tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-81403596405021061562024-02-07T03:37:18.975-05:00The Walter Duranty ReportReporting what the reporters missed.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger204125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-88760978892486432462010-06-10T09:11:00.007-04:002010-06-10T11:30:10.380-04:00Value Meal or Last Meal: Jay Leno and the Death Penalty<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzc-qWVGCUM8XHxExFMQxO8iLjENoO9s5FP0hoktqIVok8lpJ_3BQFy8Dk-CcZSsoRQy3eeYSyBamjm_2GiFmcIsnq7bq-6qOPn8AiOrJg0pgz2EcD_xHFdIdfqZ9pcitvmmB7D0HPh-sY/s1600/last+meal.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 212px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzc-qWVGCUM8XHxExFMQxO8iLjENoO9s5FP0hoktqIVok8lpJ_3BQFy8Dk-CcZSsoRQy3eeYSyBamjm_2GiFmcIsnq7bq-6qOPn8AiOrJg0pgz2EcD_xHFdIdfqZ9pcitvmmB7D0HPh-sY/s400/last+meal.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5481164484041609314" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span><span>I never thought that this blog would get dragged into the insipid mire of America's Late Night Wars, but Jay </span><span>Leno has forced my hand.<br /><br />While the various programs may jockey for ratings, in terms of quality, the winner is so obvious that it pains me that this is even a conversation i</span><span>n America. Jay Leno is a mean-spirited hack. All the hosts, from Grand Master Letterman, to my beloved Ferguson, to oft-forgotten Kimmel, go after the low-hanging fruit of celebrity scandal, but Leno poaches exclusively in this preserve. Watch his monologue, and you will find that almost without exception, every single so-called joke is a vicious personal attack.<br /></span><br /><span>Now, this blog was not created to rush to the defense of the likes of Lindsay Lohan (she does cocaine! Ha!) and Jon Gosselin (he's sort of fat and balding! Double Ha, Jay!), but a recent segment on The Tonight Show did go after some defenseless people in a misguided stab at humor: America's death row inmates.<br /></span><br /><span>Jay unveiled a bit this season (he calls it "one of my new favorites"), "Value Meal or Last Meal," in which he offers up a menu of items, and then invites the audience to guess whether this is a prisoner's last request or a combo dinner option from a chain restaurant. The two times I have seen the bit, the offerings have indeed been revolting concoctions from Applebee's and Chili's, not death row fare. To me, this indicates that Leno is happy make light of the desperate situations of men and women who are facing certain death at the hands of the state, but he is too cowardly to openly mock them, instead turning his sights at the last moment onto fast food restaurants. The meals are usually enormous and e</span><span>normously unhealthy, and the crowd seems to believe that the big reveal will be that this is a last meal, not a value meal. This whole segment</span><span> plays on the notion that death row inmates are overweight simpletons who choose to spend their last moments stuffing their faces with fried food. It degrades their deaths and trivializes a monstrous practice. As for the innocent victims of the executed, all I will say is that you do not need to demean one life to celebrate another, and Jay Leno is not championing victims' rights with this bit.<br /><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCzTNxRuuTQ-KPhXUXHgimS_xUJFwU01-VoItk1BrIFudUzrkmbEvMpdXRcJ79qhGI5gTH7m60fFoiteu_l14pll0LYOX_10OtOiu1oL4sshI3WunszN7YndvKUfy2YZM2OzDB2x1FlZPe/s1600/Leno.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 535px; height: 120px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCzTNxRuuTQ-KPhXUXHgimS_xUJFwU01-VoItk1BrIFudUzrkmbEvMpdXRcJ79qhGI5gTH7m60fFoiteu_l14pll0LYOX_10OtOiu1oL4sshI3WunszN7YndvKUfy2YZM2OzDB2x1FlZPe/s400/Leno.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5481164693781391378" border="0" /></a><span><br />Now, if Leno wants some really funny material, one of the most hilarious last meals of all time must have been that of <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/archive/1993/02/22/1993_02_22_105_TNY_CARDS_000360366">Rickey Ray Rector</a>. Rector, executed in 1992 by the state of Arkansas, asked for steak, fried chicken with gravy, cherry Kool-Aid and a slice of pecan pie. Nothing about that meal seems outwardly funny – he didn't order grotesque amounts of fried foods, as Leno finds so hilarious, nor did he order anything bizarre or exotic. No, the gut-busting part is his dessert – you see, Rector was so severely mentally handicapped that he set aside his piece of pie to save for later, believing that as soon as this whole ordeal was over, he would be back in cell where he could enjoy his dessert in peace. That right there is comedy gold, Jay.<br /><br />There are other options that would fit Jay's sensibilities nicely. He could make a joke about the fact that inmates in the federal death row in Terre Haute, Indiana have to place their orders for their last meal <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/22/weekinreview/word-for-word-execution-protocol-please-order-your-last-meal-seven-days-advance.html?pagewanted=1">at least seven days prior to their execution date</a> – "That federal bureaucracy is such a nightmare!" Or how about the fact that many states mandate in their execution protocols that prisoners eat their last meal at least several hours before the death penalty is administered. This is largely to maintain the atmosphere that a pseudo-medical procedure is being carried out, much like you are not supposed to eat the day before major surgery. Jay could riff on this with a zinger like, "Hey, I'm going to die anyway, I don't care if I throw up a little bit on my shirt!"<br /><br />Finally, Leno has got to do this segment about Edward Earl Johnson, a 26-year-old man executed by Mississippi in 1987 for the murder of a sheriff, a crime of which many believe he was innocent. His final two weeks of life, including his last meal, were documented in the film <a href="http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/fourteen-days-in-may/"><span style="font-style: italic;">14 Days in May</span></a>. He ate his last meal surrounded by friends and family in the Parchman Prison Farm. Leno could use this moment to really run with his family restaurant/death chamber dichotomy – "Is this guy in prison or at a Bennigan's?!"<br /><br />If you can't stomach a second more than is absolutely necessary of Jay Leno, fast forward the clip below to the 6:00 mark to see the segment from the May 28 episode of The Tonight Show.<br /></span><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><object height="288" width="512"><param name="movie" value="http://www.hulu.com/embed/QCjyB1zXkUoZKVw1hdvrvg"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><embed src="http://www.hulu.com/embed/QCjyB1zXkUoZKVw1hdvrvg" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" height="288" width="512"></embed></object><br /><br /><div style="text-align: left;">Should Jay Leno decide to use any of this Grade-A material I have written for him, I would expect an invitation to The Tonight Show, where I plan to <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vG7UnWEsRk4">behave like this</a> when he ruins it with his horrid delivery.<br /></div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-77156316320892974272010-02-24T16:09:00.006-05:002010-02-24T17:08:59.950-05:00Russia Today Thinks British Bobbies Are Violent Stormtroopers<span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>A few people have recently pointed out to me that Kremlin-owned cable channel and propaganda mouthpiece Russia Today (full disclosure: I briefly worked at Russia Today) has released a series of controversial advertisements promoting it's supposedly contrarian coverage.<br /><br />These ads have appeared in airports in the UK, but airport operators in the United States rejected them. A compromise was struck, and Russia Today was allowed to use ads the simply bore the phrase "Politically Incorrect" – I'm not sure if this is some sort of pun, or if it's in reference to the censored ads, which the American audience have never seen. Either way, the revised ad somehow makes less sense than original. The ads superimpose seemingly opposite images over one another – the most controversial of these ads depicted US President Barack Obama and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and asks, "Who poses the greater nuclear threat?" The rest of the ads can be seen <a href="http://rt.com/ads">here</a>.<br /><br />The Ahmadinejad/Obama advertisement is ridiculous (especially considering that Obama has articulated a sincere desire to rid the world of nuclear weapons); the AK-47/camera is interesting, if trite; and the insurgent/soldier is compelling, if wholly biased and politically opportunistic.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXOrMGaZMA6yZQ0xjdY4KxqHrCQK1Kh7U40l0ep3fA-V5e_XGd-NPPW_fHWTcfMI7PrhcuaqKjVDQ8Wk6MdCf6xrouNxKo3hIal_WN0b9biAk7-lD85utk1NK4gKr87ic6McVwJY_kyTfP/s1600-h/7-big_Policeman-poster_big.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXOrMGaZMA6yZQ0xjdY4KxqHrCQK1Kh7U40l0ep3fA-V5e_XGd-NPPW_fHWTcfMI7PrhcuaqKjVDQ8Wk6MdCf6xrouNxKo3hIal_WN0b9biAk7-lD85utk1NK4gKr87ic6McVwJY_kyTfP/s400/7-big_Policeman-poster_big.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5441932371009392258" border="0" /></a>Perhaps the most interesting of this series of ads is the last one (above), depicting a policeman and some sort of tattooed hooligan or activist; it asks, "Who is more dangerous?" It is a valid question – protesters, both peaceful and not-so-peaceful, are routinely suppressed with overwhelming and disproportionate force all over the world. Russian law enforcement is one of the worst offenders in this regard, as the government frequently resorts to violence and arrests to silence critics of the regime. However, this advertisement clearly depicts a British police officer. British policing is not without its problems, but for the Russian government to depict a British officer as a baton-wielding skull-cracker is the height of absurdity. Who's more dangerous? Neither – the answer is these guys:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyfncq8EcYS3wJ8hEhrUthxvYlmHwe1hdIZSQWO4H2cySz9r34NPJEuNFKMwLAkfsdM7c90yqfK2IfC-p6fGSLYmPww1Ro3m6VbHLrhgjyKyOcK-cKwatkPGhsHCPmqo3daTQHE3vRAZer/s1600-h/russian_police372x192.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 372px; height: 192px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyfncq8EcYS3wJ8hEhrUthxvYlmHwe1hdIZSQWO4H2cySz9r34NPJEuNFKMwLAkfsdM7c90yqfK2IfC-p6fGSLYmPww1Ro3m6VbHLrhgjyKyOcK-cKwatkPGhsHCPmqo3daTQHE3vRAZer/s400/russian_police372x192.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5441932949466864994" border="0" /></a>Unfortunately, censoring these ads may have been the best thing for Russia Today. These propaganda images lay bear the obvious biases of the network; the scrubbed ad just positions it as an "alternative" new source. The network is part of Russia's soft power offensive. The Kremlin has tried to sell the network as similar to news outlets like the BBC or Deutsche-Welle, which are at least nominally government-owned but remain editorially independent. In addition to providing news about Russia to an English-speaking audience, the network was also founded with the mission of countering negative views of Russia in the foreign media (<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/22/world/europe/22russia.html?pagewanted=print">this mandate also extends</a> to news outlets for the domestic market). Of course, the hand of the Kremlin could not be more obvious in its editorial positions or its news coverage. No matter what advertising campaign RT runs in the US, it is unlikely that anyone but the most uninformed contrarian (like <a href="http://larussophobe.wordpress.com/2008/04/02/editorial-peter-lavelle-scum-of-the-earth/">their own employees</a>) will turn to it for news. This may be, as my compatriot said, "largely due to prejudice, but that doesn't mean it's wrong."<br /><br />Of all the bad things that the Russian government does, running a poorly-produced propaganda cable channel is probably one of the most benign, and probably short-lived. To spread its gospel of a "multi-polar world," Russia Today offers its feed to satellite providers and public broadcasters for free, and it has no advertisements, meaning all of the channel's costs are paid straight from government coffers. With the country's finances in poor shape, the regime may see rapidly diminishing returns on its propaganda investment when budgets for public services are squeezed.<br /><br />But then again, I'm wasting my breath. This is all just propaganda.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Thanks to my friends for their many insightful comments on this issue, some of which have been lifted for this post. Check out more commentary on this story on <a href="http://seansrussiablog.org/2010/01/27/rts-agitprop/">Sean's Russia Blog</a>.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-23668587683576522042010-02-18T10:39:00.006-05:002010-02-22T19:17:12.002-05:00Medvedev Promises Police Reform, But Proposals Are Off the Mark<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRmUhdYHN0vEhZMSwj9-ul2YIZdE4sPrQMcO4mFDeymuG6W6VO1lqrYyE1431EaRj7aCNwlL57A6l3GkbQ7SGdri5YavdzkqTomDJPCgn590EwoK6ZUUzUnWaEDusaYyfsbmXiv_cCRIcX/s1600-h/xin_1220305010758546154499.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 276px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRmUhdYHN0vEhZMSwj9-ul2YIZdE4sPrQMcO4mFDeymuG6W6VO1lqrYyE1431EaRj7aCNwlL57A6l3GkbQ7SGdri5YavdzkqTomDJPCgn590EwoK6ZUUzUnWaEDusaYyfsbmXiv_cCRIcX/s400/xin_1220305010758546154499.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5439716391842843810" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>Russian President Dmitry Medvedev is talking tough about police reform.<br /><br />On Thursday, <a href="http://www.javno.com/en-world/medvedev-crackdown-on-evil-police-corruption_294709">Medvedev dismissed two high-ranking officials in the Interior Ministry</a>, as well as 16 regional ministry officers, 15 of whom are generals. <a href="http://www.kommersant.ru/news.aspx?DocsID=1324815">According to the Russian daily Kommersant</a>, half of these dismissals were tied high-profile incidents of police criminality and corruption, while the rest were the result of scheduled position rotations within the ministry.<br /><br />The changes were announced in a speech before senior officials of the Interior Ministry, in which Medvedev said the country needed to "cleanse this evil from the state and municipal structures."<br /><br />(<a href="http://www.javno.com/en-world/medvedev-crackdown-on-evil-police-corruption_294709">Agence France-Press</a> translated that phrase as "cleanse the state structures of evil," which could be interpreted to mean that Russia's security agencies are "state structures of evil." <a href="http://www.prime-tass.ru/news/articles/-201/%7B87FA0A97-647B-4CD2-8DB5-E63D8BA8AFAE%7D.uif">The original Russian phrase was</a>, "очистить государственные и муниципальные структуры от этого зла." Either way, I think the misinterpreted phrase is closer to the truth.)<br /><br />Among other reforms announced by the president was a plan to cut the Interior Ministry's bloated general staff in Moscow by half from its current size of 20,000. He also called on Prime Minister Vladmir Putin to draft a sweeping reform proposal for the country's law enforcement agencies, which is to be submitted to parliament by December 1. Medvedev stated that he would maintain personal control over the reform project, but giving Prime Minister Putin a central role is like putting the fox in charge of the hen house.<br /><br />While the housecleaning and tough talk about corruption are somewhat heartening, I remain skeptical (an opinion I've expressed before <a href="http://walterdurantyreport.blogspot.com/2009/11/whistleblowers-in-russian-police-turn.html">here</a> and <a href="http://walterdurantyreport.blogspot.com/2010/01/sergei-magnitsky-murder-siloviki-circle.html">here</a>). In the past several months, the country has been rocked by shocking criminal acts by police officers, including well-publicized beatings, mysterious deaths, and a not-so-mysterious video-taped mass killing. Some commanding officers have lost their posts as a result of these incidents (though not their jobs or their pensions), but almost none of the guilty officers have seen the inside of a courtroom, and jail time seems like a remote possibility.<br /><br />One thing that Medvedev said betrays a fundamental misunderstanding (or, more likely, an intentional misinterpretation) of how democratic policing works and how the country's law enforcement structures should be reformed. While his principal target of reform should be dismantling the police's culture of corruption and bringing dirty cops to justice, he has taken elsewhere: clearance rates.<br /><br />"Only one in every two crimes is cleared annually. There are over 1.3 million unsolved crimes in Russia each year, and a quarter of these are serious or very serious crimes," he said Thursday.<br /><br />The clearance rate is the proportion of reported crimes that lead to an arrest –they are "cleared" when the case is turned over to the courts for prosecution. The political reasoning behind Medvedev's statement is clear – people want the police to solve more crimes, because they think it will put more criminals in jail and will make them safer. It is true that solving more crimes is a good thing, but setting your sights on clearance rates is highly problematic.<br /><br />Clearance rates are easily manipulated. Especially within an embedded culture of corruption, there is a powerful temptation to doctor figures. This can be done in two basic ways – by not filing reported crimes, thus reducing the overall crime figures, or by making knowingly erroneous arrests, which moves the case off the police department's ledger and into the hands of prosecutors. Medvedev said about these supposedly paltry numbers, "Most importantly, behind [these figures] lie the fate of real people – of victims, their loved ones, their family members." He should remember that there are also countless victims of bad police work and police corruption who get caught up in this chase for ratings.<br /><br />Law enforcement agencies in the Soviet Union were obsessed with clearance rates, and every department was mandated to keep theirs at 95% or above until that target was scrapped in the 1980's. This is an impossible figure, but like so many other statistics in the USSR, it was doctored and fudged, often by ignoring crime reports, planting evidence, throwing innocent people in jail, and coercing confessions through torture. None of these things are acceptable from police in a democratic society, yet they were and remain commonplace in Russia.<br /><br />No up-to-date statistics are available on Russia's clearance rate nationwide (if you can find them, please let me know), but the regional figures fluctuate wildly and are highly unreliable. For certain crimes, like murder, many jurisdictions report preposterous rates of 90 to 100%. Regardless, Medvedev's ballpark figure of 50% is absurdly high – if he believes that it is too low, then it suggests that he is not aiming for accurate, accountable figures, but the phantom rates of the Soviet days that will dupe citizens into thinking that the police keep them safe.<br /><br />By comparison, in the United States, 45.1% of violent crimes were cleared in 2008, and 17.1% of property crimes (theft, burglary, etc.), <a href="http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2008/offenses/clearances/index.html#figure">according to the FBI</a>. America's law enforcement system is by no means perfect, nor is it fundamentally broken like Russia's – so why are the figures so low? Because the clearance rate only tells a small part of the story. It does not tell you how officers go about solving crimes, and whether they do it legally.<br /><br />Boosting clearance rates can be part of a successful crime control strategy, but only part, and not when corruption is so widespread. Cities like New York used clearance rate targets to reduce crime, but the NYPD also meticulously maintains its databases and they are subject to regular audits. Even then, the system is <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/07/nyregion/07crime.html?scp=6&sq=nypd%20study&st=cse">prone to manipulation</a>, and many have criticized the department for being too focused on clearance and crime rate numbers. Statistics are only worthwhile if they are accurate and reliable, and even then, they are only part of the answer.<br /><br />Medvedev's focus on police reform is admirable, and it is certainly more genuine than the promises of his predecessor, who remains irretrievably entrenched in the rottenness of the Soviet security apparatus. But this endeavor looks doomed to repeat the mistakes of past reform efforts by focusing on top-down, statistically-driven initiatives that pay no attention to the institutional problems of Russian law enforcement.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">UPDATE: </span>For more on the topic of policing statistics and fudging the numbers, check out this post from Peter Moskos on his blog, <a href="http://www.copinthehood.com/">Cop in the Hood</a> - <a href="http://www.copinthehood.com/2010/02/juking-stats.html">"Juking the Stats."</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-82052282866899996702010-01-21T13:17:00.009-05:002010-01-21T15:37:11.562-05:00The Sergei Magnitsky Murder: Siloviki Circle the Wagons<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEik2ztpGx7gSrNmwEZILq-bZtT5dwXXwQCV8iL1znsfH3mVvQ2eiMSM2V-ftA5CADMuMfy78B7BA04J_qZpMOTVh6A1fqPLw5TknmhQry7VASmzuTF_bCrNd6WhmeHjNuR3HybxCFL402I7/s1600-h/9266AA11-DB17-4D8B-B5FC-E4F39F25FE4D_w393_s.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 393px; height: 295px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEik2ztpGx7gSrNmwEZILq-bZtT5dwXXwQCV8iL1znsfH3mVvQ2eiMSM2V-ftA5CADMuMfy78B7BA04J_qZpMOTVh6A1fqPLw5TknmhQry7VASmzuTF_bCrNd6WhmeHjNuR3HybxCFL402I7/s400/9266AA11-DB17-4D8B-B5FC-E4F39F25FE4D_w393_s.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5429279422164177874" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>It has been more than two months since the death of Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian lawyer who died in police custody after being refused medical attention. Magnitsky represented British investor Bill Browder, founder of Hermitage Capital Management, in a case involving a huge tax fraud allegedly perpetrated by Russian police officials and uncovered by Mr. Magnitsky. He had spent nearly a year in pre-trial detention, imprisoned without charge by the very people he accused of perpetrating the fraud against his clients and the Russian government.<br /><br />Were it not for his British citizenship, Mr. Browder himself could have wound up in similar circumstances. He has been refused entry to Russia since 2005, despite the fact that he runs one of the largest investment firms in the country and has been a tireless booster of investing in Russia. He is not a political activist or human rights campaigner; instead, he champions investors' rights, which are also severely trampled in Russia. He refused to play by the crooked rules of the coterie of Kremlin insiders and current and former members of the security services, the so-called <span style="font-style: italic;">siloviki</span>, who control business in Russia. Magnitsky was a tireless advocate of his client's interests, and he was murdered because he refused to flee the country or commit perjury by implicating himself or his client for the crimes of his captors.<br /><br />Since this case became an international sensation (though only after Magnitsky's captors had succeeded in killing him), President Dmitry Medvedev has done some house cleaning, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/12/world/europe/12moscow.html">firing top prison officials</a> who oversaw Magnitsky's detention and non-existent medical treatment (he died of untreated pancreatitis and gall stones, not a heart attack and toxic shock as the government claims). As for the men who orchestrated the fraud and arrest, Viktor Markelov, a sawmill foreman and likely a bit player in the $230 million tax fraud, <a href="http://lawandorderinrussia.org/2009/time-the-danger-of-doing-business-in-russia/#more-679">was convicted in April 2009 of stealing government funds</a> (his conviction was in fact <a href="http://newsru.com/russia/20jan2010/magnitsky.html">based on the investigative work of Magnitsky himself</a>). The two police officers who orchestrated the whole affair, Lt. Col. Atryom Kuznetsov and Maj. Pavel Karpov, have been <a href="http://www.vesti.ru/doc.html?id=336887">reassigned to desk jobs at the Interior Ministry</a>, and no charges are pending against either one. Not a penny of the $230 million has been recovered.<br /><br />This is how things usually work in Russia when a scandal like this breaks. The government offers up a few sacrificial lambs – this time in the form of Moscow prison director Vladimir Davydov and 19 other prison officials and the fall guy Markelov – but it always protects its own in the police.<br /><br />For more details on the Magnitsky case, read <a href="http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2009/12/22/they_killed_my_lawyer?page=full">Bill Browder's letter published in Foreign Policy</a> in December. You can also <a href="http://audiovideo.economist.com/?fr_story=839854a8c031305662728c147e70405f0472fa83&rf=bm">listen to an interview with Browder from The Economist</a>, which I highly recommend. <br /><br /><iframe src='http://video.economist.com/linking/index.jsp?skin=oneclip&ehv=http://audiovideo.economist.com/&fr_story=839854a8c031305662728c147e70405f0472fa83&rf=ev&hl=true' width=402 height=336 scrolling='no' frameborder=0 marginwidth=0 marginheight=0></iframe><br /><br />Hermitage has set up a website, <a href="http://lawandorderinrussia.org/">Law and Order in Russia</a>, which chronicles this entire ordeal and contains a wealth of documents related to the tax case and Mr. Magnitsky's detention, all of which have been translated into English.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-56050226366788113712010-01-12T16:51:00.011-05:002010-01-14T17:51:50.280-05:00More Hockey: Playing and Watching the Game Outdoors<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpz3nHNZhtgy8fOQuFNKh7w7LGOyk9L9kSCBnNsZ9oYO9kyHF0MtY3ufYehn7gbZxO6RPjEFMoFmO2Ydx7iJ4aFyXBe-DimRq3DoYzIqHZB8Ti-oHTgoBLLHErQTz8bn936gumzH1YzJTd/s1600-h/IMG_2039.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 339px; height: 254px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpz3nHNZhtgy8fOQuFNKh7w7LGOyk9L9kSCBnNsZ9oYO9kyHF0MtY3ufYehn7gbZxO6RPjEFMoFmO2Ydx7iJ4aFyXBe-DimRq3DoYzIqHZB8Ti-oHTgoBLLHErQTz8bn936gumzH1YzJTd/s400/IMG_2039.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5426728920879180930" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>Hockey was meant to be played – and watched – outdoors. On New Year's Day, the National Hockey League pulled off another spectacular <a href="http://www.nhl.com/ice/eventhome.htm?location=/winterclassic/2010">Winter Classic</a>, an outdoor game between the Boston Bruins and the Philadelphia Flyers at historic Fenway Park. I was not able to make it to Boston for those festivities, but this past weekend I did make the trip to Beantown to see college hockey rivals Boston University and Boston College face off at Frozen Fenway.<br /><br />It seemed a bit sacrilegious that my first visit to Fenway would be to see a hockey game – a lifelong Red Sox fan, I've never seen them in their home ballpark – but you could not ask for a better atmosphere for a hockey game. As my brother and I shivered through three periods, and temperatures dropped to 15F, we did not complain that we had to watch the game through binoculars from the bleachers, or that the public address announcer kept talking during play. That's acceptable in baseball, but not okay in hockey – once the puck drops, the PA, organ, and infernal jock jams must all cease so that the crowd can hear the swish o<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSZp8PimL2GGZdqBwQyFuyk3kTGQI9Uj0QXzj9DF2rUu_MmZibeZU0HX-mDdVDRE9dTEFADp-PcSJmdReAlA0pFhpkrOPX8kPnPEd5tdrLm76Kbd_ysW8qHIDcsvQ1iBAcxO4fdVOvXiAC/s1600-h/IMG_2055.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 310px; height: 232px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSZp8PimL2GGZdqBwQyFuyk3kTGQI9Uj0QXzj9DF2rUu_MmZibeZU0HX-mDdVDRE9dTEFADp-PcSJmdReAlA0pFhpkrOPX8kPnPEd5tdrLm76Kbd_ysW8qHIDcsvQ1iBAcxO4fdVOvXiAC/s400/IMG_2055.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5426729383284469602" border="0" /></a>f the skates and the crack of the puck off of stick blades and boards. Our sightlines were not great, but they did a great job micing the ice; and I'm fine with an obstructed view seat, if that view is partially blocked by the Pesky Pole.<br /><br />The trip to Fenway brought back memories of places both very near to and very far from my home. <a href="http://bandycentral.blogspot.com/2008/02/good-old-pond-hockey.html">Playing shinny on local ponds</a> was a big part of growing up, and quite a few of the rinks I played on in youth hockey in Connecticut were outdoors. But this was the first time I had been to an outdoor hockey game since I lived in Russia. While in Irkutsk, I was a rabid follower of our local bandy club (not exactly hockey, but close), <a href="http://www.sibscana.ru/">Baikal-Energia</a>. 15,000 fans braved temperatures that dipped well below freezing – at their most recent home game, against Stroitel Syktyvkar, the <a href="http://www.rusbandy.ru/game/431/">official game t</a><a href="http://www.rusbandy.ru/game/431/">ime temperature was -13F</a> – on a regular basis. I guess I have grown soft and used to the warmth and comfort of an NHL arena; so had most of my fellow spectators in Boston, as the crowd had thinned out significantly by the third period. What we all needed was a few belts of <a href="http://www.nemiroff.co.uk/">honey pepper vodka</a> and some slices of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salo_%28food%29">salo</a>, a type of Ukrainian salted pork fat. Neither was on offer at the concession stands, however; just beer, which promptly froze in the plastic cups.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgI6nQ7BiobNjNaAMahKtVmLX3Y1Trhz854daqa6eVcc4wSd9J76Lpzqn9n5HqElNWPa3QJXd-NqyJKo5w4_8iqzXc5N3sDgrZ63vzz6mUPCwv3dGeQ3Z-HgMaJTyP0jRKD9pPB8rcdNDe9/s1600-h/IMG_2060.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgI6nQ7BiobNjNaAMahKtVmLX3Y1Trhz854daqa6eVcc4wSd9J76Lpzqn9n5HqElNWPa3QJXd-NqyJKo5w4_8iqzXc5N3sDgrZ63vzz6mUPCwv3dGeQ3Z-HgMaJTyP0jRKD9pPB8rcdNDe9/s400/IMG_2060.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5426730181906972546" border="0" /></a><br />Unlike previous Winter Classic events, the NHL decided to leave the ice down in Fenway for a full month, making it accessible for public skating and youth, high school, and college hockey. That is, <a href="http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/12/30/high_hockey_teams_left_out_in_cold_over_costs_to_play_at_fenway/">for those who could afford it</a> – two hours of ice time cost high schools upwards of $20,000, meaning only wealthy private schools could have the privilege of staging a game there. Nonetheless, the rink's extended stay was a big success, and the league hopes the next host of the event will make similar accommodations. Connecticut hockey fa<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_TuV77uMKrUnN2yU7A4emaep_ZotPyjsN0jiwJo1DwfPWt_MEsBHCs8Vj0qEORrqbibfRoPlzc0i91UPulvkMdc754EpZgbcFQkg8WNbaYOUoA-ZIi08_ST7BBvPLF7Zja9BuZqBCrmy0/s1600-h/Ovation+%28Baikal-Uralskiy+Trubnik%29.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 346px; height: 259px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_TuV77uMKrUnN2yU7A4emaep_ZotPyjsN0jiwJo1DwfPWt_MEsBHCs8Vj0qEORrqbibfRoPlzc0i91UPulvkMdc754EpZgbcFQkg8WNbaYOUoA-ZIi08_ST7BBvPLF7Zja9BuZqBCrmy0/s400/Ovation+%28Baikal-Uralskiy+Trubnik%29.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5426729646419326722" border="0" /></a>ns had a lot to cheer about; not only did <a href="http://www.courant.com/sports/high-schools/hc-fenwayhockey1222.artdec22,0,2236577.story">Avon Old Farms and Taft square off</a> on the Fenway ice on December 21, but the honorary captains for the BC-BU game included two of the state's greatest players: former Eagles standouts and NHL stars Craig Janney (of Enfield) and Brian Leetch (Cheshire).<br /><br />Outdoor hockey used to be ubiquitous, and even though leagues are staging <a href="http://www.findingdulcinea.com/news/sports/2010/jan/Outdoor-Hockey.html">more and more outdoor games</a>, fewer and fewer kids are growing up playing on natural ice. I was lucky to play a few games last year at an <a href="http://nedrink.com/node/9">outdoor rink in Nederland, Colorado</a>, located at 8,500 feet amidst beautiful mountain scenery, but few have such a privilege. Interestingly, no Stanley Cup final has ever been held outdoors. Even in the early days of the trophy, when the Amateur Hockey Association of Canada battled for the title, all the deciding games were held insi<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvmPMxzhyOjSMmnX6mLs8JF4CdBU1c6U7IFL76NzNBsuIsLcALeQe_-Zn-cIfwCjbqdVl9thNp9I3O5OMne9ej-UpERVXXOUlIJnJJgyDAuIbMEt6_xKKx87G_wfVEJz7K5AhW1Mpczh0D/s1600-h/denisatolympics.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 345px; height: 350px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvmPMxzhyOjSMmnX6mLs8JF4CdBU1c6U7IFL76NzNBsuIsLcALeQe_-Zn-cIfwCjbqdVl9thNp9I3O5OMne9ej-UpERVXXOUlIJnJJgyDAuIbMEt6_xKKx87G_wfVEJz7K5AhW1Mpczh0D/s400/denisatolympics.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5426730692599875922" border="0" /></a>de. When the Montreal Hockey Club won it for the first time in 1894, they played at Victoria Rink, which opened in 1862. Even when the cup was contested in far-off Winnipeg in 1896, the city hosted the games in the <a href="http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/mb_history/43/hockeyhistory.shtml">recently-constructed, 2,000-seat Granite Rink</a>. The Vancouver Olympics are fast approaching, where the hockey tournament will be staged at the Canucks' home, GM Place. When the Games were held in Cortina d'Amprezzo in 1956, all the on-ice events were held at the open-air Stadio Olympica (which has since been covered), including the Soviets' gold medal game victory over the United States (Canada finished with the bronze, though their goaltender was Denis Brodeur, father of the team's current backstop, Martin).<br /><br />As for the game we watched outside, the Terriers dominated most of the way. A late rally drew the Eagles within a goal, but they came up short, and BU earned some bragging rights with a 3-2 victory. Let's hope this great tradition continues, and more fans and players get to experience the game out in the open.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-45001839192330443752010-01-06T13:22:00.007-05:002010-01-06T16:06:15.598-05:00Hockey and Nationalism Should Be Kept Apart<span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>Tuesday was an historic day for American hockey. <a href="http://www.uscho.com/news/college-hockey/id,17779/CarlsonsOTGoalGivesUSGoldatWorldJuniors.html">The United States defeated Canada in the final of the World Junior Hockey Championship</a>, winning just the second gold medal in the country's history. Canada had been aiming for history themselves; having won the tournament five years in a row, a sixth consecutive gold would have set a new record of dominance. Instead, the US came out on top in an end-to-end overtime thriller that was without a doubt one of the most exciting hockey games I have seen in years.<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><object height="361" width="440"></object><br /><object height="361" width="440"><param name="movie" value="http://sports.espn.go.com/videohub/player.swf?mediaId=4801691"></object><br /><object height="361" width="440"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></object><br /><object height="361" width="440"><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"></object><br /><object height="361" width="440"><embed src="http://sports.espn.go.com/videohub/player.swf?mediaId=4801691" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" allowscriptaccess="always" height="361" width="440"></embed></object><br /><object height="361" width="440"></object><br /></div>Meanwhile, my friend Gene sent me <a href="http://www.tnr.com/blog/the-avenue/metropolitan-war-imagined-nhl">this blog post</a> from The New Republic by Adie Tomer, which relates an idea by everyone's favorite pop psychology maven, Malcolm Gladwell, about how to fix the National Hockey League. Apparently, I have not been experiencing enough diarrhea of the mouth, so I subjected myself to reading <a href="http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/two/091218">his interview</a> with serial ego-blogger and self-referential nincompoop, ESPN's Bill Simmons. <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtux8Beuu9KOZxP8wLP90KS5_N9AQk46Qn7ciXBdxrmwH0wap99ByzB17KOHK9xGnSBWAWXyuee_JAPHHbnBGyc9DFQIS4CBsIkLvpNDL9BFHtf4YiR1pesZlLKeJX460D88xVZw8Fr_gQ/s1600-h/malcolm-gladwell-real-or-merely-cartoon.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 196px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtux8Beuu9KOZxP8wLP90KS5_N9AQk46Qn7ciXBdxrmwH0wap99ByzB17KOHK9xGnSBWAWXyuee_JAPHHbnBGyc9DFQIS4CBsIkLvpNDL9BFHtf4YiR1pesZlLKeJX460D88xVZw8Fr_gQ/s400/malcolm-gladwell-real-or-merely-cartoon.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5423732974540678050" border="0" /></a>Simmons and Gladwell think it would be totally radical if the NHL were realigned into two 12-team conferences divided equally between the US and Canada. Not only would this endow hockey-mad Canada with the six more franchises it richly deserves, but it would also set up an awesome "border war" in each Stanely Cup final, stoking national pride and making everyone from sea to shining sea (in both countries) totally excited about hockey, regardless of which cities are represented in the final.<br /><br />So, how are these two things related? Well, if this national showdown would be so awesome for hockey, why does nobody in the US care that we just had a cross-border battle for the ages? Not only does Tomer make no mention of it (his commentary was posted the day of the final), but it was totally ignored by the national media (ESPN only <a href="http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/olyhockey/news/story?id=4799816">mentions it</a> on their NHL page, not their main page). The reason is that the appeal of teams isn't just limited to their respective cities; the appeal of hockey in the US is limited, period.<br /><br />While there are lots of deserving cities in Canada without NHL teams, and lots of undeserving American ones with them, this hare-brained idea will do little to help hockey. Fewer teams in the US might be better for the overall health of the league, but it won't do much to grow the game in the US. Gladwell and Simmons' idea of creating national buzz about the Stanley Cup final is already true in Canada, as it's non-stop national news whenever there is a Canadian team in the final or even the conference final.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_h4YuqDDd6Zovyrpye4ztrlftZyRh5ifP7iqeX8iprV8WEME2FRPER_xK1ilkb3k6fstEW1E4GGASfQMnZuZ65Ng-eI6JimbFSHCIj8hXQDO0BPGhy572_4ZSTdqRtvLk9ccewH_Ph3rT/s1600-h/peter-stastny.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 195px; height: 262px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_h4YuqDDd6Zovyrpye4ztrlftZyRh5ifP7iqeX8iprV8WEME2FRPER_xK1ilkb3k6fstEW1E4GGASfQMnZuZ65Ng-eI6JimbFSHCIj8hXQDO0BPGhy572_4ZSTdqRtvLk9ccewH_Ph3rT/s400/peter-stastny.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5423734761098044482" border="0" /></a><br />Gladwell keeps harping on the mismanagement of the NHL, but the fact that the Phoenix Coyotes are a mess does not give his ideas any more credence. Here is one of his nonsense analogies about how to improve hockey:<br /><blockquote>I was once in Brazil when Brazil was playing Argentina in soccer, and the entire country was in a state of advanced hysteria. I was at a conference and they stopped the proceedings, in the middle of the day, so everyone could go watch the game. Unbelievable. That's what happens when you combine sports and national loyalties. Can you imagine this happening every spring?</blockquote>Perhaps this would be a better idea if Canada shared a border with Sweden or Russia, but even these countries cannot match Canada's obsession with hockey or its sheer output of talent. The Coyotes should definitely move back to Canada, and <a href="http://bandycentral.blogspot.com/2007/01/gary-bettman-is-terrorist.html">Gary Bettman should have been fired</a> many, many years ago, but drawing analogies between the hockey rivalry of the US and Canada and soccer matches between Brazil and Argentina is ridiculous (see my point above re: diarrhea of the mouth). And we really need this in hockey:<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><object height="340" width="560"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/mjGvgeGSVWk&hl=en_US&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/mjGvgeGSVWk&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="340" width="560"></embed></object><br /><br /></div>I think this realignment is an idea dreamed up by an American (Simmons) who likes the example of Green Bay – a small town with a big professional franchise – and thinks it would be quaint to have NHL teams in places like Saskatoon and Winnipeg. Practically speaking, not only is it tough to decide which 12 of the 24 US franchises should be cut (once you get past the usual Sunbelt suspects, it gets much harder to decide), but it's hard to find six more Canadian cities that could support a $200 million+ hockey franchise, especially considering that Toronto won't let anyone into their southern Ontario fiefdom, which contains most of Canada's larger cities (my picks were Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Quebec City, Halifax, Hamilton and Victoria, hypothetically speaking).<br /><br />Gladwell's other idea is that Canadians "secede" from the NHL and run their own league. Many Canadians have in effect done this. Instead of trekking to the league's six Canadian outposts, they watch junior hockey in their hometowns, where 17- to 20-year-olds ply their trade in the Western, Ontario and Quebec Major Junior Hockey Leagues, and in the various junior A and B circuits across the country. Canadians may be happy to spend their ticket dollars on their local youngsters, but they still tune in every Saturday night to watch Hockey Night in Canada. If the NHL is to remain the world's pre-eminent hockey league, it needs the revenues that large US markets and American TV networks and advertisers provide.<br /><br />Lastly, I would like to take aim at a larger point made by Gladwell and expounded upon by Tomer, and that is that melding sport and national pride is a good thing. Why do we need to inject nationalism into the NHL? It is a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NHL_captains">cosmopolitan league</a> with players from around the world who are embraced by their adopted cities across North America. The Washington Capitals are captained by a Russian, the Ottawa Senators by a Swede. The Montreal Canadiens are without a captain, but their three alternates are two Americans and a Russian; Toronto is in a similar situation with a Czech, an American and a Canadian wearing the "A" on their sweaters. There are plenty of opportunities for players to wear their national colors, such as the annual IIHF World Championships (another non-event in North America), the WJC and the Olympics.<br /><br />Sport may on occasion be a peaceful proxy for actual confrontation between nations, but nationalism and sport often make for a dangerous combination that can boil over into real violence. Just watch the soccer hooligans at this summer's World Cup in South Africa. Hockey has been largely free of fan violence on this continent, but there were a pair of ugly nationalism- inspired incidents during the 2002-03 NHL season, when <a href="http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/hockey/news/2003/03/20/anthem_booed_ap/">Montreal Canadiens fans booed "The Star-Spangled Banner"</a> in response to the invasion of Iraq; <a href="http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/sun_sentinel/access/314936031.html?dids=314936031:314936031&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:FT&type=current&date=Mar+23%2C+2003&author=Michael+Russo+Staff+Writer&pub=South+Florida+Sun+-+Sentinel&desc=FANS+BOO+O+CANADA%3B+PANTHERS+ISSUE+APOLOGY&pqatl=google">Florida Panthers fans responded by booing "O Canada"</a> at their own arena. We don't need to encourage that nonsense every year at the Stanley Cup final. The World Junior Championship has also <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD3GrBRppe6VrMWd2rEBYjPQQRE0wTEu546UBNz29ULoVKexiWmHsmqtJ3PN3zpwO2Kyyzw9cmDHodSywq1aShHuMWCpBIr2Wvzd3WorrfxBzZmn83I6nkHuBh0fpTMt1eV2KnVD52Fzom/s1600-h/hooligans_feature.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 358px; height: 243px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD3GrBRppe6VrMWd2rEBYjPQQRE0wTEu546UBNz29ULoVKexiWmHsmqtJ3PN3zpwO2Kyyzw9cmDHodSywq1aShHuMWCpBIr2Wvzd3WorrfxBzZmn83I6nkHuBh0fpTMt1eV2KnVD52Fzom/s400/hooligans_feature.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5423734871894701618" border="0" /></a>experienced that nationalist boobirds, when <a href="http://www.thestar.com/article/166050">Canadian fans in Vancouver in 2006 jeered the American squad</a> while cheering on their traditional rival, Russia. Booing teenagers is always a classy move. I have made my opinions about the Olympics well known <a href="http://walterdurantyreport.blogspot.com/2009/11/canada-shores-up-arctic-claims-with.html">here</a> and <a href="http://bandycentral.blogspot.com/2008/08/jacques-rogge-worst-person-in-world.html">elsewhere</a> – they just provide another tool for xenophobes and bigots to manipulate national sentiment, and international events are no less sullied by corporate advertising and fraud than the professional athletic circuits. But the vocal fans in Vancouver should add a little flavor to the usually tame Winter Olympics, especially during the hockey tournament.<br /><br />I will admit to feeling a great deal of pride in my country when John Carlson netted the game winner in Saskatoon last night, but I would be far happier to see the Boston Bruins Slovak captain Zdeno Chara hoist the Stanley Cup. Let's keep nationalism out of the NHL, and let's keep people who don't know what they're talking about out of hockey.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-44463035237473770692009-12-15T01:56:00.012-05:002009-12-17T02:20:44.667-05:00The Man-Dog Case: The Life of a Stray in Russia<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlXF-6W5qtWDBXi5xeofjbpnTQ0inCla6oicgYrpZ5gPX3opc-R34VciYOYdem3kZ-NboMzTZkXsqU19SrQPjxRwDgWdOf7iVkoetkOfesTrSEzYs0EsAdBkFxZHmxKAdv1c-ApzIy_zsG/s1600-h/Gus+and+stray+dog.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 272px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlXF-6W5qtWDBXi5xeofjbpnTQ0inCla6oicgYrpZ5gPX3opc-R34VciYOYdem3kZ-NboMzTZkXsqU19SrQPjxRwDgWdOf7iVkoetkOfesTrSEzYs0EsAdBkFxZHmxKAdv1c-ApzIy_zsG/s400/Gus+and+stray+dog.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5416098393860436978" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>I was a member of the debate team in college, competing in an extemporaneous style known as American Parliamentary debate. We competed in tournaments around the northeast, and we had rather limited success (limited, really, to a single moment, when we bested one of the top teams in North America by successfully defending the right of professional basketball players to use performance-enhancing drugs). When we entered the final round of a weekend tournament, and it was clear that we had no chance of making the playoff rounds (know as the "break" in debater parlance), we would often debate topics that were absurd or funny because the outcome didn't really matter. One such joke case was a particular favorite, and it was known as "The Man-Dog Case." In the scenario of this debate, you find yourself transformed overnight into a dog, and the question up for debate is this: do you stay at home and become a docile, domesticated dog, or do you choose to roam the streets as a stray?<br /><br />Inevitably, the debate regresses into a discussion about the pleasures of dog sex, whether trash is tastier than kibble, and how hard it really is to evade dog catchers. This was certainly not the highest level of discourse possible, but during my time living and traveling in Russia, this debate stuck with me. The country is crawling with stray dogs nearly everywhere you go, from the center of Moscow to remote Siberian villages. When I saw these dogs huddled in great masses at my local subway station, or chasing children on dirt roads outside Irkutsk, I thought to myself, is it good to be a stray in Russia? Russian strays have been in the news a lot lately, so I decided to have a debate based on these stories as well as my own work as an amateur canine biologist. <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9oslASH-2I&feature=related">So let's do some debate!</a><br /><br />In support of the resolution, it is better to live as a stray in Russia than live in a home.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> Contention #1: You might get sent into space.</span><br /><br />This is the dream of all stray dogs. All the dogs of the early Soviet space missions were female strays picked up off the streets of Moscow. Of the 11 sent into space, six returned to earth safely, including Strelka, who would later give birth to <a href="http://www.svengrahn.pp.se/histind/sputnik5/sputnik5.html">Pushinka</a>, a puppy that was given as a gift by Nikita Khrushchev to the Kennedy family. From the streets of Moscow to the space program to the White House in one generation – now that's what I call the American Dream. You will also get your portrait hung in an <a href="http://www.mjt.org/recentaddtions/creatures.html">obscure museum in Los Angeles, as a bonus</a>.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> Contention #2: You will have free reign of the Moscow subway.</span><br /><br />Back in April, Moscow's subway-<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy8x6h1jv6_sgWG7wx9aCG9LNFKIqLaogFPcidRJ0_ZWr_RCfCTlK1RmDrJ67-khp6yUrYc5znNJYW5pN_jFkrQAtJ7h-24wgMmVtd9P1L-HQFr1qWv_9NCuE1QIh-tDGohr4G9ssGg9y-/s1600-h/1524827.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 225px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy8x6h1jv6_sgWG7wx9aCG9LNFKIqLaogFPcidRJ0_ZWr_RCfCTlK1RmDrJ67-khp6yUrYc5znNJYW5pN_jFkrQAtJ7h-24wgMmVtd9P1L-HQFr1qWv_9NCuE1QIh-tDGohr4G9ssGg9y-/s400/1524827.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5416098645578971874" border="0" /></a>riding canines became a bit of an Internet sensation, as <a href="http://englishrussia.com/?p=2462">blogs</a> and news sites latched on to this latest meme. These dogs are not news, and I had I been diligent with my blog posting, I could have "scooped" all these sites with my personal knowledge of Russian strays. Regardless, dogs freely ride the subway in Moscow, often sacking out on benches or taking over whole sections of cars. They cannot read Russian or understand the announcements (much like your average tourist), nor can they count or read a map, so to find their desired stop, they quickly hop off the train, look around to see if they recognize the station, and then either get off or jump back on the train before the doors close. Perhaps their most amazing feat is their ability to coolly ride the gargantuan escalators, which would easily spook your average American house pet. Riding the subway has also given Moscow strays an <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB121123197068805001-lMyQjAxMDI4MTIxMDIyMzAxWj.html">evolutionary advantage</a>, as they have become smarter and developed advanced behaviors never before seen in other dogs (<a href="http://www.metrodog.ru/">Metrodog.ru</a> is no longer actively updated, but it is a great archive of these canine behaviors).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> Contention #3: There are career opportunities in advertising.</span><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwF609GvNieKQTtnE2541UxBV75dRwHU9783pnWl97Z7oL-OEr-yv7UmgGQ4x-CGGh1i-U6rnYyNlcgJQX-PfKSh_9mS00_oVc7hI3eYWB8JGYxE2bcaWO54nlGFS01WWqKh4_BI_Rmytr/s1600-h/467753_20020918185048.gif"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwF609GvNieKQTtnE2541UxBV75dRwHU9783pnWl97Z7oL-OEr-yv7UmgGQ4x-CGGh1i-U6rnYyNlcgJQX-PfKSh_9mS00_oVc7hI3eYWB8JGYxE2bcaWO54nlGFS01WWqKh4_BI_Rmytr/s400/467753_20020918185048.gif" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5416099154325521058" border="0" /></a>Advertisers abhor blank space, and stray dogs are really just underutilized billboards. So, in 2002 in the city of Penza, <a href="http://newsru.com/russia/18sep2002/hobo.html">a local business beg</a><a href="http://newsru.com/russia/18sep2002/hobo.html">an employing the beasts for advertising</a>. After being snared by means of an enticing meatball, the dogs then had stencil advertisements spray-painted across their bodies and were then released unharmed back into the streets to unknowingly flog the wares of a number of different brands, including the country's largest oil producer, Lukoil.<br /><br />And opposing the resolution.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> Contention #1: You might get sent into space.</span><br /><br />While some space dogs went onto lives of fame and fortune, Laika and four other less fortunate hounds never got the chance to enjoy their notoriety, as they ran out of oxygen and their capsules burned up in the atmosphere.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"> Contention #2: You might get poisoned and turn green.</span><br /><br />Stray dogs have become masters at <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZ7spv_pf7wU1LMYG8Ho2K7ChEC72AkEYAqGwTUu6L14g1OBTPkNKcZl8lzI9Wjm9D5ugJmKZL8Ym8r3QNLsacBrvlnUaXBDQPprEk-yzHXDsTDSuPkVcVvO9suaqtf3DOdBCwVqEKZ0W2/s1600-h/15010999.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZ7spv_pf7wU1LMYG8Ho2K7ChEC72AkEYAqGwTUu6L14g1OBTPkNKcZl8lzI9Wjm9D5ugJmKZL8Ym8r3QNLsacBrvlnUaXBDQPprEk-yzHXDsTDSuPkVcVvO9suaqtf3DOdBCwVqEKZ0W2/s400/15010999.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5416099341263085282" border="0" /></a>tracking down the most delicious detritus of human civilization, and they will travel across the city, and even make several subway transfers, to feast on discarded shawarma. But even for a dog, there is no such thing as a free lunch. In Yekaterinburg, a pack of about 20 dogs has reportedly <a href="http://en.rian.ru/strange/20091211/157201348.html">turned green after scavenging in a local dump</a>. Officials believe that the color change is due to the dogs consuming chemicals that were illegally dumped at the site. It was probably no worse than being spray-painted by an advertising company, but eating trash, poisoned or otherwise, probably sucks pretty bad.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Contention #3: People will try to castrate and kill you.</span><br /><br />Last year the Moscow city government announced plans <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aV0bG.sii_ng&refer=exclusive">to spay and neuter nearly half of the city's estimated 100,000 strays</a>. This program was coupled with a plan to erect several shelters around the city to house homeless dogs, but these facilities are <a href="http://rt.com/Top_News/2009-04-22/No_food_and_mercy_for_stray_dogs_in_Moscow_shelters_.html">horribly mismanaged</a>. Rather than sterilize the dogs and house them during their recovery, as the city program intended, most shelters just kill the animals, keeping them in appalling conditions before putting them down while pocketing the cash from the city. At least dogs do not have to worry about the police so much anymore – until 2002, police officers were authorized to shoot any stray dogs on the street, a policy which likely endangered far more people with wild gunfire than it saved from marauding strays. Now Russian dog catchers use tranquilizers to subdue animals.<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><object height="225" width="280"></object><br /><object height="225" width="280"> <param name="movie" value="http://rt.com/s/swf/player.swf?file=http://rt.com/v/2009-04-26/Dogs.flv&image=http://rt.com/s/obj/2009-04-22/D__NADYA_RussiaToday_22.04.2009_out_dog-2.jpg&controlbar=over&skin=http://rt.com/s/swf/skin/stylish1.swf"></object><br /><object height="225" width="280"> <embed src="http://rt.com/s/swf/player.swf?file=http://rt.com/v/2009-04-26/Dogs.flv&image=http://rt.com/s/obj/2009-04-22/D__NADYA_RussiaToday_22.04.2009_out_dog-2.jpg&controlbar=over&skin=http://rt.com/s/swf/skin/stylish1.swf" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" height="225" width="280"></embed></object><br /><object height="225" width="280"></object><br /><br /></div>So, would you choose the life of a tramp, endlessly riding the underground rails in search of your next meal, or would you choose a cozy life in a Moscow high-rise? I'm still undecided, but I think all that we have learned from this debate is that while Russian strays are some of the most resilient, resourceful, and adorable creatures on earth, being pretty much anything in Russia, man or beast, is quite a terrible proposition.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-31564734745351653592009-11-14T15:57:00.008-05:002009-11-19T11:04:28.211-05:00Whistleblowers in Russian Police Turn to Youtube, But Real Reform Still Unlikely<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrTSzw57No1HoS6T_XSL4yrbOHC6Kxzptf_iMWV08uVrDuLSHbC-o0y54p1yTDzMVp81tXVqqZPkvPNtUpvQ4ClhSPA_yvyGOhZ802KB-Ql6qMWwEUJWyBv_RRivaqXlumi_i8kxHzb6Qu/s1600/menty.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 267px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrTSzw57No1HoS6T_XSL4yrbOHC6Kxzptf_iMWV08uVrDuLSHbC-o0y54p1yTDzMVp81tXVqqZPkvPNtUpvQ4ClhSPA_yvyGOhZ802KB-Ql6qMWwEUJWyBv_RRivaqXlumi_i8kxHzb6Qu/s400/menty.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5405292714561351106" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York --</span> Several days ago, Alexei Dymovsky, a police major in the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk, released <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4vB2a15dOU">a series of Youtube videos</a> that have caused <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/russia/091110/russia-whistleblower-police-office-youtube">a stir across the country</a>. In the three videos, Dymovsky launches an assault on the country's law enforcement agencies, accusing them of corruption, incompetence, and abuse of junior officers. Throughout his monologue, he appeals to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to tackle these problems.<br /><br />These videos have become an Internet sensation, drawing more than one million hits and sparking some measure of debate about the state of law enforcement in Russia. In very uncharacteristic fashion, Russia's Interior Ministry, which controls the country's police forces, <a href="http://www.voanews.com/english/2009-11-13-voa44.cfm">has launched an investigation into police corruption</a>, though the Interior Minister, Rashid Nurgaliyev, denied that it has any connection to Dymovsky's allegations. Nurgaliyev claimed that it was part of a normal review process, yet he ordered that Dymovsky be suspended until the review is completed. Nonetheless, the major's employers in Novorossiysk were less impressed; despite the order from the minister to merely suspend him, <a href="http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?NewsID=14509098&PageNum=0">he has been fired from the police force for slander</a>. The local police chief, Valery Medvedev, has also asked prosecutors to file <a href="http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?NewsID=14511080&PageNum=0">criminal charges against him for libe</a>l. Following the release of the videos, Dymovsky traveled to Moscow to address the news media - he claims that law enforcement officials attempted to prevent him from leaving Novorossiysk, <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUSTRE5A93SC20091110?pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=10522">forcing him to make the journey by car</a>.<br /><br />Here is the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4vB2a15dOU">first of the videos</a>, with English subtitles (here are the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FShrxDK-wbg">second</a> and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzOmzczyQcg&feature=related">third</a>, without translations):<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/R4vB2a15dOU&hl=en_US&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/R4vB2a15dOU&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /></div><br />Dymovsky’s videos have caused other police officers to come forward with stories of corruption and misconduct. One such whistleblower is <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6J8nUVlnPc">Mikhail Yevseyev</a>, who worked for the police department in the northern city of Ukhta, where in 2005 a firebombing of a shopping center killed 25 people. Yevseyev claims that the case against the two young men who were convicted of the crime and sentenced to life in prison in 2008 was entirely fabricated, and following the verdict, he resigned from the department in protest. Soon after Yevseyev’s video was released, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uUFESZ8ol4Y">Grigory Chekalin</a>, who formerly worked in the Ukhta procurator’s office, posted a video describing how his office fabricated the evidence in the bombing case. Dymovsky has spawned a whole new genre of Youtube videos in Russia, and even a <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrE9Alo50Wc">Moscow traffic cop</a> has gotten in on the action.<br /><br />This story has been picked up by news outlets all over the world, but what does the case of Maj. Dymovsky really tell us about Russian law enforcement? Frankly, not very much that we did not know already.<br /><br />The fact that the public has embraced Dymovsky simply underlines the high levels of distrust of the police and other public institutions in Russia. According to a survey conducted by the <a href="http://www.levada.ru/eng/">Levada Center</a> in 2005, <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VGF-4JXY3MJ-2&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1097332723&_rerunOrigin=scholar.google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=1971f56d9c5ea58d4079d0305fb483cd">only 12% of Russians expressed trust the police</a>. Sadly, this ranked higher than many democratic institutions - the federal legislative bodies, the State Duma and the Federation Council, garnered only 10% trust, while political parties managed only 5%. According to <a href="http://www.levada.ru/eng/sborniki.html">a 2007 poll</a>, 65% of respondents believed that efforts of police are "mainly devoted to their own interests," while only 21% believed they were "devoted to the security of the population of the country." Researchers <a href="http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/119394105/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0">Theodore Gerber and Sarah Mendelson</a> concluded that policing in Russia was fundamentally “predatory”; that is, rather than serving a useful societal function, the police use their coercive power to extract wealth from the “prey” population.<br /><br />For some, the quick reaction of Kremlin authorities was suspicious - <a href="http://www.gazeta.ru/social/2009/11/12/3285759.shtml">one political analyst hypothesized</a> that the entire affair was fabricated by the Interior Ministry, perhaps to draw attention away from other public scandals - principally, <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8190115.stm">the murderous rampage of police officer Denis Yevsyukov</a>, who killed three people in a Moscow supermarket in April. He, like many other officers guilty of heinous crimes, has somehow avoided prosecution. I think that this public relations conspiracy is unlikely, but what makes these whistleblowers somewhat convenient for the Kremlin is that they attack some degree of systemic corruption, but they do not challenge the foundation of Russia’s security apparatus. Dymovsky appeals directly to Vladimir Putin, as if he can sweep away his corrupt underlings with his purity and sobriety; what the major fails to understand is that this former KGB stooge is at the very center of the country’s systemic police corruption. He derives his power from the predatory state.<br /><br />One of Dymovsky’s most important criticisms is of the quota system. This was one of the superficial policing reforms that Russia has undertaken in recent years. These quotas are so rigidly enforced that officers are in effect encouraged to make bogus arrests and fabricate cases to meet their absurd targets. Rather than improving professionalism and accountability, this system has had the perverse effect of retrenching the predatory policing model. Rather than tackle this substantive issue, it is more likely that the government will find scapegoats. This is a tried and true method of giving the appearance of making reforms while avoiding real change. During perestroika and the early years of the Yeltsin administration, some people were brought to justice for the excesses of Soviet oppression, but these were usually low-ranking officials. One would expect that the current investigation will result in some very public firings of regional officials but no concrete changes in policy or practice. Dymovsky actually gave the Kremlin the perfect scapegoats, blaming his superior officers in the local police force - the least-connected brass will make perfect sacrificial lambs.<br /><br />Corruption has always been a popular target of reform because it is an issue that impacts many ordinary citizens’ daily lives, but focusing on the corruption and misconduct of individual officers distracts attention from the philosophical foundations of the Russian police state. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, reforms to the Russian security services have been superficial and ineffective. The Interior Ministry and the Federal Security Service (FSB - formerly the KGB) remain largely unchanged in structure and function from the Soviet period. “Law enforcement” is a misnomer in Russia - you must have the rule of law in order for it to be enforced, which Russia lacks. The police forces (called the <span style="font-style: italic;">militsia</span> in Russian, sometimes referred to as “militia” in English) may resemble those you would encounter in a Western democracy, but they differ in fundamental ways. Louise Shelley, an expert on policing in Russia and the Soviet Union, described the difference like this in her book <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=jla71nIxeBUC&pg=PA188&lpg=PA188&dq=policing+soviet+society&source=bl&ots=rD-eY9bYn3&sig=lB5R8Y8AsthRbskw77-KgStV1p8&hl=en&ei=B9sCS_zNA86-lAfpic3mAQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CA0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=&f=false"><span style="font-style: italic;">Policing Soviet Society</span></a>:<br /><blockquote>A superficial glance at the militia’s patrols, safe houses and covert techniques might suggest that the Soviet militia differed little from the police of western societies. Such superficial similarities, however, masked fundamental differences. Without procedural guarantees of the rights of citizens, the law remained on the side of the Soviet militia, which readily imposed its will on both criminals and law-abiding citizens.</blockquote>This fact remains largely unchanged in Russia today. In the US and other democracies, most people (I will grant that there are those who disagree, and most justifiably) believe the job of the police is to protect the public against crime and disorder. In Russia, their job is protect the state from the public. As long as that fact remains true, and believers in this philosophy continue to hold power, not amount of Youtube videos will change the practice of policing there.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-69547488110585080242009-11-05T17:18:00.007-05:002009-11-05T18:54:38.332-05:0020 Years After the Fall: Progress for Some, Repression for Others<span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>As we <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2BQ7s6H_IotSzfCpQRHeJbJnICgw5iwVX7lhJ-1AzgVSsMOdmwU1mQIhD0iR6Tt5p1TKgHMxo4-mNHnj1P25hEsOisfK4dIyRwR3lNbtpRncGUPLh9ZZK2QnozBrQFWut51JOgwAwc8RP/s1600-h/St+Petersburg+protesters.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2BQ7s6H_IotSzfCpQRHeJbJnICgw5iwVX7lhJ-1AzgVSsMOdmwU1mQIhD0iR6Tt5p1TKgHMxo4-mNHnj1P25hEsOisfK4dIyRwR3lNbtpRncGUPLh9ZZK2QnozBrQFWut51JOgwAwc8RP/s400/St+Petersburg+protesters.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5400770013839452146" border="0" /></a>approach the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, commemorations of those momentous events of 1989 are all around us. I'm marking the occasion by reading T<span style="font-style: italic;">he State Within a State: The KGB and Its Hold on Russia, Past, Present and Future</span>.<br /><br />The book was published soon after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and author Yevgenia Albats, an investigative reporter who currently hosts a radio program on the independent station <a href="http://www.echo.msk.ru/">Echo Moskva</a>, recounts the rise of the KGB and its terrifying hold on Russian society from the early days of the Revolution to the nascent Russian democracy of the early 1990's. She began her work as a journalist in the 1980's during perestroika, when a small degree of openness allowed her to investigate the depravities of the KGB.<br /><br />Russia has changed a great deal in the 15 years since this book was written, but what Albats wrote in 1994 - that the state was still in effect run by the KGB, as it always had been since the state security apparatus was erected soon after the October Revolution - is even truer today. During the 1990's, Yeltsin made half-hearted attempts to curb the influence of the security services, but they were in vain. There is no more KGB, but its successor, the FSB, remains largely unreformed, with the same institutional structure and personnel in place as in the Soviet Union. A KGB agent rose to the presidency, and he remains entrenched in power, surrounded by a coterie of stooges who are all veterans of the secret police. These torturers and assassins have traded epaulets for business suits, yet they still wield the power of a violently repressive state.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCs2vDhmxnN_y_IU0cVPNxeHHan6Tjx8Z644YUGnwkFQGfczyDO1iWTw6iH2_m4IelHiOYuRrU4AdlBXjgo60JEx-Ac-8TPYCOqzFmorBVOxjuR1CG68AQxLtpDRhx6a5R8FWJPm-sU2oJ/s1600-h/Andrei_Lugovoi.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 189px; height: 210px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCs2vDhmxnN_y_IU0cVPNxeHHan6Tjx8Z644YUGnwkFQGfczyDO1iWTw6iH2_m4IelHiOYuRrU4AdlBXjgo60JEx-Ac-8TPYCOqzFmorBVOxjuR1CG68AQxLtpDRhx6a5R8FWJPm-sU2oJ/s400/Andrei_Lugovoi.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5400770171647853394" border="0" /></a>The problem is that Russia, unlike most of its neighbors in Eastern Europe, has never come to terms with its past. There were no Nuremberg trials for the tens of millions butchered by the Soviet state. Almost no one has ever been held to task for the crimes of the KGB; the few that have were merely the pawns of power struggles within the organization (for example, Beria was executed not for ordering extrajudicial killings, as his indictment stated, but for opposing Khrushchev). Even today, <span style="font-style: italic;">chekists</span>, as agents of the secret police are known, are protected from prosecution (and not just protected - Andrei Lugovoi, the alleged murderer of dissident Alexander Litvinenko in London, is currently a member of the Russian parliament.)<br /><br />Who wants to come to terms with anything? Putin's rule has reinscribed Soviet-era thinking among the people - democracy and free markets are a trick by the West to impoverish Russia, and the state must remain strong, even if that means resorting to violent repression. According to <a href="http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1396/european-opinion-two-decades-after-berlin-wall-fall-communism">a recent poll by the Pew Research Center</a>, 58% of Russians view the collapse of the Soviet Union as a "great misfortune." Since 1991, support for nationalist views and imperial expansion has increased, while support for multiparty democracy and free market capitalism <a href="http://www.economist.com/daily/chartgallery/displayStory.cfm?story_id=14792427">has declined</a>. History is written by the winners, and contrary to what the events of 20 years ago may have indicated, in Russia at least, the winners were not the democrats; they were the communist stooges who have always run the country, and they are writing a history that glorifies Stalin, demeans the victims of Soviet atrocities, and legitimizes state repression.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi19YStnVKhc62-AEJVSk6Az8SbSeclND5-3Cbylq_A_jnVvIcBJGx9tYTxsMYKjlVgPLRzmMBHfFdjA46eD4iHgmuBYIIZnc0Ll6I7CfNG-fuAI60lN8HHD5_-x8BMN6zHwbeN0JVk8FOL/s1600-h/hoff.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 266px; height: 400px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi19YStnVKhc62-AEJVSk6Az8SbSeclND5-3Cbylq_A_jnVvIcBJGx9tYTxsMYKjlVgPLRzmMBHfFdjA46eD4iHgmuBYIIZnc0Ll6I7CfNG-fuAI60lN8HHD5_-x8BMN6zHwbeN0JVk8FOL/s400/hoff.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5400770329022696914" border="0" /></a><br />Things are not so grim everywhere in Eastern Europe. Nearly all the Soviet satellites have become democracies and joined the European Union. Even as we are disheartened by the lack of progress in Russia, we can celebrate the liberation of millions of people elsewhere on the continent. So, if you are looking for a more uplifting way to celebrate the fall of communism than reading about torture in Moscow's Lubyanka Prison, over the next four months, New York will be host to <a href="http://www.performingrevolution.org/">Performing Revolution in Eastern Europe</a>, a festival of music, theater, film and art.<br /><br />To kick off the festival, this weekend <a href="http://lepoissonrouge.com/">(Le) Poisson Rouge </a>in Greenwich Village is hosting the <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/arts/events/nightlife/2009/11/09/091109goni_GOAT_nightlife">Rebel Waltz music festival</a>. The two-night event features bands from the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Poland, all of whom found themselves at some point on the wrong side of the communist censors. In <span style="font-style: italic;">The State Within a State</span>, Albats writes about the efforts of Soviet authorities to curb the deleterious effects of rock 'n' roll music. She quotes Oleg Kalugin, a retired KGB general who became a strong critic of the Russian security services. He was convicted in absentia in Russia for espionage in 2002, though his real crime was airing too much of the KGB's dirty laundry; he currently lives in exile in the United States:<br /><blockquote>"When Leningrad's stages began to fill up with rock-oriented musicians, a rock club was formed at the KGB's initiative to keep the rock movement manageable and under control."</blockquote>Unfortunately, the censorship in Russia continues. DDT, a Russian rock band formed in the early 1980's that remains one of the country's most popular groups, has been unable to perform or record in Russia a song critical of Vladimir Putin, "When the Oil Runs Out." We now offer a recording from a concert in Lithuania, and with it a sincere hope that more tyrants will fall and criminals will be brought to justice twenty years on from the "fall" of communism:<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/x7uThXdZeGc&hl=en&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/x7uThXdZeGc&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /></div><br />And how would any celebration of the Berlin Wall coming down be complete without David Hasselhoff?<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/0zXiClnK8oE&hl=en&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/0zXiClnK8oE&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-84648087464847451762009-11-02T16:12:00.005-05:002009-11-02T21:10:50.237-05:00Canada Shores Up Arctic Claims With Olympic Flame<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpY9wGeC1UioLy3yr6DVKcYVjkTc2Vf4brzaftU49paC-tmCTxfDH_hHnWT0vze3qfANJSx9pfSNFp0Ti9VgcOWDmeSex6-vu3_IDGjt9UT8Qeg4RmBqovD3zvolHd4m-Yy4SbEtd0tfVo/s1600-h/bc-081121-olympic-torch-national-FULL.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 309px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpY9wGeC1UioLy3yr6DVKcYVjkTc2Vf4brzaftU49paC-tmCTxfDH_hHnWT0vze3qfANJSx9pfSNFp0Ti9VgcOWDmeSex6-vu3_IDGjt9UT8Qeg4RmBqovD3zvolHd4m-Yy4SbEtd0tfVo/s400/bc-081121-olympic-torch-national-FULL.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5399692538710137890" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span><a href="http://www.vancouver2010.com/more-2010-information/olympic-torch-relay/olympic-torch-relay-interactive-map/">The torch relay</a> for the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver began on Friday. The Olympic flame started its Canadian journey in Victoria, British Columbia, and over the course of 106 days, it will travel 28,000 miles to hundreds of Canadian towns and cities, arriving back in Vancouver for the opening ceremonies on February 12.<br /><br />One of the communities the torch will visit is Alert, which sits on the northern tip of Ellesmere Island in the province of Nunavut. Alert is the northernmost permanently inhabited place on earth, located just 507 miles from the North Pole. The torch will be flown more than 1,700 miles from Churchill, Manitoba just so it can briefly touch down and greet the five permanent inhabitants of Alert, all members of the Canadian military who man the signals and weather stations there. Alert will not be the only stop north of the Arctic Circle - on its way back south, the torch will stop in Ausuittuq (also known as Grise Fiord) and Qausuittuq (Resolute) in Nunavut. It will also make stops in Kugluktuk (Coppermine), Nunavut, Inuvit, Northwest Territories and Old Crow, Yukon Territory.<br /><br />This arctic leg of the relay is particularly interesting because it has obvious geopolitical overtones. In recent years, Canada has <a href="http://www.economist.com/world/americas/displaystory.cfm?story_id=14313727">increased its military presence</a> in the north in an attempt to shore up sovereignty that it sees as increasingly under threat. The region is <a href="http://www.economist.com/world/international/displaystory.cfm?story_id=E1_JGGDDTN">gaining geostrategic importance</a>. As ocean temperatures rise and sea ice retreats, the Northwest Passage through Canada’s vast northern archipelago may become a viable year-round shipping lane. The arctic also holds vast untapped supplies of natural resources, especially oil and gas, that may become accessible in the near future.<br /><br />The main competitors for these arctic treasures are the United States and Russia. The US refuses to recognize Canada’s claim that the Northwest Passage is an internal waterway, asserting that it is international waters that foreign ships can ply without Canada’s approval. Russia, meanwhile, has claimed that its own territorial waters - and therefore its claims to undersea resources - extended to the North Pole and beyond, setting its maritime boundaries uncomfortably close to Canada. In 2007, in an apparent attempt to legitimize this claim, Russia <a href="http://www.newsru.com/russia/10aug2007/titanic.html">sent a submarine to the </a><a href="http://www.newsru.com/russia/10aug2007/titanic.html">bottom of the ocean</a> at the Pole to plant a small Russian flag on the sea floor (they appear to be unaware that <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEx5G-GOS1k">flag-planting ceased to be a legitimate way to make territorial claims sometime in the 17th century</a>).<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/uEx5G-GOS1k&hl=en&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/uEx5G-GOS1k&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br /></div>Now Canada is using the Olympics to further shore up its claims to the arctic, and the torch can be used to enhance sovereignty both externally and internally. Externally, the torch’s arrival in Alert signals to the world that Canada considers these far-flung regions as integral parts of their national territory. Internally, it binds these remote communities to the national center - Canadians who live in the arctic, or who are members of the First Nations minority, are just as much a part of the national celebration as the metropolitan south or Anglo-, French- or any other type of Canadian (the weekly television show <a href="http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/Sports/CBC%27s_Hockey_Night_in_Canada/Coach%27s_Corner"><span style="font-style: italic;">Hockey Night in Canada</span></a> plays a similar role).<br /><br />Canada is not unique in doing this. Most host countries carry the torch through every one of their constituent regions. At the last Olympics, the Chinese government used the torch relay to reaffirm its territorial integrity, carrying it across the restive regions of Tibet and Xinjiang and even to the top of Mt. Everest (the Himalayan region has long been at the center of territorial disputes between China, India and Pakistan). Much of the torch relay in 2008 was besieged by protesters in foreign countries who spoke out against the Chinese government’s oppressive policies in Tibet and elsewhere, but once the flame reached China proper, it was met mostly with celebration of the Olympics as a symbol of Chinese global power and national unity.<br /><br />During this march to Beijing, the American news media <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpljenpoG-X6c8BKde93rGfszub4G2XwfESG5PzYjSLJzstAfa-eO0Nj412ytPFbc5RtaUFLpBIfOMqU_dlgteFi9Z82x6tzqdRAhJjlacE6Dt_zIpuojZ7jpqw1l5WzPM-nCXx4B3oi_W/s1600-h/b24-2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 235px; height: 318px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpljenpoG-X6c8BKde93rGfszub4G2XwfESG5PzYjSLJzstAfa-eO0Nj412ytPFbc5RtaUFLpBIfOMqU_dlgteFi9Z82x6tzqdRAhJjlacE6Dt_zIpuojZ7jpqw1l5WzPM-nCXx4B3oi_W/s400/b24-2.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5399692655637969330" border="0" /></a><a href="http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/04/09/the-beleaguered-torch-now-with-nazi-origins/?scp=6&sq=olympics%20beijing%20hitler&st=cse">rediscovered the origins of the torch </a>relay in the 1936 Berlin Games and spoke breathlessly about “Hitler’s Olympics” and the parallels with Red China and their nationalist spectacle. Chinese nationalism can be a terrifying and dangerous thing, and the government has shown a great deal of recklessness and a great lack of control whenever it unleashes nationalist anger. Nonetheless, the point here is that no one is above using sport, especially the Olympics, for promoting nationalism. The 1936 Olympics <a href="http://www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/online/olympics/">created many iconic images</a> that linked sport to fascism, militarism, and racial prejudice. We like to think that instead we have inherited the mantle of Jesse Owens, who embarrassed the Master Race, but Berlin lives on at every Olympics. China was chided for its global torch tour, but no other country has shied away from the practice because of its Nazi origins. The International Olympic Committee has long been run by fascists, from Nazi sympathizer Avery Brundage to Francoist Juan Antonio Samaranch. The current body is filled by corrupt sycophants and apologists who hand the Olympics to the highest bidder, even if it is an oppressive dictatorship like China or Russia. We would all be better off if we just did away with the Olympics entirely - the institution is too corrupt and too compromised to even approach any of the lofty goals it aspires to.<br /><br />Canada is using the Olympics, albeit in a tiny, insignificant way, to further its geopolitical agenda, but so does every other country that hosts the Olympics. When Russia inherits the Olympic flame in 2014 for the Winter Games in Sochi, it will undoubtedly be used for far more aggressive and chauvinistic nationalist purposes. It will likely make stops in Georgia's breakaway republics of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, but I bet that it will also be taken to the North Pole, either undersea or over ice.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-30048395360085258802009-10-09T23:12:00.002-04:002009-10-11T11:29:15.164-04:00How Obama Can Earn His Nobel Peace Prize<span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York --</span> President Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize yesterday. It is not entirely clear why he deserved this award. The Nobel Committee seemed to award him the prize for his tone and aspirations rather than any concrete accomplishments.<br /><br />"It was unavoidable to give the prize to the man who has improved the international climate and emphasized negotiations and dialogue," Thorbjoern Jagland, the chair of the Nobel Committee, said, as<a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/worldview/091009/outstretched-hand-nobel-committee-gives-obama-boost?page=0,1"> quoted in GlobalPost</a>. In effect, he was given the award for not being George W. Bush.<br /><br />George Packer made a good case for refusing the award, noting <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/georgepacker/">on his <span style="font-style: italic;">New Yorker</span> blog</a>, "The prize should be awarded for achievement, not aspiration, and so far Obama’s main achievement has been getting elected President, which is in a different category."<br /><br />I wholeheartedly agree. He was already elected President of the United States - how much more validation does he need? Will this prize suddenly cause the North Koreans to surrender their nuclear weapons, the Russians to abandon their claimed sphere of influence, or the Palestinians and Israelis to get serious about peace? Certainly not. While it may affirm the Europeans' love affair with Obama, it does little to improve his position or prestige when he gets to the negotiating table.<br /><br />I will give credit to Obama for staking out one particularly bold position: to rid the world of nuclear weapons. As he has stated, this goal will probably not be achieved either during his presidency or his lifetime. This marks another distinct departure from the policies of the Bush administration, as well as nearly every other administration before it.<br /><br />George W. Bush did have some accomplishments in the field of nuclear non-proliferation. The nuclear smuggling ring led by Pakistan's A.Q. Khan was broken, and Libya was persuaded to abandon its weapons of mass destruction. But Bush's marks were quite poor overall. The nuclear club has expanded, not shrunk. North Korea is now in possession of the bomb, and Iran continues to make strides toward it. In addition to withdrawing from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and continuing America's refusal to join the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (in force since 1996), Bush also supported the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/21/us/senate-votes-to-lift-ban-on-producing-nuclear-arms.html?scp=1&sq=%22tactical+nuclear+weapons%22+rumsfeld&st=nyt">development</a> and use of tactical nuclear weapons, specifically to <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/18/opinion/18levi.html?scp=4&sq=%22tactical+nuclear+weapons%22&st=nyt">deter the nuclear efforts of Iran</a>.<br /><br />No past president has ever made it his stated goal to make the world free of nuclear weapons. Earlier this year, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/10/weekinreview/10taubman.html?_r=1&sq=tactical%20nuclear%20weapons&st=nyt&scp=1&pagewanted=all">Philip Taubman described</a> in the <span style="font-style: italic;">New York Times</span> why this goal is so ambitious and daunting, offering this analogy: "To fully grasp the political and military implications, consider what would have been involved had the great powers of the 19th century decided to abolish gunpowder." Perhaps Obama is acting more like Superman in <span style="font-style: italic;">Superman IV: The Quest for Peace</span> than a human president. He can't gather up all the world's fissile material and throw it into the sun, but his goal is admirable, and should he go even part of the way to achieving it, his Nobel Prize will be well deserved.<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/82TzfWMWJJ0&hl=en&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/82TzfWMWJJ0&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br /></div>To mark the president's award, I would like to share with you the 1939 cartoon <span style="font-style: italic;">Peace on Earth</span>. This MGM short directed by Hugh Harman has been incorrectly credited with a Nobel Peace Prize nomination; nonetheless, it offers a noble aspiration of peace, and that is worthy of something, if not the Prize itself.<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/J8OYvHPpGDY&hl=en&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/J8OYvHPpGDY&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br /></div>Finally, if you think that nuclear weapons are not scary things, or if you don't believe that just two decades ago, the world teetered on the brink of utter destruction, <a href="http://www.wired.com/politics/security/magazine/17-10/mf_deadhand?currentPage=all">this recent news about the Soviet doomsday device</a> - <span style="font-style: italic;">Dr. Strangelove</span> for real - should terrify you. Stanley Kubrick's masterpiece is certainly a powerful piece of anti-nuclear cinema, but if you would like to be scared shitless of atomic warfare, I suggest that you watch the 1964 film <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fail-Safe_%281964_film%29"><span style="font-style: italic;">Fail-Safe</span></a>, starring Henry Fonda.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-64166665987795421542009-10-08T14:11:00.013-04:002009-10-08T17:38:09.285-04:00Borders and Migration: Erecting Fences On the Canadian Border<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlcp4M7U9ogQ0e51pIo8kGNI5n81zL_duFtwPvu61Pr3pGJ9c2ENMztMJeqIdkgUdySjXsKOxTYxmG9Z0NndfilIVnyKUIL0igUSUKrCOxg49eErSVprGwZVp93oaWiNDa_MjJEndzH8ao/s1600-h/IMG_1609.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlcp4M7U9ogQ0e51pIo8kGNI5n81zL_duFtwPvu61Pr3pGJ9c2ENMztMJeqIdkgUdySjXsKOxTYxmG9Z0NndfilIVnyKUIL0igUSUKrCOxg49eErSVprGwZVp93oaWiNDa_MjJEndzH8ao/s400/IMG_1609.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5390338065272390306" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>Borders are never as straight and bright as they appear on maps. They are messy. They are uneven. Due to a whole lot of messiness - in the form of the drug trade, illegal immigration, arms smuggling, and a vicious war between drug cartels and the government - a lot of attention is being paid to the US-Mexico border. But changes are also taking place along America's northern frontier, and they deserve attention and concern.<br /><br />Earlier this week, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/04/us/04border.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=canada%20border&st=cse">authorities erected gates along the border in the towns of Derby Line, Vermont and Stanstead, Quebec</a>. The two towns are essentially one - due to an incorrect survey, the American town was founded north of the 45th parallel. When the border was corrected, nobody saw the need to move the town, so the border line runs through homes and streets, and even through the town's lone public library. American authorities decided last year to clean up the warren of streets that crisscross the border by erecting these gates which will force travelers to move through designated border crossings.<br /><br />This summer I visited Derby Line, and I went poking around the border to see what changes had been made. The library was closed that day, so I could not go and see the border line painted on the floor, but I did see some shiny new signs advising me to turn back and go through the crossing. When I did turn my car around, I was bombarded by sirens from the border post. When I pulled over, the visibly angry American agent accused me of illegally crossing from Canada and threatened me with a $5,000 fine. When I told him I had made a wrong turn, he lectured me some more and then directed me to the Canadian border crossing, where I continued on my way to Quebec City.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizjF0K-MAvr8eoxwtSopPwU2ACdjnYOC-kgSWs9uIGpLY0Bud7DHt3MOcw05Xt_ZqSLPS6Vuo3klVkm9rvBdtgRjZ70d6ecoca-RyVcX-u2AmWl5fiWqrWJfzObTT42PAlcExM1BbuPEiW/s1600-h/IMG_1612.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizjF0K-MAvr8eoxwtSopPwU2ACdjnYOC-kgSWs9uIGpLY0Bud7DHt3MOcw05Xt_ZqSLPS6Vuo3klVkm9rvBdtgRjZ70d6ecoca-RyVcX-u2AmWl5fiWqrWJfzObTT42PAlcExM1BbuPEiW/s400/IMG_1612.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5390337524628600002" border="0" /></a><br />Apparently, turning a small, remote Vermont town into Belfast or Nicosia is what we must endure to be safe from terrorists. While some increased security measures may be necessary along the Canadian border, the problem is that the logic of these changes focuses entirely on security without acknowledging the other impacts of the border. Rather than a zone of interaction, the border is seen as a barrier to keep people out of the United States, thus completely ignoring trans-border social and economic relations.<br /><br />Fear mongers in the Bush administration like former Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff pushed for draconian border measures, even suggesting that British citizens of Pakistani origin should be subjected to stricter passport controls than other Britons. The new DHS chief, Janet Napolitano, <a href="http://www.economist.com/world/americas/displaystory.cfm?story_id=13743475">has not softened the line</a> when it comes to the US-Canadian border. She has repeatedly stated that she wants the border with Canada treated like the border with Mexico: hardened, strengthened, and more closely monitored.<br /><br />This has had <a href="http://www.economist.com/world/americas/displaystory.cfm?story_id=14140341">dire economic impacts</a>, especially along the highest-traffic section of the border, that between Michigan and Ontario. Over the past few decades, the American Big Three automakers have have built up networks of production facilities and suppliers that capitalize on certain cost advantages on both sides of the border. NAFTA only accelerated this trend, and last year, Ontario surpassed Michigan as the world's largest auto producing region. Stricter border controls have hampered this model, and this has been a contributing factor to the uncompetitiveness of North American-built cars; the result has been that the recession and unemployment have cut deepest in these two regions. Here's one example of this impact <a href="http://www.economist.com/world/americas/displaystory.cfm?story_id=E1_TDSGGQDN">from the <span style="font-style: italic;">Economist</span> last year</a>:<br /><blockquote>Now the stickier border is adding to the troubles of Detroit's uncompetitive carmakers. A ship carrying 4,000 cars from Asia landing on the west coast of the United States undergoes just one inspection; the components in a car made in North America will, all told, have gone through thousands, notes Jayson Myers of Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters, an industry body.</blockquote>Conservatives harp on the point (listen to Bill Kristol's points <a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=97752303">here</a>) that President Obama's positions on many issues related to national security have been and will remain largely unchanged from the policies of the previous president. They see this as a vindication of the their beliefs and proof that history will look kindly upon the Bush presidency. What this opinion fails to acknowledge is that security policy is more often driven by inertia and fear than by reason. It is always easier build a border fence than to tear one down, for fear of accusations of being "soft" on crime or terrorism or illegal immigration. Dick Cheney repeats this line over and over again, maintaining that illegal renditions, vicious torture, and various other war crimes keep us all safe at night. Add to this list the requirement that Americans and Canadians carry passports to cross the border. It is impossible to know how Barack Obama would have reacted had he been president on September 11, 2001, but it is patently absurd to claim that the Bush administration took <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOMSvDrx7MGZlS0eq6fGoafKHZClAPPrC3NecQhyy6Bw80TQvxUU_efMbwaYtvj7NON_GLxhMOogFTS5DAu22IWI25th2UrTDKzUqDkBcaJayOIQEcco_Myl1r7b4dJi7j6YfVa9XRzM1_/s1600-h/IMG_0038.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 300px; height: 400px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOMSvDrx7MGZlS0eq6fGoafKHZClAPPrC3NecQhyy6Bw80TQvxUU_efMbwaYtvj7NON_GLxhMOogFTS5DAu22IWI25th2UrTDKzUqDkBcaJayOIQEcco_Myl1r7b4dJi7j6YfVa9XRzM1_/s400/IMG_0038.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5390338633161703250" border="0" /></a>the best course of action given the circumstances.<br /><br />This is not to discount the fact that suspects who were plotting terrorist attacks have been apprehended while trying cross the border from Canada, the most notable being Ahmed Ressam, the so-called Millenium Bomber, who was arrested in Washington state in December 1999. However, I believe that many of these border policies are driven by a piece of mythology about the September 11 attacks. In the days and weeks following the attacks, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/14/us/after-attacks-northern-border-tightened-inspections-mean-delays-maine-west.html?scp=1&sq=terrorist+and+jackman+and+maine&st=nyt">reports began circulating</a> that some of the hijackers had entered the US from Canada. As it turned out, the two men who flew from Portland, Maine to Boston and then hijacked the Los Angeles-bound Flight 11, crashing it into the North Tower of the World Trade Center - Mohammed Atta and Abdulaziz al-Omari - had long been residing in the United States. None of the hijackers sneaked across a land border; they all traveled here by air and entered the country legally. Nonetheless, the mystique of this erroneous report remains, and it contributed greatly towards transforming our land borders, both literally and rhetorically, into front lines in the Global War on Terror.<br /><br />For a good portion of America's history, the border with Canada has been an area of conflict and division. In addition to the American Revolution and the War of 1812, when Americans twice invaded Canada, the two countries have fought a number of other small conflicts, including the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aroostook_War">Aroostook War</a>, the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pig_War">Pig War</a> and the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenian_Raids">Fenian Raids</a>. In hindsight, these incidents seem preposterous, but we are continuing to move on a path towards greater division and securitization of a region that should be a zone of interaction and cooperation between our two countries. Unfortunately, border policy is formulated and implemented at a national scale, directed from Washington, and successive administrations have shown an inability to consider the local-scale impacts of a tightened border. Maybe we should <a href="http://blog.taragana.com/n/a-border-runs-through-it-on-us-canada-boundary-street-barriers-signal-post-911-chill-185386/">start listening to the residents</a> of Derby Line instead of Dick Cheney.<br /><br />Well, not this resident. Nobody should listen to him:<br /><br /><table style="font-family: arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); background-color: rgb(245, 245, 245);" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" height="353" width="360"><tbody><tr style="background-color: rgb(229, 229, 229);" valign="middle"><td style="padding: 2px 1px 0px 5px;"><a target="_blank" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold;" href="http://www.thedailyshow.com/">The Daily Show With Jon Stewart</a></td><td style="padding: 2px 5px 0px; text-align: right; font-weight: bold;">Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c</td></tr><tr style="height: 14px;" valign="middle"><td style="padding: 2px 1px 0px 5px;" colspan="2"><a target="_blank" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold;" href="http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-may-9-2006/law-and-border">Law and Border</a></td></tr><tr style="height: 14px; background-color: rgb(53, 53, 53);" valign="middle"><td colspan="2" style="padding: 2px 5px 0px; overflow: hidden; width: 360px; text-align: right;"><a target="_blank" style="color: rgb(150, 222, 255); text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold;" href="http://www.thedailyshow.com/">www.thedailyshow.com</a></td></tr><tr valign="middle"><td style="padding: 0px;" colspan="2"><embed style="display: block;" src="http://media.mtvnservices.com/mgid:cms:item:comedycentral.com:110134" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="window" allowfullscreen="true" flashvars="autoPlay=false" allowscriptaccess="always" allownetworking="all" bgcolor="#000000" height="301" width="360"></embed></td></tr><tr style="height: 18px;" valign="middle"><td style="padding: 0px;" colspan="2"><table style="margin: 0px; text-align: center;" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" height="100%" width="100%"><tbody><tr valign="middle"><td style="padding: 3px; width: 33%;"><a target="_blank" style="font-family: arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 10px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); text-decoration: none;" href="http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes">Daily Show<br />Full Episodes</a></td><td style="padding: 3px; width: 33%;"><a target="_blank" style="font-family: arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 10px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); text-decoration: none;" href="http://www.indecisionforever.com/">Political Humor</a></td><td style="padding: 3px; width: 33%;"><a target="_blank" style="font-family: arial; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 10px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); text-decoration: none;" href="http://www.indecisionforever.com/2009/09/23/ron-paul-on-the-daily-show-tuesday-sept-29/">Ron Paul Interview</a></td></tr></tbody></table></td></tr></tbody></table>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-6827915945668207022009-09-30T16:36:00.003-04:002009-09-30T17:17:08.276-04:00Paramilitary Force Takes Over Montana Town, Onion Story Becomes True<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmQAWp5EyFLdpT6iQIP4ra-kSTykJiiaCH2GqXegDd5GtYA-l4CPOMB-1JobQC_WkKzfjqbN_qOM6yhjEhyphenhyphenLAQREAm6E5HJRzkH-h-4DTsaIP1gc3saFtKeyqD2_2b5-QPoMMzlEhcmXev/s1600-h/Serbian-Troops-C.article.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 250px; height: 216px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmQAWp5EyFLdpT6iQIP4ra-kSTykJiiaCH2GqXegDd5GtYA-l4CPOMB-1JobQC_WkKzfjqbN_qOM6yhjEhyphenhyphenLAQREAm6E5HJRzkH-h-4DTsaIP1gc3saFtKeyqD2_2b5-QPoMMzlEhcmXev/s400/Serbian-Troops-C.article.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5387371800112119762" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>Everybody knows that the government sucks at everything, and private enterprise will solve all of our problems. Do you know what the government especially sucks at? Operating police departments and prisons.<br /><br />The war in Iraq has clearly demonstrated that <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/09/17/opinion/main5317352.shtml">well-paid mercenaries with ill-defined rules of engagement</a> are much better at fighting and keeping the peace than those dumbasses in the US Army. And everybody knows that <a href="http://www.sonypictures.com/homevideo/paulblartmallcop/index.html">shopping malls</a>, which are almost exclusively patrolled by private security forces, are the safest, most awesome places in America.<br /><br />The town of Hardin, Montana has learned these lessons well, which is why they have <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/09/29/crimesider/entry5351491.shtml">employed the services</a> of the generically-named <a href="http://www.americanpolicegroup.com/index.html">American Police Forces</a>. Hardin made national headlines earlier this year when they <a href="http://walterdurantyreport.blogspot.com/2009/05/sending-guantanamo-detainees-to-phantom.html">offered their recently constructed and deeply indebted town jail</a> to the federal government to house detainees from the Guantanamo Bay prison camp. Well, that offer is now off the table, because APF has stepped in to not only take over the jail, but also the town's police force.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUxDtx7dG9itoiOBvJwnJlFmnpDvwbz6L5myouuOtISA_H_zTHu1VlO60vss7KGF5RNRQhvIPScrPaWv4jA5k3gsJ3Qc7Ci3TElGFO1-1aASS98HWFi8Y4bPz8yGOxcLinr5BbD4g7-i6S/s1600-h/custom_1254279197332_americanpoliceforce.jpeg.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 340px; height: 317px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUxDtx7dG9itoiOBvJwnJlFmnpDvwbz6L5myouuOtISA_H_zTHu1VlO60vss7KGF5RNRQhvIPScrPaWv4jA5k3gsJ3Qc7Ci3TElGFO1-1aASS98HWFi8Y4bPz8yGOxcLinr5BbD4g7-i6S/s400/custom_1254279197332_americanpoliceforce.jpeg.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5387372337899654338" border="0" /></a><br />Yesterday <a href="http://gawker.com/5370717/is-american-police-force-the-next-great-militia">Gawker did a rundown</a> of all the various reasons why this whole deal is incredibly suspect and troubling. The California-based company has links to other more established private military contractors, but the exact web of relationships has yet to be unraveled. This whole thing <a href="http://mikeyounglaw.com/wp/2009/09/29/american-police-force-internet-scam/">may be some kind of scam</a>, but one fact is certain - there are three SUVs filled with armed men driving around this town claiming to be the police department.<br /><br />American Police Forces and their associated company, <a href="http://www.dpsna.com/aboutus.htm">Defense Product Solutions</a>, both have very slick websites, but there is one bizarre detail: APF's logo is actually <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coat_of_arms_of_Serbia">the coat of arms of Serbia</a>.<br /><br />During the fiasco of the 2000 presidential election the Onion ran the headline, "<a href="http://www.theonion.com/content/node/38646">Serbia Deploys Peacekeeping Forces to U.S.</a>" Could this joke have finally come true? Is the Serbian military now roaming the streets of Montana? Or does this company just have the world's worst corporate branding? Either way, I think it is probably time for the Montana State Police to step in and throw everybody involved into the still-vacant Hardin jail while they try and sort this mess out.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-26410836599608435342009-09-30T13:00:00.003-04:002009-09-30T13:26:24.217-04:00The Bill Sparkman Murder: The Past and Present of Resistance to the Census<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRsyLgeNedTZFW18_n4kAIQVhm4iQwIp5QKfzSbu5BhPSK14FVBzIpyOe5ldYB3VY5OGGF4AzqsNwHdN5KUJhLSWXTQHfjvdkQY0P3FDAgFo78PPZu1W4Uq2fdXcyAjwzRwVw3A7ZsEYGf/s1600-h/sparkman.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 265px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRsyLgeNedTZFW18_n4kAIQVhm4iQwIp5QKfzSbu5BhPSK14FVBzIpyOe5ldYB3VY5OGGF4AzqsNwHdN5KUJhLSWXTQHfjvdkQY0P3FDAgFo78PPZu1W4Uq2fdXcyAjwzRwVw3A7ZsEYGf/s400/sparkman.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5387305950338477378" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>For most Americans, the decennial census is a mundane exercise that goes largely unnoticed. You receive a form in the mail, and occasionally you see census workers walking around with clipboards and knocking on doors. It is only slightly more exciting for researchers and academics, because a few months after the final count, we get a raft of brand new data about the US population with which to tinker and model.<br /><br />For a narrow slice of the population, mostly those people located far to the right on America's political spectrum and far from the country's urban centers, the census is a favorite boogeyman. For mainline conservatives, the census is regarded with suspicion because every 10 years, the ranks of minorities who don't vote Republican continue to grow; Republicans would rather that it was harder to find and count these poorer, urban populations. For the lunatic fringe, the census is an invasion into their private lives by the hated federal government.<br /><br />There is now evidence that these two views are converging. The <a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113294861">grisly murder of census worker Bill Sparkman in rural Kentucky</a> three weeks ago shows us that despite more than three centuries of census taking in America, suspicions remain. Rather than being driven deeper into the backwoods, this virulent fear of the census - and of government in general - is gaining traction in national politics. No one has condoned this dreadful murder, but certain public figures have chosen to use misinformation about the census to stoke Americans' fears, just as they used lies about the president's citizenship and the so-called "death panels." These conspiracy theories are aired every night by Glenn Beck and repeated continuously in the halls of Congress.<br /><br />A look back at the history of the census in America, and resistance to it, may be instructive to understand how we reached this place.<br /><br />The earliest opposition to the census had a religious foundation. Enumerating the population was referred to as the "Sin of David," a reference to the biblical King David's order to count the people of Israel, in defiance of God's will. In some parts of the world, enumerations are still rejected on religious grounds - in 2000, <a href="http://religion.ng.ru/pravoslav/2001-02-14/4_person.html">the Russian Orthodox Church opposed a government plan</a> to issue tax ID numbers to the entire population; some members of the clergy called them the "number of the beast." In America today, certain strains of religious fervor drive general resistance to government authority, but few cite King David's hubris.<br /><br />The first federal census was launched in 1790. In the preceding century, the 13 colonies had each conducted more than 30 censuses, but a single national effort to count every person from Georgia to Maine had never been undertaken. Many were skeptical that it could be done accurately, but few doubted the necessity of a census, especially since America was embarking on an experiment of representative government. No taxation without representation was the battle cry of the Revolution, but there could be no representation without enumeration.<br /><br />It is important to remember that the census is not an exercise carried out by a faceless state bureaucracy. Mr. Sparkman was one of the thousands of Americans who work part-time and full-time to complete the census. America's first census was carried out by a few hundred individuals; they were poorly paid, had little or no training, and they often had to provide their own materials and transportation. One such person was Edward Carrington, the marshal for the district of Virginia in 1790, who was responsible for the commonwealth's census returns. In March of that year, he wrote a letter to the US Department of Justice outlining his plans for the census; in it he also noted the importance of the census to democracy, and the dangers of misinformation about the undertaking:<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcDIYpwGEACOsNznwKlEE2TZqFZGu1VperM4omtLbdAFGu1WWnwETve9T5dvsRmYLqURN2cbJP4fMq7EBHMOfYDL9CbdeKJTRCEzYS74cIzCfhP-sEaRaY9Nh-Pf3YxmmSwWywuhedDnok/s1600-h/Census+cartoon+crop.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 338px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcDIYpwGEACOsNznwKlEE2TZqFZGu1VperM4omtLbdAFGu1WWnwETve9T5dvsRmYLqURN2cbJP4fMq7EBHMOfYDL9CbdeKJTRCEzYS74cIzCfhP-sEaRaY9Nh-Pf3YxmmSwWywuhedDnok/s400/Census+cartoon+crop.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5387306201815544546" border="0" /></a><blockquote>When it is considered that this measure is to ascertain the proportions of representation of the several states in the Federal Government, and that the due weight to which this state is entitles therein, depends on the faithful execution of the act of Congress, it is hoped that gentlemen will be careful in their recommendations, and that all the good citizens of Virginia, will be ready to aid a full and fair enumeration of the inhabitants thereof.</blockquote>Later that year, he also wrote to James Madison, the most ardent supporter of the census, and predicted that there would be active campaigns against the project:<br /><blockquote>The Assistants [census takers] may compel every one he called on to make him a return by means of the penalty [a small fine levied for non-compliance], but it is not probable he will be able to discover any concealments of parts of families and there is no doubt but that many evil disposed persons will endeavour to impress upon the minds of the people, ideas that their future taxes will be governed by the numbers that shall now return.</blockquote>In early America, resistance to the census was strongest on the frontier. A healthy distrust of government is what led many into the wilderness in the first place. Most of the people who had settled beyond the Appalachians had done so without the consent of the British or American governments, so they had no proper title to the land they occupied - these squatters feared that any contact with government agents was a precursor to the loss of their property rights. This suspicion, combined with the difficulty of reaching remote populations in places like Kentucky, Vermont, and western Pennsylvania, conspired to make these people undercounted, and thus underrepresented in the first Congress. A report on the first census in the remote areas along Lake Champlain in Vermont described this situation:<br /><blockquote>Due to inexperience, imagination by the inhabitants that some scheme for increasing taxation was involved, difficulties of no roads, bridges, unsettled wilderness and isolated locations of the early settlers, opposition on religious grounds, all delayed the final enumeration a full year.</blockquote>It is likely that Mr. Sparkman faced some similar challenges in Clay County, Kentucky. Driving on bad roads to reach isolated populations with little support or supervision, like the census takers before him, he worked to help people be counted so that they could collect what was theirs from the national stock. In return for his service, he was lynched and branded. His killer (or killers) is still at large, and though we have no definitive explanation for this horrible crime, the fact that the word "FED" was inscribed across his chest is a chilling reminder of how deep anti-government sentiment continues to run in many parts of the country.<br /><br />In reality, the census is not mundane. Embodied within this power to count and catalog the population is the power of<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoqR9vMKvr3cCp78EPIsBsvCSNz9mBBntnPIdRanZiBUjv1OowI180h8VME6k5uWMCKYQeauMZSmNAYXZgDlmrmk9pfbd9LjjYskB1NAdeB0zZYyMqXX7kffulv-zY1h25J_iXaEChgmu6/s1600-h/2010Census.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 318px; height: 369px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoqR9vMKvr3cCp78EPIsBsvCSNz9mBBntnPIdRanZiBUjv1OowI180h8VME6k5uWMCKYQeauMZSmNAYXZgDlmrmk9pfbd9LjjYskB1NAdeB0zZYyMqXX7kffulv-zY1h25J_iXaEChgmu6/s400/2010Census.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5387306123468530066" border="0" /></a> the modern state to function. Even if we strip down the government to its most basic activities, as Ron Paul would have us do, an accurate count of the population is necessary for apportioning representatives to Congress, levying taxes, and raising an army. The framers of the Constitution understood this, which is why the census is essential to the operation of the federal government. But it does not represent an immanent threat of tyranny. We do not need Republican congressmen and backwoods survivalists to protect us from the depravities of enumeration. But <a href="http://www.economist.com/world/international/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10311346">the <span style="font-style: italic;">Economist</span> described</a> the often ambiguous position of the census like this:<blockquote>Nowadays, a census is part of the standard equipment of a functioning state. In 1995 the <span class="scaps">UN </span>called for all member nations to hold a census in the following decade. Yet counting people remains a sensitive business for two reasons, connected with the ambiguous character of government. Where government is oppressive, people want to keep out of censuses, lest information they provide is misused. Where government provides, people want to be in censuses, and to boost their numbers, in order to claim a larger share of the goodies.</blockquote>As an unambiguously democratic government, America should debate the merits of collecting certain types of information about the population, and how we deploy that information to better the lives of our citizens. In doing so, we should ensure that "gentlemen will be careful in their recommendations" and not whip people into a paranoid, anti-government frenzy in order <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZS9UW0okY4">to gain political advantage or improve television ratings</a>.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Brief bibliography:</span><br /><br />American Antiquarian Society. <span style="font-style: italic;">Early American Imprints</span>.<br /><br />Anderson, Margo J. (2008). "<a href="http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/social_science_history/v032/32.1anderson.pdf">The Census, Audiences, and Publics</a>." <span style="font-style: italic;">Social Science History</span> 32(1): 1-18.<br /><br />"<a href="http://www.economist.com/world/international/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10311346">Census sensitivity</a>" (2007). <span style="font-style: italic;">The Economist</span>, Dec 19.<br /><br />Hobson, Charles F. and Robert A. Rutland, eds. (1981). <span style="font-style: italic;">The Papers of James Madison</span>, vol. 13. Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia.<br /><p></p>Onuf, Peter (1987). <span style="font-style: italic;">Statehood and Union: A History of the Northwest Ordinance</span>. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.<br /><br />Scott, Ann Herbert (1966). <span style="font-style: italic;">Census, U.S.A.: Fact Finding for the American People, 1790-1970</span>. New York: Seabury Press.<br /><br />Strelchik, Yevgeny (2006). “<a href="http://religion.ng.ru/pravoslav/2001-02-14/4_person.html">Nelzya pronumerovat chelovecheskuyu lichnost</a>” (“You can’t replace a person’s identity with a number”). <i>Nezavisimaya Gazeta</i>, April 5.<br /><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-61989368117248622772009-09-22T18:31:00.006-04:002009-10-15T11:16:36.751-04:00Special Commentary: Don't Be Stubborn, Scrap the Interceptors<span style="font-style: italic;">Today at the Walter Duranty Report, we are publishing a special commentary from our friend Mac Broderick on the Obama administration's decision to cancel the ballistic missile interceptor program in Eastern Europe. We encourage our friends and readers to contribute any articles or commentary they find interesting or relevant to the wide range of topics we discuss here on our site, and as always, feel free to add your comments about anything you read here.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">WASHINGTON, D.C. -- </span>When analyzing <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZA7VVhXtIh94ewZzfqLHA2qrpcbIOf92HSLAaFkj-DrSqeeuEuTFj1QEKZnimrV8Kyy-lhiArCKKFaL5uigedqmUMzllnyrzV-CKw5Q8Rk0_8eQBiSOp4N4K_utBNF90JTf-SsFoxl9cq/s1600-h/starwars_350.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 350px; height: 263px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZA7VVhXtIh94ewZzfqLHA2qrpcbIOf92HSLAaFkj-DrSqeeuEuTFj1QEKZnimrV8Kyy-lhiArCKKFaL5uigedqmUMzllnyrzV-CKw5Q8Rk0_8eQBiSOp4N4K_utBNF90JTf-SsFoxl9cq/s400/starwars_350.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384437635435258578" border="0" /></a>the Obama administration’s decision to scrap missile defense bases in the Czech Republic and Poland, one characterization seems to have trumped all others: “It is a system that doesn’t work, designed to counter a threat that doesn’t exist, designed for a people that don’t want it.” Analysts and politicians should keep this variation on former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski’s original description of the proposed system in mind while debating the merits of the system.<br /><br />First and foremost, the system did not work, nor did it show the promise of working anytime soon. Second, neither the Western Europeans the system was designed to protect, nor the Eastern Europeans who would be hosting it, seemed particularly enthused about it. Third, Iranian missiles do not currently have the ability to reach Western Europe, and probably will not until 2018, according to most estimates. These circumstances gave the Obama administration more than enough reason to cancel the Czech and Polish interceptor stations.<br /><br />So why was the decision so contentious? The reactions provide a microcosm of the political attitudes towards Russia. Those opposing the administration's decision, the “Russia hawks”, cite two arguments: 1) Demonstrating our commitment to our Eastern European allies, and 2) The notion that we need to “get tough on Russia.” The first point is a valid one. Examples abound of Russia’s belligerence towards its neighbors. At best, it can be described as an irritable neighbor with a tendency to overreact to the most petty slights. In an area where concrete actions carry more currency than diplomatic gestures, NATO would be wise to reaffirm its commitment to the defense of Poland and its neighbors in some manner other than speeches. The deployment of the Patriot missile battery originally planned to defend the missile installations would be a good start. Moreover, several politicians in the region, especially on the Polish side, have staked considerable political capital on supporting the system, and should not be punished for their decision to do so. The Obama administration’s communication of the decision did not show any sensitivity to the situations of Poles and Czechs; hopefully its further actions will demonstrate otherwise. However, this commitment to our allies does not require the US to spend irrationally on projects with little ability to confront temporal problems; rather, a pragmatic approach to the security, integrity, and stability of Eastern Europe will serve not only our allies, but ourselves well in the long term.<br /><br />As for the idea of getting tough on Russia, this has become the national security equivalent of being tough on crime: it’s the low hanging fruit for establishing your national security bona fides. There is no lobby to contend with, you appear to bask in some sort of Reagan-esque glow, and you may convince a few people that you have some grasp of international politics. Unfortunately, Russia bashing is too often the result of knee-jerk politics, as opposed to a carefully thought-out decision on how to deal with this country.<br /><br />This does not mean to minimize the Putin administration’s lack of respect for democracy or the sovereignty of its neighbors. However, Putin and Medvedev’s actions do not mean that opposing Russia for the sake of opposition should be the US’ default position. This is especially true when the leaders in question have a tendency to foment nationalist sentiment for domestic benefit. Careful engagement, complemented by constructive reinforcement of our allies and the clear delineation of how we expect Russia to act if it would like to be treated as a valuable member of the international community, should bear more fruit. Let’s leave stubborn petulance to the Russians.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-49307622096758289812009-09-21T15:58:00.008-04:002009-09-21T18:31:26.234-04:00Washington Post, Daily Telegraph Shilling for Russian Government<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjncbP7G_XYkV6Ks4Lg31GooSxdqOi8uvqdhM2ZBFrTP3weV_8TXapOsnJG0OhoOIYmmQHuLP6XDBrg7MPSpCJhJeLqDr8wJomroQsd_TxsHVYGEbd4gEne5tOftXHR_FdU4YIY80mtgjT2/s1600-h/1753.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 262px; height: 400px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjncbP7G_XYkV6Ks4Lg31GooSxdqOi8uvqdhM2ZBFrTP3weV_8TXapOsnJG0OhoOIYmmQHuLP6XDBrg7MPSpCJhJeLqDr8wJomroQsd_TxsHVYGEbd4gEne5tOftXHR_FdU4YIY80mtgjT2/s400/1753.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384034784103808850" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>Everyone knows the sorry state of affairs of America's newspaper business and its derelict advertising revenue models, but I didn't think that one of the nation's most prestigious newspapers would sink to this.<br /><br />Well, let's not get ahead of ourselves - I totally did think they could sink to this, but I'm still disappointed that they have. Earlier this summer, my compatriot Itchy forwarded me a link to an advertising supplement on <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/">washingtonpost.com</a> titled "<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-adv/advertisers/russia/">Russia Now</a>." I had thought that it was a one-off insert, but I have now realized that the <span style="font-style: italic;">Post</span> is making this a regular monthly feature in its newspaper.<br /><br />The segment is filled with articles lauding Russia's political leaders and celebrating its business-friendliness. But more troubling than the propaganda is that while the <span style="font-style: italic;">Post</span> does rightly place the words "A Paid Supplement to The Washington Post" at the top of the Russia Now webpage, nowhere on the site does it say who is actually paying for it. On its website, it bills the supplement as an "Advertorial," a chilling new word which suggests that the paper's own editorial content may be up for sale (and a word, I was saddened to learn, that has entered the dictionary, alongside the likes of "edutainment" and "celebutante.")<br /><br />Much of the content of Russia Now appears to be original, with hard-hitting articles like "<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-adv/advertisers/russia/articles/society/20090826/how_to_register_your_stay_and_stay_friends.html">How to Register Your Stay and Stay [With?] Friends</a>" (it's a simple matter of going to the post office, apparently). The rest is press pickups from other news agencies, most of them owned by the Russian government - for example, there is <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-adv/advertisers/russia/articles/politics/20090818/south_ossetia_one_year_on.html">a great interview by RIA-Novosti</a> with South Ossetian leader Eduard Kokoity, who speaks unchallenged about the "thousands" of civilian deaths as the result of "Georgian crimes."<br /><br />Another participant in this scheme, Britain's <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sponsored/russianow/"><span style="font-style: italic;">Daily Telegraph</span></a>, is a bit more forthcoming, advising: "This online supplement is produced and published by Rossiyskaya Gazeta (Russia), which takes sole responsibility for the content." More honest, however, would be to point out that not only is <a href="http://www.rg.ru/"><span style="font-style: italic;">Rossiyskaya Gazeta</span></a> wholly owned by the Russian government, it is in fact the official mouthpiece of the government, as it is the paper of record for all decrees and legislation. In addition to the <span style="font-style: italic;">Post</span> and the <span style="font-style: italic;">Telegraph</span>, the supplement is also printed by Indian newspaper <a href="http://content.yudu.com/A1ahrf/et-08-07-09/resources/index.htm?referrerUrl=http%3A%2F%2Frbth.ru%2Fe-paper.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Economic Times</span></a>, Bulgaria's <a href="http://content.yudu.com/A1f1c1/rb-26-08-09/resources/index.htm?referrerUrl=http%3A%2F%2Frbth.ru%2Fe-paper.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">Duma</span></a> and Brazil's <a href="http://jbonline.terra.com.br/editorias/russiahoje/"><span style="font-style: italic;">Journal do Brasil</span></a>. Russia Now is also produced by <a href="http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=50828&cid=187&p=03.09.2009">The Voice of Russia</a>, an answer to America's similarly-named government broadcaster. Russia Now can also be found as a stand-alone English-language website called "<a href="http://rbth.ru/">Russia Beyond the Headlines</a>."<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuBeRJGQQ0rINS1Kp-4HJQ0ih_R0l6Q_Cy44wRxzpyfE6cWrArR84vfQvbNFpNpj3AygEJt8dvLtvDq8bKetHxb6vBPRq3nNN4b4myPpyBTfmCEA2S8A1mm7LWkShMXsMHJA_Op9VuQyPw/s1600-h/Russia+Now.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 34px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuBeRJGQQ0rINS1Kp-4HJQ0ih_R0l6Q_Cy44wRxzpyfE6cWrArR84vfQvbNFpNpj3AygEJt8dvLtvDq8bKetHxb6vBPRq3nNN4b4myPpyBTfmCEA2S8A1mm7LWkShMXsMHJA_Op9VuQyPw/s400/Russia+Now.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384032635960765986" border="0" /></a><br />The pages of newspapers are filled with advertisements from private businesses, multi-national corporations, and even sovereign governments who are trying to sell you something. Newspapers regularly print advertising inserts imploring readers <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1988/02/23/business/advertising-magazine-supplement-devoted-to-ireland.html">to visit Ireland</a> or <a href="http://www.targetmarketnews.com/storyid06030802.htm">not to be racist</a>. They even sometimes print ads that look like news stories right next to real articles, as the <a href="http://www.laobserved.com/archive/2009/04/southland.php"><span style="font-style: italic;">Los Angeles Times</span> did earlier this year</a> on their front page, or the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/"><span style="font-style: italic;">New York Times</span> does on its website every day</a>.<br /><br />The difference here as that the drivel printed and broadcast by the likes of RIA-Novosti, Russia <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsyB5qvPrKi0FrORjJfH0578TfN_k8bMuwZPfYyHwx9fkGgqeokrQIBtU1xmm8a6vNTirIIxpjBh1cBKDcTDnyY5oLx1eYtrv0HD6_u0yje2hySPrqo8rT-YpP_HA4aWPMnwnQ4Bt9JfJ1/s1600-h/Anna+Politkovskaya.jpg1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 247px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsyB5qvPrKi0FrORjJfH0578TfN_k8bMuwZPfYyHwx9fkGgqeokrQIBtU1xmm8a6vNTirIIxpjBh1cBKDcTDnyY5oLx1eYtrv0HD6_u0yje2hySPrqo8rT-YpP_HA4aWPMnwnQ4Bt9JfJ1/s400/Anna+Politkovskaya.jpg1.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384035018706968370" border="0" /></a>Today, or Rossiyskaya Gazeta, and here reprinted by Russia Now, is regarded as legitimate news in the completely unfree Russian news media market. The Russian government is paying money to foreign media to reprint its sham news - news which it foists on its own citizens on a daily basis, and which is rightfully disregarded by the legitimate independent press. Is this the state of America's newspapers then? Accepting money from foreign governments to reprint their vile propaganda? So much is being made of the advertisers <a href="http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/showtracker/2009/08/as-boycott-continues-glenn-becks-audience-swells.html">fleeing Glenn Beck's program</a> on Fox News for his outrageous demagoguery; I think it is time that the news media start turning away certain advertisers, especially <a href="http://www.cpj.org/deadly/">one that poses as large a danger to the legitimate news as the Russian government</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-56008218258367072912009-09-15T16:28:00.004-04:002009-10-13T10:09:31.476-04:00The Future of Russia's Automotive Industry: Toys<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLHLB-2QFJxXp_UaW1PoSMsQoPTXjbu4fFBN-dDfRU1l_ezic6g1okab1oYrKmv6zP57dHRwDfZ1SLtpwP9UFLLu-wPowcupulJxmVkNvYW0HfsVqwTWZZ46f8lGU9h6ect41sD84ItUAz/s1600-h/m2141-1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 221px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLHLB-2QFJxXp_UaW1PoSMsQoPTXjbu4fFBN-dDfRU1l_ezic6g1okab1oYrKmv6zP57dHRwDfZ1SLtpwP9UFLLu-wPowcupulJxmVkNvYW0HfsVqwTWZZ46f8lGU9h6ect41sD84ItUAz/s400/m2141-1.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5381810037439281698" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>Togliatti, the home of Russia's largest carmaker, AvtoVAZ, has not weathered the global recession well. Car sales in Russia have plummeted this year, and factories are promising huge layoffs.<br /><br />Luckily, the Russian Industry and Trade Ministry has a plan: let them make toys.<br /><br />In an effort to revive the fortunes of this beleaguered region, where tens of thousands are already unemployed or underemployed in the colossally inefficient auto plants, and thousands more may be laid off soon, the government <a href="http://newsru.com/finance/15sep2009/autotoys.html">announced plans Tuesday</a> to create a special economic zone designed to attract manufacturers of toys and games.<br /><br />The government plans to provide incentives to both foreign and domestic producers to locate production and development facilities in the region around Togliatti. According to the minister, Stanislav Naumov, the special zone would be centered around a design and production facility proposed by Hong Kong-based toy company Grand Toys. The company manufactures products for several well known companies, including Mattel, Hasbro and Nintendo. It was not immediately clear how many jobs this program would create.<br /><br />In addition to preserving manufacturing jobs, the ministry cited several advantages of the program, though none of them seemed to make much sense. For example, the government believes that this will reduce the price of toys in Russia - I don't think that this is a very big problem, nor do I see how relocating production from China to Russia could possibly reduce the price. Also, this plan would reportedly reduce Russia's dependence on foreign imports, despite the fact that the import substitution model does not have a stellar track record, and there is no reason to prop up such an insignificant industry as toy production.<br /><br />Needless to say, a few jobs molding plastic toys are unlikely to turn around the fortunes of this city. In late July, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/29/business/global/29ruble.html?_r=1">AvtoVAZ announced plans for 27,000 layoffs</a> at its plants in Togliatti, which currently employ around 100,000 workers. Despite their astonishing Soviet scale, these plants produced a paltry 140,000 cars in the first six months of this year, making them some of the least efficient in the world. The government has already plowed US$750 million into the company to keep it afloat, but those efforts appear to be in vain.<br /><br />In a related story, the <span style="font-style: italic;">New York Times</span> ran <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/13/world/europe/13moscow.html">a piece on Saturday about Moscow's famous "Detsky Mir" toy store</a>. The building is undergoing a huge renovation, and many preservationists fear that, like so many other buildings in the city, its architectural integrity is being compromised. You can read the full report on threatened architecture in Moscow from the Moscow Architecture Preservation Society (MAPS) <a href="http://www.maps-moscow.com/?chapter_id=232">here</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-68483544478287808822009-09-08T12:09:00.003-04:002009-09-08T12:27:57.835-04:00Nantucket Overrun By Deer, Ticks, and Idiots<span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>Over the weekend, the <span style="font-style: italic;">New York Times</span> ran <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/06/us/06nantucket.html?_r=1&sq=nantucket&st=cse&scp=1&pagewanted=all">an article about the accelerating spread of Lyme disease and other tick-borne illnesses on Nantucket</a>. We have <a href="http://walterdurantyreport.blogspot.com/2008/12/lab-to-move-to-kansas-connecticut.html">blogged about this disease in the past</a>, and its (alleged) origin in an offshore military research laboratory. Most people I tell this story to are incredulous and don't believe any of the links between Lyme disease and Plum Island, but I again implore you to read <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Lab-257-Disturbing-Governments-Laboratory/dp/0060011416">Michael C. Carroll's <span style="font-style: italic;">Lab 257</span></a>.<br /><br />Personally, I think that deer should be eradicated from the island. They are not native to Nantucket, but were introduced in 1922, a time when deer were quite rare in the northeast. Now we have no shortage of deer, and an aggressive culling and birth control program would do wonders to reduce the danger of tick-borne illness to the island's human residents. Nobody needs to go around blasting the island to pieces killing 2,500 deer, but the visitors have outlived their usefulness.<br /><br />Other islands have experienced <a href="http://www.fireisland.com/Fire-Island-News/44">a similar deer tick menace</a>, such as Fire Island, off the coast of Long Island, which has "the highest concentration of deer ticks of any National Park area in the Eastern United States." This problem is often exacerbated by <a href="http://www.nps.gov/fiis/naturescience/deer.htm">people feeding deer</a> (as insane as that sounds). Said one Nantucket resident who opposes efforts to control the deer population, "I really love the deer, and I can’t help it. My mother took me to see ‘Bambi’ when I was little." Well, my mother took me to see "Lady and the Tramp," but that does not make it okay for me to spread garbage all over my front lawn to attract stray dogs, which I also really love.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-13470500538203918102009-09-03T14:39:00.000-04:002009-09-03T15:57:45.942-04:00Execution of the Innocent: Cameron Willingham and the Case Against the Death Penalty<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEile7X3IUJLfeMe673viuz0DgAwsCTgbtxLi5nXUuFsvn7cGplJrKIdy76DM-LEUqQpKKlYN4pxegstzNxXMwtCaTFhDoQ0xqwA7ue1Z32Tea010AaWZYZ1wmARQRm5rA0UApBi8ob1eD65/s1600-h/willingham.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 251px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEile7X3IUJLfeMe673viuz0DgAwsCTgbtxLi5nXUuFsvn7cGplJrKIdy76DM-LEUqQpKKlYN4pxegstzNxXMwtCaTFhDoQ0xqwA7ue1Z32Tea010AaWZYZ1wmARQRm5rA0UApBi8ob1eD65/s400/willingham.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5377313843412587042" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>In the September 7<sup>th</sup> issue of The New Yorker, reporter David Grann wrote <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/09/07/090907fa_fact_grann?currentPage=all">a piece about the case of Cameron Todd Willingham</a>, a man executed in Texas in 2004 for the murder of his three young daughters. Willingham's case has been much heralded as a clear-cut example of the execution of an innocent man. In the article, Grann cites <a href="http://cfr.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/04-1170.ZC.html">a 2006 Supreme Court decision, <span style="font-style: italic;">Kansas v. Marsh</span></a>, in which Antonin Scalia stated:<blockquote>It should be noted at the outset that the dissent does not discuss a single case—not one—in which it is clear that a person was executed for a crime he did not commit. If such an event had occurred in recent years, we would not have to hunt for it; the innocent’s name would be shouted from the rooftops by the abolition lobby.</blockquote><a href="http://blog.aclu.org/2009/08/31/shouting-from-the-rooftops/">Many</a> <a href="http://sobeale.blogspot.com/2009/08/shouting-from-rooftops.html">people</a> believe that the Willingham case is that “rooftop” moment, Grann included, who concludes his article by stating:<blockquote>There is a chance, however, that Texas could become the first state to acknowledge officially that, since the advent of the modern judicial system, it had carried out the “execution of a legally and factually innocent person."</blockquote>However, I will argue that it is not this moment, as much as I would like to put an end to the death penalty, for three main reasons. First, it is highly unlikely that anyone in Texas will admit that Willingham was innocent, due to the type of evidence used to both convict and potentially exonerate him. Second, Scalia's statement is wildly misinformed, as there have been many cases in which a clearly innocent person has been executed, yet these names have not become celebrated causes or toppled capital punishment in America. Finally, even if the state does admit that Willingham was wrongfully executed, it will make a good liberal rallying cry, but I do not believe that it will have the effect of dramatically shifting public opinion against the death penalty.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">The evidence for and against </span><span style="font-style: italic;">Willingham</span><br /><br />Just before Christmas in 1992, a fire raged through the Willingham home. Cameron, who was home at the time, managed to escape the fire, but the blaze killed the family's one-year-old twins and two-year-old daughter. Fire investigators quickly concluded that the fire had been intentionally set, leading to Willingham's arrest and trial for murder. Despite the lack of a clear motive, his history of domestic abuse and the expert testimony of the arson investigators convinced the jury that he was guilty of murder, and he was sentenced to death in 1993.<br /><br />Willingham maintained his innocence throughout, claiming that a space heater in the children's room must have started the fire. Shortly before he was executed in 2004, his case came to the attention of outside fire experts, who concluded that every piece of evidence pointing to arson in Willingham's case was invalid. This report was sent to clemency officials in Texas in hopes of earning a stay to investigate the case further. The stay was denied, and Willingham was put to death February 17, 2004.<br /><br />Willingham is dead, but his case has sparked an investigation in Texas into the practices of forensic scientists. When this commission releases its report next year, there is a chance that they could conclude that the investigation into this case was flawed, though a complete admission of wrongdoing is highly unlikely. And even if the fire evidence is brought into question, that does not mean that any judicial authority will exonerate Willingham – a flawed investigation is not ironclad proof of innocence, prosecutors will argue.<br /><br />This case was built on eyewitness <a style="font-style: italic;" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpyIwK8coc1s4L9XIKfcCYECJ4KXBlxwwY18w11eZZYyvD4HAHbkX8hoPUppzVoJOu30qKVr56ROJmhqPCRV1_5xJukxz8EdF734K4XtV7MpQLNHlP7OooJmKX8cB4NYYMIksx29DDp14k/s1600-h/scalia.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 277px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpyIwK8coc1s4L9XIKfcCYECJ4KXBlxwwY18w11eZZYyvD4HAHbkX8hoPUppzVoJOu30qKVr56ROJmhqPCRV1_5xJukxz8EdF734K4XtV7MpQLNHlP7OooJmKX8cB4NYYMIksx29DDp14k/s400/scalia.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5377314206138092866" border="0" /></a>accounts and expert testimony, and these things, it can be argued, are always subjective. Prosecutors use this subjectivity to their advantage to get convictions at trial, and after the trial – or in this case, after the execution – they can use that subjectivity to cast a shadow of a doubt on Willingham's innocence. There is no irrefutable evidence in this case, like DNA, and even that is subject to endless questioning and posturing by lawyers.<br /><br />As Scalia himself stated in the 2006 <span style="font-style: italic;">Kansas</span> opinion, correctly this time, there has never been a case in which DNA evidence proved the innocence of an executed inmate. Now, there are a lot of reasons for this. For one, most inmates spend an average of 12 years on death row. Many of those currently incarcerated or recently executed were tried and convicted before the advent of DNA technology, meaning samples that could now prove their innocence were never collected or analyzed. Most importantly, though, once someone is executed, there is little reason to reopen the case, so DNA evidence is usually not preserved after the execution.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Names we should already be shouting</span><br /><br />Willingham's case is indeed tragic, but not unique, despite Justice Scalia's protestations. In their article “The Execution of the Innocent” (published in Acker et al., <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Americas-Experiment-Capital-Punishment-Reflections/dp/0890890641"><i>America's Experiment with Capital Punishment</i></a>, 2003) Michael Radelet and Hugo Bedau argue that while “never in the twentieth century has a government official in this country admintted that an execution carried out under his/her authority, or that of a predecessor, took the life of an innocent victim” (326), the execution of the innocent is neither rare nor unlikely.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieel-2KqKvJ136EjA9pTg0WXtVxYnFl3ocnQDDDpp70xLprNbwSpba0uJlcoAyd6q1dCOvSD00MPooEgqX1IartgjgGounSWW_HOjEsyGBSPKeeKRVbH1auFo7uTvi70xGNh0ghNsVfJRL/s1600-h/hill_joe1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 265px; height: 400px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieel-2KqKvJ136EjA9pTg0WXtVxYnFl3ocnQDDDpp70xLprNbwSpba0uJlcoAyd6q1dCOvSD00MPooEgqX1IartgjgGounSWW_HOjEsyGBSPKeeKRVbH1auFo7uTvi70xGNh0ghNsVfJRL/s400/hill_joe1.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5377314420269480962" border="0" /></a>In an earlier book, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Spite-Innocence-Erroneous-Convictions-Capital/dp/1555531970"><i>In Spite of Innocence: Erroneous Convictions in Capital Cases</i></a> (1987, with Constance Putnam) these authors identified 23 cases in which likely innocent people were put to death just in the twentieth century. Many of the names would be familiar to any high school student, like Joe Hill, a labor organizer allegedly framed for murder in 1915, and Sacco and Vanzetti, Italian immigrants convicted of murder in Massachusetts in 1920 (the complete list, with unhelpful commentary from a third party, can be found <a href="http://www.cyberussr.com/hcunn/deathpen/radelet.html">here</a>). But you don't have to be completely innocent to be wrongfully executed. In addition to these cases in which the executed inmates probably had nothing to do with the crimes, the authors have identified several classes of cases in which the defendant was involved in the victim's death, but this did not rise to the level of capital murder, such as accidental killings, homicides in self-defense, homicides by the mentally ill, and non-capital murders (Radelet and Bedau 2003).<br /><br />Some argue that many of the failings of capital punishment have been fixed since the Supreme Court struck down all existing capital statutes in the 1972 <i>Furman v. Georgia </i><span style="font-style: normal;">decision, and admittedly, only one of the 23 cases occurred after the death penalty was reinstated in 1974 (that of James Randall Adams). However, since the Radelet and Bedau study was conducted, more names have been added to the list – i</span>n Grinn's article, he adds the cases of Ruben Cantu and Larry Griffin. Furthermore, death row inmates continue to be exonerated, suggesting that people are still wrongfully convicted. According to Radelet and Bedau:<br /><blockquote>If the history of the last twenty years is any guide to the future, an average of three death row inmates per year will continue to be vindicated and released. How many equally innocent death row inmates will be unsuccessful in obtaining relief is impossible to know, but the number is most certainly not zero (2003, 334).</blockquote>Since 1973, 135 people have been exonerated and released from death row. Some people point to this fact as evidence that the system worked – despite a wrongful conclusion of their trials, the appeals process eventually led to the truth. But we must assume that the appeals process works as imperfectly as trials; just as certain people are convicted because of insufficient resources, ineffective counsel or misconduct, those same barriers exist – and are in fact greater – for defendants seeking a reversal on appeal.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Does </span>Willingham's<span style="font-style: italic;"> innocence even matter?</span><br /><br />As stated earlier, I am a staunch opponent of capital punishment, and the case made here may sound cynical and defeatist. Willingham's case was an enormous miscarriage of justice, and I do not want to see any defendant, guilty or innocent, face that same fate.<br /><br />But nonetheless, an admission of wrongdoing in this case will not turn the tide against capital punishment. As Justice Thurgood Marshall pointed out, most Americans are completely ignorant about the death penalty; they support it or oppose it on emotional, not evidentiary grounds. As for active proponents of capital punishment, many acknowledge that innocent people will be put to death, but they are willing to accept that in exchange for the retributive and deterrent benefits, which likely do not even exist. <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/angel/procon/haagarticle.html">Ernest van den Haag</a> likened the death penalty to any other activity in society which carries inherent risks: "Despite precautions, nearly all human activities, such as trucking, lighting, or construction, cost the lives of some innocent bystanders. We do not give up these activities, because the advantages, moral or material, outweigh the unintended losses."<br /><br />This does represent a victory, however, for death penalty abolitionists, as Radelet and Bedau point out at the conclusion of their 2003 paper:<br /><blockquote>One of the amazing things that has happened in the fifteen years since our research was first released to the public is that those who defend the death penalty now concede the inevitability of executing the innocent ... We know of no defender of capital punishment who, prior to 1987, was willing to make such a concession in public.</blockquote>Despite this concession, a majority of Americans continue to support capital punishment, and it remains the law of the land in 35 states. So shout Cameron Todd Willingham's name from the rooftops; just don't forget to add his name to the others that have fallen on deaf ears.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-80505675763187223862009-09-02T11:00:00.008-04:002009-09-02T14:52:40.007-04:00Baseball Skies<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-9e5Us3IV02uD1SqL67YSovixoVzU6kFu4W9GXQ9UAIt7LU16wRyrbfKaoUCqIOf6OEY-UlvnWW84o_FsfpcwwfSwzbgW4jTNBqVXr74Cfba6qQ08BDy0oBR-3bAJ6R7gDavLFfhUcwxa/s1600-h/IMG_1152.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-9e5Us3IV02uD1SqL67YSovixoVzU6kFu4W9GXQ9UAIt7LU16wRyrbfKaoUCqIOf6OEY-UlvnWW84o_FsfpcwwfSwzbgW4jTNBqVXr74Cfba6qQ08BDy0oBR-3bAJ6R7gDavLFfhUcwxa/s400/IMG_1152.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376942775608438290" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>This has been a summer of transitions for me - moving to a new city (Brooklyn will now be my more or less permanent dateline), coping with life after graduate school, and looking for work in a tough economy. But there has been one constant throughout the summer: baseball.<br /><br />I crisscrossed the nation between New York and Colorado three times this year, and on every trip, I made sure to stop at some of the hallowed sites of America's pastime - not the gleaming corporate cathedrals of the monopolistic MLB, but the minor league parks of America's small cities and the sites where baseball history was made.<br /><br />Unlike most other popular American sports, baseball is played almost exclusively outside (and with the impending demise of Minnesota's Metrodome and Tampa's Tropicana Field, there will be no more indoor baseball in the major leagues) and during the most beautiful time of year. So, here I would like to share some of my pictures from the summer and the beautiful skies of America's ballparks.<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://picasaweb.google.com/s/c/bin/slideshow.swf" flashvars="host=picasaweb.google.com&captions=1&noautoplay=1&hl=en_US&feat=flashalbum&RGB=0x000000&feed=http%3A%2F%2Fpicasaweb.google.com%2Fdata%2Ffeed%2Fapi%2Fuser%2Fagustafson%2Falbumid%2F5376903708485584721%3Falt%3Drss%26kind%3Dphoto%26authkey%3DGv1sRgCK-ercCmgfnHZw%26hl%3Den_US" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" width="800" height="533"></embed><br /></div><br />Here were some of the other highlights of my travels:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.sluggermuseum.org/"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Louisville Slugger Museum and Factory, Louisville, KY:</span></a> In addition to being home to the world's largest bat, the Louisville Slugger museum will teach you such interesting facts as how the two-tone bat was invented (it was a spare bat that we being used to stir paint) or how many bats a major leaguers uses in a season (over 100). One of the coolest things about the museum is that they have a batting cage where you can hit with a wide selection of wooden bats fresh off the factory floor.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bobfellermuseum.org/"> </a><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a7/2Ruth1948April.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 300px; height: 225px;" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a7/2Ruth1948April.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><a href="http://www.bobfellermuseum.org/"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Bob Feller Museum, Van Meter, IA:</span></a> When Babe Ruth walked onto the field at Yankee Stadium for the last time on June 13, 1948, two months before throat cancer would take his life, he held a bat at his side to steady his ravaged body. That day the Cleveland Indians were in town, and the bat he grabbed off the rack belonged to future hall of famer Bob Feller. Today you can see that bat, signed by Ruth and Feller, on display in the pitcher's hometown museum.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.nemosdetroit.com/"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Nemo's Kitchen, Detroit, MI:</span></a> Located in the shadow of the now-demolished Tiger Stadium, Nemo's is as much a Tigers institution as Ty Cobb and gothic lettering. With the stadium gone, they have adapted to the times - where you could once walk down Michigan Avenue to a Tigers game, the bar now has a fleet of buses to shuttle patrons to games for a modest $3 (and parking around back is free). Anyone contemplating a trip to a Tigers game should make this a mandatory stop.<br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_collegiate_summer_baseball_leagues"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Collegiate Summer Baseball:</span></a> When the college baseball season ends, players need a place to hone their skills and keep the scouts' attention - that's where the summer collegiate leagues come in. In small towns across America, players play for room and board, usually boarding with local families, and in the evenings they ply their trade for the crowds. It's not quite the big leagues, but the spectators treat the players like their adopted sons.<br /><br />For future summer trips, I have put together a short wish list of baseball shrines I would like to visit:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.japanvisitor.com/index.php?cID=360&pID=366"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Koshien High School Baseball Tournament, </span></a><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSlI0LfyBznHczRsLksqp_153WQonKoDL-HBbqqSvfU2UAfAn-obtG7Pg2XJUNRi5avB9uza4ExHDvtFK6HdLyybdinTdL7BdQFKFGw4lcsxBSEOnPR3zKWAKfpvlaOSPT7MlSrRWf0XZu/s1600-h/Menko+Sheets,+1920s.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 280px; height: 400px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSlI0LfyBznHczRsLksqp_153WQonKoDL-HBbqqSvfU2UAfAn-obtG7Pg2XJUNRi5avB9uza4ExHDvtFK6HdLyybdinTdL7BdQFKFGw4lcsxBSEOnPR3zKWAKfpvlaOSPT7MlSrRWf0XZu/s400/Menko+Sheets,+1920s.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376939358336407106" border="0" /></a><a href="http://www.japanvisitor.com/index.php?cID=360&pID=366"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Japan:</span></a> Though a bit far for a weekend road trip, the annual Koshien tournament is one of the most popular sporting events in Japan, eclipsing even the country's major leagues. 4,000 teams compete for the right to play in the tournament at historic Koshien Stadium in Nishinomiya, where more than a million fans show up to cheer on their hometown squads while millions more tune in at home. Japanese and American culture are very different, yet I find it remarkable that we both love such an idiosyncratic and arcane game as baseball; Koshien is one of those institutions that gets at the heart of the game - kids playing, not for money, but honor and glory. (The PBS program POV ran an excellent documentary on the tournament, a trailer is <a href="http://www.pbs.org/pov/kokoyakyu/">here</a>.)<br /><br /><a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/internalReutersGenNews/idUSTRE52100920090302?sp=true"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Esquina Caliente, Havana, Cuba - "The Hot Corner":</span></a> Cuba is not known for its freedom of speech, but at this spot in Havana's Parque Central, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jknx6-pGmpQ">people gather for heated debates</a> - about baseball. Recently featured in the documentary about Red Sox pitcher Luis Tiant's return to the island after 46 years of exile, <a href="http://www.thelostsonofhavana.com/"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Lost Son of Havana</span></a>, the Hot Corner is a sort of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speakers%27_Corner">Speakers' Corner</a> that American baseball fans should envy.<br /><br /><a href="http://web.baseballhalloffame.org/index.jsp"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Baseball Hall of Fame, Cooperstown, NY:</span></a> Now just a few hours drive from my front door, the Hall of Fame is near the top of my to do list.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.littleleague.org/series/2009divisions/llbb/series.htm"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Little League World Series, Williamsport, PA:</span></a> <a href="http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=4351487">As Kenny Mayne said</a>, "The best entertainment, and the true spirit of any sport, can be found at any children's game." As an unmarried man with no children of my own, people give me strange looks when I show up at a random little league game, but the LLWS offers enough public spectacle that I could show up on my own to watch kids play without anyone calling the cops on me. Congratulations, by the way, to <a href="http://www.littleleague.org/series/2009divisions/llbb/WSBoxScores/LLWS32.html">Chula Vista, California</a>, who defeated Taoyuan, Taiwan 6-3 in Sunday's final.<br /><br /><a href="http://boston.redsox.mlb.com/index.jsp?c_id=bos"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Fenway Park, Boston, MA:</span></a> Most people who know me are aghast when I tell them that I, a lifelong rabid Red Sox fan, have never been to a game at Fenway Park. I have traveled as far as Detroit and Baltimore just to see the Sox, but never to their home ballpark. Hopefully this fall I will get the chance to walk down Yawkey Way with a playoff ticket in hand.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-5053445691551822912009-08-05T13:14:00.007-04:002009-08-05T15:53:01.092-04:00Facebookin' Health Care<strong>NEW YORK, New York --</strong> This might be a lame use of a blog.<br /><br />This post follows from a facebook conversation about health care reform in the US, and I'd like to offer my thoughts below. This is entirely because facebook limits comments on links, etc., to a paragraph or so, and there no longer seems to be any way to create content on facebook by uploading a note from scratch, as opposed to pasting in a blog link. Hence, my use/abuse of the blog to continue an argument that would've remained on facebook, if Mark Zuckerberg didn't suck.<br /><br />At any rate, the article that spurred the back-and-forth was <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203517304574304581005451834.html">this WSJ article</a> about Democratic lobbying groups attacking party members who were "out of line" in criticizing the Party Leadership's (still not elucidated) stance.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">I had commented on the article as follows:</span><br /><blockquote>Still unclear on why it's supposed to be wrong for businesses to want to make a<br />profit. I really don't know what worldview the majority of Democratic<br />congresspeople are supporting -- trashing an industry simply because it is<br />profitable?<br /><br />There seems to be a need for some healthcare reform (or so I'm<br />told...), but allowing the motivation for it to be the fact that certain<br />companies are profitable is inane, vengeful, and economically backward.<br /></blockquote><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">A friend of mine responded:</span><br /><blockquote>Once again you have posted a link to an article along with a comment that<br />is almost unrelated. The article is about political infighting among democrats,<br />not the overall economic philosophy of the democratic party. Are you hoping no<br />one will bother to read the article, and we'll all just assume it substantiates<br />your point?<br /><br />I'm sure that privately run fire departments would also be quite<br />profitable, if not for the public option... Not all things should be left to the<br />private sector.<br /><br />Your "or so I'm told" bullshit suggests that you don't personally know<br />anyone who has suffered under our current health care system. I'm glad you and<br />your family have been so fortunate, but open your eyes. It is not working....<br /><br />I am sick of you guys posting this shit. (Yes, G-Man, I'm talking to you<br />too.) So please answer the following question: What is the republican<br />health-care platform, other than opposing the democrats? No change to the status<br />quo?<br /></blockquote><br /><em>My reply is this:</em><br /><br />Guys, I'm glad you commented -- some debate is obviously a good thing when Congress and the administration want to radically alter something that affects our financial and physical well-being to the degree that healthcare does.<br /><br />Firstly, though, I think your criticism was pretty off-base: the comment I made is in no way unrelated to that article. The article is about lobbying groups publicly attacking Democrats who have qualms about undertaking radical changes to 1/6+ of the economy without slowing the process down for debate. The POV of the attacks is that "profiting" is somehow wrong. To my mind, that is a dangerous, populist route to take.<br /><br />In any economy, in any sector, you need to turn a profit to stay in business and, ergo, to employ people. People need jobs, but those jobs will only exist when an industry is profitable. Yet in a recession, when people feel financially hit, demagogues can appeal to populist anger at "rich bosses." As recent incidents in France (workers rigging bombs to factories) or China (workers beating executives to death) show, that populist rage can be an unpredictable, violent thing. Today far-left lobbying groups rail against "profiteering" in healthcare; but that same logic can apply to any other industry tomorrow: energy, agriculture, food processing, higher education, technology, finance. I find the line of attack these lobbies are taking to be fundamentally worrisome.<br /><br />Moreover, let's look at the larger, overarching point of the article that you say I'm not addressing. The point is that lobbying groups are launching ad hominem attacks on politicians who don't want to go along with the government's plan. As I said, when you're talking about restructuring 18% of the economy, some debate is a good thing. The administration, however, wanted a bill to go through by early August -- after virtually no debate. Sure, Obama goes on YouTube and urges people to have "health care parties" where you can talk about how worried you are about health care; but there hasn't been any actual open debate in Congress or the administration about what changes would be best, either in an ideal world or in the current situation. Instead, as he has done elsewhere (the stimulus and energy legislation, e.g.), Obama puts out a few forceful advertisements or press conferences about how badly something needs to be done … and then he lets Nancy Pelosi worry about the details behind the closed doors of congressional committee rooms.<br /><br />And those Democrats who have qualms about the closed manner in which the process has taken place are then vilified by lobbying groups that are apparently connected to the Democratic Party. Stifling debate is a dangerous, unhealthy thing to do in a democracy.<span style="font-style: italic;"> </span><span style="font-size:100%;">That's especially true when a plurality of people are opposed to the initiatives that are coming together and feel that it will make their own health care worse.<br /><br />As much as Obama portrays healthcare as a huge crisis, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/27/AR2009072701372.html">80% of Americans are happy with their own</a> coverage, and coverage rates have been more or less stable for about 20 years. There are problems, certainly -- most people feel that the system in general has problems even if they themselves are satisfied -- but people don't want a radical revamp. Doesn't that count for something? After all, isn't democracy about the will of the people? Can you force a new health system with a big government role on people, the constituents of the state, if most of them don't want it but because you think Congress and the president know better than people what's good for them?</span><br /><br />But that sort of stifling is what those ads aim to do. Incidentally, by attacking people who post articles critical of this process, you are also stifling any attempts by people to create discourse.<br /><br />Why is discourse important? It helps to know what the government is trying to pull when it comes to any policy. But in this case, there are some good ideas out there, and then there are some less-good ideas, many of which are arguably in the main congressional plans. A quick look at the only state to have introduced health care reform of the sort that seems likely to be pushed by Congress -- Massachusetts -- isn't much of a success story. Fewer uninsured have been covered than thought (though coverage rates are pretty good there), but more importantly costs have soared, the system is in debt, and growth-killing taxes are being introduced despite promises of no new taxes for the middle class to fund the program (sound familiar?). And that's in a state of 5 million people that is one of the wealthiest, healthiest, least-obese states in the country.<br /><br />So what needs to be done? What else is out there? I don't know what the Republicans' plan is, to answer your question. They don't seem to have one, and it's a pretty big disappointment when the opposition is either irrelevant, has no idea what to say, or goes along with the ruling party. It was annoying when Democrats went along with Bush initiatives that were ill thought-out, and it's annoying now when the Republicans appear to have little to add. One-party rule is always a bad thing.<br /><br />More proactively, there are probably three areas to look at here: quality, coverage and cost. As for quality, the quality of care in this country is pretty good. Granted, we pay 80% more as a % of GDP than France and Japan and don't have markedly better outcomes. But outcomes are still better than, e.g., in the UK. So quality is good, but, importantly, we don't get enough value.<br /><br />That brings us to cost. Theoretically, rising costs aren't in and of themselves a problem. As an economy grows more sophisticated, people don't need to spend all their money on nondurables like food or clothing. That they spend more to advance technologies that let people live longer, healthier lives is a given. But cost is an issue when it becomes prohibitive -- or when health care is run by the government and those costs eat into other government expenditures or raise the public debt. So if you want to have real problems with cost, giving government greater responsibility for health care costs is a pretty good way of making cost a real problem -- which is what you have when that responibility eats into other spending, or worsens the debt load.<br /><br />As for prohibitive costs, they play into coverage. People get hit hardest financially when they aren't insured or their insurer gives them poor coverage. Making sure more people are covered, and that that coverage is good, is important.<br /><br />But the biggest driver of rising costs is the same factor that results in the US having outcomes no better than France while paying twice as much compared to GDP: Waste. The system is full of waste, with doctors ordering far more expensive tests and ineffective treatments than is needed. The reason behind that is that reimbursement for hospitals and doctors is based on the costs they run up, not on the quality of their outcomes. As a doctor or hospital, you get paid more by insurers or the government when you order more expensive tests, whether or not they're needed. The incentives are totally backward.<br /><br />That's the biggest factor driving cost increases. It's a problem, but there are hospitals and health care systems that have tackled it: the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, California's Kaiser Permanente system, the Cleveland Clinic. What they all do is pay doctors yearly salaries rather than commissions based on the costs they rack up, and have outcome-based systems of cooperation among different doctors to coordinate treatment and make sure unnecessary tests aren't given.<br /><br />Revamping the system in that mold -- <span style="font-weight: bold;">putting in place a system</span> (Medicare incentives, e.g.) <span style="font-weight: bold;">that moves reimbursement to a salary model and coordinates care to achieve better, more efficient outcomes</span> -- would be the best step in the right direction. But the plans being hashed out by Congress don't do that. And prominent Democrats bucking the government's plans get steamrolled when they might have something good to say.<br /><br />That change of incentives is agreed upon by academic health-policy experts, yet it has no place in the main plans. Other policies have achieved mainstream acceptance among health-policy experts (including Obama advisor David Cutler, whose book "Your Money or Your Life" goes over these issues really well; maybe if Obama came up with his own plan instead of leaving it to Congress, we'd see more of Cutler's good ideas…) include <span style="font-weight: bold;">separating insurance from employment</span>. Employers today get tax breaks for offering health insurance. That leads to an incentive structure where they can offer really, really expensive plans -- and write it off as taxes. The result is to push up costs and have more waste in the system -- all funded by the US government's tax system, and none of it reformed under Congress' proposals. Neither Democrats, influenced by unions that have the most generous and wasteful benefits, nor Republicans, influenced by the insurance companies that can benefit from this policy, want to touch this one, although every health-policy expert sees it as Public Enemy No. 1. <span style="font-weight: bold;">You stop offering those tax incentives, and you can move away from employer-based coverage</span>. Not only does that mean that US employers don't have to shoulder insurance burdens (making them more competitive globally), but it means people don't get screwed when they lose their job. That step toward portable insurance is key, although insurance under the competing congressional plans would only be portable if it's controlled by the government, while employers will continue to have the same bad set of incentives vis-a-vis private insurance.<br /><br />Another reform: <span style="font-weight: bold;">Individual mandates</span>. This is a bit more controversial, but a large number of uninsured are younger, healthy people who can afford insurance but choose not to purchase it, preferring instead to have more spending cash. The result is that if you are, say, unemployed or a young adult and not yet working, it's expensive to buy insurance. That's because you aren't part of a group buying pool, and also because so many other young, healthy people don't buy insurance. The upshot being that insurance costs go up when it's only older or less-healthy people buying the insurance. When younger people with lower medical costs buy it, they bring costs down for everyone. Putting in place tax penalties for people who don't buy insurance could create individual mandates that bring down costs for all. Lots of Republicans are reasonably opposed to this as a violation of personal liberty, but it may not be the worst of ideas.<br /><br />There are various other ideas, some supported by Democrats (more government spending on <span style="font-weight: bold;">EMRs and other technology</span>; a <span style="font-weight: bold;">health "exchange"</span> where people can go to get good, clear info on what plan would be cheapest/best for them), others by Republicans (<span style="font-weight: bold;">tort reform</span>; <span style="font-weight: bold;">allowing insurers to operate across state lines</span>, breaking up the local monopolies that exist). Then there are interesting ideas that both, or no, parties support: <span style="font-weight: bold;">non-profit health cooperatives</span>; p<span style="font-weight: bold;">rohibiting insurers to exclude based on pre-existing conditions</span>; <span style="font-weight: bold;">tying outcomes to value</span> so that, e.g., people can use any clinic with their insurance but using more costly and less-efficient ones costs you more out of pocket; and, importantly, action to <span style="font-weight: bold;">break up the local monopolies</span> that insurance companies have become.<br /><br />Look, at the end of the day, US health care is among the best in the world. I know it's not New York hipster-cool to say that (maybe Conor Oberst will be pissed at me), but it's true. There are big problems, but on the bright side there is a broadening consensus among health-policy experts about how to take care of them. Unfortunately, Congress' plans don't really take them into account. Instead, they try to ape European-style plans. Doing that doesn't mean we'll get European-style outcomes, and it may mean that, despite European-style taxes, outcomes here are affected negatively. Medicare, after all, is a politicized, wasteful mess (they still haven't figured out where funding for Part D is coming from...) and hardly the path you want to follow. The number of hospitals is about half of what it was in the 1970s. That's because hospital profits have been getting squeezed both by insurers and by Medicare for decades. The result is that there are fewer hospitals, pushing costs up and making care less accessible. If you have a government-run plan that artificially pushes down costs, unless you put hospitals under government control (that may work, but it's not exactly part of the plan now), they'll take more margin hits and more of them will go out of business … pushing costs up further at the existing, less-accessible ones.<br /><br />Atul Gawande wrote an <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/01/26/090126fa_fact_gawande">interesting article</a> a few months ago about how different health care systems came about. It's pretty interesting, but he recommends the US stick to what it knows and improve that, expanding coverage, cutting costs and improving quality. As he notes, that would be done by embracing reforms like those above, rather than having a government insurance plan that doesn't cut costs or restructure the way doctors are paid; that retains a backward employer-based system necessitated by WWII-era worker shortages; that politicizes health decisions (meaning any cost cuts will be political death and that therefore costs will keep on rising); and that creates more debt and eats into other government expenses. Yeah, it's fashionable to focus on how the Republicans, who are pretty irrelevant here, have no plan, or about how ridiculous and hickish Max Baucus or Ron Wyden sounds. But it's just stupid to try to silence Baucus' or Wyden's voices when what they want is an examination of the largely closed way a handful of powerful congresspeople have cobbled together a populist but iffy plan.Itchyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17964967274527279113noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-28786055621293296762009-07-25T18:59:00.010-04:002009-07-25T20:47:08.250-04:00Gambling in Russia and the Rust Belt<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjxEWoYEwXI6JZczNGGcfVzd48pm6AcfFq3sx-1M6YC28GKSM9rram3S3aIUaQZYHDq4Oexz_fefeFjdRVv42rAnBIyLEqpKjkm4-EU85ibCMjf9kky7e879DvDhEak4rNiEgdXZ84hARN/s1600-h/Korona.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 300px; height: 330px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjxEWoYEwXI6JZczNGGcfVzd48pm6AcfFq3sx-1M6YC28GKSM9rram3S3aIUaQZYHDq4Oexz_fefeFjdRVv42rAnBIyLEqpKjkm4-EU85ibCMjf9kky7e879DvDhEak4rNiEgdXZ84hARN/s400/Korona.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5362563217420113970" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BOULDER, Colorado -- </span>Earlier this month, the Russian government implemented a ban on gambling, restricting casinos to four special zones scattered across the country. The Western press was all atwitter over this story, acting as if the Kremlin had declared over night that casinos be shuttered.<br /><br />The deadline of July 1, 2009 to close or relocate all gambling establishments had actually been established two and half years ago, but due to a lack of planning by the government and the general arbitrariness of the law in Russia, few operators chose to close before the deadline, and none have yet moved to the new gaming zones.<br /><br />The four tiny enclaves to which gambling is now restricted are located in the Kaliningrad Region along the Baltic Sea; in the Altai Region near the border with the Altai Republic in southern Siberia; near the Far Eastern city of Primorye; and along the border between the Krasnodar and Rostov regions along the Sea of Azov.<br /><br />The regions have been described in the press as "remote," "far-flung," and "far from Moscow." It should be noted that the last casino zone listed above is not far from Sochi, the city that will host the 2014 Winter Olympics. Like the casino operators view of the ban, I have a similar attitude towards the Sochi Olympics - I'll believe it when I see it.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8JWxBm5tEei15guBAwbqLMMGalaB4AEJlARIYlGjJzWN5whX2cNo9eWTlYqV3uZ6Kr9hljVMo9EU7JuosTYulvEinw2lMkvSMsMJfU1bkLCDrVqt6BajAMbrhO_1_KiNma8bWmmfD3TXH/s1600-h/russia_love005.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8JWxBm5tEei15guBAwbqLMMGalaB4AEJlARIYlGjJzWN5whX2cNo9eWTlYqV3uZ6Kr9hljVMo9EU7JuosTYulvEinw2lMkvSMsMJfU1bkLCDrVqt6BajAMbrhO_1_KiNma8bWmmfD3TXH/s400/russia_love005.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5362561658369664466" border="0" /></a><span style="font-style: italic;">Says one resident of Siberia, "When do we get the showgirls?"</span><br /></div><br />The Russian Ministry of Finance has <a href="http://www.kommersant.ru/doc.aspx?DocsID=878520">plans to spend $31 billion of public and private money </a>(roughly 80% from the private sector, the rest from the state) developing these gambling regions, but so far no one has stepped up to invest anything. Some operators have even chosen to <a href="http://www.russiatoday.com/Top_News/2009-07-20/Belarus_to_become_post-Soviet_Las_Vegas.html">move to the hermit kingdom of Belarus</a> rather than open up shop in the Russian enclaves.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAGzQXoXyCy0NUpbRAZVjav9FcAy8lDHRcJ3RDILmCpadIsNOroySon1TPmi3a35ZW9hySx8bhDx58B9K5GOHXIhTQJwPgV_YuKHVVkVk8kh2fogrZg5aMMWqFqiPunp6SS9mZzTh10Xi-/s1600-h/04.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 266px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAGzQXoXyCy0NUpbRAZVjav9FcAy8lDHRcJ3RDILmCpadIsNOroySon1TPmi3a35ZW9hySx8bhDx58B9K5GOHXIhTQJwPgV_YuKHVVkVk8kh2fogrZg5aMMWqFqiPunp6SS9mZzTh10Xi-/s400/04.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5362561505486138242" border="0" /></a><br />As this ban was taking force, I found myself driving across America's rust belt - though upstate New York, Pennsylvania, and Michigan - where casinos are popping up everywhere. Many of these dying post-industrial cities have decided to bet their chips on gambling to improve their fortunes.<br /><br />Downtown Detroit is now dotted with massive new hotel casinos, built to compete with the establishments across the river in Windsor, Ontario, a city hit just as hard by the decline of the auto industry. Meanwhile, the <a href="http://www.forgottendetroit.com/mcs/index.html">landmarks of Detroit's city center remain dilapidated</a>, the city remains <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203517304574306270885525320.html">as dysfunction and destitute as ever</a>, and the crushing competition for gambling dollars has driven Windsor to become <a href="http://www.windsorstar.com/business/fp/Windsor+among+worst+cities+Maclean/1802384/story.html">one of the worst cities in Canada</a>.<br /><br />Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, once one of America's colossal steel centers, <a href="http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-hometown-bethlehem19-2009jul19,0,3881670.story">has turned to the golden gambling goose</a> to at least slow its breakneck decline. A massive steel crane that in a previous era may had carried iron ore to the blast furnaces is now adorned with a massive sign welcoming you the new Sands resort casino.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3dJpkDakwT1iirKSTlVEcViz6OT_99fEvMWb3-nC2UjCIOrSyOnfKY4k-nRt5oy1bfLQddf_YdLSLPN9VRSYCzpAO5aJu_yUsatGbh-71vYhnWJ4qvh6mbH1lxl9a5KYip8mpVHiM-CfE/s1600-h/up-SKL928QIA87C5V4N.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 378px; height: 284px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3dJpkDakwT1iirKSTlVEcViz6OT_99fEvMWb3-nC2UjCIOrSyOnfKY4k-nRt5oy1bfLQddf_YdLSLPN9VRSYCzpAO5aJu_yUsatGbh-71vYhnWJ4qvh6mbH1lxl9a5KYip8mpVHiM-CfE/s400/up-SKL928QIA87C5V4N.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5362561580889485506" border="0" /></a><a href="http://www.gangresearch.net/Archives/hagedorn/rustbelt.html">This is not a new trend</a>, of course - the former steel town of Gary, Indiana opened its first casino over a decade ago, and a growing list of cities and states with nowhere left to turn to improve their economic plight fight and claw with one another to attract the next gleaming casino to their city.<br /><br />Not only do casino operators squeeze the most desperate municipalities for tax breaks and financing, but they then turn around and squeeze their profits out of the most destitute members of the population. Anyone who thinks that casino revenues come from high-rollers, or from people who are making a reasoned, informed choice to gamble, has clearly never been to the casinos outside of Las Vegas or the Riviera. Bethlehem, Detroit and Gary will never become vacation destinations, meaning the casinos will sell their "entertainment" to the unemployed citizens of these impoverished cities.<br /><br />This was the case in Russia as well. Yes, the law was poorly planned and badly executed, but gambling had become a serious social ill in the country. Roughly 400,000 people have lost their jobs as a result, a tough pill in Russia's faltering economy, but I have little sympathy for the operators who are mostly homegrown gangsters or foreign profiteers. I can say from personal experience that the expats working in Russia's gambling industry are some of the worst people in the world.<br /><br />One of the most depressing sights I have ever seen was a man, drunk and likely homeless, pouring 1 ruble (roughly 3 cents) coins into slot machine outside a Moscow subway entrance. The machine was nothing more than a steel box with three digital clock-like displays that flashed random numbers. No bells, no pictures of fruit, and no waitresses plying him with free drinks. For millions of people, this is the so-called glamorous world of gaming.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-76105566927756924442009-07-23T14:29:00.006-04:002009-07-24T23:43:24.285-04:00Bush and Nixon: The Men Who Would Be Baseball Commissioner<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHSnZ7zOknSBCQT4FbZyrQjKOp4JyLAiWIYvn75T8BDN6T-vJNf7ilCSZof8QiMD7i-6JiTNwgbsHGU3s2QLY7qv5DGVCsNjd1zHqwPYNz_cvTmJk-k3tO_OdmJ8ddb2RxzKhonRCwhKtG/s1600-h/obama-first-pitch.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 276px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHSnZ7zOknSBCQT4FbZyrQjKOp4JyLAiWIYvn75T8BDN6T-vJNf7ilCSZof8QiMD7i-6JiTNwgbsHGU3s2QLY7qv5DGVCsNjd1zHqwPYNz_cvTmJk-k3tO_OdmJ8ddb2RxzKhonRCwhKtG/s400/obama-first-pitch.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5362236928850573346" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BOULDER, Colorado --</span> President Barack Obama recently enjoyed the privilege of throwing out the ceremonial first pitch at the Major League All-Star Game in St. Louis. The tradition is nearly as old as the game itself. The All-Star Game started in 1933, and every president since Franklin Roosevelt, who first pitched at the game in 1937 at Washington's Griffith Stadium, has made the ceremonial delivery.<br /><br />This is just one of many connections between the presidency and the national pastime. While attending the <a href="http://www.sluggermuseum.org/">Louisville Slugger Museum and Factory</a> earlier this summer, I watched a <a href="http://www.cleveland.com/travel/index.ssf/2008/10/19-week/">documentary chronicling this relationship</a>. Lincoln was lampooned in a political cartoon from 1860 for his love of the game its in infancy; ambidextrous Harry Truman and Gerald Ford each threw Opening Day first pitches with their left and right arms; and Ronald Reagan, when working as a Cubs radio announcer for a station in rural Illinois, would make up colorful descriptions of the action on the field for listeners, as all he had to rely on was a play-by-play ticker tape.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://memory.loc.gov/service/pnp/ppmsca/09300/09311r.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 640px; height: 509px;" src="http://memory.loc.gov/service/pnp/ppmsca/09300/09311r.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />Two men who achieved the highest office in the land also nearly held the highest office in baseball. The dearly departed George W. Bush (well, he's just moved to Dallas) and the <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/23/nixon-tapes-abortion-nece_n_219746.html">irrepressible racist</a> Richard Nixon were both considered for the job of commissioner of Major League Baseball, though both chose instead to run for president.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/photo/2009/06/30/PH2009063001600.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 454px; height: 323px;" src="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/photo/2009/06/30/PH2009063001600.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>How different would America - and the game of baseball - be today had both of these men become commissioner? They were arguably the two worst presidents ever to be elected to two terms, yet baseball could have kept them away from the presidency. The ball club owners could have done the nation a favor by keeping these men out of public office. Nixon's presidential ambitions were clear when he declined the offer in 1965, though Bush's were not when he was considered for the job 1992. In Nixon's case, the owners could have been acting much like when a country accepts to host some deposed Third World strongman to prevent them from causing any more trouble, like Saudi Arabia did with Idi Amin, or <a href="http://www.bu.edu/aparc/presidents/">Boston University continues to do with many former African dictators</a>.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">(Above: Nixon making a proposal to add the expansion Saigon Senators to the National League)</span><br /><br />Nixon did cause at least one owner a headache when he became president. In 1973, Commissioner Bowie Kuhn fined and suspended newly-minted Yankees owner George Steinbrenner for making illegal contributions to Nixon's re-election campaign, something Big Stein claimed he was forced to do under pressure from Nixon campaign officials.<br /><br />As commissioner, what challenges would Nixon have faced in 1965? That era saw some big changes in baseball, including expansion into Canada, the playoff system, the players union, free agency, and the growth of night games. As the man who presided over much of this time period, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/15/AR2007031502135.html">Kuhn was a dynamic yet controversial commissioner</a>, and he was hardly on the cutting edge of all of these changes, especially the new labor relationships that were taking shape between owners and players. Nixon was no friend to unions as president, but during the 1960's he had been <a href="http://content.usatoday.com/topics/post/J.+Edgar+Hoover/63887543.blog/1">considered to head up the nascent Baseball Players Association</a>, and long after he had left the White House, he did successfully arbitrate a dispute between MLB and the umpires in 1986 to avert a strike. With this solid baseball resume, I think it is unlikely that Nixon would have left his office in disgrace aboard a chopper flying out of Dodger Stadium, waving the "V" for Victory.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.photoshoppix.com/modules/coppermine/albums/userpics/10008/normal_mr_bush.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 408px; height: 325px;" src="http://www.photoshoppix.com/modules/coppermine/albums/userpics/10008/normal_mr_bush.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />Unlike Nixon, Bush had few political ambitions, at least that anyone was aware of, in 1992, and even when he assumed the presidency just eight years later, few foresaw that his campaign promises of modest foreign policy, limited federal spending, and education reform would turn into ... well, we all know what happened. Bush also has a baseball resume, but the crises that faced the game during his potential tenure were far more serious. While still the managing partner of the Texas Rangers, Bush was a candidate to replace Faye Vincent. Steroids would become the single most important issue over the next decade, and while he did employ at least one proven juicer (Rafael Palmeiro), it's hard to say whether he would have handled the situation any better or worse (which would be quite hard to do) than Bud Selig. One decision that Bush was surely on the wrong side of was to expand the playoffs to six teams and break the leagues into three divisions, which has been an unabashed success. Every owner voted in favor of the change in 1993, with one exception - the Rangers' George W. Bush.<br /><br />Bush also understood the power of baseball as a national symbol, something that he mobilized for maximum propaganda effect after the attacks of September 11th, 2001. His theatrics at Yankee Stadium a few days later would make any die-hard nationalist proud. The Yankees, true to form, have continued this ceremony to the present day, forcing everyone to sing "God Bless America" at every seventh-inning stretch. And if you don't feel like singing, then you can <a href="http://gawker.com/5213634/the-yankees-wont-let-you-pee-on-america">get your ass to jail</a>. USA! USA!<br /><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/w8WhoiuU3Og&hl=en&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/w8WhoiuU3Og&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />It is an interesting bit of counter-factual history, and if I had to choose, I would gladly pick both these men to be my baseball commissioner instead of my president. Bush <a href="http://www.usnews.com/articles/news/politics/2009/01/22/with-bushs-departure-mulling-the-future-lives-of-former-presidents.html?PageNr=1">may still have ambitions to become commissioner</a>, though his rock-bottom popularity make him a risky choice to replace Selig when he retires, supposedly in 2012. I can say this without exception, though; in many cases, both the country and baseball have deserved far better leadership than they have gotten.<br /><br />Despite his brief term, Bart Giamatti is considered by many to be the last great commissioner. He famously banned Pete Rose for life for betting on baseball, but more importantly, he was able to eloquently express his love and admiration for the game to the public, something that Selig appears utterly incapable of doing. Giamatti also served as president of Yale University, and immediately upon assuming this post in 1978, he issued this memo:<br /><blockquote>To the Members of the University Community:<br /><br />In order to restore what Milton called the ruin of our grand parents, I wish to announce that henceforth, as a matter of University policy, evil is abolished and paradise is restored.<br /><br />I trust all of us will do whatever possible to achieve this policy objective.</blockquote>That's a platform I can get behind, whether it be from a university president, a baseball commissioner, or the president of the United States.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-611794665632132542009-06-18T16:53:00.007-04:002009-06-29T11:01:40.109-04:00Wednesday Links: Recession Solutions<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.americanconsumernews.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/recession.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 309px; height: 201px;" src="http://www.americanconsumernews.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/recession.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span><span>Everyone is trying to cope with economic hardships. The Russian government is giving people free lumber. New Yorkers can no longer steal paper plates from their local Whole Foods. And Oprah just wants you to read <span style="font-style: italic;">The Secret</span> and think positively to solve all of your financial, emotional, and medical problems. </span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB124519350145620855-lMyQjAxMDI5NDE1NzExOTczWj.html"><br />Wall Street Journal: Let the forest be your stimulus.</a> </span>Despite having the third-largest hard currency reserves in the world, Russia still can't spend its way out of economic oblivion. So instead, the government is letting ordinary citizens fell timber, prospect for gold and plant potatoes for free in hopes of stimulating the economy.<span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /><br /></span><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/12/world/europe/12russia.html">New York Times: Russia's defense minister is a "stool salesman."</a> </span>Russia's military has long been plagued by a bloated officer corps, but in its current economic dire straits, the country can hardly afford to gently show these officers the door. They just roughly kick them to the curb.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/5203452.article"><br />Architects' Journal: We will build Europe's largest ... er ... parking lot.</a> </span>The Russia Tower was slated to become Europe's tallest building, but financial mismanagement has brought the project to a halt, and little has been built since the cornerstone was laid two years ago. So much for Norman "The Apologist" Foster's wet dream of a building.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://tipstrategies.com/archive/geography-of-jobs/#recovery">Geography of Jobs: Americans are equally screwed everywhere.</a> </span>That's not entirely true, but almost no major cities have been free from job losses. This map comes from consulting firm TIP Strategies and displays the change in the number of jobs for the 100 largest metropolitan areas since 2004.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.wnyc.org/shows/bl/economic_indicators/">WNYC: Forget NYSC, I'm joining the YMCA.</a></span> Like the <a href="http://walterdurantyreport.blogspot.com/2009/06/recession-and-2-bills.html">two-dollar bill story</a> reported earlier, WNYC is asking listeners to submit their own uncommon indicators of the recession. The result is a fascinating interactive map of New York City.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /><a href="http://www.newsweek.com/id/200025">Newsweek: Oprah wants you to inject things into your vagina.</a> </span>Oprah got thoroughly skewered by Weston Kosova and Pat Wingert in this Newsweek cover story, where they portrayed her as an uncritical, weak-minded ninny who unflinchingly endorses crackpots and cranks. The results are hilarious.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=106766219536&h=7brg8&u=xuZEJ"><br /></a></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51Q2125RC2L._SL500_AA240_.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 240px;" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51Q2125RC2L._SL500_AA240_.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=106766219536&h=7brg8&u=xuZEJ">Toronto Star: Foreigners don't like hockey.</a> </span>Canada has been lauded for its open and fair immigration policies. Now if they could only get the new arrivals to take up hockey.<br /><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/eticket/story?page=090618/dchoops">ESPN: I wanna be like Barry.</a> </span>If you want to get close to Obama, join in on some hoops. This borders a bit on a cult of personality, but luckily basketball is already very popular in the US, so we don't risk facing a situation like Russia, where niche sports like tennis, judo and skiing saw their popularity skyrocket simply because the president (Yeltsin in the first case, Putin in the latter two) played them.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /><a href="http://www.metropolismag.com/pov/20090616/letter-from-boston-its-the-pedestrian-oriented-small-commercial-districts-stupid">Metropolis Magazine: Meet America's stupidest mayor.</a> </span>We have leveled our own <a href="http://walterdurantyreport.blogspot.com/2009/03/boston-mayor-tom-menino-one-of-countrys.html">broadsides against</a> illiterate Boston mayor Tom Menino; now he may be facing a challenge to his authoritarian rule.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.torproject.org/"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Tor Project: Help stop the Iranian thugocracy.</span></a> Speaking of authoritarian rule, the Iranian government has become quite adept at thwarting journalists and would be protesters from gaining access to the Internet to get information about the unrest out of the country. This piece of software prevents the authorities from easily tracking them and cutting off their access, or worse, finding out their identity and personally targeting them. It can also be quite useful to bloggers and journalists in any part of the world.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8140359640502106156.post-64233335902616643132009-06-18T10:58:00.006-04:002009-06-21T14:43:08.720-04:00The Recession and $2 Bills<span style="font-weight: bold;">BROOKLYN, New York -- </span>Recently a friend took a trip down to Baltimore for a family wedding. During that trip, something rather curious happened: on multiple occasions while making commercial transactions - usually with cab drivers - he received back in change the elusive two-dollar bill. He returned to New York with three of them in his wallet, totally befuddled as to why Thomas Jefferson's visage was in such regular circulation in Maryland.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.votenader.org/email/general/2008/10/23/2DollarBill.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 500px; height: 211px;" src="http://www.votenader.org/email/general/2008/10/23/2DollarBill.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>Just last week, I took a trip back to my hometown of New Haven, and I retold this story to a mutual friend of ours at a local bar. We were both equally puzzled about this strange occurrence. I have never in my life been in possession of a two-dollar bill, and we both thought perhaps that Baltimore was such a backwards place that the bills had never fallen out of use. The bartender overheard us and said that he had two in his pocket that he had received from customers that week.<br /><br />"It's the recession," he said simply. His theory was that when economic times are tough, people start dipping into any reserves of cash they might have on hand, whether those be collectible coins, loose change in the couch, or a stash of two-dollar bills.<br /><br />The two-dollar bill has actually never been pulled from circulation. They currently make up roughly 1% of the money supply, and the Federal Reserve continues to print the bill. <a href="http://www.ustreas.gov/education/faq/currency/denominations.shtml#q5">According to the Fed</a>, "The $2 bill has not been removed from circulation and is still a circulating denomination of United States paper currency. The Federal Reserve System does not, however, request the printing of that denomination as often as the others. The Series 2003 $2 bill was the last printed and bears the names of former Secretary of the Treasury John W. Snow and Treasurer Rosario Marin. As of April 30, 2007 there were $1,549,052,714 worth of $2 bills in circulation worldwide."<br /><br />Most of the bills, however, are not in regular circulation. Banks hold on to them and usually only distribute them to customers when they are specifically requested. Most of them end up, for example, stashed away in the pockets of bartenders instead of in the register to be given out in the normal course of transactions.<br /><br />Perhaps the cab drivers of Baltimore are simply following the orders of the Federal Reserve to use the bills like you would any other currency, and our neighborhood bartender just happened to get lucky. I have not found any evidence or research about links between the resurfacing of two-dollar bills and recessions, but it seems to make logical sense.<br /><br />For the past several years, the two-dollar bill has started to become more and more common. A Reuters story from 2006 <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/money/2006-11-06-two-dollar_x.htm?loc=interstitialskip">reports increased orders for the bills</a> from banks since 2001, though it is hard to say why. The piece cites the bills' popularity among strip clubs, as they mean double the tips for the dancers. It is possible that the combination of increased supply and less reluctance on the part of spenders to use them due to the recession has led to their increased visibility.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.sellanythinggold.com/images/products/products-gold-tooth.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 340px; height: 241px;" src="http://www.sellanythinggold.com/images/products/products-gold-tooth.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />The bill has been linked to the current recession, but in a different way. Recently a story appeared in several news outlets <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Economy/story?id=7042022&page=1">about a pharmacy owner in Alabama</a> who earlier this year gave his employees his own economic stimulus. Danny Cottrell gave each of his full-time employees bonuses of $700 and his part-time staff $300, with two conditions: they had to give 15% of the cash to charity, and the remainder had to be spent in local businesses. To track his employees' spending, he handed out the bonuses entirely in two-dollar bills, so that if they did as they were told, the local market would be flooded with the bills (A similar scheme was tried by the <a href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4188/is_20030517/ai_n11388095/">Geneva Steel Company</a> in Utah in 1989 to show the economic importance of the company and its employees. The bills have subsequently been used to show the impacts of the plant's closing in 2001.) Interestingly, Mr. Cottrell also wrote an <a href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0LIY/is_2_92/ai_n6332826/">article in 2004 for <span style="font-style: italic;">VFW Magazine</span></a> about a limited-time release of uncirculated two-dollar bills from the Federal Reserve. Perhaps that is how he managed to get ahold of $16,000 worth of the bills to dole out to his employees.<br /><br />Is the two-dollar bill really an indicator of the recession? It is hard to tell. I think we will only know how bad things really are when people start paying for their beers and cab rides with their own gold teeth.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4