Darwinian interludes
Francis Sedgemore
July 19, 2007 9:30 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/francis_sedgemore/2007/07/darwinian_int=
erludes.html
My attention was recently drawn to an interesting if somewhat rambling
essay by the physicist and futurist thinker Freeman Dyson.
In his article, Dyson focuses on biotechnology and the benefits it
could bring to humanity as long as we move beyond the current
stranglehold imposed by agribusiness corporations and their armies of
patent attorneys. Domesticated biotechnology, Dyson argues, will,
"once it gets into the hands of housewives and children", lead to an
explosion of diversity in new living creatures, rather than the
monoculture crops favoured by the corporate giants.
Pragmatic patriotism
Sarfraz Manzoor
July 19, 2007 9:00 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/sarfraz_manzoor/2007/07/pragmatic_patri=
otism.html
Gordon Brown's richly symbolic decision to fly the union flag over
Downing Street and his recent proclamations in favour of Britishness
suggest that he considers patriotism a weapon in the battle for the
hearts and minds of British Muslims.
The hope is that emphasising our common British identity will help
counter the lure of Islamism. There is a sound logic to this strategy,
but there's a snag: while Islamism offers a coherent political
ideology, patriotism is often little more than a stream of platitudes.
Softening up
Indra Adnan
July 19, 2007 8:00 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/indra_adnan/2007/07/softening_up.html
When Douglas Alexander spoke to the Council on Foreign Relations in
Washington last week he made a plea for more use of soft power in
international diplomacy. While many will welcome the instant change of
approach from a British foreign minister, just as many will be
querulous: how, they will want to know, do you do soft power?
The term was first coined by Harvard Professor Joseph Nye in 1990 who
described soft power as:
"The ability to get what you want by attracting and persuading others
to adopt your goals. It differs from hard power, the ability to use
the carrots and sticks of economic and military might to make others
follow your will."
The case against summer
Conor Clarke
July 19, 2007 7:30 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/conor_clarke/2007/07/the_case_against_s=
ummer.html
Summer is upon us, and for millions of schoolchildren on both sides of
the Atlantic this development can be summed up in a single word:
freedom. Most private school students have been on the loose for
several weeks, as have students in the US, and state school students
will get their first taste of liberty in a few days - an event that is
more eagerly awaited than a Harry Potter book launch. Yes, the long
summer holiday must be glorious. How could so many kids be wrong?
Easily. Despite its large fan base, the summer holiday is one of the
worst innovations in the history of education. Summer isn't a sweet-
tasting saviour; it's a pernicious beast that must be slain
immediately. Children should instead stay in school all year long.
The epic narcissism of Cindy Sheehan
Niall Stanage
July 18, 2007 10:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/niall_stanage/2007/07/the_epic_narcissi=
sm_of_cindy_s.html
Even the American left's netroots are getting tired of Cindy Sheehan.
It's a shame it took them so long.
Sheehan, the epic narcissist who became the face of the anti-war
movement, has been banned from posting any further entries on Daily
Kos, arguably the most influential of all liberal blogs in the US.
Barriers to change
Wayne S Smith
July 18, 2007 8:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/wayne_s_smith/2007/07/barriers_to_chang=
e=2Ehtml
Writing in the Guardian last year, I described the utterly
counterproductive nature of US policy toward Cuba and expressed the
hope that "the British prime minister would not support Bush's gravely
mistaken policies in Cuba as he did those in Iraq."
Sadly, just before leaving office, Blair in effect, did precisely that
by having the United Kingdom vote against the majority in the European
Union wanting to lift the sanctions imposed against Cuba in 2003
because of Castro's arrest of some 75 dissidents and the execution of
three men who had attempted to hijack a ferry.
Alternative realities
Roger Howard
July 18, 2007 8:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/roger_howard/2007/07/alternative_realit=
ies.html
In Washington's eyes, there could scarcely be a more terrifying vision
than the prospect of radical Islamists, the sworn enemies of the
"Great Satan" and its regional proxies, getting their fingers on the
nuclear trigger. But there is at present one country where they are
perilously close to doing just that, and if they succeed, could quite
conceivably use the bomb to realise their threats of waging holy war
against the enemies of Islam.
Given the pronouncements of the Bush administration over the past
couple of years, you could be forgiven for thinking that describes
Iran, whose leaders have uttered much-quoted threats against Israel
and who appear determined to press ahead with a programme of uranium
enrichment that could easily be diverted to develop a nuclear warhead.
Power, politics and poppies
Robert Fox
July 18, 2007 7:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/robert_fox/2007/07/power_politics_and_p=
oppies.html
The problem with parliament's latest critique of British operations in
Afghanistan is that so much of what's wrong, and needs to be done,
lies beyond the control of Britain, its parliament and forces, and
Afghanistan. The House of Commons defence committee has just handed
down a thoughtful, detailed, sobering and, in the end, constructive
report on what Britain is now trying to do there.
I would say that wouldn't I? I was one of two-dozen witnesses who
reported to the committee. No off-record, hiding behind the political
or diplomatic sofa, and all the omert=E0 in which officialdom now
indulges itself. After my testimony to the committee I was
congratulated and vilified equally for naming names, attributing
sources for ideas and statements. Quelle surprise! I told one elderly
statesman I was a journalist, and that the problem with unattributed
remarks on such occasions from journos, politicians or generals is
that they all seem to come from the imagination and pen of that well-
known sage, AJ Makeitup.
The long and short of it
Thomas F Schaller
July 18, 2007 7:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/thomas_f_schaller/2007/07/the_long_and_=
short_of_it.html
America's stature is waning.
No, this is not another post-Iraq story about the fading hegemonic
global reach and reputation of the United States. Americans, you see,
are quite literally no longer heads and shoulders above the rest of
the world.
Dati's malchance
Colin Randall
July 18, 2007 6:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/colin_randall/2007/07/datis_malchance.h=
tml
There were two obvious reactions when Rachida Dati was appointed as
French justice minister: delight and apprehension.
Dati had fought her way to the top despite modest origins as one of 12
children growing up in a poor immigrant family in Ch=E2lons-sur-Sa=F4ne.
So anyone interested in building a decent society, in which merit is
rewarded, surely shared my delight when Nicolas Sarkozy named her in
his first cabinet. She had clearly impressed him as an adviser at the
interior ministry, and she proved an able spokeswoman for his
presidential campaign.
Eat well, stay well?
Sarah Boseley
July 18, 2007 6:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/sarah_boseley/2007/07/weve_been_told_to=
_the.html
We've been told to the point of tedium that eating fruit and
vegetables is good for us. It's not just the old apple-a-day adage any
more - public health experts and dieticians urge dark green leafy
vegetables and a variety of fruit. Don't think you can get away with
five glasses of orange juice.
But what does this five-a-day message really mean? Unpick it for a
moment. Does it mean that if you eat two bananas and some green beans
one day, your defensive shield will slip and you run the risk of
letting in heart disease or cancer? Of course not. "Five a day" is
proxy for a good diet. If you eat that quantity of fruit and
vegetables, you will have the right sort of levels of vitamins in your
body most of the time. It also is likely to mean less of the bad
things - salt, fat and refined sugar.
Staying alive
Guy Rundle
July 18, 2007 5:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/guy_rundle/2007/07/staying_alive.html
Long life can bring with it the worst of all epitaphs: "I didn't know
he/she was still alive." Thus it was for Mary Douglas, the
anthropologist and social theorist whose obituaries last month
reminded many of a time so distant - the 60s and debates around social
meaning, taboos, boundaries - that its concerns have the appearance of
some ancient theological debate in a dead religion.
Douglas's work was important because - at the height of the post-
second world war belief that individual freedom and collective meaning
could be maximised without contradiction - her books such as Purity
and Danger reminded us that meaning not only resides in the system of
codes and symbols by which a society lives, but that such processes
are of greatest importance where they attach to the fundamental
aspects of human existence: birth, death, gender, sociality and so on.
Casually mess with these and you can play havoc with the whole
cultural order.
Bush's new faith-based strategy
Ian Williams
July 18, 2007 5:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/ian_williams/2007/07/bushs_ps_from_god_=
not_a_peace.html
Has God sent a reminder to the amnesiac president of the United
States? How else to account for George Bush's sudden and belated
announcement of an international peace conference on the Middle East?
It was back in 2003 that the US President reported an even earlier
divine directive as told to the Palestinian leaders Abu Mazen and
Nabil Shaath:
I'm driven with a mission from God. God would tell me, 'George, go and
fight those terrorists in Afghanistan.' And I did, and then God would
tell me, 'George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq ...'. And I did. And
now, again, I feel God's words coming to me, 'Go get the Palestinians
their state and get the Israelis their security, and get peace in the
Middle East'. And by God I'm gonna do it.
The grass is always greener
Tom Clark
July 18, 2007 4:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/tom_clark/2007/07/the_grass_is_always_g=
reener.html
David Blunkett is not remembered for having been a liberal home
secretary. It was evidence and argument that persuaded him, at the
start of 2004, to downgrade cannabis from being a class B to a class C
banned drug. It is, however, politics that lies behind Gordon Brown's
suggestion today that the move may be reversed. The change would be a
significant one. Possession of cannabis is no longer, in general, an
arrestable offence. If it were restored to class B, however, a prison
sentence of up to five years for mere possession could apply (though
sentences would rarely be that stiff in practice).
The biggest driver of the 2004 change was that the old approach had
failed. Before the war on drugs was declared in the early 1970s,
cannabis was rarely found outside universities. For instance, in 1967
- the first summer of love - there were in fact just 2,293
convictions. Despite the threat of stiff penalties, however, it soon
grew to become mainstream. By 2004 there were 3.6m users, and another
driver for the change was the hugely adverse effects - in terms of
confidence in the justice system - of criminalising such a high
proportion of the population. Then, finally, there were practical
matters - the waste of police and court time involved in dealing with
so many otherwise law-abiding citizens. Before the change cannabis
alone accounted for 75% of police inquiries related to drugs.
Balancing the blogs
Joseph Harker
July 18, 2007 4:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/joseph_harker/2007/07/balancing_the_blo=
gs.html
White men, are you all stupid? Before you accuse me of racism, or
indeed sexism, let me say that I take the question from the book by
Michael Moore, who is a white man (though probably not stupid; but is
he alone?).
What got me thinking was reading the thoughtful piece posted on this
site by Manish Vij, who believes the Simpson's character Apu
Nahasapeemapetilon to be a racist caricature. I'm not a regular viewer
of the show, and don't have any strong opinions on it, but he put
across some cogent arguments.
The Beeb's list of shame
Stewart Purvis
July 18, 2007 3:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/stewart_purvis/2007/07/the_beebs_list_o=
f_shame.html
It started as what looked like the finale of a good *****-up story that
annoyed the Queen and embarrassed the BBC.
Now, thanks to a powerful cocktail of coincidence and unexpected
disclosure, Wednesday July 18 2007 has become the most significant day
in the BBC's history since the Hutton report (registration required)
cost the jobs of a BBC chairman and a BBC director general.
The saga of the poisoned spy
David Hearst
July 18, 2007 3:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/david_hearst/2007/07/the_saga_of_the_po=
isoned_spy.html
When Alexander Litvinenko was poisoned, his employer and associate,
the exiled Russian billionaire Boris Berezovsky, wondered privately
why they had not tried to kill him instead. He had the money, the
influence and soon after Litvinenko's death, called openly for a coup
in Russia. Today Mr Berezovsky revealed there was an attempt on his
life and that Scotland Yard had told him to leave the country three
weeks ago. This would be the second such assassination attempt on the
billionaire since he settled in London.
The longer the saga of the poisoned spy goes on, the more you have to
ask yourself what is the most likely thing to have happened. There are
many conspiracy theories. One current in Russia is that this is all a
set up, designed to besmirch the name of Russia, combat its growing
economic assertiveness and set the stage for missiles to be placed in
Poland on Russia's border.
Alice-in-Wonderland justice
Mark Kleiman
July 18, 2007 2:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/mark_kleiman/2007/07/aliceinwonderland_=
justice.html
Of course Troy Davis's mother is happy that the Georgia board of
pardons and paroles voted to stay her son's execution just a day
before he was scheduled to die for a murder he didn't commit. And I
confess to being very pleasantly surprised; it seemed to me
overwhelmingly likely that Davis was a goner, and the movement to
remove procedural barriers to execution in the United States was about
to claim its first demonstrably innocent victim.
First, the established facts. One Friday night in 1989, two men
scuffled in a Burger King parking lot in Savannah, Georgia. An off-
duty police officer tried to intervene, and one of the men shot the
cop to death. The (probable) gunman then coolly went to the police and
identified Davis, an African American recent high-school graduate, as
the killer. The police then dutifully went about turning that false
accusation into a capital sentence.
A malicious campaign
Inayat Bunglawala
July 18, 2007 2:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/inayat_bunglawala/2007/07/a_malicious_c=
ampaign.html
Today happens to be the deadline for signing an e-petition on the No
10 Downing Street website to oppose the building of a so-called "mega-
mosque" in East London. The petition, started by a "Jill Barham",
reads as follows:
We the Christian population of this great country England would like
the proposed plan to build a Mega Mosque in East London Scrapped. This
will only cause terrible violence and suffering and more money should
go into the NHS."
Sound effects
Open Thread
July 18, 2007 1:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/open_thread/2007/07/sound_effects.html
Music can release chemicals in the brain that affect your heart rate,
your breathing and may even make you sweat, according to Daniel
Levitin, a former rock musician turned neuroscientist.
Keep your eyes off the roads
Frank Fisher
July 18, 2007 1:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/frank_fisher/2007/07/keep_your_eyes_off=
_the_roads.html
The cat's out of the bag. And heading southwest on the M3 at a steady
60mph - at least if it was, it looks as if the police would know. A
Home Office document, released to the press, apparently by mistake,
reveals that legislation is being prepared to grant police access to
congestion charging and traffic flow information, as a matter of
course. In real time. Without warrants or court orders. And exempt
from the Data Protection Act. Ministers appear conflicted on the
reasons behind this massive extension of police surveillance of the
general public - some claim the observation will be carried out to
counter terrorism alone, others that general crime is the target.
Neither explanation is correct of course - the targets are us, all of
us. Because they're not quite sure they can trust us. The public are
like that. Pesky buggers. Erratic and unpredictable.
Body politic
Geoffrey Alderman
July 18, 2007 12:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/geoffrey_alderman/2007/07/body_politic.=
html
In his annual health of the nation report, the government's chief
medical officer, Sir Liam Donaldson, asks us to accept a fundamental
change in the law regarding organ donation. There are currently around
7,000 patients in the UK waiting for an organ transplant. So
successful is modern medicine in saving the lives of road accident
victims that the supply of organs suitable for transplant has slowed
to a trickle. To make matters worse, even when a cadaver is available,
the consent of relatives must be obtained - quickly - before an organ
can be removed. Many of these 7,000 patients will die because such
consent cannot be obtained in good time. Sir Liam asks, therefore,
that doctors should be free to assume that patients who die have
automatically consented to donate their heart, lungs and other organs,
unless they have specifically opted out during their lifetime.
This is an outrageous assumption, because it postulates that the state
has a fundamental right to possess itself of my organs. That will be
the default position if Sir Liam has his way. While I can agree that
there is indeed a transplant crisis, there is another, much more
consensual way of tackling the problem.
We just can't get enough
John Vidal
July 18, 2007 12:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/john_vidal/2007/07/we_just_cant_get_eno=
ugh.html
We've just had the first really big look at the environmental
catastrophe now unfolding in China. Courtesy of the OECD, the club of
30 rich nations which was called in by the Beijing government to
assess the environmental situation, a monster 260-page report has just
been published, which draws together the work of China's leading
scientists, the World Bank, and central and local government.
What we are witnessing is the mass poisoning of a people and the
ecological devastation of a nation. If this were a war by one people
against another, we would call on the UN to step in. But it's a war
against nature so we turn away.
A new political game
Jackie Ashley
July 18, 2007 11:30 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/jackie_ashley/2007/07/a_new_political_g=
ame.html
Whatever Harriet Harman's on, let's have it on prescription. At the
dispatch box in the Commons yesterday afternoon she was radiant,
surrounded by a cheerful-looking clutch of Labour women. Perhaps it
was a trick of the summer light, or perhaps it was the effect of her
successful election campaign; but at a time when it's easy to feel a
bit down about politics and women, yesterday was a good day.
Harman was setting out her priorities on women's issues, speaking as
minister for women rather than as Commons leader, and it was a hard-to-
argue-with list. At the top, more help for families, with particular
reference to carers. Women with dependent older or disabled relatives
and children get a particularly raw deal: I've been banging on about
this for ages and if - if - the government is really going to do more,
then that is wonderful news.
The 'fat cat' doctors
Richard Smith
July 18, 2007 11:00 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/richard_smith/2007/07/the_fat_cat_gps.h=
tml
Daily Mail readers across Britain would have been wondering yesterday
if their GP was worth =A3250,000 a year. Some would think "absolutely -
and a bit more" after receiving highly professional and sympathetic
care. Others who rang their surgery and were told to ring 999 if they
had a medical emergency or who couldn't book an appointment might
think that as taxpayers they were being ripped off.
GPs, meanwhile, are getting very fed up at seeing their income
splashed across the front page of newspapers. It's not much better
than seeing yourself naked in the paper. "Rise of the =A3250,000 GP"
says the main Daily Mail headline with a smaller headline saying "half
of all family doctors now on six-figure salaries".
Learning the hard way
Tommy Dodds
July 18, 2007 10:30 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/tommy_dodds/2007/07/learning_the_hard_w=
ay.html
A-levels are getting easier - everyone says so and now it has been
confirmed by Sir Peter Williams, chairman of the Advisory Committee
for Maths Education, who was last week appointed to review the
teaching of maths in primary schools. There's only one problem with
this statement though: it's wrong.
Mr Williams has claimed: "over 20 or 30 years ... A-level standards
have fallen. They have edged south," stating easier questions in maths
and physics exams as proof. Unfortunately he hasn't actually taken any
of these exams in school as far as I know. Neither, I suspect, has he
had to study the current A-level curriculum. I have studied it
however, last year, and I can assure him that it is anything but easy.
America is just starting to wake up to the awesome scale of its Iraq
disaster
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2129453,00.html
The American public has decided that its boys should come home, but
the ghosts of Baghdad will return with them
Timothy Garton Ash in Stanford
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
Iraq is over. Iraq has not yet begun. Two conclusions from the
American debate about Iraq, which dominates the media in the US to the
exclusion of almost any other foreign story. Iraq is over insofar as
the American public has decided that most US troops should leave. In a
Gallup poll earlier this month, 71% favoured "removing all US troops
from Iraq by April 1 of next year, except for a limited number that
would be involved in counter-terrorism efforts". CNN's veteran
political analyst Bill Schneider observes that in the latter years of
the Vietnam war, the American public's basic attitude could be
summarised as "either win or get out". He argues that it's the same
with Iraq. Despite George Bush's increasingly desperate pleas, most
Americans have now concluded that the US is not winning. So get out.
Rich donors' hefty cheques will never solve poverty
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2129457,00.html
The philanthropy of the wealthy is all very well, but they would help
more if they cured their peers' tax-averse culture
Polly Toynbee
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
It's good to give, of course it is. Sir Tom Hunter this week announced
that he is giving away =A31bn over his lifetime. Compare that with the
world's richest man, Carlos Slim Hel=FA, who says he won't be giving
away his =A333bn fortune: "Poverty isn't solved with donations - my
concept is to accomplish and solve things, not going around like Santa
Claus."
Sir Tom is not altogether typical: in Britain, the rich give a lower
proportion of their wealth than others, with more donors in the north
east than the south east, and more women than men. The total value
stays pretty steady at 0.9% of GDP.
We are failing in Afghanistan
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2129456,00.html
The costs of losing this war far outweigh those of Iraq. We must
urgently change the approach
Paddy Ashdown
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
In July 2006, Britain's highly respected commander of international
forces in Afghanistan, General David Richards, issued a stark warning:
"Afghanistan is a good and winnable war but, at the pace we are
proceeding, we need to realise that we could actually fail here." A
year on, as yesterday's defence committee report indicates, we are
indeed beginning to fail in Afghanistan.
Land use, not population, should be our priority
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2129475,00.html
We're not in denial - campaigning to keep our numbers down is a waste
of time, says Shaun Spiers
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
I receive quite a few letters asking why the Campaign to Protect Rural
England does not campaign on population. I used to send fairly
detailed replies engaging with the letter writers' arguments.
Sometimes I modestly suggested that even if the CPRE devoted all its
campaigning might to promoting chastity or contraception, or opposing
net immigration, we would not affect the country's population by a
single person. We would be wasting our time and our donors' funds.
Out of the shadows
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,2129493,00.html
In Iraq, suicide attacks and sectarian killings grab the world's
attention. But it is the guerrilla war being waged by the Iraqi
resistance that is having such a devastating effect on US and British
forces. And now these insurgent groups want to create a united front -
and a political platform. Seumas Milne talks to some of their leaders
in Damascus
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
Dr Zubeidy is a hunted man. His picture has been shown on Iraqi TV as
a wanted terrorist. Since Shia militia came to his house in Baghdad to
kill him last year - and kidnapped and murdered his brother-in-law
when they realised that he wasn't home - he has rarely slept in the
same place twice and always carries fake ID. "Fortunately there are
many thousands who are also wanted," he says. "But I have had to move
37 times. It has been very difficult for my children in particular -
they have often had to change schools and it has had a psychological
impact on them. But they understand what this is all about - they're
also fighting with me in their own way." A medical doctor in his late
40s, Abd al-Rahman al-Zubeidy was imprisoned under Saddam Hussein for
hiding and treating a friend who had got into a fight with an official
from Saddam's Ba'athist regime. He was released in a general amnesty
in the run-up to the US-British invasion.
The dirty tricks campaign against the 'Mega-Mosque'
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,2129492,00.html
Emine Saner
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
With hours still to run before it closed last night, one campaign was
clearly the hot topic on Downing Street's e-petition website. More
than 270,000 people had signed up in opposition to plans for the Abbey
Mills mosque, to be built on derelict land near the Olympic site in
east London by Tablighi Jamaat, the Islamic missionary sect.
The petition was started by one Jill Barham, with the motion: "We the
Christian population of this great country England would like the
proposed plan to build a Mega-Mosque in East London scrapped. This
will only cause terrible violence and suffering and more money should
go into the NHS." Some have suggested the petition was started with
the aim of stirring up religious hatred.
Failure is not yet inevitable. But it is now likely, and will remain
likely until we increase resources and redress the disastrous failure
of the international community to get its act together. The tragedy is
that this is happening despite a high level of professionalism and a
lot of raw courage among our soldiers. And it is happening despite
some outstanding reconstruction successes outside the hot conflict
areas of Helmand province.
How secure is Facebook?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,2129494,00.html
Anna Pickard
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
Disaster struck Oxford's undergraduates this week when students were
fined for end-of-term hijinks. Caught on camera performing the ancient
final-exam ritual of "trashing", they face disciplinary hearings and
fines for their bad behaviour. But it was the students themselves who
provided the evidence - proctors simply perused the community site
Facebook and collected pictures of wrongdoing.
So how do you stop your pictures being seen by everybody? Many new
users are unaware that Facebook provides a number of privacy settings:
in fact, you can be very specific about who can see your information.
Using the button marked "privacy", you can make sure that some people
can see your phone number, while others are restricted to reading your
sandwich preferences. You can even change it so that people can't see
your chosen profile picture until you're sure who they are.
Insurgents form political front to plan for US pullout
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,2129675,00.html
Leaders of Iraqi groups say attacks will go on until Americans leave
Seumas Milne in Damascus
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
Seven of the most important Sunni-led insurgent organisations fighting
the US occupation in Iraq have agreed to form a public political
alliance with the aim of preparing for negotiations in advance of an
American withdrawal, their leaders have told the Guardian.
In their first interview with the western media since the US-British
invasion of 2003, leaders of three of the insurgent groups -
responsible for thousands of attacks against US and Iraqi armed forces
and police - said they would continue their armed resistance until all
foreign troops were withdrawn from Iraq, and denounced al-Qaida for
sectarian killings and suicide bombings against civilians.
Out of the shadows
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,2129544,00.html
In Iraq, suicide attacks and sectarian killings grab the world's
attention. But it is the guerrilla war being waged by the Iraqi
resistance that is having such a devastating effect on US and British
forces. And now these insurgent groups want to create a united front -
and a political platform. Seumas Milne talks to some of their leaders
in Damascus
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
Dr Zubeidy is a hunted man. His picture has been shown on Iraqi TV as
a wanted terrorist. Since Shia militia came to his house in Baghdad to
kill him last year - and kidnapped and murdered his brother-in-law
when they realised that he wasn't home - he has rarely slept in the
same place twice and always carries fake ID. "Fortunately there are
many thousands who are also wanted," he says. "But I have had to move
37 times. It has been very difficult for my children in particular -
they have often had to change schools and it has had a psychological
impact on them. But they understand what this is all about - they're
also fighting with me in their own way." A medical doctor in his late
40s, Abd al-Rahman al-Zubeidy was imprisoned under Saddam Hussein for
hiding and treating a friend who had got into a fight with an official
from Saddam's Ba'athist regime. He was released in a general amnesty
in the run-up to the US-British invasion.
Blair begins new job with Quartet meeting in Lisbon
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,2129892,00.html
Haroon Siddique
Thursday July 19, 2007
Guardian Unlimited
Tony Blair will today have his first meeting with the four major world
powers that make up the Quartet, in his new role as special envoy to
the Middle East.
The former prime minister is meeting representatives from the US, the
United Nations, the EU and Russia in Portugal.
Closed crossings pushing Gaza into disaster, says UN
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,2129658,00.html
=B7 Agency asks Blair to visit Hamas-controlled strip
=B7 68,000 Palestinians lose jobs in one month
Rory McCarthy in Gaza City
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
UN officials issued warnings yesterday about the dire collapse of
Gaza's economy and called on the international community to open
crossing points for trade.
At least 68,000 Palestinians have lost their jobs in the past month
since Israel closed the crossings out of the narrow, highly populated
strip of land, according to the latest Palestinian figures. The
closures came after the Islamist movement Hamas seized full security
control of Gaza in mid-June after months of near civil war with its
rival Fatah.
A country in crisis as fearful government cracks down on Islamist
opposition
http://www.guardian.co.uk/egypt/story/0,,2129630,00.html
Mubarak's obsession with Muslim Brotherhood deals blow to multiparty
politics
Ian Black in Cairo
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
It was 3am when armed security agents hammered on the door of Khairat
al-Shater's flat in Nasser City; his daughter Zahra could only watch
and comfort her distraught children while her father and husband,
Ayman, were detained as Hosni Mubarak's latest crackdown on the Muslim
Brotherhood got under way.
"The Brotherhood are good people," insisted Zahra, in a hijab of the
kind increasingly seen on the streets of Cairo. "We believe in
peaceful change and the regime is crushing us. Ordinary criminals are
freed quickly and are treated better than political prisoners in
Egypt." Seven months on, the two men were up before a military court
again this week on charges of money-laundering and membership of a
proscribed organisation. Mr Shater, a wealthy businessman, is No 3 in
the Brotherhood hierarchy. Some 450 activists remain locked up under
emergency laws.
Japanese nuclear plant may be on quake fault line
http://www.guardian.co.uk/japan/story/0,,2129633,00.html
=B7 Leak during tremor worse than originally admitted
=B7 IAEA calls for openness in investigation of errors
Justin McCurry in Tokyo
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
The world's biggest nuclear power station faces an uncertain future
after it emerged yesterday that it may lie directly above the fault
line that triggered Monday's earthquake in which nine people died and
more than 1,000 were injured.
The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant - the biggest in the world in terms of
output capacity - shook violently when a magnitude 6.8 earthquake
struck Niigata prefecture in northern Japan on Monday morning. The
plant was not designed to resist shaking caused by earthquakes of
greater than magnitude 6.5.
US academics admit aiding Iran democracy drive
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,2129804,00.html
Robert Tait in Tehran
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
Two Americans detained by Iran for alleged spying last night admitted
involvement in US-backed pro-democracy projects but appeared to stop
short of making widely anticipated full confessions.
The acknowledgements by Haleh Esfandiari and Kian Tajbaksh - both
Iranian-born academics - came in recorded interviews broadcast on
state television apparently to show that civil protest movements in
Iran were being supported by the US.
Ms Esfandiari, 67, Middle East director of the Washington-based
Woodrow Wilson Centre, and Mr Tajbaksh, 45, an associate of the George
Soros Open Society Institute, face charges of "espionage" and
"endangering national security" after being accused of trying to
overthrow Iran's Islamic system.
Teacher's shuttle voyage fulfils dream
http://www.guardian.co.uk/space/article/0,,2129564,00.html
Richard Luscombe in Miami
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
More than two decades after witnessing fellow schoolteacher Christa
McAuliffe's fiery death in the Challenger space shuttle disaster,
Barbara Morgan returned to the Cape Canaveral launchpad yesterday to
speak of fulfilling her friend's destiny during her own journey into
space.
Ms Morgan, McAuliffe's understudy for the 1986 mission that exploded
shortly after lift-off, killing all seven astronauts on board, went
back to the classroom when Nasa's Teacher in Space programme was
scrapped after the tragedy. The elementary school teacher from McCall,
Idaho, was summoned again to the agency's Houston headquarters in 1998
and will achieve a 21-year-old dream when she flies aboard the shuttle
Endeavour on a 14-day mission scheduled for August 7.
Billionaire denies building secret sex lair
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2129639,00.html
Ed Pilkington in New York
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
America's 160th richest person, a billionaire who made his money from
the 1990s hi-tech boom, has been accused of planning to build a
"secret and convenient lair" underneath his California mansion
dedicated to drug-taking and sex with prostitutes.
Henry Nicholas, the CEO of the computer chip-making firm Broadcom
until three years ago, has twice been accused of debauchery. The first
claim was made by builders saying they were hired to build the
hideaway at his home in Laguna Hills. The second claim comes from a
former employee who has filed legal papers claiming $150,000 (=A375,000)
in unpaid salary.
Mandela's Elders to tackle global crises
http://www.guardian.co.uk/southafrica/story/0,,2129647,00.html
Chris McGreal in Johannesburg
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
Nelson Mandela marked his 89th birthday yesterday with the launch of a
group of world-renowned figures who plan to use several Nobel peace
prizes and "almost 1,000 years of collective experience" to tackle
global crises which governments are unable or unwilling to confront.
"Using their collective experience, their moral courage and their
ability to rise above nation, race and creed, they can make our planet
a more peaceful and equitable place to live," said the former South
African president.
Ancient lake could help ease Darfur tensions
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sudan/story/0,,2129585,00.html
Rodrique Ngowi
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
Scientists have discovered the underground remnants of an ancient lake
in Sudan's arid Darfur region, offering hope of easing the water
scarcity that lies at the root of much of the unrest in the region.
Decades of scarce water and other resources have stoked low-intensity
local conflicts that eventually blew up into a devastating civil war.
The four-year conflict has killed more than 200,000 people, displaced
more than 2.5 million others and sparked a regional humanitarian
crisis after feeding instability in neighbouring Chad and the Central
African Republic.
Revealed: Blair's talks with Murdoch on eve of war
http://media.guardian.co.uk/site/story/0,,2129690,00.html
Tania Branigan, political correspondent
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
Tony Blair spoke to Rupert Murdoch three times in nine days in the run-
up to the invasion of Iraq, it emerged yesterday, after the government
caved in to a four-year campaign for the release of details of their
conversations and meetings.
The Cabinet Office agreed to publish the dates of their contacts one
day after the former prime minister left office. No further details of
the calls are available and no details of informal meetings or
conversations have been disclosed.
Breach of ice age lake made Britain an island
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,,2129662,00.html
=B7 Massive freshwater floods cut land bridge to France
=B7 Evidence found in sea bed rift of 400,000 years ago
Ian Sample, science correspondent
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
A cataclysmic flood split Britain from France hundreds of thousand
years ago, in a violent act of nature that carved out the white cliffs
of Dover and set the course of history for a new island.
High-resolution sonar images of the English channel collected over
more than 20 years have revealed a deep scar in the limestone bedrock
caused by a torrent of water 400,000 years ago. At the time glaciers
reached from the North Pole to a point north of the Thames, and
England's southern coast could be reached from France by a broad land
bridge.
Africa cradle of humankind, study shows
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,,2129668,00.html
Ian Sample
Thursday July 19, 2007
The Guardian
Modern humans took their first steps to colonise the world from a
single region of sub-Saharan Africa, according to British scientists.
Many scientists have long thought humankind emerged from the continent
some 56,000 years ago, before spreading northwards and establishing
Stone Age cultures across Asia, Europe and Australia. But some have
argued that separate populations of Homo sapiens arose in different
regions, before independently taking over fresh territories as their
populations grew.
Blair's road map to redemption?
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/article2782505.ece
Former Prime Minister confronts history of failure in new role as
Middle East envoy
By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem
Published: 19 July 2007
Tony Blair arrived in Lisbon last night to begin a second career in
which he must know that success may prove even more difficult than
being the first British Labour prime minister to win three elections
in a row.
Mr Blair will be anointed as Middle East envoy by the international
Quartet, the EU, UN, Russia and the US, knowing the history of the
region is littered by the failures of his predecessors as
international peacemakers.
The Kurdish mountain army awaiting the next invasion of Iraq
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article2782512.ece
By Patrick Cockburn in the Qandil mountains
Published: 19 July 2007
Hiding in the high mountains and deep gorges of one of the world's
great natural fortresses are bands of guerrillas whose presence could
provoke a Turkish invasion of northern Iraq and the next war in the
Middle East.
In the weeks before the Turkish election on Sunday, Turkey has
threatened to cross the border into Iraq in pursuit of the guerrillas
of the Turkish Kurdish movement, the PKK, and its Iranian Kurdish
offshoot, Pejak.
Mum's the word: Why Oxford students are putting motherhood before
career
http://education.independent.co.uk/higher/article2780464.ece
By Lucy Tobin
Published: 19 July 2007
A group of women students at Oxford are scrutinising a photo of 100
beaming freshers, wondering who will end up being famous. As an Oxford
undergraduate myself, I am part of the group and I notice that, after
identifying candidates for Prime Minister, next year's Pop Idol and a
university professor, the girls all discount themselves from the top
of any career ladder on the grounds that their maternal ambitions are
stronger than their professional aims. Oxford's undergraduates are
billed as among Britain's brainiest, but we female students are
prioritising marriage and children over a career.
Feminists may be shocked. But while students do not see the glass
ceiling as intact, there is a strong belief that women can only soar
to the career heights of men if they choose not to have children. It's
a passionate concern at Oxford, where students flock to internship
interviews at top banks and law firms and question the companies' male/
female ratios in the boardroom. The overwhelming impression is of
companies' recognition that the figures are "not as equal as they
should be".
The curse of inheritance: Do wealthy dynasties always make for happy
heirs?
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/article2783269.ece
A businessman vows to give away a billion to charity. Another family
contests a =A38m bequest. The rich are getting richer, and their
children all want a slice of the pie. But they should heed some of
these cautionary tales
Published: 19 July 2007
The Heskeths
For 150 years, the Hesketh family owned Easton Neston, one of
Northamptonshire's finest stately homes, with an estate that included
Towcester racecourse. Then along came Thomas Alexander Fermor-Hesketh
(below). Born in 1950, the rotund Lord Hesketh inherited his title at
five, following the early death of his father, and his estate and
fortune at 21. By 2004, Easton Neston had to be sold.
The Utopia Experiment: A radical crash course in self-sufficient
living
http://environment.independent.co.uk/lifestyle/article2783275.ece
How will we cope when the oil runs out? James Durston learns to live
without running water and ready meals
Published: 19 July 2007
It's June in the Highlands, just outside Inverness. The weather is
only slightly short of disgusting, I've spent the last 12 hours on a
night bus from London and I'm marching under the weight of a rucksack
into a small farmstead that will be my home for the next month. The
reason: to take part in an experiment in self-sufficient living that,
if all goes to plan, will give me the tools to survive if civilisation
as we know it suddenly collapses.
The Utopia Experiment, which started in April and will run until
October next year, has been devised by Dylan Evans, 41, formerly a
senior lecturer in robotics at the University of the West of England.
Dylan believes oil shortages, global economic depression and climate
change will soon combine to bring our current way of life to its
knees. Some 200 volunteers, of whom I am now one, will take part in
his experiment, on a some-in, some-out basis. The community lives in
Mongolian-style yurts and washes either in the icy stream or in one-
half of an old whisky barrel. Cooking is done on a wood-burning
Rayburn. TV, fridges and freezers don't exist. Crops must be grown and
animals looked after so that, eventually, Utopia becomes a self-
sufficient bubble, freeof modern utilities.
The plot to kill Boris Berezovsky
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article2782504.ece
He is Putin's most-wanted, a dissident who has tormented Russia's
leader from his sanctuary in London. And yesterday, as the diplomatic
row raged, details emerged of a plan to assassinate him. By Anne
Penketh and Kim Sengupta
Published: 19 July 2007
Has the Kremlin declared open season on the Russian dissident
community in London? Boris Berezovsky and the former Chechen rebel
Akhmed Zakayev certainly think so. And it seems that British security
officials share their fears. Yesterday the outspoken tycoon was taking
no chances, after it emerged that a Russian man had been arrested and
deported on suspicion of plotting to kill him.
Mr Berezovsky appeared at a news conference, held only 200 yards from
Downing Street, accompanied by several bodyguards and a unit of London
police, and accused Vladimir Putin of trying to kill him last month.
Against the grain: The eco-friendly wooden computer that could spark a
revolution
http://news.independent.co.uk/sci_tech/article2780174.ece
With power-hungry chips and ever-bigger screens, most new PCs are eco
disasters. But not this one.
By Julia Stuart
Published: 18 July 2007
Even in the design-obsessed 21st century, when our iPod Nanos come in
all the colours of the rainbow and flat-panel TVs are hung on walls
and admired like works of art, wooden computer are still capable of
turning heads. But this one aims to do more than make a fashion
statement - its goal is to save the planet.
This is the prototype of what its manufacturers, PC World, claim is
the UK's first truly carbon-neutral mass-market PC. Due to be launched
in October, it uses between 13 and 17 per cent of the energy of a
standard desktop computer. And if it sells well, it could spark a
revolution, reversing our ever-growing appetite for power-hungry
gadgets.
The Big Question: How old is humanity, and where did 'Homo sapiens'
come from?
http://news.independent.co.uk/sci_tech/article2782482.ece
By Steve Connor, Science Editor
Published: 19 July 2007
Why are we asking this question now?
A new study was published yesterday that purports to "prove" the
theory that humans evolved from a single origin somewhere in sub-
Saharan Africa. It seems to answer two of the biggest questions in
human evolution - where we came from and when we began to spread
across the world. The answer appears to be that we came out of Africa
about 55,000 years ago. The study supports the idea that we derive
from an ancestral stock of people who had already been living in
Africa as an independent species for about 150,000 years before some
began the global migration that led to man's dominance of the planet.
Adrian Hamilton: The growing threat of new nationalism
http://comment.independent.co.uk/columnists_a_l/adrian_hamilton/article2782=
485.ece
While the world is globalising economically, politically it is
retreating to the 19th century
Published: 19 July 2007
I feel sorry for David Miliband, the new Foreign Secretary, as he
rings round Europe in an effort to garner support for our
confrontation with Russia. Like so many of his predecessors, Prime
Ministers included, you start off in the job by thinking that you can
make a fresh start and barely before you've taken the first paper from
your red box you're the victim of events.
Russia, Iraq, Aghanistan, the frisson in our relations with America,
the speed and energy with which President Sarkozy has seized the
European agenda - not one of these are problems of Miliband's own
making, or ones which he would have wished as his priorities at his
new desk. Yet there they are, all crises which deprive a British
Foreign Secretary of his ability to control events.
Akbar Ahmed: What's fundamentalist about wanting to live in dignity?
http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/article2782479.ece
Leaders and commentators need to stop viewing Muslims as a monolith
Published: 19 July 2007
Visiting the UK from the US is an unsettling experience. One gets a
feeling of deja vu. It is like seeing a blockbuster Hollywood film on
"Islamic Terror" being remade for a UK audience on English sets, with
an English cast. The police are not quite as fat and drive smaller
vehicles, but the emotions and prejudices are the same.
We hear a chorus of voices demanding total attention to security
issues, while ignoring the sensitive topics of human rights and civil
liberties. Distorted and misleading terms are dropping into use which
tend to define Islam as inherently violent. "Islamism" has become the
preferred phrase in the UK. Growing Islamophobia is spilling into the
non-stop television discussions and newspaper articles.
Let's Talk Sex
http://www.channel4.com/learning/microsites/L/lifestuff/content/up_close/le=
tstalksex/
In Let's Talk Sex, Davina McCall takes on the establishment over the
crisis of teen pregnancies and spiralling rates of sexually
transmitted infections in the UK. It's time for Britain to be brave,
she says, and for sex and relationships education to become compulsory.
.
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