The Global War on Women
February 27, 2012 by Peter · Leave a Comment
The pervasive oppression of women and girls is humanity’s greatest travesty.
Consider these facts:
- The leading cause of death for pregnant women is homicide.
- Women and girls ages 15 to 44 are more likely to be maimed or killed by men than by malaria, cancer, war or traffic accidents combined.
- The children most at risk of attempted abduction by strangers are girls ages 10 to 14, many on their way to or from school.
- Only about one third of countries around the world have laws in place to combat violence against women, and in most of these countries those laws are not enforced.
- According to the U.S. Department of Justice’s National Crime Victimization Survey — the country’s largest and most reliable crime study — there were 248,300 sexual assaults in 2007.
- One out of every three women will be a victim of violence in her lifetime.
And the reward: Women work 67% of the world’s working hours, yet earn only 10% of the world’s income.
The silence of the left: Obama, Bush and extrajudicial killing
February 25, 2012 by Peter · Leave a Comment
Salon’s Glenn Greenwald has spent the duration of Obama’s presidency asking a fundamental question of the left: Why are George W. Bush’s transgressions, which elicited fury from Democrats and liberals, acceptable when President Obama adopts – and embraces – them? In a recent post, Glenn decries the intellectual dishonesty he sees reflected in a Washington Post poll:
During the Bush years, Guantanamo was the core symbol of right-wing radicalism and what was back then referred to as the “assault on American values and the shredding of our Constitution”: so much so then when Barack Obama ran for President, he featured these issues not as a secondary but as a central plank in his campaign. But now that there is a Democrat in office presiding over Guantanamo and these other polices — rather than a big, bad, scary Republican — all of that has changed, as a new Washington Post/ABC News poll demonstrates.
Monsters
February 20, 2012 by Peter · Leave a Comment
I’d really like to know what justice looks like for the monsters who do this:
In a [Sierra Leone] rape treatment center, I met a 3-year-old patient named Jessica, who was cuddling a teddy bear. Jessica had seemed sick and was losing weight, but she wouldn’t say what was wrong. Her mother took her to a clinic, and a doctor ferreted out the truth. She had been raped and was infected with gonorrhea.
Václav Havel on Kim Jong-il
December 19, 2011 by Peter · Leave a Comment
On a day when two prominent leaders on opposite sides of the moral spectrum pass on, it’s worth reading what one thought of the other:
Today, the testimony of thousands of North Korean refugees, who have survived the miserable journey through Communist China to free South Korea, tell of the criminal nature of the North Korean dictatorship. Accounts of repression are supported and verified by modern satellite images, and clearly illustrate that North Korea has a functioning system of concentration camps. The Kwan-li-so, or the political penal-labour colony, holds as many as 200,000 prisoners who are barely surviving day-to-day or are dying in the same conditions as did the millions of prisoners in the Soviet gulag system in the past.
Occupy Wall Street versus Tea Party: a video comparison
October 4, 2011 by Peter · Leave a Comment
As OWS defies the skeptics and gains national traction, I figured it would be worth contrasting these interviews, the latter of which were conducted during Glenn Beck’s “Restore Honor” rally:
OCCUPY WALL STREET
RESTORE HONOR/TEA PARTY
Fearing death and facing death on September 11, 2001
September 11, 2011 by Peter · Leave a Comment
On the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, tributes and remembrances abound, as they should. We learn by remembering. And we honor the fallen.
Every New Yorker has a story to tell about that day. My wife and I had just flown back home on September 10th and had admired the majestic towers on the drive into Manhattan. The thought that those twin icons would vanish 24 hours later was unimaginable.
On that crisp morning, we woke up and began preparing business documents we were delivering to our accountant, whose office was in World Trade Center building 7. We planned to train it down to Chambers from the Upper West Side, stroll down and arrive around 9 am. A couple of minutes before we left, a family member called and told us to turn on the television. We did. Our lives changed forever, as did the lives of everyone around us. [Afterwards, we purposely moved down to lower Manhattan, making Battery Park City our home, surrounded by the spirit(s) of those who gave their lives on that life-changing day. And we still have the package addressed to a building that no longer exists.]
Vindicated by new polls, progressive bloggers and activists will determine President Obama’s political fate
September 6, 2011 by Peter · Leave a Comment
The defining conflict of the Obama presidency is not between the White House and Republicans. It’s not between the White House and the Tea Party. It’s between President Obama and the left, specifically between Obama and progressive opinion-makers and online activists.
It’s no coincidence that the angriest barbs from this White House have been directed at the netroots. And it’s no surprise that the media and political establishment – along with a vitriolic cadre of Obama supporters – are mortified by the principled left, simultaneously dismissing them as bit players and accusing them of being ingrates who are damaging Obama’s reelection prospects (hint: you can’t be both).
I’ve repeated a version of this thesis for years: a handful of influential progressive opinion-makers are canaries in the coal mine, propounding and presaging views and arguments later adopted by rank and file Democrats.
It’s been that way since the dawn of the blogosphere and has only been magnified with Twitter and other online platforms. Just as the netroots laid the groundwork for the eventual downfall of the Bush presidency, the sharp, insistent, principled critiques of President Obama emanating from the left on civil liberties, women’s reproductive rights, gay rights, the environment, secrecy, executive power, the economy, war, among other issues, have had a profoundly outsized effect on perceptions of this president.
Recent polls (including Gallup, which shows a double-digit decline among liberals) indicate significant erosion of support for Obama among groups who propelled him to victory in 2008, reinforcing the idea that reality is catching up with netroots criticism. This crumbling of support is typically attributed by pundits to the poor economy, but the problem is more complicated: it’s the poor economy coupled with the sense (fair or unfair) that Barack Obama has no convictions, no moral center, nothing for which he will take an unwavering stand.
That perception of a lack of convictions can’t be attributed solely to attacks from the right, since they can be discounted as partisan. It’s when the left makes that argument that conventional wisdom congeals.
GOP radicals and the end of American exceptionalism
August 9, 2011 by Peter · Leave a Comment
Last November, Karen Tumulty wrote an interesting article titled American exceptionalism: an old idea and a new political battle:
[T]he idea that the United States is inherently superior to the world’s other nations has become the battle cry from a new front in the ongoing culture wars. Lately, it seems to be on the lips of just about every Republican who is giving any thought to running for president in 2012.
The proposition of American exceptionalism, which goes at least as far back as the writing of French aristocrat and historian Alexis de Tocqueville in the 1830s, asserts that this country has a unique character. It is also rooted in religious belief. A recent survey by the Public Religion Research Institute and the Brookings Institution found that 58 percent of Americans agreed with the statement: “God has granted America a special role in human history.“
Ending Violence
July 30, 2011 by Peter · Leave a Comment
Violence: “The intentional use of physical force or power, threatened or actual, against oneself, another person, or against a group or community, that either results in or has a high likelihood of resulting in injury, death, psychological harm, maldevelopment, or deprivation.”
The World Health Organization’s World Report on Violence and Health estimates that over a million people lose their lives to violence and millions more are injured and maimed every year. The report states that violence is “among the leading causes of death among people aged 15-44 years worldwide, accounting for 14% of deaths among males and 7% of deaths among females.”
What is infinitely disturbing is the myriad forms this violence takes and how deeply pervasive and borderless it is. Across the globe and across the centuries, humans have committed the most barbaric acts, limited only by their imaginations, and the march of civilization has done little to change the grim reality that on any given day, in every corner of our planet, gruesome and ungodly things are done to women, children and men.
Are rightwing bloggers to blame for the Norway massacre?
July 25, 2011 by Peter · Leave a Comment
In an article titled Killings in Norway Spotlight Anti-Muslim Thought in U.S., the New York Times highlights the connection between Anders Behring Breivik and American bloggers:
The man accused of the killing spree in Norway was deeply influenced by a small group of American bloggers and writers who have warned for years about the threat from Islam, lacing his 1,500-page manifesto with quotations from them…
His manifesto, which denounced Norwegian politicians as failing to defend the country from Islamic influence, quoted Robert Spencer, who operates the Jihad Watch Web site, 64 times, and cited other Western writers who shared his view that Muslim immigrants pose a grave danger to Western culture.
Mr. Breivik frequently cited another blog, Atlas Shrugs, and recommended the Gates of Vienna among Web sites. Pamela Geller, an outspoken critic of Islam who runs Atlas Shrugs, wrote on her blog Sunday that any assertion that she or other antijihad writers bore any responsibility for Mr. Breivik’s actions was “ridiculous.”
Much as I find Geller’s writing execrable, the primary responsibility for the slaughter in Norway rests with the cowardly killer and not the hate-mongers he quotes in his pathetic manifesto.
That’s not to say that there are no consequences for spewing a constant stream of hatred and intolerance.
After the Giffords shooting, I wrote about eliminationism on the right. My focus was on the invective directed by rightwingers at the left, but it also applies to anti-Muslim bigotry rampant on a number of conservative sites…
Reuters- BBC News
- NY Times
- Business News
- OIL FUTURES: Crude Down 1.2% To New 2012 Low Of $92.81 A Barrel - Wall Street Journal
- All It Takes Is a Greek Story to Further Scare Markets - CNBC.com
- Federal Reserve concerned about fiscal cliff - CNN
- FOREX-Euro slides to 4-month low as Greek fears persist - Reuters
- How JPMorgan's storm in a teapot grew - Financial Times
- Science/Tech News
- Upgrading Your Verizon Device? Say Goodbye to Unlimited Data - PC Magazine
- New MacBook Pro Retina display will cost Apple, consumer too? - Los Angeles Times
- Apple's Patent Win Delays Shipments of Two HTC Smartphones - Wired News
- A post-IPO Facebook strategy - Reuters
- Google Revamps Search Engine To Make It Smarter - Wall Street Journal
- Health News
- Healthful food is not necessarily more expensive than junk food - Los Angeles Times
- Half as many women dying in pregnancy, childbirth as 20 years ago - Los Angeles Times
- Paralyzed woman uses mind-control technology to operate robotic arm - CBS News
- New Report Says Fish Pedicures May Carry Dangerous Bacteria - KBOI
- Flesh-Eating Bacteria Risk Rare Despite New Case - Sci-Tech Today
- Earthwire
- Environment
- Health/Poverty
- Maternal deaths continue to decline but more progress needed - UN report
- Hypertension and diabetes on the rise worldwide, says UN report
- Sub-Saharan Africa cannot sustain growth without ending hunger - UN report
- New UN-backed guidelines aim to protect rights to land, fisheries and forests
- Funding gap threatens efforts to assist millions facing hunger in Africa - UN official
- Human Rights
- UN expert urges Canada to adopt national strategy to ensure right to food
- Senior UN official condemns killing of Syrian citizen journalist
- UNESCO chief calls for investigation into death of Honduran journalist
- UN envoy welcomes deal to end hunger strike by Palestinian prisoners in Israel
- Mexico: UN and regional experts urge government to take action to protect journalists
- Women/Children
- Increase of women in parliament is a step towards gender equity in Algeria - UN
- UN mission in Afghanistan condemns attacks on schools by insurgents
- As death toll rises, UN urges greater protection of civilians in Yemen, especially minors
- Children in Mali suffering from triple disaster, warns UNICEF
- UN launches initiative to help end new HIV infections among children by 2015