News in Review III

A Solution for the Climate Crises

Paul Hellyer, a former Canadian defense minister, has a unique solution to the climate crises:

"I would like to see what (alien) technology there might be that could eliminate the burning of fossil fuels within a generation ... that could be a way to save our planet."

Apparently Hellyer believes that governents around the world have large amounts of knowledge culled from researching UFO crashes and wants us to put it into practice.

I suppose the government cover up of intelligent life is the real inconvenient truth...

The Ups and Downs of Life on the Road

The article linked to above has a first sentence that rivals "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times" and "Call me Ishamel". It is most certainly the greatest first sentence ever recorded in a news article:

"A jazz musician was injured Friday after jumping from a burning motor home driven by a one-time roller skating stripper from Lodi."

I get goose bumps everytime I read it.

(hat tip: Tom)

New's in Review II

The Jaywalking Historian

“Tufts University professor, [Felipe Fernandez-Armesto] who was arrested last Thursday and charged with disorderly conduct, contends he was assaulted without provocation for merely jaywalking across Courtland Street. But Officer Kevin Leonpacher insists he is no rogue cop and suggests perhaps the professor is a bit of a scofflaw.” -from 1/10/07 AJC story

As if Atlanta hasn’t gotten enough bad publicity in the past couple of years (courthouse shooter, runaway bride, Cynthia McKinney, et al) now we have Atlanta police taking down a 56 year old history professor in town for the AHA (American Historical Association) conference.

Now, granted, I’m sure Dr. Fernandez wasn’t the little angel he’s claiming to be, but still, the officer should have been able to tell that this guy wasn’t a threat. It just looks bad no matter how you cut it. On the other hand, Dr. Fernandez should have been smart enough to cross at a crosswalk.

After being released from prison Dr. Fernandez described his cell mates, in what is my “Pretentious Professor Quote of the Day” (PPQD), as: "extremely unfortunate members of the underclass."

Scorpions on a Plane!

“A scorpion stung David Sullivan on the back of his right leg, just below the knee, then continued up that leg and down the other, he believes, before getting him again in the shin.

It wasn't what he was expecting on a flight from Chicago to Vermont.” –from a 1/10/07 AP story

Okay, so I just included this so I could say “Scorpions on a Plane!” It is a bit strange, though. I love this quote: “The airlines tell you can't bring water or shampoo on a plane," Helena Sullivan [the wife] said. But the scorpion did make it aboard, she said.

Of course there is absolutely no connection between an insect making its way onboard and keeping passengers from carrying on shampoo, but what else are you going to say to the reporter?


Pillars of Creation Toppled by Stellar Blast

“They helped open the public's eyes to the wonders of space when they were first photographed in 1995, but a new study suggests the famous Pillars of Creation in the Eagle Nebula might have already been toppled long ago, and that what the Hubble Space Telescope actually captured was their ghost image.” -from a 1/10/07 Space.com story

First of all, I love the title of the article (same as my title for this section). It sounds like a chapter title in a discount bin sci-fi novel, doesn’t it?

Second, this really is pretty cool. Most people know that space is so vast that it takes thousands of years for the light from stars to reach us. What this article is saying is that these pillars of dust photographed in this Hubble Telescope picture were actually destroyed by a supernova 6000 years ago. It’ll be another 1000 years before we see what it looked like after the explosion. Kind of boggles the mind, ey?

Continuing Education for Representatives

There’s an article over at CQ.com right now featuring snippets of an interview Jeff Stein had with Silvestre Reyes, the incoming chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. The results of the interview are a bit disturbing:

Al Qaeda is what, I asked, Sunni or Shia?

“Al Qaeda, they have both,” Reyes said. “You’re talking about predominately?”

“Sure,” I said, not knowing what else to say.

“Predominantly — probably Shiite,” he ventured.

Actually, Al Qaeda is only Sunni. As Mr. Stein puts it: “if a Shiite showed up at an al Qaeda club house, they’d slice off his head and use it for a soccer ball.” This is a key bit of information to know in order to understand the global battle with terrorism. In fact, as one small example, there was talk of reprisal from Al Qaeda after Hezbollah’s (Shiite) “success” in Lebanon. Why would there be a reprisal for actions that both groups would agree on? As Bernard Haykel wrote in his article “The Enemy of my Enemy is Still my Enemy”:

"[T]he rise of Hezbollah makes it all the more likely that Al Qaeda will soon seek to reassert itself through increased attacks on Shiites in Iraq and on Westerners all over the world — whatever it needs to do in order to regain the title of true defender of Islam."

I suppose these intricacies wouldn’t matter, though, because when asked about Hezbollah, Reyes replied:

“Hezbollah. Uh, Hezbollah...”

He laughed again, shifting in his seat.

I’m not writing this to claim superiority or to denigrate Representative Reyes. I’m sure there are many, many issues that Reyes is very familiar with, certainly more than me, and probably more than most of us, however if you are a Representative coming in as chairman of the Intelligence Committee, these are the types of things you should know. It’s a sad state of affairs that our representatives are so clueless on what is so often called the “defining issue of our time.” How can educated decisions be made about how to handle these global struggles without the proper information? Perhaps they should teach night classes over on Capitol Hill.

The Chinese Worker, the American Consumer, and the World Market

I read an interesting article from Business Week the other day. The article, titled “Secrets, Lies, and Sweatshops” details the practices used to try and prevent unethical and illegal treatment of workers in Chinese factories and the loopholes and tricks used to get around the system. All major American retailers have a system in place for inspecting, monitoring, and auditing factories for abuses to workers. In most cases, each supplier factory is required to undergo a yearly factory audit that checks on such things as underage workers, fair pay, and safety. If a factory fails, they must make changes to come up to code, much as a restaurant would have to do if it failed a health inspection, or face consequences. These changes can be very costly, and so of course factory owners find ways to cut corners. There are many practices used, such as having two sets of books, one with the actual employee’s age and time sheets, and one with false information, or coaching workers on how to respond to inspectors if questioned, or even good old fashioned bribery. None of this is new, but the article does mention one very interesting trend: a new industry has sprung up to help factories out. For a $5000 fee you can hire a consultant from Shanghai Corporate Responsibility Management & Consulting Co. to come to your factory and “solve” your audit problem. Of course, the consulting firms’ stance is that they only assist factories in making legitimate improvements to come up to code, but the Business Week article mentioned above interviewed a former worker, Tang Yinghong, at Ningbo Beifa Group, a factory which supplies various items to Wal-Mart:

Lai [Mingwei, the consultant] provided advice on how to create fake but authentic-looking records and suggested that Beifa hustle any workers with grievances out of the factory on the day of the audit, Tang recounts. […] After following much of Lai's advice, the Beifa factory in Ningbo passed the audit earlier this year, Tang says, even though the company didn't change any of its practices.

While American companies do make good faith efforts to try and stop unethical practices, and Chinese factory owners, for the most part, are willing to comply where reasonable, all too often ethical treatment is trumped by the almighty dollar. The American consumer wants low prices and every retailer’s number one strategy is to provide that. Time and time again, price is the determining factor in a consumer’s choice. You only have to look as far as declining customer service as an example of how that strategy didn’t work as well as 10% less cost did when trying to draw customers. For example, Home Depot built there business on customer service: “You Can Do It, We Can Help”, remember? However, having an ex-plumber or electrician work in your store costs a lot more than an 18 year kid working over the summer, so experience goes by the wayside and a few pennies less to Joe Consumer (and another point or two to the company’s margin) takes over.

This price pinch, of course, stretches to the suppliers as well. To pay their workers more and to implement certain safety practices costs money. Most Chinese suppliers make very low margin, the money is in the volume, so an extra 5-10% cost can be the difference between making money and breaking even. Every major retailer will fight tooth and nail to keep prices the same for products year after year, even if material prices go up. Every retailer knows that there are 100 other Chinese guys waiting to get the business if a current supplier can’t perform. If material prices are the same for everyone, and labor prices are supposed to be the same, where do those extra savings come from? All too often it’s from cutting corners. The retailers know this, but they have to show that they are trying to curb unethical practices. As long as Joe Consumer thinks that the store he shops at is cracking down on unethical practices, his conscience is clear to buy cheaper socks.

The problem, of course, is on both sides. American companies could agree to raise prices a bit to allow for more ethical practices, and implement even stricter audit regulations, but at the same time the deception would most likely still go on, and the factory owner would pocket the extra cash. Unfortunately, human nature is such that saving a few bucks trumps any altruistic good we wish on our fellow man. This is true no matter what country you’re in.

This being the case, the only thing that could possibly change the system would be to put some power into the worker’s hands. Of course, even now, the worker is not forced to work in the factories. He chooses it because it allows for a better life. It still may not be fair or ethical, and this certainly isn’t an argument for the rightness of unfair practices, but the worker does make the decision that the extra money is worth the long hours and low pay. However, there are changes in the air. Wages are increasing and hours are decreasing for factory workers. The main reason is there has been a massive shortage of workers over the past year.

Most years, Chinese New Year puts a dent in production schedules, especially for spring goods. The reason is that many workers do not return from vacation. They go back home, get comfortable, and decide time with their family is more important than venturing back to the city. However, last year after Chinese New Year, around 1.7 million workers didn’t return. The problem has only gotten worse for factories in southern China.

Why the shortage? One reason is that the Chinese government recently repealed many of the taxes they had on farms. With the extra money, more farmers can stay and work at home instead of seeking out work in the city. But the biggest reason is China’s “one-child” policy. Every couple is allowed only one child by law. This went into effect 18 years ago, so the current emerging work force comes from a generation where there are no brothers and sisters. This decline in the workforce combined with the fact that a family with only one child will put all of their resources into that one child has caused the migrant worker pool to dwindle (read more in this NYT article). Also, the large amount of business done in China has caused larger and larger factories to emerge, which can pay workers better and offer more benefits and with the rise in technology, workers from different factories can communicate easier on what they are making.

While there is a long way to go, the money we are pouring into China does seem to be improving the quality of life there. In fact, some companies are beginning to source in countries such as Bangladesh because labor rates are rising in China. While we should continue to monitor abuses, and should punish them when found, we also must hope that the market will allow for better conditions naturally. This isn’t to say we just sit back and wait, there is much that can be done to care for people well, and we should be active in it, but you can’t change human nature. As much as I hate to admit it, in many cases, market forces do a better job of policing us than we do.

Paradise Now

Last night I attended a viewing of the movie Paradise Now at Georgia Tech, which is the story of two suicide bombers in Palestine. The movie was followed by a brief lecture and discussion. As you may recall, this movie was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards this past year. The movie was very well made. The acting was excellent, as was the writing, which is amazing considering the danger the crew faced while making the movie: the location manager was kidnapped during filming and six members of the crew quit after a missile destroyed a car yards away from where they were working. These real life difficulties give extra impact to what is happening on screen. You realize that this is not just another movie.

The director insisted that, "the film is simply meant to open a discussion. It does not condone the taking of lives." This hardly kept the controversy away, as you can imagine. However, I do feel that it is an important movie to be shown and a discussion worth having. The movie does humanize the suicide bombers, but the thing we forget is that they are human. The interesting story here, and the almost unbearable sadness, is what leads a man to this. Having an understanding doesn't make the action right, these bombings are still horrible atrocities almost beyond words, but it does lead insight into the problem, and perhaps allows for a path to a solution.

The main point of the discussion that followed the movie was that the narrative of the Palestinian is one that is absent from most American news and discussions, which is true. The entire region is labeled "terrorist" and cast aside. While there are many people and organizations in the region that are terrorists, that do take innocent life, there are many that just want a peaceful solution. The best way to reach this is for both sides to understand the story of the other. The speaker after the movie claimed that no resolution will be made until an Israeli Jew and a Palestinian Arab can reach out to each other in mutual understanding and good will. This sounds nice of course, but the reality is much more difficult. Most of the time it seems that all we can do is hope and pray for peace and stability in the region, for all people, but it should also be our responsibility to learn both sides and educate ourselves on an extremely complex situation.

News in Review I

Great News for Gourmands

Obese mice on a high-fat diet got the benefits of being thin — living healthier, longer lives — without the pain of dieting when they consumed huge doses of red wine extract, according to a landmark new study. -from 11/02/06 AP story

Great! So, now, as long as what works for mice will work for humans, we can gorge ourselves on fatty foods and cancel it out by washing it all down with some red wine! Don't worry about diet or excercise; revel in your Epicurean lifestyle! Man, if this is true, I'm eating Big Mac's with a bottle of Merlot every night.

Surprise!

Amanda Brisendine attributed the 30 pounds she gained in the past year to an abandoned smoking habit and rich food. So when she went to the hospital with sharp stomach pain, she wasn't expecting to leave with a newborn son. -from 11/01/06 AP story

Now, granted, I know very little about pregnancy, and I don't want to be one of those men that puts his foot in his mouth about something he will never truly understand, but, what!? How do you go 9 months and not know you're pregnant?

Woman: "Honey, good news! I found a great weight loss solution!"
Man:"Oh yea, what's that?"
Woman: "C-section! Meet your new son!"

Um...Why is this News?

Barb Dougherty, a 30-year Postal Service employee, said she was attacked and bitten Monday by a squirrel while delivering mail in Oil City, about 75 miles north of Pittsburgh. -from 11/02/06 AP story

I mean, sure, it's a bit odd, but c'mon. War, faminine, disease, and squirrel bites... At any rate, at least the mail was delivered...come rain, snow, or small furry animals!

North Korea at Night

This is an amazing photograph I stumbled across on this site. It was taken by a satellite in October of 2000. While Kim Jong Il is spending billions on his military and chemical and nuclear weapons (not to mention his affinity for lavish living, such as expensive wine) his country of 23 million people does not even have light at night. The website notes that the lights in the Sea of Japan are fishing vessels which use bright lights to lure squid. Yes, a satellite photo of Asia shows fishing vessels with more lights than the entire country of North Korea. It's hard to comprehend. Please pray for the people of North Korea.

Amish Faith Shines

There was an excellent article in the Dallas Morning News last Friday about the faith of the Amish after the tragedy that occurred there. There really isn't anything more I can say; the article speaks for itself.

North Korea Part II

The headline of this article on CNN caught my eye this morning: “N. Korea Sees US Pressure as an Act of War”. The official quote from North Korea’s Foreign Ministry:

"If the U.S. keeps pestering us and increases pressure, we will regard it as a declaration of war and will take a series of physical corresponding measures."

North Korea is not getting the reaction they wanted from their nuclear tests, so they’re upping the ante. They either want the US to make a dumb move and win some public approval, and then bargaining rights to get more free stuff, or they want to force the US into bilateral talks. North Korea is trying to force opinion against the US by saying things like, “the issue of future nuclear tests is linked to U.S. policy toward our country.” You can tell they don’t want war (though a North Korean diplomat did offer this gem, "we hope the situation will be resolved before an unfortunate incident of us firing a nuclear missile comes") they just want more leverage in bargaining. Also from the Foreign Ministry statement:

"Even though we conducted the nuclear test because of the U.S., we still remain committed to realizing the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula through dialogue and negotiations."

It would almost be funny if it weren’t such a volatile situation to everyone in the region and the suffering North Koreans. I remain hopeful that the situation will be resolved without anything blowing up (there is still speculation that perhaps the test wasn’t a nuclear warhead at all, or a dud that shows they still are not quite there yet), but nothing changes the state of the North Korean people. They are being held hostage by a crazed dictator waving nuclear weapons in the world’s face. Kim Jong Il knows the world has sympathy for his people and he uses this to gain even more from the world. As I said before, I hope this is just a mind game, but also one that we can win, not just for our sake, but the sake of the Korean people.

Update: Monkey see, monkey do...Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said this regarding Iran's nuclear program during a televised speech Wednesday: "these three or four countries are bullying and have no right to interfere in these issues and the Security Council has no right to interfere." Guess he thought Kim Jong Il had a good angle.

North Korea

I just read a fascinating, albeit lengthy, article from the Atlantic Monthly about the situation with North Korea. Of course tensions have been high in Korea for over 50 years, but especially as of late with the recent nuclear tests. It seems to me that the Kim Jong Il is doing everything he can to get leverage in an increasingly failing state. This is the reason for the very public announcements of missile tests and nuclear tests. The more aid he can coerce out of the world, the more time he has as leader. How to deal with North Korea is the difficult question. No one wants war with a country that has a million-man army and an extensive stockpile of chemical and biological weapons, while at the same time economic sanctions that cause the country to collapse could create an enormous humanitarian crisis and a very dangerous security crisis with nuclear and chemical weapons up for grabs. Whatever we do, it needs to be well thought out. While Kim Jong Il may be crazy, he is more in line with “evil-genius” crazy. The article describes him thusly:

Expertly tutored by his father, Kim consolidated power and manipulated the Chinese, the Americans, and the South Koreans into subsidizing him throughout the 1990s. And Kim is hardly impulsive: he has the equivalent of think tanks studying how best to respond to potential attacks from the United States and South Korea—attacks that themselves would be reactions to crises cleverly instigated by the North Korean government in Pyongyang. “The regime constitutes an extremely rational bunch of killers,” [professor of history at South Korea’s Kookmin University Andrei] Lankov says.

Kim Jong Il is ready for the game, I just hope we are as well.

More on 9/11 Conspiracy Theories

I read an interesting article, by Edward Feser about the 9/11 conspiracy theories and why people are so inclined to believe them. The author's main point is that the tendency towards conspiracy theories comes from Enlightenment thinking that authority should inherently not be trusted (he does make the point that this comes from the faulty view that the middle ages was a dark and unlearned time, but that is another post for another day). His point is not that we should blindly follow authority, but that it is the foundation for any further thinking. The fallacy is that it is impossible to discount any previous authority and start fresh as you must start somewhere. He draws a parallel between this fallacy used by conspiracy theorists and one used by secularists to discount Christianity:

Even very radical shifts in worldview typically presuppose a deep level of continuity between the view that was abandoned and the one that comes to be adopted. Hence the Protestant who converts to Catholicism (or vice versa) does so on the basis of religious premises both traditions have in common. Hence the secularist who rejects Christianity as a whole typically does so on the basis of scientific and moral principles that developed out of the Christian tradition itself. (See here, here, and here.) And hence the conspiracy theorist who claims to believe that the government and the media are in thrall to some purportedly sinister force or other (the military-industrial complex, the Mossad, or whatever)invariably bases his theory precisely on materials drawn from these sources (such as newspaper accounts and television news broadcasts, and even the Warren Commission and 9/11 Commission reports, which JFK assassination buffs and 9/11 fantasists, respectively, comb for evidence to support their case).

So the conspiracy theorist cites evidence to his case from the very sources that he seeks to disqualify. The author goes on to cite a similar fallacy that the authority the conspiracy theorist questions is very often only the authority that disagrees with his point, while authorities that agree are cited without question. This is obviously faulty thinking, but an interesting side note would be to show the below video. Very often the end of 9/11 conspiracy theories is to show that the Bush administration was one of the main benefactors of 9/11 and so must have been involved in causing or at lease allowing it to happen. This is a very attractive view for those on the left that are blindly against the Bush administration (as an aside, I am in no way saying the Bush administration is without fault or has handled everything well. They have made many mistakes, but to say that they caused 9/11 or other such nonsense is only to deny your purpose because then honest criticism is often overlooked as more lunacy from the left). At any rate, perhaps the best argument would be to show the below statements by leftist darling Noam Chomsky. But then, I suppose he would be an authority and must be questioned, right?

Pervez Musharraf

The president of Pakistan, Pervez Musharraf, has been a name we have heard here for several years now. After 9/11, Musharraf pledged support for the US in the battle with terrorism, and specifically against the Taliban in Afghanistan. Recently, we have heard his name pop up with more frequency. He was here for the UN conference and also spent some time promoting his new book: In the Line of Fire. The majority of the rhetoric surrounding Musharraf has always been positive, and as this article notes, perhaps too positive for a man who seized control of his government in a coup and where there are questions about how "democratic" the elections have been to secure his control in the years since, but on the whole he has been seen to be a strong ally. The past week, I've been reading articles here and there relating to Musharraf, and the interesting idea I've stumbled across is that the seeming contradictions in Musharraf are really contradictions in many of the Muslim countries as a whole. What we see is a paradox of ideas: that of traditional Muslim ideology and values, and the ideology and values of the West that are being spread, directly and indirectly through them.

With all of the positive rhetoric we have heard, I always assumed Musharraf was pretty solid in our court. I suppose this was naive optimism, but during an interview with the president on The Daily Show, the fact that we are dealing with a man, running a nuclear country that could very easily change his mind about his support became clear. I'm not saying he's going to go against us, but the recent controversy surrounding whether former deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage, told a key official in Pakistan after 9/11 that they had better support us or else we would bomb them into the stone age has shown some cracks of division. Armitage has claimed this statement was false, and I'm sure he would never use the phrase "bomb into the stone age", but I also don't doubt that he was surely a bit on the firm side in the conversation, and it does make you wonder how much support is due to goodwill and how much is due to force. At any rate, the interview is an interesting one to watch, so for your convenience see below:



And so the paradox I mention shown in Musharraf is really a reflection of the country he leads. My friend Christina was in Pakistan last April and two posts on her blog really capture this separateness, this paradox of Middle Eastern and Western ideas, very well. The first is about Islamabad, which is a thoroughly modern and westernized city. The second is about the trip taken to the earthquake zone. The picture with the entry says quite a bit by itself.

All of this is not to question our alliance with Musharraf and Pakistan, but to realize that situations are usually more complicated than they appear on the surface. Having an understanding of a culture like Pakistan's is essential to understanding the alliance, and the entire global situation.

The Pope and Controversy

Last week Pope Benedict XVI made some comments in Germany that inflamed the Muslim world once again. This of course is nothing new. It seems that with increasing regularity there are reports of uprisings because of comments someone somewhere made about Islam or Mohammed. An article on the recent uprising and a short summary of other such events are listed here. These include Salman Rushdie for the publication of his novel The Satanic Verses, which portray Mohammed in an unfavorable light. A Fatwa was placed on his head and he went into hiding for the next couple of decades. He escaped murder, but unfortunately his Japanese translator wasn’t so lucky. It also mentions the more recent event involving the Danish cartoons. Most remember this bit of chaos, so I’ll refrain from any further explanation. So, what did the Pope say that made so many, so angry?

"Without descending to details, such as the difference in treatment accorded to those who have the 'Book' and the 'infidels', [Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologus] addresses his interlocutor with a startling brusqueness, a brusqueness which leaves us astounded, on the central question about the relationship between religion and violence in general, saying: 'Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached'. The emperor, after having expressed himself so forcefully, goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. 'God', he says, 'is not pleased by blood - and not acting reasonably is contrary to God's nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats."

The offending point is, of course, the quote from Emperor Paleologus. Claiming that Islam has nothing new to offer except violence and evil is a bit over the top, but the Pope was not using it as his main point. It was simply an illustration of how violence should not be used to spread religion; instead it should be through reason and discourse. So, how did the offending parties respond? With a carefully worded rebuttal? Honest debate? No, they responded with this:

The Pope has since apologized for his remarks, which was perhaps the best course of action for a public leader to take, however, his point was made. The scary thing is that this violence is not just chaos, it has a goal in mind. The goal for the Islamofascist movement is an Islamic state where Sharia would be in place. One tenant of Sharia is that of Dhimmitude, which is a term used to allude to the conduct of non-muslims in a state ruled by Sharia. These inhabitants must submit and cede their individual rights such as free speech. We are not in an Islamic state, but the Islamofascist movement is winning on this point. While there is still criticism, many media outlets and public figures are afraid to say anything. After the Pope apologized, Iranian President Ahmadinejad said in an interview with Brian Williams of NBC: “I think that he actually takes back his statement. And there is no problem.” That’s precisely what’s scary: any criticism, any statement, anything at all not found favorable is unacceptable. Take it back, though, and there’s no problem. So much for reasoned discourse.

A World War

"On that day [September 11], we learned what we ought to have known already, which is that clerical fanaticism means to fight a war which can only have one victor. Afghans, Kurds, Kashmiris, Timorese and many others could have told us this from experience and for nothing (and did warn us, especially in the person of Ahmad Shah Massoud, leader of Afghanistan's Northern Alliance). Does anyone suppose that an ideology that slaughters and enslaves them will ever be amenable to 'us'?"

In this article, Christopher Hitchens nails the point that the war we are fighting is not just a war against “us” the United States, but a war against everyone who has suffered, been oppressed, or done battle with Islamic fundamentalism. I think that all too often we see this as “our” war and not the world war that it is. Of course it is right to mourn for our fallen, but there have been many fallen in many parts of the world at the hands of the same enemy. We should mourn together and find resolve and strength with our brothers and sisters in other oppressed regions.

You may not agree with the tactics that have been taken in this war or how it is being fought, but it is hard to disagree with the fact that there is a war. There have been many conspiracy theories that 9/11 was nothing more than a charade to allow consolidated power and a movement to a new world government by the elite. Personally, I think this enters tin foil hat territory, but I think it shows a certain naiveté in the population that people would be more willing to grasp onto a giant conspiracy theory to explain things instead of what is really happening. There is a real enemy that is not the stuff of graphic novels and pulp fiction.

The question is, how do we shake this image, and in some ways it is deserved, of the giant un-feeling hegemon? A hegemon we most certainly are, but this is a war that needs allies. In a battle such as this one even the smallest player has a role and we would be foolish to ignore any and all help that we can get.

Breeding Ideology

The article linked to in the subject is another comment on the repercussions of falling fertility rates among certain groups. This time, it is liberal voters in the US. It claims that the Democratic Party may be in for some challenges if its potential voter base keeps declining. Since most people tend to follow the voting nature of their parents, if Democratic voters are not having babies that will make for a lot less Democratic voters in the future. The author, Arthur C. Brooks, sites the 2004 General Social Survey:

“[I]f you picked 100 unrelated politically liberal adults at random, you would find that they had, between them, 147 children. If you picked 100 conservatives, you would find 208 kids.”

Why is this? The easiest answer I can come to would relate to the lifestyle choices of each group. With nothing to back this up but my own perception, liberal, Democratic voters, tend to congregate in cities, and have a focus on their individual career instead of family, while conservative, Republican voters, live in suburbia or rural areas, and put focus on child rearing and family. This explains why perhaps having children is not as conducive to the “liberal lifestyle”, but it still doesn’t explain why liberal values correlate with low birth rates. I suppose the best explanation for that is the rejection of “traditional” values as outdated and a desire for progress, hence the term “progressives”, and family being a “traditional” institution. If you have other ideas, feel free to leave them in the comments section. The article doesn’t answer the question except through a humorous quote cited to “a liberal columnist in a major paper”:

"Maybe the scales are tipping to the neoconservative, homogenous right in our culture simply because they tend not to give much of a damn for the ramifications of wanton breeding and environmental destruction and pious sanctimony, whereas those on the left actually seem to give a whit for the health of the planet and the dire effects of overpopulation."

I suppose the appropriate conservative response could be, “yea, maybe it’s just because liberals can’t get any. Ha!” At any rate, it’s certainly an interesting topic. Of course, this is not a hard and fast rule. I have friends who are liberal and want/have multiple children and I have friends who tend to the conservative side and do not want children. But perhaps in general, the type that does not desire children tends to agree with the liberal side in our current political climate. The article goes on to show what will happen if the current trend continues and basically rules out any future victory for the Democratic Party. I think the pendulum effect will come into play, though: as one political viewpoint reaches the mainstream there is always a reaction, even if it has to come from folks whose parents would be ashamed of their voting record.

Another interesting aspect of this phenomenon is that it has been noted for some time now in Europe. The aforelinked (did I just create a word? Cool.) BBC article lists the sustainable birthrate level in Europe to be 2.1 children per woman and shows most countries at a much lower level (anywhere from 1.29 in Greece to 1.99 in Ireland). This certainly could have an effect on the political climate of Europe, but as Niall Ferguson, professor of History at Harvard, writes in his article “The Origins of the Great War of 2007” (oh, and sorry for all the doomsday stuff lately, guess it’s just been on my mind), it could have a much larger effect as well. He sites that while the population of Europe is falling on the whole, the Muslim population is on the rise and this could play into the cause of a major global struggle. He writes:

“In 1950, there had three times as many people in Britain as in Iran. By 1995, the population of Iran had overtaken that of Britain and was forecast to be 50 percent higher by 2050”

Great, so just on the horizon we’re going to have the great Redneck vs. Islamofascist wars to look forward to. Man, that could make for some interesting satire…but I will refrain. Again, I don’t think that we should over generalize. Not every child of Republican parents is going to vote Republican and most children of Muslim parents are not going to be terrorists, but the statistical trends do lead to interesting analysis and you can’t deny that the more people you have of a certain ideology, the stronger that view will be in the world.

I would be interested to see if any similar trends took place in history. I would imagine only recently have we been at a point with such wealth, not to mention multiple birth control solutions that this could even be a factor. Probably what you would find in history is the forceful removal of an idea via limiting the breeding process. It’s interesting to see it happening voluntarily now and only time will tell which way it will swing.

Iran

The article linked here, titled “August 22, Does Iran Have Something in Store?” is well worth the read. I’m getting around to this a bit late as the article was published in the WSJ on August 8, 2006, and the date the article speculates about is tomorrow, however it still has interesting insight into the nature of the Islamist Fascist movement and Iran specifically. The article, by Bernard Lewis a well respected professor Emeritus at Princeton who is considered one of the preeminent authorities on the Middle East, describes that the probability of a nuclear encounter with Iran is far greater than it was during the Cold War. His reasoning is that during the Cold War there was the idea of Mutual Assured Destruction. If one side started launching warheads, the other would reciprocate, and soon there would be nothing left. Lewis claims that this theory is useless now because we are dealing with an enemy that sees destruction as positive an outcome as victory. He sites an example of this thinking:

A passage from the Ayatollah Khomeini, quoted in an 11th-grade Iranian schoolbook, is revealing. "I am decisively announcing to the whole world that if the world-devourers [i.e., the infidel powers] wish to stand against our religion, we will stand against their whole world and will not cease until the annihilation of all them. Either we all become free, or we will go to the greater freedom which is martyrdom. Either we shake one another's hands in joy at the victory of Islam in the world, or all of us will turn to eternal life and martyrdom. In both cases, victory and success are ours."

His ultimate conclusion is that, while there’s a good chance it won’t happen, something big could happen on August 22. Why? The article reads:

This year, Aug. 22 corresponds, in the Islamic calendar, to the 27th day of the month of Rajab of the year 1427. This, by tradition, is the night when many Muslims commemorate the night flight of the prophet Muhammad on the winged horse Buraq, first to "the farthest mosque," usually identified with Jerusalem, and then to heaven and back ( c.f., Koran XVII.1). This might well be deemed an appropriate date for the apocalyptic ending of Israel and if necessary of the world. It is far from certain that Mr. Ahmadinejad plans any such cataclysmic events precisely for Aug. 22. But it would be wise to bear the possibility in mind.

While the August 22 date is interesting and makes sense, tomorrow will most likely not be the day that there is a major cataclysmic event, but it certainly is a starting point. Last week Iran began test firing missiles and announced a new military buildup called “Zolfaghar Blow" after the two-point sword of Ali, the cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet Mohammed. Today the news stories are that Iran is refusing to end its nuclear program (this has been the stance for awhile, but the deadline is now upon us). Iran is definitely building up for a fight and the scary thing is the leadership welcomes it. While I would hesitate to call this extreme ideology the majority opinion in the Muslim world, it certainly is not one solely relegated to the fringes as is evidenced by the radical nature of Mr. Ahmadinejad’s rhetoric (calling the holocaust a myth and speaking of awaiting the return of the 12th Imam). So, how do you combat an enemy that has no fear of dying and in fact welcomes it? How do we approach Iran? We’ve already made it clear we won’t accept a nuclear Iran, however another war is certainly not something we could handle right now and would be amazingly difficult. Let’s hope diplomacy works, because we’re right on the brink here.