Wash Mugabe Away With A Revolution

Spread Democracy, Revolution

Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe is the stinkiest head of state on the planet right now. That jerk has to be pushed out of power. The sooner the better. To his credit, he lead his country's independence from Britain. He is also on record expressing active empathy with some of the inner cities in America. Inner city blacks do have it tough in America, and not all African heads of state act like they know that. But then it is down the slope thenon. This guy's has been a rule of terror for two and half decades now. If he does not like you, he will send bulldozers to raze your shantytown. His mismanagement is so total, Zimbabwe's economy has actually been shrinking. A low growth rate is one thing, but to actually go ahead and shrink?

Spread Democracy, Revolution

This is one of those dictators who actually conducts elections. I would not be surprised if he also challenged Bush to a televised debate like Saddam did. He is up for reelection in 2008 again.

Spread Democracy, Revolution

The opposition in Zimbabwe is disunited. That is a big problem. And their strategy seems to be to beat him at the polls. That is a misguided strategy. In a country where the opposition leaders get beat up like they were petty criminals in a pre-rule of law country, the regime does not hold elections. It rubber stamps the status quo.

Spread Democracy, Revolution

The goal of the opposition has to be to create a unity platform and then shoot for a mass movement. Mugabe's 2008 polls must be boycotted. Instead the demand should be to organize an all party government that would hold elections to a constituent assembly that will give the country a new constitution.

Spread Democracy, Revolution

The ground rules are broken. The constitution is faulty, big time.

Zimbabwe: The Constitution Is Faulty
Zimpundit: Zimbabwe

South Africa should offer this guy a bungalow somewhere he can spend the rest of his days.

On The Web

Robert Mugabe - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mugabe - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Robert Mugabe - President of Zimbabwe
BBC News | AFRICA | Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe strongman
BBC NEWS | World | Africa | Mugabe's descent into dictatorship
Mugabe: Blogs, Photos, Videos and more on Technorati
The wasteland - inside Mugabe's crumbling state | Special reports ...
Robert Mugabe News - The New York Times
In Zimbabwe, Mugabe Critics Face Beatings - New York Times

In The News

Mugabe: Freedom fighter or dictator? The Tide, Nigeria
Robert Mugabe: terrorist or liberator? New Zimbabwe.com
Zimbabwe: The End is Nigh for Mugabe AllAfrica.com
Southern Africa: Mbeki Has Moral Obligation to Help Ease Out Mugabe AllAfrica.com
Archbishop Pius Ncube says Mbeki won’t succeed with Mugabe SW Radio Africa, Zimbabwe
Zimbabweans pray under heavy police guard Independent Online
Mugabe Must go African Path, MN
President Mugabe is accused of torturing opposition figures. Kenya Broadcasting Corporation, Kenya
Torture continues more than 600 abducted (14-04-07) The Zimbabwean
Opposition on collision course with security services New Zimbabwe.com
Tsvangirai believes Zim solution rests in crisis talks The South African Star (subscription)
Zimbabwe: Until Death Do US Part - the Mugabe Vow AllAfrica.com, Washington
Zimbabwe: Ndlovu Must Stop Talking Nonsense AllAfrica.com
South African clerics attack SADC inaction over Mugabe SW Radio Africa, Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe police watch but allow prayer meeting Stuff.co.nz, New Zealand
Mugabe suspected of supressing inflation figure Telegraph.co.uk, UK
Zim inflation data a no-show News24
Zimbabwe: UK MP to grill minister over ZANU officials' kids in UK ZimDaily, UK
Zimbabwe: Mugabe, Central Bank Governor clash ZimDaily Battle lines have been drawn between Zimbabwe’s embattled President Robert Mugabe and the Reserve Bank Governor Gideon Gono after the central bank chief blasted Mugabe’s claims that Zimbabwe’s economic meltdown is a result of sanctions imposed on the country by the West. ...... The ageing Mugabe who has ruled the country since independence in 1980 has refused to accept blame for the poor performance of the country’s economy always pointing at British and American leaders Tony Blair and George Bush and accusing them of sabotaging Zimbabwe’s economy in order to effect regime change. ...... Gono blamed the chaotic land reform program, rampant corruption within government, and poor policies by government as the major causes of the economic meltdown adding that those tasked with the responsibility of running government ministries and the land reform program had proved incompetent. ...... questioned the prudence of Mugabe’s decision to unilaterally withdraw the country’s membership from the Commonwealth as well as antagonizing Western governments at a time when the country was in dire need of foreign currency injections from friendly Western countries. ........ the Look East Policy was fast proving to be a monumental flop ....... Gono is now impatient with Mugabe because of his penchant for political expediency at the expense of pragmatic economics. ....... Gono was hoping that ZANU PF’s central committee was going to deal decisively with Mugabe’s costly political brinkmanship by choosing a new presidential candidate for ZANU PF in 2008’ presidential elections. ...... The beleaguered Mugabe has responded by unleashing a terror campaign against his critics in order to silence them. .... It is yet to be seen how Mugabe well known for his vindictiveness and detest for criticism is going to deal with Gono’s latest utterances.
Zimbabwe: Mutambara's 2007 independence message ZimDaily Fellow Zimbabweans, 18th April 1980 is an important day that marked the end of colonial and imperialist rule in our country. ..... No single individual delivered us from bondage. It was a collective effort. Across the length and breath of this country and in neighbouring countries such as Zambia, Mozambique and Tanzania, our sons and daughters came together, with a single purpose- to free Zimbabwe. For the record; Yes, Robert Mugabe was part of the liberation war effort. ..... in that war he was a spineless coward who could not even fire a pistol. To this day he does not even know how to return a soldier’s salute. ....... the people of Zimbabwe do not owe Robert Mugabe anything. We owe ourselves as a people. ...... We live in an undeclared state of emergency where our basic freedoms and liberties of assembly, speech, movement, and association are heavily curtailed by repressive legislation. Political rallies, marches and demonstrations are banned. ...... The transformation of the police into a criminal sadistic brutal force is worse than anything we ever saw under the Smith regime. .......Zimbabweans live in a state of collective fear of violence, hunger, destitution, diseases and arrest. Basic and essential commodities are either unavailable or unaffordable. School fees, property rates, rentals and agricultural inputs are beyond reach. ....... The crippling fuel crisis, erratic and inadequate power supply, destruction of commercial agriculture, food shortages, and lack of housing are devastating the population. ...... Inflation has soared to record levels of over 2000%, unemployment is above 85%, while poverty levels are above 90%. Life expectancy is 34 years for women and 37 years for men. ...... Robert Mugabe and ZANU(PF) have failed the people of Zimbabwe. They have become a negation of the principles and values of the liberation war. Consequently, not only was Mugabe a mindless but lucky coward, he has become a despot running out of luck. ........ On our Independence Day we refuse to be patronized by a sick old man who has become a negation of the liberation struggle. This man has become a sellout. ....... just an unimaginative dictator who brutalizes Africans and denies them basic human rights and economic opportunities. ........ These are revolutionary times that demand soldiers and cadres. Zimbabwe must become the leading democracy in Africa characterized by people-centered social development and economic growth. Our GDP and per capita income should be in the top three in Africa. ........ leaders in the genre of Lee Quan Yew of Singapore, Mahathir Mohamad of Malaysia, Nelson Mandela of South Africa, Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf of Liberia, Indira Gandhi of India, Angela Merkel of Germany, Ernesto Che Guevara in Cuba, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt. ...... The skills required for nation building are very different from those required to fight colonialism and imperialism. A new generation of leaders is required to take our country to the next level. ...... The time has come to pass the baton from liberation struggle leaders to globalization savvy nation builders. The issues of technocratic capacity and technical solutions have never been more critical. ....... Zimbabwe must become a globally competitive economy that rivals such nations like Singapore, Malaysia and Japan. We need creative dreamers and parallel thinkers who do not fear globalization, but rather thrive on chaos and uncertainty. ...... External players can assist and facilitate, but the buck stops with us. We cannot outsource our emancipation to foreigners. We shall be our own liberators. We shall be masters of our own destiny and complete the unfinished business of the liberation struggle. ....... Let us spurn ZANU(PF)’s divide and rule tactics. A united front inspired by a single candidate principle is a categorical imperative in every election (Presidential, Parliament, Senate, Council). ....... Let us continue with the spirit of cooperation in pursuit of a new constitutional and electoral law framework to ensure that our next elections are measurably free and fair.
Zimbabwe: Prof. Mutambara, where is Plan B, CD and E? ZimDaily, UK President Mugabe ... he has only 2 deliverable plans at his disposal namely: Plan A which encompasses state violence, dirty works and intimidation; Plan B which involves electoral fraud, the patronage system, vote buying and other forms of legalized manipulations. ..... Mr. Morgan Tsvangirai ... Plan A: elections which were neither free nor fair and Plan B: mass protests which were always a still birth whose increasing costs on opposition supporters’ lives are becoming visible everywhere. ..... If Zimbabweans are convinced and sure that President Mugabe is: (1) a brutal dictator who is denying us freedom and democracy; (2) a failed ruler who is destroying our economy and lives; (3) an unfeeling and very old man who has nothing more to offer; (4) a selfish former revolutionary leader who is just obsessed with hanging on to power in order to keep his controversial legacy intact and (6) that his actions are equal or more evil than those of Ian Smith, then we are more than justified to adopt whatever course(s) of action that shall set us totally free once again. ....... Zimbabweans are highly educated and smart people .... The ordinary cowards are the ones who argue that wars to bring about democracy can only be fought in Palestine, Iraq, Darfur, DRC, Angola, Mozambique, Burundi, Rwanda, Somalia, etc. Therefore it is better for Zimbabweans to die from man made poverty, misery, hunger and cold blood murders than in an armed uprising. ....... Today President Mugabe, his newly found police – cum – politician Wayne Bvudzijena, Dydimus Mutasa, Kasukuwere are running clandestine hit squads only to turn their faces and blame the MDC for obvious reasons – to justify their brutality and elimination of opposition voices. ..... the life threatening political situation in our country ..... the idea of one opposition one candidate under Plan A in 2008.

Study: Climate change could bring new US Dust Bowl CNN International
Southwest could become Dust Bowl, study warns Arizona Republic
US: climate change brings drought to Southwest Xinhua
Grim news on climate change China Daily
"Report Confirms Climate Change Is a Fact" Spiegel Online
Emissions Already Affecting Climate, Report Says New York Times
Clinton gladly plays the gender card Chicago Tribune lining up the support of feminist elites and stoking excitement in teenage political neophytes. .... Clinton ahead of her male rivals among women in every early primary and caucus state. ..... 42% of likely primary voters among Democratic women, compared with 19% for Sen. Barack Obama ..... her openly gender-based strategy also explores new political territory. It is aimed at tapping into her loyal female base for energy and money ...... Clinton is quickly locking up the top echelon of women's movement leaders ..... EMILY's List and NOW .... ready campaign cash and PAC structures that fund media campaigns targeting women, voting and fundraising databases, and operatives who can aid in primary day turnout. ..... unmarried and working class women — a growing segment of economically stressed voters .... Clinton is trying to cultivate single and working women by championing equal pay, economic relief and comprehensive national healthcare, talking up their concerns in webcasts and town hall meetings. But scoring points with harried female voters may require more than the sisterly patter that pervades Clinton's campaign "conversations." ...... She has to be tough, but not too tough. She has to show she cares but she's still in charge. ....... Clinton's relaxed demeanor, her chatty references to her ex-president husband and her supporters' chants of "you go, girl" have all given the events the breezy air of an "Oprah" telecast ....... building a formidable women's apparatus ...... Clinton's support among women's movement leaders is "deep and long-standing" ...... Vital Voices, a nonpartisan group that promotes the fortunes of international female leaders .... When Melissa McPheeters, an epidemiologist in Ann Arbor, Mich., gets new e-mail from the Clinton campaign, she promptly forwards the messages to 100 female friends around the country.

Obama Slowly Plans Health Care Proposal ABC News Obama noted that in previous campaigns, presidential candidates have offered detailed proposals without building that political support ..... Obama said he's not wedded to any specific system, but he thinks the plan he'll eventually support will offer universal coverage and will squeeze efficiencies out of the health care system. It also will stress preventive programs, such as weight control. ... "The status quo is unsustainable," Obama said. "Standing pat is not an option." ...... "The government is already covering half the people" ...... rejected suggestions that higher taxes are inevitable in a revamped health care system. ..... Obama said he was surprised that few at the meeting were willing to scrap the system. ..... Obama said videos of discussions will be posted on his campaign Web site.
Obama slowly plans health care proposal Charlotte Observer
Obama moving cautiously on health care plan KWWL
Clinton's standing among blacks on the line CNN she changed her mind after Clinton voted to support the U.S.-led war in Iraq. .... Obama reported 100,000 donations, compared with the former first lady's 50,000. ... "This election makes you think very differently because it's not about 'Oh, which white man?"' ..... she supports him "without apology" to the former first couple. ..... Obama will not get votes because of his color any more than Clinton will get votes for being a woman ...... there's an awful lot of stupid black people out there who voted for Bush ... black women voters, who tend to be organized and loyal
Clinton's standing among blacks is on the line Boston Globe
Giuliani trails Clinton in NY, tied with Obama amNewYork
Clinton still tops among New York voters Politics on the Hudson
Obama Nearly Matches Clinton In Presidential Fundraising Voice of America

French Train Sets Rail Speed Record New York Times 357 miles (574.8 kilometers) an hour .... 150 meters per second .... a reduced number of train cars and larger wheels ..... the speed could serve as a selling point in Asia .... High-speed trains are a potentially lucrative market in developing countries — China and India are the biggest markets, with China spending about 15 billion euros a year on its rail sector, while India is looking at developing a high-speed train network. ... national television broadcast live images from the train. ..... The Maglev from Japan holds the world record for a train with a speed of 581 kilometers (361 miles) an hour recorded in 2003; it uses electromagnetic technology, where the train does not actually touch the rail. This technology is more costly, typically runs shorter distances and is less compatible with existing rail networks. .... High-speed trains have not caught on in the United States as they have in Europe, where TGV is generally considered to provide faster transportation than air travel for train trips of less than 3 hours.

Ehud Olmert's Moment Time a favorable rating of 3% ... Given the poll's margin of error, it was possible Olmert had no support beyond his extended family. ..... Israel's less than triumphant war against Hizballah last summer ..... "I know I'm unpopular," he told the nation mournfully in a recent speech. .... the Bush Administration's desperate desire to wring good news from the mess it has caused in the region. ..... the collision between a grand geostrategic scheme and implacable tribal realities ...... the prospect of an alliance of moderate Arab states, and Israel, against the growing influence of Iran ..... an unresolvable religious conflict," a reference to Hamas' refusal, on Islamic grounds, to acknowledge the possibility of a Jewish state. ..... The Saudi path is a dead end. .... Syria gets back the Golan Heights. Israel gets recognized. Hamas gets the boot.
Banking Goes Mobile "I look forward to the competition trying to keep up with us." ..... all information sent between the phone and the bank has 128-bit encryption ..... Available for more than two years in Japan and much of Europe
Poll: A Surprising G.O.P. Edge for '08 an uptick in the percentage of Americans identifying themselves as Democrats ..... Hillary Clinton loses to John McCain, 42%-48%, and to Rudy Giuliani 41%-50% ..... Clinton maintains a 7% edge over Obama ... Obama still loses: 43%-45% to McCain, 44%-45% to Giuliani ...... most voters have made up their minds about her, both pro and con. ..... Edwards has surged among Democrats since he announced that his wife Elizabeth's cancer had recurred. In a three-way matchup, Clinton polls 38% among registered Democrats, versus 30% for Obama and 26% for Edwards.
Supreme Warning on Global Warming Automobile emissions contribute about 25% of America's greenhouse gas emissions but wasted energy in homes and offices have an even greater effect. ....... the people most at risk from climate change live in [poor] countries that have contributed the least

Clinton Fundraising Numbers Are More Style Than Substance ABC News 50,000 donors contributed the $26 million. .... under campaign fundraising laws, she cannot touch any money donated for the general election unless she wins the primary. If she loses the primary, all the general election contributions must be returned.
Obama Distances Himself From Jesus Sculpture CBS2 Chicago
Sculpture of Obama as Jesus causes stir Times of India
Leveraging Strength: Comparing Obama and Clinton's Donor Numbers Huffington Post the story of the first quarter Democratic presidential numbers is not one of dominance by Hillary Clinton, but the extremely strong showing by Barack Obama. ...... Obama has not yet released his official numbers yet, but the word is that it's going to be somewhere in the $20-23 million dollar range. At minimum he has kept pace with Clinton and it's conceivable that once Clinton's general election donations are purged from her number that Obama will have exceeded her fundraising for the quarter. ......... Obama had 83,531 donors and Clinton received money from 50,000 people. John Edwards, who I'm going to otherwise ignore in this post, had 40,000 contributors. ...... Clinton has over 250,000 people in her database and Obama has 78,000 ..... Obama had 7% more donors than he had in his donor universe ....... Clinton's strategy stretching back to her 2006 Senate campaign has been to find victory through shock and awe with the volume of her war-chest ...... it means that her network is tapped out ..... Obama did something truly remarkable this quarter -- keep pace with the Clinton machine and in many respects outperformed her. The lack of a fundraising institution didn't hurt Obama this quarter and he'll be better prepared to leverage his growing database in the next one. ...... At some point soon the conversation may have to shift from being about how Obama kept up with the Clinton behemoth to how the Clinton institutional machine kept pace with the Obama phenomenon. .... Traditionally big donor fundraising drops off after the first quarter as that's when most people max out their contribution. The story for second quarter fundraising may well be about the rise of the Obama machine and the fall of Clinton.
Romney Raises $23 Million; Rudy $15 Million NewsMax.com
Supreme Court Joins Global Warming Debate WMDT
Standoff in Ukraine as prime minister defies president's order International Herald Tribune
The Captured Britons: Advantage Iran? TIME
WiMAX to Go Live in Warwick BusinessWeek With more homeworking made possible, a reduction in office desk space could allow the council to make money by leasing office space it no longer needs. ... 20 per cent of council employees said they would not need desk space if the advantages of the WiMax network were fully realised. ..... experiment with wireless CCTV cameras and applications such as a mobile community library and home health services. ..... with Leamington Spa's computer games industry, the local economy is very technology-based, making the ability to offer WiMax even more appropriate.
World Cup organizers downplay safety concerns after soccer ... International Herald Tribune
Microsoft Releases Emergency Windows Patch PC World

Hillary Clinton Raises $26 Million to Set Record ABC News campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle .... $6 million of the $26 million were raised through "grassroots" efforts. Of that, $4.2 million was raised on the Internet.

Google seeks world of instant translations Stuff.co.nz see our Arabic-English output, then they say, that's amazing ..... Och showed a translation of an Arabic internet news site into easily digestible English. ..... Languages without considerable translated texts, such as some African languages, face greater obstacles. ...... the muscle work is performed by machines. ..... Google chairman Eric Schmidt also sees broad political consequences of a world with easy translations. .... "What happens when we have 100 languages in simultaneous translation? Google and other companies are working on statistical machine translation so that we can on demand translate everything all the time" ..... "Many, many societies have operated in language-defined communities where they really don't understand and are not particularly sympathetic to other peoples' views because of the barrier of language. We're about to have that breakthrough and it is a huge thing."
Google moves into translations TVNZ
Tower of Google uses stats for translation Register Google dreams of a world where hundreds of languages can be simultaneously translated by machines which compare texts using statistics rather than applying grammatical rules. Statistical machine translation uses a computer to compare two documents - one in the original language and one translated by a human. It finds patterns and links between the two and uses them to create its own future translations. ..... "The more we feed into the system the better it gets." .... They have one of the world's best translators, especially for Arabic and Mandarin .... the development was important for Google because documents on the web are increasingly in languages other than English.

Darfur: A Clear Case For External Intervention

Transparency is not enough. People already know all over the world. And the genocide continues unabated. Political mechanisms have to be developed such that if a government anywhere engages in genocide, that automatically triggers counter action by some global body or coalition of governments elsewhere. There has to be a muscular counter strike to prevent the collapse of basic human decency.

Darfur has been going on for too long. We have become numb. It has become background noise.

It was said about the Nazi Holocaust: never again. Then Rwanda happened, and the battle cry was, never again. And now Darfur has been in your face.

Darfur is a major statement on a lack of a global political infrastructure. Apparently people there have not had the option to call 911. The rest of us express concern, dispatch statements of solidarity, but all that we end up saying is that there is not much we can do, that the people at the receiving end are basically consigned to being helpless. The rest of the world does not care, does not know to care, does not have the mechanism to care.

The mechanism is lacking.

What is the best we can hope for?

(1) Expose. The old media and the new media could do a super job of plain exposing. Get all the gory details out. That helps. Human rights organizations should continue doing the good job they have been doing. Perhaps they should get more graphic in how they present themselves. They should seek to reach a wider audience.

(2) Lobby. Citizen activists should pressure their lawmakers and leaders to do something.

(3) Muscle. Military action should be threatened.

(4) Make Peace. The political work of making peace might normalize things, but that would require intense, sustained engagement by a major power, like Bill Clinton in Ireland. Some second rung power could also pull it. Maybe India and China should jump in and boost their global credentials. This is a major case of statelessness. A defensive state has let nonstate actors run amok, sometimes by design, at other times with no actual participation. Amnesty can only be thought of in terms of a comprehensive peace and assured justice for the future, and only as the price to be paid to bring an end to future murders and rapes and lootings. The Janjaweed are posing as a non state actor, kind of like the Al Qaeda on the global scene. But how non-state are they really? How do you politically and militarily counter the Janjaweed?

(5) Engage. Perhaps the nearby regional powers should do a better job of engaging the evil doers in power in Sudan. Maybe they can try and talk some sense into their heads. Maybe carrot and stick approaches will take us somewhere.

(6) Cultivate. Dream up new global mechanisms - legal, political - for situations like this one.

(7) Depose. Is there any way regime change can be brought about? Options should be explored. The Sudanese government is clearly the guilty party. These people have to go.

(8) Provide. While the peacemakers try to make sense out of the situation, the aid agencies must provide food, water, medicine, shelter and safety to the hilt to the displaced. Safe zones have to be created. People in the war zone should know they have the option to get out. That hope has to be there.

(9) Create. Peace making efforts have failed so far because attempts have been made to soothe warring factions. The goal should not be that the factions stop competing for power. The goal should be to transform the competition so it is no longer military, but rather political, electoral. Perhaps peace talks should be held, there should be a ceasefire, and elections to a constituent assembly should be organized. The primary challenge seems to be one of building a state where one does not seem to much exist.

The solution like in Iraq is political. If our primary thrust is to be to seek a political solution, we will also be more likely to navigate the local political contours better.

On The Web

Darfur conflict - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia After fighting worsened in July and August 2006, on August 31, 2006, the United Nations Security Council approved Resolution 1706 which called for a new 17,300-troop UN peacekeeping force to supplant or supplement a poorly funded, ill-equipped 7,000-troop African Union Mission in Sudan peacekeeping force. Sudan strongly objected to the resolution and said that it would see the UN forces in the region as foreign invaders. The next day, the Sudanese military launched a major offensive in the region. ..... The UN estimates that the conflict has left as many as 450,000 dead from violence and disease. ..... As many as 2.5 million are thought to have been displaced as of October 2006. ..... In March 2007 the U.N. mission accused Sudan's government of orchestrating and taking part in "gross violations" in Darfur
Darfur - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Save Darfur
Darfur: A Genocide We can Stop
BBC NEWS | World | Africa | Q&A: Sudan's Darfur conflict More than two million people are living in camps after fleeing almost four years of fighting in the region ...... Sudan's government and the pro-government Arab militias are accused of war crimes against the region's black African population ...... Sudan also rejects moves by the International Criminal Court to name and then try war crimes suspects. ...... There are two main rebel groups, the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), although the peace talks were complicated by splits in both groups, some along ethnic lines. .... admits mobilising "self-defence militias" following rebel attacks but denies any links to the Janjaweed, accused of trying to "cleanse" black Africans from large swathes of territory. ...... following air raids by government aircraft, the Janjaweed ride into villages on horses and camels, slaughtering men, raping women and stealing whatever they can find ....... UN-backed attempts to get some 50 key suspects tried at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. ...... The Janjaweed patrol outside the camps and Darfurians say the men are killed and the women raped if they venture too far in search of firewood or water. ...... Some 200,000 have also sought safety in neighbouring Chad, but many of these are camped along a 600km stretch of the border and remain vulnerable to attacks from Sudan. ...... Many aid agencies are working in Darfur but they are unable to get access to vast areas because of the fighting. ...... there has been a dramatic increase in violence and displacement since the deal was signed. ....With the peace deal looking unworkable and amid fears of renewed "all-out war" ...... an area the size of France ...... Sudan has resisted strong western diplomatic pressure for the UN to take control of the peacekeeping mission.
Human Rights Watch: Africa : Crisis in Darfur
Sudan: Darfur Destroyed
Darfur: Blogs, Photos, Videos and more on Technorati

In The News

US diplomat visits Sudan's war-torn Darfur Raw Story, MA
Positive signs in Darfur?Monsters and Critics.com
Africa: Ban Ki-Moon to Hold Darfur Crisis Talks With Head of ... AllAfrica.com
Darfur needs peace, not peacekeepers Los Angeles Times the double-think of balkanized minds branding as disaster in Iraq what they recommend for Darfur's salvation ...... Without a political solution brokered by the international community, there will be no peace to keep and even less to impose. ...... there are up to 15 rebel factions fighting the government — and increasingly, each other. ...... some rebels have begun raping women from their own tribes. ...... Most of the bloodshed in Darfur took place between the end of 2003 and the beginning of 2005. The same international community that is being urged to intervene in western Sudan was, at that time, helping negotiate peace between the government in the north and rebels in the south to put an end to the longest-running civil war in independent Africa — 21 years — that left an estimated 1.5 million dead. ........ our support should be realistic and honest — and not, in the end, helpless posturing. ...... In the absence of a peace agreement to monitor, what right do we have to demand that anyone — be they our children or U.N. blue helmets from the Third World — go and die in Darfur?
Darfur Crisis Comes To Google Earth InformationWeek, NY
Museum, Google Zoom In on Darfur Washington Post
Delusions of Darfur Chicago Tribune government-sponsored genocide in Darfur ...... Sudan's president, Omar al-Bashir, addressed a Nation of Islam convention in Detroit via satellite in February. The United States is exaggerating the problems in Darfur to justify an Iraq-style occupation, he told the crowd. There's no need for United Nations peacekeepers because the current African Union force is doing "fantastically well." He described the situation in Darfur as "quite calm." ........ "It is not in the Sudanese culture or people of Darfur to rape. It doesn't exist."
Google maps the Darfur crisis- Internet users can now ... ReliefWeb (press release)
China's "turnaround" on Darfur links to Spielberg: report Hindu, India
Has China changed its "see no evil stance" on Darfur? Foreign Policy (subscription)
Darfur Collides With Olympics, and China Yields Sarasota Herald-Tribune
Darfur Collides With Olympics, and China Yields Tuscaloosa News (subscription)
Militia Talks Could Reshape Conflict in Darfur New York Times, NY Adam Shogar, a commander of the Sudan Liberation Army, the non-Arab rebels at the center of the Darfur conflict, stretched a coal-black arm at Yassine Yousef Abdul Rahman, his copper-skinned, brown-eyed counterpart from an Arab insurgent group, studying him carefully with midnight eyes. ....... “The government fear is if the Darfur Arabs unify and move against them, that is a decisive switch in the balance of power” ....... “Should they shift against the government, then the government is in deep trouble.” ....... The struggle in Darfur has often been portrayed as one between Arabs and black Africans, nomads and farmers, with the former bent on slaughtering the latter. But the conflict has never been that simple. ....... Sudan’s central government in Khartoum views them as marginal and expendable ....... Arab tribes have found themselves victims of non-Arab militias armed by Chad’s government ...... and set off a broad conflict in one of the most unstable parts of the world. ...... The main perpetrators of some of the worst atrocities have been government-sponsored Arab militias that have come to be known by a local epithet for bandits, janjaweed. ...... its own military, weakened by a long civil war in the south and made up largely of non-Arab recruits, could not be relied on to crush the rebellion among non-Arab tribes in Darfur. ........ the relationship between the central government, dominated by three small Arab tribes living along the Nile, and Darfur’s Arabs, who claim a heritage going back to the Prophet Muhammad, is often antagonistic ....... Darfur’s Arabs have long been the stalwarts of the main opposition Umma Party, perhaps the largest and most popular political party in northern Sudan. ....... in the 1980s and ’90s, as the government sought to exercise greater control over Darfur. Political and traditional leaders at the state and tribal level were replaced by Arab candidates closer to the government. ....... “For centuries we have had friendship and exchange with the Fur people and other African tribes. Now we are seen as killers.” ....... the reality that the various tribes of Darfur need one other more than they need the government. ....... But even as the relationship between tribes begins to shift, slowly, back toward its traditional balance in Darfur, Chad is descending deeper into interethnic conflict. ....... black Africans living in squalid, makeshift camps. ....... much of the violence is between Arab and non-Arab Chadians. ....... “Are politics going to destroy centuries of friendship?” ....... 140,000 Chadians have been displaced in interethnic fighting in the past year ....... 10 villages of Arab families have been displaced in the latest fighting, fleeing toward Darfur against the advance of Dadjo militias. ....... Arming local militias is seen as an expedient way of dealing with border security problems, but the experiences of Darfur and the civil war in southern Sudan have shown that once militias are unleashed, they are nearly impossible to control ...... one of the most important messages he plans to bring to the Security Council is the complexity of the conflict here. ....... “It is a political problem, and it needs a political solution.”
Lopez, Molina, Etc. Set for Where's Darfur? Benefit, 4/23 Broadway World, NY
Darfur refugees will return home PRESS TV, Iran
Goodlatte: US can play role in Darfur Staunton News Leader, VA
OU students, author discuss Darfur Norman Transcript, OK
UK accused of collaborating with Sudan over Darfur refugees Sudan Tribune, Sudan
Probe Of Sexual Violence, Disappearances In Darfur Scoop.co.nz
Home Office 'collaborating with Sudan over refugees' Independent
Darfur governor expects return of displaced people after ... People's Daily Online, China

Obama Gameplan: Stable, Democratic Iraq

The Al Qaeda are mosquitoes. The idea is not to mutate them into some other more palatable species. The idea is not to reform them. They are a few thousand in number. Isolate them. Penetrate their organizations. Use human intel. Engage in surgical military operations as necessary. Decapitate, isolate their leaderships wherever possible. Strengthen homeland security. Take precautions. Think a few steps ahead. Fight smart and hard, not blunt. Fight lean and mean, not loud and scattered.

But the best way to get rid of mosquitoes is to drain the swamp. The Bush gameplan has been to add floodwaters to the swamp and then indiscriminately shower the area with DDT, and keep doing both again and again. Insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different result. The DDT has claimed lives of plants that are above water, and many species in the water that we should not want to get rid of. And the mosquitoes keep multiplying, because they have more water to play with now, and they mutate, DDT stays the same.

But the Bush propaganda machine will tell you if you are anti-DDT, you must be pro-mosquito.

If Bush will have his way, America will have spent a trillion dollars in Iraq, and the fight will still not have concluded.

The Obama gameplan is to suggest there is no military solution in Iraq. The primary challenge is political. The solution is political. Iraq is a case study of how not to spread democracy in a country that is not democratic. For one, it is too costly.

The prescription is Nepal's April Revolution. That is the prescription for Burma, for Zimbabwe. The people are sufficient unto themselves. They can rise up, they will rise up. They will come in unceasing waves. But organizational work has to be done. Political parties have to form a coalition. There has to be leadership. There has to be a gameplan. The diaspora has to get organized. The international community has to take an active, informed interest.

In Iraq's case, you slowly withdraw troops, on a definite timetable, and you fill up the resultant military space with Iraqi military and all round political grunt work. All the factions in Iraq are going to have to learn to do business with each other the democratic way. Hold dialogue, cut deals, move the ball.

But the swamp does not begin and end in Iraq. There has to be a mass movement for democracy in every single Arab country. Such can be engineered. Such can be timetabled almost. It is not like calling a muse. It is like doing homework. If we do it right, autocracies in the Arab world can start falling one after the other like in Eastern Europe in the late 1980s.

Regime after regime in the Arab countries are offensive. In a democracy you know who to blame. You voted for someone, and if they don't deliver, you vote them out. But in dictatorships like the Arab countries are, the easy slogan becomes Death To America. The distant Satan is the source of all your ills.

Bush's way of spreading democracy has been racist, quite frankly. It has been about disrespecting the Arab masses. That is not how you want to present democracy.

Democracy has to be a grassroots rallying cry. And that can be fuelled, the process can be expedited with external help.

In The News

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Laden's CD with Invitation to Terrorism Appears in Bihar Patna Daily asks the Muslims to join the 'freedom fighters' in Kashmir to wage war against
India .... The police are analyzing the content of the CD with the help of language experts in
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leader Osama bin Laden's speeches urging Muslims to join the 'Jehad' (holy war) have
surfaced in the rural pockets of Patna and adjoining Bhojpur districts in Bihar.
India demands new IMF quota formula Earthtimes.org a new 'simple and transparent' International Monetary Fund (IMF) quota
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basis ..... 'No halfway house of blending GDP at market exchange rates with GDP on PPP
would meet these twin objectives,' said Rakesh Mohan, deputy governor of the Reserve Bank
of India (RBI), representing Bangladesh, Bhutan, India and Sri Lanka. ..... The continued
expansion in world GDP in 2006, with growth crossing the 5 percent mark, points to the
emergence of a new phase - one that is more diversified with most regions posting higher
growth than in the previous year ..... the new robust phase is driven by emerging market
economies with China and India continuing to contribute substantially to the global growth
momentum.' ..... The increasing integration of China and India into the global production
stream has significantly altered the efficiency of the global production process ..... risks
emanating from the behaviour of oil prices, adverse developments in the US housing market,
persistence of global imbalances, large leveraged positions in financial markets and possible
emergence of inflationary pressures. ...... policy makers should be ready to respond to
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Obama Compares Rappers to Imus ABC News
Obama Returns Lobbyists’ Donations New York Times
The Clinton question: electability Concord Monitor
CBS Poll: Giuliani, Clinton Pad Leads CBS News Giuliani's lead over McCain is now 23 points, 52 percent to 29 percent ..... Giuliani comes in at 47 percent, followed by McCain at 25 percent and Romney at 10 percent. ..... — multiple marriages (Giuliani has been married three times) and age (McCain is 70) — ..... GOP primary voters are most likely to think Giuliani will be the party's eventual nominee. ...... Democratic primary voters continue to favor Clinton and expect her to be the party's nominee. ...... Clinton leads Obama by 15 points and former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards by 18. Last month, Clinton's lead over Obama was 8 points. ..... Opinions about Obama have become slightly less positive among Democratic voters in recent weeks. ..... a majority believe the political stalemate between the White House and Congress over a war funding bill is having a negative impact on the morale of U.S. troops in Iraq. .... Americans overall continue to believe that the war is going badly, that the troop increase is not helping and that the prospects for success in Iraq are dim. ..... A record number cite the war as the country's most important problem.
'Patna should be within 5 hrs reach from rest of bihar' Business Standard We are spending Rs 150 crore on roads just in Patna ...... Our next priority for the capital is flyovers all over the city. ..... road building is going on all over Bihar. We aim to spend Rs 3,000 crore on building roads. This does not include the Prime Minister’s Gram Sadak Yojana. .... your colleague at the Centre, Rural Development Minister Raghuvansh Prasad Singh says he keeps giving you money for the National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme (NREGP) that Bihar is unable to spend .....defining minimum wages: we have revised it from Rs 67 earlier to Rs 77 now ..... We need land for roads, flyovers, bridges… So we have started a land bank: land over which there is no dispute. ...... Power plants take time to build. .... the national average per capita consumption of power is 600 units. Bihar consumes 74 units per capita. ...... The main thing is the visible, demonstrable punishment for corruption through fast track courts.
Bihar criminal justice on a fast track Hindustan Times
India tests nuclear capable missile ABC Online
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The banker, his lover and her pay rise of $80000 Sydney Morning Herald startling pay rises given by the development lender to his Libyan-born girlfriend, Shaha Riza ...... a day after Mr Wolfowitz was booed in a meeting with World Bank staff who were demanding his resignation, US President George Bush stood firm behind an old colleague who was one of the architects of the war in Iraq. ....... on Mr Wolfowitz's personal direction, Ms Riza was given pay rises that took her annual package to nearly $US200,000 ($241,706) when she was reassigned from the World Bank's Middle East press office to the US State Department ...... This was a rise from $US132,660 and was tax-free because of her status as a diplomat. ...... an August 2005 memorandum in which Mr Wolfowitz ordered the bank's human resources division to award Ms Riza a series of extraordinary promotions and pay increases.
Paulson seeks 'even keel' in trade relations with China Channel News Asia
China to go on buying spree in US cities Financial Times
Google's Biggest Acquisition: DoubleClick, for $3.1 Billion Playfuls.com a whopping $3.1 billion in cash ...... a provider of digital marketing technology and services ...... the display ad company ...... Acquisition-happy Google, which expects the purchase to close this year, had a stunning $11.2 billion in cash at the end of 2006. DoubleClick has also recently introduced a Nasdaq-like exchange for online ads ...... make Internet advertising better - less intrusive, more effective, and more useful. Together with DoubleClick, Google will make the Internet more efficient for end users, advertisers, and publishers ....... "This was a hotly contested asset," said analyst Jordan Rohan, to Bloomberg. "Clearly Google was willing to pay what it took to keep this away from Microsoft." ..... Headquartered in New York, and with 17 offices and development hubs and 15 data centers worldwide, the company employs more than 1200 people and delivers billions of digital communications every day. ... DoubleClick, which was founded in 1996, provides display ads on Web sites like MySpace, The Wall Street Journal and America Online as well as software to help those sites maximize ad revenue.
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Google Earth edges into global politics Ithaca Journal
Darfur Crisis Comes To Google Earth InformationWeek
Museum, Google Zoom In on Darfur Washington Post Elie Wiesel conceived of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, he envisioned a "living memorial" that would not only chronicle the crimes of the past but also take on issues of contemporary genocide ........ "A memorial unresponsive to the future would violate the memory of the past" ....... the genocide unfolding in the Darfur region of western Sudan, where government-backed militias and nomadic tribesmen have burned huts and villages to drive sedentary farmers from their homes. ....... accompanying video footage, photographs and eyewitness testimony explain what happened in each case. ...... women accompanying attacking tribesmen while singing songs and lashing out with racist slurs. "The blood of the Blacks runs like water, we take their goods and we chase them from our area and our cattle will be on our land," he quoted the women as telling some of the farmers under attack. ........ the credibility gap that Holocaust survivors once faced: how to provide concrete evidence that the most unspeakable atrocities are actually occurring. ........ the story of Jan Karski, a young Pole who came to America in 1943 and attempted to describe to a skeptical Justice Felix Frankfurter, himself a Jew, what he had seen in the Warsaw ghetto and a Nazi death camp. ........ After asking technical questions, pacing back and forth and then quietly sitting down, the judge told the Pole, "I am unable to believe you." ........ a viewership of 200 million and growing ...... "No one can any longer say they don't know. This tool will bring a spotlight to a very dark corner of the earth, a torch that will indirectly help protect the victims," said John Prendergast, a senior adviser to the International Crisis Group. "It is David versus Goliath, and Google Earth just gave David a stone for his slingshot."
Sprint plans WiMax network The Grand Rapids Press Some low-income households could pay $9.95 a month. .....The city hopes the service will be available this year, making it one of the first cities in the nation with WiMax service. ....... there's a reason fast-food restaurants often are built across the street from each other ...... Technology to put a WiMax receiver into a card that could be used with laptops still is being developed. ....... Sprint earlier announced it would introduce its WiMax service in Chicago and the Baltimore/Washington, D.C. area by the end of this year. ..... the network would spread to other cities, from Boston to Grand Rapids to Seattle.
Taking wireless to the WiMax Chicago Tribune Chicago soon will become one of the first cities in the country to have access to the next generation of computer communication, in which people will keep connected to the Internet wherever they go. ....... envelop the region in a digital signal as powerful as the broadband service ...... a $3 billion national bet by Sprint ...... will provide competition to Internet connections offered by Comcast Corp. and AT&T Inc. ...... a mobile Internet will spawn totally different services, such as cheap radio tags for airport luggage that would assure an end to lost bags. Or billboards that change their messages to appeal to the age and gender of people walking by them. ....... "Low-cost chips and pervasive wireless will change everything" ........ Chicago, Washington and Baltimore, are the first cities to get Sprint's new high-speed wireless service, which will spread to other cities next year. Sprint said it will take three years to build the new network. By the end of 2008, Sprint hopes to have coverage available to 100 million Americans. Sprint has enlisted help from Motorola, Intel Corp., Nokia Corp., Samsung and other equipment vendors to create a wireless network that is open to innovation, much like today's wired Internet........... Nearly all new laptop computers come equipped with Wi-Fi chips at no extra charge. Intel and other chipmakers intend to do the same for WiMax, making it inexpensive and widespread. ...... Sprint's commitment to build the nation's first commercial WiMax network has really focused industry efforts to get WiMax products to market ..... They've talked about $40 to $50 a month ..... It will be about three times faster than so-called 3G data services available from cell phone carriers. ..... The goal of Motorola and other vendors, said Mitoraj, is "to make WiMax so inexpensive that it's a no-brainer for devicemakers to put the chipset into their products." ...... the really interesting devices equipped to use WiMax probably won't be available until 2009 .... about 200,000 cards enabling laptop computers to use WiMax may be shipped this year. ...... Sprint is leading the way in WiMax, he said, because it has a supply of radio spectrum sitting idle. ...... Sprint's decision has caused a buzz across the industry.
Amitabh Bachchan pleads for privacy Apun Ka Choice “My son’s wedding is a very private solemn and precious moment for me and my family. Surely, we’re entitled to our privacy if and when we need it.” ..... none of the Khans have been invited and the reason cited by the Bachchans is the illness of Bachchan's mother Teji Bachchan. The Bachchans don’t wish to have a grand wedding out of respect to Teji Bachchan. .... rumours that Salim Khan who has written several successful scripts for Bachchan during his career earlier was invited, but Salim Khan too claims that this is untrue. ....... Salman too has not been invited obviously due to his past friction with Ash. ...... lovebirds Ash and Abhishek seem to be spending quality time together in London and are enjoying every bit of their rare time together. ...... The only ones who have so far received an invitation are Karan Johar , Sanjay Dutt , Ajay Devgan and Kajol and Sunil Shetty .
Team accepts Imus's apology Boston Globe a national debate on race, gender, and power spurred by derogatory comments by radio host Don Imus ...... we are in the process of forgiving ...... "We still find his statements to be unacceptable, and this is an experience that we will never forget" ....... The team met with Imus for three hours on Thursday night at the governor's mansion in Princeton, shortly after Imus was fired from his radio show by CBS. ..... emotions ran high, with tears on both sides ...... Imus did not shed any, but his wife, Deirdre, did, according to the person at the meeting, and she hugged each of the players individually. ...... the team voted on whether or not to accept Imus's apology. ...... a culture that "has produced language that has denigrated women." ....... CBS fired him from the radio show that he has hosted for nearly 30 years. ....... was once named one of the 25 Most Influential People in America by Time magazine. ...... Governor Jon S. Corzine was critically injured in a car crash while heading to the governor's mansion in Princeton for the Thursday meeting. ...... comments Imus made April 4 when he called the Rutgers players -- eight of whom are black -- "nappy-headed hos."
Study says CO2 emissions in US rose 18% during1990-2004 period Earthtimes.org
G-7 Predicts Strong Global Economy ABC News
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Rumor: Dell to Buy Palm, Enter Smartphone Market Mobile Magazine moving away from standalone PDAs and into smartphones that combine the functionality of a personal organizer with the calling features of a cell phone. ..... Before Dell can finish the deal, they'll have to fend off other potential buyers. Earlier this month, there was a rumor floating around that Nokia was interested in buying Palm too.
Dell dumps handheld business IT Week Dell appears to have quietly ended its presence in the Pocket PC market with the removal of its Axim x51 handheld from the company’s web site. .... the decline of the unconnected handheld market as customers switch to either smartphones or PDAs with cellular connections. ..... while the Dell handheld range could have incorporated cellular technology into existing handsets this would demand a fundamental shift in the company’s business model.
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Astronaut will run in marathon from space Central Maine Morning Sentinel the U.S. Navy commander will run the equivalent distance on a treadmill -- 210 miles above Earth, and tethered to her track by bungee cords so she doesn't float away. ...... "Boston Marathon in Iraq" ...... She is pioneering a new frontier in running and in sports with her run, which will truly be out of this world ....... three months with little gravity takes a toll on a human, and NASA requires all members of a station crew to exercise on the treadmill, a stationary bike and a resistance machine to maintain bone density and muscle mass ....... A "vibration isolation system" built by a NASA engineer will keep her from shaking the entire space station as she runs, but the machinery puts a strain on the runner's hips and shoulders. She also has to be ready to abort her mission.
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