Watching America.” The article was translated from Russian and from the on-line Pravda, Pravda.ru.

The literal translation, according to Watching America translators is: “The McCain Incident–An Egyptian May Be the President of the U.S.”

Now, I don’t speak Russian, but I know the “Watching America” Russian translators are very good at what they do, so I don’t doubt the accuracy of their translation. Furthermore, when one “googles” the Russian article and requests “translate this article,” one gets this translation for the title, “Kazus McCain: President of the United States could become ‘Egyptian‘” While some of the Google foreign language translations are fair, they are by no means perfect. But one can readily tell that there is something “funny” about the title–and perhaps the story.

And lo and behold, once we get into the translated text (the article discusses the presidential primaries battles between McCain, Clinton and Obama), we read the following:

A new issue has arisen. The issue is that John McCain was born in Egypt. To run for the presidency of the US, one must be born in the United States, but both the father and mother of the senator were citizens of the United States. Therefore it is unlikely that the circumstances mentioned above will hinder McCain in any way.

And, in a question and answer session between Pravda and “the president of the Institute of Strategic Rankings and Analysis, professor of the Department of the Applied Political Sciences of the Higher School of Economics, professor MGIMO Alexander Konovalov.”:

Q: There is some news coming from the press that McCain, as a candidate, may be hurt by the fact that he was not born in the US, but in Egypt. Is it true that this fact could be a hindrance to his campaign or is it simply gossip that is a part of all campaigns?

A: In principle Obama may have a bigger problem because he is a son of a Kenyan student and a white American woman. Then the Kenyan student left for Kenya and abandoned his girlfriend (sic) with little Obama. After that she married an Indonesian and they left for Indonesia for a prolonged period of time.

I don’t remember how the Constitution stipulates this, but I do know that a child born into a military family becomes an American citizen. McCain has a “winning” biography. He spent five years as a POW in Vietnam; he was tortured; he spent five years in a hole. Actually, as he was tortured by the Vietnamese, he heard Russian speech in the next room. And in his words, these people periodically recommended to the Vietnamese how best to torture McCain.

He’s twice married; his second wife is Miss Arizona. He has seven children; three of which are adopted. Therefore, I find it unlikely that with such an excellent resume, the fact that McCain was born in Egypt will play any role in the election.

I have no reason to think that the Russian article is a hoax. I have suggested to both my hometown newspaper and to the New York Times that they may want to look into how prestigious Pravda could make such a monumental mistake (and some other smaller ones), but they have not.

I have come up with my own explanation for the mystery surrounding McCain’s birth place, Egypt or Panama.

As many remember, the British controlled zone of the Suez Canal was also known as the “Canal Zone,” just like the Panama “Canal Zone.“ Perhaps the writers of the “McCain an Egyptian” article, and others, had read that McCain was born in the “Canal Zone” and automatically assumed that it was the Suez “Canal Zone.” Coincidentally, the year that McCain was born (1936) is the same year that Britain, after having “protected” the “neutral canal zone” since 1888, signed a treaty with Egypt retaining control over the canal.

As a footnote, had McCain been born in the Suez Canal Zone, it might have been an even stickier case to prove that he is a “natural born” U.S. citizen. Furthermore, the present “anti-anything remotely resembling/associated with Muslims” climate might not have helped him either–as is sadly the case with the other presidential candidate.

The young Corporal Sarah Bryant, a member of the British Intelligence Corps, has become the first female soldier to be killed in Afghanistan. The mortal remains of Sarah and three other soldiers killed on June 17, when a device exploded in Helmand province near their base at Lashkar Gar, have reached Britain. (Photo above of Sarah on her wedding day to her husband Carl Bryant in 2005).

Reports The Telegraph: “The sight of Sarah Bryant’s bare shoulders in her wedding dress is almost unbearably poignant. Two years ago, she was a glowing bride; now the 26-year-old is wearing a body bag, having been blown up when her Land Rover was hit by an explosion on Tuesday afternoon. The grief of the family and friends…

“Her death will naturally revive those old arguments about whether women are suited to the battlefield. It is always so when something happens for the first time and Cpl Bryant is the first woman to die in the British Armed Forces in Afghanistan.” More here…

A floral tribute at the town’s memorial read: “To an English rose and her comrades. Rest in peace.” In what her family described as an ‘amazing life’ she had also served in Iraq and learned Pashtu so she could help train the Afghan security forces.

The Independent reports: “The number of British servicewomen killed in Afghanistan and Iraq now stands at seven. About 700 of the British force of just under 8,000 in Afghanistan are female. A number of those serving in Helmand and Kandahar are members of the Intelligence Corps and fluent in Pashtu, while others are based in Kabul with a proficiency in Dari, the language of the Tajiks and Uzbeks.

“The Defence Secretary Des Browne said: ‘We have now lost nine soldiers in 10 days and every single one of them is a tragedy’.” More here…

The BBC adds: “The death of Cpl Sarah Bryant in Afghanistan has brought the subject of women in the military to the fore.”

The first general election in which I was able to vote was the British election of 1997 - held after four consecutive terms of Conservative government.

Following 13 years of Margaret Thatcher, who was thrown out in a very English coup, the Conservative party was in that year led by John Major, under whom it became rotten with hypocrisy – or “sleaze”, as it was called in almost every issue of every newspaper at the time.

I’d been brought up in a largely Conservative household, with a father who’d talk of how it was in the “bad old days of Labor” - the party that was responsible for the conditions that led to a bankrupt Britain in the ‘70s, the “Winter of Discontent” in ’78 to ’79, and the “three-day working week”, which saw trash pile up on the streets and bodies lie unburied by graves, as workers in all sectors went on paralyzing strikes.

Twenty-or-so years later, as I watched the campaigning for my first general election as a voter, a new kid on the block, Tony Blair, was leading the “New Labour” party, as he’d branded it. Since I didn’t know him from Adam, I wasn’t going to vote for him – and since I realized that the sitting Conservative administration was no Thatcher government, (and knew cowardly political wriggling when I saw it), I wasn’t going to vote for them either. Accordingly, I sat out the election, and didn’t vote.

Without having a horse in the race, I watched the results come in on the TV from a friend’s room in Cambridge. One by one, safe Conservative seats fell. A true “landslide” was indeed underway.

It was strangely exciting – not the excitement of having one’s team win, but more like that of landing for the first time in a new country.

And just like landing in a new country and getting the cab straight to the hotel immediately to sleep off the jet-lag, only the next morning can you walk the street and get any idea of what the new country feels like.

So it was, the morning after the election, with a new Labour government elect –not one I voted for – I walked the main street of Cambridge with an excited smile. I felt good but it took me a few minutes to work out why.

I’d just watched unwittingly, an entire country redefine itself – 60 million people collectively saying, “We’re not that any more; now we’re this”. Of course, no one knew exactly what “this” was going to be. But therein was an act of faith, of drawing a line, of self-confidence. In a loud clear voice, or perhaps choice, a nation said, “Today, the British choose what Britain is - and politicians do not”.

Such an act of self-assertion along is itself of great political power – not because of what it chooses, but because of what it is. Its value – quite independently of the party elected –is in reaffirming to everyone at the same that real power lies with the people. Especially when it sets a new direction, such collective decision-making inevitably jolts the political establishment more humbly back to the heel of the nation. And in so doing, an electorate not only chooses its preferred path but it also helps shapes the path taken by the new administration.

In the U.K., 11 or so years ago, walking around after the general election, all I knew was that I felt good – a little hopeful and a little proud, wondering the how exactly a collective decision could directly affect the feelings of an individual who had no direct involvement in it.

It can.

As in Britain in 1998, there will be a strong “feeling in the air” in the United States on 5 November 2008 – not least because of what has come before, in terms of leadership (or its absence), integrity (or its compromise) and political reactivity (rather than pro-activity).

How does America want to feel?

A country, like a person, acts out of the feeling it has about itself. Some say one should vote for the party whose policies one would like to see shape society; some say to vote for the character of the leader; both are reasonable. But a voter will also serve himself well by performing a little thought experiment – of imagining the feeling in the stomach when he first finds out the identity of the new President elect.

Feeling, after all, is the language of the soul. In an age of noise, of ideologies’ talking past each other and through each other, of obfuscation and a general factual inadequacy of corporate media, a gut feeling can tell more of one’s truth than any argument, ideological position, or extrapolation from history.

It is a commentary on our times that any report from Afghanistan and Iraq in the news blogs/media now provokes at best a cynical remark, or worst a yawn. But there are a few indefatigable columnists/journalists whose assessments of the ongoing tragic drama continues to provide fresh insights. Simon Jenkins, a distinguished journalist, is one of them.

In a recent column in The Sunday Times, Jenkins makes interesting observations about Taliban and Al-Qaeda. “In seven years in Afghanistan, America, Britain and their Nato allies have made every mistake in the intervention book…They disobeyed the iron law of postimperial intervention: don’t stay too long. The British ambassador threatens ‘to stay for 30 years’, rallying every nationalist to the insurgents’ cause. The catalogue of western folly in Afghanistan is breathtaking.

“…All hope was buried in a cascade of hypotheticals. Victory would be at hand ‘if only’ the Afghan army were better, if the poppy crop were suppressed, the Pakistan border sealed, the Taliban leadership assassinated, corruption eradicated, hearts and minds won over. None of this is going to happen. The generals know it but the politicians dare not admit it.

“The Taliban’s chief objective is not world domination but a share of power in Afghanistan. While they cannot defeat western troops, they can defeat Nato’s war aim by continuing to build on their marriage of convenience with Al-Qaeda, which supplies them with a devastating arsenal of suicide bombers.

“What is sure is that Al-Qaeda, as a (grossly overrated) ‘threat to the West’, will not be suppressed without Taliban cooperation. This means reversing a policy that naively equates ‘defeating’ the Taliban with ‘winning’ the war on terror. Fighting in Afghanistan is as senseless as trying to suppress the poppy crop. It just costs lives and money.”

More here…

Recap of BBC Show, as promised to TMV readers earlier.

I was on a BBC radio show today as a blogger from The Moderate Voice.

The issue of the day there was (still), “Should Hillary Clinton quit?”

As a sign of intense international interest in the Obama-Clinton primary race, the BBC has been airing many opinion shows about the elections.

This one segment of one particular show today was just a few minutes of discussion on that topic.

There were, in those few moments on air, lots of emails flying, listener-phone callers… also, about 7 passionate bloggers on the long distance lines too at the same time… and a well-spoken BBC reporter on site at Clinton headquarters in West Virginia.

The BBC show was what I would call ‘a scattershot of opinions,’ wherein as one of the many guests, you sort of get called on by the radio host, as in school, to give your briefest .02 worth… the question itself pressuring for a yes or no response with some details of support.

There’s no time, really, ‘to question the question’… and it would have been bad form on my part, disrespectful of the host and all the planning that went into this segment… but I wanted to ask, “But, is this the right question?” or, “What is behind this question?”

I do hope that’ll be another show though that will cover such ideas. I think we need opinions. But also, like any living entity, we need routes into far larger ideas too.

Quicker vs. Deeper
I note, and certainly not just in this segment at the BBC, that radio guests cannot respond nor interact with one or two other persons, as one would in an actual conversation.

So, the talk-fest is almost like a subliminal/ fast slide-show of opinings, valuable in an instant-snapshot-of-the-culture montage way. Yet, it cannot– as a true conversation in depth would– provoke or catalyze thoughtful grasp and grappling with deeper issues… the latter, I think, adds value to listeners’ shorter-term ‘right/wrong’ and yes/ no/maybe judgments re election issues.

In such important cultural discussions, just to coin a metaphor, I wish for a flowering plant with roots. Rather than just a cutting and gathering of the roses as one may. Both beautiful forms. But, one has far more longevity.

Yet, the radio show was interesting nonetheless, and the male radio host was snappy and energetic. The woman reader of emails on-air was very expressive in tone of voice, lending a theatrical air to listener’s emails. And, the people who are this show’s producers are good-natured, smart, and gentlemanly to the bone.

Though I’ve been on radio many times over these years, at length, and as the sole guest… I’m sincerely appreciative of being asked on today… even though I’m not sure they’ll ever ask me back again… as I interposed Read the rest of this entry »

Look at these faces.  While the rest of the world wrings its hands and waits helplessly on the sidelines, Burma’s government says it will accept aid, but that it doesn’t want the help of foreigners in getting it to the people. (BBC News)  The UN is pretty sure the government’s own unaided efforts won’t be enough. 

The UN says that up to 1.5 million people may have been affected by Cyclone Nargis, which devastated the Irrawaddy Delta region on Saturday. Burmese state media say 22,980 people were killed, but there are fears the figure could rise to 100,000.

Hundreds of thousands of people have no food, water or shelter. Officials say people could die because no help is getting to them.

In a statement, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged the junta to prioritise the aid effort over tomorrow’s nation-wide referendum on a widely-criticised new constitution.

It would be "prudent to focus instead on mobilising all available resources and capacity for the emergency response efforts", he said.  (BBC News)

Read the rest of this entry »

Ken Livingstone is a vicious bigot and I won’t miss him.

BBC:

Boris Johnson has won the race to become the next mayor of London - ending Ken Livingstone’s eight-year reign at City Hall.

India lives at two levels. Urban India is enthusiastically chasing a mirage that Western style consumerism holds the key to happiness. But nearly 70 per cent Indians still live in villages or small towns where contentment, and living within one’s means, is still the prevalent traditional mantra. What is best option for an average person with limited means? The debate goes on…

Many people in big “rich” Western consumeristic societies have now begun to tear their hair as the big bubble seems about to burst. Says The Times of London: “Almost 600,000 people (in Britain) will be unable to refinance their debts this year after finding their usual lines of credit cut off, forcing them to go bust or sign expensive ‘bankruptcy-lite’ agreements.

“About one million Britons are struggling with £25 billion of unsecured borrowings that they cannot repay – ‘problem debt’ averaging £25,000 each - according to a report by TDX Group, which provides detailed debt-collection information to banks. TDX said that last year 400,000 people remortgaged or applied for new credit cards or personal loans to pay off old loans.

“A further 300,000 people took more dramatic options to escape their debts, such as bankruptcy, debt management plans or individual voluntary agreements (IVAs). IVAs are called bankruptcy-lite because they involve the creditor, usually a bank, accepting a reduced sum to be paid off over a set period. Debt management plans are a higher-risk, unregulated form of IVA.”

And then there is the prospect of looming unemployment…click here…

Asks a reader of The Times: “Whilst every bankruptcy or IVA is a personal story, there is a bigger question for society to ask: What are the social implications for a society that has grown fat and complacent on unfettered consumerism?

“Could it be strikes, lawlessness and general disorder in our neighbourhoods. We have a whole generation that have never had to be content with less and able to value things by saving for them.” — Steve Marchant, Broadhempston, UK

Point worth considering…