Entangled Alliances

Okay, so here’s an interesting ethical question to wrap your head around.

photo credit: sskennel

Let’s say you’re the US Secretary of State and you’re visiting China. Let’s also say your visit comes at a time when America is facing a serious recession and so desperately needs China to keep buying American debt. Do you:

a) Engage in a forceful dialogue with China over the many human rights abuses it either carries out itself or supports around the world via its financial dealings, even though this might sour China’s commitment to buying up US debt and thus further destabilise – or even crash – the entire global economy? Or…

b) Decide that the stability of America’s economy is the first priority given the current global economic crisis, even though this lets China off the hook for its horrendous human rights record?

Not easy, is it?

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photo credit: josef.stuefer

In my last post “Netanyahu will be Prime Minister: What now for Israel?” I discussed the decision by Israel President Shimon Peres to let right-winger Binyamin Netanyahu form Israel’s new government, but left open the crucial question of whether, following Netanyahu’s likely formation of an exclusively right-wing coalition, the two-state solution is off the table – and what happens if it is. (for a primer on what the two-state solution actually is, check out the Wikipedia entry)

Questions on the future of Israel and Palestine don’t come much bigger than this. Ever since Camp David in 2000, the two state solution has been appreciated by all sides as the eventual desired outcome. Back in 2002 The Arab League endorsed Saudi Arabia’s Arab Peace Initiative which was, essentially, a two-state solution. Successive Israel Prime Ministers Barak, Sharon and Olmert have all accepted that it must be the goal to work towards. But with Netanyahu’s victory, it might be time to start wondering whether it’s simply no longer an option. Whether you’re an optimist, a pessimist or a realist, it’s not the kind of question that the main players in the peace process can ignore for long, unless they want to find themselves up the proverbial creek without a paddle, while facing a raging whirlpool and a bunch of hungry alligators. You get my point.

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A follow-up from my Facebook quick hit the other day.  MSNBC.com’s Internet blogger, Bob Sullivan, covers the Facebook furore, and links to tips for maintaining some degree of privacy (and the harrowingly entertaining struggle of one man trying to leave Facebook forever).  The money quote for civil libertarians and the downright paranoid:

And of course, with some data, there’s just no way to remove it:

“Where you make use of the communication features of the service to share information with other individuals on Facebook, however, (e.g., sending a personal message to another Facebook user) you generally cannot remove such communications,” the Facebook terms of service agreement reads.

This should give pause to any Facebook user who plans to get a job or have children some day. Heaven forbid you decide to run for Congress 20 years from now. And we haven’t even mentioned Facebook’s Beacon disaster, which saw the company introduce an advertising platform that followed users around the Web and reported their behavior to friends. Facebook quickly backtracked after a similar uproar.

Really worth reading the article in full.

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In her latest Op-Ed in the New York Times, Maureen Dowd covers Will Ferrell’s “W” on Broadway. The gist of Dowd’s article is the sense of sympathy extended to President Bush, in Will Ferrell’s play, here is an excerpt from Dowd’s article in which she quotes Adam McKay:

“He’s so clearly a neglected 13-year-old that there’s something really kind of heartbreaking about him,” McKay said, calling him “a good-time Charlie” who was “just used his whole life to front questionable business endeavors, and in a way that’s what his presidency was.

“He doesn’t have Cheney’s cartoonish need for power and greed that’s so off the charts you don’t even understand how Cheney got that way. W. may have some awareness, deep down inside, sort of like a petulant teenager who just flunked the trig quiz and knows he screwed up. I think Cheney not only knows but is delighted with everything he did, as is Rumsfeld.”

It’s true that there may be some exoneration of President Bush by the media and public, certainly as Bush’s Presidency ran down the clock there appeared sympathy, from the press.  Why might this be the case and what impact, if any it will have on Bush’s legacy?

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photo credit: ZoomGalaxy

The big news today is that Israel’s President Shimon Peres has selected Binyamin Netanyahu – leader of the right-wing Likud Party – to form the next government. This announcement comes two weeks after the results of the Israel elections, where the moderate Kadima party, headed by Tzipi Livni, beat Likud by one seat. Despite Livni’s victory, however, it was obvious from the start that Netanyahu (pictured, on the left) would likely be the one chosen to form a government, as he is able to scrape together a bigger coalition of right-wing parties than Livni can of left-wing ones. This outcome became near inevitable yesterday when extreme right-wing leader Avigdor Lieberman -whose party “Israel is our home” came a decent third place in the elections – fulfilled his kingmaker role by vowing to support Netanyahu. Following Peres’s decision today, we now know for certain that  Netanyahu will be the next Prime Minister of Israel.  (For more on the election results and  the coalition alternatives, see my post Israel Election Results: Your guess is as good as mine)

The key question now is what the government he chooses to form will look like. Netanyahu has already reached out to  Livni, as well as Ehud Barak of the left wing Labour Party, no doubt realising that a fringe right-wing coaltion government will be unlikely to accomplish much and receive little support from the U.S. – at least not from the new Obama administration. Indeed, he is reportedly ready to offer Livni the job of  foreign minister and deputy prime minister, as well as the role of defense secretary to her deputy Shaul Mofaz. However, both Livni and Ehud Barak have signalled that they would rather stay in opposition than form a government with Netanyahu – Livni unwilling to be a “figleaf” for a right-wing administration- and thus a unity government must be considered the less likely option.

If Netanyahu does end up having to form a right-wing government, then the prospects for the two-state solution – and thus a real peace process – could be disastrous. In my next post I will explore why the two-state solution would be off the table and, more importantly, what happens if it is. (Hint: nothing good)

photo credit: PappaJack

Tuesday marked the anniversary of Kosovo’s declaration of independence from Serbia. I meant to write about this sooner – but the day passed off largely without event, with none of the ugly scenes in Belgrade of a year ago.

In the extended entry, I’ll look at the effect of this declaration – both in Kosovo and on the wider international system – as well as the mood on the ground, from a visit I made there a couple of months ago.

(and I will definitely return to my mini-series on the EU in 2009 shortly – I should also have a post on Norway coming up in the next few days)

This post has become quite large so I’ve divided it up into the following sections if you’d prefer to read it that way.

• The International System
  • and Serbia
• Inside Kosovo
  • Division of Kosovo?
  • Mitrovica
  • Civil Society

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photo credit: doug.siefken

Chicago, you’ll be surprised to hear, is pretty corrupt. Perhaps the best true story concerning corruption in the Windy City – if not anywhere – is the hilariously brilliant  story of the 1970s “Mirage Sting”.  In 1977, The Chicago newspaper The Sun-Times OK-ed the plans of a couple of their investigative reporters to set up a bar (The Mirage) in the north side of Chicago, pose as simple bar owners and see what came out of the woodwork. The results were incredible. The undercover journalists had purposely left unfixed around the bar multiple health and safety breaches, or as they put it: “more health violations than barstools”. They then watched with amusement as the building inspector came in, spent a few minutes looking round, then slipped a proffered $10 bill into his inspection papers while exclaiming “Beautiful day!”. There then followed an almost sitcom-esque parade of inspectors willing to ignore any violations providing a few dollars were slipped into their folders. Fire, plumbing, ventilation : all were bribed to look the other way. The journalists were even taken under the wing of a “Mr. Fixit” named Philip Barasch. Barasch was a big Chicago landlord who taught them the tricks of the pay-off trade:  what hour the inspectors would show up and how much to give them. Barasch’s best tip? Don’t pay off the cops, because if you do “they keep coming around every month, like flies, looking for  a payoff” . Since that marvellous Sun-Times scoop, Chicago politics hasn’t exactly cleaned itself up: out of the last five governors of Illinois, four (including Blagojevich) were indicted in office.

Fast forward to the present and following the events of the past few days, it now looks like Roland Burris – the man chosen by disgraced former Governor of Illinois Rod Blagojevich to replace Barack Obama as the state’s junior senator in the United States Senate – is just as corrupt as the man who selected him. Burris, it turns out – following his fourth explanation of the events- sought to raise money for Blagojevich at the exact same time that the Governor was planning to appoint him to the Senate. Despite his strenuous denials of any wrongdoing, it looks like the fourth explanation is one too many, as the Chicago Tribune is now calling for his resignation. Thus the squeaky clean Senator chosen by the dirty- as-hell governor turns out to be… just another Chicago politician.

The selection of Burris is an odd story in itself…

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Looks like Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius is going to be President Obama’s choice for HHS, following the ignominious withdrawal of Tom Daschle.  Seems to me that Obama never misses an opportunity to make an easy Senate pick-up.  Must be infuriating to be Bob Menendez.

Talking of President Obama, he’s making his first “overseas” trip this week: to Canada.  Meanwhile, Hillary’s touring the Far East, assuring the Indonesians that Obama will find time to visit them eventually.  Don’t remember people being so keen for Air Force One to touch down when it was carrying the Texan…

photo credit: azipaybarah

Meanwhile, Hillary as elder stateswoman is putting into stark contrast the gun-totin’ (literally) ways of her successor.  Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, whose associations with the NRA are well known, caved in to those dastardly NYC liberals this week and removed the rifles from under her bed (insert lament for Caroline Kennedy here).

Gillibrand is far from the only recently-appointed Senator in the news.  In the never-ending saga of the Illinois Senate seat, Roland Burris, former (i.e. impeached and ousted) Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich’s choice as Obama’s replacement, is under active investigation by the Senate Ethics Committee.  It might only be a matter of time before he is forced out, and Illinois’ senior Senator, Dick Durbin, already seems to be distancing himself.  All this seems to lead credence to Russ Feingold’s suggested 28th Amendment, an end to gubernatorial appointments for empty Senate seats.  This article from The Economist makes the case.

In other news, this week, Facebook was forced into a volte-face regarding its terms of use.  It had unilaterally appropriated the rights to everything you post or write on its site.  It’s only a matter of time, however, before they find some other way to do this.  Generation Y needs to wake up and realise that privacy online is a major issue.  You write something on Facebook, or post the pictures from that drunken party, and it’s in the public domain forever.  Check out the interesting debate going on at the New York Times about the future of ’social spaces’ online.

Jacques Chirac appeals to a long history of English amusement at the French.  When, in 2006, he stormed out of an EU summit because the (French) leader of a European business lobby addressed attendees in English, it gave the Anglophone world another chance to feel smug in the superiority of their tongue.  How ironic that English, brought to every corner of the world by the trading ships of the British Empire and the teleconferences of American business, had become the lingua franca of the 21st century.  

photo credit: kurotashiO!

Since then, things have got worse for the French.  Francophones are increasingly threatened, not just in international organisations where English is an easy mutual method of communication, but also by the infiltration of the language of Shakespeare into that of Molière.  The Académie Française can’t be pleased about all the people sending textos or emails (which it insists on calling mél), if they don’t have time for le chat.  This worrying trend has even seeped into the corridors of power.  Chirac must be seething to find that under a successor derisively called l’Américain, the Higher Education Minister feels happy to defy Gallic loyalty, winning this year’s “prize” for services against French, the Prix de la Carpette Anglaise (think doormat):

Her crime: proclaiming to the press that she had no intention of speaking French when attending European meetings in Brussels, because, she said, it was quite obvious that English was now the easiest mode of communication.

Outside France, where resistance, especially through its “linguistic Commonwealth”, the International Organisation of Francophonie, is strongest, English is surging ahead more quickly.  Last week’s Economist reported on efforts by European news websites, such as Der Spiegel (Germany), NRC Handelsblad (Holland) and Politiken (Denmark) to offer content in English.  As The Economist points out, this affords an opportunity for the first real pan-European exchange of ideas:

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The world has news:

photo credit: markhassize11feet

- The blogger Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com – also known as the election-predicting guru whose forecasts for the 2008 U.S. elections were the best anywhere – has applied his legendary predictive methods to … calling the Oscars! Don’t bet against him…

- The Obama effect is still shaking up the international landscape: now Syria wants to come in from the cold. This news makes the International Crisis Group’s excellent report on Syria last week seem rather timely.

- A group of City metal traders, now owned by the Royal Bank of Scotland, (which is now owned 70% by the British taxpayer) are trying to avoid paying income tax and national insurance contributions on six-figure bonuses. Here’s the hilarious money quote:

The traders… have a history of seeking to escape tax or national insurance on their bonuses… In the 1990s, traders took payment in jars of platinum sponge, a valuable greyish-black metal preparation used as an engineering catalyst, or in gold bullion

WTF? Jars of platinum sponge? Wow, these people really don’t want to pay their taxes, do they?

- An important reminder, via NoseMonkey’s EUtopia , that the EU is not always the bringer of good tidings; sometimes it can also be a threat to civil liberties. Although to be fair, the example in question is more a case of the corrosive effect that UK interference has on Europe. No, Britain, no!

- Via Assim Saddiqui in the Guardian, it looks like the UK government is changing its strategy of working with extremist non-violent Muslims in order to stop extremist violent Muslims into one of… not working with anyone. It seems the UK hasn’t learned the lesson of Northern Ireland and the Middle East… yesterday’s extremists are tomorrow’s moderates . Why is the government increasingly the lowest stupid denominator?

- Politico.com, for anyone not familiar with it,  is a useful source for the latest, breaking stories in U.S. politics while at the same time being a gossipy rag that is obsessed with scoops and making divisive stories out of nothing. With this in mind,  The New Republic has an interesting article that highlights its  worrying “scoop or bust” mentality. If this is the model for the future of online journalism, then we’re in trouble.