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Feature Editorials

Taking Hostages: Tehran in 1979 - Cairo in 2012

Tuesday, 14 February 2012 00:00 Alan Caruba Feature Editorials
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As someone who vividly recalls the Iranian “students” who took our diplomats hostage in 1979 and the 444 days it took to get them back, the repeat of this by the Muslim Brotherhood in Cairo, putting 19 pro-democracy, non-government organization (NGO) Americans on trial on trumped up charges has an ugly repetitive feel to it.

The contempt the Iranian revolutionaries, led by Ayatollah Khomeini, had for America and, I might add, international law and practice that goes back centuries, is everything you need to know about dealing with militant Islamists, whether they are in Iran, Egypt, or anywhere else on the face of the Earth.

Just as then-President Jimmy Carter dawdled while looking for a diplomatic response, this same scenario is now being played out by Barack Obama and it won’t work now just as it did not work then. Carter authorized a failed military operation that, by most accounts, was poorly organized and executed.
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Banking Misuse in Pakistan

Monday, 06 February 2012 21:11 Fakirayaz
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The latest news is the Supreme Court taking suo moto notice of the Bankers helping themselves to large dollops of cash as ‘Bonuses’ for their performances delivering high profits for their institutions. The bankers have already been giving themselves gold medals for their being voted ‘banker of the year’ and, of course, ‘Best Central Banker of the Year’ to two State Bank governors.

These Bankers, mainly of the National Bank and State Bank of Pakistan, have presided over the sharpest decline in industrial production in the country. This decline has caused the largest unemployment in the country, and could have triggered a massive revolt.

The poverty levels are already below known records, while desperation-driven suicides for economic reasons have become a daily occurrence. The interest rates have been maintained at ridiculously high rates, so that it is not economically viable for industry to be financed with bank funding.
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Auschwitz: Ignoring History, Predicting the Future

Sunday, 29 January 2012 21:25 Alan Caruba
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The late Israeli scholar and diplomat, Abba Eban, (1915-2002) said, “History teaches us that men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives.”

Similarly, Winston Churchill said, “You can always count on Americans to do the right thing—after they have tried everything else.” In Churchill’s case, he was referring to the U.S. reluctance to become involved in another war in Europe, but the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 changed that overnight. By 1945, along with our allies, the wars in Europe and Asia were over.

The Nazis killed people on such a scale that it is almost incomprehensible. It happened within my lifetime and that of many others, some of whom are among the fortunate survivors. And yet, today, the denial of the Holocaust and the millions of other Nazi victims is an article of faith among Arabs in the Middle East and countless others around the world.
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Conservative Corporate Media: A Threat to Brazil's Democracy

Saturday, 14 January 2012 00:00 Luiz Felipe Limongi
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The boycott by Brazil's mainstream media on a bestselling book revealing one of the most explosive corruption scandals in the country's history saw Brazilians giving heightened priority to the imperative of challenging the country's corporate media.

The book “A Privataria Tucana”, written by Amaury Ribeiro Júnior, details a serious corruption scheme that took place during the Fernando Henrique Cardoso administration (1994-2002), involving prominent figures of the PSDB (Brazilian Social Democracy Party).

The author's investigative work exposed a web of political corruption, influence-peddling, bribery and money laundering among a network of public officials during the country's privatization process. 
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The Next Banking Crisis

Sunday, 18 December 2011 00:10 Hugo Radice
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In the ongoing Euro-crisis, our political leaders are constantly criticized for ‘playing catch-up’ and not being ‘ahead of the curve’ (although others might feel that they are completely round the bend). 

Perhaps, therefore, it is time to look up from the turmoil in the sovereign bond markets and the counsels of the European Union, dust off the crystal ball, and look forward to the next banking crisis.

For it is becoming increasingly clear that banks across Europe face a much more serious problem than a 50 percent haircut on their holdings of Greek government bonds; and that problem goes to the heart of what is wrong with the current culture and practices of the financial sector.
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Resistance Takes Root in Barcelona

Sunday, 27 November 2011 20:12 Hilary Wainwright
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The Catalans have a phrase: em planto. It has a double meaning: ‘I plant,’ or ‘I've had enough.’ At end of the huge 15 October demonstration of Indignados (‘outraged’) in Barcelona – the papers put it at around 250,000 – we were greeted with an impromptu garden under the Arc de Triomf, the end point of the march. Campaigners for food sovereignty had planted vegetables in well-spaced rows, ready for long term cultivation.

The point was partly an ecological one. But the surrounding placards indicated that the gardeners also intended it to make a symbolic point about the broader significance of the march. “Plantemos” declared a large cardboard placard, meaning: “we plant ourselves” – “we stand firm.”

Mariel, who was dressed as a bee – essential to flourishing horticulture and now facing pesticidal destruction – explained that the activists who organized the garden were part of the agro-ecology bloc on the march. The march as a whole had several layers of self-organization that became apparent at certain moments. There were three main focal themes – all issues on which active alliances had come together over recent months: education (yellow flags), health (green flags) and housing (red flags).
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