Secretary Gates Announces New Key-log Pact: Cyber-War Without End, Amen…

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“With that in mind, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates recently gave two sharp-edged speeches, one at Maxwell-Gunter Air Force Base, the other at West Point, each expressing his frustration with the slowness of the armed services to adapt to a counterinsurgency planet and to plan for the next war.

Now, there’s obviously nothing illogical about a country’s military preparing for future wars. That’s what it’s there for and every country has the right to defend itself. But it’s a different matter when you’re preparing for future “wars of choice” (which used to be called wars of aggression) — for the next war(s) on what our secretary of defense now calls the “the 21st century’s global commons.” By that, he means not just planet Earth in its entirety, but “space and cyberspace” as well. For the American military, it turns out, planning for a future “defense” of the United States means planning for planet-wide, over-the-horizon counterinsurgency. It will, of course, be done better, with a military that, as Gates put it, will no longer be “a smaller version of the Fulda Gap force.” (It was at the Fulda Gap, a German plain, that the U.S. military once expected to meet Soviet forces invading Europe in full-scale battle.)

So the secretary of defense is calling for more foreign-language training, a better “expeditionary culture,” and more nation building — you know, all that “hearts and minds” stuff. In essence, he accepts that the future of American war will, indeed, be in the Sadr Cities and Afghan backlands of the planet; or, as he says, that “the asymmetric battlefields of the 21st century” will be “the dominant combat environment in the decades to come.” And the American response will be high-tech indeed — all those unmanned aerial vehicles that he can’t stop talking about.

Gates describes our war-fighting future in this way: “What has been called the ‘Long War’ [i.e. Bush’s War on Terror, including the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq] is likely to be many years of persistent, engaged combat all around the world in differing degrees of size and intensity. This generational campaign cannot be wished away or put on a timetable. There are no exit strategies.”

“There are no exit strategies.” That’s a line to roll around on your tongue for a while. It’s a fancy way of saying that the U.S. military is likely to be in one, two, many Sadr Cities for a long time to come. This is Gates’s ultimate insight as secretary of defense, and his response is to urge the military to plan for more and better of the same. For this we give the Pentagon almost a trillion dollars a year…..”

From Tomgram.

Comment:

Please note Secy. Gates’ promise of war in cyberspace .

In 1928, there was the pact to end all war (the Kellogg-Briand Pact). And now some 80 years later, out of the mouth of the secretary of defense, we have what amounts to a declaration of perpetual war; war that reaches into cyberspace, into your computer hard drive, into your innermost thoughts……like some sordid, key-logging snoop.

Yes, dear reader, as you read this humble missive, you too have become part of the great cyber-war-of- the -worlds; you too are a cyber-trooper, cyber-civilian, cyber-POW…… or cyber-kill…. as the case may be.

Whether you realize it or not.

The new frontier of the state’s aggression (actually, it’s always-and-forever frontier) is now your mind…your thoughts…indeed the space between your thoughts, from keystroke to silent keystroke…..

Fighting for Food: Mobs riot as food prices soar in Somalia….

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“Down with those printing the fake money!” the young men yelled, denouncing the growing number of counterfeiters who have contributed to escalating prices. “Down with opportunists!”

The Mogadishu Traders’ Union said it decided Tuesday to again accept the old 1,000-shilling notes and ordered its private security units to enforce that at the city’s main Bakara market.

“We, the big traders, have already decided to accept the old note and today we want to tell other businesses also to accept the decision,” said Abas Mohamed Duale, deputy chairman of the union.

Protests and riots over rising food prices have recently hit other nations, including Haiti, Egypt, Cameroon and Burkina Faso. The price of rice and other staples has risen more than 40 percent since mid-2007.

The Asian Development Bank said Monday that a billion poor people in Asia need food aid to help cope with the skyrocketing prices.

Soaring fuel prices, growing demand from the burgeoning middle classes in India and China and poor weather have contributed to the jump in food prices worldwide, economists say. Africa has been particularly hard-hit.

In Mogadishu, the price of corn meal has more than doubled since January. Rice has risen during the same period from $26 to $47.50 for a 110-pound sack.

The cost of food has also been driven up by the plummeting Somali shilling, which has lost nearly half its value against the U.S. dollar this year because of growing insecurity and a market clogged with millions of counterfeit notes. The shilling has tumbled from about 17,000 to 30,000 per $1…..”

More from AP.

Mumbai Madness: The World’s First Billion Dollar Home…

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“Forbes estimated Ambani’s net worth at $43 billion in March. Reliance Industries was founded by Mukesh’s father, Dhirubhai Ambani, in 1966, and is India’s most valuable firm by market capitalization. The couple, who have three children, currently live in a 22-story Mumbai tower that the family has spent years remodeling to meet its needs.

Like many families with the means to do so, the Ambanis wanted to build a custom home. They consulted with architecture firms Perkins + Will and Hirsch Bedner Associates, the designers behind the Mandarin Oriental, based in Dallas and Los Angeles, respectively. Plans were then drawn up for what will be the world’s largest and most expensive home: a 27-story skyscraper in downtown Mumbai with a cost nearing $2 billion, says Thomas Johnson, director of marketing at Hirsch Bedner Associates. The architects and designers are creating as they go, altering floor plans, design elements and concepts as the build…”

More at Forbes

with a hat tip to Kevin Duffy for the link.

In India, the Old Curry for the Goose is the New Curry for the Gander….

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“The marriage of Naveen, an engineer in Florida, hit rock bottom in mere five months. “I just asked her why she was in touch with her boyfriend. She tried to harm herself with a knife. We returned to India and I suggested she stay with her parents for some time. As soon as I was back in the US, she filed a 498-A case against my family and me. My parents were jailed for three days,” said Naveen, a case against whom is on in India and an Interpol Red Corner Notice pending abroad. Anupama Singh, the secretary of Rakshak that has raked up such cases, said the voluntary organisation has received over 700 such complaints, half of them from the US alone.

“We don’t say all these are genuine cases, but many are. The government is not really concerned. It’s futile to talk about the plight of men and their families by the women they marry. “In contrast, the cases of women being tortured by their husbands abroad have been overplayed with the government claiming that 30,000 brides — 15,000 from Punjab’s Doab region alone — had been abandoned abroad,” she said.

But in 2005, the government said in Parliament that only 100 such complaints had been received. The ministry of overseas Indian affairs (MOIA) recently revised the figure to 152. The trend, therefore, is more of vanishing brides and abandoned grooms abroad, Singh added.”

Comment

That’s from the Times of India last year, describing the ongoing barrage of domestic abuse of non-resident Indian males (especially high-status, high-earning males)  by their delicately-nurtured, oh-so-domestic, docile, doe-eyed, dosa-making desi brides).

No surprise. Whenever the state starts “doing-good” with its right hand, its left hand has the thumb pressed into the pan of the scales. Dowry laws were cooked up to protect victimized wives.  But after gender feminists got done with the recipe, a new set of victims had been trussed up for carving on the marital altar – husbands.

Mobs: A Citation in ‘USA Today’

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Should have posted this last month when it came out…

As Economy Dips, So Does Customers’ Generosity

2008.3.21 22:30

Hair isn’t the only thing being trimmed at Head Bangers The Salon in Pendleton, Ind.

Customers searching for ways to fight high gas and food prices are doing some trimming of their own – in tips.

“Even the regulars are cutting back,” stylist Joanna Anderson said. “Usually they are apologetic and say they wish they could give more. But they just can’t right now.”

Many workers depend on tips for a substantial part of their income, and those hairdressers, bartenders, cab drivers and food servers have been among the first to be hit hard by the slowing economy, experts say.

Those workers are feeling a pinch because talk of a recession has consumers putting the brakes on extra expenses.

“It’s simply panic, and people cut back in anticipation of what may or may not come,” said financial commentator Lila Rajiva, co-author of “Mobs, Messiahs and Markets: Surviving the Public Spectacle in Finance and Politics.”

More at USA Today. 

(c) 2008, USA TODAY International. Distributed by Tribune Media Services Internationa

“Barack, the Magic Negro”: Limbaugh’s parody is in poor taste…..

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A parody song about Barack Obama has been making the rounds of the talk shows.

This from “Crooks and Liars”:

BREAKING: Limbaugh’s “Barack the Magic Negro,” on-air song has workers up in arms

By: John Amato on Friday, April 27th, 2007 at 12:44 PM – PDT

rush-limbaugh_1.jpg UPDATED: Rush Limbaugh has angered many black employees over this parody song called “Barack the Magic Negro” This isn’t the first or the last time that Limbaugh will go after Obama’s race:

audio_mp3 Download | Play

I’ve been told that they have held meetings internally to deal with a ground swell of anger at Rush because of this.

UPDATE: I’ve anonymously confirmed that stations around the country who carry the show are having concerns expressed by listeners and even their own workers of color about the Obama parody, and the ensuing controversy in the media, and that respective managements are considering ways to address the matter with as little Imus-like backlash as possible,..This is starting to boil over…

A caller noticed there was a disclaimer added to the station she listens to and asks Rush why.

audio_mp3 Download | Play

Comment:

Why is accusing the United States government (ala Jeremy Wright) of using biological weapons against its minority citizens racist, but demeaning a black presidential candidate, a perfectly vacuous candidate in our humble opinion, NOT? Oh, because “Barack, the Magic Negro” is hip sociological talk, we hear:

“The Magic Negro is a figure of postmodern folk culture, coined by snarky 20th century sociologists, to explain a cultural figure who emerged in the wake of Brown vs. Board of Education. “He has no past, he simply appears one day to help the white protagonist,” reads the description on Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magical_Negro .

It’s an Al Sharpton phrase, Al Sharpton being tacky-race-theorist-in-residence on the American political scene. (Not that I don’t think Sharpton isn’t sometimes funny, but if you live by race, you’re going to die by it — and don’t complain).

In other words, it’s the old business of who says what. If rapper Snoop Doggy Dogg calls a woman a “ho,'” then that is social commentary; but if you (Joe Six-pack) do it, well, that’s sexist abuse.

Alright. Let’s stipulate that. If you’re a guy, you don’t get to call the ladies “ho’s” any more than if you’re white in 21st century USA you get to refer to blacks as “negros” (in a derogatory way) without raising up a few racial ghosts, even if the self-appointed guardians of racial morality do.

We get that part.

What we don’t get is this: when we’ve had evidence from Tuskegee onward that governments, and not just in the US, are capable of just about anything against their own citizens, why is it racist to state the perfectly libertarian proposition that states are inherently murderous, but OK and even rather funny to use a stealth-racialist label on an individual who’s no more or less a bland apparatchik than any white candidate? (And we’re not Obama-bots here).

Of course, the Right Reverend Wright didn’t do himself or Obama any favors by his firebrand performance over the weekend. His makeover into introspective new, new theologian by Bill Moyers was an impressive act of cross-dressing, but his subsequent reversal to black theo-speak at the National Press Club undid that performance thoroughly.

The chickens-coming-home-to-roost explanation of American foreign policy is a banality of left-wing analysis, at home on many academic campuses, but add a dashiki and the visceral cadences of black preacher-talk, and it becomes the verbal equivalent of Jimi Hendrix playing The Star Spangled Banner.

It’s powerful stuff dressing up American government history as a morality play. But as foreign policy analysis, it’s weak. But then again, having been happy to confuse the two whenever it suited us, we’ve only ourselves to blame for this conflation of the moral and the political…..

So we’re left impressed only by the Reverend’s sincerity (conceded even by Newt Gingrich ) and unerring eye for a You-Tube moment (and there’s that million dollar mansion and the book tour to come) and quite unimpressed by whoever it is who manages the Barack Balancing Act — you know, placate the base (Weatherman buddy,– hat tip to The Absurd Report for that – Farrakhan bodyguards, Wright sermons) but aim for the center ( working-class white fears, health care, jobs).

So far, Obama’s aim’s been pretty rotten. He was loyal to his inflammatory pastor….and for payback, the guy tossed him into the flames.

It should have been all over for Obama by now.

But now comes this…..

Sometimes I have to wonder if Limbaugh is an undercover Air America operative….

Boom Without End: What The Web Knows…..

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“India and China combined are commonly acknowledged as the next two economies to be reckoned with, in terms of double digit economic growth. Prices for basic materials such as copper, steel, nickel and virtually every other mineral used in construction are marching steadily upward.Certain economic commentators are calling this a ‘super-cycle”, implying that the trend will eventually reverse itself, and these industries will contract as they have done since the industrialization of mankind.

It is no such thing.

The cyclical nature of mining is dead, a relic of the past.

What do you think is going to happen to the demand curve for basic materials when China, India, Africa, and Latin America’s internet penetration percentages rise to meet North America’s?

How bout Russia?

China is the largest consumer of copper, but the United States is second. Once a standard of living is achieved it must be maintained.

The rest of humanity’s existence will now be spent in bringing the rest of the world population up to a better standard of living. Or we shall perish in the effort.

The secret is out….”

James West in The Midas Letter

Feminastiness: Eastern Men As Oppressive As Westerners….

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Topping my recently opened female-of-the-species-is-more-deadly-than-the-male file, this, from an Indian site (I’ve changed some of the language for clarity):

How to Improve Gender Sensitivity in India: 

1) Women must not be imprisoned even if they kill. They need to be put into reformatories.

2) As soon as a woman marries, she should get 50% rights to her husband’s property.

3) Large scale single parenting by woman (with maintenance provided by husband) is the norm. Research shows that children who are not allowed to see their fathers after divorce for years grow up to be very healthy. In India, Gender Sensitive judges alone should decide if the women should allow the father to see the child after divorce or not. Or if he should ever see them.

4) Any violence committed by woman against others (including murder) should be considered self-defense.

5) The disparity between life expectancy rates in men and women needs to be raised to the levels in developed countries. In India, women live 2.4 years more than men on an average. This difference has to be improved to the levels in the US and Europe where women live more than 6 years than men on an average.

6) If a man cancels an engagement, he need to be punished by imprisonment of upto 5 months. On the other hand, if a woman cancels an engagement, she should be compensated with 30% or more of the man’s yearly income.

7) For any woman who commits suicide within 7 years of marriage, a dowry harassment (or other harassment) case against the husband should be filed by default. He should be imprisoned for at least a year for not taking care of his wife.

8) If a woman complains of domestic violence, the man should be imprisoned immediately and bail only granted by a court. All their joint bank accounts need to be frozen at once. The woman also has the to right to stay on in the “matrimonial home” (i.e., the husband’s house), until she gets a divorce. If the women has an adulterous relation that is proved beyond doubt, the husband must still allow her to live in his house, or provide alternate accommodation of equal quality. The benchmark case is in the movie, “Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam.” The husband is even expected to help the women achieve her adulterous goals. If he cannot directly help, he must provide one-third of his salary towards the wife until she marries the other man.

9) A man must do half of all household work, even if his wife is not working. But he must always work full-time. If he does not, even if he does all house work, he should be labeled lazy, improvident, pathetic, and derelict, certainly in private, and preferably in public where it will cause maximum humiliation and pain either to him or to his relatives. If a woman does not work either outside the house or in, she is nonetheless entitled to all consideration and respect and anything less than deferential treatment of all her needs, demands, whims, and psychiatric moods should be considered a violation of her human rights.

10) After marriage, a man must not stay with his parents or allow his parents to stay for a prolonged period with him (“prolonged” to be decided by the woman and subject to revision at any time on request by her, her friends, or her relatives however distant and uneducated). He must allow her in-laws to stay in his house for at least the same length of time his parents stay in his house. If he violates any of these fundamental human rights of a woman, he can be imprisoned for neglect and abuse of his in-laws.

11) If in-laws of a man “feel” their daughter (or they) are not properly treated, the man should be thoroughly counseled and sensitized to his failure. If he does not mend his ways, stringent laws must be passed (with provision even for administering a good lashing) that will rectify his behavior.

12) The ratio of male:female suicide rates in India should be brought to the levels in the West. In India, 50%(about 25,000) more men commit suicide than women. This is much lower than western standards, where about 150% more men commit suicide than women.

13) The richer and the more educated the men are, the more pressure should be placed on them. They should provide the wife with a lifestyle equivalent to their status….. and they must also spend quality time with family (See 9, 10, 11 above). If this is still impossible, see 12.

14) By definition, Bangalore techies (since they work with software) are required to be softer than others. Since they are also paid more than most, they should deposit 20% of their monthly salary, at least,  in their wives’ names.

15) If the wife of a techie complains of dowry harassment (or any other harassment), he must be sacked from the job immediately (that is, after he gets out of jail on bail).

16) If the wife and husband are both techies, then the wife must not spend any part of her salary towards household or personal expenses. All expenses must be born by the man.

17) Streedhan given as a gift to the daughter during marriage must also be considered dowry.

18) Rural women and poor women are ignorant and can’t afford legal help. So, clearly the laws are really meant for urban India. Rural women should actually be discouraged from approaching the police or the courts since they don’t have the money anyway. Instead, they should be empowered in other ways – by better employment and by continuing to live in the traditional family system where they respect the decisions of elders. That will show everyone that that women’s rights laws are really UNDERUSED and (more importantly) will encourage urban women to MISUSE the law and file false cases. That makes for good business for feminist and Human Rights lawyers and keep bribe-giving at a healthy level, the booty being divided between the police and the women’s organizations. Currently, the rate of extortion for a techie is upto 1 lac and for an NRI (non-resident Indian) it goes upto 4 lacs.

19) Since, rural women do not suffer from domestic violence (see 18), domestic violence laws must be used mostly – and most stringently –  in urban India. Quod Erat Demostrandum.


More here in the archives of one of many new blogs on the feminist abuse of dowry and domestic abuse laws in India.

It would be funny if it were not another grim reminder of the way statutory remedies by the state end up creating more problems than remedies. Ultimately, both the men’s movement and the feminists are right….only in different places and ways. The feminists are more right (generally) about rural, uneducated women…..and the men’s movements is more right (generally) about urban, well-educated women.. But even then, each individual case is unique.

Racism, sexism and exist, but only as useful terms for analysis.. Down in the marrow, it’s all about power and relative power.

And when it holds power, the fairer sex is also the fiercer sex…

Read more here on the abuse of dowry laws and some advice for expatriate men who want to return home to be married:

498A victims offer the following advice for men getting married in India:
• When the bride and groom’s families exchange gifts, keep a written record of everything received and given.
• If you are traveling to India, make copies of your passport, visa and all credit cards and leave the copies with a trusted friend or relative.
• Don’t give anyone your tickets or passport.
• Register with the local Foreigners Registration Office upon arrival in India, and let them know your expected date of departure as well.
• “Don’t sign any blank checks.”
• Consider a prenuptial agreement.
• Keep aware of any bank activity by monitoring your bank statements.
• Print out and save any emails that may help your case. Under India’s recent cyber-laws, the emails may be admissible as evidence.
For more information, contact the following:
• Yahoo! Groups: Misusedowryact and Nridivorce
• www.sangyabalya.org (site is not always operational; alternatively, call them in Bangalore at 011-91-80-5696-9850 or email them at victimsof498a@rediffmail.com.
• The FBI’s local Indian staff can be reached through the American embassy in New Delhi: 011-91-11-2419-8000
• A few blogs are online, such as batteredmen.fullhydblogs.com, batteredmen.rediffblogs.com and batteredmen.blogspot.com.

The Flight to Food….

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“All over the world, food is causing trouble. Why? Not because there is too much of it or too little, but because it has gone way up in price.Why has it gone up? Well, for one reason, Ben Bernanke and other monetary authorities are pushing more money into the world financial system. The cash has to go somewhere. Much of it seems to be finding its way into the commodities markets – including soft commodities, notably food. In other words, worldwide inflation of food prices is a monetary phenomenon, as Milton Friedman might have put it, not a feature of the weather. But rather than attack the cause of inflation, the authorities are aiming squarely at its consequences.

Of course, there are other reasons for food price increases. There are a lot more people in the world than there used to be. And the new people have to eat too. Since many of these new people are entering the ‘middle class’ they have more money to spend on food, so they can bid up prices. And, typically, they want more meat. It takes more land to produce meat than it does to produce grains – putting further pressure prices all up and down the food chain.”

Thus speaks the proprietor of a newsletter in the business of watching financial trends.