BBC NEWS | South Asia | Afghan 'anti-women law' attacked

Technorati Tags: afghanistan,hamid karzai,kabul,human rights,anti-women laws,sunni,shia

BBC NEWS | South Asia | Afghan 'anti-women law' attacked [Source: BBC News]

This news article leaves me a little speechless. The Afghan government is wholly supported by the United States government. That is to say, if our military was not present, this government would not exist. Said again, if our military could all come home from Afghanistan tomorrow, the government would fold before the last plane left the Kabul airfield.

The law, signed into being last month, limits the rights of Shia women. No longer can they leave the house without their husband’s permission. Wives cannot deny their husbands sex. I am sure other restrictions apply, these are the only two notable restrictions. I also found from a Canadian source that the law stipulates that wives and daughters must “preen” themselves whenever the husband/father orders.

The argument set forth is that Hamid Karzai needs votes to win the next election. The Shia Muslims represent 10% of the population. In allowing the Shia to establish their own family laws, the possibility exists that the Sunni Muslims will also be allowed to establish their own family laws, as well. By allowing various segments of society to establish their own rules, everyone wins, and, I am guessing, Hamid Karzai wins, too.

However, I feel that the U.S. is somewhat complicit in all of this, since we are propping up Hamid Karzai. What good is supporting a “democracy” that allows its population to be subjugated? How much of a “democracy” can the government in Kabul be if an entire gender has laws passed that keep that gender repressed?

Our connection to the Afghani government, the human rights concerns that these laws fly in face of, continues to put the United States on the edge of a moral precipice, an edge I wish we could back away from – safely.

Tech Startups Don’t Need the Valley Unless They Need VC

Tech Startups Don’t Need the Valley Unless They Need VC [Source: Gigaom]

 

Technopole: a location with plenty of venture capital, a highly educated workforce, ancillary and support businesses, a research university in close proximity, a climate conducive to business ventures, and a pleasant atmosphere for raising a family.

But is venture capital really required? Is growing fast and growing big really a condition for technology startups?

Business founders and consultants suggest that the days of reliance upon the Bay Area (San Francisco Bay) may be numbered. Educated people of entrepreneurial spirit can be found around the world, from Madison, Wisconsin to Beijing, China.

Entrepreneurs are also looking for ways to balance family life, and women entrepreneurs are finding ways around the startup culture found in Silicon Valley.

The United States government should foster the grow of technopoles beyond those that exist today. Distributing technopoles around the country helps lessen the reliance upon few center of technology, helps distribute the possible wealth of such a location, helps distribute talented people, and assists in dispersing the technology infrastructure of the country.

Technorati Tags: technopole,venture capital,silicon valley,penelope trunk,entrepreneur,technology,startup,geography

Geography professor claims to have found Osama bin Laden - [Source: Telegraph]

Technorati Tags: pakistan,osama bin laden,parachinar,GIS,geography,crime,analysis,animal movement

Geography professor claims to have found Osama bin Laden – Telegraph

An interesting article, and for my geography students, excellent Geography Journal fodder. Geographers, not just one as this article title alludes, have developed a model to narrow the search for Osama bin Laden. In fact, their analysis have identified the area within the red box as the most likely candidate for his home.

The article cites animal distribution theories as the basis for establishing this location. GIS is a potent tool for the analysis of habitats, whether those habitats be associated with squirrels or terrorists. Software tools are available that use Animal Movement algorithms for crime analysis. Why not use these same tools to find UBL?

The geographers, according to the article, narrowed the scope of UBL’s habitat to about three houses in a city, Parachinar, of about 500,000 people. That, to me, anyway, seems like a stretch.

Noting the map above, the city is a plausible host for UBL. The city is the closest one can get to Afghanistan without crossing into Afghanistan. A city of 500,000 would allow someone like UBL to hide without his presence being common knowledge. Many services would most likely be available to him, medical, telecommunications, internet, grocery stores, and the like. The close proximity to Kabul would allow him to maintain contact with Al-Qaeda associates within Afghanistan. Parachinar also lies along the route to Peshawar (pop: 3 million) and Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan (pop: 1.5 million) and Rawalpindi (pop: 3 million).

Parachinar is also located in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), which is an oxymoron. The FATA is anything but administered by the Pakistani federal government; more like an area owned and operated by the same tribes that the government would like to think that it administers. By taking up residence within the FATA, UBL is assured protection by Taliban supporters, Al-Qaeda supporters, anti-American factions, and those seeking to topple the Pakistani government.

Best Affordable Places To Break a Hip, I mean Retire [Source: USNews.com]

South Bend, Ind.: Best Affordable Places To Retire - USNews.com

I'm not going to argue the southern states. Those are a give-me. People of retirement age move south. The climate is better, generally, and the South & Southwest caters to the those that need assisted-living.

The elderly do not really care for cold weather. That is a broad generalization, based on my snowbird father who flies the Kansas City coup to take up his winter residence in the motorhome parks of Florida.

Seeing Eau Claire, WI, Pittsburgh, PA, and South Bend, IN in the list surprised me. Why was I not surprised about Omaha? It's easier to break a prisoner out of Sing-Sing than to get a Nebraskan out of the Cornhusker State.

Eau Claire, Wisconsin features 26-miles of trails along the Chippewa River, which I can see would be of great advantage to those that are in the less ambulatory years of their life. What better place to break a hip? The pleasure of being feasted upon by mosquitos, badgers, or perhaps a black bear waiting for help to arrive is unparalleled.

As for Pittsburgh, PA, who would seriously considering retiring to Pittsburgh? Violent crime is 1.78 above the national average. However, there are a lot of old people that live in Pittsburgh, and apparently they have developed a significant health presence to address the needs of the elderly. Learn something new everyday, I do. Sometimes, I relearn something. Still; Pittsburgh?

And that leaves South Bend, IN. Again, I am having a problem with the selection of South Bend. Home to Notre Dame University, with enrollment according their web site a little under 12,000, is about 1/10th of the population. Not too bad. Not a bunch of kiddies driving around, acting goofy. South Bend is a northern city, the weather gets cold, they have snow. With Pittsburgh, I looked into elderly services, of which Pittsburgh has many. Doing the same for South Bend did not result in the same details. If South Bend is setup for an sizeable elderly population, the facts must be buried several pages deep in Google.

The statistics for the 2010 Census will be interesting to evaluate. From 1990 to 2000, the West and the South saw the greatest increases in the older population. I am guessing that trend continued from 2000 to 2010 (which will actually measure 1999 - 2009).

Source of the Amazon River : Bigger, Better, and Longer!

Source of the Amazon River : Image of the Day

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wouldn't life be easier if we could rely on things not changing, just being static, same thing, day-in, day-out?

Sounds pretty lame if you ask me. However, textbook publishers would probably love it. Maybe not; that is after all how they make their money. Make a change, an edit, and now everyone has to by a new edition. Same thing with software. Want to write or read new file types, well, buy version 10 because is has all new enhancements we didn't include in version 9 because we need a reason for you to buy version 10! And version 11 will be out in 6 months!

And now we have Brazilian team that has put to bed the question of which river is better, I mean bigger, I mean longer, as obviously the Amazon River has suffered from inadequacy issues stemming from the Nile River being longer ...

Well, now the Amazon is not only the largest river system in the world, but also the longest river system in the world. Sorry, Nile :( I think the Nile is a more confident river system, though, and doesn't need its ego stroked as much.

I think the Nile is feminine, anyway. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong.

Cyber spy network with global reach raises alarms | csmonitor.com

Cyber spy network with global reach raises alarms [Source: Christian Science Monitor]

I'm sorry but to me news like our CSM article here is not news. I am not surprised that China, whether sanctioned or not, is trying to hack computers globally. And the correct term is "crack" and not "hack." Hacking involves coding - programming.

Next thing we know, we will have an expose on "Bears That Crap in the Woods," or exclusive tantalizing photos of "The Pope and His Hat."

The United States attempts to penetrate foreign government servers, and foreign governments, and yes, even our alleged allies try to penetrate our government servers.

Eastern Europe, Romania, Hungaria, Croatia, Belarus, and, oh, yes, Russia. Lots of Russia would like to crack into U.S. computer networks. Just ask Estonia. They are frequently on the receiving end of Russia cyberattacks.

I would not be surprised if a NATO country or two wouldn't be trying to get in to our computer networks. Or Israel.

South Koreans have been implicated in cyber attacks. And North Korea just goes without saying. They probably have people working day and night, eating small bowls of rice, attacking foreign governments.

As for this report being a wake-up call, what group of nitwits is asleep at the switch? (pardon the pun) The U.S. government should be awake and monitoring our networks 24/7/365.

The questions our healthcare debate ignores | Salon

The questions our healthcare debate ignores [Source: Salon]

Joe Conason writes a decent article compared to many I have read regarding the comparison of U.S. health care concerns versus health care concerns abroad.

As the article states, there is no argument that a "gross" discrepancy exists in the value of U.S. health care and the value we receive for that health care. At least I do not know enough to argue the point. I do wonder, though, which OECD members have a health care system that is as robust and mature as ours, that invests in research and development as much as the U.S. does, and that produces as much medical scholarship as we do.

Apparently, quoting the Salon article, the study found that the United States ranks poorly among OECD countries on measures of life expectancy, infant mortality and reductions in "amenable mortality," meaning deaths "from certain causes that should not occur in the presence of timely and effective healthcare." There is not doubt on these points that some health care concerns could be better in the United States. But why should this be? Lets consider the members, first:

Australia - Austria - Belgium - Canada - the Czech Republic - Denmark - Finland - France Germany - Greece - Hungary - Iceland - Ireland - Italy - Japan - South Korea - Luxembourg - the Netherlands - New Zealand - Norway - Poland - Portugal - the Slovak Republic - Spain Sweden - Switzerland - and the United Kingdom

By in large, most of these countries in the list are European countries. Not just any European countries, but the power houses, the most mature - and also the most homogenous, the most educated, and the most wealthy. Noted exceptions to this is South Korea and Japan, obviously not European, though they also qualify as being highly educated and homogenous.

The United States, as happens frequently, then gets compared to countries of a smaller size, both in total area and poopulation, that is not anywhere close to having a population of the same historic, genetic, linguistic, ethnic, or cultural backgrounds - meaning we are anything but homogenous. Though educated, we are not the most highly educated people in the world, regardless of what we would like to think. Furthermore, comparisons like this lump all 50 states into the same pot, thereby diminishing those states that are doing things well, and hiding those states that really need help.

Additionally, many of those countries listed, if not all, have rules about involvement of pharmaceutical companies in the media, lobbying doctors and politicians, and spending unnecesary money on marketing and publicity. Secondly, in most of these countries, the health care workers are state employees. In other words, in the United States we tend to allow free market competition to drive our health care system whereas abroad the governments place strict controls on how much doctors can make, and the cost of medicines and procedures. How many of our doctors would be willing to draw a state salary instead of a quasi-free market salary? Lastly, in many of those countries, and this could actually work in the U.S., insurance involves not only the government, but the individual AND the employer. All contribute to the health care system costs.

Talking all of this into consideration, I can only imagine that anyone who supports universal health care AND is using the above countries as examples can only support SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. That is what I just describe above. All of those countries utilize SOCIALIZED MEDICINE in some form or fashion. And this makes drug companies and health care companies in the United States extremely fearful, as socialized medicine hits their bottom line.

I'm a Cynic. I wonder how many people would still go into health care if they knew they would become a state employee, just like the state trooper or the Fish & Wildlife Officer, an his/her salary would be dictated by the government? I wonder what would happen to the real cost of drugs if pharmaceutical companies were restricted from advertising.

How would the whole calculus of our medical economy change in light of a new paradigm?