Monday - May 30, 2011

if only we had president reagan again.

Now this is very interesting and I thought bmews readers would like to see the opinion of this Brit on this subject.
I can’t add anything to this.  But you might.

Ping pong, high fives and an insidious obsession with PR gimmicks

By IAIN MARTIN

Twenty-nine years ago, another American President addressed a joint meeting of both Houses of Parliament. Unlike Barack Obama, this visitor was not accorded the ultimate parliamentary honour of being asked to speak in the ancient Westminster Hall.

Instead, Ronald Reagan was relegated to the Royal Gallery, because many Labour MPs felt that a Right-wing U.S. leader was not sufficiently worthy.

But after the festival of hype and spin that accompanied Obama’s visit this week, with British politicians fawning in his presence, it is well worth re-reading.
Reagan’s brilliantly incisive and clear-sighted speech from that day, back in the summer of 1982.  And what a sharp contrast to Barack Obama’s vapid sloganeering and windy rhetoric it is.

Reagan correctly diagnosed the ills of his age. He lambasted the Soviet tyranny that still enslaved Eastern Europe, highlighted the dangers posed in the West by the relentless increase in the powers of the state, and reminded his audience of the importance of individual freedom.

While explaining how he would defend Western Europe, he outlined how he would pursue nuclear disarmament — but only from a position of strength. People in countries such as Poland, he also said, would be encouraged to shake off the yoke of communism.

As a former Hollywood star, Reagan has been criticised for elevating public relations above political principle.
Certainly, he used his acting skills. But he was also a deeply serious man, with a passionate and coherent free-market philosophy developed during his time as the boss of the Screen Actors’ Guild and then as a successful governor of California.

The truth is that public relations techniques were simply tools he had mastered to get across his message.
How different politics are today, where public relations seem to be both the medium and the message. Forget the Special Relationship. Obama’s visit to Britain was one extended photo-opportunity designed to win him votes in next year’s presidential election.

Compare Reagan’s principled vision to the vacuous soundbites of Obama, who may be Harvard-educated but whose shallowness makes him seem merely to be a classier, transatlantic version of Tony Blair.
Not that you would know it from the sycophantic reaction of Britain’s political establishment, who greeted Obama’s Westminster speech as if it was the Gettysburg Address.

But then we live in an age when image is seen as much more preferable to the more difficult responsibility of dealing with reality. Obama, the consummate PR man, is the personification of this insidious trend.

Of course it was a major achievement for him to become America’s first black President. But his record in the White House has been, at best, patchy. It is impossible to discern any clear thread running through his presidency other than an obsession with winning re-election.

LOTS MORE HERE

Sure do MISS this man.

   Tuesday - May 24, 2011

Late But Still Crowder

Little Stevie took extra time to make this “week’s” video, going on a big old road trip. Let’s hope it was worth it.

Crowder On Net Neutrality

   Monday - May 23, 2011

Politics can be a stressful business

Don’t ya sometimes wish that our guys would just open up and let us know how they really,really feel?

Parliamentary gagging order Ukrainian style: Speaker grabs his deputy in death grip during debate row

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
Last updated at 2:19 PM on 23rd May 2011

Vice speaker of the Ukrainian parliament Adam Martynyuk was recorded on camera as he grabbed a colleague by the throat and slammed him into the ground with a ‘death grip’ wrestling move.

Martynyuk had been presiding over a legislative session in a chamber of the Ukrainian parliament in Kiev on Wednesday when tempers flared.

The usually dull proceedings were disrupted when Martynyuk’s deputy Oleg Lyashko asked to make a speech but was refused. He then reportedly called Martynyuk a ‘Pharisee’.

Martynyuk leapt to his feet and lunged at his deputy.

In what appears to be an expert self-defence move, the speaker pinched the deputy’s throat in a ‘death grip’ while jamming two fingers into his temple.

He then overpowers the man who is thrown to the ground after toppling over a wooden stand.

But still visibly irritated, Lyashko gets up from the floor and the pair square up and push each other.

more text here

   Wednesday - May 18, 2011

Question of the day

I was listening to Neal Boortz while out doing errands this morning. As I was getting out of the car at home Neal posed this question:

We’ve already seen that a black man, with no qualifications, can become President. Why not Herman Cain?

Well, BMEWSd and BMEWSettes...why not?

   Friday - April 29, 2011

Go Donald Go

Trump Gives Them Both Barrels In Vegas
Fires Off Mouth, Reloads, Fires Again

“We have weak pathetic leaders.” “Our leaders are stupid, they are stupid people.” “It’s just very, very sad.”

Real estate mogul and reality TV star Donald Trump unleashed an f-bomb-laced attack on President Obama and Washington politics Thursday night during a speech that likely won’t help him win the family-values vote should he decide to run for president.

At a Las Vegas casino that bears his name, Trump assured a crowd of adoring supporters that he is seriously weighing a presidential run and will make a decision soon.

During a 30-minute stump speech focused mostly on foreign affairs, Trump blasted Obama’s handling of Libya, Iraq, China and Afghanistan, and in one of his many curse-bombs, he lamented the nation’s focus on building schools in war-torn Iraq, while neglecting education in the United States.

“In the meantime we can’t get a f---ing school in Brooklyn,” he said.

He also cursed the spike in gas prices: “We have nobody in Washington that sits back and said, you’re not going to raise that f---ing price.”

Trump even dropped what’s considered the most offensive f-bomb when he promised to use swear words while negotiating with China.

“Listen you mother f---ers, we’re going to tax you 25 percent,” he said.

Trump also sprinkled in a number of insults directed toward the nation’s leaders.

“Our leaders are stupid, they are stupid people,” he said. “It’s just very, very sad.”

The setting was fitting for the casino mogul whose moniker is draped across the gold-tinged Trump International Hotel & Tower just off the Las Vegas Strip. An open bar greeted more than 1,000 people, waiters passed hors d’oeuvres and a Trump impersonator entertained the crowd.

At one point, a woman in the lavish reception at the Treasure Island casino on the Las Vegas Strip yelled out that Trump should run for president.

“I think I am going to make you very happy,” the developer said.

But he later said: “There is a really good chance that I won’t win because of one of these blood-sucking politicians.”

So he’s crass. So he’s a loudmouth blowhard. GOOD! Hit them hard Donald, hit them again and again and again. Give them the rough language of real Americans and all the anger that goes with it. Shoot your mouth off 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, because the press won’t ignore you the way they ignore us. And maybe, just maybe, some of those velvet slipper lace undie wearing crybaby Republicans in DC will realize that they too just might be able to grow a pair and learn how to fight.

   Tuesday - April 26, 2011

$7 Gas

3 Inch Lizard Could Shut Down Texas Oil Business

How’s that for jobs “saved or created”? Out of control EPA wants to put the Dunes Sagebrush Lizard on the Federal Endangered Species List, and you know what that will mean.

If the Dunes Sagebrush Lizard is declared an endangered species, it could devastate oil and gas production in the Permian Basin for at least two years. Critics believe this proposal is an entirely politically motivated move to hurt the energy industry in America.

The listing of the Northern spotted owl as a threatened species has killed logging and created ghost towns in the Northwest – and the owls are still in decline after 20 years of protection. The ESA protection of the delta smelt as a threatened species created unemployment of more than 40 percent in the San Joaquin Valley – until the votes of two congressmen for Obama’s health care bill turned the water back on – temporarily.  (Suddenly the fish weren’t so important.) Unfortunately for the owls and smelt, they’re not getting the needed population boost, but the unemployment figures of the loggers and farm laborers has increased significantly.

The Obama administration wants us to believe that they will really focus on jobs and the economy. The announcements and “pro-business” staff members are just window dressing. While no one is looking, they’re continuing the job-killing policies. On December 14, the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) announced that the Dunes Sagebrush Lizard “faces immediate and significant threats due to oil and gas activities and herbicide treatments.” As a result, they propose it be listed as “endangered”—under the Endangered Species Act (ESA)—which starts the clock for a 60-day public comment period. Hoping no one would notice, the proposal was announced during the throes of the holiday season. We, the public, need to take notice.

If the lizard receives the ESA listing, oil and gas development will be virtually stopped for those that have not yet signed the CCA and no new exploration will be allowed—which means even higher prices at the pump. As we’ve seen with the closing of the Alaska pipeline, the less supply we have, the higher the price. If the economy’s really important, wouldn’t Washington want to keep prices low for the consumer and to help recovery? An ESA listing will also block potential wind farms and solar installations. The news release states that “Habitat loss and fragmentation” is due to the “creation of roads and pads, pipelines and transmission lines.” Transmission lines are needed to get the renewable energy from “out there” where the land is to “in here” where the people are.

The endangered species we should all be concerned about is “the job.” The economy of this entire portion of the country is dependent on ranching/farming and the extractive industries. Take them away and you take jobs away. The region will become the victim of policy-induced poverty.

SANTA FE - U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce, R-2nd District, says he sees a threat in the desert, a tiny reptile that can destroy jobs if the federal government lists it as an endangered species.

Critics of Pearce, a Republican who is weighing whether to run for the U.S. Senate next year, counter that he is trying to whip up a furor against environmental laws to advance himself politically.

In the middle of this debate is the dunes sagebrush lizard. A dusty brown, this lizard grows to no more than 3 inches and is so rare - limited to stretches of southeastern New Mexico and west Texas - that most humans will never see one. The dunes sagebrush lizard lives in dunes covered by shinnery oak. Its habitat is shrinking, and the U.S. government has listed it as a candidate for “endangered” status since 2001.

The state of New Mexico already lists the dunes sagebrush lizard as an endangered species, making it illegal to kill or harm the animal. But state protections are slim compared to those a federal designation would provide. Under the Endangered Species Act, the U.S. government could restrict oil drilling, grazing and use of off-road vehicles to protect the dunes sagebrush lizard.

Its range covers Chaves, Eddy, Lea and Roosevelt counties. Most of that habitat is federally owned, controlled by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. In addition, the lizard lives in four counties of west Texas.

Pearce, focusing on the reptile this week in town meetings throughout the 2nd Congressional District, said people would be put in peril if the federal government classifies the dunes sagebrush lizard as “endangered.”

“Most of the oil and gas jobs in southeast New Mexico are at risk,” he said. “In the ‘70s, they listed the spotted owl as endangered and it killed the entire timber industry.”

MIDLAND (Texas)- The sagebrush lizard has ended up on the radar of many oil companies locally, that’s because it may end up halting production.

The Permian Basin Petroleum Association will be having a public rally on Tuesday in protest of the dunes sagebrush lizard being added to the endangered species list.

Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson and Congressman Michael Conaway will be speaking alongside Ben Sheppard, President of the Permian Basin Petroleum Association, about the hindrance this will force on the area.

The rally is scheduled at 5 pm Tuesday at the Midland Center.  On Wednesday, the official hearings will be held by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service at 6:30 pm at the Midland Center.

Public comment is welcome.

I’m sure a few hundred thousand emails to the EPA and to US Fish & Wildlife Service couldn’t hurt. Be polite, but be firm. People, jobs, and country first. Insignificant little animals last. Let them adapt, or perish.  If West Texas oil production comes to a screeching halt, or if the drilling companies have to apply for, pay for, and then include the expense of dealing with the EPA’s CCA regs, that is going to drive the price of American crude right off the charts. Which is exactly what Ocommie and his gang o’ thugocrats want.

   Tuesday - April 19, 2011

Still Stuck On Stupid

Oh noes, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer vetoed the “birther bill”!!! While admitting that the AZ legislature probably has the votes to override her veto, she said she vetoed the bill because it was “a brdige too far”; in her opinion it gave the AZ secretary of state too much power.

Brewer said in her veto letter that she was troubled that the bill empowered Arizona’s secretary of state to judge the qualifications of all candidates when they file to run for office.

“I do not support designating one person as the gatekeeper to the ballot for a candidate, which could lead to arbitrary or politically motivated decisions,” said Brewer,

Ok, that sort of makes sense if you don’t think about it at all. The blatantly stated implication being that corruption would sneak in; absolute power and so forth? What does that say about the government of Arizona when the governor of that state implies that the secretary of state of that state isn’t fully trustworthy? And it is generally the secretary of state’s actual job to be the “gatekeeper to the ballot”. Somebody has to have the responsibility. What underling does Brewer think ought to be the one to make the decision? The Bisbee dogcatcher?

And then she goes into stupid land with

“In addition, I never imagined being presented with a bill that could require candidates for president of the greatest and most powerful nation on Earth to submit their ‘early baptismal circumcision certificates’ among other records to the Arizona secretary of state,” she said. “This is a bridge too far.”

Is it too much to expect that the governor and the media actually read the damn bill? (applicable text below the fold here)

Pretty much everyone has a proper birth certificate these days, but AZ bill HB2177 tries to be fair and cover those situations where a valid “natural born” citizen doesn’t. Was it foolish of them to do so? Did they make a mess of it? Let’s look at the wording and see what they created, and try and shoot holes in it.

Part A. The party has to tell the state that so-and-so is going to be their candidate for President, and that what’s-his-face is going to be their candidate for Vice President. Fine by me. Next, the party has 10 days to hand in an affidavit that their candidate is a natural born citizen, and include proof of that. What the heck, it’s only in the Constitution after all. Fine by me. Too bad that the Arizona bill didn’t also extend this burden of proof to the VP candidate. That requirement is not explicitly stated in the Constitution, but it really ought to be, don’t you think? And don’t you think it should also apply to anyone in any of the “succession" positions below those offices, which would thus force every member of the federal legislature to be a natural born citizen as well? Or at least extend the natural born qualifier bit to those proper “officers” if a strict interpretation of Article II Section 1 is used and the 1947 Act is tossed out? But that’s getting off topic. Let’s focus on what the Arizona bill was trying to do, which was to keep possible usurpers off the ballot in the first place.

Part B. What is proof?

Subsection 1. A long form birth certificate with traceable data. Name, date, hospital, doctor, signatures of witnesses.

But I don’t have one! Ok, then come up with at least two of the following:
a. baptismal record OR circumcision record (gosh, the first bit doesn’t apply to atheists and the second bit doesn’t apply to females!! And Jan, what the heck kind of church do you belong to that does the baptisms and circumcisions at the same time???)
b. hospital birth record (gosh, but she was born at home, or in a ditch by the side of the road!!)
c. postpartum medical record ... signed by the person who delivered the child or who examined it after birth (gosh, after mom had the baby in the field, she went back to the log cabin in the mountains!)
d. early census record (all this will show is that a child under 10 was living at some place at some point. It may be proof of residency, but it is not any proof of citizenship)

Subsection 2. A sworn statement or form that shows that the presidential candidate has lived in the USA for at least 14 years.

Part C. Oh, Part B subsection 1 can also include an official affidavit from at least two people who witnessed the birth. (but she was alone, at night, in the snow!)

Part D. If the secretary of state is given the alternate junk in B.1.a - B.1.d and/or C., and can’t figure it out, they have the power to send this mess to committee or to hold hearings. They don’t have to do either one.  Then what happens?

Part E. (not an enumerated subsection) Jumping back to Part A, if the candidate and his party’s election committee don’t submit the required documents and swear up and down that they are true, then the candidate does not get their name on the ballot.

(not another enumerated subsection either) If they do submit the docs, but the AZ secretary of state, along with the possible assistance of the optional committee or hearings, feels that most of it is crap, then the candidate does not get their name on the ballot.

Part F. An elected state level legislator or any AZ citizen can request that this law be enforced. (yeah, let’s make sure the barn door is closed after the horse has left and the building has burned down)

And that’s the entire bill. Ok, that’s the part that applies to Presidential Candidates. The rest of the bill only applies to local and state elections.

It certainly could be better written. Part C should really be B.1.e. Part D should require either public hearings or a committee, not “may” allow for them. Part E should be two subsections under Part D. Part F should not exist: this bill should establish a procedure that WILL ALWAYS HAPPEN for every candidate wishing to run for President to get on the AZ ballot.

It is easy to shoot holes in the requirements for B.1.a-B.1.d. Let’s say that single mommy, a full citizen living in the USA who doesn’t believe in God, went for a hike by herself, the exertion of that activity caused her to go into labor, and she delivered her own daughter out in the woods with only the aid of a sharp rock and a bit of vine. And got home a day or two later and stayed home alone for two weeks recovering, but realized that she was basically Ok, so she didn’t call a doctor or 911.  That gives you a fully natural born citizen who would not pass the muster required by this bill. But how do you write a bill that says “Hey, you wanna run for President in our state? Prove you’re a normal citizen just like everybody else.” and then try to be nice and allow for oddball circumstances? I don’t think you can. And that means that once in a while someone is going to sneak in through the cracks, even if they were actually born in Kenya and then adopted by some white girl who was just passing by. [ Seriously. I’m not really part of the “Birther” crowd, but I’m not happy with the oddball shit surrounding Obama. Are there even pictures of his mother being pregnant? Does anyone have her passport showing that she was in the USA when he was born? Did anyone ever even do a blood test to prove he was her child? Or his? Too many questions. Better off not allowing any oddball candidates to run. Sorry, but too bad. I can come up with a boxful of pics of my mom gravid with me. I have my original birth certificate right here, and I’m sure I’m at least a checkmark on several censuses conducted when I was a child. Plus the hospital I was born in is still in business, and they have records. So do the state and the county. So does my church. You have the same documentation too. We all do at this point. Everyone does, except Obama. Or whatever his name was at that time. We all also have school records going back all the way, and they would be made public if we ran for office. But not Fearless Reader. ]

So Brewer was perfectly correct in not signing this partially flawed piece of legislature. Try it again guys, and do a better job next time. However, her rejecting it because it mentions circumcision, and the media and the armies of comment snipers who can’t show any more maturity than Beavis & Butthead, are just plain wrong. And Brewer’s qualm that it’s a “bridge too far” to give the AZ Sec State this much power is also wrong. That is part of the job. You certainly don’t want the decision made on a town by town or county by county basis by 1000 different people. It has to be made at the state level, and it has to be made near the top of the heap. That’s what the secretary of state is all about. They have to be trusted to be above politics. The whole thing falls apart if they aren’t. Stipulate that the grunt work has to be done by a bi-partisan committee, but the ultimate decision has to be made by the person in that job. That is not a bridge too far at all.

   Friday - April 01, 2011

Weinervision

More Stevie!

   Thursday - March 31, 2011

Your Pound Of Beans

Meanwhile In Africa
Ouattara forces take Ivorian port of San Pedro

Forces loyal to Ivory Coast’s Alassane Ouattara have seized the major cocoa port of San Pedro, extending a nationwide offensive that has left incumbent Laurent Gbagbo isolated in the main city, Abidjan.

In a blow to Gbagbo, his army chief of staff, General Phillippe Mangou, sought refuge in the South African ambassador’s residence in Abidjan. A South African spokesman denied rumors that Gbagbo was on the way to South Africa.

Residents and combatants from both sides said the pro-Ouattara forces were in control of western port town of San Pedro, and that it was now largely calm apart from some sporadic shooting.

Reuters witnesses in the main city, Abidjan, Gbagbo’s last remaining stronghold, said the streets were virtually empty and gunfire could be heard overnight and on Thursday morning, but it was not clear who was involved.

Gbagbo has resisted pressure from the African Union and the West to step down since a presidential election last November, which U.N.-certified results showed he lost to Ouattara by an 8-point margin, sparking a deadly power struggle.

But forces loyal to Ouattara launched an offensive this week on three fronts, and towns across the country fell, mostly without resistance, one after another as they swept south.

Cocoa prices have fallen about 9 percent since on the push. The capture of San Pedro, which ships half of the top grower’s beans, could, in theory, mean a resumption in exports.

Diplomats said on Thursday that European Union sanctions, including an embargo on cocoa shipments from San Pedro, would remain in place and if any exemption were discussed it would take four or five days to come into force.

So, who cares? Well, you do, even if you don’t know it. The Ivory Coast provides nearly half the world’s cocoa, and the unrest there has caused the commodity price to skyrocket. Neighboring Ghana and Nigeria Cocoa together produce a bit less than le Côte d’Ivoire; the 3 West African nations account for a touch more than 2/3 of world production. Ghana and Nigeria are having their own political instabilities.

Cocoa bean production is not a huge business; only about 3.4 million metric tons (1000 kilos = 2200lbs) a year of beans are grown worldwide. With more than 6 billion people in the world this amounts to just about 1 pound of cocoa beans per person annually.

Politics in the Ivory Coast are typically African, tribal crossed with religious, and too complicated for outsiders to understand, but when they had a civil war there 8 years ago cocoa prices took a huge jump from which they never fully recovered.  Laurent Gbagbo was president before, during, and after the war, so I guess his forces won. A few months ago they held an election and he lost, although his people obviously rigged the numbers and he claimed victory. Since then he has refused to step down, and this has plunged the country right back into civil war. Thanks a lot. At this point in time it looks like rebel leader and election winner Alassane Ouattara and his followers are winning, and with their troops seizing the one decent port in the country international market fears are easing.

current commodity price link


This is some interesting economics, considering that there is a worldwide sanction on cocoa from the Ivory Coast right now. In theory they are not part of the current market, so how could the situation there impact global pricing? I guess the answer is that they are still growing the beans, and they have to be piled up in warehouses somewhere. World demand is fairly stable, so with only 1/3 of the product currently available from the other producer nations, this would cause a rather skittish market. But it is more complex than that, because cocoa is not created in a factory. The beans are grown on trees, and the pods ripen whenever they feel like it. This means the main harvest season lasts 7 months, and the minor secondary harvest season lasts another 3 months. Right now we are just into the no harvest at all period.

Cocoa farming is on the decline in several of the other producer nations. The trees take 5 or 6 years to mature and can produce for 50 years or more, but there just isn’t much money in it for the farmers. I find that interesting in itself, because the commodity price is more than half again as high now than it was when the Ivorian civil war started, and that price (around $2200/mt) was nearly 3 times as high as the price was just 2 years earlier in 2000 ($800/mt). Even if you ignore February’s record shattering price of over $3700/mt, a 32 year high and the current drop from there, cocoa beans are selling at more than 4 times the price they were a decade ago. Go figure. You’d think people would be planting left and right. I guess it’s just too much hard work, even though most of it is done by children.

Some analysts say that up to a quarter million of the pod pickers are small children, and there are very strong allegations that many of these children are kept as slaves. But given the typical abhorrent living conditions in Africa and their standard horrific inhumanity and barbarism, how could you tell? But before you feel all guilty and start searching for only Fair Trade chocolate to buy, you should know that the cocoa pods can usually only be harvested by children. The cocoa tree is fragile and the pods grow from the trunk, not from the branches. Adults climbing the trees damage them, and monkeys can’t be used because they don’t differentiate between the ripe pods and the unripe ones. So child labor is it. Don’t forget that the Turd World has a very different view on child labor than the spoiled and decadent west. What we see as child abuse they see as giving children the work opportunity to not starve to death.

Oh, and the root of all the problems in the Ivory Coast? You don’t even have to guess; you know what the answer is. Pisslam. Of course! When the French controlled the Ivory Coast it was a wonderland, with some of the highest per capita income and standard of living on the entire continent. This continued for several decades after independence in 1960, but at some point the Ivorians started importing foreign labor to do the scut work. And guess who showed up?

A former French colony and the world’s top cocoa producer, Ivory Coast was once regarded as a haven of peace and stability, until a 1999 coup that toppled president Henri Konan Bedie. Long considered a peaceful country, that welcomed millions of immigrant workers to sustain a booming economy after its independence from France in 1960, up to 40 percent of the 16 million population is now foreign. The immigrants inflamed political, religious and ethnic frictions between the largely Muslim north and the predominantly Christian south and west.

Until his death in 1993, these disputes were kept under control by the country’s post-independence president, Felix Houphouet-Boigny. But like Yugoslavia in the 1990s, the ancient ethnic and religious animosities were still there, and were exploited by rival politicians after Houphouet-Boigny was gone. Elections were held and Laurent Gbagbo, a southern nationalist, won. He tried to improve his control of the country by forcing northerners out of the security forces, and have millions of them declared foreigners, and ineligible to vote.

This led to the first round of fighting in 2002. The French sent in troops, to at least prevent escalation, and with UN help, a ceasefire was achieved in 2003. But in late 2004, the ceasefire was broken with government air raids on rebel bases in the north.

Until the push south this week, the worst of the violence had centered on Abidjan, where anti-Gbagbo insurgents, who do not necessarily support Ouattara, have seized parts of town.

In a sign violence could spin out of control, the army called on Gbagbo’s often violent youth wing to enlist in the military. They have been fired up with anti-French, anti-foreigner and anti-U.N. propaganda, and on Wednesday the army started openly handing out weapons to them.

Currently there are 11,000 UN Blue Helmets in the Ivory Coast, the vast majority of them being other Africans. So you know what that means ... it’s a mess. A chocolate mess.

   Wednesday - March 30, 2011

welcome to parliament and shut up!

Quite a departure for BMEWS but I thought Americans might enjoy this bit of English byplay in Parliament. Actually, there wasn’t so much by play as David Cameron, the Brit PM, told Ed Balls to “Shut Up.”

We don’t have too much of that back home. Do we?  I rather like the change. I get tired of the usual phony “my honorable friend” BS. Don’t you?

   Sunday - March 13, 2011

Attack of the ‘Ations’

Leglisl-Ation
Regul-Ation
Tax-Ation

Wasn’t this a Moody Blues song?

Herman Cain, who is exploring a run for the Presidency, gives a great speech at CPAC this year.

There are many black men and women I would vote for. Herman Cain is one of those. Obama wasn’t, and isn’t.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t vote for skin color, I vote for content of character.

   Tuesday - February 08, 2011

Lines Drawn In The Sand

How About Aksum, Kush, or Upper Nubia?



Somebody has to draw some borders somewhere in here


“We’re leaving and we’re taking all the money with us!”: oil producing Christian black southern Sudan votes to split from piss poor Arab muslim northern Sudan. Years of civil war have destroyed Sudan, and the sub-Saharan southerners have voted to divorce themselves from the pan-Saharan northerners. Borders have to be drawn, and the new country has to pick out a name. But the USA has already agreed to recognize them ($$$$), even if the country won’t even exist until July.

KHARTOUM (Reuters) – South Sudan voted overwhelmingly to declare independence in final results of a referendum announced on Monday, opening the door to Africa’s newest state and a fresh period of uncertainty for the fractured region.

Hundreds of south Sudanese danced, screamed and waved flags as the announcement was broadcast on a line of TV sets in a square in the center of the southern capital Juba.

A total of 98.83 percent of voters from Sudan’s oil-producing south chose to secede from the north in last month’s referendum, the chairman of the vote’s organizing commission Mohammed Ibrahim Khalil said.
...
The referendum is the climax of a 2005 north-south peace accord that set out to end Africa’s longest civil war and instill democracy in a country that straddles the continent’s Arab-sub Saharan divide.

Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir earlier said he accepted the result, allaying fears that the split could reignite conflict over the control of the south’s oil reserves.

“Today we received these results and we accept and welcome these results because they represent the will of the southern people,” he said in an address on state TV.

Southern officials say the question of a name for the new state is unresolved but it could become just “South Sudan.”
...
“Southern Sudanese are a new people now. We have a new identity. We have respect from everyone at last. Our country has come today,” said Rebecca Maluk, a war widow and mother-of-three in the crowd in Juba.

U.S. to recognize south Sudan as a new country
President Obama says the Sudan split will be officially recognized in July. In a Jan. 9 vote, 98% of southern Sudanese voters chose independence. Obama calls for peaceful resolutions to disputes and an end to attacks on civilians in Darfur.
...
The south is principally Christian, and the north Muslim. The separate countries still have to negotiate a range of issues, including citizenship, borders, and oil rights and revenues. In his statement, Obama said the “outstanding disputes must be resolved peacefully. At the same time, there must be an end to attacks on civilians in Darfur and a definitive end to that conflict.”

Funny how the more that things change, the more they stay the same. Way back when, back in the days of Pharaoh, the southern border of upper Egypt was usually considered to be either the First Cataract of the Nile (at modern Aswan), or the Second Cataract of the Nile (currently underneath Lake Nasser by present day Wadi Halfa), depending on how subservient the Nubians were being. 4000 years later, and the modern border between upper Egypt and Sudan is ... in exactly the same place. The ancient land of Damot is pretty much the modern country of Eritrea. Across the Red Sea, the biblical land of Sheba is nowadays called Yemen. These are all natural borders formed by rivers and mountain ranges.

In another Once Upon A Time, somewhere between then and now, the land of Punt ruled both sides of the mouth of the Red Sea down to the Horn of Africa, which is now part of Ethiopia and Somalia.  So Punt doesn’t work as a name for the new country. I think it was also more of a confederation of tribes too, since the kingdom went across several natural borders. But Kush historically began at the Sixth Cataract, and the city near there, where the White Nile meets the Blue Nile, is called Khartoum. It makes sense to put the border near there, because the land changes radically at that point, and for all I know the people do as well. I don’t know where the population demarcations are in Sudan, but I’m pretty sure they’re not far from this city. The White Nile comes up out of the fever swamps of tropical Africa, and the Blue Nile comes down from the more temperate highlands of Ethiopia. Neither area is historically Arab. Upper Nubia would be a good name to tie this new country to it’s African roots. Aksum (Axum) would work too, and celebrate the area’s Christianity. It wouldn’t be a perfect geographical fit, but it would be one in a Prestor John kind of way, since the old kingdom of Aksum was the first African nation to go Christian. You can look at a map of Sudan and see how the northern cities have Arabic names, while the southern ones have African names. So it would seem smart to me to draw the borders on as natural a line as possible

So peace may finally be at hand in this troubled corner of the world, and a new Christian nation may be about to rise in Africa. One with an actual revenue stream. Now if they can just negotiate a border so that they wind up with a few miles of water front property on the Red Sea, they’ll be in clover. Well, maybe not clover, but emmer or kef.

UPDATE:
I do not know if the United States has ever before extended diplomatic recognition to a nation that does not yet exist. Is this a first? More importantly, is this recognition some kind of imprimatur, a sign that the nation being born has the support and backing of the USA? A Christian nation on the borders of muzzie-land? That itself would be such a bold move that ... I’m having a Vizzini Moment - “it’s inconceivable!!” - and have it happen under the pro-Arab, anti-Christian, no-push-for-international-freedom Obama regime? A total break with our historic “hands off, mostly” Africa policy? I’m thunderstruck. And if it settles the Darfur genocide without bringing in armies? Holy cow. We’re talking major legacy and another Nobel Peace prize, IF - and it seems to be a doubtful if - IF the USA is the driving force behind this. I do not think they are. I can not let myself believe that our diplomatic corps could pull off such a miracle and NOT have a single word to say about it in the press until after it was a done deal. That could never happen. So my thought is that this is a solution the people in southern Sudan came up with all by themselves. And while the world may be only too happy to recognize their nascent independence, the question remains whether their neighbors - crazy people with lots of guns on all sides - will also do so. Keep your fingers crossed.

   Wednesday - February 02, 2011

Quick Posts, Part 1: Our Side Just Got Better Looking

Carla Confesses: ‘I no longer feel left wing’

The supermodel-turned-singer’s reputation as a “luvvie Lefty” has been cited as a major handicap to Mr Sarkozy’s re-election, and her political change of heart is an attempt to boost support for her unpopular husband among his core Right-wing electorate.

Only two years ago Mrs Bruni-Sarkozy had claimed that she was “instinctively left-wing” after at one stage supporting her husband’s Socialist rival in the 2007 presidential elections. She had also publicly opposed Mr Sarkozy’s plan to conduct DNA tests on immigrants.

In 2008, she told the Libération newspaper: “Nobody has to be joined at the hip in politics or with one’s husband”. A year earlier she told a British newspaper: “I would never vote on the Right.”

But in Monday’s interview with Le Parisien newspaper, she said her previous political persuasion was only due to her belonging to a “community of artists.” “We were bobo (bourgeois bohemians), we were left-wing but at that time I voted in Italy (her native country).” I have never voted for the Left in France and I can tell you, I’m not about to start now. I don’t really feel left-wing anymore,” she said.

[Drew assigns Peiper a terrible and odious task] JD, do you think you could find a nice elegant pic of Mrs. B-S to go along with this post? I know they’re hard to find and there are so few to choose from. Thanks!

You’re more then welcome but this is a darn hard job I’ll tell ya. Looking at photos of pretty Italian women, jeesh. At my age too.
OK, time to nap now.

   Sunday - January 30, 2011

Pun For Everyone

Obama: Caught Between Mubarak and a hard place




Hey, I was busy shoveling snow all afternoon, and I haven’t had a chance to catch the news. Perhaps a miracle has happened in either Cairo or Washington DC and the whole almost-revolution has settled down and it’s status quo as usual. But if not ...

Obama has a really tough decision to make about Egypt and the nascent revolutions all across northern Africa. But in Egypt, what makes it the “wurst” is that this really is a “chickens coming home to roost” situation. Because Obama is Carter II. But this time it’s like he’s possessed. And what was Carter I most famous for? Why, golly gosh and y’all, for brokering the Camp David Accords, which developed some kind of peace and mutual recognition between Egypt and Israel, and lead directly to the Eqypt - Israel Peace Treaty shortly thereafter. It was a pretty monumental bit of diplomacy, getting former freedom fighter Menachim Begin to make an agreement with former freedom fighter Anwar El Sadat, when just a few years before their two countries had been at war with each other. For a few memorable days at any rate. I seem to recall that a whole boxful of Nobel Peace Prizes got handed out over that agreement. But all was not roses. When Sadat signed the Accord and the Treaty, Egypt got kicked out of the Arab League. Your average fellah in Egypt was not too happy either; just two years later Sadat was dead, gunned down on live international television by “radical fundamentalists”. ie, the Muslim Brotherhood. And then Hosni Mubarak stepped in and took over as Rais; President for life of Egypt.

How did Carter get these two to the table? How did he make Egypt our nominal ally forevermore? Mad skills I suppose. Or you could consider that Egypt has pretty much nothing in the way of resources. Seriously. What they have is mud, which is what they’ve had since the days of Nemer, who was Pharoah 1. Mud grows food much better than sand, but at best they can do little more than feed themselves. While Israel does have some resources, and I count the ingenuity of her people as a viable resource, they aren’t exactly Finland, which has a nickel mine under every other reindeer. So, how? Well, hmm ... could it be that Israel is the country that receives the largest amount of foreign aid from the USA, and Egypt is the second largest country? When did that start, or when did it really ramp up? Could it be that ol Jimmah just bought them both off? I hear that Egypt gets $1.5 Billion a year from us. So that’s the chicken.

The roosting part is that Mubarak is pretty much a dictator. Stifling dissent, jailing the opposition, gagging the press, those jackboots kicking in doors in the middle of the night. Somewhere there are electrodes making sparks in the darkest nights. I wouldn’t call him Mr. Popular. But he’s been our dictator, always. Bought and paid for, and we’ll just turn a blind eye as long as he keeps the islamaloonies under his thumb, keeps the Suez Canal open, and manages to not shoot any missiles into Israel. But the typical Egyptian in his galabeya and rope sandals does not see us as any kind of buddy. Not much of the 1.5 Bil seems to filter down to his level.

Weevil #1: If Obama throws his hat in the ring and comes out swinging for old Hosni, then the USA is once again a total hypocrite. The land of freedom supporting a harsh dictator? Not cool. What’s next, hiring their government torturers to restaff Abu Graib and bring it back to it’s “glory days”? Huge win for radical pisslam.

Weevil #2: If Obama turns his back on Mubarak, he’s abandoning a key ally due to his rough treatment of his own citizens. Which is EXACTLY the same reason why Carter twisted the jambiya in the Shah of Iran’s back, and will have exactly the same consequnce: the only real opposition in Egypt is the Muslim Brotherhood. Oh sure, they’re not an Official Terrorist Group. Shades of difference. Can you say “intifada” boys and girls? How about “hamas”? I knew that you could. At the very best, the Muslim Brotherhood are enablers of violent fundamentalists. Jihad Joe with Kung Fu grip and his turbo camel of doom. Suicide belt sold separately. Sure, Obama could try and bend the world press to making it look like he was backing freedom, but that backing would give the people the freedom to become another rabid national mullah run mob like Iran. Bad scene. It’s taken 30 years for the regular folks in Iran to figure out that we aren’t the Great Satan after all; we’re not the real enemy, their own government is. And that crazy squad is nowhere even close to stepping down from power. They’re too busy stoning women and hanging homosexuals and making laws about men getting whipped for having too tidy a beard. Huge win for radical pisslam.

Yes, I could do a Princess Bride segue here, because the whole situation reminds me of Vizzini’s battle of wits with the Man In Black to figure out which wine goblet has the iocaine powder in it. And the truth is the same: they both do. There is no win in this for us.

Instead, I’ll take the obvious path: As you can see in the above images, both weevils are the same size, so Obama can’t even choose the lesser of two weevils. And to push that metaphor further along, it really bolls me over that Obama is probably going to do what he’s best at, which is to Vote Present and let the chips fall where they may. And that really galls me.

Alas, the upside will be that, no matter which way he does turn, the media will be 1000.37% sympathetic and supportive. Had Bush been in this no-win position, the press would be building crosses and heating the branding irons white hot even before he made a single statement.

Stay tuned.

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