Category: Politics & government

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Economics Environment Politics & government Science & technology

[332] Of Gmail, Climate Stewardship Act and a great satire

I have been invited to Gmail! w00t! 1 GB of space baby!
The layout seems to be very simple and I like it. Simplicity with a extraterrestrial free space is good. And just to show off, here is what Google sent me:

First off, welcome. And thanks for agreeing to help us test Gmail. By now you probably know the key ways in which Gmail differs from traditional webmail services. Searching instead of filing. A free gigabyte of storage. Messages displayed in context as conversations. So what else is new?

Gmail has many other special features that will become apparent as you use your account. You’ll find answers to most of your questions in our searchable help section, which includes a Getting Started guide. You’ll find information there on such topics as:

How to use address auto-complete
Setting up filters for incoming mail
Using advanced search options

You may also have noticed some text ads or related links to the right of this message. They’re placed there in the same way that ads are placed alongside Google search results and, through our AdSense program, on content pages across the web. The matching of ads to content in your Gmail messages is performed entirely by computers; never by people. Because the ads and links are matched to information that is of interest to you, we hope you’ll find them relevant and useful.

You’re one of the very first people to use Gmail. Your input will help determine how it evolves, so we encourage you to send your feedback, suggestions and questions to us. But mostly, we hope you’ll enjoy experimenting with Google’s approach to email.

Speedy Delivery,

The Gmail Team

Of course, there is a talk that Gmail violates privacy by scanning the private mail in order to display ads. But for the time being, the opportunity cost is low for me. I am willing to sacrifice a bit of privacy for one of my favorite firms. It’s Google for God’s sake. Who hates Google?

Maybe Yahoo! and MSN but hey, almost all of us hate MSN, don’t we?

And Earth Day is two more days. Do your bit for Mother Earth by reading the mail below!

Dear Mohd Hafiz, This Thursday, April 22, is Earth Day, and I have some great
news! Thanks to the incredible support from more than 850 online
donors, we have set a one-week online fundraising record for
Environmental Defense. We are now over $150,000 toward our June
1 goal of $725,000.

This is tremendous first week, and we thank everyone who joined
the 51 Club. Your commitment to Environmental Defense Action
Fund and our work to pass the McCain-Lieberman global warming
bill has gotten our campaign off to a terrific start!

If you have not yet joined the 51 Club with a minimum donation
of $51, don’t wait any longer! If you have already joined,
please consider a second or a third gift now —
http://actionnetwork.org/ct/n11Lsyp1SaI_/

Your support is critical if we are to win the 51 votes necessary
to pass the McCain-Lieberman Climate Stewardship Act in the
Senate.

The odds are against us. Passing the most comprehensive and
practical global warming proposal ever offered in Congress will
be tough. Frankly, the opposition from special interest
lobbyists remains strong. It is precisely because
McCain-Lieberman takes such an important step toward reducing
pollution that the big polluters and many oil, energy and auto
companies are spending millions to stop it.

ExxonMobil is one such company. The extent of ExxonMobil’s
cynical public relations campaign came to light in a recent PBS
report on NOW with Bill Moyers, which reported that the company
has funneled millions of dollars to organizations that raise
doubts about global warming. Their basic strategy was laid out
in a confidential memo that blatantly spelled out their
disinformation tactics. The memo, titled “A Global Climate
Science Communications Action Plan,” reads: “Victory will be
achieved when uncertainties in climate science become part of
the conventional wisdom.”

Let us be clear: any type of “victory” ExxonMobil will claim in
pulling the wool over the public’s eyes will be short-lived.
There is scientific consensus about the dangers of global
warming, and corporate interests should not sway you from this
fact. We are up against some mighty foes, and the stakes are too
high to back down. This is why we are asking for your help
again.

So, this Earth Week, act now and join the 51 Club today with a
minimum donation of $51. Together, we can counter the special
interests and win this critical vote —
http://actionnetwork.org/ct/n11Lsyp1SaI_/

Sincerely,

Ben Smith
Manager of Online Activism
Environmental Defense Action Fund

PS: Thanks to the over 260,000 people who have signed our online
Emissions Petition supporting the McCain-Lieberman bill. Thanks
also to the hundreds of people who have mailed and faxed in
print petitions, which continue flooding into our mailroom every
day.

Fifty one bucks?
What can I say? Die Grunen: ekologisch, sozial, basisdemokratisch, gewaltfrei.
Anything for a noble cause.

One more thing, today in the Michigan Daily, Jess Piskor has written one of the best pieces the paper has ever published this semester:

The leaders of this worldwide revolutionary message are without doubt Electronic Arts, Chevrolet and Nike. Their slogans, taken together clearly spell out what needs to happen: “Challenge everything.” “Start a Revolution” – “Just do it.”

Kudos. Finally, after a lot of crap, somebody actually tries to reinstitute glory to the Daily editorial board.

p/s – Monaco is on fire.

Categories
Politics & government

[331] Of Sharon’s unilateral withdrawal and MTB for 2004

Last week, Bush unbelievably endorsed Sharon’s unilateral withdrawal plan from some of the occupied territories.

If one reads merely the surface – of which I did for the first few hours before I actually read up the whole plan a few hours later last week – one would certainly say, wow, that’s an improvement towards peace.
Yet, the world is far for being perfect. Utopia is still a utopia.

Upon delving further into Sharon’s unilateral withdrawal, the plan, like what was said in the NYT dead-tree edition last Friday, the plan is anything but a sincere unilateral withdrawal. It is more about exchanging partial Israeli withdrawal for part of the lands without the Palestinian consent.

The best thing is, Sharon negotiated the plan with himself, forcing the Palestinian, the supposed to be the other participant of any Israel-Palestinian – using nowadays cliche – out of the loop.

Seriously, Sharon discussed the plan, of all persons, with himself. A joke?

No. Sharon was explicitly quoted saying, “I discussed this between me and myself and came up with a new initiative”.

Puzzled? Me too.

Though there might be some truth to Bush’s statement that it is unrealistic for Israel to mobilize a full departure from the occupied lands, it is more unrealistic believe that the Arab and especially the Palestinian would accept Sharon’s proposal.

It is already hard to convince the Arab and the Muslim as a whole to accept the existence of an Israeli state. To convince them to swallow the possibility that Israel might keep some of the annexed territories will probably be too great a task.

Bush is unrealistic. The cool My Teddy Bear for USA!p/s – Just found out that Ann Arbor plans to hold an Earth Day celebration this Sunday at the historic farmer market. w00t! Also, the Naked Mile, I believe, is this week. Hopes to see some girls. :)

Categories
Politics & government

[330] Of the new Resident of Federated Malaysian States

Scarily, Malaysia is becoming more and more similar to Singapore.

In the past few weeks, the former Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir has been appointed as an adviser to two of the most prominent companies in the country. Namely, the two firms are Petronas and Proton. Despite resigning from Malaysia top political executive post, Mahathir seems to be able to find a niche inside Malaysia corporate structure.

In Singapore, Lew Kuan Yew still holds a considerable amount of power after more than a decade stepping down from the President post.

I simply hope Mahathir’s new job as an adviser is not the same as J.W.W Birch’s job was. I hope it is simply an advising job rather than an instructing job. Via Screenshots.

Somebody has to stop Mahathir, seriously.

And crap, because of bureaucracy and my procrastination, I might have to delay my planned internship in Europe for a bit of time. And worse crap, I HAVE to find some place to stay for the time being. Crap and a lot of crap. Too much crap makes you a piece of crap. Got crap?

p/s – Earth Day is coming! It’s on April the 22nd! Yeah!

Categories
Economics Politics & government

[328] Of Ann Arbor and David Brooks’ Liberal Air

Today, Ann Arbor gets two spots in the mainstream media. One concerns the latest longevity progress done by the University of Michigan and the other is about a satire – the satire proposes a “direct flights between Madison, Berkeley, Ann Arbor and the New School for Social Research“. Via Ann Arbor Is Overrated.

Finally, somebody mentioned Michigan and in particular, Ann Arbor’s liberalness (if that is really a word) in a nationally circulated newspapers.
I have no doubt, Bush will not get Michigan for November, no matter how hard he tries.

Crossing the Pacific, in The Star’s words, “Malaysia is set to become the sole global manufacturer of two models of Steyr assault rifles with a joint-venture agreement signed between the National Aerospace and Defence Industries (Nadi) and Austrian weapons-production giant Steyr Mannlicher Holding GmbH”.

I am looking forward to see the Free Aceh Movement to use the Steyr assault rifle smuggled in from Malaysia against the Indonesian national army in the future. Oh, the joy of a second Konfrontasi!

Not…

Categories
Environment Politics & government

[325] Of Tigris-Euphrates marshes and Iraq

nb: all mays and mights in Italic were added well after after this entry was published. The words are added after a discussion with a friend. Whatever the addition, I don’t support the war but I accept the positive externality the war has produced on the environment of the marshes.

I may have changed my mind about Iraq. The more I think of it, the more appropriate the war seems to be.

Saddam Hussein is no angel. He killed his own family. He murdered his own people. He tortured them. He enriched himself at the expense of the Iraqis. He lived lavishly like the ancient Egyptian pharaohs while some of the Iraqi minorities struggled to meet ends.

Saying so, it doesn’t mean I support Bush. If I may, he and his administration are among the worst liars I have ever heard or seen in my life. He even dared lied to the world at the United Nations Security Council.

Yet, the war did and does benefit the Iraqi. Although hatred against the American troops is running high in Iraq, the freedom to express that hate was simply a nonexistence during Saddam Hussein’s regime. Under that despot, the Shiite couldn’t possibly take their voice down to the street. They couldn’t perform their full religious responsibility freely and openly. The US and its allies, regardless of the real underlying reason for the invasion, changed that for the better.

But what really might bent my opinion was not his treatment of the Kurds or of the Shiite. It was not the way he kicked freedom right at the stomach. Though I believe freedom, democracy and human rights are important, in this case, they are the secondary reasons on why I may switch camp.

The prime mover that altered my view, given that I am a green, was the way he treated the Earth.

During the days after Saddam Hussein’s defeat after the invasion of Kuwait, a few rebelled against him thinking that Saddam had been weakened. Unfortunately for the rebels, the Baath-controlled government was not as weak as they had perceived and the rebellion was crushed swiftly. Consequently, some of the rebels seek refuge in the marshes near Tigris and Euphrates.

In his quest to quell the rebellion further and to squeeze the rebel out, Saddam oversaw a major draining of the marshes. The Tigris and Euphrates were blocked from entering the marshes. To justify this action, Saddam cited agricultural reason for the water diversion. Regardless of what Saddam said, little agricultural program was carried out.

The diversion in the end not only managed to suppress the rebellion, it also managed to be one of the biggest ecological destructions in modern history. Almost the entire marshes, a prominent natural feature of Mesopotamian geography that once covered as large as 20 000 km² are lost under Saddam’s regime. According to the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP), as much as 90% of the marshes is gone. All other species that are dependent on the marshes are probably gone too.

A 1973 satellite photo taken from UNEP’s Desk Study on the Environment in Iraq. The map shows the marshes before Saddam’s action. I’ve editted it to make it smaller.
The same area in 2000, taken from the same study.

Apart from that, the area is also suffering a severe salination. Furthermore, if nothing is done in time, the area faces extreme desertification threat.

The marsh former glory. Reproduced with permission from Laputan Logic.
The marsh generally now. Reproduced with permission from Laputan Logic. Photo by Daniel B. Gronberg.

The disappearance of the marshes is not just a tragedy environmentally. It is a cultural tragedy too. The Marsh Arabs or the Ma’dan in Arabic, have been the inhabitants of the marshes for more than 5 000 years. Their ancestors had possibly witness the rise and fall of the great Mesopotamian ancient civilizations.

Before the drainage of the marshes, according to Wikipedia, it was estimated that almost half a millions Marsh Arabs had lived in the marshes. Right now, it is reported that merely 10 000 still linger hopelessly there. A culture that has survived for 5 000 years is being threatened to the edge of extinction in less than three decades.

A Ma’dan village in 1974. Reproduced with permission from Laputan Logic. Photo by Nik Wheeler.

However, this was not the first time the Tigris and the Euphrates were diverted at the expense of the marshes. During the Iran-Iraq War that lasted for approximately eight years from 1980 to 1988, the Tigris and Euphrates were diverted in order to slow down the Iranian counterattack. In spite of this, the effect from the Iran-Iraq War was minimal.

Currently, the occupying forces are slowly diverting the water from the ancient Tigris and Euphrates back in the marshes. If the so-called Coalition of the Willing hadn’t invaded Iraq, such action wouldn’t be possible. As much as I hate to say this, as much as the war is unjustified and based on lies and deceits, restoration of the marshes is possible because of the invasion. With the cooperation given by the occupying forces, UNEP has also conducted several studies on the current situation of the marsh and thus allowing conservation effort to start.

Yet, whether damage is repairable or not, we are left at the mercy of time. I truly hope it is repairable. I hope to see, or at least read somewhere in future publications about the recovery of the marshes. I hope to see first hand or through third person source, flying and singing birds conquering the blue sky of the marshes, for the water buffaloes to swim in line, for kids to again sing among the marshes without worry.

I, from now on – no matter how unjustified the war was, whether or not WMD was there in the first place – support the war. I might be too late for more than a year but thank God, somebody else didn’t make the same mistake.

Note – Click here for Laputan Logic on the Marsh Arab.