#2
Now Haqqanis book leaves no doubt that hes out to promote worldwide jihad. And in that case, U.S. officials are wasting their time trying to coax him to the negotiating table.
For a map, click here. For a map of Michoacan, click here. To read the latest full Rantburg report on the growing Moreira debt scandal, click here
By Chris Covert
The Mexican national press has made it a point not to make too much of the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI) victory in Michoacan Sunday. The leaders of two of the rival parties, PRI and Partido Accion Nacional (PAN) did their share Sunday, one of them by running victory laps in the press before the polls even closed.
American press outlets have also helpfully weighed in to the post election analysis calling the Michoacan state elections "key".
To be sure Humberto Moreira Valdes, in his office as leader of PRI only nine months is probably pretty happy to be informed the Michoacan elections were key. Beats telling supporters that a Michoacan loss would not cost him his resignation.
Senor Moreira should also be worried. PAN leader Gustavo Madero exercised a bit of hubris to claim based on exit polls of a PAN victory in the governor's house, but that tiny bit of silliness could be the only harbinger any political organization can hope for going into 2012, including PRI.
Of the elections in 2011, save for Baja California Sur (which went PAN), Moreira can claim credit for five wins. Governorships in Guerrero, Nayarit, Mexico state and Coahuila, plus sweeps in all statehouses and municipal council elections. His feat mirrored the string of victories achieved by his predecessor, Beatriz Parades Rangel when in 2010 her efforts led to PRI flipping or retaining 11 of 14 statehouses.
Clearly with those strings of victories, any leader of PRI can work with some confidence that that momentum can carry into the 2012 presidential elections.
But for Michoacan.
Madero decided to draw the line at Michoacan apparently just after the July trouncing the other two mainstream parties received at the hands of PRI, including Partido Revolucion Democratica (PRD), Mexico's mainstream leftist political party.
In mid August Madero decided to make Moreira the focus of attacks, instead of PRI or its candidate, the latter being illegal in Mexico. His attacks come almost a full month following a report by the Procuradoria General Nacional (PRG) or attorney general's office which took notice of the suspicious nature of the ballooning public debt.
The reason for that delay is pretty clear along with the seemingly half hearted nature of the attacks. Madero wants Moreira as leader of the PRI. Moreira resigning is not an option because then PAN has little to go after PRI with.
PAN is suffering greatly politically from six years of warfare on the streets of Mexico as President Felipe Calderon Hinojosa attempted to deal with the increasingly violent Mexican organized crime cartels. Attacks against the president and his policies, even though PRI has funded those very policies have taken their toll. PAN's political fortunes are on the decline.
Madero knows it, and before August there was little he could do about it.
Now, almost three months after Madero's attacks began and two former Coahuila state officials are facing federal indictments for fraud, four months after an embarrassing pasting at the hands of the PRI, come the Michoacan state elections.
But for its order in state elections in 2012 and the fact president Calderon's sister Luisa Maria "Cocoa" Calderon Hinojasa ran under the PAN banner, the Michoacan election would be just another backwater electoral contest involving less than one percent of the total population of Mexico.
It is in the Michoacan state Chamber of Deputies and the governor's seat that Madero realized the dividends from his strategy. Of 24 seats, PRI managed to take only 11. It took the plurality of seats but not a majority, which compared to the overwhelming victories earlier in the year is an amazing accomplishment. A majority, 13, are held by PAN and PRD, neither party strangers to coming together to oppose PRI in local elections and the inevitable wrangling over state resources.
Madero probably now realizes dividends from his attacks would pay off if PRI lost somewhere.
The governor's race, however, had had established for it a number beyond which the contest amongst the three candidates -- but in reality between PRI and PAN -- would not be considered close. The numebr was 60,000 or roughly six percent of eligible voters.
Calderon Hinjosa ended the election with 520,333 votes or 32.67 percent versus PRI's coalition garnering 563,598 for 35.39. The difference is 40,375 votes.
If the Michoacan elections are a harbinger for 2012, the lesson to take would be that 2012 will be street brawl. As this writer has said in the past, if Madero has an ace up his sleeve for 2012, that ace is a wildcard by the name of Humberto Moreira Valdes.
The only solution to bad debt is to write it off--renounce it all. Why aren't those who took the risks for their own private gain being forced to absorb the losses?
Can we please dispense with the fantasy "solutions"?
--There is no way Europe is going to "grow its way out of this debt."
--"Restructuring" is a code word for writeoffs.
--Printing euros to buy the bad debt is just a shuck-and-jive game of transferring the losses to unsuspecting holders of euros or taxpayers.
--Nobel prize winning economist Thomas Sargent noted: "There's a fundamental truth that everyone has to understand: what the government spends, the public will pay for sooner or later, whether in taxes or inflation or having their debt defaulted on." (Source: BusinessWeek 11/20/11).
--There is no free lunch.
--the central flaw in the global financial system: risk has been disconnected from return.
--Not only has the risk been palmed off onto taxpayers and savers unsuspecting chumps, the returns have been concentrated into the few hands that control the big bets.
--The current system works until the debt-serfs rebel.
--Those who made the bets should rightly lose everything--yes, be wiped out. Who should not suck a loss are those who did not stand to gain: the taxpayers and holders of the currency.
--Life will go on if the banks are wiped out and closed, pension funds and insurance companies take losses, etc.
High officials have said that peace is not a foregone conclusion. I wonder what Europe will be doing 5 years from now. With armies drawn down so far, I don't see war--at least not right away. Certainly not full scale wars of the type we're used to seeing over there.
Assume the gloomy outlook is correct, and that sometime in the not-too-distant future there will be riots killing foreign nationals, and counter riots, and demands for revenge against the thieves and killers. (From over here I don't see that degree of demonization yet. But I have to rely on reporters who speak the local languages--I've no clue what the man in the coffee-shop thinks.)
Neighbors might go to war in the classical way again. But non-neighboring countries might go with different models--attacks in third countries or on the sea, rocket attacks from throw-aways, or borrow from the midEast model and use terror bombings.
What would we expect to see on the road to classical war, given that the armies aren't that large yet?
They'd be expanding the forces under cover, or arranging so they can expand quickly. Rifles and uniforms are cheap, experienced drill sergeants a little less so, trucks and depots and artillery and aircraft still less--is anybody trying to buy back stuff they sold to third world countries? They'd start collecting dual use vehicles, and rehabbing boats as mine sweepers, and hiring vets from other countries.
Governments might start trying to be best pals with Turkey and Russia. Greece vs Germany wouldn't be much of a contest unless Greece had a powerful ally. (Hmm. Probably wouldn't be Turkey...)
The shape of trade wars will depend on how things settle out from the breakdown, and I can't make a decent stab at guessing that, and suspect that very few could.
I'll keep my eyes peeled. We have enough of our own troubles here. Mexico is coming apart at the seams already. The breakdown will be demagogue fertilizer all over; I could easily foresee states offering to secede. Texas isn't Germany, nor California Greece, but there are enough parallels to shape the same kind of conflict.
#2
What would we expect to see on the road to classical war, given that the armies aren't that large yet?
Technically, I suspect the Swiss are in the best position for a modest increase to their borders. Not like they've ever done something like that before. Heh.
#3
What would we expect to see on the road to classical war, given that the armies aren't that large yet?
Pakistan is only held together by foreign aid, and is a nuclear power. Iran is suicidally jihadi and on the verge of getting nukes. And North Korea is, well, North Korea.
#4
If there is to be conflict in Europe, I can see several possible developing ways for it to happen.
1) As usual, bad stuff begins in the Balkans. The most likely scenario is again Muslim v. Christian.
2) Standing armies are too expensive, compared to mercenary companies. So conflict outside of the Balkans will begin as internal fights, beyond the ability of police to quell, so mercenaries are brought in.
3) Other minorities will likely get into the act, including Roma, Basques, and some others. Oddly enough, Spain could be partially fractured, because its regions want more federalism, and less Madrid centralism. Northern Italy is begging to leave Italy, as they are nothing like the rest of Italians.
4) France is way ahead of everyone else, because it still has an army, if decrepit, and mercenaries, the FFL, and nuclear weapons. It could also likely rebuild a conventional army rapidly, if needed.
#5
I see the trouble beginning in the Balkans as well as the usual suspects realize that nobody is going to stop them.
I see troubles in Western Europe being along the lines of riots and increasingly sever anti-riot actions that might result in forced emigration.
You might also see little actions like the Cod War where one nation sends a destroyer or a flyover to make a point but Western Europe is unlikely to actually go to war against each other at this point. Turkey and Greece perhaps, but not Western Europe.
#6
Turkey having gone Islamist, it could make a move against Greece or Cyprus. It has already issued vague threats about exploitation of newly discovered natural gas deposit. South Cyrus belongs to the EU. That would draw Europe in.
The reality that Krugman refuses to accept is that Europe offers a glimpse of Americas future if it continues down the path of European-style big government. The root of Europes financial crisis lies in decades of over-spending and over-borrowing, largely to pay for overgrown and bloated welfare systems, vast public sectors, and incredibly generous pension plans. Europe has a huge entitlements disaster heading its way, with graying electorates unable to sustain the status quo. Added to this has been the disastrous euro experiment, which has created a one-size fits all approach for 17 EU countries, with varying levels of economic advancement. It has been a huge leap into the dark, without a shred of democratic accountability.
There is only one path Europe can take if it is to avoid economic meltdown: dramatic cuts in public spending, the dismantling of its welfare states, the removal of crippling taxes and business regulations, the downsizing of the public sector, and a return to self-determination for EU member states. It is Europes lack of fiscal responsibility, economic freedom, and national sovereignty, that are at the heart of the current economic crisis, and the United States must do all it can to avoid European-style decline.
#4
There might be a way to preserve the Euro, and Greece is a small enough economy to experiment with the technique without threatening the rest of Europe. The technique worked for Germany's economy way back when, so it is not particularly novel.
When the Weimar currency, the Papiermark, was hyperinflating, it had to be replaced by a new currency, the Reichsmark. But to protect the Reichsmark from being infected by the hyperinflation, a third, transition currency, called the Rentenmark, was introduced.
The Papiermark was a fiat currency, and hyperinflation was caused by Germany's massive WWI reparations, which the government just printed more money to pay.
The Rentenmark, however, was back by gold, so was solid as a rock. So the debt was pretty much set aside, and the Rentenmark was used for bank and financial institution normalization, a special bank being created for the purpose of managing the debt.
The Reichsmark, as well, was backed by gold, and was able to take over as a fairly debt free currency. Which is why, except for events intervening, Germany would have recovered without the Nazis, who just managed to seize power in a narrow window of opportunity during the recovery.
In Greek terms, they need to be temporarily taken off the Euro and returned to the Drachma. But they need a third currency, called say, the "Greco", to make the transition back to a solid economy.
The Greco would likely not be backed by gold, but by commodities swaps between the EU and Greece, with favorable set prices for Greek exports, and EU surpluses sold at a great discount to Greece.
This would both make the Greco strong, though it would only be a banking and financial business currency, and it would give Greece a growing store of Grecos, which would increase the value of the Drachma, the internal Greek currency.
Grecos could then be worth far more than the Euro, and be used to slowly pay off Greece's external debts, without harming the Drachma. Then, with their debt reduced considerably, the Greeks could slowly be reintroduced to the Euro.
#6
Anonymoose Germany would have recovered without the Nazis,
The whole of Europe including Germany was in a depression at the time when Hitler took over in 1933, as was the US. Hitler's claim to fame was that he reduced unemployment from 30% to 5% by 1936. I think that the success of Hitler was one the main impetuses for Keynes General Theory which was meant to ensure full employment.
He wrote in his forward to the German edition "The theory of aggregate production, which is the point of the following book, nevertheless can be much easier adapted to the conditions of a totalitarian state than the theory of production and distribution of a given production put forth under conditions of free competition and a large degree of laissez-faire. This is one of the reasons that justifies the fact that I call my theory a general theory."
I do like to point this fact out to my Keynesian "friends" It drives them mad.
The U.S. military is denouncing a former Navy SEAL's book that claims to describe the "real" version of the raid that killed the late Osama bin Laden ... who no longer exists...
"It's just not true," U.S. Special Operations Command front man Col. Tim Nye said. "It's not how it happened."
Laden with conspiracy theories and attacks on the Obama White House, Chuck Pfarrer's "SEAL Target Geronimo" claims an alternative version of the raid in which the SEAL team shot bin Laden within 90 seconds of arriving at the Pakistain compound where the al-Qaeda criminal mastermind was holed up.
Pfarrer claims the White House issued a fictional and damaging account of the raid that made the SEALs looks inept. He says President Barack I mean, I do think at a certain point you've made enough money Obama's speedy acknowledgement of the raid was a craven political move that rendered much of the intelligence gathered on the raid useless.
Pfarrer's account broke into Amazon's top 20 book sales list last week, and Pfarrer has appeared on Fox News, CNN and in other venues to promote it.
"I have truth on my side," Pfarrer said in an interview with The News Agency that Dare Not be Named. "I spoke to the guys on the ground and in the secondary bird," he said, referring to the aircraft full of a second SEAL team that was there to rescue the first if it came under attack so far inside Pakistain's borders.
"This is a fabrication," Nye countered, issuing an on-the-record denial on behalf of Navy SEAL Adm. Bill McRaven, who took command of all special operations this summer.
In his previous role, McRaven executed the raid in May as head of the military's elite Joint Special Operations Command. Nye said McRaven was concerned the book would lead Americans to doubt the administration's version of events. He also disputed Pfarrer's portrayal of friction between the CIA and the military special operations forces who carried out the raid.
#3
Though I agree that too much information was given (what they found, who conducted the raid), I can see the point of, "Well you left a helicopter in the middle of Islamabad, kinda tough to deny a raid."
#4
Well, we coulda had Hillary say it was rogue elephants, uh, elements or something. What's the point of having a Secretary if he or she never "disavows any knowledge of your actions?"
#6
All I know is by towards the end of the announcement I was telling them to shut up about it, then Joe "Stand Up for Us" Biden splerted the name at a pep rally all I could hope for is misdirection from the get-go, but then remembered how poorly crazy uncle joey did when he cried at the vp debate.
Just thinking, throw so much smoke that even if someone found the fire, they would think there are more.
Would have been fun if, after the helo was abandoned and everyone accounted for to drop some massive ordinace like a FAB so any pieces left would hardly be described as neat-o helo, rumor the sounds were emergency gas venting. Maybe the left it there to cover the ISI turncoat, whatever. Just so long as they don't figure out the spy squirrels used to map the building.
[Dawn] ARE the Pak Taliban amenable to negotiations and would that lead to sustainable peace? After the Oct 18 All-Party Conference resolution, which endorsed talks with Pak krazed killers, the government has received offers for negotiations from some Taliban factions.
Of 13 peace treaties signed between the state and various gunnies groups, two are still intact, both of them pertaining to North Wazoo. In each of these agreements the state has compromised on its writ, allowing the gunnies to further consolidate their grip. The gunnies have repeatedly violated and revoked the deals. What has changed now that the political and military leadership are once again considering initiating parleys and pacts?
The popular argument in Pakistain is that if the US can talk to the Afghan Taliban, why should Islamabad not do the same? However, nothing needs reforming like other people's bad habits... it remains to be seen whether talks between Kabul, Washington and the Taliban will yield positive results.
Secondly, a nationalistic trait dominates the Afghan resistance but the Pak Taliban lack this `legitimacy`, and ideological and tribal characteristics have persuaded Pakistain to look at the Pak Taliban from its own perspective.
Although prospects for a successful grinding of the peace processor in Pakistain`s tribal areas are not entirely bleak, the state must first decide what it wants to achieve. Is the desired objective minimising terrorist attacks in the country, or dismantling terrorists` networks? Are the decisions swayed by a craving to regain lost ground or to reintegrate the gunnies into society?
Also of crucial importance is what the state demands of the krazed killers, and what it can offer in return. What is required is a comprehensive approach based on a lucid policy that is mindful of the lessons learned from previous peace deals.
With the exception of the Swat ...a valley and an administrative district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistain, located 99 mi from Islamabad. It is inhabited mostly by Pashto speakers. The place has gone steadily downhill since the days when Babe Ruth was the Sultan of Swat... peace agreement, all other pacts were signed between the military and the krazed killers, with the principal objective being to secure an end to attacks on the security forces. The local tribes` participation in these talks was nominal, their only function being to serve as guarantors. The state negotiated from a position of weakness, offering too much and demanding too little. Most importantly, the Taliban enjoyed public support at the time, which strengthened their hand at the negotiating table.
Public support for them has plummeted after the military operations in Swat and South Waziristan. The extent of the effect this would have on their bargaining position is of critical importance. Besides other structural and tactical flaws in the previous agreements, a major strategic deficiency was a consistent failure to assess the krazed killers` ideological and political strength.
The real advantage the Pak Taliban possessed was their ideological and political cause. The cause has a central place in counterinsurgency studies. Without an attractive cause, a krazed killer movement is little more than a criminal syndicate. The Pak Taliban got their political inspiration from Afghanistan, but ideologically they were influenced by both Al Qaeda and Pak krazed killer and radical groups.
Initially, the Pak Taliban focused on Afghanistan or on acting as controllers for Al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban in South and North Waziristan. Punjab- and Kashmire-based groups introduced foreign gunnies to the religious discourse for change in Pakistain.
Pakistain`s religious political parties have for long been striving for the Islamisation of the state and the socialisation of society along religious lines. This is a common narrative in Pakistain but after 9/11, krazed killer organizations have promoted this narrative with greater vigour.
Al Qaeda came up with an ideological and political agenda which appeals to gunnies in countries all over the world. These internal and the external factors transformed the Pak Taliban movement. Although many Pak Taliban groups had a far from prominent role in Afghanistan, even that became a source of political legitimacy for them. However, today is that tomorrow you were thinking about yesterday... under these influences their focus gradually shifted to Pakistain.
Punjab- and Kashmire-based krazed killer organizations became invaluable assets for Al Qaeda as their objectives converged. The Taliban absorbed both tendencies and became agents of change in their respective areas. They felt empowered in a system where rustics had been the victims of colonial-era laws, political agents and maliks. The nexus of these three elements still exists and has grown even stronger.
Prospects for sustainable peace will remain bleak unless this bond is weakened. The Pak Taliban will fear losing political and ideological legitimacy. A long-term strategy to weaken this bond can meet the challenge.
Fortunately, there is a desire among sections of the clergy in Pakistain to play its role in curbing violent tendencies. They can offer an alternative to the Taliban groups to strive for their causes through peaceful means. This would not be an easy task and the option of use of force against Al Qaeda and inflexible elements among the Taliban should remain on the table and must form an unambiguous provision in any future peace agreement.
A selective approach may also work as the Taliban are far from being a homogenous entity. There are three major factions among them: the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistain (TTP), local Taliban groups (such as groups led by Gul Bahadar and Mullah Nazir, with whom peace treaties are still intact), and other krazed killer groups such as Lashkar-i-Islam who are not part of the two major factions. The TTP itself is an alliance of many small krazed killer groups. Although these groups share common ideological and political views, their objectives vary and include sectarian and Islamisation agendas as well as tribal and ethnic priorities.
A strategy based on an accurate assessment of the krazed killers` ideological and political strengths can be used to engage these factions. However, Caliphornia hasn't yet slid into the ocean, no matter how hard it's tried... different approaches would be needed to engage different groups and a successful policy in one area may not work in another. There are other critical dimensions too but the key to success in any grinding of the peace processor lies in active engagement with the local tribes, and political and religious actors in conflict areas. A persistent, flexible and accommodative approach which can adjust to changing situations just might do the trick.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/15/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
Arm the Tadjiks, Uzbecks and Hararis. They'll fix the Taliban/Pushtun problem.
[Dawn] A WEEK ago, three Hindu doctors were bumped off in Shikarpur. While the details of the incident remain unclear, the discriminatory aspect of the killings cannot be denied.
The Eid day violence followed the release of a report in September by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistain (HRCP), which documents how minorities in Balochistan ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... , particularly Hindus, are increasingly being kidnapped for ransom, forced to convert to Islam, and persecuted to such an extent that Hindu families fear sending their children to school.
In this context, it is not surprising that a recent study by the Pew Research Centre Forum on Religion and Public Life ranked Pakistain as the third-least tolerant country in the world in terms of social acceptance of religious diversity.
The reasons for heightened intolerance and violence towards religious minorities are multifaceted and well known.
The findings of an HRCP working group in April identified many of these: non-implementation of human rights ...which are usually open to widely divergent definitions... laws; failure to prosecute those who discriminate against minorities; the proliferation of hate speech in the media and in mosques and other public spaces; the persistence and prejudiced application of discriminatory laws such as the blasphemy law; inadequate minority representation in parliament; the impotence of the National Commission for Minorities; biased and inaccurate content about minority communities in the national school curriculum, and more.
Two days after the Shikarpur incident, the US Commission on International Religious Freedom released a report considering one of these reasons in detail. Connecting the Dots: Education and Religious Discrimination in Pakistain examines how social studies, Islamiat and Urdu textbooks used both in Pakistain's public school and madressah systems encourage prejudices against religious minorities. As part of the study, the International Centre for Religion and Diplomacy and the Pak think tank Sustainable Development Policy Institute reviewed more than 100 textbooks from classes one to 10 of Pakistain's four provinces. Additionally, 277 students and teachers at 37 public schools and 226 students and teachers at 19 madressahs were interviewed.
This study shows that intolerant and prejudiced references to religious minorities, especially Hindus, are rife -- and not only in Islamiat textbooks, but also in social studies and other texts. According to the study, religious minorities are often portrayed as second-class citizens who should be grateful to Pak Moslems for affording them limited rights. Hindus, with some exceptions, are portrayed as the enemies of Pakistain and Islam. Their culture is described as unjust and cruel in comparison with Islamic culture, which is understood to be fair and brotherly. The greatest curricular travesty occurs in the form of omission or historical distortion: there are few mentions of how non-Moslems have contributed to the formation and development of Pakistain and its culture. Interviews also revealed that more than 80 per cent of public school teachers view non-Moslems as 'enemies of Islam' to varying degrees.
Interestingly, all of the madressah teachers interviewed for the study correctly identified religious minorities as being citizens of Pakistain (as opposed to only 60 per cent of government school teachers who were able to do so). Madressah teachers were also often more informed about other religions and expressed tolerance for minority beliefs. Still, the study found that madressah textbooks generally portray non-Moslems as either kafirs (infidels), dhimmis (non-Moslems under Islamic rule) or murtids (apostates) -- labels that can hardly be expected to promote a tolerant and cohesive society.
The findings and recommendations of the USCIRF study (and several others that have preceded it, and are duly cited therein) are significant because, if acted on, they could effect genuine change. In recent years, politicians have paid lip service to minority rights: the PPP established a ministry for minority affairs; Imran Khan ... aka Taliban Khan, who ain't the sharpest bulb on the national tree... swore to champion minority rights during his Oct 30 rally in Lahore. No tangible policies have accompanied the political rhetoric, however, and the plight of non-Moslems in Pakistain is worsening.
The liquidation of former Punjab governor Salmaan Taseer demonstrated that the blasphemy law won't be repealed without a major political battle staged by the bravest souls. But piecemeal curriculum reform -- which has been initiated, and which is supported by ready funding from international donors -- can be enacted by even the flimsiest, non-committal politician.
The momentum to facilitate this change already exists: the National Education Policy 2009 stipulates that minorities should receive equal educational opportunities and that textual materials should not contain controversial or offensive content against them. Curricular reform efforts initiated in 2006 have, according to the USCIRF report, "made significant progress towards eliminating biases, historical revisionism and religious exclusivity".
The new curriculum for classes six to eight, for example, substitutes history for social studies and includes two chapters (out of 15) on the pre-Islamic history of the subcontinent. Other textbooks promote tolerance, avoid gratuitous criticism of India and emphasise respect for diversity. Unfortunately, six years after these changes were drafted, revised textbooks incorporating the new material have yet to go to print.
Pushing through a curriculum reform process that is already under way (though by no means perfect) is far easier than setting out to change a hateful society's mindset. Political leaders seeking to stem the problem of pervasive and violent intolerance should therefore consider the publication of tolerant textbooks a good place to start the long war against bigotry.
An initial policy mandate of big-promise politicians should be to promote the full implementation of the 2006 reform process (which, the USCIRF report recommends, includes the removal of derogatory content and the inclusion of content relating to the positive contributions of religious minorities to Pakistain).
This effort may not instantly elevate the status of religious minorities to their rightful position as protected, equal citizens of Pakistain. But it will begin the slow purge of hateful and misguided ideas from the public sphere.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/15/2011 00:00 ||
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#2
Of course, Iranian action against Persian Gulf shipping would justify prejudicial actions by other nations that could set Iran back to the 7th century. BC.
Im amazed that in a park full of revolutionaries, there are large contingents that cant throw away their own trash, said Jordan McCarthy, 22, a member of the protesters sanitation team.
Jordan and her fellow revolutionaries like to assure us that theyre the future. And in the sense that, in a post-prosperity America pox-ridden encampments of the homicidal, suicidal and narcotically inept will not seem that unusual, she may have a point. But I do hope at least a few of the celebrities whove endorsed the movement Susan Sarandon, Cornel West, Naomi Klein, Michael Moore, Margaret Atwood, Noam Chomsky get to spend the night
#1
"I'm amazed that in a park full of revolutionaries, there are large contingents that can't throw away their own trash," said Jordan McCarthy
Maybe OWS will be a learning experience for some of the young folk.
By the way, whatever happened to the Tea Party?
#3
Tea Party is wise to allow the OWS folks to destroy themselves before making another appearance. Then when the Tea Party does have a rally or two they should have a million cameras ready for the handful of OWS nuts that try to cause a fuss.
#4
But I do hope at least a few of the celebrities whove endorsed the movement Susan Sarandon, Cornel West, Naomi Klein, Michael Moore, Margaret Atwood, Noam Chomsky get to spend the night.
Me too. Throw in Michael Bloomberg, Jean Quan, Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama, and Harry Reid to the list of left wingnuts.
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
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
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.
...a valley and an administrative district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistain, located 99 mi from Islamabad. It is inhabited mostly by Pashto speakers. The place has gone steadily downhill since the days when Babe Ruth was the Sultan of Swat...
Punjab
A WEEK ago, three Hindu doctors were 
