Incurious George W. can't grasp democracy

Article

President George W. Bush possesses some considerable liabilities. He's not particularly bright and, as he showed by his fumbling responses in his press conference last week, he doesn't think quickly. Bush's most substantial liability is that he's incurious. He isn't interested in, and appears fundamentally unaware of, the existence of, other cultures, other countries, other ideas, and of people unlike himself — no matter whether they happen to be "others" or Americans.

But throughout the Islamic world there is a deep sense of unfairness about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. For example: Iraq ignores a United Nations resolution and gets invaded; Israel ignores every single U.N. resolution that applies to it and gets everything it wants. Bush is too incurious to notice. He doesn't know, that's to say, that no one who is totally incurious about other people, other ideas, other cultures, other values, can be a democrat.

'A costly blow to America's credibility'

'A costly blow to America's credibility'

So much for the constructive mediator. In a costly blow yesterday to America's credibility as an honest broker for a Middle East peace, President Bush endorsed Israeli plans to retain some West Bank settlements and to essentially reject the Palestinians' "right of return".

For Peace

"Peace we want because there is another war to fight; against poverty and disease."
-- Indira Gandhi --

The Hispanic Challenge

A very controversial article by Samuel Huntington - The Hisphanic Challenge

Finally found time to read this article forwarded by Raj. He writes:
Samuel Huntington is also known for his famous 1998 book
'The clash of civilizations and the remaking of world order'
in which he predicts that the world in the 21st century will
be shaped by a power struggle between 4 major blocs: Western,
Islamic, Chinese and Indian. Very eloquent and readable book.

Greatest Bengali

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/3623345.stm

Listeners of the BBC's Bengali service have voted Bangladesh's first president, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the "Greatest Bengali of All Time". Sheikh Mujibur, assassinated in 1975, easily beat Nobel prize-winning poet and playwright Rabindranath Tagore.

My personal favorites: Vivekananda & Netaji were 8th and 5th respectively. And of course Jagadish Bose was 7th.

Iraq and Vietnam: Two Wars, Parallel Tracks (NYTimes Opinion Letter)

To the Editor:

In "Take a Deep Breath" (column, April 10), David Brooks tells us all to "get a grip," and he compares Senators Ted Kennedy and Robert Byrd to Chicken Little. Well, Mr. Brooks, look up, because the sky is falling.

The comparison of Iraq to Vietnam couldn't be plainer: manipulated public opinion to justify a war on a contained country that was no real direct threat to us; two arrogant and unyielding defense secretaries who used real soldiers like chess pieces to justify a prototypical ground war theory; porous borders impossible to seal off; hatred and distrust of Americans by the people we're trying to help; and an isolated United States with no real support from the rest of the world.

I returned from fighting for my country in Vietnam 35 years ago, but it doesn't take a scholar to see the parallels of that war to this one.

LEN DISESA
Durham, N.H., April 10, 2004

Zimbabwe farmers plight

In relation to what we were discussing yesterday. I agree that resolving all historical mistakes by violence is not the solution. But, accepting what bad things happened before to fate, and not trying in any way to correct those mistakes might not be the solution either. You can read a lot about this in press. Of course, take the british newspapers with a grain of salt because of obvious reaons.

Quote - "The struggle to take back this land was the motor force behind the war against white rule which led to victory in 1980. Zimbabwe's white farmers have owned much of the country's best agricultural land since they took it under colonial rule when blacks were forced off their ancestral lands."
http://www.workerspower.com/wpglobal/Zim-farmers.html

An Iraqi woman says

"Shit on Bush because he made this crisis," she continues. "What does he want? Why have these people come all the way from America to do this to us? Why is he doing it?"

"Did we knock on his door," she asks. "Bush comes and barges in to our house and we're not to fight?"

Could not have put it better

The Iraqis have discovered that the freedom the Americans introduced means humiliation, enslavement and the usurpation of Arab resources so that America can grow richer by starving and subduing the people.

Commentator in Kul Al-Arab - Israeli Arab

War front

Is Iraq another Vietnam?
The veteran Democratic Senator, Edward Kennedy, has described Iraq as George Bush's Vietnam - the long war that ended in humiliating retreat for the United States in 1975.

More on Iraq war

Bush and Blair made secret pact for Iraq war

Why can't the American public read these news? The British for all their faults, seem much more educated and aware.