Archive for the ‘Politics’ Category
Benghazi billboard says it all
Apparently, not every Libyan rebel was asking the West to send in its military.
The idea behind the war on Libya: R2P
The policy underpinning the UN declaration on Libya is “responsibility to protect”, otherwise known as R2P. UN secretary general Ban Ki Moon called the authorization an ” ‘historic’ affirmation of the global community’s responsibility to protect people from their own government’s violence.”
According to Josh Rogin’s account of “how Obama turned on a dime toward war”, officials pushing for military intervention included “Samantha [...]
So it begins: West appears to kill Libyan civilians, Arab League bails out
The mission said to “protect” civilians looks like it has done the opposite. Libyan state TV has reported that 48 civilians have been killed. The Arab League and Russia are among the first to denounce the bombings. Of course, it is always possible that the Libyan regime is inventing them, as part of a propaganda war. [...]
Libya: how the West just made things worse
Sean Collins reports from New York on how the UN’s green light for military action may wreck any hope of freedom for the people of Libya.
You can read my spiked article in full here.
US and West declare war on Libya: it just got much, much worse
I came home tonight and found that the US and the other Western powers had just launched another war in the Middle East. Add Libya to Afghanistan and Iraq.
A few hours ago the United Nations Security Council voted to authorize military action against the Libya regime led by Colonel Muammar el-Gaddafi. The authorization extends beyond the much-discussed “no-fly zone” to include [...]
Narcissistic Americans scare-monger about nuclear power at home
We all watch as the disaster in Japan continues to unfold. The loss of life and destruction caused by the earthquake and tsunami are terrible, while the stories of the Japanese people coping are both heartbreaking and impressive. Now there is the threat of a substantial release of radiation, with each day bringing news of [...]
NPR: talk of “uneducated” Americans is the real outrage
An embarrassing video has led the Chief Executive of NPR (National Public Radio) to resign. Vivian Schiller offered her resignation a day after a conservative film-maker released a video that captured an NPR fund-raiser talking to people pretending to be donors from a Muslim Brotherhood front organization. NPR – the publicly-funded and listener-supporter radio network that many people [...]
Debate how to hire, not fire, teachers
With thousands of teachers’ jobs on the chopping block across the country, there is a vigorous debate over how to implement layoffs in a “fair” way.
At issue in New York and other states is the policy of LIFO, “last in, first out”. Seniority is the determining factor. There are calls from across the political spectrum to [...]
Are state pensions in crisis?
Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin and other Republicans have said that the cost of pensions to state employees is unaffordable, and a central reason why collective bargaining needs to be virtually eliminated.
However, as I noted in my article on Wisconsin, it is understandable why the pensions appear under-funded today:
This situation is due to the decline in [...]
Republicans make Wisconsin their battle ground
My op-ed on Wisconsin has been published in The Australian, the country’s biggest-selling national newspaper. You can read it here.