unser kofferproblem habt ihr ja noch mitbekommen. aber es ging noch weiter
also ostertags schalen-koffer-tier haben wir bei ihnen im käfig gelassen, mein paraguay-trolley-monster blieb auch zu hause und stattdessen kam mein kleiner, toller trolley zu einem weiteren einsatz. zwar 6 kilo verschenkt, dafür aber ne menge an platz gewonnen.
das sollte sich auch gleich auszahlen als uns die nette dame vom flughafenshuttle abholte. beängstigend was alles in einen zafira passt. nach kurzer fahrt kamen wir am flughafen an und checkten auch gleich ein. ich konnte mir die frage nicht unterdrücken, wie viele gepäckstücke man denn aufgeben dürfe. und da kam die antwort wie selbstverständlich: “zwei natürlich…!”natürlich! ich wollte der dame schon erklären, dass das für die internetseite und ihren netten kollegen gestern nicht so natürlich war… aber egal! viel mehr verhielt ich mich als guter christ und hielt nach der ohrfeige auch gleich die andere wange hin, um zu erfahren, dass unser flieger etwa drei (3!) stunden verspätung hat… wenn das mal kein gelungener start ist!
wir uns also zu einem der aufenthaltsbereiche begeben, uns in die sessel gleiten lassen und people watching betrieben. zuerst haben wir aber noch mit einem blick auf die abflugbildschirme rgistriert, dass natürlich nur unser flieger verspätung hat. hunderte von fliegern, aber nur unsrer is so cool… aber was solls. wir haben die zeit ja gut genutzt. denn nach etwa zwei stunden wirft karin mal nen blick in ihre handtasche und zeigt mir voller freude ihr parfum. parfum in der handtasche… war da nicht was?? fliegen, flüssigkeiten, bestimmungen…na klingelt’s? ja bei uns auch. also karin los sich so ein tolles tütchen besorgen. erleichtert und beruhigt verschließen wir das gute duftwasser in dem tütchen und lassen wieder die blicke streifen. karin ihr blick blieb dann auf ihrem handgepäck hängen, um mir aufzuzählen, was sie noch alles so dabei hat: ein weiteres parfum, duschgel, zahnpasta, shampoo, deo… naja kurzum unser halbes bad. oder wie das die sicherheitsbeamten am flughafen deuten würden: einen kompletten bombenbausatz. toll. aber das schicksal meint es doch gut mit uns – man darf doch zwei gepäckstücke aufgeben… also ab zum schalter und aus der handgepäck-bombe schnell ein vollwertiges gepäckstück gemacht. uns kann halt nichts schrecken. erst recht nicht als karin auch noch nach etwa einer weiteren halben stunde entspannt ihren autoschlüssel aus der hosentasche zieht. na sollte der flieger doch nicht fliegen wollen, kein problem. fahren wir eben…
der flug selbst verlief dann eher unspektakulär. zweimal essen, zweimal schlafen und drei filme später waren wir auch schon da. lustig wurde es dann erst wieder bei der gepäckausgabe. wo ein älterer herr vor uns stand, der mal jede schwarze tasche untersucht hat, ob sie vielleicht sein eigentum sei. dabei war es ihm auch gleich, ob das schwarz blau oder braun war. oder ob die tasche krasse gelbe markierungen hatte. oder ob die tasche schon zum dritten mal an ihm vorbei fuhr. egal, konnte ja doch seine sein… das ganze ging dann so weit, dass eine weitere reisende zu ihm rüber ging und sich ihre tasche von seinem wagen holte… der gute hätte seine brille nicht auf der stirn parken sollen! sie hätte ihm da gute dienste erweisen können. neues land, neuer hauptdarsteller hab ich mir dann gedacht als wir unser auto geholt haben. etwa fünf minuten vom schalter der autovermietung entfernt, fiel mir dann völlig überrascht ein, dass ich meinen führerschein nicht dabei habe… den braucht man ja auch nicht. klever gemacht! so musste karin ihre kreditkarte als sicherheit angeben-und wieder was gutes im schlechten gefunden. als fahrbaren untersatz haben wir uns dann nach reiflichen überlegungen das umwelt-monster ausgesucht: einen ford escape. hier hat nicht die vernunft sondern der spass gesiegt. als hätte die vernunft bei leuten, die kofferbomben ohne führerschein transportieren eine chance gefahren bin dann ich
anschließend ist nicht mehr viel passiert. wir sind gut zur tante gekommen. diese hat sich super gefreut. haben noch was getrunken und sind dann müde und glücklich ins bett.
It seems that these days, cool lodgings can sprout anywhere. Even in the arid open plains of Texas. Or make that the desert part of Texas, in a little town called Marfa. It may be off the radar for virtually all travelers, bar those who know their Pop Art from their Pop Tarts! The Thunderbird Hotel.
One art critic commended the hotel as being:
“Laid-back cowboy cool and desert views at this sleek design hotel in Marfa, Western Texas.”
Donald Judd, 15 Untitled Works in Concrete, 1980 - 1984, Marfa, Texas
You’ll find the spunky Thunderbird in Marfa – a small West Texas town seated nearly a mile high in the Chihuahuan Desert. Marfa is surrounded by stark mountainous desert beauty and breathtaking sunsets nearly every day. Art is as much a part of the landscape here as well – Marfa has an international reputation in the art world as a place where Donald Judd came to live and work.
Spare yet comfortable rooms are filled with custom-designed furniture, colorful woven Peruvian blankets and original works of art. The grounds, with a heated swimming pool and arbor-covered communal sitting areas, offer shade from the sun or a fireplace to warm up the cool desert nights.
Ever since iconic minimalist sculptor/furniture artist Donald Judd decamped to Marfa, Texas, the place has exuded an under-the-radar art world cool. So it’s not a surprise to find some of the hippest lodging anywhere here, a classic midcentury (1959) roadside hotel overhauled by architects Liz Lambert and R.L. Fletcher of Lake/Flato Architects in 2005, outfitted with custom-made furniture by local designer Jamey Garza, industrial lights from Jielde, Peruvian Frasada blankets, and Indian cotton sheets.
Der Reifegrad einer Demokratie zeigt sich vor allen Dingen beim politischen Machtwechsel. Darauf hat die Schriftstellerin Thea Dorn unter Berufung auf Niklas Luhmann im ZDF-Nachtstudio hingewiesen: Niklas Luhmann sagt: „Demokratie herrscht, wenn die Opposition an die Regierung kommt, ohne das Gemeinwesen zu ruinieren”.
Nun war zwar Merkel nicht in der Opposition, aber ihr künftiger Koalitionspartner FDP. Versinken wir jetzt im Chaos, unterliegen wir dem Diktat des “neoliberalen” Finanzkapitalismus und müssen wir mit einem sozialen Kahlschlag rechnen? Wohl kaum. Mal abgesehen davon, dass der Neoliberalismus mit Guido Westerwelle überhaupt nichts zu tun hat. Neoliberal nannten sich Geistesgrößen aus verschiedenen Ländern, die sich 1938 in Paris im Institut International de Coopération Intelellectuelle versammelten, um mit Walter Lippmann über dessen Buch “An Inquiry into the Principles of the God Society” und die Zukunft des Liberalismus zu diskutieren. Haupttriebfeder der Runde waren politische Alternativen zum Totalitarismus von rechts und links.
Man sprach über den fundamentalen Irrtum der Philosophie des Laissez-faire, die im Kampf gegen die autoritäre Wirtschafts- und Gesellschaftsordnung der Vergangenheit übersehen hatte, dass die wirtschaftliche Freiheit nicht etwas Wildwachsendes, sondern das empfindliche Geschöpf einer Rechtsordnung ist, der ein komplexes System von sittlichen Normen und Überzeugungen, von Gewohnheiten und Wertvorstellungen entsprechen muss. Die Neoliberalen beschäftigten sich mit der Frage, welche Rechtsordnung einer gerechten, freien und ergiebigen Wirtschaftsverfassung angemessen ist. Diese Intellektuellen waren keine dümmlichen Casino-Kapitalisten, skrupellosen Firmenjäger und renditesüchtigen Spekulanten. Es waren honorige und erfahrende Intellektuelle, die Konzepte für eine freie, soziale und gerechte Gesellschaft entwickelten – allerdings ohne die Attitüde der Machtanmaßung, wie wir sie in politischen Debatten häufig vernehmen müssen.
Und in 60 Jahren hat die Bundesrepublik Deutschland eine in der Geschichte des Landes einmalige politische Stabilität erreicht, die man nicht leichtfertig zerreden sollte. Schlechte Gesetze und Rechtsverordnungen, Steuergeldverschwendung, bürokratischen Ausuferungen, Willkür, Korruption, Macht- und Amtsmissbrauch verdienen eine harte politische Auseinandersetzung in der Öffentlichkeit.
Nur sollten wir deshalb nicht das gesamte Gefüge unserer Institutionen in Frage stellen. Entscheidend ist nur, wie Luhmann sagt, dass das System des politischen Gleichgewichts funktioniert und Schaden vom Gemeinwesen abgewendet wird – egal welche politische Strömung temporär das Sagen hat.
Regierungshandeln ist an Kompromisse gebunden, muss sich mit Gesetzestechnik und Verwaltungen auseinandersetzen, muss sich ständig der Öffentlichkeit stellen und die Regeln der parlamentarischen Demokratie beachten. Das politische Personal muss viele Hürden überwinden, um gestalterisch wirken zu können. Das ist anstrengend und manchmal zermürbend für die Akteure, aber gut für die Demokratie.
Roman Polanski is in “good spirits” despite his arrest on a decades-old warrant relating to the rape of a 13-year-old girl in 1977, his agent said on Tuesday.
“His voice is strong … he’s very anxious to get this resolved and go home,” Jeff Berg told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
Berg said the film director’s arrest on a 1978 US warrant as he arrived in Switzerland from France was a surprise because he has had a house in the country for more than a decade.
“It is surprising because Roman, for the last 12, 15 years, has lived in Switzerland, he has a home, he travels there, he works there,” he said.
“His presence there is well-known as it is through much of Europe, so this came kind of as a shock given the fact that he was invited to Zurich to receive a lifetime achievement award.”
Polanski, the 76-year-old director of Chinatown and the Pianist had travelled to Switzerland to accept a lifetime achievement award at the Zurich film festival, the organisers of which expressed “great consternation and shock” at his detention.
He has hired the Swiss lawyer Lorenz Erni, of the Eschmann & Erni law firm, to fight any extradition charges.
His French lawyer, Georges Kiejman, told France-Inter radio it was “too early to know” whether Polanski would be extradited. “For now, we are trying to have the arrest warrant lifted in Zurich,” he said.
The Oscar-winning director Andrzej Wajda and other Polish film-makers today appealed to the US, Swiss and Polish authorities for the Paris-born Polanski to be freed.
Polanski has strong links with Poland, having moved to the country with his Jewish family when still a toddler shortly before World War II.
His mother died in a Nazi concentration camp, but he avoided capture and spent his youth in Poland before moving to the west.
In a letter posted on the website of Polish Filmmakers Association, the directors called on the US authorities to review the indictment in his 31-year-old case, asking the Polish government to help prevent any extradition.
Poland and France intend to make a joint appeal to Switzerland and the US to have Polanski released from his detention, the Polish foreign minister, Radek Sikorski, told the Polish PAP news agency.
Sikorski said he and his French counterpart, Bernard Kouchner, also planned to ask the US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, to offer Polanski clemency.
The director has had French citizenship for many years and is married to the French singer and actor Emmanuelle Seigner.
He has spent much of his life in France since fleeing the US in 1978, but regularly visits countries without extradition treaties with Washington.
The French culture minister, Frederic Mitterrand, said he was “stunned” by news of Polanski’s arrest, adding that he and the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, wanted to see the director reunited swiftly with his family.
“[Mitterrand] profoundly regrets that a new ordeal is being inflicted on someone who has already known so many during his life,” a culture ministry statement said.
Polanski pleaded guilty to the assault in 1977 but jumped bail and fled the US the following year to avoid a lengthy jail sentence.
He has spent more than three decades in exile in Paris, refusing to return to the US even when he won an Oscar for the Pianist in 2002.
Zurich police said he had been detained at immigration in Zurich on Saturday night at the request of the US justice department and was in custody awaiting extradition.
“There was a valid arrest request and we knew when he was coming,” Guido Balmer, of the Swiss justice ministry, said. “That’s why he was taken into custody.”
The director was permitted to make one call to his wife, who left their two young children to travel to Switzerland, the British writer Robert Harris, who has been working with Polanski, said.
“This is a high-profile action designed to send out some sort of message to someone somewhere,” he added. “No one condones what happened in the 70s, but I think this is pretty appalling.”
A statement from the Swiss Association of Directors called it a “grotesque judicial farce and a monstrous cultural scandal”, while the country’s Association of Film Directors and Scriptwriters said it was “a slap in the face for the entire cultural community in Switzerland”.
Polanski was 44 and already a twice Oscar-nominated director when he had sex with Samantha Gailey, a 13-year-old model he had hired for a photoshoot, at Jack Nicholson’s house in Los Angeles in March 1977.
He claimed the sex was consensual, saying the girl was “not unresponsive”, but Gailey said he had drugged her with painkillers and champagne before carrying out a “very scary” assault.
In recent months, Polanski’s lawyers have been seeking, through the US courts, to have the rape charges against him dropped after saying new evidence had emerged in a documentary that showed he was a victim of “judicial misconduct” at his original trial.
The film showed a former Los Angeles deputy district attorney admitting discussing the case with the trial judge while it was ongoing.
In February, a Los Angeles judge agreed that “substantial … misconduct” had taken place during the original court proceedings, but said he could not drop the charges so long as Polanski remained a fugitive.
The director has since appealed against the ruling, insisting he would not voluntarily return to the US even to clear his name.
Gailey, now called Samantha Geimer, has spoken in support of his attempt to have the charges dismissed, accusing the district attorney’s office of resurrecting “lurid details” of her assault to distract attention from its own wrongdoing.
The “wishful thinking” and well, just childlike (puppy obviously) gullibility of the general public never ceases to amaze this dog. Obviously being a canine there was no dogmoney school, so the finer points of the bone trade escape me, but from about mid 2005 doggy instinct told me that all was not “great” or “well” or “rosy”, at all, and that everyone was living now on the promise of paying back shitloads of bones at some later point, and that was clearly wrong.
We either do have the fucking bones or we don’t, the whole worlds dogs can’t all borrow bones and live like from the great Bone-Master forever, it had to stop one day.
So this dog cashed in his kennel for bones back here
And since then everything has happened pretty much as it had to, including the start of the end of the current people-money system.
However, despite actually seeing the edge of what is to come, the humans en-masse all appear to think that they can escape their fate? Humans are wierd.
So at this point I’ll hand over to one of them who surprisingly does seem to understand – not like the way dogs just intuitively know, but this human seems to know the why’s too so over to him from here
We now have zero percent money, which is even better than the ½% charged by Japanese banks or 1% charged by central banks to lease gold. But that few sovereign bonds are attractive today’s borrowers are going into junk bonds, stock markets and even gold and silver.
That will continue as long as interest rates remain at current levels in the US. Despite efforts by some central banks, such as the Swiss and Canadians to hold the value of their currencies down, they continue to appreciate. As the Fed has said, zero interest rates will prevail for sometime to come. That means perpetual downward pressure on the dollar and continued upward pressure on gold and silver.
Low rates will last at least two more years, as will increasing money and credit in spite of all the rubbish we hear of exit strategies we hear from the Fed and the G20. Just pipe dreams and lies.
The nations are all trapped in a box and none of them can escape, unless they own gold and silver. Eventually the US bond market will collapse, as Wall Street believes what the Fed says.
The intersession of the Fed into markets has to continue or the system will collapse and deflation will take over. This desperate situation will force more and more players into the dollar carry trade into gold and silver. Monetary stimulus is the only thing that can keep the ship from sinking.
The dollar as we predicted will test USDX 71.18 by the end of October or at least by the end of the year.
The dollar is being dumped wholesale, something that should have happened ten years ago. It didn’t happen because of massive US pressure on all nations not to jump and play along within the game.
During the first six months of next year 71.18 will be broken. First to 65, then 60, then 55, then to 50 and perhaps to 40 giving new and greater impetus to higher and higher gold and silver prices as the dollar carry trade goes wild.
That means that probably the dollar will be officially devalued and debt will go to default in 2011.
They won’t be alone.
There will be another Smithsonian or Plaza type meeting and all currencies will be officially devalued or revalued against one another and all debt will be reduced by 2/3’s.
A new international trading unit will be formed and three old dollars will be replaced by one new dollar.
Do not ask how domestic debt will be settled because we do not know. Logically it should be on the same basis as international settlements, but who knows what these criminals will do.
Not only is the US financial structure doomed but also so is that of the entire world. That is why gold and silver investments are so important.
Gold and silver are breaking out because in part we have a carry trade that is looking for action and gold and silver markets are not reflecting their intrinsic value. They are way under priced due to the criminal activity of central banks, all of which are controlled by the Illuminists.
Eventually zero interest rates and the dollar carry trade, just like with the yen, will cause terrible distortion. Inflation since 1980, real inflation, demands gold over $6,000 an ounce. The question is how far will it go? Markets have a way of getting way overpriced and that could happen to gold and silver.
You say to yourself how could this happen? It didn’t just happen it was planned that way to force the world’s inhabitants to accept world government. Zero interest rates guarantees the destruction of new capital formation as money runs to asset accumulation or preservation of wealth.
Monetization is running rampant even at Treasury auctions as dealers buy for the Fed, the Fed buys through the Cayman Island and their swap partners use swap dollars to buy at the auctions as well.
We just found out from the Fed that they lied about gold swaps. What do you think the percentages are that they are lying about currency swaps and secret Fed buying of Treasuries from secret offshore locations? All this means gold will quickly hit $2,000 and climb to $3,000 in 2010. 2011 will be another doubling, and the end of phase 3. The question is will we have a phase 4? If we had to bet on it we’d say yes. Would you believe $12,000 or more? As this all transpires only about 15% of Americans will catch on and the rest will lose almost everything. Or perhaps, revolution will change that.
Julian Robertson, founder of Tiger Mgt. told CNBC, if the Chinese and Japanese do not buy our debt inflation could go to 15% to 20%. “It is a question of who would lend us the money if they don’t. They really control our destiny. They own almost exclusively short-term debt, because we cannot sell long-term debt. Americans need to start saving and we have to grow out of the problem.”
basically it’s coming bitches
-and there’s no amount of wishful thinking about “recoveries” going to make any difference, so just make sure you’re one of the 15%, and make sure you take care of your dogs, because within 3-5 years they’ll be worth much more to you than a pocket full of those paper bones you all value so much.
Sheepishly the Western spooks are now claiming that they have known about Iran’s secret Nuclear enrichment facility. The truth is that the CIA did not have a clue about the Qom facility. Iran, suspecting a leak informed the IAEA that it had a facility in Qom. Most analysts believe that this is only one of the many underground nuclear facilities that Iran has. It is suspected that the Islamic republic has more than a dozen such facilities and several dozen fake facilities to throw the Western intelligence agencies off the train.
Iran’s acknowledgment that it is developing a second uranium-enrichment facility does little to dispel the view that the regime is developing a weapons program. Israel must consider not just whether to proceed with a strike against Iran—but how. WSJ. SEPTEMBER 25, 2009 The Iran Attack Plan By Anthony H. Cordesman
Iranian power stations
A Nuclear Iran is inevitable. The Plan to attack Iran. Israel’s huffing and puffing is not scaring Teheran which continues to develop its nuclear program. The North Korean lesson is not lost to to Teheran. Washington did not attack Pyongyang because North Korea had nuclear bombs and missiles to deliver them. The US devastated Iraq, because she did not have any WMDs.
Where will Iran retaliate if attacked? Map of 32 US bases & Israel
Armageddon: Will the US or its ally Israel really attack Iran?
The Day after: Attack on Iran & Retaliation
Americas August Attack? Awe and Shock!
We have been aware of this facility for several years, says western official
The Qom uranium enrichment plant first appeared in 2006, in grey satellite photographs of the sort the world has become familiar with through the long years of the Iran crisis.
Iran nuclear sites
North-east of the mosques of Qom, the theological heart of Iran, the revolutionary guard had established an anti-aircraft missile battery at the base of the mountain, western officials said. As intelligence analysts tried to discover what the missiles were there to protect, satellite imagery began to reveal intensive activity at the side of the mountain. “There was extensive excavation and construction work under way,” a western official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The Qom site was put under more frequent surveillance to check on the progress, but at that point it was just one site among the several suspect zones being watched.
“It was like a stake-out of a building,” a British official said. “You know something wrong is going on in there, but you have to wait until you have got all the evidence.”
Iran in Crosshairs map. Is an Israeli attack on Iran with tactic approval from the White House imminent
Western intelligence had been looking for a clandestine uranium enrichment site, suspecting that while the attention of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was fixed on the known enrichment plant at Natanz, Iran would have a parallel programme hidden elsewhere intended to produce highly enriched uranium for weapons. Technical advances from the overt site would be continually transferred to the covert one. Qom seemed to fit the bill. A senior US administration official described the site as “a very heavily protected, very heavily disguised facility”.
The official added: “We have been aware of this facility for several years; we have been watching the construction, we have been building up a case so that we were sure that we had very strong evidence, irrefutable evidence, that the intent of this facility was as an enrichment plant.”
The coming war between Iran and Israel: Dimona v Busheher
Americas August Attack? Awe and Shock!
Israel’s Regional Game and Iran
American attack on Iran: War or Peace?
Enrichment plant
At some point this summer, US, British and French intelligence agencies were able to corroborate the information they had, and concluded that the Qom site was an enrichment plant. “We believe that it is not yet operational. We think it is most likely at least a few months, perhaps more, from having all of the centrifuges installed and being capable of operating if the Iranians made a decision to begin operating it,” the senior American official said.
It is not clear how the western intelligence came to the conclusion that the Qom plant was big enough for 3,000 centrifuges.
Iranian target maps. Don't wait for the attack to begin on Iran. The war has already started and Iran has been facing the brunt of this for years. The Government of Baluchistan setup in the Middle Eastern capital along with support to Jundallah as well as the Kurds, Arabs (Khuzistan) and the Baluch are only some of the insurgencies raging in Iran.
The conclusion reached by the CIA, MI6 and France’s DGSE put Washington, London and Paris in a dilemma. Barack Obama had offered to extend America’s hand if Iran “unclenched its fist” and the approach appeared to be giving Tehran more trouble than George Bush’s bellicosity — by removing a bogeyman and paving the way for a serious challenge to the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in the June elections.
Earlier this month, Iranians finally agreed to a meeting on October 1, and arrangements were made to meet in Geneva. “If we had come out with this, we would have been accused of torpedoing the process,” a western diplomat said. In the end, the Iranians appear to have become aware that the Qom secret was out and pre-empted the inevitable disclosure by admitting it in a letter to the IAEA’s director general, Mohamed ElBaradei, delivered on Monday.
Americas August Attack? Awe and Shock! The air is pregnant with the news of an impending attack by the exiting Bush Administration. The coming war between Iran and Israel: Dimona v Busheher. The sabre rattling by Israel by conducting a highly provocative air battle and bombing raid 900 miles in the sea (the exact distance to Tehran). Israeli attack on Iran? Iranian Fatal mistakes in Afghanistan sucked NATO to the region.
Ex-CIA: US, Israel Planning Iran Attack Before 2008 Election. As Israeli aircraft and American planes (painted with Star of David–as happened in the 1973 Ramadhan war) strike pre-determinded Iranian targets, there will be a different type of retaliation from Iran.
American attack on Iran: War or Peace?Based on military might, overwhelming force and technological superiority many in Tel Aviv think that this will be a simple operation. It will not be. The Dogs of war:-Iranian Oil bourse opens and challenges the Dollar on Feb
Dogs of War: Irans Oil Bourse challenges the mighty Dollar and paints a target on itself
The letter said Iran was building a “pilot-scale enrichment plant” designed to produce low enriched uranium, but that no uranium had so far been processed. The Iranian argument is that under IAEA safeguards, as long as no uranium hexafluoride is fed into centrifuges, the plant is not nuclear, and therefore Iran has no obligation to notify the IAEA until six months before uranium is introduced.The Guardian. Why Iran confessed to secret nuke site Julian Borger and Patrick Wintour, Sep 27, New York/ Pittsburgh:
Iran's missile Sajjil 2 is seen before its launch by Iranian armed forces in front of a picture of Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Semnan province, Iran on May 20, 2009. Iran says the missiles have a range of nearly 1,243 miles, which would put Moscow, Athens and southern Italy within striking distance from Iran, said Jane's Information Group, which provides information on defense issues. (UPI Photo/Vahid Reza Alaie/Mehr News
[Note: this prayer, like last week's prayer, reflects and quotes from the Encyclical Letter Caritas In Veritate given by Pope Benedict XVI on June 29, 2009. Quotes from the letter are identified by paragraph number.]
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 1 Cor. 13:6
Lord, your love is the truth you ask us to accept and share with others. (John 15:12). Help us to follow your command as we work to reform our economy and allocate our resources. As the Encyclical Letter states: “The economy needs ethics in order to function correctly –not any ethics whatsoever, but an ethics which is peopled-centred.” (Encycl. Ltr, par 45). Do not let us be misled by blind faith in “markets”. Instead, give us the political will to set the boundaries needed to ensure that our markets function in ways to that do not unjustly enrich the few at the cost of impoverishing many. The Encyclical Letter further warns that:
The risk of our time is that the de facto interdependence of people and nations is not matched by ethical interaction of consciences and minds that would give rise to truly human development. Only in charity, illumined by the light of reason and faith, is it possible to pursue development goals that possess a more humane and humanizing value. (Encycl. Ltr, par. 9).”
Do not let us be misled again by undue reliance on the science of economics and mathematical calculations that fail to account for human fears and costs. Help us instead to identify and analyze what would best promote the common good, and to accept responsibility for improving the lives of those who have suffered greatly as a result of our past failures, both economic and political. Do not let us be misled by selfish ambition or the myth of the self-made man. Help us instead to recognize our interdependence and accept that each of our fates – whether rich or poor or in between — are intertwined. Let us recognize that our wealth as individuals and as a nation depends on our genuinely caring for and helping each other, especially those who now struggle day to day simply to survive. Guide us O Lord, and move us forward.
Summer Night City. Dark, Lights, Ironic Sights. Times Square, NY. Kodak Moment On A Nikon.
Nothing beats the energy and feel of being in the heart of the center of the universe, being in Times Square, in Manhattan, New York, USA.
The lights stand out in stark contrast to the dark night.
Reflections of light seem to levitate in mid-town mid-air as if hanging from some unseen bright blinding blinds. There were other ironies in the night,
It was a Kodak moment, but caught on a digital Nikon (2 year old S6 pocket camera).
A Broadway show sign advertises MAMA MIA and music by one of my all time favorite groups ABBA, but, the night reminds me of a different song by them….
It’s night, and summer, in the city, in Summer Night City.
As ABBA sang:
"It's elusive, call it glitter
Somehow something turns me on
Some folks only see the litter
We don't miss them when they're gone
I love the feeling in the air
My kind of people everywhere
When the night comes with the action
I just know it's time to go
Can't resist the strange attraction
From that giant dynamo"
Hells bells I have been slack. 3 weeks without a blog entry, I so must correct that.
Well lots has been happening including, finally, exchanging contracts on the house. I think this is the point of no return so from 1st October we will be the proud owners of a near 200 year old 4 storey semi-detached in AvonCliff in Somerset. How very fabulous and so enticing I can barely hardly wait to move home. Realistically though we have at least another year in Chicago which is fab because we actually adore Chicago. However, as soon as our tenants move out I shall have to be spending much more time in England than Chicago. When that day comes it means we will have to repatriate our dog Daisy from her loving foster parents in Luxembourg and start to become a complete family with garden and friends and walking all over again. I can’t wait.
Daisy Looking gorgeous
Above you can see one of the final pictures of Daisy when we left her in Luxembourg. Such a fine beast. Sounds really soppy but we miss her so much, they become such a part of your life, as you would expect, but it was better for her to stay in Luxembourg anyway we think. Not that we had a choice. When we moved to Chicago we found out at the last minute that the condo association in our building had a weight limit of 30lbs. A completely arbitrary limit and doesn’t take into account the viciousness of small dogs or breeds. We fought the ruling but obviously you can’t beat condo associations and their unreasonable rules like that. Obviously I understand the rules and to be honest it wouldn’t have been a problem if we had known about them before we bid for the job as we wouldn’t have bid. But our predecessors did not correctly update the report telling us about the apartment rules and the like so we applied.
Daisy as a puppy
To say we were massively unimpressed by this omission is an understatement especially as I found the Condo Association letter outlining the rule change, re dog weights in the apartment after we moved in, so they had the information. Grrrrrrr…. 3 years without our dog because someone didn’t update the post information, how very thoughtless. Lesson to everyone there in future, never take anything for granted and triple check every piece of information about a move. I think if I had known how much it would have affected us especially with me not being able to work which is another story, we would have taken our second choice, not that we don’t adore Chicago but well it split the family up. God rambling thoughts here on a public forum. Time to hit the gym I think.
Fast zwei Jahre nach dem Tod von Norman Mailer am 10. November 2007, hat das neokonservative Commentary Magazine einen elaborierten Generalveriss dessen Lebens/werkes veröffentlicht. In bester Tradition des Autoren wird zwischen seinen privaten Eskapaden und seinem literarischem Output nicht wesentlich unterschieden. Der Rezensent beschreibt den doppelten Pulitzerpreisträger als moralisch in jeder Hinsicht degeneriert und seine Prominenz als Symptom für die Verderbtheit der amerikanischen Kultur:
In the republic at twilight, where the cult of the self is our one true faith and energy has superseded virtue as the object of our reverence, it was inevitable that someone like Norman Mailer should become America’s most celebrated man of letters.
Lesenswert ist das im Zusammenhang mit der stattlichen Auswahl an Rezensionen und Essays, die Commentary auf seiner Internetseite im Gedenken an das Leben des kürzlich verstorbenen neokonservativen Publizisten Irving Kristol veröffentlichte. Kristol hat sich ebenso wie Mailer in The White Negro und The Armies of the Night intensiv mit der amerikanischen Counterculture beschäftigt. Seine Haltung war dabei, anders als bei Mailer, nicht die des partizipierenden (Selbst-) Beobachters, sondern von beeindruckender Abneigung geprägt.
Die Gegenkultur sei nicht nur gegen Kultur, sondern auch völlig ohne Anlass gewesen, schreibt Kristol in einem seiner Texte. Mailer würde wohl widersprechen und — wie er es in The White Negro tut — noch einmal auf Shoa und Atomkrieg als psychologischen Hintergrund des hier als amoralischem Draufgängertums empfundenen “American existentialism” hinweisen. Beides Faktoren, die ganz anders auf Kristol wirkten — und ihn zusammen mit seinem Entsetzen über die besagte Counterculture aus dem Lager des linksliberalen Intellektuellen nach rechts trieben.
Mailer nahm die Counterculture vorweg, Kristol wird als Pate der Counter-Counterculture gehandelt — und beide haben tausende Seiten Text hinterlassen, die man als Streitgespräch zweier unversöhnlicher Positionen zu Individuum, Staat, Kultur und Moral in Amerika lesen kann. Buckley vs. Vidal in XXL.
I say: this is, for me, a happy day! Iambic pentameter? Really? I worry about myself sometimes. It’s National Punctuation Day, in the USA.
Who knew, right?
Meanwhile, back in the land of normal sentence structure; There’s a baking contest, which is lovely, in a Leave it to Beaver fashion.
Entries close September 30, so get your oven mitts on, folks. Even if you don’t know your ellipses from your colon this is serious business we’re talking. Baked goods are at stake!
Also I find the thought of posting pictures of hyphenated, parenthetic food stuffs strangely exciting. Something about it tickles my fancy, if not my taste buds.
“Unless someone is willing to post me a breaded hash mark or two?” she asked, hopefully. Of course, I could try the baking thing myself but in my present condition I’d very likely burn down the house.
Crosby’s horse… where he always is… at the rear of the pack!
There has been some bleating and special pleading heard from certain quarters concerning the appointment of Raymond Velencia to the OCA Metropolitan Council. We can’t do anything about it, “our hands are tied”, all because of “procedure”. Hmm… Take a look at a typical example (the name has been changed to spare the author deserved embarrassment).
Does the OCA Statute allow for a diocesan bishop (or the Metropolitan) to overrule the Diocesan Assembly’s election of delegates to the Metropolitan Council? Does anyone, i.e., the Holy Synod, the Metropolitan Council itself? Who, if anyone, can remove a sitting member of the Metropolitan Council and for what cause(s)?
Depending on the answer(s), this could be a situation where hands are tied due to the actions of the DoWA’s Diocesan Assembly, i.e., a situation similar to Sudan’s membership on the United Nations Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR).
The Oarsman
22 September 2009
What vacuous and fatuous nonsense! It is obvious that the Oarsman has little experience of the real world and what happens there every day in plain sight. I reiterate, all that was necessary was for Jonas Paffhausen to have rung up the Washington Diocesan Assembly and have said, “That bastard is out. Choose someone else”. Trust me… Velencia would have withdrawn his name, with a fulsome speech thanking the assembly for its trust, and a candidate acceptable to Paffhausen would have been elected. As I said, it happens every day. It’s called “politics”, Mr Oarsman, and such piffle as “procedure” would not be allowed to stand in the way of Mr Big’s desires.
We see that in the current OCA Synod of Bishops meeting. Tassos has been an utter failure as Treasurer, his special pleadings have fallen on deaf ears amongst the faithful. Donations are down, not only to the Central Administration, but, to other church bodies, as well (SVS has been particularly hard-hit, and as all OCA bodies live from hand-to-mouth (there are no Episcopalian-style endowments, despite noise to the contrary)). They are making noises about how he was only a place-holder, etc, etc. Oh… who did they tap for Treasurer? The CFO of SVS, a consummate insider… hmm… the “new broom” is looking increasingly like the “old broom”… is another Honesdale National loan in the offing? It looks like the old gang doesn’t care for appearances, anymore. (I pity poor Fr Michael… if he is made a bishop, he is going to have to decide whether to stand with these boobs or to stand tall like Bishop Job did… THAT shall be a hard decision!)
One can feel some pity for Mr Tassos… he is the latest victim to be thrown from the train by the cabal. Who’s next? I’ll say this, it won’t be Kishkovsky, and it won’t be Garklavs. Of course, Bobby K sits in Venice, waiting out the expiration of the statute of limitations on his crimes in New York State… are the hands of the SOBs (Synod of Bishops, not “sons of bitches”… although the latter seems more accurate, nicht wahr?) tied there, as well?
In any case, Mr Oarsman, the so-called Metropolitan Council is not a canonical body. It is a creaky knockoff of Prodie organisations… (Chukcha says, “However… they do it better… they follow their rules”.) One can say that it is nothing more or less than a contemporary resurrection of the Holy Governing Synod (a body vilified by those of the Oarsman’s ilk, incidentally). How ironic! The body that they view as embodying “democracy” in the Church is nothing but a soulless revivification of the one historical Church institution that they hold up to obloquy!
“However… may I say something?”
“Sure, Chuk, what is it?”
“In the Soviet days, we had a wonderful constitution. It was full of very nice things… However… Chukcha says that what is written is not important. What is done is important. No one acted on those words… no one was free. Chukcha says that character and deeds matter. Procedure and words do not. However… watch out for those who say otherwise”.
I agree with Chukcha! What about you? Hey, Oarsman! Get your nose out of the books and start living. One of the things that you could do is to stop reading that self-serving drivel from SVS and start emulating the saints… the real saints… like St Aleksandr Nevsky!
Friends and neighbours, let’s look at a real saint. What follows is an excerpt from the film Aleksandr Nevsky. It’s called, Arise, ye Russian People! Click on the link for nine minutes of good watching. By the way, Oarsman… I follow St Aleksandr Nevsky, not the pompous Aleksandr Schmemann! You’d do well to do likewise.
“What’s Crosby’s horse?” you ask.
Oh… that’s simple. The late entertainer Bing Crosby was an enthusiastic follower of the ponies. Unfortunately, he became known as a supporter of the slowest oaters on the course. “Crosby’s horse” was not only the last horse; he was a horse with no chance of winning. You can see the analogy, can’t you?
Today we create Supercomputers that can make 100s of teraflops of calculation by not years, months, weeks or days, not hours or minutes, no, seconds. With such incredible computer hardware we have a dilemma, because we now that computers can help humans control the stock market, currency, political decisions, and the life of every man, woman and child, and do not think this one minutes Computer technology will not be used for that.Interestingly enough, an advanced thinker in the science of virtual reality noted that "technology, Computer, Technology, always prevails over law," ah ha, good point, but is he correct? Think about it, in almost every aspect of human endeavor that happens, if you generally do not need a law to a problem. So, why should the technology be different? And it would not suffice to say, his wisdom is very much on target.Should we make, Computer, Technology, laws with, Computer, Technology, respect to the use of supercomputers to foretell, or create them? Should we allow people to have control of such absolute power? Oh, did you here you have not, "absolute power corrupts absolutely." Yes, another fine quote hanging so timeless wisdom from the annals of history.Should we make, Computer, Technology, rules so prior to the issue or challenge? Because if we do, and people often do, we should also not that once you create a rule, you can eliminate potential innovation capacity or at least slow down, which is dangerous to think ahead. Too, Computer, Technology, much structure (rules) can strangle the concept of freedom to innovate. Think this topic is too far from there? Well, not children themselves, there are AI software design teams making programs for businesses, governments and the military now.
Trial lawyers watch as a new financial regulator is born
By: David Freddoso
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce made its case this morning to several reporters against House Democrats’ bill to re-vamp federal regulation of the financial industry. The bill, HR 3126, would establish a new regulatory agency, the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, which would consolidate some regulatory functions while splitting others apart — it’s the financial equivalent of the Department of Homeland Security.
The bill is very complicated and contains many moving parts. Some of the Chamber’s opposition is broadly based on the problems it could create in the credit market. Some opposition is based on more parochial concerns by various industries — for example, the bill could lay specific new burdens on home inspectors and others involved in the real estate transaction process.
But one important aspect of the bill is that it contains two provisions that trial lawyers savor, and which they have spent a decade lobbying for, at least.
First, the bill effectively allows the federal government to deputize state attorneys general to sue companies in certain consumer protection enforcement actions. That might not sound like a boon for the trial bar, but consider this: The federal government is currently barred from contracting private plaintiffs’ lawyers. State attorneys general, on the other hand, are accustomed to hiring them, as in the famed tobacco settlement, which literally netted billions of dollars for a fortunate handful of trial attorneys. That means that HR 3126 stands to create lots of new business for the trial bar. (Experience has shown that this business also tends to go to the politically well-connected.)
Second, the bill contains a provision long-sought by the trial lawyers’ largest lobbying group, the American Association for Justice (formerly known as ATLA). It allows the new agency to regulate tightly or even ban binding arbitration agreements — the kind that many credit card companies require you to sign as a condition of membership. This is a handout for plaintiffs’ lawyers, designed to generate more lawsuits in place of dispute arbitration. That’s why AAJ lists the issue prominently in its lobbying disclosure reports. In fact, a ban on binding arbitration was a major goal for them even as early as 1999, the records show, when the group was pushing the Year 2000 Consumer Protection Plan Act.
AAJ has spent $47.3 million lobbying Congress since 1999, $13.4 million of it since Democrats took over the House and Senate in January 2007.
By: David Freddoso
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce made its case this morning to several reporters against House Democrats’ bill to re-vamp federal regulation of the financial industry. The bill, HR 3126, would establish a new regulatory agency, the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, which would consolidate some regulatory functions while splitting others apart — it’s the financial equivalent of the Department of Homeland Security.
The bill is very complicated and contains many moving parts. Some of the Chamber’s opposition is broadly based on the problems it could create in the credit market. Some opposition is based on more parochial concerns by various industries — for example, the bill could lay specific new burdens on home inspectors and others involved in the real estate transaction process.
But one important aspect of the bill is that it contains two provisions that trial lawyers savor, and which they have spent a decade lobbying for, at least.
First, the bill effectively allows the federal government to deputize state attorneys general to sue companies in certain consumer protection enforcement actions. That might not sound like a boon for the trial bar, but consider this: The federal government is currently barred from contracting private plaintiffs’ lawyers. State attorneys general, on the other hand, are accustomed to hiring them, as in the famed tobacco settlement, which literally netted billions of dollars for a fortunate handful of trial attorneys. That means that HR 3126 stands to create lots of new business for the trial bar. (Experience has shown that this business also tends to go to the politically well-connected.)
Second, the bill contains a provision long-sought by the trial lawyers’ largest lobbying group, the American Association for Justice (formerly known as ATLA). It allows the new agency to regulate tightly or even ban binding arbitration agreements — the kind that many credit card companies require you to sign as a condition of membership. This is a handout for plaintiffs’ lawyers, designed to generate more lawsuits in place of dispute arbitration. That’s why AAJ lists the issue prominently in its lobbying disclosure reports. In fact, a ban on binding arbitration was a major goal for them even as early as 1999, the records show, when the group was pushing the Year 2000 Consumer Protection Plan Act.
AAJ has spent $47.3 million lobbying Congress since 1999, $13.4 million of it since Democrats took over the House and Senate in January 2007.
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Todo mal hondureño que se alegre por lo que suceda que mejor abandone el país, nadie tendrá misericordia con ellos, los insurgentes tendrán que ser reducidos a cenizas, aplastando de una vez por todas.
Honduras esta mejor preparada que lo que cualquiera pudiese pensar, sea cual sea la causa, que es obvia, Manuel Zelaya tendrá que pagar con su sangre tantas felonías, y si Dios es justo, también la pagarán todos aquellos que han arruinado el prestigio de esta nación.
El color de la piel del presidente Obama no será obstáculo para que éste condene las conclusiones antiimperialistas, a las que seguramente arribará la II Cumbre África Sur América
Así lo señaló a la Agencia Bolivariana de Noticias (ABN), el intelectual y pensador estadounidense de izquierda, James Petras, al reflexionar sobre los alcances de esta cumbre que se efectuará los días 26 y 27 de septiembre, en la isla de Margarita, Venezuela, y a la cual asistirán representantes de 65 países de ambos continentes.
Al ser preguntado por las posibles reacciones de Obama como afrodescendiente, ante esta Cumbre, Petras dijo que “no hay que tocar demasiado la política del color de la piel, porque es Obama quien ha apoyado el embargo a Cuba, donde hay una enorme población de ascendencia africana”.
Dijo que también es Obama quien está aumentando la guerra en Afganistán, a pesar de que los afganos también son un pueblo del Tercer Mundo.
“Yo creo que en el grado que Venezuela tiene influencia en esta reunión, en el grado que el evento empiece a adoptar posiciones antiimperialistas, Obama va a criticarlo, va a poner distancia”, indicó.
Cita como ejemplo la conferencia internacional contra el racismo, celebrada recientemente en Suiza, “donde Obama adoptó una posición hostil contra la reunión, retirando a sus delegados, porque allí se criticó la política racista de Israel”.
El catedrático (Universidad de Binghamton) cree que el acercamiento entre los pueblos y gobiernos de América del Sur y África, en la búsqueda del fortalecimiento de las relaciones Sur-Sur, tiene su explicación en varias razones.
La primera que menciona es la crisis del sistema capitalista mundial, que en sus palabras, comenzó en Estados Unidos, alcanzó a Europa y de allí impacto tanto a África como América Latina.
“Esta situación ha provocado un replanteamiento de las relaciones económicas entre el norte y el Sur”.
“En segundo lugar -dice- en América Latina hay el surgimiento de gobiernos de centro izquierda, que buscan ampliar y diversificar sus mercados, socios, comercios e inversiones”.
Y, en tercer lugar, menciona nuevas formas de explotación que estarían dándose en África, con el surgimiento de nuevos polos económicos asiáticos.
“En África han sufrido, últimamente, varias formas de explotación por parte de. los nuevos países en crecimiento de Asia, como: China, India, Corea y también países petroleros del Medio Oriente”.
“Por estas razones -continúa- en África, entre algunos sectores políticos están tratando de encontrar una salida a la explotación norte-sur, y por estas mismas razones África y América del Sur coinciden en la necesidad de formar alianzas con países que no son imperialistas, ni de la nueva onda ni de la vieja onda”.
Cree también que la coincidencia de intereses de productores de materia prima , como el petróleo y otros minerales, frente a las transnacionales extractoras, apuntalarán la base de una política de alianzas.
“Como comparten un tipo de relaciones con las multinacionales y sufren la explotación de estas, buscan una forma de negociar mejor. Se orientarían hacia la conformación de una especie OPEP del sur, pero más amplia, en el sentido de que no esté limitada al petróleo, solamente”.
-¿Qué perspectiva le ve usted a esta reunión’
-Yo creo que entre los gobiernos del sur, particularmente Venezuela, tiene una gran voluntad y un fuerte compromiso de unificar el sur contra el imperialismo del norte. Otro es Brasil, el cual tiene algunos lazos históricos, especialmente con los países de habla portuguesa como Angola y Mozambique, y eso también podría facilitar algunos acuerdos.
Pero a su juicio, otros países de América del Sur, como Argentina, Chile y Perú, podrían tener una relación más fría con los intereses de los países africanos, pues sus economías apuntan hacia China y otros países asiáticos.
A esto habría que agregar, según explica, los fuertes lazos que varios países africanos mantienen con transnacionales, incluso, de las que provienen de las economías emergentes, ya citadas.
“Se va a necesitar un gran esfuerzo, para que los líderes en África se desconecten de estos lazos que han crecido en el último período, y así poder lanzar una nueva serie de acuerdos con América Latina”, expresó.
Dijo que sólo en el grado que se identifiquen intereses y objetivos comunes entre los países participantes, se harán más sólidos los acuerdos.
Indicó, además, que en la medida que puedan establecerse empresas públicas (el presidente Chávez las ha llamado “grannacionales’), por lo menos en el área del petróleo, y en las industrias del cobre, el estaño y el uranio, para citar ejemplos, se fortalecerán las bases de las alianzas estratégicas.
“Sin embargo, mientras las principales ramas de la economía estén en manos de capitales extranjeros, será muy difícil formular una estrategia de alianzas estable”.
-Pero, políticamente este acercamiento tiene mucha importancia ¿No cree usted’
-Es una gran oportunidad de abrir un diálogo y explorar intereses comunes. Y eso es muy positivo.
Añade que es posible que en la reunión se fijen algunos proyectos de cooperación y colaboración y definan una posición contra el intervencionismo, el imperialismo norteamericano.
“De la reunión saldrá una declaración en el plano diplomático, que seguramente condenará la política militarista de Estados Unidos, tanto en Afganistán, como en Irak, los ataques en Somalia, la agresión sionista a los palestinos, la intervención y el embargo contra Cuba”.
… y la comunidad internacional entera deberá ser juzgada por la historia.
La noticia del regreso de Manuel Zelaya al territorio hondureño me ha conmocionado. Este precedente demuestra el poder de los enemigos de la libertad, la felicidad y el derecho de los seres humanos a vivir en paz. Porque a partir de hoy 21 de septiembre de 2009, ningún país democrático, civilizado y soberano del mundo está libre de la amenaza que el poder de las dictaduras puede ejercer sobre su territorio. Sin duda, este acto ha demostrado que el poder del dinero es suficiente para destruir sistemas de gobierno que en obediencia de lo establecido por su Constitución decidieron realizar.
Pero esto no ha acabado. Es muy probable que Manuel Zelaya retome de manera ilegítima y forzada el puesto como Presidente de Honduras. Luego, realizará las elecciones establecidas para el mes de noviembre y utilizará el discurso populista como bandeirante conciliador y pacifista para seguir ganando adeptos dentro de las masas más pobres e ignorantes del país.
Si esta terrible noticia hubiese ocurrido en mi triste país yo seguramente estaría luchando por mi libertad y exigiría la prisión para este pusilánime traidor. Mientras tanto, espero que si corre sangre en los próximos días, sea la sangre de los criminales que intentan violar el ejercicio pacífico de lo establecido por la Constitución hondureña.
Por ahora, escuchen las declaraciones del Presidente de Honduras Roberto Micheletti,
Sometimes I forget where I am. It’s not early Alzheimers, or even just ditzy forgetfulness (which I am prone to), it’s the sheer amount of change and movement that’s been a part of my life for the last couple of years. I wake up in the morning and spend a few confused minutes trying to orient myself. Even my dream last night had me in Ann Arbor, Michigan visiting my sister and my friend Matt, and in Philadelphia, visiting friends (newly married!) Katherine and Sean. In each city, I was desperately looking for a place to stay the night, to eat a meal, to settle down a little.
In the mornings when I finally do realize what city and country I am in, I remember that I am in Galway, Ireland. And I am beginning a new life, again.
This past summer was a wild roller coaster ride of time with friends, precious moments with family, travels around the United States, and mental preparation for another move across the ocean. And then, two weeks before leaving for Ireland, my world was turned completely upside down with my most intimate encounter with death to date. My stepfather Greg, lovingly known as Paco, died of natural causes while canoeing in Canada. To say it was unexpected would be the understatement of the year. Paco was one of the most active, healthiest people I have ever known.
I wish I could just write this blog, with my observations and commentary on life in Ireland, without having to acknowledge his death. But I feel that I have to, if I am to be honest about my life here. Because it is not as if I am only beginning a new life in a new country. Not anymore. Now, I am beginning to learn to live with the knowledge of the existence of death in a way I never had to before. I am having to re-teach myself to trust that the people I love will, in fact, be around tomorrow; that I’m not about to lose another person. I am constantly reminding myself to savor the good moments, and to follow my dreams, and to carpe diem! – and all of those cliches. I am doing all of these things, while at the same time, beginning a life again in a new country.
And thank God that country is Ireland. It is a place that practically forces you to feel things more deeply. Its sad history – the oppression, the famine, the poverty – is all around. The constant reminders of it are never far away and are as permeating as the English language, the language of colonization. And at the same time, the good things are somehow so much more sweet. Fast, joyful discussions about anything and everything shared over a pint of beer or a glass of wine. The comfort of a cup of hot tea taken inside a warm house while the wind and rain pound the trees outside. Swans gracefully drifting along the riverbank. Rainbows, the ocean, and so much GREEN. Ireland is so full of life. So it makes for an excellent place to begin again, and to live out a few of those cliches.
And this is where I will leave you for now. After all, I am supposed to be a student, and I have reading to do. I promise more on what my new life here is actually like. And I promise it soon – we should have internet in our place as soon as tomorrow. Until then, slan go foill (bye for now).
So empfanden wir ganz kurz gefasst unsere Zeit in New York. Wer es ganz genau wissen moechte, hier Teil 1 des Reiseberichts.
Mi. 09. September 2009 – Ankunft
Schon kurz nach unserer Ankunft (18:35 Uhr) am New Yorker Flughafen JFK wartete die erste “Attraktion” auf uns – Eine Fahrt mit dem A-Train *Yeah* mit dem wir dann sogar an der Atlantic Avenue vorbeifuhren. (Das Blaswerk sei an der Stelle gegruesst.) Unsere Unterkunft für die naechsten Tage war das WG-Zimmer von Anne, Volkers ehemalige WG-Mitbewoherin in Leipzig. Da Anne noch Probe hatte, begruesste uns David und nicht zu vergessen Foster, Annes Katze. Sie spielte munter mit einer Maus. Nein keine Spielzeugmaus, sondern eine lebendige Maus, die sich in die Wohnung geschlichen hatte. David brachte die Maus schnell weg und wir fielen totmuede ins Bett. Wir schliefen so fest, dass wir nicht einmal merkten, dass die Maus dann doch noch Foster zum Opfer fiel. Doch wer jetzt denkt, Foster sei eine fiese Katze, der irrt. She was so sweet and lovely und schaffte es einfach nur, dass wir uns total heimisch fuehlten.
Do. 10. September 2009 – Brooklyn Bridge und Manhattan
Ausgeschlafen und ganz entspannt begann unser Tag mit Anne & David in Anne’s Lieblings Coffee-Shop. Gestaerkt mit besten Kaffee und Bagels ging es dann gleich zur Brooklyn Bridge. Der Fussmarsch ueber die Bruecke war einfach atemberaubend. Ganz langsam naehrten wir uns immer mehr der eindrucksvollen Skyline von Manhattan. Keine Anhung wie man es beschreiben soll, aber wir dachten immer wir schauen auf einen riesigen “Wald” der anstelle von Baeumen riesige Hochhaeuser beherbergt. Die Bruecke fuehrt von Brooklyn direkt ins Financial District in Lower Manhattan. Je mehr wir in die Haeuserschluchten vordrungen, um so staerker empfanden wir ein eigenartig drueckendes Gefuehl. Blicke nach oben liessen uns einfach nur schwindelig werden und nahmen uns anfangs regelrecht die Luft. Doch nur kurze Zeit spaeter haben wir uns daran gewoehnt. Immer der Nase nach, ging es so zur Wall Street mit der NY Stock Exchange. Der unuebersehbare Ground Zero rief dann einen Tag vor 9/11 ein eher bedrueckendes Gefuehl hervor, denn auch wenn ringsherum der Alltag an uns vorbei zog, dachten wir an den 11. September 2001 und dessen Folgen zurueck.
Die Subway brachte uns dann unterhalb der Hochhaeuser zum Stadtteil Greenwich Village. Dort befinden sich u.a. die Jazzclubs Blue Note und das Village Vanguard wie auch der Washington Arch, der in der Eingangszene von “Harry and Sally” als Kulisse diente.
Am Abend ging es dann ins Jules zum Konzert des Trios von Adrian Cunningham.
Auf Hagalil hält man es für angebracht, einen übersetzten Artikel von Ha’aretz-Reporter Avi Shavit zu veröffentlichen, in welchem die Doppelmoral, die dem sog. UN-Goldstone-Report innewohne, angeprangert wird. Es geht um Gaza bzw. um Israels ja mittlerweile fast schon zu den Akten der Geschichte gelegte Operation Gegossenes Blei. Hagalil meint, es sei außerdem ziemlich, darüber zu berichten, Israel sei, in den Worten von Israel-Ober-Guru Ulrich W. Sahm, “empört” wegen der Ergebnisse, die in besagtem Goldstone-Report veröffentlicht worden seien. Israels “Empörtheit” findet sich ebenso auf der Website von ntv und in der Badischen Zeitung. Israels Empörung, so wie sie in den verlinkten Quellen dargestellt wird, hat es Gouvernantenhaftes. Was erlauben Goldstone? In dem Report wird Israels Militär massiv für sein Vorgehen in Gaza an der Jahreswende 2008-2009 kritisiert, es ist von “Fahrlässigkeit und Rücksichtlosigkeit” die Rede. Der Freitag: Menschenrechtler, Anwälte und Journalisten waren es, deren Untersuchungen zum Gaza-Krieg Anfang 2009 die Vereinten Nationen nun in einem Report zusammengefasst haben. Darin wird der israelischen Regierung die Verantwortung für sieben Vorkommnisse gegeben, bei denen UN-Besitz beschädigt und UN-Mitarbeiter sowie andere Zivilisten verletzt oder getötet worden seien. Die Reaktion Israels? Selbstherrliche Indigniertheit. Das Google-Ergebnis zum Begriff “Goldstone-Report” enthält zahlreiche Websites, auf denen davon gesprochen wird, wie unfair Israel behandelt werde und dass palästinensischer Terror belohnt werde. Israels ewige Friedenstaube im Amt des Staatspräsidenten, Shimon Peres, behauptet, der Goldstone-Report stelle nichts weniger dar als ein Beispiel grober Geschichtsklitterung. Israels Recht, ja Pflicht, zur Selbstverteidigung werde in Zweifel gezogen. Ich bin sicher, dass irgendwo in den Weiten des www irgendjemand auch noch sagen wird, Israels Existenzrecht werde durch Goldstone mit Füßen getreten. In einigen Foren wird schließlich schon gefragt: Ist der südafrikanische Richter Richard Goldstone, der Namensgeber des Reports, ein Antisemit? Was ist von den Vorwürfen zu halten? Richtig. So gut wie kaum etwas. Sie stellen die altbekannte Argumentationslinie dar, die immer dann gezogen wird, wenn Israel für irgendetwas verantwortlich gemacht wird. Abgesehen von der Tatsache, dass die Entstehung des Reports ja ohnehin ohne Unterstützung Israels geschrieben worden ist, ja, dass Mitarbeiter Goldstones ja nicht einmal Einlass nach Israel und die Besetzten/Verriegelten Gebiete erhielten, und ungeachtet des Umstands, dass im Goldstone Report die Vorgehensweisen palästinensischer “Sicherheitsorgane” ebenfalls verurteilt werden, kommt hier die Strategie gefahren, nachdem immer dann besonders auf die Gefahr von Antisemitismus hingewiesen wird, wenn Israel besonders viele Araber getötet hat. Das Verhalten ist bekannt und symptomatisch – für die Doppelmoral Israels und seiner “Freunde und Fürsprecher”, aber auch für den Zustand der Hasbara. Dazu Richard Silverstein: The hasbara attack machine is in high gear. I imagine you’ll be seeing full page ads in the N.Y. Times, op eds by the usual suspects (Abe Foxman, etc.), and hearing many lies from what Daniel Levy calls “the smear industry.” I imagine that right now as we speak Gerald Steinberg and Danny Ayalon are desperately seeking to expose a nasty Goldstone hobby. Perhaps (like Marc Garlasco) he collects historical artifacts of the Boer War, bespeaking a sympathy for pro-Nazi Afrikaners? The truth of the matter is that Israel gradually, inch by inch, is losing the propaganda war. Yes, it has an effective hasbara apparatus that has kept the opposition at bay for years. But the sheer accumulated weight of Israel’s brutal violations of morality and law are sinking its case before the international community. Also: Wann werden Israels Advokaten Grund haben, nicht mehr so empört dreinzublicken? Vielleicht, wenn Israels Regierung und Militär endlich verantwortungsvoll handeln!
Aug 12th 2009 2:20PM by Zac Bissonnette | Bloggingstocks.com
In appearance on CNBC, Black Swan author Nassim Taleb slammed the U.S. government’s handling of the financial crisis and argued that none of the systemic problems in the system had been fixed. “When you have cancer, sometimes it hurts to remove the tumor,” he said. “They’re not removing the tumor.” “It is a matter of risk and responsibility, and I think the risks that were there before, these problems are still there,” he said. “We still have a very high level of debt; we still have leadership that’s literally incompetent …” Should Obama reappoint Ben Bernanke? Taleb doesn’t think so. “Bernanke belongs to a school of economics that is not in synch with the complex system. By having Bernanke there you’re rewarding failure.” Meanwhile, three-fourths of investors surveyed recently said that Bernanke has earned another term, but that plays right into Taleb’s arguments: by instituting policies that prop up markets, Bernanke has pleased market participants without really having fixed anything long-term.
Stało się. Nadzieje zwolenników instalacji amerykańskiej tarczy antyrakietowej właśnie zostały pogrzebane. Przeciwnicy projektu mogą natomiast z radosnym sercem świętować. Przedwczoraj, czyli w 70 tą rocznicę agresji sowieckiej na II Rzeczpospolitą, szefowie rządów Polski i Czech zostali poinformowani o wycofaniu się Waszyngtonu z umowy, którą podpisano pod koniec ostatniej kadencji prezydenta Busha juniora. Czy obecna głowa państwa – prezydent Barack Obama, rezygnując z wcześniejszych ustaleń kierował się krytycznymi uwagami na temat skuteczności samego projektu? Czy raczej krok ten jest ukłonem w stronę Federacji Rosyjskiej, w ramach niepisanego porozumienia w kwestii Irańskiej? Być może odpowiedzią będzie rola jaką Moskwa odegra w procesie regulowania problemu irańskiego. Jedno jest pewne, decydenci Kremla mogą sobie nawzajem pogratulować dobrze wykonanej roboty.
Oczekiwanie/Niepewność
Właściwie już po objęciu fotela prezydenckiego przez Baracka Obamę, projekt instalacji elementów BMD (Balistic Missle Defence) stanął pod wielkim znakiem zapytania. Świeżo upieczony prezydent dał jasno do zrozumienia, że wątpi w rzekomo potwierdzoną testami, skuteczność owego systemu. Część komentatorów twierdzi, że opinia Obamy była w mniejszym stopniu podyktowana oceną skuteczności, raczej wynikiem dwustronnych porozumień pomiędzy Waszyngtonem i Moskwą w ramach resetowania bilateralnych stosunków.
Entuzjaści projektu, z drżącym sercem oczekiwali jednoznacznych, pozytywnych deklaracji i słuchali coraz to nowych przecieków napływających zarówno z USA jak i Rosji. Spekulowano na temat możliwych ustępstw Moskwy w kwestiach istotnych dla USA w zamian za porzucenie planów instalacji tarczy. Sceptycy natomiast, radowali się kiedy przecieki wskazywały na chęć porzucenia projektu przez nową administrację Obamy.
Sama instalacja nie wpłynęłaby bezpośrednio na możliwości obronne Polski dlatego, że przeznaczeniem systemu było przechwytywanie rakiet długiego zasięgu, skierowanych przeciwko USA. Natomiast w razie konfliktu angażującego tarczę, obecność instalacji na terenie Polski mogła być potencjalnie groźna dla niej samej. Jednym słowem, gdyby elementy BMD powstały w Polsce, ta znalazła by się na samym szczycie wrogiej listy priorytetowych celów. O co więc chodziło polskim politykom, kiedy decydowali się na podpisanie umowy z Waszyngtonem?
Z całą pewnością nie o samą budowę tarczy, która właściwie nie dałaby Polsce żadnych wymiernych korzyści. Chodziło o coś zupełnie innego. Mianowicie o gwarancję zaangażowania USA w szeroko pojmowaną, ewentualną obronę polskiej suwerenności. Dlatego, że hipotetyczna agresja na Polskę wiązałaby się z automatycznym atakiem na żołnierzy amerykańskich stacjonujących na jej terytorium. W skrócie chodziło o coś w rodzaju poszerzenia gwarancji zawartych w artykule 5 traktatu Waszyngtońskiego, na którym opiera się strategia obronna NATO.
Katastrofa/Wybawienie
W dniu 17 września, rządy Polski i Czech zostały poinformowanie o wycofaniu się amerykańskiej administracji, z umowy którą z wielkim trudem udało się wynegocjować pod koniec kadencji republikańskiego prezydenta Busha. Z całą pewnością jest to dzień żałoby dla entuzjastów instalacji BMD na terenie Polski. Przeciwnicy natomiast powinni się szczerze radować bo oto nastał dzień, kiedy w końcu, imperialistyczna Ameryka zadecydowała o zmniejszeniu swego zaangażowania w regionie. Oczywiście jest to powód do radości również wśród kręgu moskiewskich polityków. Prawdopodobnie również dla Niemiec, które wspólnie z Rosją pragną stworzenia nowej architektury bezpieczeństwa na starym kontynencie.
Dzień 17 września 2009 jest dla polaków datą szczególną. Szczególną dlatego, że równo 70 lat temu, w czasie gdy Polska próbowała zatrzymać hitlerowską machinę wojenną, została w niespodziewany i haniebny sposób zaatakowana przez sowietów. Wobec niefortunnego zbiegu okoliczności, czyli wyboru, przez prezydenta Obamę, tego właśnie dnia na poinformowanie swych polskich i czeskich sojuszników o zerwaniu umowy – należy zadać sobie pytanie czy było to działanie celowe? Prezydent Kaczyński sugeruje, że tak. Podejrzewam, że prezydent prywatnie przekonany jest, iż Obama zdecydował się na ten właśnie dzień, na wyraźne żądanie Moskwy. A poważniej, nie sądzę aby Waszyngton celowo wybrał tą datę, chociaż jak to mówią – wszystko jest możliwe.
Czy decyzja amerykańskiej administracji wynika z krytycznego podejścia do wątpliwej skuteczności stacjonarnego systemu BMD? Być może, na pewno w jakimś stopniu.
Problem w tym, że wiele czynników wskazuje na zupełnie inną opcję. Oczywiście mowa tu o roli jaką Moskwa może i powinna odegrać, w procesie rozwiązywania kryzysu wokół programu atomowego Iranu. Zgadzam się z redaktorem Wołejko, który twierdzi, iż Moskwa w relacjach z Teheranem nie ma rzeczywistego wpływu na ten ostatni. Ale w wachlarzu możliwości kremla jest choćby zgoda na proponowane przez zachód sankcje. Oczywiście nie jestem bezkrytycznym zwolennikiem sankcji, jednak w pewnych okolicznościach są one po prostu niezastąpione. Szczególnie gdy alternatywą jest konflikt zbrojny o nieprzewidywalnych następstwach.
Jeżeli Waszyngton nadal nie wyklucza żadnej opcji, to w mocy Kremla jest również umożliwienie realizacji izraelskich planów ataku na instalacje nuklearne w kraju ajatollahów. Pewne źródła donoszą, że przy budowie elektrowni atomowej w Buszerze pracuje wielu rosyjskich inżynierów i specjalistów, dlatego niespodziewany atak na te instalacje oznaczałby dla agresora spore kłopoty. Być może właśnie z tego powody, premier Izraela Benjamin Netanjahu odbył ostatnią „półoficjalną” wizytę do Moskwy. Podejrzewam, że nawet gdyby prezydent Obama wstrzymał się z agresją – Izrael sam świetnie by sobie poradził. Oczywiście niezbędne jest zielone światło ze strony Moskwy i gwarancje, że Rosja nie dostarczy, obiecanych Teheranowi, systemów obrony przeciwlotniczej przed ewentualnym atakiem.
Wracając do tematu, czy prezydent Obama, podejmując ostateczną decyzję względem instalacji BMD w Polsce i Czech kierował się najnowszymi testami jej skuteczności? Prawdopodobnie tak, pytanie tylko w jakim stopniu. Wprawdzie nie przekonują mnie „najnowsze”, zrewidowane prze z administrację Obamy testy, jednak w pewien sposób przemawia do mnie decyzja o rozwoju mobilnego systemu BMD, którego podstawową zaletą jest mobilność właśnie . Ma to sens, z bardzo prostej przyczyny – ruchome elementy systemu będą dużo trudniejsze do zniszczenia dla ewentualnego agresora. Jednak nie mogę się oprzeć wrażeniu, że to właśnie sceptycyzm Moskwy względem amerykańskiego projektu odgrywał decydującą rolę w trakcie podejmowania decyzji przez prezydenta Obamę.
I co dalej?
Należy zadać sobie fundamentalne pytanie: czy rezygnacja z wcześniejszych ustaleń między rządami USA, Polski i Czech oznacza definitywne zmniejszenie zaangażowania w regionie?
Pytanie na pozór banalne, jednak dla Europy Wschodniej niezwykle istotne. Jeżeli administracja Obamy w ramach resetowania stosunków z Rosją, postanowiła wycofać się nie tylko z projektu BMD, lecz również z wzajemnej współpracy wojskowej i eksportu technologii z nią związanych – oznacza to próbę zaciśnięcie współpracy z Moskwą do poziomu, w którym rola państw europy wschodniej, jako buforu przed ekspansją Kremla, będzie zupełnie marginalna lub zupełnie straci rację bytu. Oczywiście, zdaję sobie sprawę z tego, że teoria jest nieco „na wyrost”, jednak powinniśmy teraz bardzo uważnie śledzić rozwój wydarzeń. Na szczególną uwagę zasługuje rola jaką Moskwa odegra w trakcie najbliższych negocjacji w kwestii Iranu i jego programu nuklearnego. Istotnym, z punktu widzenia Warszawy i innych krajów regionu, będzie kształtowanie się przyszłych relacji na linii Moskwa – Waszyngton. Wnikliwa obserwacja, powinna nam wcześniej czy później przynieść odpowiedź na nurtujące nas pytania.
The United States and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization are expanding their nearly eight-year war in Afghanistan both in scope, with deadly drone missile attacks inside Pakistan, and in intensity, with daily reports of more NATO states’ troops slated for deployment and calls for as many as 45,000 American troops in addition to the 68,000 already in the nation and scheduled to be there shortly.
The NATO bombing in Kunduz province on September 4 may well prove to be the worst atrocity yet perpetrated by Western forces against Afghan civilians and close to 20 U.S and NATO troops have been killed so far this month, with over 300 dead this year compared to 294 for all of 2008.
The scale and gravity of the conflict can no longer be denied even by Western media and government officials and the war in South Asia occupies the center stage of world attention for the first time in almost eight years.
The various rationales used by Washington and Brussels to launch, to continue and to escalate the war – short-lived and successive, forgotten and reinvented, transparently insincere and frequently mutually exclusive – have been exposed as fraudulent and none of the identified objectives have been achieved or are likely ever to be so. Osama bin Laden and Omar Mullah have not been captured or killed. Taliban is stronger than at any time since their overthrow eight years ago last month, even – though the name Taliban seems to mean fairly much whatever the West intends it to at any given moment – gaining hitherto unimagined control over the country’s northern provinces.
Opium cultivation and exports, virtually non-existent at the time of the 2001 invasion, are now at record levels, with Afghanistan the world’s largest narcotics producer and exporter.
The Afghan-Pakistani border has not been secured and NATO supply convoys are regularly seized and set on fire on the Pakistani side. Pakistani military offensives have killed hundreds if not thousands on the other side of the border and have displaced over two million civilians in the Swat District and adjoining areas of the North-West Frontier Province.
Yet far from acknowledging that the war, America’s longest since the debacle in Vietnam and NATO’s first ground war and first conflict in Asia, has been a signal failure, U.S. and NATO leaders are clamoring for more troops in addition to the 100,000 already on the ground in Afghanistan and are preparing the public in the fifty nations contributing to that number for a war that will last decades. And still without the guarantee of a successful resolution.
But the West’s South Asian war is a fiasco only if judged by what Washington and Brussels have claimed their objectives were and are. Viewed from a broader geopolitical and strategic military perspective matters may be otherwise.
On September 7 a Russian analyst, Sergey Mikheev, was quoted as saying that the major purpose of the Pentagon moving into Afghanistan and of NATO waging its first war outside of Europe was to exert influence on and domination over a vast region of South and Central Asia that has brought Western military forces – troops, warplanes, surveillance capabilities – to the borders of China, Iran and Russia.
Mikheev claims that “Afghanistan is a stage in the division of the world after the bipolar system failed” and the U.S. and NATO “wanted to consolidate their grip on Eurasia…and deployed a lot of troops there,” adding that as a pretext for doing so “The Taliban card was played, although nobody had been interested in the Taliban before.” [1]
A compatriot of the writer, Andrei Konurov, earlier this month agreed with the contention that Taliban was and remains more excuse for than cause of the United States and its NATO allies deploying troops and taking over air and other bases in Afghanistan and the Central Asian nations of Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. In the case of Kyrgyzstan alone, there were estimates at the beginning of this year that as many as 200,000 U.S. and NATO troops have transited through the Manas air base en route to Afghanistan.
Konurov argued that “With Washington’s non-intervention if not downright encouragement, the Talibs are destabilizing Central Asia and the Uyghur regions of China as well as seeking inroads into Iran. This is the explanation behind the recent upheaval of Uyghur separatism and to an extent behind the activity of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.” [2]
It must be kept in mind, however, that for the West the term of opprobrium Talib is elastic and can at will be applied to any ethnic Pushtun opponent of Western military occupation and, as was demonstrated with the NATO air strike massacre last Friday, after the fact to anyone killed by Western forces as in multi-ethnic Kunduz province.
The last-cited author also stated, again contrary to received opinion in the West, that “the best option for the US is Afghanistan having no serious central authority whatsoever and a government in Kabul totally dependent on Washington. The inability of such a government to control most of Afghanistan’s territory would not be regarded as a major problem by the US as in fact Washington would in certain ways be able to additionally take advantage of the situation.” [3]
An Afghanistan that was at peace and stabilized would then be a decided disadvantage for plans to maintain and widen Western military positioning at the crossroads where Russian, Chinese, Iranian, Pakistani and Indian interests meet.
The Russian writer mentions that Washington and its NATO allies have employed the putative campaign against al-Qaeda – and now Taliban as well as the drug trade – to secure, seize and upgrade 19 military bases in Afghanistan and Central Asia, including what can become strategic air bases like former Soviet ones in Bagram, Shindand, Herat, Farah, Kandahar and Jalalabad in Afghanistan. The analyst pointed out that “The system of bases makes it possible for the US to exert military pressure on Russia, China, and Iran.”
It suffices to recall that during the 1980s current U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates was the CIA official in charge of the agency’s largest-ever covert campaign, Operation Cyclone, to arm and train Afghan extremists in military camps in Pakistan for attacks inside Afghanistan. A “porous border” was not his concern at the time.
Konurov ended his article with an admonition:
“There is permanent consensus in the ranks of the US establishment that the US presence in Afghanistan must continue.
“Russia should not and evidently will not watch idly the developments at the southern periphery of post-Soviet space.” [4]
Iran’s top military commander, Yahya Rahim-Safavi, was quoted in his nation’s media on September 7 offering a comparable analysis and issuing a similar warning. Saying that “The recent security pact between US and NATO and Afghanistan showed the United States has no plan to leave the region,” he observed that “Russia worries about the US presence in Central Asia and China has concerns about US interference in its two main Muslim provinces bordering Pakistan and Afghanistan.” [5]
To indicate that the range of the Western military threat extended beyond Central Asia and its borders with Russia and China, he also said the “presence of more than 200,000 foreign forces in the region particularly in South-West Asia, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Middle East, the expansion of their bases, the sale of billions of dollars of military equipments to Iraq, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and looting their oil resources are the root cause of insecurity in South-West Asia, the Persian Gulf region and Iran,” and noted that “US and NATO forces in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, the Gulf of Oman and the Persian Gulf had been a cause for concern for Russia, China and Iran.” [6]
The Iranian concern is hardly unwarranted. The August 31 edition of the Jerusalem Post revealed that “NATO’s interest in Iran has dramatically increased in recent months” and “In December 2006, Israeli Military Intelligence hosted the first of its kind international conference on global terrorism and intelligence, after which Israel and NATO established an intelligence-sharing mechanism.”
The same article quoted an unnamed senior Israeli official as adding, “NATO talks about Iran and the way it affects force structure and building.” [7]
Six days earlier an American news agency released a report titled “Middle East arms buys top $100 billion” which said “Middle Eastern countries are expected to spend more than $100 billion over the next five years” the result of “unprecedented packages…unveiled by President George W. Bush in January 2008 to counter Iran….” [8]
The major recipients of American arms will be three nations in the Persian Gulf – Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Iraq – as well as Israel.
Other Gulf states are among those to participate in this unparalleled arms buildup in Iran’s neighborhood. “The core of this arms-buying spree will undoubtedly be the $20 billion U.S. package of weapons systems over 10 years for the six states of the Gulf Cooperation Council – Saudi Arabia, the U.A.E. [United Arab Emirates], Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Bahrain.” [9]
A week ago Nicola de Santis, NATO’s head of the Mediterranean Dialogue and the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative Countries Section in the NATO Public Diplomacy Division, visited the United Arab Emirates and met with the nation’s foreign minister, Anwar Mohammed Gargash.
“Prospects of UAE-NATO cooperation” and “NATO’s Istanbul Cooperation Initiative” were the main topics of discussion. [10]
The Istanbul Cooperation Initiative was formed at the NATO summit in Turkey in 2004 to upgrade the status of the Mediterranean Dialogue – the Alliance’s military partnerships with Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Morocco, Tunisia, Mauritania and Algeria – to that of the Partnership for Peace. The latter was used to prepare twelve nations for full NATO accession over the last ten years.
The second component of the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative concerns formal and ongoing NATO military ties with the six members of the Gulf Cooperation Council: The United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain (where the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet is headquartered), Kuwait, Oman and Qatar.
In May of this year France opened its first foreign military base in half a century in the United Arab Emirates.
In addition to U.S. and NATO military forces and bases in nations bordering Iran – Iraq, Afghanistan, Turkey, Pakistan and increasingly Azerbaijan – the Persian Gulf is now becoming a Pentagon and NATO lake.
China is also being encroached upon from several directions simultaneously.
After the visit of the Pentagon’s Central Command chief General David Petraeus to the region in late August, Kyrgyzstan, which borders China, relented and agreed to the resumption of U.S. military transit for the Afghan war.
Tajikistan, which also abuts China, hosts French warplanes which are to be redeployed to Afghanistan this month.
Mongolia, resting between China and Russia, hosts regular Khaan Quest military exercises with the U.S. and has now pledged troops for NATO’s Afghan war.
Kazakhstan, with Russia to its north and China to its southeast, has offered the U.S. and NATO increased transit and other assistance for the Afghan war, with rumors of troop commitments also in the air, and is currently hosting NATO’s 20-nation Zhetysu 2009 exercise.
Late last month China appealed to Washington to halt military surveillance operations in its coastal waters, with its Defense Ministry saying “The constant US air and sea surveillance and survey operations in China’s exclusive economic zone is the root cause of problems between the navies and air forces of China and the US.” [11]
A spokeswoman for the American embassy in Beijing responded by saying, “The United States exercises its freedom of navigation of the seas under international law….This policy has not changed.” [12]
The war in Afghanistan was launched four months after Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan formed the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a regional security and economic alliance with a military component. Now the Pentagon and NATO have bases in the last three nations and military cooperation agreements with Kazakhstan.
In 2005 India, Iran, Mongolia and Pakistan joined the Shanghai Cooperation Organization as observer states. Now all but Iran are being pulled into the U.S.-NATO orbit. No small part of the West’s plans in South and Central Asia is to neutralize and destroy the SCO as well as the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), founded in 2002 by Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Armenia and Belarus.
Uzbekistan joined in 2006 but after General Petraeus’s visit to the country last month it appears ready to leave the organization. Belarus, Russia’s only buffer along its entire Western border, may not be far behind.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 the U.S. and NATO immediately moved on Central Asia, and the war in Afghanistan has provided them with the opportunity to gain domination over all of South as well as Central Asia and to undermine and threaten the existence of the only regional security bodies – the SCO and CSTO – which could counteract the West’s drive for control of Eurasia.
Die Taliban haben angekündigt, dass sie mit drei gefangene US-Soldaten das Waterboarding anwenden werden. Ein Taliban- Kommandeur behauptet, dass Waterboarding keine Folter sei und nicht gegen die Genfer Flüchtlingskonvention oder US-Recht verstösst. Er versicherte, dass ein Arzt alle Waterboarding Sitzungen überwacht, um sicherzustellen, dass die Soldaten keine bleibenden Schäden davontragen. Darüber hinaus sagte er, sie achteten darauf, die Anweisungen für Waterboarding in einem SERE (Überlebens-, Ausweich-, Widerstands- und Fluchttraining bei Streitkräften der USA) Schulungshandbuch, dass sie im Internet gefunden hätten, zu befolgen.
Zur Stützung seiner Behauptung, dass Waterboarding keine Folter sei, zitiert der Taliban-Kommandeur die rechtliche Analyse des Office of Legal Counsel vom US Department of Justice. Er wies darauf hin, dass die Autoren dieser Analyse, ein angesehener Bundesrichter beim zweithöchsten Gericht in den USA und ein Professor an einer amerikanischen Top-Law School.
Traigo al blog un edificio neoyorquino. En apariencia uno más. Y lo es, en efecto. Sin embargo, su historia sirve de muestra de una especie ya extinguida en la práctica. Ejemplifica un fenómeno socio-urbano nacido a finales de la década de los sesenta en algunas de las grandes ciudades de los Estados Unidos como San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago o Nueva York.
En el último tercio del siglo XX en los Estados Unidos, las clases medias iniciaron un proceso de abandono del centro urbano como área residencial hacia las periferias, lo que produjo que muchos edificios quedasen vacíos. Muchos de estos edificios más tarde se readaptarían como Habitaciones de Ocupación Individual (SRO). La mayoría se edificó entre finales del siglo XIX y principios del XX y exhiben el estilo arquitectónico típico del momento.
La reocupación de estas viviendas del centro urbano se entendió como una opción viable de dotar de techo a la población sin recursos, especialmente a los pobres y homeless que deambulaban por las calles de Manhattan. También tenían cabida estudiantes o trabajadores de paso, inquilinos solteros y viudas con pocos medios económicos, y también otros habitantes de la ciudad que no precisaban de espacios amplios, ni de comodidades o de grandes infraestructuras para vivir. Esta circunstancia hizo de estos edificios una fórmula de acceso a alquileres económicos, especialmente en áreas donde todavía la gentrificación y el alto precio del suelo no dificultaban su acceso.
Hotel Sant George, en Los Angeles, edificio construido en 1905 y renovado en 2004 como SRO por The Skid Row Housing Trust. (FOTO de 8perf by Flickr)
Los alquileres se podían pagar integramente o bien con ayudas de organizaciones benéficas y/o programas federales o estatales que podían hacerse cargo de una parte , incentivando a los propietarios de los edificios para que acogieran al mayor número posible de inquilinos sin recursos y personas sin hogar. En algunos casos hubo edificios dedicados a SRO que se reformaron por completo gracias a las rebajas tributarias que les etorgó el Estado a condición de que acogieran en sus instalaciones a inquilinos de rentas bajas y también a grupos sociales desfavorecidos específicos, como sintecho, enfermos mentales, alcohólicos o enfermos de SIDA, etc.
Dependiendo de la sensibilidad de los propietarios del edificio y de su estado, los SRO podían pasar de ser auténticos depósitos de mugre a parecerse mínimamente a un hotel. Algunos tenían el aspecto de residencias y otros eran auténticos heteles-celda, en los que las habitaciones originales se reducían al máximo con láminas de acero o de “pladur” que ni siquiera llegaban a la altura del techo. Para evitar que los inquilinos se colaran a las otras habitaciones por el espacio entre las divisiones y el techo era habitual colocar mallas metálicas, lo que daba aún un aspecto más carcelario. (Fuente: Wikipedia)
El antiguo Hotel Lincoln Square de Manhattan (Nueva York) situado en pleno Upper West Side en la calle 75, ahora Apartamentos Lincoln, fue conocido como un SRO (Single Room Occupancy) o Habitaciones de Ocupación Individual. Por lo general sus cuartos estaban ocupados por uno o dos inquilinos que compartían uno o dos cuartos unidos, con o sin cuarto de baño, pudiendo compartir baños comunes con otros inquilinos del edificio. Aunque lo habitual en este tipo de arriendos es que se compartiesen cocina y cuartos de baño, si bien algunos también poseían una mini cocina sin separación alguna del dormitorio, pués todo era uno. La fórmula de este establecimiento fue su funcionamiento como hotel -de ahí su nombre, que vemos en el letrero que todavía exhibe-, si bien en origen los SRO se alquilaban con carácter de residencias de larga duración como si de apartamentos se tratase. (De hecho, en la mayoría de los directorios telefónicos de NY-Manhattan el edificio continúa figurando como Hotel Lincoln Sq.) La política de los actuales propietarios del edificio, que lo compraron con inquilinos, se basa en su “acoso y derribo”, con la intención de renovar por completo el inmueble y reconvertirlo en apartamentos de lujo. En esta zona el precio del suelo es elevado y el inquilinato escaso, pués sus ocupantes, de escasa capacidad económica, dificultan los planes especulativos que originaron su compra a los anteriores arrendatarios.
FOTO: Enrique F.-2007
En muchos casos estos edificios se construyeron en los alrededores de los distritos de negocios de Nueva York, o en áreas residenciales céntricas, como es el caso de este hotel, muy cerca del Lincoln Center. La foto está tomadas en el cruce de la Avenida Amsterdam con calle 74 , en el centro el antiguo SRO, Hotel Lincoln Square.
(Foto: Enrique F.- 2007)
Panorama del Upper West Side de Manhattan mirando hacia el Este, en dirección a Central Park. La foto está tomada desde una de las habitaciones de los Apartamentos Lincoln (Antiguo SRO Lincoln Square). Se aprecian las azoteas de las “row houses” de las calles 75th y 74th, casas adosadas en línea, de finales de 1800, edificadas para las clases trabajadoras de la época y también llamadas “brownstones“, por el color habitual de la piedra utilizada en su edificación, generalmente arenisca. Al fondo se ve el edificio de San Remo Apartaments, de 1930. El San Remo se construyó en piedra caliza y ladrillo siguiendo un estilo ecléctico “art-decó-neo-clásico” que incorpora numerosos elementos decorativos, especialmete en las dos torres que se yerguen sobre la base principal y que se coronan con sendos pináculos.
Este edificio de apartamentos de lujo en el entorno de Central Park forma parte de un grupo de cuatro de semejante factura que se construyeron en los años treinta del siglo XX siguiendo la moda imperante. En el han vivido personajes famosos como Diane Keaton o Dustin Hoffman, o como Rita Hyworth, que ocupó uno de sus 125 apartamentos hasta su muerte en 1987. En la actualidad viven en el edificio el actor Steve Martin, el director de cine Steven Spielberg y el cantante de U2 Bono, entre otras celebridades del mundo del espectáculo.
En lo alto, a la derecha, se adivina el edificio Dakota, mundialmente conocido por ser la última morada de John Lennon. En la actualidad su mujer Yoko Ono sigue viviendo allí. (FOTO: Enrique F.- 2007)
SRO en la actualidad
Debido a que el valor del suelo se ha incrementado notablemente, en la actualidad resulta rentable la rehabilitación de estos edificios, lo que se traduce en que, una vez reformados, a los inquilinos que todavía habitaban en ellos se les obliga a hacer frente a los nuevos alquileres, siempre infinítamente más altos. Esto, definitivamente, es como una orden de desalojo, lo que explica el visible aumento de “sin techo” en las calles de las ciudades Norteamericanas y en concreto en Nueva York, desde principios de los años 80.
La transformación de estos edificios ha supuesto un largo proceso de reconversión vía “gentrificación” o recualificación socioespacial, en el que los propietarios de los inmuebles han usado todos los medios posibles, principalmente el hostigamiento y el acoso a los inquilinos para que los abandonasen. A veces, la Administración ha impedido estas situaciones presionando a su vez a los propietarios e impidiendo demoliciones o cambios de actividad a partir de una legislación restrictiva que regulase las transformaciones. Y en otros casos se ha llegado a acuerdos económicos entre propietarios e inquilinos, facilitando el vaciado del inmueble para su posterior readaptación en apartamentos de lujo, cada vez más reclamados por las nuevas clases medias urbanas que persiguen el centro de Manhattan como zona residencial emergente trás la “conquista” de los barrios periféricos. En cualquier caso, para su reconversión se obliga a los propietarios a la obtención de un certificado de “No Hostigamiento”.
Antiguo “Spring Apartment Hotel“, en Seattle, edificio construido en 1923 y que funcionó como SRO hasta 1992, fecha en que fue reconvertido en Hotel Vintage Park. (FOTO: machupichu, 2008 by Flickr)
Una unidad en un edificio SRO, por sus siglas en inglés (Single Room Occupancy), consta de uno o dos cuartos que no
tienen cocina o baño dentro del apartamento. También se los denomina “Clase B”. Hay cinco
clases de edificios identificados como SRO. Clase “A” – Casas De Una Familia
Son cuartos alquilados en edificios construídos como casas de una familia
y convertidos más tarde en casa de huéspedes. Clase “B” – Hotel
Estos fueron hoteles construídos como edificios de cuartos individuales con
clasificación de hotel. Son utilizados como residencias permanentes a largo
plazo con unidades de cocina y baño compartidas. Sección 248 SRO –
Estos son edificios clase “A” convertidos a SRO ya que la puerta de entrada
del apartamento ha sido cerrada y cada unidad individual comparte la cocina y
el baño. Clase “A” SRO –
Estas son unidades individuales en un apartamento clase “A” donde los
residentes comparten la cocina y el baño. SRO Ilegal –
Un SRO convertido ilegalmente es una conversión a unidades tipo B que no
están reflejadas en el Certificado de Ocupación y por lo tanto no están
aprobadas por el Departamento de Edificios. También puede incluír una o más
unidades tipo B en un edificio clase A.
Merrifield, Andy. Dialectical Urbanism: Social Struggles in the Capitalist City. New York: Monthly Review Press, 2002.
(Chapter 6, scrutinizes what has been happening to Single-Room-Occupancy (SRO) tenants as many neighbourhoods in the city become gentrified as the city reinvents itself as a post-industrial, financial services and tourist-destination metropolitan centre.)
Albúm de fotografías de SRO Lauren Cesalzmann (Flickr)
Single-Room-Occupancy Housing May Be Demolished, Court Rules (The New York Times, 1989)
