A different class
Henry Stewart
August 31, 2007 10:00 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/henry_stewart/2007/08/a_different_class=
..html
Another article on comprehensives, another attack on them. John Mullan
complains that among students who gain the same grades at A level,
those from non-selective schools are less widely read and stretched.
But then research comparing students entering university with the same
A level grades shows that those from comprehensives ended with better
degrees than those from private or grammar schools. John's figures are
inevitably anecdotal. The research was based on the results of 79,000
students.
There have been a lot of comparisons of school performance this
summer. John's article is at least based on real experience. Most of
the coverage has been based on uses of statistics that only
demonstrated the lack of numeracy among journalists. An example was
the claim that comprehensives were falling behind in the achievement
of A level A grades because their absolute figure increased 3% against
private schools' 6%.
Diverging agendas?
James Denselow
August 31, 2007 9:30 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/james_denselow/2007/08/diverging_agenda=
s=2Ehtml
British forces still have an "important job" to do in Iraq, Gordon
Brown said earlier this week. The reality, however, is that a
continued UK presence in the country has more to do with British-
American relations than it does with changing realities in Iraq.
US policy shifted quite dramatically at the beginning of this year
from "Iraqisation" (Iraqi forces standing up and US forces standing
down) under General Casey, to lots more US forces arriving and surging
in Baghdad under General Petraeus. In the meantime, British policy has
steadily maintained its commitment to the former path.
Against the grain
John Palmer
August 31, 2007 9:00 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/john_palmer/2007/08/against_the_grain.h=
tml
It is surprising that the media and politicians do not yet seem to
have fully realised how climate change - or at least the extraordinary
global weather of the past year - now threatens a return to serious
food price inflation and a growing possibility of real shortages of
some agricultural products in the months to come. A combination of
terrible weather conditions - flooding in some global regions, draught
in others - is leading to a threatened collapse in the expected world
grain harvest this year. It is already leading to the dismantling of
one of the remaining foundations of the European Union's Common
Agricultural Policy.
According to a Reuters news agency report, grain prices have already
jumped by around 75% in North America and Europe in recent months
where production is well down on last year. Meanwhile, the appalling
seven-year drought in Australia has resulted in a further drastic cut
in grain production there too. International grain stockpiles are at
their lowest for 25 years and the International Grain Council has cut
its estimate for 2007/08 world wheat output by seven million tons to
607 million. In the European Union grain output could fall to 114.1
million tons from forecasts of 118.9 million only a month ago.
Early learning
Dorothy Rowe
August 31, 2007 8:00 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/dorothy_rowe/2007/08/early_learning_.ht=
ml
It's far too early to know whether education for pre-primary
schoolchildren improves their life chances. Think 20 years ahead. How
many children now aged four are not going to need the services of a
therapist or counsellor?
In 1962 I began work as an educational psychologist in Sydney. I was
able to visit the homes of the children who were referred to me and
get to know the family well. What puzzled me was why it was that very
often, in a group of siblings, only one child was having
difficulties.
The art of peace
Khaled Diab
August 31, 2007 7:00 AM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/khaled_diab/2007/08/the_art_of_peace.ht=
ml
In The Art of War, Sun Tzu observes that "if you know your enemies and
know yourself, you will win a hundred times in a hundred battles." In
the as-yet unwritten Art of Peace, knowing your enemy can have other
advantages: it can give you the necessary insights and empathy to
reach out the hand of peace and hold it there.
Personally, my recent trip to Israel and Palestine has done more than
all my historical and political research to humanise the conflict in
my mind.
One or the other?
Asheesh Siddique
August 30, 2007 8:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/asheesh_siddique/2007/08/one_or_the_oth=
er.html
Americans are having a field day mocking Larry Craig: who could resist
jabbing at a conservative senator caught (pardon the expression) with
his pants down soliciting sex from another man in a public toilet?
Craig's vociferous assertion that "I am not gay and never have been"
has only fueled speculation that he is in deep denial about his true
desires, as well as incited mockery at the irreconcilability between
Craig's homophobic social politics and his preferred company.
While the events of this week have titillated the public and filled
progressives with glee at the fall of an ideological opponent, Craig's
saga also challenges our modern understanding of homosexuality.
Shattered lives
Edith Montero
August 30, 2007 7:45 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/edith_montero/2007/08/shattered_lives.h=
tml
We arrived in Ica at nightfall. I have been to Ica many times, I know
it very well, but we got here and we got lost. I couldn't tell where I
was, many of the streets didn't exist any more and I couldn't work out
where we were.
Less than a week before we arrived on August 21, the whole region was
rocked by an earthquake that measured 7.9 on the Richter scale. In the
poorest shanty towns on the outskirts of the city of Ica, 95% of the
houses were reduced to rubble. More than 500 people were killed and
1,300 badly injured.
Fears for the future
Ilana Bet-El
August 30, 2007 7:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/ilana_betel/2007/08/fears_for_the_futur=
e=2Ehtml
The election of Abdullah G=FCl as president Turkey has been a long slog:
five eventful months in which his candidacy first brought millions out
onto the streets in protest, then brought down the government -
subsequently re-elected in a landslide victory with 46% of the vote -
and finally brought the military, historically the most respected and
collective organ in the nation, to more or less admit defeat to
factional politics.
G=FCl caused the storm due to his beliefs and background: he is a
practising Muslim, with a wife who wears the hijab, the traditional
headscarf - which has been outlawed in government offices, including
universities, in order to preserve the secular nature of the state. In
addition, he used to belong to an avowedly Islamist party, before
breaking with them to join the ruling AKP, a populist party with
leanings towards "tradition" and "Islam". Both terms are anathema in
Turkey, especially among the highly westernised middle classes - those
who came out onto the streets when G=FCl was first proposed as
president. To them, his candidacy, let alone election, was an affront
to the very essence of modern Turkey, as founded by Ataturk.
Goodbye Gonzales
Marcy Wheeler
August 30, 2007 6:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/marcy_wheeler/2007/08/goodby_gonzales.h=
tml
The news reports announcing that Michael Chertoff would replace
Alberto Gonzales - reports that came even before Gonzales had
announced his resignation - had the appearance of a chess player
boldly making a move but then getting scared at the last minute and
refusing to let go of his piece.
With the premature naming of Chertoff, the Bush administration
initially signaled it would nominate another favourite to run the
department of justice. While Chertoff has much more directly relevant
experience than Gonzales had when the latter was nominated to be
attorney general, Chertoff's tenure as secretary of department of
homeland security has been almost as troubled as Gonzales' at justice.
When asked about Chertoff as a Gonzales' replacement, for example,
Senate judiciary committee chairman Patrick Leahy simply made just one
sardonic statement: "We are talking about the person who was in charge
of the recovery effort on Katrina."
Iran's siege mentality
Liam Fox
August 30, 2007 6:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/liam_fox/2007/08/irans_siege_mentality.=
html
There is no doubt that Iran is feeling isolated. In his first major
foreign policy speech, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said that
diplomacy was the only way the international community could avoid
making a "catastrophic" choice of either "the Iranian bomb or the
bombing of Iran". President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad dismissed the remarks
by saying that Sarkozy was showing his "inexperience" on foreign
affairs.
This week, George Bush announced, during a speech to a cheering
audience at the 89th American Legion convention, that he has
authorised American military commanders in Iraq to "confront Tehran's
murderous activities". American forces in Iraq acted by arresting
seven Iranians in a Baghdad hotel. Iran responded by saying that it
was ready to fill the vacuum that has been created by the situation in
Iraq.
Dave's game
Michael White
August 30, 2007 5:32 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/michael_white/2007/08/daves_game.html
As September looms and politics kicks back into life, people are
wondering what David Cameron is up to. Is his poor showing in the
opinion polls since Tony Blair finally gave way to Gordon Brown
forcing him back on the Tory core vote? Or is he tacking to the right
to get his poll numbers looking healthier before the conference
season?
There's evidence to support both views. Since returning from his own
holiday Cameron and his team have talked him on to the front pages on
tax-and-red-tape, on NHS hospital closures (bit of an own goal there),
on Europe, on crime and his vision of "anarchy in the UK", and, last
night, on too-many-immigrants, courtesy of a BBC Newsnight interview.
Sinking together?
Tariq Ali
August 30, 2007 4:33 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/tariq_ali/2007/08/sinking_together.html
For a politician whose sycophantic colleagues boast that she is closer
to the pulse of the people than any of her rivals, Benazir Bhutto's
decision to do a deal with Pakistan's uniformed president indicates
the exact opposite. She is sadly out of touch. General Musharraf is
now deeply unpopular here. It is not often that one can actually
observe power draining away from a political leader. And the lifeline
being thrown to him in the shape of an over-blown Benazir might sink
together with him.
An indication that she was not completely unaware of this came a few
days ago when she declared that her decision was "approved" by the
"international community" always a code-word for Washington) and the
Pakistan army (well, yes). In short, Pakistani public opinion was
irrelevant.
TV: fading to a dot?
Martin Moore
August 30, 2007 4:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/martin_moore/2007/08/tv_fading_to_a_dot=
..html
Fuelled by pipe tobacco and past experiences of mescaline, Jean-Paul
Sartre wrote a play - Les S=E9questr=E9s d'Altona - in which one of the
lead characters appeals to a court of crabs to judge his actions and
his guilt. The crabs were meant to signify both his peers and
posterity, and the appeal is symbolic of the ethical dilemmas we face
and of our need to be judged (I think, although the exact meaning of
the play is famously obtuse).
I was reminded of Sartre's existential angst by Jeremy Paxman's
MacTaggart lecture at the Edinburgh Television Festival - Never Mind
the Scandals: What's it All For? In an atypically reflective, but
reassuringly spiky critique of the television industry, Paxman
appealed to a court of his peers to "rediscover a sense of purpose",
to do "less hyperventilating and more deep breathing". We need more
cogitation and rumination, Paxman said, and less herd-like stampeding
for media "impact".
A serious setback for Pakistan
Kamran Nazeer
August 30, 2007 3:29 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/kamran_nazeer/2007/08/a_serious_setback=
_for_pakistan.html
If reports about the ongoing discussions between President Musharraf
and the former prime minister Benazir Bhutto are accurate, then
Musharraf may soon cease to be a general and Bhutto may take up her
old job: this is one step forward and two steps back for
constitutional government in Pakistan.
No doubt there's a strong argument that the president of a country
should not also be the commander in chief (though the framers of the
US constitution disagreed). So the deal will fix that anomaly. But, in
return, to allow Bhutto to have a third term as prime minister, the
constitution will be amended and all corruption charges against her
will be dropped.
Home truths
Inayat Bunglawala
August 30, 2007 3:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/inayat_bunglawala/2007/08/home_truths.h=
tml
Over a year after we first put our tiny ex-council property on the
market we should finally be moving home in a few days. Along the way I
have been gazumped twice.
Still, the losses I incurred through carrying out the house surveys
and paying the mortgage arrangement fees (non-refundable, of course)
upfront - only for the chain to later fall apart - was cushioned by
the fact that my own property was continuing to increase in value,
month on month. Not so fortunate though were the first-time buyers who
were looking to get on to the property ladder themselves and who were
left painfully out of pocket when the chain collapsed. They deserve
better protection.
Admirable Nelson?
David Cox
August 30, 2007 2:30 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/david_cox/2007/08/admirable_nelson.html
It's perhaps appropriate that Nelson Mandela's sculptural apotheosis
should coincide with Princess Diana's commemorative rites. We seem to
need secular saints. Yet, is Mandela really comparable with his new-
found partners on Parliament Square's podia, Abraham Lincoln and
Winston Churchill?
Mandela's forgiving attitude towards his former enemies is to be
commended, but it hardly constitutes a historic achievement. Others,
such as Desmond Tutu, proved able to summon up as much magnanimity,
while the efforts of white South African campaigners against
apartheid, like Donald Woods, were surely more noteworthy. Other black
activists, such as Steve Biko, made greater sacrifices for the cause.
Talkin' tough, doing something
Dave Hill
August 30, 2007 2:00 PM
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/dave_hill/2007/08/tough_by_nature.html
Hold your fire while I straighten my body armour. Commenters armed
with arsenals of insults about handwringing liberals may care to spare
me their best shots on discovering that I hope the killer of Rhys
Jones is quickly found and then locked up for a long time. They may be
interested to learn that I didn't choke on my wholemeal muesli while
reading yesterday morning's newspaper applause for David Cameron's
speech and mini-manifesto on crime.
True, what the seething classes applaud as solid, old-school
commonsense I regard as more PR than the sturdier stuff that had gone
before: cheerleaders for "zero tolerance" policing never explain why
murder rates dropped just as quickly everywhere else in America as
they did in Rudy Giuliani's New York, but, hey, it sure sounds tough!
That said, I'd be quite happy for a future PM Dave to trash the police
targets culture and have more cops walking the beat. I doubt they'd
catch more teenage gangsters but their presence might encourage the
fearful to re-take the streets and that would help.
For Obama, Nothing is the Matter with Kansas
http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/georgetown/2007/08/barack_obama_=
and_the_kansans_a.html
In 2004, 78% percent of White Evangelicals voted for George W. Bush.
The GOP, I surmise, would like to achieve similar numbers in 2008. The
danger presented by Barack Obama is not so much that he will
completely reverse this result. Neither he, nor any other Democrat
will be able to do that. It will be decades, if not longer, before
Evangelicals return to the Party they once so faithfully supported.
Rather, what Obama may be able to do is siphon off scads of "Swing
Evangelicals" in battleground states. If I were a Republican operative
I would dread the following scenario:
It's mid-October and the senator is addressing a room full of Kansans
in a non-college town. The Kansans (who in my reverie are dressed like
the cast of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Oklahoma) are initially
skeptical about this "liberal" affiliated with the socially
progressive United Church of Christ denomination. But Obama opens his
talk by reminding them that he too is from Kansas (being from Kansas:
Kansans love that!). He then surprises his listeners by pointedly
noting his disagreements with certain secular mantras of his party
(Indeed, it suddenly dawns upon the lone, closeted village atheist in
the room
The jinx of the north
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2159499,00.html
Clinton and Obama are doomed to failure in a presidential race, for
they are not from the south
Sarah Churchwell
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
As an American who yields to none in her loathing of the incumbent
president, I am frequently invited to enthuse over the presumptive
2008 Democratic contenders. But I'm unconvinced that either Hillary
Clinton or Barack Obama is electable. Perhaps it's time to consider
the dark horse.
US papers report that John Edwards has gone on the attack; one of his
advisers just opined that a Clinton nomination would lose blue states.
A recent poll agreed: more than half of Americans would never vote for
Clinton, which shouldn't surprise anyone who remembers the first
Clinton presidency. Obama presents a similar problem. I'm a fan, and
from his home state, but I don't think he can win the presidency yet.
Moreover, the dark horse has an overlooked advantage, and given that
none of the nominees has offered anything so divisive as actual ideas
to help us choose among them, Democratic strategists might consider
Edwards for one reason alone: history.
There is an eerie familiarity to this 100-year-old pact
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2159548,00.html
Relations were strained ahead of the 1907 Anglo-Russian convention,
and the sore points were Persia and Afghanistan
Geoffrey Wheatcroft
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
For years past, international affairs have had an uncanny feeling of a
time warp, a loop playing endlessly over and again, what goes round
comes round. Ninety years ago there were British troops in Basra, and
bloodshed between Jews and Arabs would shortly break out in Jerusalem.
A hundred years or more after the Salisbury and Campbell-Bannerman
governments, we have been dealing with just the same problems as they
faced, from Ulster to South Africa, while even the conflicts in the
Balkans have often seemed like the old Eastern Question writ new.
Agenda for a fairer Britain
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2159497,00.html
Labour must address taxation and its attitudes to unions if it truly
wants to tackle gross inequality
John Grieve Smith
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
This week's revelation that the earnings of chief executives are now
almost 100 times that of their average employee comes hard on the
heels of a study by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation pointing to
widespread dissatisfaction with the current gap between those at the
top of the income scale and those at the bottom. It is time the
government took more vigorous action to achieve the Labour party's
basic aim of establishing a fairer and more equal society. This should
be a key part of Gordon Brown's new programme.
Secular Turks will settle for nothing less than a truly liberal
society
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2159489,00.html
We cannot compromise our ideals just so Turkey can be a role model in
the Middle East, says Mehmet Karli
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
Your leader (Islam and democracy, August 22) is correct to state that
a military intervention to defend secularism in Turkey would be "bad
for the military itself, ... bad for Turkey and, indeed, bad for the
rest of the Muslim world". Moreover, it should not be forgotten that
it was the Turkish army that prepared the fertile ground for the
development of political Islam. The military coup of 1980 cleared the
way for political Islamists by crushing established political parties
and by propagating an authoritarian ideology called the Turkish-
Islamic synthesis, a poisonous mix of nationalism and Islamism.
The view: Is it thumbs down for Roger Ebert?
Danny Leigh
August 31, 2007 9:56 AM
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/film/2007/08/for_editors_the_view_roger_and.html
It seems the end of an era is beckoning - one perhaps best described
as the age of the thumbs. Various film blogs have been reflecting this
week on the future of Roger Ebert, the veteran critic whose presence
on US TV screens has grown as familiar in American homes as an excess
of prescription medication. Sadly, he may shortly become just a
memory.
Ebert's famous thumbs are right at the centre of this sorry turn of
events - the intelligence of his on-screen reviews having always been
garnished with the epically reductive device of a thumbs up/thumbs
down conclusion. Now, however, the (legally trademarked) thumbs have
been withdrawn from broadcast, with competing explanations from Ebert
and his bosses at Disney/ABC. Perhaps this is the final chapter in a
story that began last summer when Ebert's treatment for thyroid cancer
required him to take an extended leave of absence from his show, Ebert
and Roeper At The Movies, and co-host Richard Roeper (himself the
replacement for Ebert's late on-screen partner Gene Siskel) was left
wagging his thumbs alongside a ragbag of guest presenters.
Biographical Dictionary of Film No 21: Juliette Binoche
David Thomson
August 31, 2007 7:00 AM
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/film/2007/08/biographical_dictionary_of_film_no=
_21_juliette_binoche.html
Do you remember the film Damage? It's from 1992, a different time,
directed by Louis Malle and written by David Hare from a best-selling
novel of that age. Jeremy Irons plays a Cabinet Minister. He has a
wife (Miranda Richardson), and two children. The oldest, a boy,
Martyn, has acquired a new girlfriend, and he brings her home. Her
name is Anna and she is Juliette Binoche. She is odd. She seems older
than Martyn, or more experienced. She is French, but she is hard and
cold. We don't quite get what she and Martyn offer each other. But
then there's a shot of Binoche and Irons gazing at each other. It's
not warm or friendly; it's not really seductive. It begins a very dark
and not totally believable film. But you know that Anna is offering
herself to him in the most total, self-effacing way she can think of.
It's as if she wants to be destroyed. And it's a Garboesque moment.
Except that it's Binoche.
The reference to Garbo is not casual - and I doubt that it would
intimidate Binoche, or La Binoche as she is known in Paris. At 43
(seven years older than the age Garbo retired), Binoche is still a
staggering beauty. She was for several years the Lanc=F4me cover girl
and she remains the ideal actress for just about any international
arthouse enterprise. She is about to open in Disengagement, by the
leading Israeli director, Amos Gitai. Still to come is Le Voyage du
Ballon Rouge by Hou Hsiao-hsien. She has shot a Steve Carell comedy,
Dan in Real Life and L'Heure d'=E9t=E9 by Olivier Assayas. At this moment
Richard Eyre is trying to set up The Other Man, from a Bernhard
Schlink short story in which she will play with Liam Neeson and
Antonio Banderas.
It's no longer quiet on the spaghetti western front
Geoffrey Macnab
August 30, 2007 4:58 PM
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/film/2007/08/its_no_longer_all_quiet_on_the.html
Forget the Renaissance, Hadrian's Wall and Ferraris. If this year's
Venice film festival is taken as the measure, Italy's greatest
contribution to world civilisation is the spaghetti western. The
festival programme is stuffed with examples - good, bad, and ugly - of
the genre: Django, My Name Is Trinity, and A Fistful of Dollars - it
is all here.
On the grounds that no festival can stage a retrospective without
providing plenty of intellectual starch to pad it out, there are also
plentiful catalogues and books explaining just how spaghetti westerns
changed the world - or, at least, movie making. The general thesis is
that Hollywood in the early 1960s was in retreat. The B-movies (and
westerns) that Nouvelle Vague critics and general audiences liked were
no longer being made. The Italians, to fill the gap, did it
themselves. In the process, they not only rescued the western genre
but gave a huge boost to world cinema in general. They spawned
imitators all over Europe such as the so-called Camembert westerns in
Switzerland.
Is Ridley Scott right about sci-fi?
Daniel Martin
August 31, 2007 7:30 AM
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/film/2007/08/is_ridley_scott_right_about_sc.html
Sir Ridley Scott believes that the science fiction movie is a spent
force; an extinct race; a decommissioned battlestar. Talking in
Venice, where he was presenting another new cut of Blade Runner, the
director declared the genre as dead as the western.
"There's nothing original," says Scott. "We've seen it all before.
Been there. Done it." Asked to pick out examples, he said: "All of
them. Yes, all of them."
Why sci-fi still has a future
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,2159579,00.html
Ridley Scott thinks sci-fi films have entered a black hole. Maybe he's
not watching the right ones, says Paul Howlett
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
Ridley Scott obviously knows a thing or two about sci-fi films: he's
the director of Alien and Blade Runner. But wasn't he being a bit
Darth Vaderish when he claimed, as he did this week at the Venice film
festival, that the genre is tired, unoriginal, and heading into the
sunset, just as the western once did?
Agreed, Ridley's all-time favourite sci-fi film, Stanley Kubrick's
2001: A Space Odyssey, is probably the supreme example of the genre,
and maybe nothing has topped it in the four decades since its release,
but that doesn't mean you can write off all modern sci-fi films ("yes,
all of them," as Ridley put it) as "nothing original ... we've seen it
all before".
The looting of Kenya
http://www.guardian.co.uk/kenya/story/0,,2159757,00.html
=B7 Leak of secret report exposes corrupt web
=B7 More than =A31bn moved to 28 countries
=B7 Property in London, New York , Australia
Xan Rice in Nairobi
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
The breathtaking extent of corruption perpetrated by the family of the
former Kenyan leader Daniel Arap Moi was exposed last night in a
secret report that laid bare a web of shell companies, secret trusts
and frontmen that his entourage used to funnel hundreds of millions of
pounds into nearly 30 countries including Britain.
The 110-page report by the international risk consultancy Kroll, seen
by the Guardian, alleges that relatives and associates of Mr Moi
siphoned off more than =A31bn of government money. If true, it would put
the Mois on a par with Africa's other great kleptocrats, Mobutu Sese
Seko of Zaire (now Democratic Republic of Congo) and Nigeria's Sani
Abacha.
Leading lender likens US credit crisis to Great Depression
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2159716,00.html
Andrew Clark in New York
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
The US financial industry displayed fresh signs of distress from the
credit crunch afflicting global money markets yesterday, with one
mortgage provider describing lending conditions as the worst since the
Great Depression of the 1930s.
Leading accountancy firm H&R Block revealed huge losses at its up-for-
sale mortgage arm, Option One, and said it was considering a halt on
new loans. Reporting a quarterly loss of $302m (=A3150m), Mark Ernst,
chief executive, said: "The loan originations market is in the midst
of the most severe dislocation it has seen in years, maybe the most
severe since the 1930s."
Brazil shines a light on its dark years
http://www.guardian.co.uk/brazil/story/0,,2159624,00.html
=B7 State catalogues atrocities during dictatorship
=B7 Victims' relatives join president at book launch
Tom Phillips in Rio de Janeiro
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
An official report detailing atrocities carried out during Brazil's
two-decade dictatorship from 1964 has been released for the first time
by the country's authorities.
The 500-page book, The Right to Memory and the Truth, came out on
Wednesday after 11 years of research. It outlines the systematic
torture, rape and disappearance of nearly 500 leftwing activists and
includes pictures of corpses and torture victims.
Return of exiled rival ups stakes in Pakistan's power struggle
http://www.guardian.co.uk/pakistan/Story/0,,2159601,00.html
Declan Walsh in Islamabad and Ian Black
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
Exiled opposition leader Nawaz Sharif upped the stakes in Pakistan's
turbulent power struggle yesterday by vowing to return home in two
weeks to challenge the president, Pervez Musharraf, despite threats of
arrest.
"This man Musharraf is on his way out ... We will be launching a
movement against Mr Musharraf and his government," Mr Sharif told
reporters in London.
Accomplice wins eleventh-hour reprieve from Texas death row
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2159753,00.html
Ed Pilkington in New York
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
The governor of Texas, Rick Perry, yesterday made the rare decision to
spare from execution a man who had been put on death row for being an
accomplice to a 1996 murder in which he had been the getaway driver.
Kenneth Foster's death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment just
seven hours before he was scheduled to be given a lethal injection.
The case had provoked protests from human rights groups in Texas and
beyond because Foster had not committed the murder, but had been in
the car, 24 metres (80ft) from where the shooting took place.
Historic Berlin synagogue reopens
http://www.guardian.co.uk/germany/article/0,,2159637,00.html
Kate Connolly in Berlin
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
Germany's largest synagogue, an architectural and historical landmark
in the centre of Berlin, will reopen today after extensive restoration
work.
The red-brick Rykestrasse synagogue is to be reopened in the presence
of former members who were forced to flee Nazi Germany. It was set on
fire on Kristallnacht on November 9 1938, when synagogues and Jewish
businesses were attacked and destroyed on Nazi orders.
Rykestrasse was saved from the complete devastation which befell many
of the city's 170 synagogues because it was in a residential area and
the authorities ordered the fire to be put out.
But it has been plundered and has deteriorated over the years because
it was in what became the communist east, whose government had little
time for religious institutions. During communism it had about 200
worshippers.
Its reopening after painstaking restoration by two architects is being
cited as further proof that Jewish life is returning to Berlin after
the Holocaust, which decimated its 560,000-strong community.
$350m to leave oil in the ground
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2007/aug/31/1
Country asks developed world to pay it not to pump - and avoid further
pollution of the Amazon rainforest
* Rory Carroll in Lago Agrio
* The Guardian
* Friday August 31 2007
Long before you reach the site the jungle changes. Birds and insects
fall quiet, streams turn inky and trees become stunted, their leaves
blackened and scrunched up, like fists.
The trail turns wider and muddier, for vehicles come here, and there
is an unfamiliar sound, a sort of whooshing, followed by crackling.
French use baguette as stick to beat Sarkozy over prices
http://www.guardian.co.uk/france/story/0,,2159639,00.html
=B7 Bread becomes focus of anger at cost of living
=B7 President defends reforms as poll reveals loss of trust
Angelique Chrisafis in Paris
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
The rising price of bread in France, symbolic of the high cost of
living, is putting pressure on the president, Nicolas Sarkozy, as he
confronts growing dissatisfaction with shop prices.
The stick of crusty bread that symbolises French eating habits is the
latest victim of the leap in international wheat prices which has hit
Italian pasta-makers and US cereal firms. Priced at an average 75 to
95 cents (50-65p) in high-street bakeries, the baguette is forecast to
rise 5 cents, a 5% to 7% jump. Consumers in France, where nine out of
10 people buy fresh bread daily and many eat baguette three times a
day, are starting to protest.
'When I look at my backside, it is in two parts' - how diplomacy got
lost in translation
http://www.guardian.co.uk/australia/story/0,,2159630,00.html
James Grubel, Reuters in Canberra
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
In the world of international diplomacy, the best-chosen words or
phrases can make an audience laugh or simply get lost in translation,
if the experience of Australia's former top diplomat is any guide.
A new book by Richard Woolcott, who ran Australia's foreign service
for four years, points to the pitfalls of translating.
Take the Australian diplomat in France who tried to tell his French
audience that as he looked back on his career, he saw it was divided
in two parts, with dull postings before life in Paris.
Civil war monument to British volunteers stolen
http://www.guardian.co.uk/spain/article/0,,2159549,00.html
Giles Tremlett in Madrid
Friday August 31, 2007
The Guardian
A monument to the British dead at one of the bloodiest encounters of
the Spanish civil war has been torn down and carried away by rightwing
extremists.
The monument is a huge stone plaque to 90 British volunteers in the
International Brigades who were killed during the Battle of the Ebro.
The plaque names each of those who died while defending Republican
Spain against a rightwing military uprising. "They died fighting for
the liberty of Spain," it says.
French troops 'raped girls during Rwanda genocide'
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/africa/article2914409.ece
By Steve Bloomfield in Kigali
Published: 31 August 2007
French soldiers stationed in Rwanda during the genocide in 1994 have
been accused of "widespread rape" by a Rwandan commission
investigating France's role during the conflict.
The commission, which is due to publish its final report in October,
will also provide fresh evidence that French soldiers trained the
Interahamwe, the extremist Hutu militia responsible for most of the
killing, and even provided them with weapons.
Cholera spreads in Iraq as health services collapse
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article2914413.ece
By Patrick Cockburn
Published: 31 August 2007
Lack of clean drinking water and poor sanitation has led to 5,000
people in northern Iraq contracting cholera.
The outbreak is among the most serious signs yet that Iraqi health and
social services are breaking down as the number of those living in
camps and poor housing increases after people flee their homes.
The birthday party that captured Israel's heart
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article2914415.ece
By Eric Silver in Jerusalem
Published: 31 August 2007
Maria Amin, a chubby-faced Palestinian girl with gleaming brown eyes,
celebrated her birthday yesterday like any pampered six year old.
Doting aunts decked her out like a princess in a gauzy white chiffon
dress, spotted with pink hearts and topped with a toy tiara.
A make-up girl primped her hair, rouged her cheeks and painted her
lips. With a pout and a shake of the head, Maria rejected a plain
lipstick and demanded a glittery gold one. She insisted on being
sprayed with a favourite scent. When the make-up girl held up a
mirror, she cooed: "How pretty!"
Outrage over portrait of Bin Laden as Jesus Christ
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/australasia/article2914411.ece
By Kathy Marks
Published: 31 August 2007
Two entries in an Australian religious art competition - one depicting
the Virgin Mary wearing a burqa, the other showing Osama bin Laden in
a Christ-like pose - were defended by their creators yesterday.
Priscilla Brack, who created a "double vision" print fusing the images
of Jesus Christ and Bin Laden, urged people to refrain from knee-jerk
condemnation. Critics assumed that she was drawing similarities
between the two bearded figures, she told ABC radio. "But I could
actually be saying that it's a juxtaposition of good and evil, which I
see as the base level reading of that work."
Protest raises fears over death of Politkovskaya
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2914404.ece
By Alastair Gee in Moscow
Published: 31 August 2007
Prominent Russian opposition leaders and rights activists staged a
rally in Moscow last night to mark what would have been the 49th
birthday of the murdered investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya,
amid mounting concerns over political interference in the
investigation into her killing.
Earlier in the day Russian prosecutors released two of the 10 suspects
in the case who had been arrested last week and said that a third had
no connection with the case in a move that will reinforce scepticism
over the handling of the investigation.
Sarkozy pledges to axe top civil service posts
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2914406.ece
By John Lichfield in Paris
Published: 31 August 2007
President Nicolas Sarkozy has promised to scrap half of the most
senior posts in the French civil service as part of a sweeping reform
of the state apparatus.
In a speech billed as a road map for the "second phase" of his
economic programme, M. Sarkozy also pledged to reduce taxes, loosen
the hold of the 35-hour working week and allow more French shops to
open on Sundays.
Spanish library in turmoil over stolen maps
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2914407.ece
By Graham Keeley in Barcelona
Published: 31 August 2007
A real life literary thriller is unravelling in Spain with priceless
documents disappearing, police mounting an international hunt for the
thief and the country's cultural chief and literary guardian embroiled
in a juicy political controversy.
Copies of two Ptolemaic world maps, which were more than 500 years old
and inspired by the astronomer and geographer Claudius Ptolemy, were
stolen from Spain's National Library, from a section which is
accessible to official researchers.
Financial scandal forces Belgium to pull the plug on 'disco
ambassador'
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2914408.ece
By John Lichfield in Paris
Published: 31 August 2007
Belgium's "electro" ambassador has been unplugged. Pierre-Dominique
Schmidt, the country's emissary to France, who is known as the
"electro" or "electric" ambassador because of his love of disco music,
stands accused of spending public money on lavish private parties at
his embassy next to the Arc de Triomphe.
Mr Schmidt, 47, who has been recalled to Brussels pending an
investigation, denies all wrongdoing. He insists he is the "victim of
a campaign of destabilisation", linked to a political crisis which
threatens to tear Belgium apart.
Scientists find weak link in 'earth's most dangerous animal'
http://news.independent.co.uk/sci_tech/article2914399.ece
By Steve Connor, Science Editor
Published: 31 August 2007
Scientists believe that they are close to finding the weak point of
the deadly Anopheles mosquito, which has been described as the most
dangerous animal on the planet because of its role in spreading
malaria.
Researchers have drawn up a detailed anatomical and molecular map of
the key sensory organ that the female mosquito uses to locate her next
meal of human blood - which is how malaria is transmitted.
Leading article: Is it democracy that is stirring?
http://comment.independent.co.uk/leading_articles/article2914347.ece
Published: 31 August 2007
Something is stirring in Pakistan, but the full import of what is
happening is as yet hard to divine. We still seem to be watching only
shadows on the wall. President Pervez Musharraf is talking, through
envoys, to Benazir Bhutto, a former prime minister and opposition
leader who lives in exile.
Ms Bhutto is letting it be known that she has set conditions for
returning to her home country. They include Mr Musharraf's agreement
to resign as head of the army and Pakistan's speedy return, through
elections, to democratic rule. Mr Musharraf's price for such a deal
would be the chance of another term as president. Despite a welter of
speculation, there was no certainty last night that the deal was done,
or even near to being done.
Michelle Obama is coming to London
http://blackwomenineurope.blogspot.com/2007/08/michelle-obama-is-coming-to-=
london.html
Candace in London gave me this information:
Michelle Obama is indeed coming to London on October 15 for three
fundraisers at the Landmark Hotel. Below is the link/invitation for
the $2300 and $1000 events. Admission to the events will be the
printout of the contribution confirmation and your passport.
Obama Time
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0735,robbins,77635,2.html
An admitted 'hope-monger' brings down the house in Brooklyn
by Tom Robbins
August 28th, 2007 6:20 PM
Before last week's big Barack Obama rally brought life and light back
to the place, the last political event of any size at the Marriott
hotel in downtown Brooklyn was a dismal affair, a fundraiser for the
Kings County Democratic organization. It was overseen by Clarence
Norman, then the party's chairman and an assemblyman from Bedford-
Stuyvesant. That night in 2003, he wore a dark double-breasted suit, a
bright red pocket hankie, and a dour look.
It grew more dour when he was asked about the scheming judges his
party had put on the bench. One had just pled guilty, another had been
booted from office. Several others were under investigation. This gave
Brooklyn's judiciary a higher crime rate than Norman's district.
Norman explained that the judges hadn't yet committed their crimes
when the party supported them. Then he walked into the ballroom filled
with favor-seekers who had paid $500 each to gain his attention.
Barack Obama Summer Book Club, part V.
http://www.fearthebeard.org/2007/08/31/barack-obama-summer-book-club-part-v/
08.31.2007 | 12:14 am | Obama for Prez
The FIBA Championship of the Americas, which is currently moving along
its inexorable trajectory towards a US victory, provides an
interesting backdrop with which to examine chapter five of Barack
Obama's The Audacity of Hope. "Opportunity" is the subject matter, a
subject that is considered at both the macro and micro levels through
several lenses. USA Basketball may not provide the perfect vehicle to
examine the relationship between free trade, global competitiveness
and individual opportunity, but it does offer some interesting avenues
for comparison.
Obama contends that one of the principal problems with maintaining the
competitiveness of American businesses is that there is a well-
documented shortage of skilled workers being produced by our system of
public education. Instead of viewing our collective intellectual
capacity as a tool for industrialization-as our political forebears
did in the wake of the Civil War, when a great many of our esteemed
universities were founded-we are trapped in a defensive posture vis-=E0-
vis the very industrial systems that this early investment helped
generate. And now, hamstrung by union opposition to globalization and
an educational system that is producing a dearth of tech- and science-
savvy graduates, we are beginning to see the inevitable decline that
rearward-gazing sentimentalism engenders. Without re-examining our
priorities and reinvesting in the workforce's ability to compete on a
global scale in value-added enterprise, we are doomed to watch as more
and more of the economic advantage that we have come to view as a
birthright, is exported to the qualified and ambitious citizens of
Bangalore and Shanghai.
Guest Voice: Obama's Opportunity
http://themoderatevoice.com/politics/14849/guest-voice-obamas-opportunity/
By Joe Gandelman
NOTE: The Moderate Voice runs Guest Voice posts from time to time by
readers who don't have their own websites, or people who have websites
but would like to post something for TMV's diverse and thoughtful
readership. Guest Voice posts do not necessarily reflect the opinions
of The Moderate Voice or its writers. This cross post is by the
independent blog Walking Think Tank:
Obama's Opportunity
By Walking Think Tank
It's safe to say that Barack Obama would not be running for president
if he had not opposed the authorization of force in October 2002 and
Hillary Clinton had not supported it. The experience factor would loom
too large if he could not make a case that his judgment is superior.
But Obama has not been able to weave his critique of Hillary's Iraq
vote into the broader narrative of his campaign - that he is a
different kind of politician who can unite the country.
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