I love American and Australian pies. They may be world apart in flavour and ingredients, but the pie lovers just can’t do without them. And here comes a fascinating biography… Pie is the latest in a series of small, engaging and beautifully illustrated books edited by food historian Ken Albala, who wrote last year’s entertaining Pancake, writes The Age. “Janet Clarkson, a GP and lecturer...

COUCH SAYS: ‘MIDDLE EAST’ MULLAH GRUMBLES AS OBAMA SITS NEXT TO HIM The apparent miscarriage of democratic justice now taking place in Iran may more prove, rather than disprove, columnist Michael Thumann’s thesis – that President Obama has presented a face of America that’s much harder to demonize. For Germany’s Die Zeit, Michael Thumann writes in part: “Is the electoral...

Auschwitz, the Gulag Archipelago, the Killing Fields of Cambodia. These are names that immediately evoke images of some of the most horrific acts of cruelty and inhumanity. In their new book, Michael and Elizabeth M. Norman take us to yet another place and another time when men and women “suffered an ordeal of unparalleled cruelty and savagery: forty-one months of starvation, dehydration, hard labor,...

According to the Associated Press, Brazil’s Supreme Court, yesterday, in a 10-0 decision ruled that 9-year-old Sean Goldman should be reunited with his father, thereby turning back the efforts by Brazil’s Progressive Party to overturn a similar ruling by a lower federal court. An obviously delighted, but still cautious, David Goldman appeared this morning on NBC’s Today Show and talked about...

In contrast with the Republican-controlled Legislature, Republican Governor Jan Brewer is earnestly trying to fix problems that have been brewing for decades in Arizona. She inherited her position earlier this year when former Democratic Governor Janet Napolitano became Secretary of Homeland Security in the Obama Administration. The dysfunctional state tax system was pressed to its limits by a rabid and irresponsible...

Despite worldwide negative publicity following increase in attacks on foreign students, Australian cities occupy five of the top 20 places in a British survey conducted to find out the “most liveable cities” among the 140 cities in the world. Melbourne (photo above), which recently catapulted into news as an “unsafe” place for Indian students, ranked third in the world, behind Vancouver...

Continuing with our Muslim coverage of President Obama’s speech to the Islamic world, we present this article from Iraq’s Kitabat newspaper. So what are Iraqis saying about President Obama’s long-awaited speech? While loathing the necessity of having Obama lecture Muslims on what they should already know about their own religion, Kitabat’s Ali Abd al-Khaleq - ‘appreciated’...

This is amazing.

Among the many things to come out of President Obama’s recent visit to the Summit Of  The Americas is the issue of whether or not we should expand ties to the nation of Cuba. Needless to say this has raised the hackles of the hard liners in the Cuban American community and has also served as a point of attack from the right. As my readers will know I have not always supported the President and have sometimes...

As many media outlets have reported it appears that North Korea has successfully tested their new rocket which could allow them to eventually send warheads as far away as Alaska or Hawaii. The technology will also allow them to develop larger weapons that could develop into ICBM’s which would reach around the world. On the surface the threats presented by this technology are obvious as the leader of North...

Recently I stopped by my local barber for my regular haircut and as often happens I got into discussions with the others in the shop. I have to admit that this is one thing i really like about going to a regular old barber (in my case the same guy since I was a little kid) because it allows you to have these conversations. It’s not something that you get to do in some of the more modern places. As you...

Major hat-tip to RHReality Check. From AFP: US President Barack Obama announced Friday the creation of a new foreign policy position designed to tackle global women’s issues. Obama named Melanne Verveer, an aide in former president Bill Clinton’s administration, as ambassador-at-large for international women’s issues. She will serve at the State Department under Secretary of State Hillary...

From JTA: The Obama administration has decided to boycott the so-called Durban II conference out of concerns for anti-Semitism. Multiple sources on a conference call with the White House on Friday told JTA that the Obama administration had opted not to attend any further preparatory meetings ahead of the planned U.N. conference against racism in Geneva in April. The conference reprises the 2001 conference in...

Fires continue to rage in Australia with over 100 dead already and the danger of more deaths in the coming days. What makes things even worse is that the fires are suspected of being caused by arson Suspicions that the worst wildfires ever to strike Australia were deliberately set led police to declare crime scenes Monday in towns incinerated by blazes, while investigators moving into the charred landscape discovered...

Read it here. An excerpt: Assimilation is already a fact of life in Israel. There are more than one million Muslim Arabs in Israel; they possess Israeli nationality and take part in political life with the Jews, forming political parties. On the other side, there are Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Israeli factories depend on Palestinian labor, and goods and services are exchanged. This successful assimilation...

Will Israel’s assault on Gaza prove to be the strengthening of Israel’s traditional policy goal of strong deterrence or prove to be a costly miscalculation? In a Newsweek web exclusive, Kevin Peraino looks at the issue. Several key parts: Of all Israeli casualties in the 2006 war with Lebanon, the loss of the Jewish state’s aura of invincibility was perhaps the most devastating. For the better...

…now apparently more divided by a common language. The resistance reminds me a bit of wariness of attempts at metrifying the US.

It seems that Mick Jagger and Ben Affleck have joined hands to bring the latest in celebrity humanitarian efforts. I applaud both Jagger and Affleck for producing a film designed to raise awareness about the problems facing the people of the Democratic Republic of Congo, and yet my inner skeptic wonders how much impact the effort might really have? Criticisms are rife of celebrity efforts to use their fame in...

The September 2007 massacre in Nisoor Square was one of many shameful chapters in a long history of discreditable/tragic incidents. Private contractors —or, as some call them, “mercenaries” — spooked by an unfortunate incident, opened fire into a crowd of civilians who were milling around the street trying to go about their lives. We’re relieved that some of those responsible are...

We read or hear the names of a plethora of countries every day. But I have to confess that as closely as I try to follow world news and foreign affairs, I can’t always identify the locations of some countries. In this era of globalization and of the projection of US power and influence, it seems sort of important for we Americans to be more aware of the world around us. After all, people in Yemen, Bahrain,...

I must admit from the start that I am somewhat surprised that this story is not getting more play in the media. An Saudi oil tanker has been hijacked by Somali terrorists and is seemingly being held for ransom of its $ 100 million cargo.

Now that Barack Obama Junior is safely America’s president-to-be, his stepmother has decided to speak to the press about her courtship and relationship with Barack Obama Senior. According to this interview with Grace Keziah Obama from Kenya’s Standard newspaper, the father of our President elect was quite a lady killer and, ‘He liked fun and loved good things. Which is why I wasn’t surprised...

Here are a few Sunday morning headlines about the United States – translated and otherwise – from the world’s newspapers: Some tough admissions for France, the ‘land of human rights’: Le Figaro, France Obama’s Lesson to the French France’s political parties are retooling after Obama’s high-tech victory: Le Monde, France French Parties ‘All Draw Inspiration’...

Is there anyone left out there wondering of the the rest of this planet sees America in a new light after President-elect Obama’s victory? This article by the great Christian Merville of Lebanon’s L’Orient Le Jour is particularly eloquent – and ends much more cold-eyed than this paragraph in the beginning might lead one to believe. And demonstrating the incredible change in perceptions,...

The tidal wave of global reaction to the election of President-elect Barack Obama is enough to make a foreign desk editor cry over what to do next. Coming later today will be articles from Russia and Iraq. Here are just a few of the many stories posted on WORLDMEETS.US in the past 24 hours: 24 Heures, Switzerland A Man, a Destiny, a World: The Best of America EXCERPT: “The arrival today of the first...