A plea-deal between British arms dealer BAE and U.S. and U.K. officials may lead to more information regarding Augusto Pinochet embezzling money while president and senator. While Pinochet has been dead for over three years, many of his family members have been tied to the embezzlement, and given their complicity in his regime and his finances, this is good news.
Plan Colombia has a fascinating post detailing the U.S. spending on Latin America generally, and U.S. spending on Latin America when you take Mexico and Colombia out of the equation. While general spending on the region will be almost $2.6 billion in 2010 and nearly $2.1 billion in 2010 (a 15% drop in spending), the non-Mexico/non-Colombia number plummet: $1.3 billion dollars budgeted for the region in 2010, and nearly $1.4 billion for 2011.
This is interesting for a few reasons; first, there's the fact that, apparently, federal spending on Colombia and Mexico constitutes almost half of the budget this year. That's not remarkably surprising, but the figures are still rather stark. I think it's also intriguing that spending on non-Colombia/non-Mexico countries next year actually increases, even while the budget decreases by 15%. Most of that spending is planned for social and economic programs, with almost none of it being military spending; by contrast, almost all of the spending on Colombia and Mexico is military spending (again, no surprise). It would be interesting to see a further breakdown of exactly where that money is going - aid to Central America seems fairly likely, while aid to Brazil may be relatively low, given how well Brazil's economy is doing. Still, it's a pretty interesting breakdown, and says a lot about policy in the region, especially with regard to where our military money is going and who we feel "only" needs social help.
Even if Alvaro Uribe is determined to be ineligible for a third term, it's quite possible that the next president of Colombia could be equally terrible on human rights. Uribe's former defense minister, Juan Manuel Santos, has said that if Uribe is ruled ineligible, Santos will be the candidate for the ruling Unity party. Santos's background as Minister of Defense is full of controversy. It was under his watch when the Colombian military attacked a FARC camp and killed Raul Reyes. While many Colombians were thrilled with the news, there was the little issue of Santos having the military violate Ecuadorian sovereignty in the attack. Additionally, Santos admitted that extrajudicial killings and the murder of civilians were not infrequent under his watch. While he claimed he admitted as much so that the Ministry could "resolve" the problem, he did not really take any substantial activity to combat tese type of extrajudicial and paramilitary activities, which continue to be one of the biggest problems for human rights in Colombia.
Santos's potential candidacy isn't some pipe dream, either. Certainly, Uribe is seeking re-re-election, a move that Congress has approved. However, the possibility of a third campaign for Uribe is not a done deal. While a top judge has recommended the rejection of a referendum on allowing a third term for Uribe, and even a majority of Colombians opposing a third term for the current president. While far from decisive, this legal and popular opposition gives some hope that democracy in Colombia can continue as it has. But with candidates like Santos, it's hard to imagine that there will be any real effort to rein in the out-of-control paramilitary activity in the country.
Shorter New Mexico Politicians: "Between allowing concealed weapons in restaurants and refusing to take a strong stand against drunk driving, we'll lower our state's population yet!"
Seriously - I don't understand why any legislative body would find setting a minimum prison sentence for drunk driving and reducing from four to three the number of DWIs before it becomes a felony to be objectionable. I understand the legislature is worried about cost to the state, but you're the legislature - find ways to reduce spending. Might I suggest firing a few regents on the UNM Board of Regents and reducing payroll ? Seriously - yes, the state is in a deficit, but this is the kind of law that makes as much sense to pass as anything. But no - New Mexico's legislators are apparently determined to make a strong push as "worst state-legislative body in the country." The competition is stiff, but with decisions like these, don't count New Mexico out yet.
[UPDATE] Well, at least they're willing to crack down on texting-while-driving...
I'm not as avid a tennis-follower as Karthika, but this editorial confuses me. Are journalists still doubting Roger Federer? This seems like questioning Jordan's skill and dedication after his sixth NBA title. Last I checked, Federer set the record for Grand Slam victories with 15 in the U.S. Open last year, and then just added a 16th in the Australian Open last week. That's 16 Grand Slam titles. More than Rod Laver. More than Pete Sampras. More than Andre Agassi, Boris Becker, Bjorn Borg, more than anybody in the history of the sport. If journalists are still questioning Federer's drive, devotion, skill, ability, future, anything other than how many more Grand Slams he'll win, they should immediately be stripped of their credentials.
This, from the title of the article to the text of the letter, is simply beyond ridiculous.
Bob Herbert published an excellent op-ed a few days ago commenting on discussions at the recent "The Next American Economy: Transforming Energy and Infrastructure Investment" conference. The conference took stock of the tremendous infrastructural problems facing the US economy, with a litany of complaints: bridges, roads, the electrical grid, air transport, stressed and leaking municipal water systems, dams, levees, etc. We could add much to that list, particularly an underdeveloped spectrum in the hands of private corporations (should we just say individuals now?), and of course higher education.
The conference was sparked by a sense of dismay over what has happened to the U.S. economy over the past several years and a feeling that constructive ideas about solutions were being smothered by an obsessive focus on the short-term in this society, and by the chronic dysfunction and hyperpartisanship in much of the government.
On this date in 1887, the U.S. Congress passed the Dawes Act, breaking up Native American lands.
By 1887, the white assault on indigenous people was nearly complete. By the Civil War, Native peoples east of the Mississippi has either been subjugated or driven west. On the West Coast, the rise of European-American settlement was causing havoc on indigenous peoples and the relatively decentralized tribes west of the Cascades and Sierra were precipitiously declining. Beginning during the war, the U.S. army and average civilians engaged in an all-out assault against the last holdout of indigenous peoples, the Great Plains, a process that would continue well into the twentieth century.
The 1870s saw most of the Plains Indians capitulate to white domination. Whites hunted the bison out, undermining food sources. Smallpox and other diseases continued ripping through the population. Alcoholism and suicide were on the rise. Whites took children from their homes and sent them to Indian schools in the east. There they faced physical punishment for speaking their own language. Racist whites commonly murdered random Indians. And despite the occasional victory such as at the Little Bighorn in 1876, superior white numbers and military force completely overwhelmed indigenous people.
Whites originally chose Oklahoma as Indian Territory because the government figured no whites would want to live there. They saw the Plains as the Great American Desert. But by the 1860s, these attitudes had changed. Whites wanted the Plains to build new cities, farms, ranches, and railroads. How to deal with the remnant Indian populations was the first question. First was to assume they would go away over time. Most Americans in the late 19th century believed Indians would be extinct in a century or so. A big boost to the new field of anthropology was the necessary to collect languages, art, and cultural artifacts from the Indians before they went extinction. We could keep them in museum collections like the passenger pigeon.
The other way to deal with the Indians was to find ways to expropriate their land. This process had already begun. The post-Civil War strategy to isolate Indians on worthless land known as reservations always came with the unwritten assumption that these borders could change at whites' discretion. The various Sioux peoples were given the Black Hills during the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868, but the subsequent discovery of gold forced them into much more marginal land east of the Hills.
Still, whites were constantly looking for new ways to take Indian lands. Massachusetts Senator Henry Dawes came upon a plan in the 1880s. Whites always talked a big game about assimiliating Indians into white culture. They never really cared about this much, but it made a good excuse to destroy Indian cultures. So Dawes introduced a bill into the Senate requiring Indians to take up 160 acre plots on their own reservations. Since their populations were dwlinding and since they used much of their land for hunting anyway, this created millions of acres Indians wouldn't farm. The government could then sell this land to whites.
And so they did. This process, known as allotment, opened up Oklahoma for white settlement and allowed whites to buy cheap lands across the Plains. It helped destroy traditional hunting cultures on the Plains, as this now private property couldn't be used for hunting. The Dawes Act was another important step on the road to forcing indigenous people under white domination. The act remained in effect until 1934, during which period oil was being discovered on Oklahoma lands still owned by indigenous peoples. Whites then developed new ways to steal the oil money, declaring most Indians unable to manage such resources and giving the money to white agents to oversee. Of course, most Indians never saw a dime of it.
In the 47 years the Dawes Act was in effect, 90 million acres were stolen from Indians, approximately 2/3 of their land in 1887. Around 90,000 people were left with no land at all.
-While ending DADT continues to stir debate in the U.S., it's far from the only country dealing with the issue of homosexuals in the armed forces. A Brazilian general has caused outrage in Brazil after commenting that gay soldiers should not be able to have troops under their command. Gen. Raymundo Nonato, who has been nominated to the top military court in Brazil, commented that while he believes homosexuals who kept their sexuality private should be allowed to remain in the military, he also believed that homosexual officers "will not be obeyed by his subordinates in combat situations."
-In a baffling decision that defies common sense and mocks justice, a Swiss court ruled that "at least $4.6 million from Swiss bank accounts previously awarded to charities must be returned to the family of former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier." The Duvalier family attained "its" wealth via the monopolization of the tobacco industry in Haiti, helping to keep the Haitian population in poverty even while the Duvaliers became millionaires. That this ruling happened just 12 hours before the earthquake was an extra thumb in the eye of Hatians; according to the report, the $4.6 million could have fed one million Hatians for two weeks.
-As General Reynaldo Bignone, the final dictator of Argentina's military dictatorship (1976-1983) went to trial for human rights abuses this week, he hopefully felt extremely uncomfortable upon seeing the images of the disappeared in the public gallery of the court.
-Finally, the Human Rights Watch report on Colombia came out. Not surprisingly, paramilitaries are a major focus, though exactly who these paramilitaries consist of and what to call them is increasingly challenging and complex. What is clear is that the current activities of paramilitaries draws upon the groundwork and actions of previous paramilitary groups, even while branching out and coming to incorporate elements of gangs as well as drug traffickers. The report also says that the AUC continues to be a major threat, as many of its soldiers never demobilized and new elements have entered into its forces. Overall, the report paints a very grim picture of the human rights situation in Colombia, and given Alvaro Uribe's neglect of these issues and connections to some of these paramilitary groups, and the likelihood that he will be elected to a third term later this year, there seems little hope that the situation will improve in Colombia anytime soon. The report is worth reading in its entirety (~120 pages) for those interested in human rights, Latin America, or policy. Still, gird yourself - it's depressing news all around, made even moreso by the fact that we're unlikely to see any improvements as long as Uribe is in office.
To follow up on yesterday's post, Costa Rica has in fact elected its first woman president. Laura Chinchilla finished with 48.1% of the vote, well above the minimum 40% needed to avoid a runoff. Otton Solis of the PAC finished in second with 25.1%, while Otto Guevara, who some analysts suggested might finish second due to a late surge, finished with 20.9%. Chinchilla's relatively overwhelming victory is somewhat surprising; Abel Pacheco of the PSUC was forced into a run-off in 2002, and in 2006, though Oscar Arias avoided a runoff, he barely won, getting 40.9% of the vote to Solis's 39.8%.
Looking at the previous election, Guevara may be encouraged with his result, as he jumped from 8.5% in 2006 to 20.9% this year. On the flipside, Solis very well may be discouraged, as he dropped nearly 15% in the popular vote with a total drop in votes of almost 200,000 between 2006 and 2010. What is more, this election may have served as a notice that Solis's policies aren't as popular as they once were or that he's simply not quite charismatic enough anymore to win.
As for why Chinchilla was elected, there are probably a variety of factors at play. Certainly, Chinchilla's political skill played a role in her election, and her role as Arias's vice-president and Minister of Justice clearly gave her a high level of visibility and experience. While I never heard her speak, she may have been charismatic, too. Additionally, she may have garnered some of the vote due to a mobilized base that rallied around her identity as a woman. Finally, one can point to the relative economic and political stability Costa Rica has continued to display under Arias, even as other countries in the region have suffered politically and economically. Certainly, Arias's free trade agreements have angered some, but Solis seems to have pinned his hopes on anti-free trade sentiment and a need for "change," and neither apparently mattered to a near majority of the Costa Rican electorate this year. I suspect (though future studies will determine this) that the potential for continued stability played a major role in this year's election, as Chinchilla promised to continue Arias's economic policies.
From here, it will be interesting to see how Chinchilla governs. Some groups have expressed legitimate concerns on her stances on homosexuality and abortion; even if comments and actions she made with regards to these issues during the campaign were political moves, it opens her up to charges of pandering to baser social and political groups in Costa Rican politics. Additionally, if she is unable to keep Costa Rica's economic and political stability going, she will be open to attacks from both Solis's more progressive PAC and Guevara's libertarianism. As president of a party in the center-left (falling very closely to the center), she'll have politicians on either side of her ready to pounce from the left if she makes any errors in economic or social policy. Additionally, where Solis and his PAC (which has been successful in congressional elections) go from here will be worth watching, as will Guevara's efforts to continue to expand his libertarian appeal.
With the Super Bowl (and NFL season) over, it's time to turn towards things that actually matter. Namely: baseball.
Peter Gammons, in his new home at MLB.com, chimed in on the issue of disparity a few weeks ago. Some of what he said isn't new - the top-market teams are able to shell out more money for free agents and buy up guys the smaller-market teams can't afford; the trend of trading stars and Cy Young winners before their contracts expire out of concern small-market teams can't afford them is startling; and the fact that there's little motivation for small-market teams to move into the middle range of salaries.
He also had some interesting observations to throw into the mix, though. One of the more interesting ones was the Marlins, who "have been singled out for not allocating enough of their revenue-sharing money on Major League salaries, but they must have allocated something right, because they've had winning seasons five of the past seven years, including 2008 and 2009. They have finished ahead of the Braves, proving that paying for good scouts and minds is more important than $3.1 million of mediocrity." This is true, but I don't think it should serve as a model that other teams should replicate. In this comments thread, the idea of a salary floor, rather than a salary cap, came up.
But Gammons also offers some evidence that a floor may not solve the problem: "The way the system is right now, there really is no difference between a $75 million and $40 million payroll," said Oakland GM Billy Beane. "I think a lot of small-market clubs look at that and ask, 'Why pay $75 million when $40 million will buy me as many wins?' " First, let's get past the cult of Billy Beane and his teams' shortcomings in the playoffs to acknowledge that he's a smart and good GM. His observation is fairly accurate - in terms of how teams finish in the standings, there is almost no difference between $75 and $40 million. Yes, teams like the Rays or Twins make runs, but they are usually exceptions that prove the rule, and how many of those low-budget teams have won the World Series in the last 15 years? The floor may make teams spend more, certainly, but I'm not sure that would actually solve the problem of disparity between those teams with lower budgets and the big-market teams. I originally really liked the idea of a floor, but I'm not sure it would actually solve the problem of the resources available to lower-budget teams. As Cleveland's own far-from-stupid Mark Shapiro put it, "When [GM] Theo Epstein took over in Boston, he changed the industry [...]Now we see the Red Sox and Yankees operating as if they're creative mid- to small-market teams, and it's widened the gap between them and some of the other franchises."
This I think really does get to the crux of the issue, and quite honestly, not only am I sure how to solve it; I'm not sure it can be solved.
To be clear, this isn't some Yankee- and Red-Sox-bashing rant. I think they absolutely have every right to operate under the same intelligent model as every other team; unfortunately for every other team and their fanbases, that's exactly what teams like the Yanks, Sox, and Dodgers have begun doing (and no doubt Mets fans wish Minaya would do). The days of owners like Steinbrenner incompetently interfering with their GMs is mostly over; even Peter Angelos has apparently finally learned that lesson.
But how do smaller-market teams deal with the financial issue? Certainly, it varies from team to team; for now, for example, the Indians (and others) have to hope that a bunch of minor-league potential-stars become major league stars at exactly the same time (in a 1-3 year window) in order to win a title, before scrapping and starting over. However, Beane faces a very different challenge; the A's simply need to get out of that stadium in Oakland. But if they move to San Jose, it may help them but set a potentially dangerous precedent for moves for other teams underperforming (why hello, Florida teams).
Certainly, the meeting between owners, GMs, and Selig sounds from all sides like it was hugely useful in clearing the air, but that doesn't mean there's any solution to the disparity problem as yet. Perhaps it will be grassroots, with individual GMs revolutionizing the management of teams yet again; perhaps it will come from some sort of revenue- or economical-decision from up on high. Certainly, the growing disparity isn't baseball's only problem; as Gammons points out, there's the matter of training umpires, setting up a new collective bargaining agreement, and the conflict between players and team medical staffs, especially in the case of the Mets. To be clear, I don't think baseball's apocalypse is nigh; far from it. But at the same time, to deny the basic structural problems it will be facing in the very near future is naive. I realize musings like these don't get anybody any closer to anything, but it does make for excellent, if occasionally worrisome, thought and discussion on where baseball is, and where it's headed. And in less than 10 days, pitchers and catchers will report, and we can focus on other things...
First of all, great game. Pretty clean, good schemes for both teams, and some dramatic lead changes. As a fan, it always sucks when the team you've been watching since you were a kid loses, but honestly, this is the best of possible losses. The storybook ending is pretty cool, and New Orleans must be a madhouse right now. Wish I could have done the live blog.
My notes:
1) I have to respect the stones of Sean Payton-- the onside kick to start the second half was very cool.
2) Brees was amazing, and the coaching staff did a fantastic job preparing and cleaning up what was a terribly sloppy performance in the NFC championship game.
3) The Colts have nothing to be ashamed of-- they played a good game and just came up a little short on a few plays. I'm damned excited to see Garcon and Collie next year with all this experience under their belt; adding Gonzo back to the fold will be fierce.
4) The shots of Brees and Fujita with their kids after the game was pretty cool, too (I'm not usually such a sucker for that kind of stuff, but it was strangely affecting tonight).
5) There's always a kind of hangover after the Superbowl; the prospect of no meaningful football until September is a drag.
6) My dislike for the politics of the guy aside, the Tebow ad was more tasteful than I thought it would be. I still question the appropriateness of an ad like that running on the Superbowl, but it could have been a lot worse.
7) The Denny's chickens were my favorite ad trope, though I kind of liked the Mark Sanchez ad, strangely enough.
8) Superbowl menu at the Dean's house: Smoked and sauced chicken wings, Indiana-style fried pork tenderloin sandwiches, guacamole with locally grown avocados, homemade potato chips smothered in Maytag blue cheese crumbles, and sliders (you know, for good measure), plus liberal amounts of our local craft brew. All awesome.
9) I'd like to point out that my Superbowl "best bets" I posted in some comment thread (Indy +3 first half and the game total under 57) both cashed.
8:47--LS--A good game. Nearly no penalties and only the single turnover that was the difference. I'm surprised the Colts couldn't get anything going after the first quarter, but the Saints called an excellent defensive game, even if they didn't touch Manning once. Big drunk night in NO, and that's it for me.
8:29--LS--Ballgame! Peyton screws the pooch.
8:05--LS--Way to go, old man. This is the Saints' opportunity. If they can get a TD here, they stand a really good chance of winning this game.
On a side note, does this game seem incredibly fast, or is it just that I'm stuffed with smoked meat?
7:40--LS--I'll take The Who before Clark W. Griswold, any day.
7:22--LS--SNAP!! Oh, doctor! Great call on the onside...totally sick.
7:13--EL--You hope you die before you get old, eh? The Who, fail.
Was Tony Bennett not available? Or the ghost of Frank Sinatra. I mean, the NFL wouldn't want a repeat of Janet or anything. Old and white makes that unlikely.
6:41--LS--2010 takes the cake for ad offensiveness.
6:31--LS--With over half a quarter without any Phil-osophies, I've completely lost track of what's going on in this game.
6:22--LS--Do there really have to be two underpants ads in a row...really?
6:14--LS--Smoking my first brisket worked out better than I could have hoped, and a batch of Hurricanes just came out. Things are looking up....
6:07--EL--Lyrad may have just won live blog post of the night. Also, Doritos is actually challenging Bud Light's decade long supremacy for most stupid fucking Super Bowl commercials. Who will win this battle for shititude?
6:04--LS--Coke's message is their soda is as outdated as The Simpsons.
6:04--EL--More commercials--Simpson have their first good idea in 8 years. Also, Go Daddy is utterly loathsome.
6:01--EL--Wow, the Colts look invincible right now. The Saints really need points.
5:48--LS--For the second straight time, the Phil-osophy comes down to: it's good for a QB to throw to the open receiver.
And, yes, White and Vigoda are awesome. I've been watching a lot of "Match Game" lately, and she can be pretty mean.
5:45--EL--CBS really watered down that Tebow ad thank Vishnu. Still, fuck that motherfucker. A right-wing Jeter. Just what the world needed. Tebow makes me wish for more abortions.
In other ad news, I forgot to predict that every single beer ad would be stupid. Also, Betty White and Abe Vigoda are great--Snickers commercial win.
5:44--LS--I never thought I could hate a family like I hate the Tebows.
5:43--LS--NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
5:31--EL--The definition of brilliance--Jim Nantz declaring that the Saints' first play as a franchise and their first play in the Super Bowl was a kick return.
5:12--LS--Seeing shots of Shockey make me want the Saints to win less. I don't see any chance Manning loses this game. I hope I'm somewhere else when the Tebow ad comes on; It's a sickening display.
The real odds that The Who look pathetic are much greater than what you've given them. It might be more sickening than the Tebow ad.
5:04--Erik--Indy 34, New Orleans 28. I really want the Saints to win. Really bad. The city deserves it. But the Colts have that machine-like team going this year. And those teams rarely lose Super Bowls. The Pats did lose to the Giants a couple of years ago in a similar situation, so it happens.
Other predictions:
Shots of Archie Manning in the stands--418
Chances of me launching a profanity-laden tirade when Tim Tebow's anti-abortion ad comes on: 100%
Chances that Phil Simms' "Phil-osophy" has any value at all: 4%
Chances that The Who will look pathetic: 83%
4:49pm--Lyrad Simool--IND 37-NO 31. This is one of the more underwhelming Super Bowls for me in years. I have have no strong feelings either way, but I suppose New Orleans is preferable because they haven't won before. Still, it'll be really irritating if Reggie Bush has a Super Bowl ring, so I don't know; it's a wash, I guess.
All times Central
I and maybe others will be liveblogging the Super Bowl a bit. Comments are an open thread. Enjoy (or not).
Maya Jade Teeth Inserts. Photo: Dennis David (Flickr)(H/T)
Watching the Super Bowl today? Think women have the right to control their own damn bodies? Or just hate Focus on the Family and James Dobson?
Join the Super Bowl Tailgate for Choice party.
Donate at least $5 to a prochoice organization today in honor of the Focus on the Family anti-abortion ad and stick it to Dobson.
In addition to the big ones, there are some good smaller orgs that could use your cash: NLIRH, and SisterSong.
Biological extinctions are always incredibly depressing to me. No less depressing? Cultural extinctions:
This is devastating for a number of fields, ranging from history and anthropology to linguistics and others. Culturally, the world has lost more than a language; it has lost all of the cultural insights, stories, worldviews, and knowledge that that language had passed on from generation to generation for over 65,000 years. As with the extinction of animals, it's hard to say what you can do about it when the numbers whittle down so far, but that doesn't render the loss any less depressing or devastating. Hopefully, Sr is resting with her ancestors and speaking her language with them once again.The last speaker of an ancient tribal language has died in the Andaman Islands, breaking a 65,000-year link to one of the world's oldest cultures.
Boa Sr, who lived through the 2004 tsunami, the Japanese occupation and diseases brought by British settlers, was the last native of the island chain who was fluent in Bo.
Taking its name from a now-extinct tribe, Bo is one of the 10 Great Andamanese languages, which are thought to date back to pre-Neolithic human settlement of south-east Asia.
When I was doing my dissertation research in Quito back in 2002-2003, one of my "ex-pat" friends, Joe, was working on a study funded by the NIH (if memory serves correctly) mapping infection disease patterns in the province of Esmeraldas. Esmeraldas is on Ecuador's north coast, and is mostly known as the center of Afro-ecuadorian culture. Joe was doing house-by-house census work with GPS in hand in places accessible only my canoe. Along the way it was his unfortunate experience to contract dengue fever, affectionately known as the Bone Crushing Disease. Joe had the misfortune of contracting dengue while his wife was out of the country, too, and thus had to take care of his two young daughters in the midst of the suffering.
For the past month or so, Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa has struggled with stagnating approval ratings. In part, Correa's troubles stem from on-going problems related to an economy almost completely dependent on oil revenues. Despite the country's oil resources, though, much of Correa's current problems stem from the weather.
Next week marks the official start of Carnaval, though informal street celebrations began this weekend in Rio, as well as in other parts of Brazil. As always, even the informal blocos (street parades and musical groups) had a "theme," and this year, they apparently were promoting keeping Rio clean (text is Portuguese only, though the pictures are universal).
While the official Carnaval events haven't begun yet, there are always controversies leading up to and during the celebration, and this year is no different. The government is gearing up to hand out 55 million free condoms to citizens throughout the country as part of its ongoing campaign to promote safe sex and combat the spread of AIDS. Though the Catholic Church has condemned the government in the past for this program, the Church has remained fairly quiet this year.
Additionally, judges have eliminated a ban on religious symbols during the events of Carnaval, ruling that the ban impinged upon free speech. Officials originally established the ban in 2007, believing it to be "imprudent" to have crosses and saints alongside the, shall we say, not-so-saintly clad women and men in the parades. This story is amusing not only because it features people being uptight about the religious implications of having scantily-clad individuals in the vicinity of crosses and saints (rather than being uptight about the scantily-clad individuals); there's also the fact that, well, Carnaval is (nominally) a religious event, celebrating debauchery and gluttony in the days leading up to Ash Wednesday, which begins the religious season of Lent and the accompanying sacrifices many make in that season. So the fact that religious symbols had been banned from an ostensibly religious commemoration is more than a little amusing.
On a far more serious note, the Viradouro samba school (they of the banned Holocaust float a few years ago) is stirring up a much different kind of controversy by picking Julia Lira, a 7-year-old girl, to serve as its Queen of the Drum Corps (Rainha). As the article points out, the role is usually reserved for women in their early-20s due to the fact that the Rainhas are often among the most scantily-clad (and, subsequently, most famous) participants in Carnaval. The symbol of the Rainha has come to be equated with the sexuality and beauty that many associate with Carnaval. Thus, the selection of a Lira for a position that is usually associated with sex and nudity is causing quite a stir, and a judge is considering even blocking the girl's participation. While I agree with the girl's father (who is also president of the samba school) that anybody thinking sex when they look at a 7-year-old has a real problem, that doesn't stop some people from looking at 7-year-olds and "feeling excitment," as Lira's father puts it, and I think the concern over the fallout of viewing children as sexual objects in a country that has struggled with childhood prostitution is a legitimate concern. Ultimately, while it is completely in Viradouro's rights to pick who they want for their Rainha, it's pretty clear that they like to make controversial decisions. It's not that they couldn't have gotten some young model or starlet; it's that they deliberately chose not to do so. In the end, I think it will actually be disappointing if Lira walks as a Rainha; after all, there are real, negative effects that her participation in this particular role could have on cultural and social attitudes. I think it would be preferable if Lira waited until she actually was in her late-teens/early-twenties to serve as Rainha; she can still participate in the samba parades before then, in a less sexualized-role. We'll just have to wait until later this week, though, to see just what happens.
Today, Costa Ricans will go to the polls to elect their next president, and Laura Chinchilla, the candidate for the Partido Libertación (the same party that current-president Oscar Arias represents), stands a decent chance of winning and becoming Costa Rica's first female president.
The Libertación is a center-left (closer to the center) party, and it seems that Chinchilla's fiercest opposition is coming from libertarian Otto Guevara, with Otton Solis of the of the Partido Acción Ciudadana running third. Chinchilla has been running on a platform of "stability," promising to continue Arias's economic policies (including free-trade agreements). Guevara has challenged her by promising to be tough on crime in Costa Rica, an amusing promise from a libertarian who wants a more hands-off approach.
I always enjoy seeing how political failures affect politicians in countries outside of the U.S., and Costa Rica is no exception. Both Guevara and Solis first ran for president when I was in Costa Rica in 2002, forming their own parties for the election and finishing fourth and third (out of 13 candidates), respectively. I'm always pleased to see that, unlike in the U.S., failure in a presidential campaign doesn't bring an end to your presidential aspirations in other countries, and Costa Rica is probably the case I'm most familiar with. Looking at their political positions today, Guevara's appeal makes some sense - there will always be people who identify strongly with libertarians, and with the PUSC's popularity dropping in the wake of corruption scandals, Guevara and his Partido Movimento Libertário offer the strongest alternative for conservative voters.
I'm more surprised at Solis's performance in this campaign, however; when he burst on the scene in 2002, it was as offering a strong third-party alternative to the dominant Libertación and the Partido Unidad Social Cristiano. Solis has been critical of the Central America Free Trade Agreement, and offered a progressive alternative to those (especially young) voters tired of the institutionality of Libertación. I'm not so surprised that the party itself is still around, but it will be curious to see what happens to Solis's political future after tomorrow. While he had a strong showing in 2002 and nearly won the election in 2006, if he finishes third tomorrow, one can't help but think that he'll really have to overhaul his message to appeal to people. And much of this is speculation, too, until the Ticos vote and the results are tallied. In effect, though, they're voting on whether they want to continue down the center-ish path that Arias has forged, whether they want a shift to the right in the name of "fighting crime," or whether they want a progressive alternative to the institutional Libertación party. It will be interesting to watch.
This is excellent news:
A landowner accused of ordering the murder of American nun Dorothy Stang in the Amazon in 2005 is reported to be back in jail after turning himself in.
Vitalmiro Bastos Moura was originally convicted for the killing in 2007. The verdict was overturned a year later but he is now due to face a retrial.
The Brazilian report says he turned himself in after Brazil's Supreme Court refused Moura's request for habeas corpus, upholding the Para state court's ruling. Of course, the fact that Moura will get a new trial isn't fully encouraging - he's wealthy enough that he may be able to avoid a second conviction; the first conviction simply never should have been overturned in the first place. Still, this isn't completely hopeless; Moura was wealthy in the first trial, and was still found guilty; perhaps the outcome will be the same in the second. If nothing else, at least right now, the Supreme Court's ruling sends the message that wealthy landowners who hire poorer people to kill those trying to protect indigenous lands and the environment in the Amazonian basin will not remain immune from their murderous actions, and that alone is an important message to send. Hopefully, Moura will (once again) feel the full force of that message.
Certainly, tensions between Argentina and England (especially on the former's account) are never low when talking about the Malvinas/Falklands Islands. Still, this past week, the already-tense language has ratcheted up a few notches. England had decided to begin oil exploration in the sea around the islands, leading to a rush of British companies getting in line to work on the exploratory drilling. Argentina has responded by threatening legal action (perhaps concerned that England would drink Argentina's milkshake?), while Falklanders themselves defended the drilling by saying it will help their economy. Neither the English nor the Argentines seem like they're willing to back down or negotiate on this, so tensions are already running high.
If this were a typical case, it wouldn't be unreasonable to expect that the two countries involved would come to some sort of agreement, but Argentine-English relations are far from typical, especially when it comes to the islands. Certainly, the islands are in England's control, and it should have sovereignty, but Argentina makes a strong case with regards to the U.N.'s ruling on the "sovereignty dispute." War still seems unlikely, but editorials in England are already reminding readers (perhaps in a pre-emptive cautionary jingoism?) that Argentina's original attack on the islands in 1982 also started off somewhat innocuously, and as the article points out, Great Britain's armed forces are rather thinly spread right now, perhaps making this the best time since the 1980s to attack the islands.
And the fact that Gordon Brown is already trying to "save his skin" and could perhaps use military maneuvers to his advantage a la Margaret Thatcher in 1982 is only half the story. If Gordon Brown thinks he's the only unpopular leader involved, he'd better think again. Her battle with the Argentine Central Bank, questions over her husband's (and ex-president's) financial actions, and unpopular struggles with striking farmers have all led to Cristina Kirchner being unpopular and embattled throughout her administration. An attack on the islands could divert the Argentine citizenry's focus on her policies towards its own nationalism means a war could benefit more than just Gordon Brown (though given the effects of the loss on the Argentine dictatorship in 1983, it is certainly a much riskier move for Kirchner). That's not to say either Kirchner nor Brown wants another war, but both would probably benefit (at least in the short-term) in the face of flagging popularity.
Again, I really don't think this will come to a war. I suspect this will remain a diplomatic war-of-words, perhaps involving courts (though I don't know how that would function), the U.N., or other international arbitration matters. Still, relations between the two countries haven't been this volatile in awhile, and it will be worth seeing what the outcome is in the coming weeks.
We've had several discussions about the right-leaning political tendencies of professional athletes in the last year, and the Tebow-Dobson Super Bowl ad is certainly a current topic of debate heading into the big game Sunday. In a rare reminder that not every jock buys into the right's Kool-Aid, The Advocate's Michelle Garcia's interview with New Orleans Saints linebacker Scott Fujita is most welcome.
Fujita, who played his college ball in Berkeley, has an impressive resume of charitable work in New Orleans. He has worked with local organizations on issues from breast cancer awareness and research, children's charities, and adoption services. For his charitable efforts, he was named the Saints' 2009 Man of the Year. In the article, Fujita espouses his support for marriage equality. Not only is it refreshing to hear something like this from an NFL player, but Fujita's comments are well-constructed, logical, and thoughtful.
I have never claimed to have all the answers ... still haven't met someone who does. But I have some strong opinions about things, especially when it comes to issues of prejudice and inequality. I also recognize that the platform I've been given as a professional athlete will be taken from under me once I leave this game, at which point no one will care to ask my opinion. So in the meantime, why not stand for something?
It's great to add Scott Fujita to the list of pro athletes (like Baltimore Ravens linebacker Brendan Ayanbadejo, Steve Young, and Charles Barkley) that have made public their support for marriage equality. If my Colts have to lose to New Orleans on Sunday, I hope Scott Fujita is involved in the play that gives the Saints the go-ahead score (as long as the total stays under 57).
Ray Ring writes a deeply unfortunate column about President Obama selecting non-whites to fill important environmental posts. He accuses Obama of putting racial diversity over environmental goals. Ring notes that several Obama environmental appointees have not been what environmentalists hoped for.
Well, sure. But that's true of how most progressives how thought about many Obama appointees. It has squat to do with race and everything to do with Obama's governing style.
What's frustrating is that Ring reinforces the long-standing divide between environmentalists and people of color. For more than 20 years, people of color have pointed out the indifference environmentalists have to poverty, to the concerns of non-whites, and to people more broadly. Many in the environmental movement have taken these critiques seriously. Even though environmentalism today is pretty dang white, it's also populated by young people who consistently reach out in solidarity to non-environmental groups.
But there's still a strong current of single-issue people within the environmentalism stream who define their movement very narrowly and blame "social concerns" for their movement's failures. What Ring espouses outside this article I do not know. But he makes a terrible mistake here in blaming diversity for environmentalists' problems and in doing so, places another brick in the wall between the environmental movement and people of color.
It's no secret that I am deeply despairing for the nation's future. I've been working on a post for awhile about how the Senate's collapse is the greatest threat to democracy this nation has faced in over a century. I fret about our inability to get anything done, to solve any social problem, to even admit that climate change is a problem.
So I am hardly surprised but am deeply saddened to see these poll results from Research 2000/Daily Kos asking self-identified Republicans about their beliefs. A few "highlights"
Should public school students be taught that the book of Genesis in the Bible explains how God created the world?
Yes 77
No 15
Not Sure 8
Should contraceptive use be outlawed?
Yes 34
No 48
Not Sure 18
Would you favor or oppose giving illegal immigrants now living in the United States the right to live here legally if they pay a fine and learn English?
Favor 26
Oppose 59
Not Sure 15
Should Barack Obama be impeached, or not?
Yes 39
No 32
Not Sure 29
Do you support the death penalty?
Yes 91
No 4
Not Sure 5
Oh boy...
Sara Robinson provides some really first-rate analysis to these numbers, particularly noting that on the issue of contraception, it's more useful to watch what people do rather than what they say. But rhetoric matters and we are seeing the impact of 40 years of crazy right-wing rhetoric reach fruition today, something that seriously threatens the future of this nation.
Samantha Bee's savaging of masculinity worriers and the men who feel they desperately need to talk about manhood with other men is classic.
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Male Inequality | ||||
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This NPR piece about a woman complaining that current jazz isn't exciting makes my head explode.
That it's on NPR seems typical--the NPR demographic is precisely the same demographic as the average jazz fan--middle-aged, white, and affluent. And this demographic usually sees good jazz as something that stopped in 1964, when A Love Supreme got a little to crazy. They like retro-jazz, but how much Wynton Marsalis can one person listen to? Well, some I guess. But how much Diana Krall? Hopefully, none at all.
So it's hardly surprising that these people would find current jazz boring--nothing's happened in years. It's all retreading familiar ground, broken in radical ways by musicians from the 1910s through the 1960s. That stuff is great; you can hear the experimentation in the music. The retread stuff is by and large trite and old-fashioned, even if some of it is well-played.
Meanwhile, there is awesome jazz and jazz-related music all over the place if you look for it. Jazz has expanded in all sorts of new directions in recent years. Bill Frisell, John Zorn, Matthew Shipp, William Parker, David S. Ware, Susie Ibarra, Ikue Mori, etc., etc., etc. There is amazing players out there. They still have the spirit of jazz--the spirit of pushing the boundaries, finding new ways to express emotion through the music, etc.
New jazz isn't boring at all. But modern musicians who really want to sound like Dave Brubeck and Art Blakey are boring. Listen to Blakey and Brubeck and so many others. And then also listen to Don Byron and Darius Jones and Roy Campbell. But don't claim jazz is boring just because you're listening to retread music.
ESPN's Jemele Hill compares Tim Tebow's anti-choice ad to Muhammad Ali protesting the draft and Tommie Smith and John Carlos raising their fists at the 1968 Olympics.
Though we haven't talked about it in awhile, the Honduran political landscape continues to change and head in uncertain directions. Last Tuesday, Porfirio Lobo was inaugurated, bringing an end to the "provisional government" of Roberto Micheletti. One of Lobo's first acts was to allow former legally-elected president Manuel Zelaya leave the Brazilian embassy and head into exile in the Dominican Republic.
The inauguration has led several to suggest that the Honduran coup is officially over, as the country has returned to democratic practices and the provisional government of Micheletti has come to an end. In some ways, I think this is true - the particular lifetime of the coupist government has come to an end, and Honduras has technically returned to electing its leaders, but turnout was questionable at best and the government itself limited freedom of speech during the campaign, factors which are hardly the marks of a "healthy" election.
But that doesn't mean the processes themselves are over. First, it will be interesting to watch what the military does under Lobo. Will it fade into the background in an attempt to get people to forget its role in the illegal removal of Zelaya? Will it continue to play an up-front role in influencing politics in Honduras? Will it remove Lobo if/when he does something that Congress, the Supreme Court, and/or the military don't like? Then, there is the issue of the economy, which is in even worse shape since the coup than before the coup (again, I suspect due in no small part to global opposition to the Micheletti government), and the broader social problems and inequalities haven't disappeared at all. As Boz mentions, if anything, Lobo is facing an even tougher landscape than Micheletti or Zelaya, exactly because on top of those social problems, the economy has only worsened.
And then, of course, there's the political landscape. Just because Zelaya is gone and Micheletti out (though still a senator-for-life) does not mean that the political rifts that the coup and its wake created have gone away. As the last post at the Honduras Coup 2009 blog reminds us, the coming months (and years?) will be really important in seeing what comes of Zelaya's supporters and opposition to the regime. Will it just fade away? Will it become a powerful political movement unto itself? Will it be able to effect any changes in Honduran society or politics via grass-roots mobilizations? Any of these things seems possible, and serve as strong reminders as to why the coup may be technically over, but its effects will be long-lasting politically as well as economically. These are all issues that Lobo will have to face and address, and he may not be able to deal with all of them in ways that satisfy the elites, the masses, or either group. His effort at an allegedly "broad" cabinet may be a start, but as the writers at the new Honduras Culture and Politics blog (former writers of the Honduras Coup 2009 blog) point out, what exactly that "broad" cabinet means is up for interpretation and questioning. And the fact that Zelaya may be in exile now does not mean he won't be a force in politics in Honduras down the road. With popular support for Zelaya still clearly strong, and with Micheletti still in the government, and with the military cleared of any wrongdoing, Lobo has a very fine tightrope to walk indeed. For example, I'm particularly curious about the way the symbol of Lobo actually accompanying Zelaya to the airport may be perceived in Honduras. Certainly, Zelaya's removal was illegal, even if Honduras's Supreme Court isn't going to allow court cases against military members involved to proceed. The fact that Lobo was inaugurated, and then accompanied Zelaya to the airport, could be interpreted in Honduran society in any number of ways: as an informal way to assume the presidency from the last legitimately elected leader of Honduras; as Lobo just trying to defuse the situation from both sides; as Lobo showing questionable allegiances; and various other ways. What the Honduran citizenry does with symbols and events like these will not only be worth watching, but essential in seeing where Honduras goes from here.
At the end of the day, I think you can make a strong argument that the coup itself has "ended." But the processes it unleashed are only beginning, and I agree with others in pointing out that the inauguration does not mean we should quit paying attention to Honduras. It will be interesting to see what directions Lobo, the Honduran elites, and the Honduran citizenry take from here on out.
Fifty-one years ago today, a plane carrying Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and The Big Bopper crashed on route from Clear Lake, Iowa to Moorhead, Minnesota, during a brutal winter tour of the upper Midwest. The Day the Music Died turned out to be one of the worst days in rock and roll history.
One wonders what would have happened to these guys had they lived. How would they have adjusted over time? Of course, it's impossible to say. Of all the 50s rockers, only Jerry Lee Lewis really changed his art much over time. Little Richard struggled to remain relevant, Chuck Berry basically kept doing what he was doing (which was awesome so he had a good reason), Elvis became Vegas Elvis, and Bill Haley died in a ditch.
On the other hand, Holly was really ambitious and getting involved in the New York City music scene. If Holly had been in New York in 1961, how would he have responded to Dylan? Would he have been a kind of crazy Texas mentor to The Band and any number of other late 60s bands? Buddy Holly on acid? That sure sounds interesting! I feel that he would have evolved in interesting ways. But again, it's really hard to say. The early 60s were pretty bad for rock and roll, though obviously the British Invasion changed everything for the better.
Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper I'm less sure of. Valens might have explored Latin music more. Or he might have been taken up by the late 60s psychedelic movement. The Big Bopper always seemed like a minor act to me, though I could be wrong.
Another interesting point about the tragedy--Buddy Holly has assembled a new band for this tour. On bass was one Waylon Jennings. Had Waylon been on the plane (and the legend is that he gave up his seat for The Big Bopper), we never would have his wonderful country albums of the 1970s. The Outlaw movement would have looked far different. And my life would have been less complete.
With Eric Rohmer's sad passing, I've been trying to answer a question--who is my favorite living director? For years it was Ingmar Bergman. Then Eric Rohmer. But now I'm not sure.
I think I have an answer though. Or at least one I can try on for awhile.
I thought about Wong Kar-Wai. But Wong's movies are so wildly inconsistent. For as awesome as In the Mood for Love and 2046 are, My Blueberry Nights was a disaster. I didn't care too much for Ashes of Time. Others are very solid. I just find Wong such a crapshoot that I can't make that commitment.
The Coen Brothers are great, but their output during the 2000s wasn't great, though with a significant recent uptick. I really like the Coen Brothers, but I don't get super excited to find out when their next film is coming out. So I guess I'm not feeling the passion.
Martin Scorsese is always a possibility. But I feel that I've been watching skilled but somewhat impersonal movies from him for years. Obviously, he's one of the all-time greats. But much of that reputation comes from very old work. Bergman on the other hand was making great movies (though proxies to some extent) until the day he died.
Pedro Almodovar is someone I greatly respect. But I only love a couple of his films. So I can't claim he's my favorite.
Farther down on the list we have John Sayles (but when was the last time he made a movie you had to watch? 15 years?) Mike Leigh (love him but also deeply inconsistent), Ken Loach (so many highs, but a lot of lows), Wim Wenders (but he totally fell apart when he came to the U.S.), and others.
But I think I can go with Arnaud Desplechin. I haven't seen his early movies, but that doesn't matter too much. Kings and Queen and A Christmas Tale are both awe-inspiring masterpieces. Kings and Queen was on my decade's top 50 and had I seen A Christmas Tale before I wrote it, it would have been in the top 15. What a fantastic film. I don't think any director created 2 such magnificent pieces of art in the last decade. I am amazed.
So for the time being, I'm going with Arnaud Desplechin as my favorite director. We'll see how this suit fits.
-In a particularly tragic story, sixteen teenagers were shot and killed in Juarez this past week. The news has barely made a ripple in the United States, even though the casualties are greater than, say, Bloody Sunday, serving as a sad reminder not only of how horrible the violence in Juarez has gotten, but how immune the United States seems to be to what is going on just south of it's border.
-Rightist billionaire and Chilean president-elect Sebastian Piñera won the presidential run-off in mid-January. While he doesn't take office until March 11, some of his suggested policies and decisions are already raising eyebrows. As Greg points out, Piñera's desire to redirect money from copper away from the military budget indicates a growing willingness not just on the left, but on the right, to use Chile's income from copper in other ways, and the fact that a right-wing politician sympathetic to the economic policies of Pinochet has adopted this stance may mean the military will have to "come around" to the reality that it won't be getting as much funding from Chile's copper industry as it has grown accustomed to receiving. More troubling to many inside and outside of Chile, Piñera has also refused to divest of some of his financial properties while in office, leading some to ask if he isn't exposing himself to a conflict of interests between his financial holdings and his duties as president. This, on top of his profession that he thought the neoliberal policies under the Pinochet regime were the type of policies he would pursue, have many worried about his economic impact on Chile even before he takes office. Beyond that, it's worth noting that his brother appears to be the Chilean version of Billy Carter (and yes, that cake does look like what you think it looks like).
-In Peru, 41 military officers and soldiers have gone on trial for human rights violations for their roles in the murder of eight civilians in 1989. Although the trial is important for bringing justice, it also has become of political importance, as president Alan Garcia (who was also president from 1985-1990) tried to remove one of the officers from beyond the court's reach by giving him high-end political appointments. The trial, its timing (during Garcia's first administration), and Garcia's efforts to gain impunity for at least some of the officers raises important questions about Garcia's role in the violation of human rights during his administration, questions that are not and should not go away any time soon.
-Among the many victims of Colombia's never-ending civil war, the displaced are oft-forgotten. Many poor and small-landholders have lost their homes and lands, and wealthy families have swooped in to take it and then receive farm subsidies from the Uribe administration, serving as a powerful reminder of the fact that gross social inequalities and questionable political alliances are one of the biggest travesties of the Uribe administration.
-Lula continues to rely on hydroelectric dams for Brazil's future power sources. It just allowed the controversial Belo Monte dam on the Amazon river to proceed, in spite of opposition from environmentalists and residents in the Amazonian basin. With his term coming to an end this year, there will be many reasons to look back on Lula's administration and point at the positive things he accomplished; however, it already seems that his environmental policy may be one of the blackest marks on his administration, and the Belo Monte serves as just another strike against Lula on the environmental front.
-A European spaceport in French Guiana may be "booming," but it's isolating and alienating many French Guianans.
-Speaking of Europeans' presence in Latin America, though it seems unlikely to come to fruition this time, Russia has begun exploring the possibility of helping construct a canal through Nicaragua to connect the Atlantic and Pacific. Nicaragua has been the center of such talks since the early-1800s, so it's not clear why this time it will come to fruition. Nonetheless, it makes an interesting story, and if Russia goes through with helping Nicaragua finally construct a canal, there will probably be all kinds of hand-wringing among politicians in the United States.
-Evo Morales is not only interested in creating greater socio-economic and ethnic equality in Bolivia; he's also interested in opening up opportunities for women, a fact recently demonstrated in his appointments for cabinet: 10 of the 20 positions were filled by women, a first for Bolivia (and for many other countries in the world).
So it seems Osama Bin Laden released a statement blaming the U.S. for climate change and talking about fighting climate change as an anti-colonial action.
Obviously, we can't take Bin Laden seriously on something like this. Certainly Juan Cole doesn't and lists 10 reasons why Al Qaeda has been bad for the climate, including causing the war which has created enormous emissions.
But let's at least pretend Bin Laden has a leg to stand on. Can we see climate change as another episode of western imperialism against the developing world?
Absolutely.
And it's actually a fairly simple case. Western nations pump out tremendous amounts of carbon emissions. They exploit nations such as Nigeria, Indonesia, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, and others to get their fossil fuels. Then sea levels rise and destroy Tonga and Vanuatu, while also erasing much of Bangladesh. Increased drought and desertification make places like Mali and Niger increasingly difficult places to live. Refugees are forced into ever more crowded nations and poverty increases.
The more interesting question whether a global movement can develop that uses climate change as a central organizing issue. It's certainly hard to say. The period of anti-colonial nationalism has largely passed, with old colonial leaders and their descendants making bank off global capitalism. The erasure of western rule or direct domination has made it more difficult for leaders to deflect attention away from their own problems onto the United States or Great Britain. Since the leaders of China, India, and most other developing world nations are trying to increase carbon emissions as fast as possible, an anti-climate change movement will focus on national problems first before going international.
This makes any real organized anti-colonialist movement based around western caused climate change very unlikely.
One of the informal things I like most about being a historian is coming upon ads and consumer goods that are extremely anachronistic now, but really hit upon the zeitgeist and language of a particular time-period. These ads, in retrospect, are often horribly racist, sexist, or classist (though that isn't to say advertising has lost any of these qualities today), but the fact that they do tap into something that was perhaps popular and/or effective at another time makes for a delightful mixture of amusement and unease.
Which is why this watch-fob promoting Coca-Cola on a Swastika is so remarkable. Of course, as many will comment, the Swastika well pre-dates the Nazi Party in Germany, and can be found in India, among indigenous cultures in the United States (including decorations adorning the Kimo Theater in Albuquerque). Still, this is one of those promotionals that you know you will never see in the Western World again, all because of their associations with the Nazis and with Hitler specifically (much in the way toothbrush mustaches just don't appear anymore).
Of course, the Coca-Cola swastika made sense at its time - Coca-Cola attaching its name to a symbol that meant (in a pre-Nazi time) good luck and good health was actually a rather innovating and relatively harmless ad campaign for the early 1900s. Still, there's something really strange about seeing those things now, even in looking to the past.
Brian points us to this Pandagon piece on Colorado Springs making drastic cuts in basic services because their residents refuse to pony up the tax money:
More than a third of the streetlights in Colorado Springs will go dark Monday. The police helicopters are for sale on the Internet. The city is dumping firefighting jobs, a vice team, burglary investigators, beat cops — dozens of police and fire positions will go unfilled.
The parks department removed trash cans last week, replacing them with signs urging users to pack out their own litter.
Neighbors are encouraged to bring their own lawn mowers to local green spaces, because parks workers will mow them only once every two weeks. If that.
Water cutbacks mean most parks will be dead, brown turf by July; the flower and fertilizer budget is zero.
City recreation centers, indoor and outdoor pools, and a handful of museums will close for good March 31 unless they find private funding to stay open. Buses no longer run on evenings and weekends. The city won't pay for any street paving, relying instead on a regional authority that can meet only about 10 percent of the need.
We've already seen cuts of this nature in Broward County, though not of this magnitude. Yet.
I say yet because I have to believe they're coming. Even if Democrats in Florida get a double winner next year in Kendrick Meek and Alex Sink--far from likely, I'd say--unless there's some massive turnover in the Legislature, we won't see any tax increases or reforms which would increase revenues for municipal services. This legislature has already made clear that they adhere to the Republican dogma that tax and budget cuts are the only tools they are willing to wield when it comes to balancing a budget, and there won't be any Washington stimulus money to bail them out this time.
I'd like to think that these sorts of cuts will wake voters up, once and for all, to the realization that you can't have services if you won't pay taxes, and that paying taxes is, in fact, a patriotic thing to do. I'd like to think that, but I have little faith that people will learn the lesson, because there are too many steps between local park closings and Tallahassee Tea Party rhetorical flourishes. I fear we'll just get more of the same.
The New Mexico Independent notes that the New Mexico state Senate yesterday voted to confirm a group of University of New Mexico regents to another term.
Why is this such a big deal? Because UNM is on the front lines of everything wrong with higher education. Because the faculty gave a vote of no confidence against the confirmation of Jamie Koch by a vote of 482-7. And no one cared. A few senators stood up for the faculty, but Koch was confirmed by a 31-5 vote.
What's so bad about Koch and the current administration. For one, they don't care about students. Two, they are looking to corporatize the university as fast as possible. Three, they flat out told the humanities that they don't matter anymore.
But perhaps the biggest issue is the reallocation of priorities to non-necessary functions. For instance:
The cost of administration at UNM had jumped to $8.2 million in 2008, up from $2.6 million in 2002, Dr. Tim Lowery, a UNM professor, told lawmakers sitting on the Senate Rules Committee Monday morning.
Opponents in a Senate committee hearing held early Monday, and later on the Senate floor, complained that the university had become politicized during Koch’s tenure as president of UNM board of regents and that top administrators’ pay had skyrocketed compared to spending on some student-focused programs. They also lamented the university’s 44 percent graduation rate and pointed to the falling faculty-to-student ratio at UNM. The teacher-student ratio has fallen from around 15 to 1 in 1998 to 21 to 1 in 2008.
Sen. Gerald Ortiz y Pino, D-Albuquerque, said the battle over Koch’s nomination boiled down to a central tension between two “very different ways in how a university operates.”
“We’ve moved into a corporate model,” Ortiz y Pino said on the floor of the Senate, where Koch’s nomination was sent following the Rules Committee’s recommendation that he win confirmation. “The regents are the corporate board and they work with the senior management. That’s certainly a model well established in industry. It’s a new model for the university.”
Seems fitting that the BCS would hire Ari Fleischer to promote it:
They hired former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer for a reason, and it wasn't because they enjoyed watching his work on CNN in the early days of the Bush 43 administration. So far, Fleischer and his minions have served only to enrage fans further by creating a Facebook page and a Twitter feed that severely underestimate the customers' intelligence. Now, they're going to earn their money. The BCS hired Fleischer because he can navigate the halls of power in Washington, not because he makes a mean Facebook page.
Rob has a series of excellent posts up about the Quadrennial Defense Review and why progressives should care. I highly recommend them. I'd like to build on his work for a brief discussion of climate change and the QDR. For the first time, the QDR includes a section on climate change and defense policy.
That the new QDR even discusses climate change is a big step. The 2006 version, written during the Rumsfeld years, couldn't care less. That edition was all about fighting the never ending war on terror and acquiring new toys. Thankfully, the Gates Department of Defense has moved to more serious policy analysis.
And what of the QDR's first foray into thinking about climate change? It's quite mixed. DoD rightfully recognizes the threat rising sea levels provide to their own facilities. The entire Navy infrastructure faces a serious threat. The United States has such a long coastline that rising sea levels will likely force the nation to spend trillions of dollars either relocating facilities or keeping the ocean out.
The QDR does a less effective job thinking about how climate change will affect U.S. military involvement around the world. The military seems inordinately concerned with climate change and the Arctic. The thawing north will open up unexploited resources to the nations with Arctic boundaries. Corporations and governments are salivating. Plus, open Arctic waters means the U.S. and Russian navies will frequently be in close quarters.
While I can see the potential for conflict in an ice-free Arctic, the DoD doesn't seem to grasp the far more profound ways that climate change will likely affect U.S. military operations. Maybe I am too optimistic in thinking the Russians and Americans will come to a mutually profitable way to split Arctic resources, along with the Canadians and Scandinavian nations. But I think the significantly bigger issue is the massive geopolitical stability climate change could create around the world. The QDR only notes that the military needs to help other militaries prepare for natural disasters and notes that climate change could exacerbate already existing instabilities.
That's all true, but one short paragraph in the QDR barely touches the surface of what the U.S. military may face. Take Bangladesh. This low-laying, overpopulated and impoverished nation sits on the Indian Ocean, laced by major rivers filled with melted snow from the Himalayas. Under the best of circumstances, floods are a fact of life here. But rising sea levels combined with the likelihood of extreme typhoons has led many people to project 50 million climate change refugees from this one nation alone. Where are they going to go? India probably, since it's unlikely Myanmar will be welcoming. If Bangladesh destabilizes, how will the subcontinent and Southeast Asia more broadly respond? How will 50 million Muslims affect already shaky Hindu-Muslim relations within India? What will Pakistan do? This seems like precisely the kind of thing for which DoD should plan.
Talking about climate change and resource scarcity in the abstract is fine, but how will the military deal with real problems. For example, what happens if the Middle East enters a prolonged drought, Turkey impounds most of the water in the Tigris and Euphrates, and Iraq and Syria go thirsty? What will happen to this already unstable region? The QDR might not be the place to explain the details of these situations, but it seems fairly clear from the document that the military is still considering climate change as an abstract problem of the future.
Finally, the QDR commits the military to saving energy. This is fine and all, but slightly better fuel efficiency is hardly going to eliminate the military's contribution to climate change. Plus, in the face of a country almost completely unwilling to take the radical steps necessary to stablilize the climate, these minor actions won't make any difference in the long run. The military also talks a lot about energy security. That's certainly a worthy goal, particularly if that energy comes from renewable sources, but the U.S. is unlikely to achieve energy independence any time in our lifetimes.
In the end then, the QDR's approach to climate change is a good first step, but little more. Its focus on energy policy over thinking through the real international security problems climate change will cause reveals a continued lack of imagination on climate change. Still, the military, and particularly the Navy, has made important strides in the last four years; hopefully, the next QDR will build upon these early ideas and show that climate change is central to U.S. foreign policy rather than the afterthought it appears to be today.
On this date in 1968, the United States suffered one of its most embarrassing military setbacks in history--the Tet Offensive.
Early January 1968 found both North Vietnam and the United States in a difficult position. The U.S. was struggling with a war that seemed to never end, supporting an unstable, corrupt government in South Vietnam that had no support from the people, and fearing the fall of South Vietnam to communism would mean the loss of all Asia.
Meanwhile, the North Vietnamese were suffering greatly from the pounding American pilots were providing every day. They wondered how long they could hold out against this beastly assault. In addition, their great anti-colonialist leader Ho Chi Minh was weakening. The North Vietnamese leadership knew they needed a big victory before Ho's passed away. So they decided to take the war to the U.S.
On January 31, the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong took a page out of the U.S. historical playbook, picking a major holiday to launch a surprise attack. They launched operations in all parts of South Vietnam, even infiltrating the U.S. embassy in Saigon for a brief time. From a military perspective, the Tet Offensive was a total failure. The North Vietnamese had way over-extended themselves and they could not hold the positions they took against superior firepower.
But despite the military losses and high casualty rates, the Tet Offensive succeeded beyond anything the Vietnamese could have expected. This was the turning point in the war.
The U.S. was in Vietnam for any number of reasons. Lyndon Johnson committed himself to the war effort because he was captured within Democrats' box of fear of being called soft on communism. Johnson was determined not to be the next Harry Truman, whose reputation was at a low point during these years. Republicans tainted Truman with "losing" China. This was utterly unfair since a) Chiang Kai-Shek was a terrible leader and not popular with his people and b) it's entirely unclear what more U.S. military support would have accomplished except for more dead Chinese and Americans. When the newly communist Chinese entered the Korean War, it was a great embarrassment for Truman and emboldened Republican shouts of a communist-infiltrated government.
Johnson wouldn't let this happen to him. But of course he didn't know what to do about Vietnam. No one did. Knowledge of Indochina in the State Department amounted to a hill of beans. Almost no one spoke these languages or specialized in the region. We backed up French recolonization efforts after World War II because we wanted to get the French back on their feet as an anti-communist ally. We fretted after Ho's forces kicked the French out in 1954 after their victory at Dien Bien Phu. We refused to allow Ho to take over the country, creating a puppet regime in Saigon known as South Vietnam. This was only supposed to last 2 years, leading to a 1956 election that would reunify the country. But fearing Ho's communism and afraid it would lead to more red advancement in an area where the U.S. had almost no economic or strategic investments before this, the Eisenhower Administration refused to allow the elections to be held. Eisenhower and Kennedy raised the stakes and when Johnson took over in 1963, he felt he had no choice but proceed.
Like any successful politician after World War II, he had to talk a big game about fighting communism. And when things started to go bad, he didn't think the American people were ready to hear it. So he began to lie about everything associated with Vietnam.
The Tet Offensive put the lie to the Johnson Administration's claims that the war was near victory. The ensuing "credibility gap," which had begun before the offensive grew. Johnson's ability to govern fell. He was hopelessly trapped in lies and with no good options. Seeing no light at the end of the tunnel, Johnson, who had won the presidency in 1964 in one of the greatest landslides in U.S. history, withdrew his name from nomination for re-election in 1968.
From an American perspective, the most tragic thing about the Tet Offensive is that it provided the final nail in the coffin to the man who could have been the greatest president since Lincoln. While Johnson was hamstrung by Cold War imperatives, he also showed the greatest passion for the poor of any president in our history. His desire to end poverty, to create environmental legislation, to sign civil rights legislation--these were the hallmarks of a great leader. But in the end, fighting the Cold War took precedence, even if it meant tens of thousands of dead Americans and hundreds of thousands of dead Vietnamese. Even if it meant throwing his presidency away on a country America knew nothing about.
From a Vietnamese perspective, obviously this day marks a enormously important point in their freedom struggle. I'm not sure how the Vietnamese mark the day today, but I imagine they see it as a great day of martyrdom for the cause of freedom. And we should probably see it that way as well.
