#1
Well, you see cobber, your thinking has a major flaw in it. Far as they're concerned, it's not your country, it's they country---given to them by Allan. And, because Allan is kind and considerate, he's given them the country already lavishly equipped with future Dhimmis. All they have to do, is prove their faith by teaching you the proper order of things.
#2
Nice sentiment but how are you going to back it up now that you have outlawed guns? Can't sing them to death and they have no such qualms about arming themselves. Goo luck mate!
[DAWN] THE finance minister acknowledged the widespread incidence of malnutrition in Pakistain the other day, but missed the point in presenting remedies for the problem.
The annual report of the National Economic Council, placed before the National Assembly by Mr Ishaq Dar, says that one out of three Paks "does not have regular and assured access to sufficient nutritious food".
The words in which the problem is identified immediately betray a lack of awareness about malnutrition and how to study its incidence.
The report goes on to suggest that the "poor performance of the agriculture sector in recent years" is responsible for this situation, and that the remedy must, therefore, be in making agriculture growth more "pro-poor", that is by diversifying the base of incomes and creating more linkages between the farm and non-farm sectors.
If the authors of the report had studied the literature on malnutrition in Pakistain, they would have realised that increasing the supply of food, or producing greater rural incomes will have only a marginal effect on nutritional outcomes.
The latter are more closely linked to social variables such as female education. They could have taken, as an example, a report published in the Lancet Series on Maternal and Child Nutrition in Pakistain in 2013, which found that half of all children in this country are chronically undernourished, and a quarter of all children are born underweight.
These are staggering numbers, and the vulnerabilities they create to disease aggravates the problem further. In a list of remedies required to arrest the growth of these numbers, the authors had mentioned steps such as marrying girls at a later age, greater awareness of prenatal health, improved health programmes to give women access to trained birth attendants, targeted safety nets in rural areas, empowerment of women, early childhood development programmes, and so on.
Malnutrition can occur widely even in areas of food abundance, and should not be just linked to incomes.
By taking such a narrow economic view of malnutrition in Pakistain, the finance minister has revealed a poor understanding of the problem, and has gone on to identify a flawed set of policies as the remedy.
When the Lancet study was launched back in 2013, the Planning Commission was represented at the event, and promised that its findings would be incorporated in Vision 2025 to guide the government's approach to long-standing problems. Sadly, this does not appear to have happened.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/23/2015 00:00 ||
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[DAWN] MONDAY's debate in the Senate on the 34-member Saudi-led alliance serves to focus our attention on the crucial role an upper house plays in a federation.
Even though our Senate has existed since 1973, when Pakistain's first directly elected National Assembly enacted the Constitution, the upper house has not been able to play the role expected of a chamber that represents the constituent units and performs functions that serve as a check on the powers of the lower house, besides holding the government to account.
Even though Britannia has a unitary form of government, the House of Lords, despite the clipping of its powers twice, still performs some useful functions like putting brakes on speedy legislation and enlightening the Commons by the quality of its debate.
America has a powerful upper house. It not only scrutinises money bills but also deals with the appointments of cabinet ministers, besides having a crucial foreign policy role that includes the ratification of treaties and ambassadorial appointments.
By having the powers to amend or reject aid bills, the US Senate plays a key role in shaping American foreign policy.
In Pakistain, two military interventions since 1973 have militated against the evolution of constitutional institutions and done incalculable harm to the country in the domain of external relations.
Resultantly, the Senate hasn't been able to perform the role expected of it. Ideally, the government should be bound to sound out the upper house on foreign agreements, treaties and defence deals -- indeed, the ratification of these should be contingent upon the approval of the Senate.
In fact, the latter should be able to summon both politicians and military personnel holding high office to account for the state's gains and losses in its interactions with, say, Afghanistan and India.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/23/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
America has a powerful upper house.
That does not seem so to me. Congress has ceded far too much power to the Executive Branch. The Judiciary has done likewise. Both should be doing everything they can to prevent an executive branch dictatorship; otherwise known as a king or emperor.
[DAWN] SAUDI ARABIA recently announced the formation of an Islamic military alliance for combating terrorism consisting of 34 Muslim-majority states. After some initial confusion, the Pak government confirmed its participation in this coalition, but without stating whether it would be willing to commit troops abroad. The credibility of this alliance is questionable, since Syria, and Shia-majority Iran and Iraq, have not been included. Without the collaboration and support of these three key states, the Middle East stands little chance of neutralising the hard boyIslamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... group.
The US has welcomed the Saudi announcement -- behind closed doors, it might even have pressured the Saudi government to initiate this project. The US presidential election is less than a year away, and the B.O. regime is under intense pressure from the Republicans for not doing enough to battle IS. The US does not want to commit boots on the ground; it wants friendly Arab nations to commit resources and soldiers for fighting IS.
Ironically, the rise of IS can be partially credited to the US: its inference and military adventurism in the Middle East, including by arming rebels many of whom later joined IS, has significantly weakened state policing and military institutions in the region. The US desired regime change in Libya and Syria. It succeeded in Libya by astutely getting the Security Council to acquiesce in its military involvement on the premise of protecting human rights One man's rights are another man's existential threat. . But on Syria, both Russian and China vetoed any Security Council resolution authorising the use of force against the established government.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/23/2015 00:00 ||
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In recent months ISIS fronts in Syria and Iraq have taken a defensive turn, after several strikes drained its ranks already exhausted by fighting on multiple fronts, according to analysts. The extremist organization suffered a number of field losses in both Iraq and Syria, but despite this ISIS has broadened the scope of its operations beyond the two countries and includes several countries across the world, killing tens of victims.
The Iraqi Analyst Hisham al-Hashimi, who monitors the terrorist group in both Syria and Iraq, told AFP “ In recent months, ISIS’ positions along most of its fighting fronts in Syria and Iraq have turned defensive , it has lost the initiative that it depended on to attack its enemies.”
Al-Hashimi also pointed out that the terrorist group has recently lost a great deal of suicide attackers, who play a major role to their offensive strategy.
Developments in Iraq also show that ISIS is losing control over the city of Baiji, specifically its nearby oil refinery in the Saladin Governorate which fell in October, followed by losses of the city of Sinjar, West of Mosul just last month.
These losses cut strategic Iraqi-Syrian supply routes exploited by the group. The routes also facilitated passage into other regions like the Governorate of Diyala and the city of Kirkuk.
In Syria the terrorist group withdrew its militants from vast areas like the rural areas north east Al-Hasakah province, and several towns in other rural areas north of Aleppo.
Syria analyst and geographical expert Fabrice Balanche said “ISIS is being attacked on numerous fronts by various actors: the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in northeast Syria and Kurdish forces in Iraq backed by American air support have been able to squeeze ISIS in the border area, in addition to the Syrian government troops using the additional boost of Russia’s air power to push back against ISIS in the northern Aleppo province and central Homs.”
“Without being able to shoot down coalition planes, ISIS will organize attacks in the heart of the coalition countries, like France, to try to destabilize us and win the propaganda battle, which is likely to bring it more funding and fighters,” Balanche added.
They are more dangerous over here when they are losing over there
I am concerned especially as we have done nothing to prepare ourselves culturally.
In australia the spy agencies still have not climbed down from their 15 years of wrongness since 9/11.
Still pretending terror attacks have nothing to do with islam
Every violent attack wins Islamists more cultural ground over here and will until the silly sausages in "intelligence" correct their error
We should be preparing our communities to speak intelligently about the secular vs theocrat struggle within Islam, in preparation for the next attack, so we can avoid a bigot backlash and defend ourselves against the islamophobia grievance narrative after.
#3
With every terrorist attacked repeatedly denied or downplayed by the 'authorities' is another reduction in the 'legitimacy' of those governments. The same governments and ruling class that aids the enemy by refusing to put in place common sense measures to avoid such attacks. ISIS may well triumph over their adversaries by taking down those very same people.
h/t Instapundit
...It is clear that many Republicans and a lot of conservatives even to this moment do not really understand what we're up against and what we have been up against for seven years. As far as they're concerned, it's just liberalism, and we face here an intellectual debate and challenge in the arena of ideas, and our task is nothing more than convincing the American people that our ideas are superior to theirs.
...I mean, the evidence is staring in the face, more so each and every day. My quote/unquote "problem" is I knew it before Obama was even inaugurated what was coming down the pike. I knew what his purpose with Obamacare was. I knew when he threw the Winston Churchill bust the Oval Office. I knew when I listened to tapes of Obama talking to his buddies in 2002, 2005, 2006. I knew what he thought of this country: Unjust, immoral, should not have existed, not a legitimate superpower, there's no such thing as American exceptionalism.
That, folks, is not just the average, ordinary serving up of liberalism that we debate every day.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
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Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
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Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[DAWN] THE finance minister acknowledged the widespread incidence of malnutrition in Pakistain the other day, but missed the point in presenting remedies for the problem.
