The role of women in Afghanistan is getting better?

Not when people are killed in horrific ways for teaching girls.

1 in 32

For every 32 people in this country, 1 is either in prison, on parole or on probation. That's an unbelievable number. But that's what the Justice Department says was the case at the end of last year.

Almost 50% of the prison population is there because of drugs.

It keeps getting worse

A couple of months ago the Red Cross was fined $4,200,000 for problems with its blood supply. Earlier this week they were hit with another fine, this one for $5,700,000. In a court settlement in 2003 the Red Cross agreed to a plan to ensure that they would detect and correct any problems with its blood supply. In the first comprehensive evaluation made by the FDA of the the Red Cross' compliance with the plan, they found 204 deviations from the plan.

This brings to $15,000,000 the amount that the Red Cross has been fined since 2003.

Stop, thief!

Some people are really determined even when on the surface it seems they have nothing to gain. Here's an article from Reuters illustrating this.

BERLIN (Reuters) - A father of two in Germany stunned authorities when he chased down an auto thief by car, leapt onto the roof of the stolen vehicle and then phoned through instructions to police as the crook sped off with him.

Police in the western town of Siegburg said Tuesday the 43-year-old had first called in to say he had spotted the thief by his suspicious driving and was in pursuit -- despite the fact he had his wife and two young children in the car.

The man stopped the thief by crashing into the stolen car, slightly injuring his wife and one of the children.

Then, as the 29-year-old thief put the car in gear and drove off again, the father jumped onto the roof.

"The witness held onto the roof of the vehicle, phoned through his position to the local station and audibly attempted to pacify the car thief," police said in a statement.

After driving about half a mile, the thief let the man climb down, and was shortly afterwards apprehended by traffic police.

© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved.

The Iraq Study Group: A Minority View

The media have made a big deal about the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group. There have been claims that their report will advocate talking with a couple of our current enemies, Syria and Iran, and may suggest a pull-out date.

In a recent Christian Science Monitor article, Andrew Bacevich does not hold much hope that the Study Group will assess the reasons for our current situation and assign blame. I suspect he has a point.

A very different Town Meeting

Last night's Special Town Meeting for West Tisbury was very different from the previous three or four. There were no really contentious issues although the Board of Assessors was rebuffed once more.

The Board asked for $6500 needed to perform the triannual revaluation required by the state. The article lost on a voice vote (which I thought was too close for the moderator to call) due to the voters being concerned at the appearance of favoritism towards Vision Appraisal, the only company to whom the RFP was sent. Town customs and/or regulations usually require three bidders on a project. The Assessors claim that mass appraisal companies, such as Vision Appraisal, use clipping services to learn of opportunities and, thus, any company interested in bidding would have known of the opportunity. It's likely that this issue will be brought before the Annual Town Meeting as the Town must have this revaluation done in FY2008.

Another surprise was the approval of an article - to pay a past due bill - which required a 90% vote in favor.

The debate on most issues was informed and brief. Did the Finance Committee's televised hearings on their recommendations have an effect?

Who are your peers?

When I was hiring people for the various software companies I ran, one question I usually asked was, "What league do you belong to?" I wanted to find out what this person thought of his programming talent and whether he was basing his judgment on a realistic view of the programming world, for I think that, if we are experienced and honest enough, we have a pretty good idea of where we stand in a particular field, be that field programming, golf, writing, chess or our knowledge of zither players in 18th century Russia. We know to which peer group we belong and, most of the time, don't compare ourselves to those who are simply more accomplished in a particular field than we are. C'est la vie.

In the world of big business there is much talk of peer groups. Companies like to compare the performance of their stock with that of other companies in their peer group. We hear often that company x is paying their CEO $12,000,000 as that is a median salary in the executive's peer group. If you believe that the members of these particular peer groups are truly comparable, read Gretchen Morgenson's article in today's NY Times.

For example, the peers to which the NYSE compensation committee compared Grasso's pay had revenue more than twenty-five that of the NYSE, assets 125 times greater and thirty times the number of employees. How about Ford? Its peer group has many more non-auto companies than auto companies. Campbell Soup and Hewlett Packard use one peer group for compensation and a different peer group for stock performance.

Most companies claim that their executive's compensation is at about the 75th percentile in their industry. And you thought that Lake Woebegone where everybody is above average did not exist. It sure does exist in the world of the Fortune 2000.

Progress in Gaza?

Israel and Palestine have announced a cease fire in Gaza effective today. Hamas says it is giving Israel six months to create a Palestinian state. I doubt that six months is enough time, but at least there should be a modicum of peace there until the Spring.

Iranian propaganda?

From an interview with the Secretary of the Iranian Expediency Council (whatever that is):

Mohsen Rezai: Now, the [Iranian] officials should be careful not to view America and the West as clumsy and incapable people.

[...]

America's arrival in the region presented Iran with an historic opportunity. The kind of service that the Americans, with all their hatred, have done us - no superpower has ever done anything similar.

America destroyed all our enemies in the region. It destroyed the Taliban. It destroyed Mr. Saddam Hussein. It imprisoned the hypocrites [Mojahedin-e Khalq] in France. It did all this in order to confront us face to face, and in order to place us under siege. But the American teeth got so stuck in the soil of Iraq and Afghanistan that if they manage to drag themselves back to Washington in one piece, they should thank God. Therefore, America presents us with an opportunity rather than a threat – not because it intended to, but because its estimates were wrong. It made many mistakes.

In addition, America has now despaired of toppling the Islamic Republic. Therefore, the threats we face are not about toppling the Islamic Republic, but about blocking Iran's influence in the region. There were times when America was confronting the very essence of the Islamic Republic, but today it is confronting Iran's influence in the region. The entire nuclear dispute revolves around this. The Americans know that we do not have the atom bomb, and that we don't want to pursue the atom bomb. But the Americans claim that a nuclear Iran – even a peaceful one – will make its neighboring countries dependent upon it, and will expand Iran's influence in the region.

It may be propaganda but, with the exception of destroying the Taliban (which seems more and more unlikely) it sure sums up where we are today.

Not experts in filing

Homeland Security (DHS) hired a company to check how well the department was following federal contract regulations. So, they decided to look at 72 contracts. Unfortunately, they could only find the files for 39 of them. They substituted 33 different contracts to make the quota.

Of these final 72, 11 were "seriously inadequate", 47 met "minimum" standards and only 14 were in "excellent" shape. The DHS Inspector General says that the situation creates "a high risk of cost overruns, mismanagement or failure." Worse in the view of Charles Tiefer, who teaches law in Baltimore and is supposedly an expert on government contracting, "This strongly suggests that we're buying the wrong stuff, the wrong way, possibly from the wrong contractors, and failing to check before, during or after."

Don't you feel safer?

Is Pelosi working for the party and the country?

Or is she settling scores? Her backing of Murtha over her longtime ally was surprising. Now she does not seem willing to give the chair of the Intelligence Committee to the person next in line.

This time we can watch it as it happens

I don't think that there were any photographs of the Nazi concentration camps until they were liberated. In our modern 21st century world there are photographs of our 21st century holocaust - Darfur - as it is happening. Fittingly, the photographs are being shown at the U.S. Holocaust Museum.

It's not easy to know what is right sometimes

I still remember riding out of Jerusalem one day about thirty years ago. In those days you were surrounded by desert almost as soon as you left the city. But in the distance there was a speck of green. It grew larger and larger as we drove towards it. It was a farm. People - Israelis - had made the desert bloom. I was always a hard worker, but I knew then that the people who made the desert bloom had to have worked a lot harder than I and most people would or could.

Even in those days there was talk about Israel stealing the Palestinians' land and I suppose that is true in some (many? all?) cases. But it was obvious that the land was fallow for centuries and with superhuman effort the land was made to bear harvests. Why now should those who let the land sit there get the benefit of the work done by people who literally made the desert bloom?

So, today's news story that almost 40% of the land on which Israeli settlements sit is land owned by Palestinians brought back that day in Jerusalem.

Some boards are made of wood

I'm talking about boards of directors. For example, the board of FPL approved a deal wherein the company paid 'change of control' bonuses to its executives when a deal was signed, not when it was completed. As a result, shareholders gave up $62,000,000 in bonuses to compensate executives for a deal not made.

And some boards have just been taken by greedy CEOs who have overstated revenue and profits. Over 1000 companies have restated their results so far this year. How many of the executives running these companies have returned bonuses based on numbers that were false? I'd bet it's less than 1%.

Mirabile dictu

I went into work today, turned on my PC and, for some reason loaded Firefox. Lo and behold, my home page appeared on the screen. I was so surprised that I didn't realize for a minute or so that the Internet was functioning. I did nothing. Comcast must have done something, but, in line with their apparent philosophy of not communicating with the people who pay their bills, they were silent.

Bricklin pulls out

Earlier this year Malcolm Bricklin, early importer of the Subaru and Yugo, signed a deal to import the Chery from China. He's had second thoughts as to whether the quality and safety of the cars will be competitive in the U.S. and has pulled out of the deal. He still likes the cost equation of manufacturing cars in China and is looking for another deal.

Most of the established car manufacturers are focusing on selling -and building - their cars in China. Right now China seems to be almost in the same spot this country was at the start of the 20th century when there were car manufacturers galore.

The Comcast Cancer Spreads

Last week Comcast demonstrated its incompetence and anti-customer attitude with my home computer. This week is my work computer's turn.

Last Friday I spoke to Joanne at Comcast who told me we would be connected within a couple of hours and she would call me back then. Seventy-two hours later I had not heard from Joanne, so I called them again. The technician to whom I spoke realized that the problem required an on-site technician; I'd be called within two hours with a time for the appointment. You know that no one called back with 2+ hours. I called Pam who would research the issue and call me right back. After an hour I called back and the fun really began. I was connected with residential service, then commercial, then residential, then the Spanish line twice. Finally I was connected with an Adelphia person who seemed to know what he was doing. Unfortunately, he could not get me on-line. So the technician is due to come Wednesday morning.

So, I spent close to three hours on the telephone today, about 45 minutes of which was productive in that I spoke to someone who actually knew something. But, still no e-mail and no web. Also, still no response from the e-mail I sent to Ms Rudnay on Sunday, the 12th.

China comes to Boston

More and more people and institutions are jumping on the China bandwagon. They smell money.

From today's Boston Globe

The University of Massachusetts and the Chinese Ministry of Education plan to announce today the formation of a nonprofit public institute to promote the teaching and understanding of Chinese language and culture.

The University of Massachusetts Confucius Institute would be the seventh such institute in the country and the first sponsored by China in New England. China, which plans to create 100 institutes worldwide by 2010, has given UMass a $1 million grant to start its institution. It will be on the Boston campus.
...............................................................................................................................................................

UMass-Boston has signed cooperative agreements with 11 Chinese academic partners in recent years to promote academic exchanges, foreign study opportunities, and management training. The Chinese government will pay for 100 scholarships for a three-week cultural program in China. Wilson said he would like students to study in China for a semester or longer.

Worse than the average

More details of the National Assessment of Educational Progress are in. Eighth grade students of schools in large cities did not do well in the recent tests. They knew less about science than their colleagues around the country. Nationally, about 57% of eighth grade students passed the test. In some big cities 20% passed.

Understand the Enemy, Contain the Threat

Max Rodenbeck has an interesting review in the current issue of the NY Review of Books. He looks at a couple of books on terrorism, including our national security strategy, but focuses on "What Terrorists Want: Understanding the Enemy, Containing the Threat" by Louise Richardson. While the sub-title really describes the book's thrust, Rodenbeck summarizes twelve key points Richardson makes (highlights are mine):

1. Terrorism is anything but new. Violence by nonstate actors against civilians to achieve political aims has been going on for a long, long time. The biblical Zealots known as the Sicarii used it against the Romans, as well as against fellow Jews, in the vain hope of provoking the Imperium to so extreme a response that they would foment a mass uprising. Following the failed 1848 revolutions in Europe, the German radical Karl Heinzen published a tract, simply titled Murder, which advocated selective homicide as a spark to general revolt. Various groups soon put such ideas into practice. The Clerkenwell bombing of 1867, carried out by the Fenians, an Irish nationalist group, prompted a surge of hysteria in London reminiscent of the response provoked by September 11.

So, in later decades, did the wave of anarchist terrorism that swept Europe and the United States. Revolutionaries assassinated seven heads of state between 1881 and 1914. Paris suffered bomb attacks no fewer than eleven times between 1892 and 1894. In the 1930s and 1940s of the last century, Menachem Begin's Irgun organization slaughtered scores of Palestinian civilians and British soldiers. The Israeli leader went on to share a Nobel Peace Prize.

2. Terrorism is obviously a threat, and the deliberate killing of innocent civilians an outrage, but it is not a very big threat. As John Mueller points out in Overblown, his sadly funny, far less patient account of America's response to September 11, the probability of an American being killed by terrorists is about the same as of being felled by an allergic reaction to peanuts. Six times more Americans are killed every year by drunk drivers than died in the World Trade Center. (And more Americans have now died in Iraq and Afghan-istan.) Excepting a few particularly bad years, the annual number of deaths from terrorism worldwide since the late 1960s, when the State Department started record-keeping, is only about the same as the number of Americans who drown every year in bathtubs.

3. The danger from terrorist use of so-called weapons of mass destruction is not as large as scaremongers profess. Known chemical weapons do not, in fact, cause much wider damage than conventional weapons, and in addition they are difficult to use. The Japanese religious cult Aum Shinrikyo (Aum is Japanese for Supreme Truth), which had excellent technicians and facilities and plenty of money to brew lethal potions, discovered this when it tried to poison the Tokyo subway with sarin gas in 1995. Biological weapons are potentially more deadly, but also hard to make and to diffuse. As for nuclear weapons, there is no evidence that any terrorist group has ever come close to acquiring them. Placing all these dangers in a single category of threat is misleading, and greatly exaggerates the overall threat posed by terrorist groups around the world.

4. Many terrorists are not madmen. The choice to use terror can be quite rational and calculated. In his memoirs, Nelson Mandela recalls that the African National Congress debated what method to use to confront apartheid. Terrorism was considered, but scrapped, mercifully, in favor of sabotage attacks, for fear of alienating potential supporters. The IRA was murderous, but found that planting bombs and then warning of their presence was just as effective as setting them off in crowds. This tactic had the advantage of avoiding some of the "collateral damage" of bad publicity. Other terrorists, such as those linked with al-Qaeda, unfortunately, like bad publicity as much as good.

5. Groups that commit terrorism, in many cases, believe they are acting defensively, using the most effective means at their disposal. Their justifications can be self-serving and morally repugnant, but are often carefully elaborated. Some terrorists rely on the complicity of the people around them, and so must work to persuade them of their rectitude. Others operate in inhospitable environments, and aim more to shock and provoke. It is, Richardson emphasizes, important to distinguish these differing approaches, since they suggest different remedies.

6. Suicide attacks can also represent a rational policy choice. They are cheap. They can be a means of access to difficult targets. They are effective in frightening people, and in advertising the seriousness and devotion of those who undertake them. Typical suicide "martyrs" are not loners or misfits; in their will to die for a cause, they tend to be sustained by the strong solidarity of a close group of collaborators. They are often motivated by personal humiliation at the hands of those they wish to hurt, or they wish to take revenge for the killings of family members or comrades. Suicide attacks are not new, either. They were used, for example, since the nineteenth century by the Muslim Moros guerrillas against both Spanish and US invaders of the Philippines. Before Iraq, their most intensive use in modern times was not in the Middle East but in Sri Lanka, where, since 1987, Tamil rebels have killed hundreds of government soldiers in scores of suicide operations, often carried out by women.

7. There is no special link between Islam and terrorism. Most major religions have produced some form of terrorism, and many terrorist groups have professed atheism. If there is a particular tenacity in Islamist forms of terrorism today, this is a product not of Islamic scripture but of the current historical circumstance that many Muslims live in places of intense political conflict. Contemporary Islamist movements that resort to terrorism are, however, often strengthened in their appeal by the fact that they want to link a faith-based activism, intended to "transform" society, with ethnic and nationalist causes. Most other terrorist groups have not combined their intentions in this way. For instance, the IRA does not have "transformational" aims, as Richardson puts it, but rather territorial ones.

8. Electoral democracy does not prevent terrorism, which has flourished in many democracies, typically being used by groups representing minorities who believe the logic of majority rule excludes them. The Basque separatist group ETA and Greece's November 17th urban guerrillas started under dictatorships, but continued their attacks following transitions to democracy in both countries.

9. Democratic principles are no impediment to prosecuting terrorists. On the contrary they are, Richardson asserts, "among the strongest weapons in our arsenal." Pointedly, she recalls that during the Revolutionary War, George Washington, although incensed by Britain's policy of incarcerating American revolutionaries on grisly prison ships, where twice as many perished as on the battlefield, gave strict orders for the humane treatment of British captives.

10. Military action is sometimes necessary to combat terrorism, but it is often not the best way to do so. When Israel withdrew from southern Lebanon in 2000, after a twenty-two-year occupation, it left behind a far stronger and more determined adversary in Hezbollah than it had started with. The Peruvian army spent twenty years in an ugly, scorched-earth campaign against Sendero Luminoso guerrillas, during which nearly 70,000 people were killed. The group was defeated and disbanded after a change in tactics when a seventy-man police team took just six months, using incisive analysis and good intelligence, to capture its leader. In the cases where brute military action has succeeded, as in Uruguay and Argentina in the 1970s and 1980s, it was at the cost of democracy and human rights.

11. Armies, in fact, often create more problems than they solve. When Britain sent its army into Northern Ireland in 1969 in response to the Troubles, it took just two years for the majority of Catholics, who were at first relieved by their presence, to turn against them. The turnaround for the US in Iraq was far shorter. During the seven months between September 2003 and April 2004, as Charles Peña reminds us in Winning the Un-War, the proportion of Iraqis saying that attacks on foreign troops were somewhat or fully justified leapt from 8 percent to 61 percent. This was exactly the period when a sudden surge in attacks on US forces, following the initial post-invasion calm, prompted vigorous counterinsurgency measures. That is all the time it took, it seems, for Iraqis to decide they did not like being searched, beaten up, shot at, jailed, and humiliated by American troops, whatever the reasons given. Recent polls show some 61 percent of Iraqis still approve of attacking the Americans, and 78 percent believe the US presence is "provoking more conflict than it is preventing."

12. To address the issues terrorists say they are fighting for cannot automatically be dismissed as appeasement. Britain did not succeed in disarming the IRA by ignoring its de-mands but by engaging them, and by altering the situation in Northern Ireland that had created the IRA's perception of a threat to its goals. In fact, the conversion of terrorist groups in-to peaceful political movements has often occurred because their rationale for violence has ceased to exist, or because they came to feel that resort to terrorist tactics would limit their room for political maneuver.

I hope Gates has read the book.