New Review: The God Gene

The following is a brief excerpt from a review posted on PopandPolitics.com:

In today’s highly charge political atmosphere, science and religion seem to be at war with one another. Half of the people in this country still think the theory of evolution is a threat to their religion and insist that schools should teach Intelligent Design. The other half believe that anything having to do with religion should be relegated to the basements of people’s homes and the word “God” should be listed as the eighth dirty word you can’t say on television. Secular, science prone folks think that the religious folks are lowering the bar for academics and intelligence, while the religious folk believe the other half to be a bunch of godless heathens who are going straight to hell.

One would think that it would be impossible to merge those two parties together in some sort of cohesive fashion, but author and preeminent geneticist at the National Cancer Institute, Dean Hamer, has successfully accomplished just that. Hamer has written a book entitled, “The God Gene: How Faith is Hardwired into Our Genes,” that in my opinion successfully makes the case that biology and spirituality are one in human existence.

First, let me say that we are not necessarily talking about religion here. Religion is a social construct made up of cultural, historical events, and meaningful rituals. Religion is the sum of biology, spirituality, and the lesser realized geographic lottery, not the impetus of spirituality, as one might tend to argue. (More)

Iran: Israel should be wiped off map

I'm of two minds about this. On the one hand, we obviously have in Iran an irresponsible administration that is not helping its cause by calling for an end to it's regional adversary. With the US and the UK on the path to war and a precedent for preemption in Iraq, rhetoric such as this only gives the global community more reason to treat the Middle East like the family problem child.

On the other hand, because Iran is now so intimately tied to Russia, which is intimately tied to China (with their bombs and billion + people and the glavin), Iran could literally go on world wide television tomorrow calling for a second Holocaust and other than complain about it, there's not much the Western world could do to have Tehran cease this sort of behavior. I still contend that the Iranians aren't totally serious when they talk about ending Israel because in their heart of hearts, they know it would mean the end of the Persian race, courtesy of the USA. MAD works, never forget that.

Obviously I don't approve of this sort of thing and I wish that the mullahs would get a life however, I feel that we're stuck with it until the Iranian people decide that their society is unacceptable. Though the more I read about other cultures (currently reading about Putin's Russia) the more I realize that the bar for acceptable civilzation is rather low outside of the US.

I'll probably address this theme in a longer column next week after I take my fiance to Boston for the weekend, but in the meantime, here's President Ahmadinejad of Iran: Establishment of Israel offensive move; Islamic nation will not let its historic enemy live in its midst.

The State of Israel should be wiped off the map, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Wednesday, underscoring Teheran’s extreme attitude towards the Jewish State.

The Iranian leader's remarks were made during a convention entitled "A World Without Zionists."

“The establishment of the State of Israel was an offensive move. The Islamic nation will not let its historic enemy live in its midst,” he said.

Meanwhile senior American officials associated with President George W. Bush issued stern warnings to Iran in an interview published Wednesday in the London-based Arabic daily al-Sharq al-Awsat saying that “Washington is working diligently to find ways to force Iran to comply with demands by the international community that it abandons its nuclear program.”

According to the report, the U.S. plans to pressure Iran through accusations of involvement in several terror activities around the world that killed American citizens. One of the most likely files to be reopened in Washington is the bombing of the U.S. Marines compound in Beirut in 1983. The U.S. will also hit on the assassination of Iranian opposition figures by Iranian secret agents operating abroad.

Jane’s Defense Weekly magazine reported yesterday that Iran is assisting Syria, Israel’s neighbor and arch enemy, with acquiring the know-how to produce advanced chemical weapons.

According to al-Sharq al-Awsat, a few months ago Syria and Iran signed a mutual assistance agreement by which Syria will provide Iran with advanced military technologies in return for assistance in producing banned weapons.


Under a multi-million dollar project Iran will help Syria set up missile-launching sites, perform test launches of ballistic missiles and acquiring chemical weapons like mustard gas and nerve gas, the magazine reported.

Iranian nukes could encourage others

Meanwhile, Iran’s nuclear program is raising significant concerns among international experts. John Chapman, a British international strategy expert, warned that the development of Iranian nuclear weapons could change the stance of other Middle Eastern countries and also push them to produce such arms.

Speaking at a press conference attended by other experts, Chapman estimated Iran was still far from acquiring nuclear capabilities and said the international community should focus on diplomatic efforts to resolve the problem.

Chapman said great importance should be attached to curbing Teheran’s nuclear ambitions, particularly because other countries in the region, such as Egypt, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia, may also be interested in developing such capabilities, in order not to fall behind in the regional arms race.

U.S., France and Spain react

White House Spokesman Scott McClellan said Washington took Iran's recent statement that "Israel should be wiped off the map" seriously."It underscores the concerns we have about Iran's nuclear intentions," he told reporters.

France's Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy slammed the Iranian threat. He said he has invited the Iranian ambassador in his country for talks following the statements by Iranian President.

"If the reports are true, this is unfathomable. I completely condemn the statements," said Douste-Blazy.

Spain's Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos also summoned Iran's ambassador to
protest the comments.

In a statement, Moratinos said he rejected the remarks in the strongest possible terms and had called for an urgent meeting with Iran's ambassador in Madrid.

Spotlight on Syria

I'll tackle this next week, in the meantime here's two articles on Syria of interest that I think people should be aware of.

Syria gets Iranian boost

With the release of the UN International Independent Investigation Commission interim report on 20 October into the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri increasing international pressure on Syria, a diplomatic source has said that Damascus is nevertheless pursuing what they describe as "an innovative chemical warfare (CW) program in co-operation with Iran", Jane's Defence Weekly newspaper reported Monday.

The essence of this co-operation, the source told the newspaper, "is Tehran's contractual commitment, made to Syria a few months ago, to provide Iranian CW technical assistance to facilitate Syria's CW program".

Utilizing this assistance, they said, Syria hopes to reach an independent production capability of precursors for producing CW agents, which it has so far been unable to achieve.

According to the source, Iran will assist Syria in the planning, establishment and pilot operation of about four or five facilities throughout Syria for the production of precursors for VX and Sarin nerve agents and mustard blister agent.

"This project is unprecedented and millions of US dollars have been allocated to implement it," the source said. More

Now because of the above allegations, I googled "Syria" and "War" and this is what I came up with. It's from Al Jazeera so take it for what it's worth.

Syria: War clock ticking down

Just few days ago we saw the Iraqi people waiting to know the fate of their former leader Saddam Hussein, the first Arab leader in history to stand trial. But there’s another Arab leader’s fate that's being threatened, it’s the Syrian President Bashar Al Assad- It seems that history repeats itself.

While Saddam Hussein was standing trial before the U.S.-controlled Iraqi Special Tribune; Washington was busy preparing to put another Arab President, a leader of another Baathist government, in the corner.

It’s all about lies.

Today, more than two years after the war on Iraq began; every single piece of evidence confirms that President Bush, who was obsessed with ousting the Iraqi leader even before 9/11, fixed the intelligence to justify his unwise decision to invade a sovereign nation, and up till now he can’t face the realty or admit his mistakes, instead he keeps repeating his old lies, the lies he fooled his nation with regarding the reasons for the war.

The same order of events in the lead up to Iraq war is now being repeated with Syria: claims, forcing UN to impose sanctions, and then military action.

But it seems that the Americans are trying this time to not repeat old mistakes. In Syria’s case, Bush’s admin seems determined not to engage in any conflict without international support.

Unlike what happened with Iraq, an international system has been arranged, without conflict and within the framework of the United Nations, to pile up the pressure on Syria, according to Le Figaro, a French paper.

Shortly after Detlev Mehlis, a UN investigator, leading the probe into February assassination of the former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Al Hariri, released his report which accused Syrian officials of involvement in the murder, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Michael Bolton was getting ready to gather international support for taking tough action against Syria.

Washington is also trying to fuel the Syrian opposition against President Bashar so that he gives in and ask for support from Bush’s administration, in return stop backing the Lebanese government, viewed by the U.S. and Israel as political interferences, as well as stopping the infiltration of fighters into Iraq to boost the strength of the anti-occupation resistance.

Only time will tell if the Syrian President will remain bold against Washington’s pressure, or if he will give in to save his nation from facing a terrible fate similar to that of the Iraqis, both under the UN sanctions and the occupation.

Syria’s hour has come.

CIA leak case probe expected to indict top US govt officials this week - report

I'm reading a book right now about Vladimir Putin's Russia (soon to be reviewed) and one of the major themes in the book is how deep corruption runs throughout modern Russia. Then of course you have the banana republics throughout the world, stolen elections, graft of millions, etc etc. Needless to say, whether it's in the US or anywhere else in the world, the old adage is as true as it ever was, power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely.

What I love about my country is that while we have our own version of rampant cronyism and corruption, every once in a while somebody powerful gets slammed. hard (without having to be assassinated). Impeachment, recalls, forced resignations, and the occasional jail sentence pepper the news cycle as a way of reminding us that the justice system may not only be blind but also slower than poop, but eventually, the jerks in this country get their comeuppance.

It seems increasingly likely that the "Cheney Cabal" will go down for this Valerie Plame leak, as they should. Maybe Cheney won't be indicted but I'll settle for a forced resignation. Some would say, (like apparently Bill O'Reilly) that this is bad for the country. To that I say balderdash. This only proves that when it counts, the system works, and that's all I ask.

Here's the story:

The special prosecutor in the investigation into the leaking of information about CIA operative Valerie Plame, is 'widely expected' to issue indictments for one or more top administration officials, including Karl Rove and Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff Lewis 'Scooter Libby, when the two-year probe reports this week, Newsweek magazine reports today.

Soon after Sept 11, 2001, Libby 'began routinely calling intelligence officials, high and low, to pump them for any scraps of information on Iraq', the report said.

'It was extraordinarily unusual for the vice president's office to step so far outside of channels and make personal appeals to mere analysts', the Newsweek report said.

'Together, the group largely despised the on-the-one-hand/on-the-other analyses handed up by the intelligence bureaucracy. Instead, they went in search of intel (intelligence) that helped advance their case for war', Newsweek reports.

Central to that case was the belief that ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein 'was determined to get nukes -- a claim helped by a report that Saddam had attempted to buy uranium from Niger, which the White House doggedly pushed.'

US Ambassador Joseph Wilson damaged that claim with his landmark New York Times article on July 6, 2003, about his trip to Niger to investigate the story, during which he concluded it was not credible. Within the White House inner circle, Wilson's article was seen as an act of aggression against President Bush and Cheney, Newsweek reported.

'Someone, perhaps to punish the loose-lipped diplomat, let it be known to columnist Robert Novak and other reporters that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, was an undercover CIA operative, a revelation that is a possible violation of laws protecting classified information', Newsweek reported.

'Libby was the most relentless digger in Cheney's close-knit group of advisers, which also included Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith, Rumsfeld's under secretary for policy', Newsweek said.

'The case has shed light on how Cheney and his clique of advisers cleared the way to war, and how they obsessed over critics who got in the way', the report said. 'The notion that they've become a gang has some merit,' a longtime colleague of Libby's is cited as saying. 'A small group who only talk to each other...You pay a price for that.'

US, France to introduce UN resolutions against Syria: report

I knew this was coming. First Secretary (and hopefully soon-to-be Vice President) Rice said this week that a military intervention in Syria was not off the table and still possible because of the "foreign fighters" coming into Iraq over the Syrian border. As soon as early indicators started pointed to Syria's complicit involvement in the assassination of Rafiq Hariri I knew that the US and France would be chomping at the bit to refer Syria to the UN Security Council. A while back I wrote about how France had a special interest in the Lebanon-Syria situation and took it rather personal when their "friend" was murdered.

The interesting thing about the following artile though is that is states that Syria is isolated in the Middle East naming Saudi Arabia and Egypt as examples. Obviously they are not totally isolated as Iran is its strategic partner but still - if it's true I guess it's nice to see that the persona of the Middle East is not totally monolithic.

Here's the article:

The United States and France plan to introduce two UN resolutions next week aimed at holding Syria to account for meddling in Lebanon and for its alleged links to the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri, the Washington Post said in a report on Wednesday.

The resolutions may be introduced as early as next Tuesday and the moves would be the toughest international action ever taken against Syria, the report said, citing Western diplomatic sources.

The moves would be designed to further isolate Syrian President Bashar Assad, who for the first time is getting cold shoulder from key Arab governments such as those in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, the report said.

The impending actions will be "the perfect storm for Damascus" and "it is pretty clear the Syrians do not have any friends left," a Western diplomat was quoted by the report as saying.

While the Bush administration has considered language critical of Syria for support of terrorism that could also be used to punish or pressure Damascus for aiding extremists in Iraq, France and other nations want the focus to be limited to Syria's intervention in Lebanon, the report said.

The United States has repeatedly accused Syria of meddling in Lebanon and failing to guard against its border with Iraq. Syria has rebutted the criticism.

All Bark, No Bite

This is sort of a companion piece from Monday's post about restarting an arms race. First, some people seem to believe I was being sarcastic in my opinion that an arms race is actually the best course of action in securing world peace. I'm not being sarcastic, I actually think that if everyone has a missile pointed at everyone else there will be less of a chance someone will actually use it. Who knows, maybe, just maybe, people will be less likely to war against each other in general all around. Now that might be wishful thinking but to date, I haven't seen containment or preemption bare the fruit of peace we've been promised. Sometimes you have to think out of the box.

However, at this juncture I doubt the US will even bother attempting to invade Iran. I know Scott Ritter thinks the war has already started but I mean a real war. A war with Geraldo Rivera running around drawing maps in the sand, that kind of war. Don't get me wrong, I think if this administration believes they have a shot they'll take it but I just don't think that shot is going to happen. The reason I believe we're not going into Iran can be summed up in two words: Russia and energy.

First I'll deal with the latter. The US desperately needs oil and natural gas. We buy from Saudi Arabia because it can pull more oil out of the ground for cheaper than any other country. That dynamic is rapidly changing as cooperation between the US and Russia is growing at a very high rate.

From Global Politician: In September 2003 the energy ministries of Russia and the USA signed a Protocol for the prevention and elimination of consequences from oil spills. Within that Protocol the US experience, concerning state guarantees for the security of energy storage facilities and pipelines can be utilized by Russia, which is highly topical by the way if we bear in mind the speedy outdating and depreciation of Russian transport infrastructure.

Earlier that year (in March 2003) the two countries signed an agreement to reduce the threat from weapons of mass destruction. This agreement envisaged the stopping of plutonium production by the shutdown of three Russian reactors under U.S.-Russia Elimination of Weapons-Grade Plutonium Production Program. In 2004 started the implementation of the agreement between the two governments, concerning the return to Russia (for processing and storage) of the already used fuel from highly enriched uranium. In result of this agreement, 17 countries received American financial and technical aid for the transfer to Russia of Russian-made used nuclear fuel from their nuclear power plants as well as for the implementation of non-enriched uranium in the power plants, as it would be less dangerous in the hands of terrorists.

On corporate levels worth mentioning the credit agreement between Lukoil and the US Overseas Private Investment Corportation, under which the private investment fund HBK Fund loaned 225 million USD for a twelve-year period to the ad-hoc Visotsk - Lukoil II for the construction of a port terminal in the Finnish bay. In its turn, the Russian consortium Stroitransgaz signed an agreement for personnel exchange and cooperation in the construction of pipelines on US territory with the US corportation Key Energy Services. Another joint project of the same Russian company with foundation Systems envisages the construction of a gas pipeline from Eastern Siberia to South Korea for 400 - 500 million dollars.

Meanwhile, in 2000 Lukoil bought out for 71 million USD the American company Getty Petroleum Marketing, which controls a network of 1 300 petrol stations and oil bases in the Eastern states of the USA. Expanding its US business, in 2004 Lukoil bought about 800 other petrol stations in New Jersey and Pennsylvania from Conoco Phillips for 375 million dollars. Thus, the Russian giant controls 8% of the petroleum product retail market in the East Coast of the USA. Apart from that, Lukoil leased a large sea terminal near New York, where it will import petroleum products from Visotsk and the Bulgarian port of Burgas, where, as is widely known, are located the largest processing facilities of Lukoil. In its turn, Conoco Phillips bought 7.6% of the state-owned shares in Lukoil for 1.9 billion dollars. The importance of this deal can hardly be re-evaluated because it provides Lukoil with the necessary legal argument to step back in Iraq and launch deliveries of crude oil from the oil fields, developed by the Russians even in Saddam times, to the oil processing facilities of Conoco Phillips in the Eastern USA.

We are not going to cross the Russians thus scuttling deals like the ones mentioned above. The cost factor for invading Iran and instigating a confrontation with Russia would far outweigh any possible gains we may make even if we successfully took Tehran like we did Baghdad.

On that point, the Bush administration doesn't seem to want to actually fight wars the way they're supposed to be fought anymore. We start rebuilding the infrastructure while the enemy is still armed and about and our footing isn't totally secure, as is the case in Iraq. That's obviously a recipe for protracted guerilla struggle, as we're currently facing. As the people of this country have no stomach for either a real war or a long war, again, there is no up side for us to preemptively or reactively invade Iran.

This brings me to my second point about Russia's involvement in this mess. According to Iranmania:
ranian Ambassador to Russia Gholam Reza Ansari said that Tehran, Moscow relations are improving in all areas, IRNA reported.

Speaking to Ria Novosti News Agency, Ansari said following the trip by former president Mohammad Khatami to Moscow several years ago a new chapter began in bilateral relations in all areas.

He also referred to the two nations' cooperation in nuclear energy. "After the completion of Bushehr nuclear powerplant building more powerplants is on the two states' agenda."

Ansari said that the building Bushehr is the most important index of economic cooperation between the two sides in the recent years.

He also expressed hope that with the timely dispatch of fuel by Russia and completion of the powerplant, operations will start on schedule.

"We have ensured Russia that our nuclear activities are peaceful and expect Moscow to convey this policy to other nations." He alluded to the energy sector as an important area of cooperation between the two countries. Soon Iran electricity grid will be connected to Russia and Armenia.

Ansari said the two nations' cooperation in industry and advanced technologies are also extensive and referred to last year's agreement to build 'Zohreh' satellite.

He also expressed hope that the agreements would be implemented in the near future.

Iran is interested in active participation in the joint Caspian Sea security forces. Tehran and Moscow have common views on political, economic and cultural areas and oppose foreign intervention in the region, he added.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said last September that his country is committed to complete Bushehr nuclear power station on time (scheduled in 2006).

Iran can comfortably stand behing Russia now knowing that the US can't and probably won't do anything more than complain and threathen them. Harsh language is about as bad as the US can do so long as Tehran and Moscow have such deep connections to one another.

On the other hand, and this takes us back to Mondays column, Russia won't let the mullahs follow through on their much ballyhooed threat to destroy Israel and the US. There are no worries there either directly or indirectly. The powerful of Iran now have as much to lose if Hezbollah explodes a nuke in Jerusalem as the Israeli's do. Economics is the single most powerful force in the world, don't let anybody tell you otherwise.

Rumor: Cheney to Resign; Rice as V.P.

If this is even the least bit true, for me it would be a dream come true on soooooooooo many levels. However, it is coming from Newsmax.com so God only knows!

After a Washington Post story suggesting that Vice President Dick Cheney’s office is involved in the Plame-CIA investigation, rumors are flying around Washington that Cheney might step aside – and be replaced by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

"If that should happen, there will undoubtedly be those who believe the whole thing was orchestrated – another brilliant Machiavellian move by the VP,” a White House insider told Paul Bedard of U.S. News & World Report.

Some observers are whispering that the driving force behind the Rice-for-Cheney scenario is political pundit Dick Morris’ new book "Condi vs. Hillary: The Next Great Presidential Race.”

In the book, Morris and co-author Eileen McGann warn that Hillary Clinton will be the next president of the U.S. unless she can be stopped.

And Condoleezza Rice, they say, is the only Republican who can win the GOP nomination, beat Hillary and hold on to the White House for the GOP.

A move now to elevate Condoleezza to the vice president’s position would better prime her for a run against Hillary in 2008.

It most certainly would by golly, it most certainly would!

Russo-Brazilian Alliance in Spotlight

As I posted yesterday, Brazil is sending one of their astronauts into space on a Russian shuttle rather than partnering up with America in light of the 2003 Columbia disaster. However, that is only the tip of the presumably newly formed Russo-Brazilian strategic partnership. Google news has a dozen or so separate stories that illuminate all the ways these two powerhouses are working together. It’s a fascinating pairing as Russia attempts to reinvigorate the glory of the old Soviet days while Brazil is seeking to establish itself as a regional superpower in South America. In Russia and Brazil we’ve got something old and something new, now all we need is something used and something blue.

Speaking of something used and blue, the United Nations has been talking about reform, specifically within the Security Council. One of UN Ambassador John Bolton’s jobs (other than planning a war in Iran) was to facilitate rudimentary changes in how the UN operates. Ostensibly his job was to get the UN to be less hostile to its host, the United States. One article states, “Washington will not support the scale of U.N. Security Council enlargement that some member states are lobbying for, the recently appointed U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, said Friday.

Speaking during his first visit to Britain since his appointment, Bolton said the United States approached the issue of enlargement on the basis that any changes must "do no harm." The level of expansion proposed by Germany, Japan, Brazil and India would undermine the council's effectiveness, he told a conference at the London think tank Chatham House.”.”Source

This is where you’ll start to see Moscow throw its weight around in favor of Brazil.

”Russian President Vladimir Putin voiced his country's support Tuesday for Brazil's bid for permanent membership of a reformed UN Security Council.

Putin expressed Russia's support for Brazil as one of the strongest candidates for permanent membership of the reformed UN Security Council in a joint statement with his Brazilian counterpart, Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, who is in town for a visit to Russia.

The two presidents "pointed out the need to achieve the broadest consensus possible in decision making on UN reforms," the statement said.

Russian support for Brazil's bid "is an acknowledgement of the need to reform the United Nations and of the positive role Brazil will play in this context," it said.

"I share the Russian belief that the UN Security Council and UN enlargement need a reform to become more representative and positive," Lula told a joint press conference with Putin after their talks in the Kremlin.

"Brazil regards Russia as a strategic partner," he said.” Source

China, whom is also a strategic partner of Russia, also backs the ascension of Brazil as a permanent member of the UN Security Council. As a matter of fact, China backs all the proposed nominees except the Japanese. Old hatreds die hard I guess, even amidst a global body of peace.

Another area of interest where Brazil and Russia have mutual interest and an opportunity to better each other’s influence in the world is in the field of energy. America is the leading consumer of energy in the world and consequently it has the greatest GDP and most expansive economy. We are as they say, the engine that drives the world economy. China and it’s billion strong population are quickly on the heels of the US in becoming the largest consumer of energy resources and this element of their development is in short order making them the world’s next great superpower. Behind China there’s another billion strong in India whom are poised to make their presence known on the world stage. Enter Brazil whose population is ranked 6th behind the US and Indonesia in terms of sheer numbers and is the next country that is ready to break the glass ceiling of economic growth, development and influence.

According to RIA Novosti, ”Russia and Brazil are intending to establish a privileged partnership in the energy sphere, a statement adopted after talks between the two countries' presidents said Tuesday.

The document said that progress had been made in bilateral energy cooperation.

The statement said that Russia could expand its participation in the construction of hydroelectric power plants in Brazil and both countries could strengthen coordination between their oil and gas and petrochemical companies, and exchange experience in renewable energy sources, especially ethanol.”

As we all know from living in America in the midst of an alleged energy crunch, lack of cheap, easily attainable energy can seriously stymie economic growth both individually as well as throughout ones country. Hell, it was costing me a $100 a weekend just to visit my fiancé, driving from Miami to Tampa! This deal between Brasilia and Moscow will most like result in a great expansion of both economies and it won’t be long before you start to hear murmurs about the, “threat from South America,” or something like what you hear about China these days.

Lastly, it isn’t just Brasilia that is taking the lions share of profits from a strategic partnership with Moscow. Putin is making great efforts to woo not just Brazil, but all Latin American countries in the hopes of joining the World Trade Organization sometime in the near future.

According to RIA Novosti, ”Russia is unlikely to have any difficulty completing talks with Latin American and Caribbean states on its accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO), Economics Minister German Gref said Wednesday.

"If all goes according to plan, no major problems will arise on the issue with Latin American [member] countries," Gref told reporters after a meeting with Latin American ambassadors in Moscow.

Russia has already signed bilateral protocols on the completion of WTO accession talks with five Latin American states, and initialed agreements with three others. It has completed talks with Brazil and Argentina, and talks are nearing completion with seven other countries in the region.”

One should make an effort to note here that Latin/South America and the Caribbean used to be America’s backyard. I don’t recall anyone in power here saying the Monroe Doctrine was dead but apparently the Russians, the Chinese, the Iranians and anybody else with a dollar in their pocket seems to think it is. Even the Canadians are insisting that the Russians be allowed into the WTO. While I don’t believe we are surrounded by enemies per se, I would say that America’s relative safety where strategic lines are drawn are being challenged more and more by the day and this is just one story that proves it. This administration is so focused on Iraq it seems to forget it’s “friends” in its own hemisphere, in my humble opinion.

Certainly this Russo-Brazilian alliance is not the end of the world but it does illustrate just how fast the global community is changing. It also seems to illustrate just how slow this administration is in reacting appropriately to these changes.

Brazil, Russia to sign space accord

What's interesting about this is that one of the reasons Brazil sought out the Russians as a partner in space exploration is because of the 2003 Columbia disaster. Now if that tragedy was the end result of neglect or poor funding then as usual we have nobody else to blame but ourselves for other countries possibly trumping us in the field of space technology. And even if it was just bad, tragic luck, space was one of the few domains left that we dominated without equal. Now the Chinese and soon probably most of the world will be restarting the space race, which is not necessarily a bad thing. Competition is good in almost all facets of life, however, I can't help but feel like because of an unread public and seemingly dense leadership, we're quickly losing all the little things that make this country special. Maybe I'be being an alarmist but I feel like it won't be long before the only thing that seperates us from the rest of the world won't be our "freedom and opportunities" but instead the army of evangelical Christians in the South.

BRASILIA, Brazil - Brazil will sign an agreement with Russia on Tuesday to send the first Brazilian astronaut into space, the Science and Technology Ministry said.

Brazilian air force Lt. Col. Marcos Cesar Pontes will fly aboard a Russian Soyuz to the International Space Station, the ministry said Monday. The trip is scheduled for March 22.

Pontes, who is currently undergoing physical exams in Russia ahead of training for the voyage, will spend about a week aboard the space station, performing experiments involving the environment and micro-gravity. More

An Arms Race is the Way of the Future

I have officially flip-flopped. That’s right, I’m changing my position on Iran’s alleged nuclear program. Somebody call Dick Cheney!

For almost the entire year to date I have been beating the drum, clanking pans together and jumping all about trying to tell anyone that will listen that we’re headed to Iran for a “pre-emptive war” on the auspices of preventing nuclear weapons proliferation. The opinion that most people writing about Iran as well as myself held is that the mullahs were going to do one of two, or both options.

The first theory goes that the mullahs were just dying to get their mitts on enough ingredients to construct a nuclear bomb and just as soon as they did, they would strap it to the nearest Shahab-3 or 4 and lob it at Israel. Regardless of how many peaceniks, isolationists and anti-Semites there are in this country, this would have precipitated a real, live nuclear war between the West and the Middle East.

The other big scary story we’re told and I’ve been repeating is that Iran will make a bomb, give it to Hezbollah or Al Qaeda and somehow, someway, they’ll use it to blow up a city in the US, or once again, our good friend Israel. Obviously I was one of the many in the chorus singing loud and proud that this nightmare scenario needed to be prevented at all costs. Revolution in the Iranian streets; that was the ticket for me as well as others.

I’ve changed my mind. Now I think not only SHOULD Iran have a bomb but also I believe every relatively secure country in the world should have a nuclear arsenal, complete with ballistic missiles of their very own. From North Korea to Iran, from France to China, from East Timor to Sudan, from Argentina to Mexico, let’s all have nuclear weapons!

I’ve come to the conclusion that the best opportunity for lasting peace on earth is for the entire world to have a good old fashioned arms race. I’ll give you a minute to let that sink in…

…

…ready now? Good, let me explain how I got to this point.

According to an article I read in Reuters, ”Iran is determined to acquire nuclear weapons and the United States may find it less costly to deter a nuclear-armed Iran than to dismantle its weapons program, according to two U.S.-funded researchers who advise the Pentagon.

"Can the United States live with a nuclear-armed Iran? Despite its rhetoric, it may have no choice," concluded the report by Judith Yaphe and Air Force Col. Charles Lutes, which was released on Thursday.

The potential for rolling back Iran's program, once it produces a nuclear weapon, "is lower than preventing it in the first place and the costs of rollback may be higher than the costs of deterring and containing a nuclear Iran," they said.”

The three most powerful and important men running the United States right now are, Mr. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, are all former CEO’s (well Bush ran and eventually sold his own oil company but that’s close enough) and as we all know about CEO’s they will always choose the cheapest option. Economics first, safety last, that’s their motto. The Bush administration has already shown that it’s not interested in winning the War or Terror or actually preventing any more terrorists attacks. It is has already shown that it’s not interested in dismantling the “web of terror,” as it’s called. They attacked Afghanistan strictly because of 9/11 and they got their boogeyman in Iraq. They’ve proven that those two conflicts are all they had on the agenda for dealing with Islamic terrorism.

Now I know what you are thinking. You’re saying to yourself that not even the Bush administration is so incompetent that they’d let Iran arm itself and become another North Korea. You are saying that not even the Bush administration would let Iran acquire nuclear bombs that they could give to Hezbollah and kill us all with. Well I have faith in this administration that where they can do the worst possible job, they will. But that’s not why I’ve changed my position.

I think this opinion of the mullahs, that their crazy enough to initiate a real live nuclear war with the west, all in the name of Mohammed, may peace and blessings be upon him, is nothing more than well crafted American mass marketed propaganda (which we do so well). Don’t get me wrong, I do agree that the mullahs hate the US and want us dead, but hey, so do the French!

But seriously folks, the mullahs have everything to lose by going nuclear against us, Israel or anyone else on the planet. They have everything to gain by just having the “threat” of nuclear missiles and then sending their tired, angry and hungry to kill American soldiers with just a Kalashnikov assault rifle and the promise of a pleasant afterlife. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about people in power, their convictions, religious or otherwise come second to their desire to stay in power. In short, if the mullahs attacked the West with nuclear bombs, directly or indirectly, the Middle East would be uninhabitable for the next 100 years or so. If you think that a nuclear terrorist attack on, at the very least, American soil wouldn’t immediately garner a response to annihilate every city in Iran, then pass me what you’ve been smoking because it’s clearly good stuff.

Now I’m not revealing any big secrets here. Despite their own rhetoric and such, the mullahs in Tehran know which side their bread is buttered on. It’s the same thing in Damascus and Riyadh. The Saudi Royal family and the Assad family only have power so long as they don’t push the US too far. As mush as I think this administration can’t seem to do anything right, if Mecca, Riyadh, Medina and Damascus were left standing in light of a nuclear attack on the US, there wouldn’t be a Washington DC left to defend as we’d burn it to the ground on principle. This is not news. Everyone from DC to Tehran is well aware of how nuclear war would play out an in reality, nobody in power really wants it.

Mutually assured destruction (MAD) works, quite simply. It worked after World War II between the US and the Soviets. Some would argue that the mullahs are not Stalin nor Khrushchev and I would say balderdash to that. People are people, and when you’re in charge, that’s all you’ll ever want to be. Another good example is India and Pakistan. More has been to work toward peace between those two countries and on Kashmir since they both acquired nuclear arms. Half of Western Europe has nuclear weapons, including France, but nobody has ever used them no matter what conflict arose on that continent. The North Koreans allegedly have nuclear arms and all we get from that place is a lot of hot air (because anything more would then threaten China and that’s not going to happen). MAD works folks, don’t let anybody tell you otherwise.

Another story in the news states, “Former members of the Russian military have been secretly helping Iran obtain the technology needed to make missiles capable of hitting European capitals, a British newspaper claimed yesterday.

Citing anonymous "Western intelligence officials," the Sunday Telegraph said the Russians were go-betweens as part of a multi-million-pound deal they negotiated between Iran and North Korea in 2003.” Source

Now you see that this effort to stop Iran from having a bomb can’t and won’t be done. So rather than just spinning our wheels or engaging in yet another poorly planned war, let’s go with a strategy that worked for over 50 years. Let’s have another arms race!

An End to Innocence

I was really offended by this when I first saw it as I can remember being a fan of the Smurfs as a child. I also assumed this had to do with Iraq, which bothered me.

Apparently it's not:

The UN children's agency has launched a hard-hitting ad campaign, involving cartoon legends the Smurfs being blown away in a sudden air strike.
The film, which aims to raise money for former child soldiers in Africa, is being shown on Belgian TV.

A spokesman for Unicef Belgium said it had departed from previous policies on advertising in order to shock people, and that this tactic was working.

Unicef said the ad should only run late at night to avoid scaring children. Read more

OK, I'll go along with this. The child soldier problem in Africa is abhorent and more indeed needs to be done about it. If stomping to death yet another one of my childhood memories saves an ex-African child soldier then so be it. I only ask that the Thundercats please be left in peace.

Have a good weekend folks.

New Review: Endgame

The following is a brief excerpt from a review posted on PopandPolitics.com:

The War on Terror is not an easy subject to write on. First, it is hard to even begin talking about it because there is no absolute truth about it. Abortion kills fetuses. That is an absolute truth. The question then becomes whether or not killing fetuses is something we should allow or not allow, and then the conversation moves on from there. With the War on Terror, there is no absolute truth. Some people don’t even believe there is one going on, that it’s merely a catch phrase. It’s like having a conversation with somebody who doesn’t believe the Holocaust ever happened; you just can’t even begin the discourse.

“Endgame: The Blueprint for Victory in the War on Terror,” by Lt. General Thomas McInerney & Maj. General Paul Vallely is not for everyone and there’s no way it can be. When I review books, I try to steer clear of the really bad polemics (barring Michael Savage and Ann Coulter, which I read for laughs). I try to tackle only the books which appear to be the most evenhanded. Though “Endgame” is written soberly and without that crazy alarmist slant that makes it seem like jihadis are beating down our very door, it was clearly written with a certain audience in mind: the Fox News audience.

This book will not win over any new converts. Before reading it you must first already believe that we are in a war against radical Muslim fundamentalist terrorists. That may seem rather obvious, but it does need to be stated out loud. If you are of the opinion that the only reason there is Muslim terrorism is because of the existence of Israel or bad behavior on the part of the US, then there’s no point in reading this book. The authors are former US military men and current Fox News military analysts, so the fact that there’s a heavy US-favored slant goes without saying. Read more

Crony Baloney

This Post is also available at The Blogger News Network

You know it’s the end of the world, as we know it when you find yourself in complete agreement with both Bill Maher and Ann Coulter.

Our common ground has come in the form of Supreme Court Justice nominee Harriet Ellan Miers. We all agree that this woman, while deserving of praise and respect, is grossly unqualified to fill the spot of Supreme Court Justice. As Ms. Coulter so eloquently put it, “You’re not suppose to nominate the cleaning lady, we thought this was clear!” Indeed, Ms. Coulter.

According to the Washington Post, Ms. Miers experience is as follows: 2004 – Present, White House counsel; 2003 – 2004, White House deputy chief of staff for policy; 2001 – 2003, White House staff secretary; 1995 – 2001 chairwoman, Texas State Lottery Commission; 1972 – 2000, private law practice; 1992 – 1993, president, State Bar of Texas; 1989 – 1991, member Dallas City Council; 1985, president, Dallas Bar Association.

This is all well and good but she’s missed one critical career move that would have at least brought her qualifications within a hairs breath of being adequate for the job – she’s never actually been a judge! I don’t think she’s even brought a case before the Supreme Court. With her nomination, President Bush has essentially said that anyone with a law degree and pulse can be a Supreme Court Justice.

This is not the way to do business. Apparently GW chooses people to fill important positions the same way Bill Clinton chose “dates” in the White House; they both just look outside their respective Oval Office door and tap the first person within 30 feet.

I’m thinking maybe I should try going to law school and then get a job as White House janitor. Maybe I’ll be lucky enough to be mopping when GW needs to pick a new UN Ambassador.

It should go without saying that any nomination the president is privileged to make should come from a pool of the most qualified people in that discipline. When you nominate the head of the EPA, you should find someone with a high pedigree of experience in both environmental sciences and administration. You don’t nominate the dude who ran the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in 1986 because he happened to be sipping from the White House water fountain when the nomination needed to be made. So it goes with the highest court in the land. The president should be choosing from a pool of qualified JUDGES, not the broad who thinks George W. Bush – Mr. Misunderestimated – is the smartest man she’s known. Look, I voted for the guy and even I don’t think that.

It’s not as if he tried to find a woman who was qualified and this was the best he could come up with. There are organizations such as the Federalist Society, whom have made it their job to collect and cultivate resumes of good conservative judges that would be beyond reproach for such an esteemed position of power. In the July 25, 2005 issue of the Weekly Standard, Bill Kristol wrote, “President Bush would improve the Court by appointing any from a long list of well-qualified women. Among them are federal appellate judges like Edith Jones, Edith Brown Clement, and Priscilla Owen on the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Janice Rogers Brown on the D.C. Circuit, Karen Williams on the 4th Circuit, and Alice Batchelder on the 6th Circuit; distinguished law professors like Mary Ann Glendon, Learned Hand Professor of Law at Harvard, and Lillian R. BeVier, John S. Shannon Professor of Law at Virginia; and state court judges like the impressive Maura D. Corrigan, who served on the Michigan Court of Appeals from 1992 to 1998, and has been on the Michigan Supreme Court since then, including a stint as chief justice. And the list goes on.”

Needless to say Ms. Miers was not the best or only choice for the job. But that’s not the issue with George W. Bush now is it? The issue has been and will always be loyalty above all else. Nobody does, says, or goes anywhere without being loyal to the Godfather, lest they be smeared into oblivion by resident traitor Karl Rove. It’s not about whether you’ll be good in the chosen position, it’s about your ability to follow orders, complete tasks, look good on the cover of the New York Times and most importantly, keep your mouth shut!

Former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neil had one job in the administration; pass a massive tax cut. He accomplished that mission and shortly thereafter the administration had no more use for the guy. He wrote a book about this, thus showing his disloyalty and the Bush administration called him everything but a Communist and a homosexual.

Former terrorism czar Richard Clarke alleges that his boss wanted him to “find” evidence that Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11. When he couldn’t and/or wouldn’t and then decided to tell his story to the world, the administration essentially called him Chicken Little and further claimed that he was, “out of the loop.” Now why they would keep the terror czar out of any loop is beyond me and maybe a question for a later column.

Loyalty. Condoleezza Rice was loyal and she was promoted to Secretary of State. If she stays loyal she will most likely be “drafted” to face Hillary Clinton for the presidency in 2008. Colin Powell loyally kept his mouth shut after being the good soldier by putting on a brilliant dog and pony show for the UN in the run-up to the Iraq War. Now he’s going to possibly own a baseball team and occasionally he hangs out with Bush instead of being hung out to dry like O’Neil and Clarke. Loyalty.

All jokes aside, Harriet Miers has one function if she becomes a Supreme Court Justice. Her function will be to be loyal to a fault to George W. Bush. For the next three years that will be a lofty job indeed but once he’s gone…what? The man can’t be president anymore after 2008. Loyalty to him in a lifetime position will amount to nothing. It would be one thing if she were this staunch conservative whom one could depend on to vote a certain way no matter who was in the White House, but she isn’t. She was on Harry Reid’s short list for Pete’s sake! She’s a Bush crony and nothing more.

George W. Bush is the Wizard of Oz. It would seem that the people chosen to surround him act as the curtain to keep the prying eyes of the American public from seeing who he really is. With this nomination of Harriet Miers he as reduced our Supreme Court to the likes of a country club. Shame on him and shame on us for giving him 4 more years to make a mockery out of every branch of government.

U.N. Links Poverty, Violence Against Women

There's only one reason to keep women as second-class citizens in any part of our modern world; because they are threat to your hold on power.

Whether it's the Saudi Royal family or some strong arm in Africa, if your hold on power is tenuous then you have to do what you can to control your population and make less likely to revolt. One way to do that is to keep at least half of your population illiterate and in abject poverty. That's the plight of many women around the world. It's obviously an awful shame and more should be done to stop it but then, more should be done to stop genocide and we all know how good the UN is at stopping that.

Here's the article:

The world will never eliminate poverty until it confronts social, economic and physical discrimination against women, the United Nations said Wednesday.

"Gender apartheid" could scuttle the global body's goal of halving extreme poverty by 2015, the U.N. Population Fund's annual State of World Population report said.

"We cannot make poverty history until we stop violence against women and girls," the fund's executive director, Thoraya Ahmed Obaid, said at the report's launch in London. "We cannot make poverty history until women enjoy their full social, cultural, economic and political rights."

The report said gender equality and better reproductive health could save the lives of 2 million women and 30 million children over the next decade - and help lift millions around the world out of poverty. More

PC Update 10/12/05

Yes I'm still alive!

I'm moving from Miami to Tampa this week. Between getting my DSL turned off, then on, then off again plus trying to close all my cases and finish boxing stuff up I won't have as much time to keep my blog up like I used to. I'm going to try but if it looks like nothing is happening here, please be patient as PC will return to it's usual level of new content by next Monday.

Thanks again to all my loyal readers.

Mark

New Review: Blood Bankers

The following is a brief excerpt from a review posted on PopandPolitics.com:

Why is the Third World still struggling so far behind the First World, even though millions of dollars have been invested and/or donated to help them move up the development ladder? That is a question that has plagued many people since former colonies were given sovereignty after World War II.

Why is it that today, in 2005, many Third World nations do not have clean water or sanitization systems? Why are they stricken with high rates of child mortality? Why are AIDS and malaria killing more people than civil war in many parts of the world? And for that matter, why do these Third World societies keep collapsing into civil war in the first place?

In “The Blood Bankers: Tales from the Underground Global Economy,” author James S. Henry -- former chief economist for McKinsey & Co., VP Strategy for IBM/Lotus, one of the original "Nader's Raiders," and founder/managing director of the Sag Harbor Group -- explains why from 1970 to 2003, over three trillion dollars were loaned to developing countries by the West and yet today, many of those same countries are struggling with high rates of poverty.

“The Blood Bankers” is the behind the scenes account of what happened and an explanation of where all that money went. Henry reveals unsparingly the convoluted snarl of transactions, often legal but usually immoral, that resulted in the further impoverishment of the Third World. Read More

Energy and Economy News Round-Up

There are a number of good stories today regarding the global economy and energy prices that I think you all should know about. Sure I could talk about John Robert's dealing with assisted suicide as his first case or the nomination of the grossly unqualified, crony-esque Harriet Miers or the double indictment of Tom Delay, but I won't. Everybody and their mother is talking about those subjects. Here on PC we do something different, something interesting, something out of the mainstream when possible.

And speaking of something out of the mainstream...

Bush Begins Mulling Greenspan Successor

The task of plucking the new heir to Alan Greenspan's throne at the head of the Federal Reserve has commenced. "There is a group of people inside the White House...who will bring forth nominees," the President proclaimed, saying that the new head shall be: "one who is good at his job," and "viewed as an independent person from politics."

Public perception is indeed vital in the wake of Bush's nomination of his long-time confidante Harriet Miers--who'd never been a judge before--as a Supreme Court justice. (To read more about the nominee, see: "She's Good For Business"). And Miers' nomination follows the public outrage over Michael Brown, former Arabian Horse Association chief, who found himself head of FEMA during the Katrina disaster.

For now, the three current front runners are experienced economic advisors to the White House and reassuringly clever: Harvard economist Martin Feldstein, Columbia professor Glenn Hubbard and former Fed governor Ben Bernanke. Those who have been given the task of choosing the next person to run the U.S. economy are Vice President Dick Cheney, Chief of Staff Andrew Card and Karl Rove. Their quandary is in choosing someone who is both independent in thought yet viewed as loyal.

Not to mention the fact that Greenspan leaves big shoes to fill: Soon to be the longest serving Fed chairman ever, he maneuvered the economy through two stock market collapses, two recessions and presided between them over the longest expansions in U.S. history. And he plays a mean sax. More

That's nice that he plays a, "mean sax," but more importantly he's also a fraud who has created our current Social Security mess (along with Reagan) and then proposed a con job to fix it. Everything I have learned about Greenspan tells me that this fellow changes opinions and values with the political winds and only to the financial benefit of himself. The only thing scarier than Greenspan being the Head Fed is his replacement. If history is any clue, Cheney and company will propose ex-stockholders currently not in prison from Enron or WorldCom. I'm not so much worried about who the Supreme Court nominees are. There's plenty of checks and balances and "people in the room," that nothing dramatic will be done in short fashion. This really worries me as the gap between wages and the standard of living in America rises with each passing day. In all likelyhood, just like Greenspan, the new Fed Chairman will do nothing but exacerbate that problem.

Biodiesel use is growing in America

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a law Oct. 4 allowing public agencies to use vehicles that can run off biodiesel blends.

The California law was signed less than a week after Minnesota became the first state to mandate a 2 percent biodiesel mix for all diesel fuel, and a day after a Texas company announced plans to build a biodiesel plant on Galveston Bay.

“Californians have always led the way in protecting our lands and oceans and pioneering new forms of energy use that reduce our reliance on foreign fuels,” Schwarzenegger said. “Today, we are continuing that proud legacy with new legislation that will decrease our dependence on foreign oil and encourage the use of cleaner burning domestic fuels.”

The proposal was written by state Sen. Roy Ashburn, a Republican representing Bakersfield, home to American Biofuels, a major biodiesel plant.

“By using biodiesel, we can reduce dependency on foreign oil by up to 20 percent,” Ashburn said.

The facility will expand to produce as much as 10 million gallons of biodiesel annually by the end of the year, and further expansions will increase production to 35 million gallons annually, a company executive told the Central Valley Business Times.

“This is a major commitment even on a world scale, considering that the state of California has the fifth largest economy in the world and is also the tenth largest emitter of global warming gases in the world,” said Joseph LaStella, president of Green Star Products, which owns 35 percent of American Biofuels. More

I was thinking about California and biodiesel the other day. I thought that it couldn't be long before they jumped on the bandwagon seeing as their environmental and energy laws are near oppressive enough to spark interest in alternative fuels as soon as possible. The other item that occurred to me was that Bakersfield had unused/closed refineries that were ostensibly just wasting away. Why couldn't they be converted to biodiesel plants? Apparently I was not the only one thinking that way. Now we just need Schwarzenegger to use some of that Hollywood charm and marketing skill to make biodiesel hotter than boy bands and Pokemon.

Oil at two-month low as U.S. cars idle

Oil slid to its lowest level in two months on Thursday as U.S. drivers finally eased off the gas and the world's energy watchdog said there was no pressing need to dip further into emergency fuel reserves.

U.S. data on Wednesday showed the world's biggest consumer was burning through less fuel than a year ago. The news allayed concerns the United States could run short of heating oil and gasoline with a dozen U.S. refineries still shut by hurricanes.

U.S. crude was down 79 cents at $62.00 a barrel at 1058 GMT, its fifth straight day of losses. Gasoline fell 3.48 cents to $1.8730 a gallon after Wednesday's 11 cents tumble.

"We're not a million miles away from where we were before Hurricane Katrina," said Emanuele Ravano, head of portfolio management at PIMCO in London.

"In terms of miles driven, U.S. motorists are being a little more cautious. But it remains open to question whether this is a two-week phenomenon." More

This is what it means to be strapped to a finite fuel source. Sure one can argue, and I have, that there is plenty of oil in the ground to last well into my grandchildren's years but the lack of forsight in that argument is stunning. Why would you want to depend strictly on a finite fuel source while not bothering to proactively seek alternatives? This is essentially how we got into this mess in the first place. We depended too much on foreign trade with the Middle East and when the mullahs tossed out the Shah thus causing the series of events leading to the oil embargo, we still did nothing to change the way we fuel this nation. It's sad really. It seems that the one thing that binds rich and powerful people is short term thinking and a general sense of screw your neighbor.

Kansas couple on trial for enslaving mentally ill

Last night my fiance and I were talking about how hard it is for social workers (clinical or otherwise) to make any real money. I explained to her that the base scale for a social workers income is much less than she's used to working in the private sector because of a variety of factors. One of those factors is that many elected officials as well as their constituents believe that tax money spent on social welfare programs are just a big waste and should be spent sparingly if at all. Many people believe in the donor or private healthcare models of social welfare and further believe that the government (tax dollars) should stay out of peoples lives entirely. Therefore, because I'm considered to be drain on society, until I go into private practice or start my own agency, I'll have to scratch out a living on less than a starting teacher's salary along with the rest of my colleagues.

When I read stories like the one below, I reflect on issues like this. I sit here and argue that social workers should be paid more and then creeps like the ones in this story demonstrate why that will never happen (unless we get create one hell of a union). According to the story, "The Kaufmans submitted just under $1 million in claims to Medicare from 1991 through 2000 and were paid $216,906, authorities said." That's insanity! What a phenomenal waste of tax payer income.

The problem is that this is just one of many stories where there's been rediculous amounts of fraud and waste committed in the helping industry. It's also sad that when folks who already don't appreciate the work social workers do will most likely cite this story as to why they think the entire welfare state should be condemned in whole, regardless of how many of us actually do the work we're paid to do and do it well.

Here's the sick sad story:

A Kansas husband and wife who ran a psychotherapy practice went on trial on Tuesday on charges that they kept mentally ill people as slaves, forced them to perform sex acts on videotape and then billed Medicare nearly $1 million for the "therapy."

Prosecutors charged that Arlan Kaufman, 68, and his wife Linda Kaufman, 62, spent 18 years taking advantage of patients entrusted to their care. The couple ran a residential care facility in Newton, Kansas, where they worked with at least 20 mentally ill individuals from 1980 until 2004.

Jury selection began Tuesday for an expected five-week trial in U.S. District Court in Wichita.

Authorities are seeking to prove that while the couple was billing relatives and insurers for therapy, rent, utilities and food, they were forcing the residents to engage in hard manual labor in the nude on a farm the couple owned outside of town.

Prosecutors charged the residents were also forced to engage in a variety of sexually explicit acts, including masturbating, fondling each other and shaving each other's genitals, much of which was videotaped.

Patients were physically injured or restrained if they resisted, authorities charged.

Prosecutors have filed 33 criminal counts against the Kaufmans including charges of forced labor, involuntary servitude, health care fraud, mail fraud and obstruction of a federal audit.

The Kaufmans submitted just under $1 million in claims to Medicare from 1991 through 2000 and were paid $216,906, authorities said.

Defense attorneys for the Kaufmans declined to comment. The couple faces more than 200 years in prison if convicted of all the charges.

Ethiopia, Egypt and Sudan Agree to Develop Nile

When activists such as Bono or former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neil talk about what Africa needs, they often refer to water. Plain and simple, much of Africa, especially West Africa, needs clean water and sanitation. Unfortunately, though the Europeans may have given the Africans their independence years ago, they left without providing any real sort of infrastructure and what was left was destroyed by the Africans themselves through various civil wars and episodes of ethnic cleansing.

Though all three above cited countries are still having difficulties ranging from on-going ethnic strife to political upheaval, it's fairly good to see that whatever governmental institutions are in place are attempting to do appropriate things to help their respective countries.

Here's the story:

In a move that could be described as a breakthrough, the three countries of the eastern sub-basin, Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt, are forging ahead with a plan to jointly develop their share of the water in the Nile Basin.

Details of the meeting and its outcome are not out, but water resources ministers from the sub-basin have met at the 7th Eastern Nile Council of Ministers (ENCOM) annual meeting, which was convened in Addis Ababa last Saturday.

The ministerial level meeting was supposed to deliberate on the findings of an earlier meeting of experts which discussed some of the joint development projects for tapping the Nile.

Speaking at the opening of ETCOM meeting, Shiferaw Jarso, the Ethiopian Minister of Water Resources Development noted that the initiative started a couple of years ago by the three countries has taken firm ground. Shiferaw said, "We have now created the conditions necessary, the preparedness and resolve to launch the action on the ground. The course we have taken is irreversible and should be carried on until we attain our objectives"

The minister emphasized confrontation and exclusion must give way to cooperation, based on the principles of equitable share of transboundary rivers, without causing significant harm to other riparian states.

"Ethiopia is fully committed to this process, and remains engaged until we see concrete results on the ground, which we believe is needed for building the necessary confidence among the riparian states," minister Shiferaw added.

The Egyptian Minister of Water Resources and Irrigation, Mahamoud Abou Zeid, was equally up-beat about the programme developed within a short period of time since the three countries embarked on the initiative. "The experts have moved from planning to action, and I must say that the level of achievement is extraordinarily satisfactory," the Egyptian Minister said.

The three countries are already involved in the realization of an initiative called the Eastern Nile Subsidiary Action Program (ENSAP) under which they have agreed to cooperate, among others, on irrigation and drainage, hydro power development and river regulation.

According to Ethiopian and Egyptian officials, "Donor Consortium" is to convene in June, in Geneva, where it is expected that donor countries and multilateral agencies, such as the World Bank and the EU, will committee themselves in support of the Eastern Nile Initiative.

At the sixth ENSAP meeting in Cairo, the three countries came up with a total of 57 hydropower, irrigation and water management projects. Most of these projects, about 46, were proposed by Ethiopia.

World Bank and I.M.F. Approve Debt Relief for Poor Nations

In my search this morning for an article worth blogging I came across a lot of bad news. Al Qaeda bombed Bali again; the US is thinking of bombing a village in Syria that's said to be housing Iraqi in surgents; there's still genocide being committed in the Sudan, and the world still doesn't seem to care; Somalia and Rwanda are having difficulties and more mass graves have been found in the Congo.

So what's a blogger to do with so much bad news and only an hour to post a blog, take out the garbage, clean litter boxes, and then get ready for a 4 hour drive from Tampa to Miami? Why post some good news of course.

Actually, I'm of mixed feelings about the cited article. Debt cancellation is a great thing for absolutely impoverish countries. Jeffrey Sachs (The End of Poverty) and Bono have been lobbying for debt's to be cancelled so that the GDP of poor nations can be redistrubited into education, healthcare and expanding the economy/labor force. Obviously I very much want that for the African nations whom are still struggling with total poverty.

However, I'm also firmly against graft. African leaders have a strong tendency to take the money and run, as they say. I believe provisions were supposed to be worked out to prevent graft or obscene misapproprations of investment funds from happening but this is Africa and as they sang in the musical, anything goes!

In addition, debt cancellation also sends a message to countries that have poorly mismanaged their economy; if you mess up, the rich countries will bail you out, again. Granted, the rich countries have screwed the poor ones, especially in Africa 8 ways from Sunday so this could be merely payback but still, the theme here is that African soveriegnty must beget personal responsibility from the leadership and if Central Africa is any indication of that, this opportunity to cancel debt and start fresh will be an exercise in futility. As always, we shall see.

Here's the story:

Finance ministers of one hundred eighty-four countries have accepted a plan to cancel the debts of some of the world's poorest nations.  The plan forgives one hundred percent of debts owed to the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and African Development Bank.

The policymaking committees of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund approved the plan during meetings in Washington. 

Leaders of the industrial nations in the Group of Eight agreed on the plan when they met in July in Scotland.  The United States is joined in the G-Eight by Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Russia.

The leaders agreed to cancel about forty thousand million dollars in debt owed by eighteen nations.  Most are in Africa.  Four are in Latin America.  Up to twenty more countries could also be approved for debt forgiveness if they, too, meet conditions.  If so, this would increase the total amount of debt cancellation to fifty-five thousand million dollars. 

The boards of directors of the World Bank and I.M.F. are expected to act quickly on final approval of the plan.  The two lenders first proposed in nineteen ninety-six to cancel the debts of highly indebted poor countries.

The plan will save the eighteen countries about one thousand million dollars a year in debt repayments.  Officials want the countries to use the money for education and health care and to fight poverty.

Anti-poverty groups praised the agreement.  But some countries said it might leave the World Bank with limited resources to provide new aid for developing nations. 

To answer these concerns, G-Eight finance ministers sent a letter to World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz before the meetings.  The ministers promised more money in the future to "cover the full cost" of the lost repayments. 

G-Eight leaders, when they met in July, promised big increases in their development aid in the next five years.

Mister Wolfowitz says the next step now is to complete a world trade agreement that helps developing countries.  Ministers of the World Trade Organization will try again to finish their negotiations when they meet in Hong Kong in December.  Talks on a new trade agreement began in Qatar in two thousand one.