DUCKPOND

R Cheney has changed the meaning of what it is to be Vice President. Obama is virtually now the Democratic Presidential nominee, so it will be interesting to see who is selected in the VP role. The same interest will be in McCain’s selection.The role of the VP is to complement, not overshadow, the presidential candidate, yet be somebody who might credibly assume the office of President. This year the interest will be age, gender and “race”, as well as the more conventional need to balance the ticket by recognizing people from different regions, with an eye to the electoral votes they may be able to swing.
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Let us just say, that while the US nobly led by the Bush Administration “adults” has been winning the war in the Middle East, and overseeing the destruction of Iraq and Lebanon, others have emerged as players in the international energy market. Of course, if the investment in war had, for example, gone to developing alternative technologies that might easily have given rise to a new set of power holders in Washington, and we cannot have that, can we? As it is the backyard, and the Madison doctrine seem to untended, which is probably not the way to honour the Reagan legacy. Two nation states come to mind, if for the moment we leave out the former “model” democracies of Peru, Bolivia, Chile and Argentina, and they are: Brazil and Venezuela.
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An old story, but obviously if you do the same things you are likely to get similar results, so I am always searching for a new angle, to see things in a new way.
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As we have witnessed elsewhere, it is not just the force of a natural disaster, but the inaction of government that adds to the problems. Cyclone Nargis hit Burma six days ago, but the damage assessment and relief supplies have been held up by an autocratic, self serving military junta. Estimates of the death toll is now believed to be over 100,000 people. The priority in these situations is to get help to the people affected as soon as possible. No doubt in the aftermath of this tragedy the danger of disease must loom.
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As the torment continues, for those discriminating Israelis with consciences and indiscriminately for the dispossessed Palestinians, there is sadly little to celebrate as Israel marks the 60th Anniversary. The die of this project was cast before the First World War, the rise of Hitler and the Holocaust.
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The North Carolina Democratic primary was a clear cut win by Obama by 14%. In a two candidate contest that seems very decisive. Some in the Clinton camp thought they had a chance of doing significantly better, and even winning. It is interesting to speculate as to how that misperception can occur. Good polling can be the necessary antidote to seen enthusiasm of the crowds. While, in my opinion, Clinton was phony, her play acting was good enough to work with the target audience who presumably identified with that persona.
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There are not any complicated rules for comments here for the very good reason that there are very few, but very much appreciated, comments. By the way, the rules that apply to comments apply equally to posts. I was passing by Tom Peters blog, and Cathy there advanced a rule that I thought was really appropriate, the living room rule. I know it is a virtual world, but sometimes we are communicating with other people. Sometimes this works, and that is the miracle of language. Sometimes it doesn’t and that is the problem of language.
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There were some big ideas missing from the recent 2020 Ideas Summit among which are putting people over profits and communities (and human needs) over corporations. When we think globally in these terms it becomes more apparent what role that Australia should play in the world.
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Australia is, as Gordon Reid observed many years ago, for all intents and purposes a frozen continent with respect to its Constitution. The provisions relating to changing the constitution make change unlikely and slow. The result is that instead of having rational democratic change, we have change from the top or change due to circumstances, usually emergencies. It is not insignificant that 1942 was a year of significant constitutional change. The vestiges of the imperial majesty still remain in the anachronism of the Governor-General (I much prefer Captain-General, the rank of Governor Phillip). Happenings in a foreign land across the seas can still have repercussions.
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Obama has a poll lead of 7 percent in North Carolina, so he is expected to win there, leaving Indiana and his support among “Euro-Americans”, and particularly the working class as critical to his chance of finally clinching the nomination. Similarly, if Clinton win significantly in Indiana and possibily take North Carolina her chances are substantially improved.
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There are seemingly no boundaries for US missile attacks. In Dusamareb, I000 residents protested a US missile attack on a house in the Somali town, that killed at least ten people, including Aden Hashi Ayro, whom the US suspected was a leader of a group related to Al Qaeda. Prima facie such an attack would appear to constitute a war crime.
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All public service employees are required to sign a loyalty oath in California, but the rigor at which the oath is applied differs. For example, the California State Universities apply a stricter regime than the University of California
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In recent weeks the dog blog has been written around a photo challenge. The light in their eyes is probably just bad photography and the onset of more wintry gloominess. Sasha and Dexter still enjoy getting out, and Sasha in particular enjoys her time running free.
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Three peace activists in Marlborough, New Zealand have created some headaches for the American system of international listening posts known as Echelon. Echelon in turn is part of the American strategy, including control of space, cutely known as “full spectrum dominance”.
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The war of terror carries on remorselessly, indifferent to the possibility of international law. The harsh sentences of the Nuremberg Trials seem in retrospect to be victor’s justice. There is, at least in the minds of the US military, no immediate end in sight and implicitly the belief that somehow peace can be constructed without including the process of justice.
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Or is it the Wright frame-up? As Paul Woodward says at The War in Context it is remarkable how little attention is actually paid to what Rev. Jeremiah Wright actually says at the National Press Conference in Washington or in pulpit. Everybody is supposed to be in awe of the way the right wing media circus will do with the latest opportunity. Snippets aplenty, and much like the Clinton campaign with motives as pure as snow. Their’s is not a racist campaign. But could any candidate run against the corporate media and win the election?
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As it happens my nephew served in Afghanistan for a tour of duty before he left the service, so that focused my attention. In these cases there is often a personal context, a historical context to frame the current developments, and the political, even geo-political, context. The long and involved history of Afghanistan is a story of imperialisms, and in the twentieth century the struggle for modernization and reaction to those attempts, and of a country in which the national state was notional, or subject to negotiation, rather than a common understanding among the peoples of Afghanistan.
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Susan Milligan in The Boston Globe points out the Republicans as much as the Democrats are running into problems after a long drawn out campaign. As Obama said the other day babies have been born and have learnt to speak in the fifteen months he has been campaigning.
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I am not familiar with the literature on opinion leadership, but I suppose public intellectuals who create and frame ideas would feature. For example, if a set of ideas such as neo-liberalism, or any other economic fashion, was considered, there would be a set of influential proponents. Most of us are not that well informed, or expert, or imaginative, and recognize it. Some of us tend to accept the plausible as given, and do not take the trouble to drive concept around the block and see whether the wheels fall off. That might be the minimum, but even that degree of engagement with disciplined thinking in comparing evidence and conclusions requires skill and application. Far easier in that case to rely upon the experts.
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We experienced heavy rain this week, which meant that on a few days we did not get out. It is easy enough to take digital photos, but putting them together is another story.
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