Hardship in Baghdad - fashion show at the Grand Hotel.
5097. ScottLoar - 1/12/2000 7:57:21 PM
As I have when reading any romanized Chinese text save I rely on context, which is slim support when the text is literary or otherwise specialized. In short, there's no sustitute for the character.
5098. PincherMartin - 1/12/2000 7:57:40 PM
Hello PE Message # 5069
5099. pseudoerasmus - 1/12/2000 8:01:40 PM
There appears to have been much other rubbish written by Marzipranks and Candide, but I must now get off-line. Outrage and correction are dear.
5100. pseudoerasmus - 1/12/2000 8:02:43 PM
Hello, Pincher. Excellent comments, as usual. Goodbye.
5101. PincherMartin - 1/12/2000 8:03:56 PM
Irv --
Message # 5081
I don't know if I would use the word "fascinating," myself.
5102. ScottLoar - 1/12/2000 8:07:09 PM
Interservice rivalry is surely not peculiar to Indonesia. That rivalry between the Imperial Japanese Navy and Army was so intense joint action could hardly be coordinated between them, the very military terminology utterly different.
5103. PincherMartin - 1/12/2000 8:10:16 PM
Scott Loar --
Those women lured by US$10,000.00 need be slow-witted or at the ready disposal of their parents to pressure them into sterilization, which means the poor, the corrupt, the feeble, the retarded. I wonder what the figures would be if broken down by race.
5104. ScottLoar - 1/12/2000 8:12:28 PM
And yet, Singapore solicits immigration of talented mainland and Hong Kong Chinese to the active disgust of many Singaporean Chinese.
5105. PincherMartin - 1/12/2000 8:20:46 PM
Scott Loar --
Interservice rivalry is surely not peculiar to Indonesia. That rivalry between the Imperial Japanese Navy and Army was so intense joint action could hardly be coordinated between them, the very military terminology utterly different.
5106. CalGal - 1/12/2000 8:21:22 PM
Pincher,
As I'm sure you know, there's a fair amount of support here for sterilizing crack addicted women.
5107. PincherMartin - 1/12/2000 8:24:08 PM
Actually, I didn't. What's the argument?
5108. ScottLoar - 1/12/2000 8:25:05 PM
Actually, moving military governors around served to disassociate the commander from his command, retarded regional and personal loyalties, and kept the military under party control. The CCP learned well this lesson from history of the last 150 years.
The most obvious example of regional loyalty was when the Beijing garrison was called out to remove the students at Tienanmen. They didn't, field troops from the Sino-Viet border were called in and did.
5109. Candide - 1/12/2000 8:32:08 PM
Pseudoerasmus
Outrage and correction are dear.
Then save thy muney lad.
5110. Candide - 1/12/2000 10:00:14 PM
RickNelson#5044
I am stricken with guilt for having forgotten to reply to you. Pseudoerasmus's arrival with a thunder-clap wiped my brain of all but a desire to kick his arse. No offence PE.
I had intended to reply and have just read in 'role-models' your reference to 'those Moties who do reply'.
I was grateful for your post. As you know Bible predictions don't interest me except as interesting psychological and historical phenomena, but I am continually oppressed rather than depressed by the way people won't question the whole military mentality.
I am not naturally a fanatical feminist but present international events might have made me into a man-hater if I didn't know some pretty nice men.
There is a kind of woman who adoringly supports her man no matter what. There is a song by Schubert with words from Sir Walter Scott. Ellen's erster Gesang. In the song a medieval lady nurses the head (still attached to his sleeping body) of her blood-stained knight in her lap as she sings him a lullaby. It turns into a sort of hymn in praise of war. It always seemed to me like a man's portrait of an ideal woman. I love the song but aspects of it really stick in my throat. It is her 'role' to comfort him after battle.
This is somehow still deep in the modern war-machine, plus other ingredients like scientific hubris and human conceit. Incurable probably.
5111. CalGal - 1/12/2000 10:08:40 PM
Pincher,
Cash for Birth Control. This one has received a great deal of coverage.
From the site:
Women and men who are using or addicted to drugs are often responsible for an extraordinary number of pregnancies (5-10 or more) that they are in no position to take care of. These babies have a 17% mortality rate. Those that do survive are frequently born premature and at a very low birth weight. The drug exposure usually leads to premature births and many times can leave these babies with permanent disabilities. Sadly, the risk of exposure to HIV also runs high. The babies require long difficult and expensive hospital stays before they are released into the overburdened foster care system. The tiny newborns struggle with drug withdrawals and are commonly abandoned at birth. The children are also at a high risk of neglect, further physical or sexual abuse and later... homelessness, institutionalization and worse.
5112. Candide - 1/12/2000 10:55:04 PM
CalGal
I couldn't possibly object to that scheme. I have seen something of that woman's work on US TV (The Lehrer Hour) and I was really impressed. The babies and children were heart breaking.
I think it would be stretching the term to call that eugenics.
5113. CalGal - 1/12/2000 10:59:38 PM
Thereby proving that you're perfectly willing to start down the slope if you approve of the reasons.
Pincher,
Obviously, the government isn't sponsoring this program--but the general concept is pretty much the same.
5114. Candide - 1/12/2000 11:18:46 PM
CalGal 5113
No, not proving that. Preventing births voluntarily when the alternative is sickness and death is a far cry from preventing births when the reason is one of class or race.
I believe in freedom of choice and this is just voluntary contraception. A friend of mine had a tubal ligation after she had completed her family. I see it in those terms. Those women can't cope with their own lives, let alone the guilt and misery of an unwanted baby that is infected with HIV.
In Australia at the height of the eugenics phase, Aboriginal women were sterilised without being informed.
5115. CalGal - 1/12/2000 11:27:10 PM
Candide,
Yet when we were discussing Singapore's policy of offering incentives only to educated or wealthy women, you called it a slippery slope. But it's the same thing.
One of the unspoken facts about these efforts, btw, is that the majority of crack addicts are black and poor. Because in general they're the addicts that also get pregnant. A lot.
5116. Candide - 1/12/2000 11:41:37 PM
CalGal
I have read that financial (tax) incentives are offered to professional women in Singapore. Perhaps Pincher Martin has up-to-date information about that. Working class women, not necessarily more stupid or immoral,are, as I understand it, offered no such incentive. Thatwould make their children doubly disadvantaged.
One of the unspoken facts about these efforts, btw, is that the
majority of crack addicts are black and poor. Because in general
they're the addicts that also get pregnant. A lot.
I believe that your article indicated that the pregnancies were involuntary and mostly unwanted. In that case colour is irrelevant.
5117. Candide - 1/12/2000 11:44:56 PM
I feel that I should stress that I meant that the fact that class was the incentive was the 'slippery slope'.
5118. RustlerPike - 1/12/2000 11:45:29 PM
Hi guys and gals.
Pelle, Danthe et al.:
Good discussion and links. First let me say that I am not well enough informed about the nuts and bolts of the issues being discussed, partly because I am 'in transition' between being employed and (hopefully) having my own business and am all caught up in that, and partly perhaps because something tells me these nuts and bolts are not what matters.
In response to a question raised here back in the 20th century - I am told by a semi-trustworthy source (my mother) that the reason the law passed by the Begin government (regarding annexation of the Golan) is not an issue is that the law itself specified a national referendum as something that could override it.
As for the June 4th 1967 vs. the international borders: It is my understanding that the Syrians edged their positions westwards between 1948 and 1967, and this accounts for those relatively small differences seen on the (excellent) map Dan posted. Their border was never, de jure, on the banks of the Kinneret, or Sea of Galilee, but they made it so, de facto. Now they want those unilateral 'modifications' they carried out to be recognized as legit.
>>>
5119. Candide - 1/12/2000 11:53:51 PM
RustlerPike
Was I way off the mark when I said that water was the central issue?
5120. CalGal - 1/12/2000 11:59:07 PM
Candide,
In that case colour is irrelevant.
I did say it was unspoken. And I think the reaction would be the same if the women were white. Nonetheless, the majority of them are black. And if you think it's irrelevant, you don't know very much about racial politics in the States.
Working class women, not necessarily more stupid or immoral,are, as I understand it, offered no such incentive. Thatwould make their children doubly disadvantaged.
So what? What does that have to do with eugenics? Besides, it hardly doubles the disadvantage. The "working woman" isn't any more or less disadvantaged if the rich or educated woman gets money for having a baby.
You can disapprove of the policy, but I see nothing in your analysis that makes this any different from offering crack addicts money to be sterilized. The one key difference (that it's the government) you haven't even mentioned.
I feel that I should stress that I meant that the fact that class was the incentive was the 'slippery slope'.
Oh. Well, I'm glad you get to choose the slope. I could have sworn that you objected to the notion of offering incentives for having children to the "right" sort. And what is offering incentives to sterilize to the "wrong" sort if not the flip side?
Sorry. I don't see the distinction. I suspect socialist hackery.
5121. RustlerPike - 1/13/2000 12:08:01 AM
Frankly, the way things look now, the chances of Barak getting this deal past the Israeli public are not very high. Personally, I fail to understand why Barak had to go to Sheperdstown personally to meet with a-Shar'a. He could have sent his foreign minister.
I fail to understand why Assad can't bring his sorry self over to meet Barak personally. It would seem to me he is the one with the most to gain from this deal, not Israel. So my attitude, right now, is best expressed by the Yiddish moykhel toyves, and the Hebrew bli tovot: no favors, thanks.
I understand why Barak is doing all this, I think: he is not a man for a stalemate. He is a man of action, and he sees the choice as being between war and peace (which, basically, I guess it always is). Since he can't bring himself to opt for war - being a sensible person and a responsible leader - he has decided to opt for peace. But maybe he is not seeing quite as large a picture as he should. Sometimes there is no action to be taken, other than just letting things take their course.
I guess this could be expressed as - thanks, Ehud, we realize you are trying to help, but there is nothing you can do right now.
The very same section of the Israeli electorate which brought Barak into power - the pragmatic, non religious, right-leaning center (I can't describe it better than that) is what will prevent the deal from getting a majority in a plebiscite, it appears. The recent polls show a clear majority against a full withdrawal from the Golan.
5122. RustlerPike - 1/13/2000 12:10:16 AM
Candide:
There is always a school of thought that says water is the central issue in the mideast. This can best be compared to the school of thought that saw the Gulf War as a war over oil. Personally, I am more of a romantic...
5123. Candide - 1/13/2000 12:12:12 AM
Rustler Pike
Thanks for the interesting but worrying analysis. It seems that reports in the local media have been accurate.
5124. RustlerPike - 1/13/2000 12:12:29 AM
Rick:
I remember a bible study in the mid 80's. It stated that revelations tells us the world's turmoil will start north of Isreal. So, we have Iraq and Pakistan.
I think those countries are better described as being to the east of Israel, no?
5125. RustlerPike - 1/13/2000 12:23:58 AM
However - I assume the bit from Revelations is itself based on Jer. 1:14, "the trouble shall unfold from the north" (my translation).
OK - I don't have time for this, I'll continue later... sorry, my daughter is demanding her bottle...
5126. Candide - 1/13/2000 12:27:12 AM
CalGal
The "working woman" isn't any more or
less disadvantaged if the rich or educated woman gets money for
having a baby.
Her CHILD is doubly disadvantaged in comparison with the middle-class child. The mother must struggle as always plus cope with the child whereas the professional woman can raise her child in elegant comfort.
I gathered from the article that the women were only sterilised if they chose to be.
So what? What doesclass as the target that have to do with eugenics? Besides, it hardly doubles the disadvantage.
It does comparitively.
Eugenics is about selection for certain qualities. Favouring a class is about selection.
Assisting addicts comes into the medical field. You could say that it is selective to give medicine to the sick and not to the well.
I am used to state medical and health schemes and I am in favour of them. I believe that it is sensible to pay taxes for basic educational and health schemes and the one under discussion seems to come into this category. It is NOT compulsory. If it were I would totally oppose it.
5127. Candide - 1/13/2000 12:51:53 AM
CalGal
Ms. Harris had first lobbied legislators to pass a bill that would make people accountable for their repetitive and inhumane acts against their own newborns. But, when that bill did not pass, she designed an
alternative plan called "Project Prevention." Her plan was to offer a
cash incentive to drug/alcohol addicts to spark the attention of those
struggling with yearly pregnancies, numerous abortions, many
abandoned children and incarcerations for child abuse.
To offer help rather than compulsion seems the opposite of eugenics.
5128. RustlerPike - 1/13/2000 12:57:56 AM
Candide:
I am not naturally a fanatical feminist but present international events might have made me into a man-hater if I didn't know some pretty nice men.
There is a kind of woman who adoringly supports her man no matter what. There is a song by Schubert with words from Sir Walter Scott. Ellen's erster Gesang. In the song a medieval lady nurses the head (still attached to his sleeping body) of her blood-stained knight in her lap as she sings him a lullaby. It turns into a sort of hymn in praise of war. It always seemed to me like a man's portrait of an ideal woman. I love the song but aspects of it really stick in my throat. It is her 'role' to comfort him after battle.
This is somehow still deep in the modern war-machine, plus other ingredients like scientific hubris and human conceit. Incurable probably.
What utter crockola. I've heard similar femino-pacifist rants from Israeli women as well. The kutzpah! If it weren't for the 20-something thousand men (and women!) who were killed defending this country since 1948, those very same women doing the man-bashing (or their mothers) would have been raped, butchered, or both by Syrians, Palestinians, Jordanians, Iraqis, Egyptians, etc. The lucky ones would have wound up as chattel, the very very lucky as wives.
I don't know about man's portrait of the ideal woman, but I do know that women would appear to be quite drawn by tough, dangerous looking guys. There are more posters of Snoop Doggy Dog in adolescent girls' rooms than of Bryant Gumble. Correct me if I'm wrong.
5129. Candide - 1/13/2000 1:05:56 AM
Rustler Pike
You're completely wrong. Well as far as I go you're wrong about liking tough dangerous guys. I always preferred bookish or artistic types meself.
And leaving nationality of attackers and victims out of it, notice who was doing the attacking?
And of course people are grateful to ALL those who save them, but it rarely seems to be bands of women attacking, burning and smashing does it?
I don't like any stereotype in bulk. No sex, race or class. Bad thinking I know.
I agree it is a silly argument finally.
That's how it is and that is that.
But I still worry when a man follows me after dark.
5130. RustlerPike - 1/13/2000 2:02:26 AM
Candide:
Well as far as I go you're wrong about liking tough dangerous guys. I always preferred bookish or artistic types meself.
A lot of guys are both artistic, knowledgeable people and yet tough and dangerous to mess with. Some are even good people. Those are the kind you want with you so that you don't have to fear the guys following you in dark alleys.
And leaving nationality of attackers and victims out of it, notice who was doing the attacking?
And of course people are grateful to ALL those who save them, but it rarely seems to be bands of women attacking, burning and smashing does it?
There is no need for the women to do the smashing if their men can do it for them, now is there? Women have always encouraged men's aggressive behavior (not necessarily the same as violent, by the way), as long as they benefited from it. They always will.
I agree it would be nice if the Syrians all shaved off their mustaches and became nice and feminized. But that won't happen, now will it? Feminism seems only to work in 'have' societies, not 'have-not' societies. Arab women seem to have more to gain by encouraging their men's aggression towards the West than by selling out to the West, which would never share its wealth with them (their men would - and do!). And I remind you - the women themselves are as fanatic and fundamentalist as their men.
Even in a less fundamentalist Arab society like the Palestinian society, I don't see women expressing any more dovish opinions than men. Hanan Ashrawi and Suhah Arafat are not moderates. And come to think of it, neither was Golda Meir.
5131. Candide - 1/13/2000 2:16:17 AM
Rustler Pike
I would never preach at someone like you who lives on the razor's edge.
A lot of guys are both artistic, knowledgeable people and yet tough
and dangerous to mess with. Some are even good people. Those are
the kind you want with you so that you don't have to fear the guys
following you in dark alleys.
But women also enjoy solitude. I was warned by the police not to walk in my favourite park because women had been attacked there.
I know that all stereotypes are stupid. But sometimes women get tired of being frightened by men. No big deal. men frighten men too I know.
I particularly loathe the "We don't want to lose you, but we think you ought to go", type of woman.
In peace time in my part of the world, they watch men play cricket and applaud and applaud.
For what it's worth I've been with the same nice chap for many years. Yes he's bookish and artistic and he's good at carpentry too.
5132. RustlerPike - 1/13/2000 2:20:52 AM
Someone please explain the lllama/Boston conflagration joke. I guess I'm a thicko.
5133. PincherMartin - 1/13/2000 3:08:43 AM
CalGal --
Message # 5111
Thanks for the link. On the basis of what is presented here, I would support such programs.
5134. PincherMartin - 1/13/2000 3:24:04 AM
CalGal -- Message # 5120
You can disapprove of the policy, but I see nothing in your analysis that makes this any different from offering crack addicts money to be sterilized. The one key difference (that it's the government) you haven't even mentioned.
5135. PincherMartin - 1/13/2000 3:40:32 AM
One of the most remarkable examples of a eugenic policy (never implemented) was one suggested by either a Japanese newspaper or one of the Meiji leaders in Japan. I am unable to find the source, but I remember quite clearly that Japanese women were to marry Western men and their offspring -- so the source reasoned -- would be able to help Japan out of its benighted state.
I have no information on how seriously anyone other than the writer took it (it was written in grave seriousness), but it is interesting to me that an opinion-maker in Japan of all places would make such a suggestion. If there is another major country in the world that takes as seriously the idea of the purity of the nation's bloodline, I don't know who it could be.
5136. RustlerPike - 1/13/2000 3:42:19 AM
Candide:
I'm not sure what you are saying, so I'm not sure we disagree. Basically, I guess, what I'm saying is blaming all the world's woes on testosterone worked well in the latter third of the 20th century, but it's beginning to sound more and more stale. I appreciate your occasional desire for solitude, but the last thing women seem to want is to be without men for longer than it takes to hold a decent kaffeeklatsch (sp?). As a matter of fact, women's lives - their very sense of self - seem to be centered around their relationships (or lack of) with men, much more exclusively so than men's lives are defined by their relationships with women.
I don't know where you live - England perhaps, judging by the fact that you are up at this hour and talking about cricket? Well - England was almost overrun by a horde of Teutons twice in the 20th century, so living on the razor's edge - and being saved by your men's bravery - is not peculiar to me or my country (remember the Battle of Britain?). And btw, when the English were fighting the Argentines over the Falklands, it was a woman who called the shots.
A question: in your parts, do they also play rugby? And do women totally despise that game, or is there an occasional woman in the bleachers getting her panties in a bunch as the men slam away at each other?
5137. alistairConnor - 1/13/2000 4:00:19 AM
Har! About a week ago, I asked here if anyone would hazard a prediction on the outcome of the Russian presidential election... the only reaction was "Why Putin of course!"
A week is a long time.
What the Russian government needs to do, forthwith, is halt military operations, hand back the administration of Chechnya to its elected government, and quickly manufacture a war elsewhere. Then, Putin might still stand some chance of being elected.
5138. alistairConnor - 1/13/2000 4:11:10 AM
Why do I feel so elated at the prospect of Putin and his gang coming badly unstuck? It won't bring back to life the thousands of people they are cynically murdering. It may well be a Bad Thing for Russian Stability (! ??) - But it would perhaps serve as an example.
5139. alistairConnor - 1/13/2000 4:42:03 AM
Pseudopath: Message # 5095
The combination of these things suggest that French officials haven’t intended to protect Muslim women by their opposition to the headscarf. Rather, their motives have been far less noble...
Then you'd better spell out their ignoble designs, for those who don't know the details.
It's pretty disingenuous, in its own way, to compare the wearing of the foulard to the wearing of a crucifix or a star of David, which are a great deal less ostentatious. Were little Catholic girls to go to school every day wearing their First Communion outfits, then there would be a scandal, you can be sure. Never underestimate the hatred of the French educator class for organised catholicism.
There are obviously more reasons than one for opposing the wearing of the foulard in schools, and the usual, often hypocritical positions affirmed by the functionaries of the national education system are the prime reason why I was inclined, for a number of years, to support the right to wear it. In the long run, when there are respectable principled positions to be held on both sides of a conflict, it's generally useful to check out what's actually happening on a human level. Hence my change of view.
Your ‘fundamentalist Dads asserting their physical, moral and sartorial authority over their pubescent daughters’ may or may not be real, but they have certainly never figured in anybody’s decision-making.
- well, it's not spelled out in the decision making because there is no law against fathers keeping their daughters in line. However, the French national education system has the central role in building social cohesion, and is using whatever texts can be dredged up to fight the good fight.
5140. alistairConnor - 1/13/2000 4:42:25 AM
The principles at stake are the good old standards of multiculturalism vs assimilationism. I've generally been a multiculturalist... up to a point. But in the end, this business of keeping women in a position of slavery, which is the explicit aim of islamic fundamentalists in France, is morally little better than circumcising girl babies.
Please don't waste your precious bandwidth replying to this... tell us about Russia.
5141. stostosto - 1/13/2000 4:43:22 AM
alistairconnor
You didn't offer any other predictions about Putin yourself, did you?
I presume you are referring to Pelle's comment at the time, something like "Putin will win, hands down", which nobody replied to. I thought about it, since it seemed a rather sweeping statement in a country as politically unstable as Russia. And if Putin's only claim to public support is his war luck in Chechnya, it appears a bit precarious.
That is also one reason I have been following developments in Chechnya, and I think the U-turn of some of the major Russian media may be a highly important development.
PE
Interesting comments on Russia - and straight from Volgograd, to boot! I hope you can find time to do more.
5142. alistairConnor - 1/13/2000 4:50:45 AM
As a matter of fact, women's lives - their very sense of self - seem to be centered around their relationships (or lack of) with men, much more exclusively so than men's lives are defined by their relationships with women.
Without wishing to get personal, Russ, a man's views on women are obviously somewhat conditioned by the sort of women they hang out with. Personally, I can't see any sort of universal truth shining out of that paragraph - it just doesn't say anything to me that's relevant to my life.
Well maybe I'm wrong, and you're the guy who really Understands What Women Want. Heck, you should write a book about it.
5143. alistairConnor - 1/13/2000 4:55:14 AM
Message # 5136 Well - England was almost overrun by a horde of Teutons twice in the 20th century
- you must know something about the First World War that I don't...
I could probably make a case for the defense of Britain in WWII being somewhat maternal in nature -- after all, the aggressive Vaterland was attacking the defensive Motherland -- but I'm feeling merciful tonight. Must be my feminine side.
5144. alistairConnor - 1/13/2000 5:01:13 AM
Sto,
Yes, I thought Pelle was being pretty adventurous at the time. My own desire was to stimulate debate, because I am absolutely clueless as to what the outcome of the presidential elections is likely to be, and I suspect that pretty well everyone else is too, including the principal protagonists!
Which is pretty frightening, really.
5145. stostosto - 1/13/2000 5:57:59 AM
PincherMartin:
I agree with most of your comments on Pinochet, but unlike your "surprise" at the call for a trial from both sides in the Chilean presidential campaign, I think there may be a straightforward explanation: Pinochet's rule simply wasn't as popular as his supporters think, including many right-wing western commentators who may have been lured into assuming so on the basis of whom his most loud opponents were. And, after all, he did lose the vote in 1990 after which he stepped down.
Sometimes the horrors of Pinochet are downplayed, since there were only 3,000 confirmed death victims, which then can be favourably compared to, say, Cuban numbers. But there was also a huge exodus from Chile which is equally telling of the terror of the regime. I can't find a source now, but I have read that more than 500,000 fled or were forced to flee. Out of a population of now 15m, then, perhaps 12m.
Pinochet's return will embarrass right in Chile's presidential poll
It's interesting that calls for Pinochet's trial scores well, politically in Chile, don't you think? Even many right wing Chileans obviously distance themselves from him.
(Quite apart from that, I think the Chileans ought to refrain from breaching the transition deal made with Pinochet cf. earlier comments).
5146. Candide - 1/13/2000 6:08:51 AM
Rustler Pike
You must know some real dorks of females. Yes a soul mate is a lovely thing BUT...women are individuals as well you know.
As a matter of fact, women's lives - their very
sense of self - seem to be centered around their relationships (or
lack of) with men, much more exclusively so than men's lives are
defined by their relationships with women.
Then why do statistics show that most divorces are initiated by women and that most men suffer more after a divorce?
I live in Australia, started in New Zealand and spent a goodish while in Britain and have been about a bit. I used cricket watching as an example of a kind of fawning attention an exploitive type of female uses on men. And then some women genuinely like cricket.
I hate rugby.
5147. IrvingSnodgrass - 1/13/2000 6:10:02 AM
Pincher Message # 5101:
Sorry, I should have said "interesting intellectually".
I was just teasing. I can see how "fascinating" would work for those outside.
Message # 5103:
I actually don't even know if Singapore practices this policy anymore (I read about it some five or six years ago, which is Asia as you know might as well be a lifetime ago). Based on Irv's comments, I assumed they did.
I haven't read of it for a similar length of time, and assumed it was still in force. But I don't know for sure.
5148. Candide - 1/13/2000 6:14:47 AM
Rustler Pike
I don't envy you being a man. I think being a man nowadays must be tough.
5149. stostosto - 1/13/2000 6:18:27 AM
Candide
Oh, yes. You have no idea.
5150. Candide - 1/13/2000 6:25:25 AM
stostosto
There there.
5151. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 6:30:20 AM
The Haaretz newspaper has obtained and published the draft peace treaty proposed by the US.
5152. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 6:41:06 AM
Let's keep the chat out of this thread, shall we?
5153. Candide - 1/13/2000 6:49:15 AM
Draft Peace Treaty it is then. Well it would have been but the darn thing won't open.
5154. Candide - 1/13/2000 6:51:41 AM
I'm sorry Pelle. We were actually cementing relations across the ocean as it were, having begun in a more orthodox and on-thread manner. It won't happen again Sah!
5155. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 7:00:26 AM
Candide
It opens in a new window.
5156. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 7:04:30 AM
Hardship in Baghdad - fashion show at the Grand Hotel.
5157. Candide - 1/13/2000 7:05:07 AM
There's a story today by the Guardian's Moscow correspondent saying that Putin is going to 'beef up' the Russian secret service and model it on the FBI. According to the story it's part of a plan to restore Russia's former glory.
5158. Candide - 1/13/2000 7:09:19 AM
And I was frivolous?
Still Baghdad! Well the rich have always been OK there haven't they — as long as they survive that is.
5159. Candide - 1/13/2000 7:10:19 AM
I opened the Guardian from my own bookmarks.
5160. Candide - 1/13/2000 7:16:25 AM
As Stephen F. Cohen wrote in these pages, "so great has been
Russia's economic and thus social catastrophe that we must
now speak of another unprecedented development: the literal
demodernization of a twentieth-century country."
This is from an article in The Nation. It looks good. I'll read it tomorrow. It's available in Politics I think. That or Current Affairs. Must dash. Be back tomorrow.
5161. RickNelson - 1/13/2000 7:58:25 AM
Rustler,
Yes, east. But, description does not exclude northeast. The reference comes from a televangelist Jimi Swaggert. One who was dethroned. The source is definitely the one referenced.
Candide,
Subliminally I suppose I meant Moties who reply. Yet at the time it was in general terms. I cannot consider all Moties who reply as my role models. My expression was to emotional in that case, I have no other elloquent way to express what I mean though.
PE,
Though I do not wholely argue, I cannot see that following what is common practice for opening speeches in the U.S. school system should be ones criterion during introduction. I think that women should open her speech as is customary to her within context of her culture, education and audience. With the qualifier that it must be tasteful and to some degree practiced elsewhere. Elsewhere to include any other countries school system. To disallow a culturally motivated introduction commonly practiced elsewhere is what I object to. I find that to be closed minded administrative policy.
Btw, best wishes to you and yours.
5162. RickNelson - 1/13/2000 7:59:50 AM
women = woman
5163. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 8:23:49 AM
Candide
I meant that the Haaretz link in my Message # 5151 opens in a new browser window.
5164. ButterfieldSwire - 1/13/2000 8:24:14 AM
1. Thanks to Irving Snodgrass and Pincher Martin for the information.
a. IS - I find it surprising that Malaysia has subsidies for high birth rates among Malays. My stereotype is that Muslim populations have high birthrates even at high income levels. But that might just be the effect of high oil incomes in the Persian Gulf.
b. Pinch - I would be against paying working class women for sterilization. On the other hand, I wouldn't exactly be marching in the streets. It occurs to me that someone who would forego having children for $10K probably shouldn't be having children.
2. I also don't find any of your arguments compelling. IrvingSnodgrass and Candide find the fact that any subsidies for the well-educated would worsen income distribution to be overwhelming. I don't. Well educated people have fewer children than less educated people, in part, because the prime educational years overlap with the prime child bearing years. A free market policy is thus a policy which inherently discourages reproduction among well educated people. A policy, such as Singapore's, which is more neutral amongst educational choices for reproduction sounds better to me.
5165. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 8:30:46 AM
Please note that the Haaretz article includes notes showing the Israeli and Syrian positions where they disagree.
Also note that there are no objections to Artice III "Normal Peaceful Relations" although some areas are identified as subjects for further consideration and discussion. Israel wants a time table for the establishment of normal relations.
One of the big sticking points is likely to be Israel's demand that the settler should be allowed to stay after the hand-over. I assume they are on land that was formerly farmed by Syrians.
5166. Dantheman - 1/13/2000 8:52:15 AM
Pelle,
Thanks for posting the draft peace treaty. I was amused by Syria's suggestion that Mt. Harmon would be operated jointly by the US and France. Even in the incredibly unlikely circumstance that the Israelis would allow that crucial monitoring post to be run by anyone other than themselves, the last country the Israelis would choose would be the Frogs.
RP #5132,
The three-l lllama joke plays off the Boston accent. They would pronounce three-alarmer (i.e., a fire which requires three separate calls for firemen) that way.
5167. Bruce Dodds - 1/13/2000 9:54:06 AM
This from today's Financial Times, with an amusing Freudian slip:
Israel wants Golan settlers to stay
Israel wants Jewish settlers on the Golan Heights to
remain in their homes should it cede the strategic
plateau to Syria in a future peace treaty, according to
news reports. It said the condition was part of a draft
peace treaty, submitted by the US to Syria and Israel in
Shepherdstow, West Virginia, where the sides held a
second round of peace talks last week. Although
effectively confirming the voracity of the document, the
office of Ehud Barak, Israeli prime minisiter, called it a
"preliminary US paper which is not binding, and
concerning which, Israel has passed on many
comments".
5168. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 10:51:29 AM
Hi Bruce,
I don't recall seeing you here before. Welcome and keep posting!
5169. Bruce Dodds - 1/13/2000 11:28:29 AM
Thank you. I have been here before, but briefly.
5170. Bruce Dodds - 1/13/2000 11:34:03 AM
Thank you. I have been here before, but briefly.
5171. Bruce Dodds - 1/13/2000 11:35:03 AM
Thank you. I have been here before, but now it looks like I will be sticking around forever.
5172. stostosto - 1/13/2000 11:39:16 AM
Hi Bruce
Welcome from me too!
I look forward to your contributions.
Would you mind starting by explaining the Freudian slip in your post above? I must confess it went over my thick head.
(I assume this one isn't to do with Boston accents...).
5173. Dantheman - 1/13/2000 11:39:35 AM
Welcome, Bruce. You don't need to stick around forever. We allow you time off for sleeping and potty breaks. (g)
5174. Dantheman - 1/13/2000 11:41:09 AM
sto-cubed
I think it's the veracity/voracity mistake.
5175. Bruce Dodds - 1/13/2000 11:41:21 AM
Thank you. I have been here before, but now it looks like I will be sticking around forever.
5176. Bruce Dodds - 1/13/2000 11:42:03 AM
I'm not going to say anything else.
5177. Bruce Dodds - 1/13/2000 11:42:55 AM
Sorry about the double posts.
5178. Dusty - 1/13/2000 11:43:26 AM
Welcome Bruce!!
5179. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 12:08:22 PM
Yesterday I promised to explain agoniste. This term was coined by PseudoErasmus to describe Scandinivians (later renamed Herringstanis) whom PE considers to be well-meaning wimps who agonise a lot about things they can do little about, support "good" causes, and now and then put on sensible shoes to march behind banners which declare that the people behind them are for something or against something, mostly against.
5180. ScottLoar - 1/13/2000 12:10:35 PM
Bruce Dodds;
You seem to be a man of few words (said again and again). Feel free to expand.
5181. ScottLoar - 1/13/2000 12:16:43 PM
PelleNilsson;
Why that's fascinating. Please keep us posted on further developments. Are there many here wishing to incorporate such things into their vocabulary?
5182. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 12:27:39 PM
Well, ScottLoar, it was one of your recent posts which inspired that little aside.
5183. CalGal - 1/13/2000 12:54:14 PM
Pincher,
My own reason for disapproving of Singapore's policy is that it's mistaken to think you can improve the human race (or just the human race within your own borders) by giving incentives and disincentives to particular socioeconomic classes of people to have babies.
Um. This sounds like you're saying "Eugenics is fine, but for heaven's sake, make sure you pick a successful method!" Would you be happier if they tested for talent throughout the income strata and incent those women to have babies?
Personally, I think it's a mistake to try and improve the human race. Utter waste of time. I think there are plenty of other more practical reasons to incent or disincent women to have babies based on their education or income.
As for your other point--Many societies would probably be willing to trade off a few artists for fewer overall children being raised in horrendous conditions by incompetent parents. And that's assuming that you could point to anyone born in the last 30 years who has come out of the inner cities or poverty-ridden rural areas to achieve anything other then repeat the cycle.
I agree with all of Butter's posts as well.
5184. PincherMartin - 1/13/2000 1:45:23 PM
CalGal --
My reply to you is in the Slow Thread. (Butter, please join us.)
5185. Candide - 1/13/2000 3:04:19 PM
PelleNilsson
While it is true I've done a bit of "Agonisteising", it is also true that our activities changed the stand of our government. More than once.
I will tell a personal anecdote involving major name dropping which at once makes my point and confirms my status as a SPECIES.
I had a face off with Alva Myrdal at a meeting about this very issue.
She had come to Australia in the early 80s to address the Australian peace movement among other things. There had, at that time been a great deal of surging around the streets with banners and in Europe the same tactics had begun to be used by those with the opposite point of view and I had seen the writing on the wall.
I stood up at that meeting and suggested that instead of marching around the streets we should organise more intelligently and form a political group.
Then I said the fatal words :"Anyone can form a mob".
Alva Myrdal turned a withering gaze on me and said:"I have never seen a mob. "I have only seen the people expressing their views collectively."
Collapse of Candide. Everyone looked at me as though I had just joined the Nazis.
To cut the story short we went on to form the 'Nuclear Disarmament Party" which went on to cause the prime minister of the day to panic and give us more publicity than we would otherwise have got.Before the party self-destructed a few idiotic schemes involving missile tests in the Tasman were hastily dropped by the government, we got one excellrnt senator into power and established the rock-star/lawyer-environmentalist Peter Garrett as a serious individual in the political and environmental field, and trained a future head of Greenpeace whose name has completely passed from my breakfastless brain. Paul something. He didn't last long in Greenpeace because he wanted to involve industry and that was unacceptable to others in the organisation.
5186. Candide - 1/13/2000 3:32:03 PM
http://www.TheNation.com/
PRESIDENT PUTIN
An editorial in the current 'Nation'. URL above.
excerpt:
And while elements of democracy still exist,
most left over from the Gorbachev years, Yeltsin undermined
others, first by using tanks to shell an elected Parliament in
1993 and then by pushing through an authoritarian
constitution, available to any would-be dictator. The Russian
media were freer in the early nineties than they are today. As
was apparent in the December parliamentary elections,
national television is controlled by intertwined oligarchic and
government interests, while the largest newspapers are the
playthings of competing tycoons with enormous influence in
the Kremlin. In short, Yeltsin's legacy to his anointed
successor, acting President Vladimir Putin, is an embittered,
polarized, impoverished nation.
5187. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 3:51:09 PM
Candide
Good story. Great dropping.
Since this thread also serves as the travel thread, here is an interesting piece of trivia about your former home country.
In the town of Kawakawa in nothern NZ there is a public toilet designed by the Austrian artist Fritz Hundertwasser (1928-). It is said to draw busloads of German-speaking tourists.
Here is another design of Hundertwasser's: 
5188. Candide - 1/13/2000 4:09:54 PM
We know all about that down here in Zorkon. (CalGal's airy description of my location). He's been part of the furniture for years.
5189. Candide - 1/13/2000 4:11:57 PM
The Greenpeace head was Paul Guilding.
5190. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 4:13:58 PM
Who can provide a picture of this famous toilet?
5191. Dantheman - 1/13/2000 4:18:04 PM
A modest proposal to warm Candide's heart
5192. Candide - 1/13/2000 4:26:25 PM
Dantheman
It's beautiful! Thank you.
Bleaters of the world unite.
5193. janjon - 1/13/2000 4:28:14 PM
Dan - that was positively brilliant. Hear, hear.
5194. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 4:32:40 PM
Dantheman
Nice piece.
sto
Reports from the Danish immigration debate start to appear in the press here. I didn't realise it is that ugly.
5195. Candide - 1/13/2000 4:37:42 PM
Pelle
Can The Nation be included with other journals in the banana strip? And without being segregated as though it had the clap?
5196. ScottLoar - 1/13/2000 4:59:54 PM
I posted this in The Slow Thread but do so here for the edification of at least one or two:
Incent and disincent are crude substitutes for encourage and discourage. I am surprised that you seemingly literate people have tolerated these crudities. Next is X-centric which rivals the examples above in pretense; all are simply silly.
5197. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 5:04:47 PM
Candide
What is The Nation (apart from being a newspaper)? Please provide URL.
5198. Dantheman - 1/13/2000 5:11:01 PM
Pelle,
Didn't Candide post it in #5186?
5199. alistairconnor - 1/13/2000 5:12:42 PM
I can't find a picture of the finished Kawakawa loo (if indeed it's finished). Here is the artist, and the work in progress: 
Tell you what, I should be driving through Kawakawa in a month or so, I'll take a picture and post it here.
As for the artist's name: I believe he was born Friedreich Hundertwasser, and changed it to Friedensreich. The paper calls him "Frederick"; but surely not Fritz.
5200. SnowOwl - 1/13/2000 5:21:20 PM
When I was young Kawakawa's main claim to fame was that the railroad ran down the middle of the main street. I recall spending a few days there and going to the local picture theature, which was really just a hall. We had to take chairs from the hotel we were staying in so we could be seated through the film.
5201. SnowOwl - 1/13/2000 5:23:05 PM
I might have gone to the theature, I also went to the theatre.
5202. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 5:32:27 PM
Candide
As Dantheman pointed out you did post the URL. It seems to be full of left-wing hackery. I'll link it but not tonight. Or sto will do it, he's often up and around later than I am.
Alistair
I'll hold you to that. And take a few pictures of the trains too. I'm a moderate railway buff.
All
Do click on the photo to the right. It takes you to a wonderfully naive article about the loo-in-being.
5203. Indiana Jones - 1/13/2000 5:36:33 PM
The Nation is linked off Politics. Does it need to be linked here as well?
Given the thread topic, its name would seem oxymoronic.
5204. PelleNilsson - 1/13/2000 5:43:50 PM
Indiana
That's true. But there are many around here who never post in Politics and perhaps do not visit either.
5205. Candide - 1/13/2000 7:01:12 PM
http://www.TheNation.com/
Its an American current affairs and political magazine that has produced some great writing and thinking. It is considered to be 'of the left' but it's much better than something that can be categorised like that. Some of the best international writers write for it.
5206. Candide - 1/13/2000 7:03:26 PM
Many left-wing hacks would repudiate Christopher Hitchens, a regular writer in that publication.
5207. Candide - 1/13/2000 7:28:35 PM
I looked at this edition (Nation)and its far more as Pelle decribed than it often is. I still think that it should be here.
5208. IrvingSnodgrass - 1/13/2000 9:14:36 PM
Candide:
Then I said the fatal words :"Anyone can form a mob". Alva Myrdal turned a withering gaze on me and said:"I have never seen a mob. "I have only seen the people expressing their views collectively."
It's too bad Alva wasn't in Jakarta in May, 1998. The group of people expressing their views collectively mindlessly burned down buildings (with hundreds of people inside), raped dozens of Chinese women, killed over 1000 people, and looted and burned thousands of buildings and cars. Sure looked like a mob to me.
5209. IrvingSnodgrass - 1/13/2000 9:20:49 PM
Oops.
5210. Candide - 1/13/2000 9:21:30 PM
Irving Snodgrass
I absolutely agree.
I was devastated at the time. I felt like a fundamentalist Christian being expelled from the true church. I didn't think I was wrong. I just had no way of communicating with the "mob".
5211. Candide - 1/13/2000 9:27:34 PM
IrvingSnodgrass
I haven't told you this before, but before my foul-mouthed neighbour moved into the adjoining house, a really nice, pleasant couple with a child lived there. He worked for a big American bank and was promoted to Jakarta. All the Americans fled and left him more or less in charge.
When 'the balloon went up' their adored daughter was at the International School, he was at the office and she was at home. People in foreign cars were getting attacked and the children couldn't leave the school. The husband made it home but was in a state of horror and said he had seen things he could never have believed possible. The daughter was smuggled home about 24 hours later. The mother said it was the worst 24 hours of her entire life.
They now live in neat, repressive Singapore and think it's paradise.
5212. Candide - 1/13/2000 9:33:35 PM
IrvingSnodgrass
I meant to add apropos the Fijian coup, that most of the material in the fine document that you linked has New Zealand sources. I was in telephone communication with Owen Wilkes who was a very wealthy peace activist. Funnily enough, many peace activists thought that he was CIA. I had no reason to do so.
The missing material is Australian, which may to some extent account for its absence — allowing for lack of sufficient evidence, although I believe the evidence was well tested.
5213. IrvingSnodgrass - 1/13/2000 10:01:45 PM
Candide:
I was in Jakarta through the horrors of the May riots, and I'll never forget them. But I don't understand your comment about "foreign cars"... all cars here are imported. The main targets in the riots were Chinese (in and out of cars) and luxury cars (plus the "Timor," a Korean car with an Indonesian name, sold by Tommy Suharto). One interesting fact... no foreigners were hurt in Jakarta during the rioting in May 1998, but 5 died in accidents in Singapore where they had been evacuated to escape the rioting.
5214. Candide - 1/13/2000 10:08:37 PM
IrvingSnodgrass.
The last piece of information is very ironical. Perhaps my friend meant large chauffeur-driven cars. Perhaps it was all just part of their panic.
I'm so sorry that you went through that experience. I can only try to imagine what effect it would have on one's view of things in general.
I do envy the 19th century idealists who thought that humans were evolving into something finer and nobler. I wish I could convince myself that that is the case.
I can't remember the American source of :"I have seen the enemy and it is us".
5215. wonkers2 - 1/13/2000 10:46:59 PM
Pogo? Peanuts? Clinton?
5216. IrvingSnodgrass - 1/14/2000 2:34:00 AM
wonkers:
It's a pleasure to see you around here. It would be even more of a pleasure to see you participating actively in this thread.
Candide Message # 5212:
I would imagine Ewins used mostly references from NZ because that is where most studies of Fiji are produced. Since he is an Australian, and published the article in Australia (at ANU), I don't think he would overlook Australian sources which withstand a rigorous academic scrutiny.
Here is Ewins's biodata (from the article):
Rory Ewins is a graduate of the University of Tasmania, the University of Cambridge, and the Australian National University, where he gained his Ph.D. in Political Science at the Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies. In 1997 he was a Research Scholar at the Macmillan Brown Centre for Pacific Studies, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand, where he completed his book Changing Their Minds: Tradition and Politics in Contemporary Fiji and Tonga. He is now Adviser on IT Policy to the Australian Vice-Chancellors' Committee.
5217. Candide - 1/14/2000 3:06:26 AM
IrvingSnodgrass
I'm totally impressed. Especially by Canterbury University, scene of my wanton youth. Did you know that Karl Popper taught there once and that Ernest Rutherford worked there in a basement laboratory that still existed in my day and which one walked past to enter the main gate to the quadrangle of the old university? It always looked like something where Faust might have made his pact with the devil. Associations with the BOMB.
I still think Ewin should have a chat with David Marr. Allow me to harbour my paranoid theory until proved wrong.
5218. Candide - 1/14/2000 3:09:46 AM
Wonkers2
It was some such character (if Clinton may be included). Not Archie the cockroach but a comic commentator, almost certainly a cartoon creature.
5219. IrvingSnodgrass - 1/14/2000 3:17:22 AM
Candide:
Yes, Canterbury University has a gloried history. Is it true that it has gone downhill in recent years?
I'd be surprised if Ewins is not familiar with Marr's work already. The fact that your theories are not mentioned by Ewins does not mean they are incorrect... it merely means that there isn't enough evidence to prove them to the standard required by academia. The CIA isn't known for leaving much evidence, so your theories could still be correct.
5220. Candide - 1/14/2000 3:29:49 AM
IrvingSnodgrass
I've lost touch with Canterbury. Actually I lost interest when it shifted from its lovely old home in the heart of the city, many years ago, while I was still hanging round there, and moved out to Ilam into one of those huge cold industrial looking places. Landscaped and tasteful though. Not anything as hideous as New South Wales University which is quite the most dreadful university campus I know. A hideous city. Canterbury may have gained a heart again.
When I went to Oxford(as a singer not a student) it reminded me (as Canterbury had intended it should) of the old Christchurch city/college atmosphere.
Canterbury was people on bicycles and students reclining by the river surrounded by weeping willows grown from cuttings from those on Napoleon's tomb. Very romantic and slow. Anyone with half a personality became a personality. There was space for development.
5221. stostosto - 1/14/2000 3:44:20 AM
Good morning everybody.
I have started the day by putting in a new link: 
Requested by Candide.
5222. PelleNilsson - 1/14/2000 3:46:28 AM
Funny. I had just logged in to do the same.
5223. Candide - 1/14/2000 3:48:06 AM
Socialist hacks and bleaters eat away like weevils at the pristine heart of the Mote.
This isn't one of the most brilliant editions but the editorial about Putin's Russia and the Christopher Hitchens story about the elections in the sidebar are worth reading. If the rest makes people mad, well that is a good emetic process. It's a great mistake to only read the people with whom one agrees.
5224. Candide - 1/14/2000 3:52:01 AM
HTTP ERROR 404
404 NOT FOUND
http://www.TheNation.com/
5225. stostosto - 1/14/2000 3:53:31 AM
And for those of you who may wonder: You are encouraged to propose good, relevant, interesting, preferably international sources on the web as permanent links available from this thread.
I don't know that any such proposals have been rejected so far. And I think that there is room for more.
5226. Candide - 1/14/2000 3:54:06 AM
Sto stostosto?
5227. stostosto - 1/14/2000 3:56:15 AM
Sorry Candide. Try it now.
5228. Candide - 1/14/2000 4:12:03 AM
'L'Espresso' Italian current affairs weekly which is connected tothe newspaper 'La Repubblica' Umbert Eco often writes for it among others.
http://www.espressoedit.kataweb.it/
I see that 'The Nation' has sneaked in a new edition since I last looked. I was given the message above when I tried to get it from the Mote.
5229. Candide - 1/14/2000 4:13:23 AM
OK stostosto
'L'Espresso' and 'La Repubblica' are in Italian
5230. Candide - 1/14/2000 4:22:11 AM
I must now depart. Goodnight all.
5231. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 5:43:23 AM
Alistair:
Without wishing to get personal, Russ, a man's views on women are obviously somewhat conditioned by the sort of women they hang out with.
You just did get personal, and in an underhand sort of way. If you want to say something extremely objectionable, bigoted and stupid, go ahead and say it directly. You think I hang around the wrong sort of women? What do you know about the woman in my life, Alistair? That she's African and therefore somehow... what? Come out and say it, my boy. Be proud of what you are.
Candide:
Then why do statistics show that most divorces are initiated by women and that most men suffer more after a divorce?
Ah - that's easy. Because, like you said, it ain't easy being a man nowadays. The present divorce laws and the feminist social mores which have become prevalent in the West are heavily biased against men, making divorce quite a tempting, easy option for women (almost an opportunity for advancement, I'd say. A great career move...) and an unmitigated disaster for men. Make one or two simple changes in the laws, and a couple of more changes in the general attitudes people hold on the subject, and divorce will become a much rarer thing.
5232. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 5:45:11 AM
Are you guys sure that's Kawakawa? Kakawawa is a lot more fitting.
5233. Dantheman - 1/14/2000 8:52:09 AM
Clinton's forthcoming visit to the sub-continent
5234. stostosto - 1/14/2000 9:29:09 AM
This from l'espresso: 
Just to balance pellenilsson's "Iraqi" post yesterday.
5235. stostosto - 1/14/2000 9:49:53 AM
Candide:
L'Espresso is a worthy read. Even if you don't speak much Italian.
An excerpt: 
5236. marjoribanks - 1/14/2000 9:58:17 AM
Wow, this place has been hopping since I last checked in. And I see that Pseuder is in fine form.
My subcon link of the day: here
I've linked this guy's stuff before. He's my paranoiac anti-Sino demagogue of choice and always always amusing.
5237. marjoribanks - 1/14/2000 10:00:52 AM
Oh jesus, I may have to go on another spree of photos after the worthy efforts of our Skandie hosts.
Only trouble is, I believe I've forgotten how to link photos. What is it again? < img src ="url" >?
5238. stostosto - 1/14/2000 10:02:51 AM
(I can't believe I really posted that..!)
5239. stostosto - 1/14/2000 10:04:26 AM
marj
check the HTML hints
it's < img src="(picture's url)" >
5240. ButterfieldSwire - 1/14/2000 10:09:15 AM
Speaking of Italian chicks, Italian women have the lowest fertility rates among the OECD, and they also have the lowest labor participation rates. I'm just wondering what they do with thmeselves all day (those who aren't appearing in L'Espresso in underwear you could take off with your teeth, that is).
5241. marjoribanks - 1/14/2000 10:16:49 AM
Italian girls, oh Italian girls. Sto can comment, I'm sure.
I made myself into a palm reader in Italy one summer, with the express purpose of getting close to the girls. Sounds cheesy, worked like a charm.
5242. PelleNilsson - 1/14/2000 10:16:54 AM
Things do easily get out of hand here.
5243. marjoribanks - 1/14/2000 10:29:35 AM
Come on, Uncle Pelle, that photo linked by your co-host must do SOMETHING for you. I can't imagine why it's in the newspaper, but I'm glad for that wake-up call this morning.
5244. marjoribanks - 1/14/2000 10:38:27 AM
On the topic of international women, I've noticed that Swedish women in particular are drawn to men of color. Then again, maybe they're just drawn to men in general.
Any comments on this phenomenon Pelle?
5245. ScottLoar - 1/14/2000 10:53:07 AM
She's nice. Very nice (reveries begin).
5246. marjoribanks - 1/14/2000 11:05:00 AM
Loar, stostosto,
Wonderful way to start the day, don't you think? I'm counting on our host to produce such an image every morning. These things really get me working.
5247. ScottLoar - 1/14/2000 11:09:48 AM
The picture prompts an Italian saying, cicca bella (which I may have misspelled), pretty flesh.
I ache.
5248. marjoribanks - 1/14/2000 11:25:22 AM
When is that girl going to uncross her arms?
Loar,
I ache too.
5249. stostosto - 1/14/2000 11:31:46 AM
Sorry to have inflicted such pain.
5250. marjoribanks - 1/14/2000 11:36:38 AM
Sto,
You good fellow, are there any more such images in your arsenal? If so, please give us one a day, I don't think I can handle any more than that.
5251. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 11:43:13 AM
After all, we all must stay abreast of the news here.
5252. stostosto - 1/14/2000 6:08:04 PM
marj, my eager young man.
I am thinking this was a one time thing. But you can go here and see for yourself.
There are other pictures.
But don't forget: The only reason I was exploring the site was because Candide said Umberto Eco writes in it.
Aren't you just dying to read him in his original language?
5253. CalGal - 1/14/2000 6:22:40 PM
No, I think we need some pictures more appropriate to the tone and mood of this thread. This is how I picture Pelle: 
5254. CalGal - 1/14/2000 6:24:43 PM
And could Mr. March be our own Scott Loar? 
5255. PelleNilsson - 1/14/2000 6:31:48 PM
Very good CalGal!
5256. CalGal - 1/14/2000 6:34:19 PM
Hashke, after a particularly good pun: 
5257. ScottLoar - 1/14/2000 6:41:26 PM
CalGal, my member is not so easily concealed, my face is younger, more handsomely proportioned, yet shows far more character than that pixillated dude you've thrown up. So, too, I swim a mile four times weekly. I do concede the attitude is almost right.
5258. ScottLoar - 1/14/2000 6:43:02 PM
Perhaps you, CalGal, would care to toss up a few candid shots of yourself, or dare you leave that to our efforts?
5259. CalGal - 1/14/2000 6:45:31 PM
And this one I just had to share: 
5260. PincherMartin - 1/14/2000 7:02:50 PM
Hahahahahahahahaha!!!!
Great stuff!
5261. PincherMartin - 1/14/2000 7:05:34 PM
Scott Loar --
CalGal, my member is not so easily concealed...
Of course, CalGal was unable to post my face and member here out of fear that you older gentlemen would recognize the sad fact that some things don't get better with age.
5262. stostosto - 1/14/2000 7:09:53 PM
CalGal
That picture really captures pelle. And that little cow next to him is such a nice touch.
5263. PincherMartin - 1/14/2000 7:27:30 PM
I particularly like Hashke's Dionysiac pose.
The strategically placed bunch of grapes (really, just a handful) is quite funny.
5264. CalGal - 1/14/2000 7:48:11 PM
Thank you all, but I must say the work made me....hungry. 
Playgirl Centerfold, April 1999
That'll do for a start.
5265. stostosto - 1/14/2000 7:51:39 PM
I have decided that there is a case for putting up a link to 
Umberto Eco occasionally writes in it, you know.
5266. stostosto - 1/14/2000 7:52:47 PM
CalGal
I was wondering when you were going to do me.
5267. CalGal - 1/14/2000 7:58:22 PM
Sto,
Frankly, you're much hotter than this guy.
And you need to brush up on your American vernacular.
5268. PincherMartin - 1/14/2000 8:00:57 PM
Frankly, you're much hotter than this guy.
Jesus Christ, you've got an overly high opinion of geeks in black turtlenecks, don't you?
5269. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 8:01:14 PM
Eddie is most definitely trying real hard to hold something in. Nobody has butt muscles that tight.
5270. stostosto - 1/14/2000 8:01:40 PM
Brush up on my what? Please, Cal. This is a decent place.
5271. PincherMartin - 1/14/2000 8:02:03 PM
Pelle's going to be pissed off when he wakes up tomorrow and sees my backside splashed all over his thread.
5272. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 8:06:58 PM
I also wanted to ask - since when are members measured in their flaccid state? That would be like giving the length of a radio antenna when it is tucked in, or of a model airplane in its box, or of a snakes' overall diameter when it is curled up... As a proud member of the compact-when-stored class, I object.
5273. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 8:07:53 PM
Sto:
'do me' means...
5274. CalGal - 1/14/2000 8:09:02 PM
Pincher,
Yes. It is a sad failing of mine. I am not overly enamored of musclebound hunks. Although Ben Affleck has considerable appeal, I confess.
Sto,
"Do me" has certain connotations you probably didn't intend.
5275. stostosto - 1/14/2000 8:12:20 PM
Well, Pike.
Look at the flaccid size as a floor value. It may get a lot bigger, but isn't going to be smaller.
5276. stostosto - 1/14/2000 8:15:22 PM
Hmmm.
"Do me" has certain connotations you probably didn't intend.
Probably not. Or perhaps it was one of those Freudian flips..?
5277. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 8:16:44 PM
Ah, but I think we were getting side tracked. Here is something more on subject, to me anyways.
5278. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 8:20:21 PM
Here's one of me with Sophia Loren: 
5279. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 8:22:03 PM
Sto: you mean Freudian lips, don't you?
5280. CalGal - 1/14/2000 8:22:10 PM
Pike,
That's not international.
5281. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 8:23:17 PM
That's such a touching photo of Marilyn. I'd never seen it before.
5282. CalGal - 1/14/2000 8:25:19 PM
Sto,
Were I to meet you, pounce upon you, strip you naked, and proceed to have my way with you, and were you to find this a agreeable idea but wanted to maintain a certain degree of sangfroid, "I was wondering when you were going to do me" would be a suitable remark for the occasion.
5283. stostosto - 1/14/2000 8:28:06 PM
CalGal
Shh... Don't rub it in. Not so hard, anyway.
Rustler
I had no idea circumcision could do that to you.
5284. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 8:35:51 PM
Sto: yes, circumcision is a cruel practice. I didn't do it to my son, and I'm pleased with myself.
Cal:
Don't be such a spoil-sport. Besides, what could be more international than Marilyn and Sophia?
5285. stostosto - 1/14/2000 8:52:45 PM
It's too late here, I've got to go to bed.
Isn't it equally late in Israel, by the way?
Oh, and Rustler: Congratulations with your Danish football coach! Just ask if you want me to fill you in on him. He is a peculiar fellow.
I also wanted to say that I have saved a newspaper article with a hilarious reportage from the Israel-Denmark match. The reporting guy is Jewish, which adds a funny angle to it. Unfortunately it's in Danish, but if you are going to be around - which I very much hope - I can translate and post some of the highlights.
5286. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 9:01:31 PM
Sto:
Yes, I'd love that (everything you offered). Did you guys hear about the call-girl scandal after the match with your team?
Actually it is fucking 4:00 AM here. I slept during the day and woke up in the middle of the night. Since I had work to do - I decided to do it, as this is a good time to get things done. The kids get pretty quiet these hours...
5287. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 9:02:43 PM
Anyhow, we'll talk later...
5288. Indiana Jones - 1/14/2000 9:20:11 PM
Alright, people. You don't want to start with the skin shots--I've got a collection that will bring the server to its knees.
Let's just link...especially those showing half-nude octogenerians.
5289. alistairconnor - 1/14/2000 9:34:25 PM
Rustler,
I am sorry for the offense my post gave you, it was a clumsy effort. However my motives are very far removed from those you want to stick on me. None of the African women I know fit your stereotype of being defined by the men in their lives, and I'm obviously not in a position to know whether or not it is true of your wife.
5290. RustlerPike - 1/14/2000 10:02:39 PM
OK alistair, we all blunder sometimes. Let me assure you I would not spend my life with a woman who was not both brilliant and fiercely proud, a natural genius who besides being extremely funny and completely beautiful is a wonderful friend, partner, wife and mother, and an all-around feast to be around. I don't think anyone has ever had such a wonderful wife.
Just because one is not PC does not mean one is a domineering, unloving, arrogant asshole. Quite the contrary. But I do think men should be hard and women should be soft. I think it is feminist-age relationships that are often marked by quite ugly female domineering and male submission and emasculation. This I find to be somehow against the grain of nature, and more importantly, unworkable, as the 50%+ divorce rate should show us.
5291. Candide - 1/14/2000 10:34:58 PM
stostosto 5238
I can't believe I gave you the URL that enabled you to post that!
L'Espresso has always had AMAZING covers but it contains some really interesting articles. I once went to a first-night production of a play by a gay friend and collected my latest edition of L'Espresso on the way. The cover had two bare male bums on it with the word SIDS (AIDS) printed across them. I sweated the whole evening trying to keep it rolled up with the cover inside.
5292. PincherMartin - 1/14/2000 10:37:57 PM
Marjori Banks -- Message # 5236
The article by Rajeev Srinivasan is outstanding. Opinionated and largely accurate, I can't disagree with any of his main points, even if some of his descriptions of how he arrived at them are a little suspect.
5293. PincherMartin - 1/14/2000 10:45:16 PM
Irv --
What do you think of this article:
Holbrooke warns Indonesian Military
5294. Candide - 1/14/2000 10:52:22 PM
http://www.repubblica.it/
This is the URL of the really good newspaperLa Repubblica that is associated with L'Espresso
marjoribanks
The Indian article was very interesting but the last bitabout the bomb tests made me fume a little. There was an indication that one could send an email to the author but when I searched all I could see was a list of more of his articles.
All I hope is that he encounters Arundhati Roy.
5295. PincherMartin - 1/14/2000 11:06:45 PM
To all you Europhiles --
Many times in this forum I have made the argument that America's economic structure is superior to Europe's (and that's anywhere in Europe, despite the great diversity among the different European states); and that in comparison to Europe, American firms quickly exploited new technologies, created more jobs, and that the American financial firms were more productive in supplying capital to the high growth sectors of the economy.
Most of you have pooh-poohed this notion, complaining that it only reflected my American bias. I knew this was not the case, since many of the strongest critics of the European way of doing business were Europeans.
Here is an article which confirms what I've been saying: European firms simply cannot compete against American firms and the reason they cannot compete is because of the way Europeans have organized their economies. What's most relevant is that the Europeans know it, and are thinking of what steps they must now take to regain competitiveness.
Europe can't match U.S. Techno-boom
5296. PincherMartin - 1/14/2000 11:12:53 PM
Sto has argued that Europe's economic performance in the decade of the 90s has been similar to America's (and that, therefore, I'm mistaken in arguing that there has been a change in the economic paradigm by pointing to the US economy's performance during that time).
Here is what the article reports the Spanish Prime Minister said of the relative performance during that time: "In Europe we are being left behind, for we have not been capable of reproducing the successes achieved on the other side of the Atlantic in the 1990s."
5297. CalGal - 1/14/2000 11:13:00 PM
Candide,
Does it have any naked men in it?
5298. Candide - 1/14/2000 11:36:38 PM
CalGal
Those photos! A-mazing. A calendar?
5299. Candide - 1/14/2000 11:40:36 PM
Sorry. Tried to post something that wouldn't behave itself. I modified it but to no avail.
5300. Candide - 1/14/2000 11:44:53 PM
PincherMartin
I haven't yet read your link about comparative "success", but I will. May a flabby liberal bleater modestly suggest that there other ways to measure a successfully run country? I'm sure you would agree with that already anyway.
5301. Candide - 1/15/2000 12:00:24 AM
PincherMartin
A wee whiff of Triumphalism wafted from the screen.
Why do so many Europeans vacation in Europe?
5302. Candide - 1/15/2000 12:02:03 AM
Damn.
Computer problems confused me.
Why do so many AMERICANS vacation in Europe?
5303. CalGal - 1/15/2000 12:07:21 AM
Because they finally put McDonalds and Burger King in most of the major cities.
5304. Candide - 1/15/2000 12:22:48 AM
Only one thing, other than the seriousness of the issue, worries me about Holbrooke's warning to the Indonesian military. He said:
"We are now in the 21st century".
No we're not.
5305. Candide - 1/15/2000 12:32:53 AM
I tried to post a local story reprinted from the 'Guardian' that was emailed to me without a URL. I can't find it in the "Guardian'.
>From the Sydney Morning Herald Sat Jan 15 2000.
N-weapons targeted at ‘hostile' West.
Russia
by Ian Traynor, in Moscow.
Russia has revised its defence doctrine to make it easier to press the
nuclear button in an international crisis, while unequivocally declaring the West hostile. A new national security strategy decreed by Acting President Vladimir Putin on Monday and due to be published yesterday marks a radical shift in Russia s view of the world. It ushers in a: policy of "expanded nuclear containment" while pledging to resist Western attempts to dominate the globe.
The strategic shift lowers the threshold at which Russia may resort to
nuclear weapons and is the first foreign policy move Mr Putin has
taken since replacing Mr Boris Yeltsin in the Kremlin on New Year s Eve.
5306. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 12:34:32 AM
Candide --
I haven't yet read your link about comparative "success", but I will. May a flabby liberal bleater modestly suggest that there other ways to measure a successfully run country? I'm sure you would agree with that already anyway.
I agree that there are other ways to measure (or, if not measure, then at least rank) successfully run countries. But this is one way, and it's one that some on this forum have mistakenly assumed Europe was performing as well as the United States.
CalGal --
Because they finally put McDonalds and Burger King in most of the major cities.
Occassionally -- just occassionally -- you can be very funny.
5307. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 12:36:33 AM
Candide --
No we're not.
You're not one of those nuts who will be celebrating the millennium next year, are you? ;-)
5308. Candide - 1/15/2000 12:37:10 AM
The story is much longer but I didn't want to muck up the Mote.
CalGal
If people travel across the Atlantic for a Big Mac, they're not thinking clearly.
5309. Candide - 1/15/2000 12:39:29 AM
PincherMartin
I enjoyed the magic journey, but now I must tell myself the truth which is :"We don't have a clue which year it is. We made it all up."
5310. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 12:42:14 AM
Candide --
If people travel across the Atlantic for a Big Mac, they're not thinking clearly.
It's the ambiance. If you haven't had a Big Mac in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower or the Parthenon, then you haven't had a Big Mac.
5311. CalGal - 1/15/2000 12:42:47 AM
Candide,
Well, really, what's the point of seeing some old Eye-talian blocks of marble if you can't get fries to go with that Whopper?
5312. Candide - 1/15/2000 12:48:09 AM
Fries? In Italy?
Woman have you no shame?
La cucina italiana offers you a myriad of sensual delights and you eat FRIES?
5313. CalGal - 1/15/2000 12:51:19 AM
Yeah. That tomato sauce they use, what's it called--marinara? it's just not the same as ketchup. But you expect to make these little sacrifices when you travel.
5314. joezan - 1/15/2000 12:51:57 AM
...or, when you can see a marvelously rendered, 24-ft. tall Il Cavallo right in the middle of Grand Rapids, MI.
5315. joezan - 1/15/2000 12:53:00 AM
...uh, 5314's to 5311.
5316. Candide - 1/15/2000 1:16:36 AM
Joezan
Ho capito.
5317. Candide - 1/15/2000 1:25:26 AM
The URL for the 'New York Times' story about the changed Russian nuclear policy.
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/europe/011500russia-weapons.html
5318. ScottLoar - 1/15/2000 8:26:36 AM
I've seen a news photo of Il Cavallo, that work reconstructed from the drawings of Da Vinci, but placed in Grand Rapids? Only in America. Perhaps placing it in a Las Vegas hotel lobby was thought too gauche.
Barnum's dictum holds true, No one ever lost a buck underestimating the taste of the American public.
5319. jexster - 1/15/2000 11:32:58 AM
The today's Washington Post first page features an article on the great gap between the EU and the US in technology, causes and consequences.
here
The dynamics, causes and consequences were predicted and analyzed in detail in Robert Reich's "Work of Nations" (1992)
5320. jexster - 1/15/2000 11:37:48 AM
5321. ScottLoar - 1/15/2000 11:49:36 AM
The article recounts what persons in business worldwide have long suspected, that Europe just hasn't gotten it together.
From the article, many politicians and businessmen acknowledge that Europe will only achieve a real breakthrough in new technologies when the state's role as ultimate provider and protector is changed so that a premium is placed on individual initiative. And if they don't do so and quickly Europe may be surpassed in technological innovation and creative applications by East and Southeast Asia damn soon, perhaps within the coming generation by masses of ambitious, increasingly well financed and technically savvy individuals of initiative. What militates against so would be certain Asian countries' governments' continuing occupation and regulation of investment capital and patronage of select firms for political purposes. Yet in countries like Taiwan, Singapore, yes even Korea and that pseudo-state Hong Kong and perhaps even Shanghai there are few holds barred on old fashioned, grasping money-making, increasingly so by a new generation of entrepreneurs.
5322. jexster - 1/15/2000 11:57:48 AM
" If you have the time to host a WWII thread I would be delighted."
I have the time but not the foggiest on how, where to start. There is so much material.
Churchill's "Gathering Storm"???
a new book I'm reading "Hitler's Vienna - A dictator's apprenticeship"???
A CNN special now running re: some respectable (?) Holocaust revisionist historian - there were no gas chambers at Auschwitz, Hitler never authorized any "Final Solution"??
5323. jexster - 1/15/2000 11:58:54 AM
The last was "to Pelle"
5324. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 1:05:27 PM
Jexter --
Ahem.
I beat your Message # 5319 with my Message # 5295
I read the Work of Nations sometime ago, so I don't remember Reich making any predictions about the US beating Europe in the technology race. I have the book lying around here. Could you direct me to the section where he makes that claim?
5325. PelleNilsson - 1/15/2000 2:35:42 PM
jexster
Re WWII
A question arises. Should it wait until Pseuder is back, which I think will be in six weeks or so? I think he is knowledgeable. In any case he has opinions.
5326. Candide - 1/15/2000 3:07:36 PM
The Washington Post article is extremely interesting and no doubt accurate.
There is one worrying aspect in the attitude of the writer, and that is the assumption that 'grow or die, is beyond dispute. It may be that this is the case but I would have liked an element of doubt to appear occasionally. There is no evidence of any respect for other aspects of living. No respect for established ways of interacting locally.
The pre-eminence in online activity in the US could partly be attributed to the unifying English language which facilitates communication. There is less incentive to use internet when one speaks a minority language.
During the Kosovo war it was dissidents using email who maintained communication with the outside world.
Which brings me to another story. Arkan was shot and killed in Belgrade.
The first story I heard when I awakened.
5327. jexster - 1/15/2000 4:18:22 PM
PM: I read the book 8 years ago and don't have it lying about.
You won't find a discussion of DSL v. broadband nor a mention of AOL/Time Warner.
His argument is contained in a discussion of the Japanese and German economies v. the US and the evils of subsidizing industry. In fact, as I recall, the theme pervades the entire work beginning with the discussion of "flat" industrial organizations. Of course the book was his confession of being wrong in his prior work extolling "industrial policies".
What a fuckin good memory eh???
5328. jexster - 1/15/2000 4:19:24 PM
The Tiger's shot, Rosie seems to be in hiding. Do I detect the not-so-fine hand of the SAS?
5329. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 5:07:25 PM
Jexter --
I remember Reich's general arguments quite well (even if I've forgotten some of the particulars):
They are: there is no such thing as an American economy because money, goods and services no longer have borders; industrial policy should be used to promote industries for the last remaining part of the economy that must still obeys borders, that is, workers.
So imagine my surprise when you say Reich predicted that the US would win the technology race with Europe and Japan. Also, imagine my further surprise when you said that Reich writes in this book that he was wrong about extolling industrial policy.
Are you sure you haven't read something more recent of Reich's, where he might have changed his mind about an industrial policy for America? Back in 1992, when The Work of Nations was published, industrial policy still had a much larger group of backers than it does today. Japan's bubble had already burst, but few knew that their economic troubles that began in this period would remain as intractable as they have and the United States economy had only just begun to pull out of the 1991 recession. Reich hardly had any basis at that time to guess that an industrial policy would be the wrong policy for America.
5330. Candide - 1/15/2000 5:33:56 PM
I have been corrected by one in my establishment. It has been pointed out to me that the comments were mainly from Europeans and that the article merely reported what was said.
Well the comments were selected at any rate.
5331. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 6:13:09 PM
Sorry, Candide, I wasn't ignoring you.
There is one worrying aspect in the attitude of the writer, and that is the assumption that 'grow or die, is beyond dispute. It may be that this is the case but I would have liked an element of doubt to appear occasionally. There is no evidence of any respect for other aspects of living. No respect for established ways of interacting locally.
The pre-eminence in online activity in the US could partly be attributed to the unifying English language which facilitates communication. There is less incentive to use internet when one speaks a minority language.
5332. Candide - 1/15/2000 6:30:45 PM
PincherMartin
The pre-eminence in online activity in the US could
partly be attributed to the unifying English language
which facilitates communication. There is less incentive
to use internet when one speaks a minority language.
Why do you think this? The Information technology infrastructure is
not particularly expensive so even small countries should be able to
set up their own niches on the web. Why is Japan, Germany or
France too small to set up these niches?
(I wish I could do your beautiful layout by the way.)
It's because when one speaks English there are more people with whom to converse.
I'm not denying the 'grow or die' principle. I am questioning it. Some people think that the physical earth would have to be a cornucopia to supply the wants of the grow or die brigade — that sustainability is the name of the game.
5333. stostosto - 1/15/2000 6:55:35 PM
PincherMurcan Message # 5296:
Sto has argued that Europe's economic performance in the decade of the 90s has been similar to America's (and that, therefore, I'm mistaken in arguing that there has been a change in the economic paradigm by pointing to the US economy's performance during that time).
I have never argued thus, and I am not going to, although it is tempting considering how much fun we could have in such a debate.
What I said was that the American New Economy mostly amounted to a shift in the so-called NAIRU (non-accelerating inflation rate of unemployment), and that such a shift has also occurred in three European countries, namely the Netherlands, the UK and Denmark. You disputed the Danish case pointing to some OECD figures, I gave you some Danish figures that seemed at odds with the OECD data. And that's that.
I believe that I have consistently been very critical of Europe, also when compared to the USA, and I would not dispute that the American system seems structurally superior to the European one in general.
I know PE has stated time and again that the European unemployment problems are not really structural but rooted in the self-inflicted austerity measures applied in order to meet the Maastricht criteria for the monetary union. I have never agreed with that line. I think there are severe structural problems in the core countries of Europe, i.e. Germany, France, and Italy, as well as in countries like Belgium, Spain, and - needless to say - Greece.
5334. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 6:59:18 PM
Candide --
It's because when one speaks English there are more people with whom to converse.
I'm not denying the 'grow or die' principle. I am questioning it. Some people think that the physical earth would have to be a cornucopia to supply the wants of the grow or die brigade — that sustainability is the name of the game.
5335. stostosto - 1/15/2000 7:09:40 PM
I disagree with your assessment of the Indian demagogue, btw. He is pure 19th century unadulterated European style nationalism without a shred of sophistication. But perhaps that's a phase India needs to go through just like we have done in our part of the world. If a hardened nationalistic stance would mean a better sense of community and of the need to make sacrifice on behalf of a common good, it might do a lot of good for India. Just like he points to in his article on the Indian Annus Horibilis that he links to, and which I have also read. He really pours scourn on the Indian politicians in a big way for their way of grossly mishandling the Orissa hurricane disaster. If you haven't read that, I can recommend it.
His talk of guns as a prerequisite of wealth on the other hand is nonsense.
Interesting that he uses the concept of a "soft state". That term to my knowledge, was coined by the Swedish economist Gunnar Myrdal who emphasised qualities as predictability, meritocracy, accountability and non-corruption as the basis for good government. India would do well to focus on those in stead of on guns. A big arsenal does not equal a hard state.
5336. joezan - 1/15/2000 7:11:40 PM
ScottLoar:
I've seen a news photo of Il Cavallo, that work reconstructed from the drawings of Da Vinci, but placed in Grand Rapids? Only in America.
Perhaps placing it in a Las Vegas hotel lobby was thought too gauche.
Oh! To the contrary, my globetrotting friend. In fact, Grand Rapids is quite well-known not only for its public sculptures, such as this Alexander Calder masterpiece in front of the VandenBerg Bldg,
5337. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 7:12:01 PM
Sto --
I have never argued thus, and I am not going to, although it is tempting considering how much fun we could have in such a debate.
What I said was that the American New Economy mostly amounted to a shift in the so-called NAIRU (non-accelerating inflation rate of unemployment), and that such a shift has also occurred in three European countries, namely the Netherlands, the UK and Denmark. You disputed the Danish case pointing to some OECD figures, I gave you some Danish figures that seemed at odds with the OECD data. And that's that.
I believe that I have consistently been very critical of Europe, also when compared to the USA, and I would not dispute that the American system seems structurally superior to the European one in general.
I know PE has stated time and again that the European unemployment problems are not really structural but rooted in the self-inflicted austerity measures applied in order to meet the Maastricht criteria for the monetary union. I have never agreed with that line. I think there are severe structural problems in the core countries of Europe, i.e. Germany, France, and Italy, as well as in countries like Belgium, Spain, and - needless to say -Greece.
5338. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 7:19:08 PM
Sto -- Message # 5335
I thought he wrote with a fine sense of style and made good sense on almost all the issues. He heaps scorn on the Indian politicians for caving in to the Chinese on the matter of the young Dalai Lama (I didn't know the Indian politicians did this, by the way. If so, then they deserve his scorn.) He also is correct that INdia suffered little for its test of a nuclear weapon, and indeed, made out pretty well by encouraging the world to focus on a part of the world (the subcontinent) which is often neglected by policy-makers.
I didn't read the attached article, but I shall.
5339. stostosto - 1/15/2000 7:19:20 PM
Pincher: Murcan = American
I don't think I mentioned Ireland in the same context as the others, since I haven't really taken any interest in that poor lilliput. They have had a huge unemployment (it's still large), cheap labour, tax incentives for foreign investment, and, thus, a respectable growth rate. But that's mostly a case of a poor country catching up. (Was it you who mentioned that the Irish had overtaken the UK? I checked it then, and they hadn't according to that source (World Bank or something like that). But they are closing in).
5340. stostosto - 1/15/2000 7:23:01 PM
Pincher
I am not able to attach the importance to foreign policy and security matters that you are capable of, and which seems to be the only thing that the Srinavasan fellow is really interested in. I believe India ought to focus much more on shaping up its economic structures.
5341. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 7:28:09 PM
They have had a huge unemployment (it's still large), cheap labour, tax incentives for foreign investment, and, thus, a respectable growth rate. But that's mostly a case of a poor country catching up. (Was it you who mentioned that the Irish had overtaken the UK? I checked it then, and they hadn't according to that source (World Bank or something like that). But they are closing in).
5342. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 7:31:21 PM
Sto --
I am not able to attach the importance to foreign policy and security matters that you are capable of, and which seems to be the only thing that the Srinavasan fellow is really interested in. I believe India ought to focus much more on shaping up its economic structures.
5343. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 7:40:01 PM
Sto -- I'm still looking in TT for that article, but in the meantime I will cite the GDP per capita (PPP) figures for 1997 provided by The World Competitiveness Yearbook 1999 (using US$ per capita at current prices and purchasing power parity):
United Kingdom -- $20,735
Ireland --$20,711
The CIA's figures show a greater disparity with Ireland over 16,000 and the United Kingdom over 20,000 for 1996.
That's just a separation of $24 more than two years ago
5344. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 7:41:09 PM
Sorry, the last sentence in my last post should be above the sentence that quotes the CIA's figures.
5345. stostosto - 1/15/2000 8:48:43 PM
Pinch
Regarding European productivity growth vs. American: It's true that Europe hasn't seen the jump in productivity growth that has occurred in America since 1995. But then European productivity growth never made the kind of near-disappearance that was observed in America from the early 70s. Europe's record in this respect is better than the American one over the last 20 years or so (as is the overall growth too). Which is not unnatural given its generally lower economic level. [A caveat: I believe these are stylised facts about the relative performances; I havent' got access to good sources on them right now, and I am unlikely to see fit to spend much time digging up substantial evidence].
The downside of European productivity growth is of course the employment situation. Growth in productivity means more production per employed worker. That may translate into higher profits, investment and further employment expansion, and/or it may translate into higher wages. In Europe it seems there has been a tendency for the incumbent employment to be able to protect itself from the competetion from the unemployed, thus enjoying a higher rate of wage increase than otherwise would have been possible on the expense of fewer opportunities for the unemployed to gain foothold. Much, if not all, of this "super-normal wage increase" has then been absorbed by taxes to pay for unemployment benefits.
5346. Candide - 1/15/2000 8:53:35 PM
PincherMartin
The only reason anyone cares about sustainable growth is because
they are rich enough to care.
True. But that does not mean that they are wrong.
5347. stostosto - 1/15/2000 9:00:40 PM
This system has ensured a relatively equitable income distribution, and a sense of security. Both are highly cherished in Europe. The problem is, the system has a cost. A high unemployment is unsustainable in the long run. Besides representing a huge drain on the budget, it also tends to erode the qualifications of long-term unemployed, further diminishing their ability to gain foothole on the labour market as well as exerting a restraining pressure on the incumbents' wage development.
The American answer to that problem has been to let the markets rip. The unemployed get fewer benefits, there are much lower minimum wages in the US, and, consequently there has been created a mass of low-wage, low-qualifications jobs in the service sector that we don't see in Europe. 'The working poor' as the catch phrase goes.
These conditions are often described very condescendingly by Europeans. But I believe there is much evidence that few people stay at the low minimum wage for long. I also think the European way condemns many people to a withering life of inactivity which is hardly much more glamorous than being a 'working poor'. Even if they are able to pay their way with benefits.
5348. stostosto - 1/15/2000 9:10:15 PM
I should add that the favoured cure in Europe is some combination of giving more room for market forces - in labour markets as well as in product and capital markets - and of activating, training and educating the labour force so that it is capable of a productivity that corresponds to the wage level which is considered acceptable. Governments take an active role in this effort, more successfully in some places than in others.
In Scandinavia and the Netherlands this model has worked fairly well for the past 5-10 years. The UK has favoured a more American-style approach, despite Tony Blair's elusive "Third Way" rhetoric.
5349. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 9:17:04 PM
Stostosto --
Regarding European productivity growth vs. American: It's true that Europe hasn't seen the jump in productivity growth that has occurred in America since 1995. But then European productivity growth never made the kind of near-disappearance that was observed in America from the early 70s. Europe's record in this respect is better than the American one over the last 20 years or so (as is the overall growth too). Which is not unnatural given its generally lower economic level. [A caveat: I believe these are stylised facts about the relative performances; I havent' got access to good sources on them right now, and I am unlikely to see fit to spend much time digging up substantial evidence].
5350. stostosto - 1/15/2000 9:21:46 PM
Pinch
Do you know that India currently spends only about 2.5% of its GDP on defense?
No, I didn't know that.
That is hardly the problem with India's economy.
I never said it was. I said good goverment and shaping up the economic structures ought to be the urgent priorities. Not entering arms races and talking tough.
Though I absolutely do agree that India should stand up to China in the lama issue, as well as other issues. I am more doubtful about Kashmir. Insofar as the people want to join Pakistan. There is going to have to be a negotiated settlement somewhere down the road, and both parties might as well realise that right away. Then both countries can get on with what really matters: Economic development.
5351. stostosto - 1/15/2000 9:28:04 PM
And now I am going to bed. It has gotten ridiculously late here, just like yesterday. But you are so much fun to be with, all.
Good night!
5352. Candide - 1/15/2000 9:30:37 PM
stostosto
The unemployed get fewer benefits, there are much lower
minimum wages in the US, and, consequently there has been created
a mass of low-wage, low-qualifications jobs in the service sector that we don't see in Europe. 'The working poor' as the catch phrase goes.
These conditions are often described very condescendingly by
Europeans. But I believe there is much evidence that few people stay
at the low minimum wage for long. I also think the European way
condemns many people to a withering life of inactivity which is hardly much more glamorous than being a 'working poor'. Even if they are able to pay their way with benefits.
You are here presumably discussing those young enough to rise to the challenge?
Are the rest to be made into Soylent Green (movie) or exposed on a mountain side?
5353. stostosto - 1/15/2000 9:35:19 PM
Candide:
Plenty of people are capable of more challenges than to while their time away in hopeless unemployment. Some are not, and I want those taken care of. I think British/American, and, possibly Aussie/New Zealand style poverty negligence is wrong.
Now: Good night.
5354. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 9:40:18 PM
Sto --
This system has ensured a relatively equitable income distribution, and a sense of security. Both are highly cherished in Europe. The problem is, the system has a cost. A high unemployment is unsustainable in the long run. Besides representing a huge drain on the budget, it also tends to erode the qualifications of long-term unemployed, further diminishing their ability to gain foothole on the labour market as well as exerting a restraining pressure on the incumbents' wage development.
The American answer to that problem has been to let the markets rip. The unemployed get fewer benefits, there are much lower minimum wages in the US, and, consequently there has been created a mass of low-wage, low-qualifications jobs in the service sector that we don't see in Europe. 'The working poor' as the catch phrase goes.
5355. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 9:42:45 PM
These conditions are often described very condescendingly by Europeans. But I believe there is much evidence that few people stay at the low minimum wage for long. I also think the European way condemns many people to a withering life of inactivity which is hardly much more glamorous than being a 'working poor'. Even if they are able to pay their way with benefits.
5356. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 9:44:11 PM
Sto --
Then both countries can get on with what really matters: Economic development.
5357. Candide - 1/15/2000 9:59:47 PM
My server (Telstra) was out except for blinks, for all of New South Wales yesterday and is appearing for three minutes then vanishing again today. If my responses are more than usually incoherent this is a frustrating contributor. We checked their website and the last update was in September 1999.
IT jobs going begging perhaps but not being created in order to reduce the costs and increase the profits? Or perhaps just stupidity?
5358. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 10:20:26 PM
Candide --
IT jobs going begging perhaps but not being created in order to reduce the costs and increase the profits? Or perhaps just stupidity?
I honestly don't understand this. What do you mean?
5359. Candide - 1/15/2000 10:29:46 PM
Why would a major server not have checked the performance of its equipment (service status)for five months?
Shortage of labour, meanness or stupidity or a combination of all three.
5360. Candide - 1/15/2000 10:30:57 PM
?
5361. PincherMartin - 1/15/2000 10:33:48 PM
I've got you. I thought those two sentences were independent of the rest of your post.
5362. Candide - 1/15/2000 10:37:05 PM
A cry of frustration. I have to shout :"Is it (modem) blinking?" up a long corridor or walk up it to ask more elegantly, every few minutes. It's been going on for several days. You mentioned emploment being created in the IT sector.
In my case activity certainly.
5363. ScottLoar - 1/15/2000 11:43:11 PM
JoeZan,
I expected you to sally forth sabre raised to defend the honour of Grand Rapids but tell me, does the placement observe
Place
Proportion
Perspective
or is it thrown in with the other lot of municipal sculpture?
And if you must know I have a good clear view of the sky from my backporch on the second story, well enough to see an occasional shooting star in the late summer evenings as I sit outside with my wife under a single candlelight, quietly talking about the things that people long married talk about. That is the backyard you invite me to notice.
5364. IrvingSnodgrass - 1/15/2000 11:45:59 PM
Pincher:
The link you posted in Message # 5293 was very interesting. There have been many rumors floating around here for a few weeks about the possibility of a military coup. The reasoning is:
• The military will do anything to avoid being brought before a war crimes trial. The war crimes investigations (about abuses in Aceh and East Timor) have been gathering speed, and will certainly lead to convictions. The military refuses to be accountable.
• The military considers the Gus Dur government weak, as they're used to the old hard-line way of doing things under Suharto.
• The military has intentionally escalated the conflict in Maluku to make themselves appear indispensable (and to show only they can handle things).
The arguments against a coup:
• The military is experiencing huge internal divisions, and it is unlikely they could unite for anything, least of all a coup. Besides the fighting between the Army and the Navy, there are three well-defined camps in TNI: 1) The Wiranto camp, which seeks to return to hard-line ways while ostensibly supporting democracy, 2) The Agus Wirahadikusuma camp, which supports Gus Dur fully, and wants to see more democracy, regional autonomy, openness and less military involvement in the government, and 3) The Prabowo camp, supporters of the disgraced Suharto son-in-law, who want a return to the old status quo. Since the Wiranto camp and the Prabowo camp despise each other, I don't think they could cooperate on anything. And the Agus camp, which is quite large, would make any coup attempt very difficult.
[continued]
5365. IrvingSnodgrass - 1/15/2000 11:46:54 PM
• Due to the free press, the military's tricks in Maluku aren't convincing anyone. Holbrooke's statements accurately reflect the desires of most Indonesians... there is a real desire to see the military go on trial for abuses.
• From my own discussions with TNI and police high-ranking personnel, a coup is not in the cards. Of course, my contacts may be out of the loop.
Holbrooke's comments were very welcome, and got good play here (although the military wasn't too thrilled). It's good for the USA to let the military know they are watching (not that the USA could or would do anything about a coup, were one to occur).
5366. ScottLoar - 1/15/2000 11:50:55 PM
PelleNilsson;
I apply to you, thread host, to provide us with a list of prescribed topics that best await the return of Pseudoerasmus for proper discussion and the benefit of his opinion. Or if that list is too long perhaps you can favour us with a short list of topics open for immediate discussion, those subjects less serious or which need not wait for elucidation by Pseudoerasmus.
Or, perhaps you could ignore the flow of discussion here until visited by Pseudoerasmus who "has many opinions"?
5367. IrvingSnodgrass - 1/15/2000 11:56:37 PM
Pincher:
wrt to your comments on the language of the internet in Message # 5331 and Message # 5332:
Although there is growth in internet sites in languages other than English, users of these sites are restricted to communicating with speakers of their own languages. Obviously, there is significant value in this, and other-language sites will continue to grow.
However, to take full advantage of the potential of the internet, one must use the de facto world language. English is the medium which has allowed people of all nations to communicate freely on the internet, and is the tool whereby borders are removed for business on the internet. In my own internet-based business, I have received enquires from 74 nations in the past year... all of these enquiries were in English (although many of the persons writing were not native speakers of English).
There is nothing about English itself which makes it any more special than any other language, but by a coincidence of fate, we are in a situation now where English is by far the pre-eminent language for communication between speakers of many languages, and having a common language for business or other purposes is a very valuable thing for all peoples and all nations.
5368. ScottLoar - 1/16/2000 12:00:43 AM
So you received enquiries from 74 nations to your internet business and all were in English. Was any other language solicited, welcomed, or evidenced at your site? If not, everyone assumes the lingua franca of business to be English.
5369. IrvingSnodgrass - 1/16/2000 12:29:14 AM
ScottLoar:
Exactly. In the absence of any specific instructions to the contrary, people from all nations will use English.
5370. IrvingSnodgrass - 1/16/2000 12:30:28 AM
I'd like to make a few observations related to Alistair's earlier posts on the Islamic headscarf issue (although these observations are not completely relevant to the discussion of the situation in France).
Here in Indonesia, the headscarf issue became a hot topic about 15 years ago when a school headmaster at a state school in Jakarta suspended a student for insisting on wearing a headscarf at school. His argument was that if a student wanted to wear a headscarf, she could attend an Islamic school, and that headscarves were not welcome in state schools.
The headmaster was overruled, and the Department of Education decided that forbidding students to wear headscarves was trampling upon their freedom of religion. Headscarves are now allowed in state schools, but are almost never seen. I'd guess that no more than 1 or 2% of girls in state schools wear headscarves, and maybe half the girls in Islamic schools.
Headscarves are not very common in Indonesia, and, unlike Malaysia, the percentage of women using them has not increased in the past 20 years. Most women wearing headscarves are older (over 60) or from the lowest classes of society. Certain ethnic groups almost never wear headscarves (foremost among these t