Blogflict Off to Denver
Posted on August 23, 2008 - Filed Under Obama
Starting Monday, Blogflict will be in Denver for the Democratic Convention.
Today, the news headlines are dominated by the Obama campaign announcement of Joe Biden as the VP nominee. As has widely been reported, the announcement was to come via text message. This strategy enabled the Obama campaign to gather thousands of cell phone numbers which they can use for calls and texts between now and November. It was also seen as a modern and chic way to make the announcement. The only problem? CNN beat the Obama text message operation by announcing first that Biden would be the nominee well before the text messages started to arrive.
For the record, Blogflict signed up for the text message alert 10 days ago and apparently the technology isn’t yet perfected - the text message never arrived! Instead, at 1:35am, a text came across from Rob in Florida, declaring, “It is official, it’s Biden.” Thanks to Rob for breaking the news to us, but where was that official text from the Obama campaign? Apparently, not everyone who signed up for the service got the message. Let us know if you signed up for the text service but didn’t get the message.
Well, at least Blogflict can go to sleep at night without the cell phone in bed, waiting for it to buzz with VP news…The McCain campaign seems set on a more traditional announcement (for Mitt Romney) via press release.
Sphere: Related ContentiConflict Site Down
Posted on August 3, 2008 - Filed Under China
The iConflict site crashed on Saturday evening after heavy traffic forced it down. The good news is the site is growing, and of course the bad news is, we were not prepared for the heavy traffic we got on Saturday. The site will be restored shortly.
The primary reason for all the traffic was this image of the “Beijing Internet Police,” a pair of online cartoon characters that appear on Chinese computers every 30 minutes to remind users that they are being watched. The image was sent to us by an iConflict user and has been verified by several news sources as a tool used by the Chinese. We’ve also had users write in to say they are in Beijing now and have never seen this cartoon. We do not know if it appears on all servers in China or just select ones.
The image has aroused much interest and we will continue to post information on the “Beijing Internet Police,” as users send us material on this controversial issue.
Please continue to share your thoughts on this. While the site is down the blog remains up and users can post their own comments here.
Sphere: Related ContentOil and the Moon (and Now Al Gore)
Posted on July 18, 2008 - Filed Under Gore, climate crisis
Yesterday Al Gore laid out an ambitious agenda to make the United States electric grid carbon free within 10 years. It is a bold and audacious plan and one that will require the full energy and effort of America if it is to be achieved. In outlining his plan, Gore called for the use of solar, wind, geothermal power, conservation and clean-coal technology.
Gore himself recognized the monumental task ahead of this country to achieve this goal. However, he noted that America, when challenged in the past, has achieved the unimaginable. Gore compared today’s challenge to the one President Kennedy presented to America in 1962.
This is wishful thinking, but perhaps Gore, or his aides, checked out Blogflict on June 21, 2008, when we wrote:
“Right now, it is pure fantasy to think that in a decade we could be self-reliant as a country for our energy needs. But in the past when our country needed to marshal our strengths and turn fantasy into reality, we did it. So why not do it again? In 1962 the idea of putting a man on the moon and returning him safely was science fiction, it sounded absurd, just as absurd as making American energy self-sufficient today. Yet, we found a way to do it.
On a sweltering late summer day in 1962, President John F. Kennedy declared, ‘We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.’
Now that Gore has put this issue out there for public debate, it is now up to the Congress and President to act. Only, they won’t. The US government won’t take this issue up until at least January of 2009 when a new President is sworn-in to office. By then, there is no reason to think that price of oil will have magically dropped down, or that our CO2 emissions will have plunged, or that the environment isn’t in even greater peril than it is today. But we must make sure that this is the last, final delay in taking action. There is too much at stake.
The New York Times, in describing the speech, noted, “Like a modern Jeremiah, Mr. Gore called down thunder to justify the spending of trillions of dollars to remake the American power system, a plan fraught with technological and political challenges that goes far beyond the changes recently debated in Congress and by world leaders.”
Theodore Roosevelt, one of America’s first true conservationists and environmentalists, once said, “The American people are slow to wrath, but when their wrath is once kindled it burns like a consuming flame.” Now is the time to light that flame and take action on our energy policy. Hopefully Gore’s speech is the kindling we need to get it burning.
Sphere: Related ContentWaterboarding and War
Posted on July 3, 2008 - Filed Under terrorism
There has been a large debate over waterboarding and if in fact it does or does not constitute torture and thus violates the U.S. Constitution. The technique, in which water is poured onto the face and breathing passages of a bound subject, elicits the sensation of drowning and imminent death.
Bush administration officials have shrugged off the idea that this interrogation method is in fact torture. While there has been a lengthy debate on both sides, the vast majority of people having never been waterboarded, do not know firsthand what it is like.
Christopher Hitchens of Vanity Fair magazine sought to find out for himself. So, with the help of trained personnel, he had himself waterboarded. Perhaps the title of his essay, “Believe Me, It’s Torture,” says it all.
Since you can’t and should not try it yourself, reading this article will have to suffice.
Sphere: Related ContentZambia’s Leader Calls For Zimbabwe Election to be Delayed, Not Cancelled
Posted on June 23, 2008 - Filed Under Zambia, Zimbabwe
iConflict contributor Henry Namwenda emailed us this report from Zambia:
PRESIDENT Mwanawasa yesterday called for the postponement of Zimbabwean presidential run-off elections slated for this Friday because of the volatile situation during campaigns. Speaking in his capacity as Southern African Development Community (SADC) chairman, Dr Mwanawasa told a Press conference at State House that the situation in Zimbabwe did not meet the SADC principles and guidelines and other African Union (AU) regulations on free and fair elections.
“It is, therefore, my considered view that the run-off election in Zimbabwe must be postponed to a later date. “I urge the responsible authorities in Zimbabwe to implement this postponement to allow for the establishment of conditions that are suitable for holding of genuinely free and fair elections in accordance with Zimbabwean law, the SADC principles and the charter and conventions of the African Union,” he said.
Dr Mwanawasa said the postponement of the run-off election had become imperative with the withdrawal of opposition - Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) candidate, Morgan Tsvangirai, leaving President Robert Mugabe as the only candidate.
He noted that only last week, SADC ministers responsible for peace and security had said they doubted the presidential run-off election would be free and fair given the situation on the ground.
“In view of the foregoing, I would be failing in my duties as chairman of SADC if I did not offer timely advice to our member state,” he said
He said that leaders should not, therefore, feel embarrassed to support the postponement because it was in the interest of Zimbabwe and its people.
Dr Mwanawasa said, as a member of SADC, Zimbabwe was a signatory to the regional body principles and guidelines governing democratic elections which it had, however, not adhered to.
“The conduct of free and fair elections is not simply judged on election day but from all activities and events prior to the day, on the day itself and thereafter. Those of you that may have observed the events in Zimbabwe during the run-off election ‘campaigns’ will agree with me that the current political environment in Zimbabwe falls far short of the SADC principles that I have just outlined,” he said.
He said free campaigns had not been allowed in that country as opposition rallies were being disrupted while Mr Tsvangirai had been arrested and detained, without justifiable cause, five times within a space of 10 days.
Dr Mwanawasa further noted that the MDC secretary general, Tendai Biti was currently in prison facing treason charges while generally there had been numerous incidences of political violence from both sides resulting in deaths of people.
“The opposition party had been denied equal access to the state media, hence denying them the opportunity to communicate their campaign messages effectively,” he said.
Dr Mwanawasa said that President Mugabe’s declaration that only God could remove him from office had created fear among the Zimbabwean voters.
Further, the Zimbabwean government had banned non-governmental organisations and other civil society organisations from carrying out their normal humanitarian functions on grounds that they were supporting MDC.
He quoted former United Nations secretary general, Kofi Annan’s statement published in the Financial Times edition of June 18, 2008 which stated that the situation in Zimbabwe was having tragic consequences both inside the country and in southern Africa.
Dr Mwanawasa said his statement was an appeal to all the relevant parties in Zimbabwe to ensure that they took measures which would prevent the situation in that country from escalating into deeper crisis.”
Sphere: Related ContentA Loss For Zimbabwe
Posted on June 22, 2008 - Filed Under Africa, Elections, Zimbabwe
Change, real change for Zimbabwe seemed to be only days away. After years of running this once proud nation into the ground, President Robert Mugabe finally had a challenger worthy of the succeeding him. All that needed to happen was for a free and fair election to take place on June 27th. But now, that is not going to happen and as long as Mugabe is in charge, it never will.
Mugabe’s war veterans and stalwart supporters had already launched a campaign of violence against all persons affiliated with the opposition party and its leader Morgan Tsvangirai. The accounts of arrests, detentions, even murders are well documented. Last week the Mayor of Harare’s wife was killed. Her crime was her support for Tsvangirai.
On June 27th the people of Zimbabwe had a choice. Go vote and risk your life or stay home. It was going to be an arduous choice and there is no doubt that some would have died at the ballot box. Rather than force people into that terrible choice, Tsvangirai decided today he has seen enough and he ended his campaign.
This gives the Presidency back to Mugabe and his murderous corrupt regime. It would have been admirable for Tsvangirai to stay the course and challenge Mugabe on election day, but the outcome was already clear. Mugabe was going to steal the election anyway, so why risk the lives of so many when the outcome was a fait accompli?
Even in Zimbabwe there is political spin. One of Mugabe’s political hacks declared that Tsvangirai had quit the race because he knew he was going to be soundly defeated on election day. This belies the truth that yes he would have lost, but only because the election was to be rigged. In the first round of voting earlier this year, Tsvangirai thrashed Mugabe at the polls only to have his victory overturned by election chicanery.
So now what? First, the international community must come down hard on the tyrant Mugabe. He must not be allowed to share the stage with the international community like he did in Rome last month. He must be isolated, repelled and decried. It is doubtful his people will read about his actions in the newspaper or television since the state controls the media. In Zimbabwe you need a license to be a reporter.
Just how bad is it now in Zimbabwe? If you live in Zimbabwe you are a victim of hyperinflation by a government that is so mismanaged and corrupt it has eviscerated this once strong and proud economy. People walk around the street carrying heavy bricks of cash that are wrapped in thick rubber bands. If you want to buy a coke, it will cost you 30 million Zimbabwean dollars. On your way home from work you can stop off at your local supermarket and pickup a chicken for dinner (if there is even any chicken in the supermarket) for a mere $20 million. If your car is low on gas, the refill will run you about $1.8 billion.
Just before the first election, Mugabe quadrupled the salary for all government employees. Normally that would be greeted with much happiness, despite it being an obvious election tactic. It didn’t work. Even with the increase, their income was so low when compared to their expenses, that it didn’t cover bus fare to and from work.
The events of today are the end of one campaign but should also serve as the catalyst for another - the international campaign against Mugabe. It’s a campaign that must be won, or Zimbabwe will be lost.
Sphere: Related ContentOil and the Moon
Posted on June 21, 2008 - Filed Under Elections, climate crisis
As the price of gas inches closer to $4.50 a gallon, its no wonder it has become a central issue in the Presidential election. The issue is how to best bring down the price. John McCain and Barack Obama have very different ideas on which is the best policy to pursue. They both miss the point. The oil and energy crisis will present the next President of the United States with an incredible opportunity.
The next President will have a strong and clear mandate from the public to do something about oil prices. All options will be on the table. But the boldest option of them all isn’t even being discussed.
John McCain wants to open up offshore drilling to the petroleum industry. This would increase our supply of available oil. Econ 101, more supply, lower prices. Obama is opposed to the drilling, fearful of the ecological damage it poses to the environment.
Attacking the supply side of the oil imbroglio is difficult. Saudi Arabia continues to show mild indifference to raising their regular production, drilling is an expensive and time consuming enterprise, and there is a fear that increasing the supply will only encourage people to use more, not less oil, so the net effect is negligible.
Attacking the demand side is just as difficult. By reducing demand, people would need to undergo a behavior change. Car pools, new light bulbs, new habits, new daily patterns to create efficiency would be needed. Most people don’t do change very well.
The drag on the overall economy has made this a challenging time for America. But what better time than for us to rise to the challenge. The time has come to think big and bold and to move this country forward with an energy policy that takes us into a new direction.
Right now, it is pure fantasy to think that in a decade we could be self-reliant as a country for our energy needs. But in the past when our country needed to marshal our strengths and turn fantasy into reality, we did it. So why not do it again?
In 1962 the idea of putting a man on the moon and returning him safely was science fiction, it sounded absurd, just as absurd as making American energy self-sufficient today. Yet, we found a way to do it.
On a sweltering late summer day in 1962, President John F. Kennedy declared, “We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.”
Barack Obama has said offshore drilling is a short term solution, not a long term one. But he is wrong. The petroleum industry lobby says that if we begin offshore drilling today, it will take approximately 7 to 10 years for the supply to hit the market. So by allowing the drilling to commence, it will do nothing to ease prices today.
If we are going to focus on a solution that would relief in a decade, why not throw out the playbook and do something different? Let’s declare it the goal of the United States of America to become energy self-sufficent in 10 years. Let’s invest mightily in alternative energy solutions. We won World War II in large measure because of public-private partnerships. Those same partnerships can help us win this battle over energy. Republicans will say its wasteful spending, Democrats will say it will take away from important government programs. They both will be wrong.
If we invest we will succeed, if we succeed, the geopolitical landscape of the world changes. No longer will American President’s need to come sat in hand to the King of Saudi Arabia, worry about ’strategic oil interests’ in the Middle East, nor worry about funding both sides in the War on Terror.
Just think what a different country we could be in 10 years from now if we succeeded? Does it sound like a fantasy? Sure it does. But so too did President Kennedy’s declaration in 1962. Yet 7 years later, it happened.
Let’s make it happen again.
Sphere: Related ContentChina’s Golden Moment?
Posted on June 17, 2008 - Filed Under China
iConflict reporter Shaun Skolnick met with people from all over the world to gauge their opinion on the Olympics being held in China. The motto for the Olympic Games is “swifter, higher, stronger,” which might be a more fitting slogan to the host country than to the Olympics.
One thing is clear the 2008 Summer Olympics will not be without controversy. What do you think?
Sphere: Related ContentA Moment for Zimbabwe
Posted on June 13, 2008 - Filed Under Elections, Zimbabwe
Most of the United States is focused on an election - the race for the White House which takes place in November. But perhaps now as the primaries are finally over and the general is in its early stages, its a good moment to pause to examine the June 27th run off election in Zimbabwe. The future of that nation is very much resting on the outcome of the run off between President Robert Mugabe and Opposition Leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
If you think prices have risen in the US, just imagine living in Zimbabwe where the disastrous economic policies of Mugabe have caused hyperinflation to hover around 100,000%. Want a soda? That will run you about 1 million Zimbabwe Dollars. The country is in dire need of economic reform.
The ruling regime is insistent on retaining power at any cost. Yesterday, Mugabe announced that war veterans are prepared to fight should the opposition win the election. He also told supporters that the opposition movement is funded by the British and is a political party for white people. Earlier in the year, Mugabe was more subtle in his posturing, now he’s just outright making wild accusations with no evidence.
But evidence was never a strong suit for Mugabe. This past week he had an opposition party member arrested for suggesting in March that they had won the election. He has been charged with treason. The punishment if found guilty - death. Tsvangirai has been arrested 3 times already this month, although no one is sure why.
The MSM and people living outside of Zimbabwe should care greatly about the outcome of this election. A stable Zimbabwe, with a healthy growing economy, would have the ability to lift millions out of poverty and steer the country on the path to prosperity. With a tyrant in power, obsessed about holding on to it at all costs - the country can only fall further into the abyss of chaos. Yet its doubtful you will see a story on the evening news about Zimbabwe or about the importance of its upcoming election. Its too bad, because elections that can truly alter the course of a nation are a rarity.
This is what Mugabe had to say yesterday about the prospect of losing the election: “We shall never, never accept anything that smells of … the MDC. These pathetic puppets taking over this country? Let’s see. That is not going to happen,” he said. “We are prepared to fight for it if we lose it in the same way that our forefathers lost it (to British colonial rule).”
By early July, Zimbabwe will either be well on its way to economic reform, or embroiled in a civil conflict. Only then it will be too late to raise awareness, because by then the country will be at war.
To read up on iConflict’s continuing postings on the Zimbabwe conflict, click here.
Sphere: Related ContentWhy Now Obama?
Posted on June 2, 2008 - Filed Under Clinton, Obama, mccain
There is something unique the American Presidency that makes people want to believe in something good.
8 years ago, a poor farmer in rural Bangladesh, trekked on foot to hear a US President speak. ”For me, the most memorable event in my life was the day I walked seven miles and almost saw Bill Clinton,” he later said. Due to security concerns the visit was called off shortly before it was to begin.
It is doubtful that this rural villager knew much about the politics of Bill Clinton. He wasn’t a democrat, in fact he probably didn’t know what meant to be one. He was there to see a symbol. A symbol of something good and hopeful.
But 8 years later, in a world transformed by terrorism and preemptive war, and in the age of American hubris and unilateralism, the image of the American President no longer conjures up symbolism of something good and hopeful. If you have traveled abroad since March of 2003 (the start of the Iraq War) then you know what I am talking about.
The 2008 election is a chance to fix what has gone astray. The Republican presumptive nominee, John McCain, understands that he can’t be tied to the Bush policies as they are widely considered an epic failure. McCain recognizes a new path is needed in Iraq, for our security, for our economy and for our environment. But we’ll leave talk of the general election for another day. Before we turn the page on this historic democratic primary its worth reflecting on it.
It wasn’t supposed to go this way. It wasn’t supposed to go this long. Every political pundit and junkie was convinced that the democratic primary would be over by February 5th. Hillary Clinton said so herself. But something funny happened on the way to February 5 - something changed.
How did we get here, to this strange moment in American politics, where the sure fire front runner fell by the wayside? It started in Iowa, that turned out not to be a blip on the screen, but a harbinger of things to come. Barack Obama did something that no other candidate has ever been able to do - he got young people out to vote. He got the disenfranchised out to vote. He got people to register to vote. Campaign after campaign there is always talk of motivating and engaging the youth of America. But its never happened, until now.
Obama is the first ‘Internet candidate’ in the same way that JFK was the first ‘television candidate.’ Maybe Obama’s ‘1960 Debate Moment’ came on youtube, in a video that was released by artist Will.i.am. Over 5 million people have watched it. The cost to the Obama campaign, $0.00. Around the same time that was released, Hillary Clinton bought one hour of TV time on the Hallmark Channel to host a town hall meeting, that amounted to an hour long commercial costing around $40,000.
Without the Internet, Obama would not have raised $200 million dollars and certainly he would not be the democratic party nominee. That distinction would have gone to Mrs. Clinton. But there is an Internet, and like we opined on Blogflict in December, the candidate that can harness it, can win the 2008 election.
New mediums of technology eventually find candidates who can use them to communicate effectively. Franklin Roosevelt did it with Radio. John Kennedy with Television. Now, Barack Obama joins that pantheon of communicators who used a new form of communication for political success. By November, we’ll find out if he’ll follow them to the West Wing.
Consider this. On the Republican ticket there has been a Bush or a Dole for every national election since 1976 (that’s before this author was born). Since 1988 we have had: Bush, Clinton, Clinton, Bush, Bush. The outcome of the last quarter century of American presidential politics hasn’t exactly been a call for change. Yet suddenly now both here and around the globe there is a palpable clamor for it.
Somewhere in an impoverished country a world away from the United States, someone is reading in a newspaper, or perhaps even browsing on an XO Laptop, about what is happening in race for the White House.
And already you can hear those thoughts creeping into the back of their heads, dreaming about the day they walk mile after mile to meet the man who could be the next American President.
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