Phlegma weblog

Bribery in France

He was considered to be the likely president of France after the 2007 election. Now he's convicted for bribery. The conviction of former prime-minister Alain Juppé may very well cause great trouble - not only for humself - but also for the ruling party and president Chirac. (NYTimes)

Juppé is one of the president Chirac's closest confidants, and his fall could resemble the trouble for CDU of Germany - who was the major party in post-West Germany. CDU was also shaken by a bribery scandal - and was ousted from nearly every position in the German public sphere.

Juppé was sentenced to 18 months suspended prison term and was disqualified from public office for ten years. He has pledged that he will appeal.

President Chirac has avoided judicial investigations into how much he knew of the payment scheme by claiming presidential immunity from prosecution, which he enjoys until his second term runs out in 2007.

This is troubling for the French. They have a president who will face charges when he leaves office in three years time. This may lead to an unstable political foundation for the president. And given that the constitution of France is buildt around a strong president, this is worrisome - not only for the French, but for all of Europe.

The Dangers of a legal War

«The Bush administration has literalized its "war" on terrorism, dissolving the legal boundaries between what a government can do in peacetime and what's allowed in war. This move may have made it easier for Washington to detain or kill suspects, but it has also threatened basic due process rights, thereby endangering us all.» (Kenneth Roth, Executive Director of Human Rights Watch, in Foreign Affairs)

President George W. Bush has suggested that his campaign against terrorism goes beyond traditional conflicts as in Afganistan and Iraq. On September 29, 2001, he said: "Our war on terror will be much broader than the battlefields and beachheads of the past. The war will be fought wherever terrorists hide, or run, or plan."

In peacetime, governments are bound by strict rules of law enforcement. Police can use lethal force only if necessary to meet an imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury. Once a suspect is detained, he or she must be charged and tried.

In times of war, law-enforcement rules are supplemented by a more permissive set of rules: namely, international humanitarian law, which governs conduct during armed conflict. Under such "war rules," unlike during peacetime, an enemy combatant can be shot without warning (unless he or she is incapacitated, in custody, or trying to surrender), regardless of any imminent threat. If a combatant is captured, he or she can be held in custody until the end of the conflict, without any trial. (ibid)

Intelligent lies?

George Bush' national security advicer, Condoleezza Rice, admittet earlier today that some of the intelligence that the Bush administration based the war against Iraq on, had "uncertainties". (New York Times) But she still defended the war.

She said that Saddam Hussein had contemptuously rejected many opportunities to tell the world about the weapons of mass destruction that he had or did not have.

The supposed existence of deadly chemical and biological weapons in the hands in Iraq was cited by President Bush as a paramount reason for the military campaign that toppled the Baghdad dictator.

Yesterday David A. Kay, the former chief weapons inspector in Iraq, told the Senate Armed Services Committee that he favored an independent inquiry into the United States' prewar intelligence about Iraq's weapons programs.
"It turns out we were all wrong, probably, in my judgment," Dr. Kay told the senators. "And that is most disturbing."
Dr. Kay reiterated what he has been saying in interviews recently: that he thinks intelligence about Iraq's weapons programs was, at a minimum, out of date. (New York Times)

And still the White House doesn't want an independent inquiry. And that isn't strange, given that they would most likely be torn to pieces by such an inquiry. (And this is the same politicians that spent an indecent amount of money and time on the question of former president Clintons adultery...)

What makes a Self

People seem to define themselves by what makes them different from others - in each particular context.

"A woman psycologist in the company of a dozen women who work at other occupations thinks of her self as a psycologist; when with a dozen male psycologist she thinks of her self as a woman." (William J. McGuire and Claire V. McGuire: Content and Process in the Experience of Self)

We define ourselves by what we are not. It's odd.

Stupid men are Conservative

That doesn't mean that I think Conservatives are stupid, but in my experience stupid men tend to be conservative. And it never stops to amaze me how stupid men can be.
They disregard opposing views and often take bombastic stands. They ridicule new knowledge because that's not the way that things have been done in the past.
If you only argue your case with "That's how it always have been", you're not thinking for yourself, nor the generations to come. You are thinking for people long gone.
These people - though young in years - are the contemporaries of their grandparents.

I agree that if something works, you don't have to change it. But you can't disregard that there may be a better way to do things. Because if that's the truth, I fear for the future of mankind. Stupid as it may be.

Deep throating

Why is it that our elected representatives allways focus on who to blaim when something goes wrong - when the public findes out that their politicians have been lying to them?

When David Kelly went deep throating in the UK, members of the cabinet pushed mr Kelly to suicide - that is at least the popular view. The facts of this investigation will be released in a couple of days.

When the Norwegian defence minister was caught lying to the Norwegian parliament about the nature of the Norwegian involvment in Iraq, she was fuming. Not because she had been lying. But because someone told.

Are these the sort of people we are supposed to have faith in to govern our destiny?

The importance of a Lingua franca

In 1992 7.6 percent of the worlds population spoke English. 92.4 percent didn't. And the percentage of English speakers is declining. (In 1958 9.8 percent of the worlds population were English speakers.)Mandarin however was spoken by 15.2 percent of the worlds population in 1992.

To interact between nations and cultures we need to have a lingua franca, a language that is understood throughout the world, a language which isn't identified with a particular ethnic group, religion, or ideology.

"In the past", Samuel P. Huntington argues, "English had many of these identifications. More recently English has been de-ethnicizes."

English is spoken throughout the world, but in many countries it's only the elitewho speak it. (In 1983 there were 18 million English speakers in India - out of a total population of 753 million.) If we want cultures to interact, we need to give ordinary people a chance to interact with each other - without the elite functioning as middle men.

Interaction os the only way to achive peace and prosperity throughout the world. If the agerage Joe, Abdullah and Chen get an understanding for eachothers ways , they are less likely to accept a war against eachother.

Hence, we need a lingua franca. But is English it? As I speak it, I sincerly hope so. But Mandarin has more than twice as many speakers as English. Hindi and Spanish nearly as many (6.4 and 6.1 percent). These may very well joint the struggle for linguistic dominance.

Do we deserve Democracy?

Democracy may not be the most efficient way of working a society, but it is without doubt the most legitimate way of governing we know of - perhaps except the utopian anarchy civilization.

But what are the standards of a society that doesn't embrace the democracy they supposedly live in? Without partisipation in political debate - wether it be outspoken or in a general election - democracy has turned into oligarchy - the Rule of the Few.

In our societies we put limitations on who of our citizens are allowed to vote in general elections. People with certain illenesses are excluded. People with a criminal record are excluded. And this goes on.

In Florida - prior to the election of 2001 - the electorate excluded people with only minor offences on their criminal record. They also excluded people with the same name as people with criminal records. This has a devestating effect on democracy. Because when you get - as in Florida - a lot of people excluded from participating in a democratic election, you kick the legs under democracy. When less than half of the population participates, you don't have a democracy - you have oligarchy.

The Truth of a Civilization

The following is from Samuel P. Huntingtons book “The clash of civilzations and the remaking of world order”:

The argument now that the spread of pop culture and consumer goods around the world represents the triumph of Western civilization trivializes Western culture. The essence of Western civilizaton is the Magna Carta nt the Magna Mac. The fact that non-Westerners may bite into the latter has no implications for their accepting the former.
...
During the 1970s and 1980s Americans consumed millions of Japanese cars, TV sets, cameras, and electronic gadgets without being “Japanized” and indeed while becoming considerably more antagonistic toward Japan. Only naive arrogance can lead Westerners to assume that non-Westerners will become “Westernized” by acquiring Western goods. What, indeed, does it tell the world about the West when Westerners identify their civilization with fizzy liquids, faded pants, and fatty foods?

The truth I guess...

The Case for War

World War I was the "war to end wars" and to make the world safe for democracy. WWII would, as Franlin D. Roosevelt put it, "end the system of unilateral action, the exclusive alliances, the balance of power, and all the other expendients that have been tried for centuries - and have failed." Instead, Roosevelt argued, we would have a universal organisation of "peace-loving Nations and the beginning of a permanet structure of peace." (From Roosevelts address to Congress after the Malta meeting.)

WWI brought facism, nationalism and communism. WWII produced the Cold War that was truly global. And the end of the Cold War has brought genocide throughout the world.

We put War in nice wrapping and sell it to our public. But when has ever war been what our generals and politicians have claimed in advance?