Ebola-like virus found among troops in Afghanistan

The Washington Times, in an exclusive story written by Sara Carter, reports that an American soldier has died in southern Afghanistan from infection with an Ebola-like virus, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever. It may have been transmitted by a tick (as an arbovirus) and probably is transmitted among people only by blood or body fluid contact. The link for the story is here. All of this reminds me of a couple of major books in the 1990s that dealt with Marburg and Ebola: Richard Preston: The Hot Zone (1994); Laurie Garrett: Coming Plague: Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance (1994). Preston maintains that we barely missed a pandemic from one strain that might bave been more contagious, Ebola Reston.

The relative transmissibility of infectious disease is always controversial and tends to be confusing to the public. In the 1980s the CDC and NIH had to work hard to convince the general public that HIV is not casually transmitted. But it has to turn an about face with H1N1 and H5N1. Ebola seems to be somewhere in the middle but it is even more dangerous.

Georgia (former Soviet republic) blogger targeted, leading to DOS attacks (August)

A blogger, identified by the names of Giorgi Cyxymu, an economics professor in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, was the target of a massive DOS attack on Twitter, Facebook and LiveJournal last summer, according to a New York Times story (Business Day)Aug. 8, 2009 by Jenna Wortham and Andrew E. Kramer, link here. It looks like I missed this story in August.

The story is important in that it shows that, at least overseas, controversial bloggers could become “targets” and be viewed as nuisances by the international (often American) companies that host them, challenging the companies to absorb some risk in order to provide free speech. Imagine how important this point would be in reporting the unrest after the “elections” in Iran.

Attribution link for Wikimedia modern map of Georgia.

India faces Maoist insurgence; another perspective on the old Iron Curtain

The November 1, 2009 print edition of The New York Times has a surprising article about the resurgence of Communism by Jim Yardley, “Rebels widen deadly reach across India,” link here. There is a color picture of a government guard in Barsur, in the Indian state of Chattisgarh, watching for Maoist guerllias.

Maoism? Yes, the resurgence of the most moralist form of Communism, from Communist China of the 1960s, where Chairman Mao Tse-Tung forced intellectuals into the countryside to take their turn living as peasants. Call it a “pay your dues” system of morality if you like. Left-wing writers in the 1970s imagined Maoism as “absolutely perfect justice at the personal level”. But you wouldn’t want to actually live it; we can just afford to ponder it now from the distance of history. Or imagine that today’s economic dislocations in the “bourgeoisie” West have imposed a “free market cultural revolution.”

And back in the 1970s, before the collapse of the Soviet Union, people on the streets would still speak of “pinko Commies”, while radical groups like the Peoples Party of New Jersey (Benjamin Spock’s) would develop platforms limiting a maximum income to $50000 a year!

The story doesn’t mention the cultural revolution, as is more concerned about how India can contain threats to its industrial operations in the eastern part of the country where rebels are common. It seems that similar problems go on in oil rich areas like Nigeria (and what about Venezuela?) .

If you want another perspective on the fall of Communism, in Germany especially, look at Rachel Bartlett’s “Live Journal” with this essay “Human Nature ant the Coming Crisis I”, here.

Wikipedia attribution link for map of India.

Update: Nov. 2, 2009

Check the op-ed "Murderous Idealism", by Paul Hollander, link here. The core point of his piece goes like this: "They also shared an ostensible commitment to creating a morally superior human being -- the socialist or communist man. Political violence under communism had an idealistic origin and a cleansing, purifying objective. Those persecuted and killed were defined as politically and morally corrupt and a danger to a superior social system."

Filial responsibility law in Singapore; Shariah in Banda Aceh; Hajj cautions on H1N1

On p. 106 of the book “Super Freakanomics” by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, the authors mention that “some governments … require grown children to visit or support their aging moms and dads. In Singapore, this law is known as the Maintenance of Parents Act.” Singapore is one of the most “pro-family” capitalist states in the world.

I found a blog called “Spotlight on Elder Abuse” that discusses the Singapore law in a posting on Feb 29, 2008, here. The posting discusses the Tribunal for the Maintenance of Parents and indicates that fathers use the law more than mothers, but that pursuits are quite successful in Singapore. The blog posting (by Braema Mathi) says that Singapore is the only nation in the world with a law like this, but in the United States, about 28 states have “poor laws” or “filial responsibility laws”, as discussed on my “Bill Retires” blog, particularly in July 2007.

The text for the Singapore law is here.

Radical Islam is better known for extreme “family conservatism” (if you can include polygamy in some countries). Recently the New York Times, in an article Oct. 29 by Norimitsu Orishi, reported on the locally strict application of Shariah in Banda Aceh, the western tip province of Indonesia so hard hit in the 2004 tsunami. The story is “Extremism spreads across Indonesian penal code”, link here. Indonesian states have local options as to applying Shariah, and apparently in this province the possibility of stoning of adulterers is real.

Donal J. McNeil reports in the New York Times Oct. 30, “Saudis try to head off swine flu fears before hajj”, link here. Saudi Arabia is asking some people, including pregnant women, not to make the trip this year, where the event is held at the end of November.

(Look at "Bill Retires" blog Aug. 12, 2007 for filial responsibility in Canada and Australia; see Profile.)

Two men in Chicago arrested in connection with Danish Cartoon Controversy

The media reports the arrest of two men in Chicago for plotting an attack on the offices of a newspaper in Denmark that published the cartoons of Muhammed in the Jylands-Posten Muhammad Cartoon Controversy. A typical story is that of Warren Richey in the Christian Science Monitor, link here.

The FBI has a press release from the US Attorneys office, Northern District of Illinois, here

It seems amazing to westerners that some people would make so much of what seems like a trivial “insult”. But radical Islam worships its own idea of perfection.

Musicians seek to know if their work was used to torture prisoners at Gitmo

The National Campaign to Close Guantanamo has criticized the use of musicians’ songs to torture Muslim prisoners. The news story is by Audrey Hudson on o A5 in the Friday Oct. 23, 2009 Washington Times. The link for the news story is here.

The National Security Archive at the George Washington University files a FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) request to discover the way the music is chosen. Music used in the past includes AC/DC, the Barney theme song, Marilyn Manson to Neil Diamond, Tupac Shakur to Sesame Street, Limp Bizkit to Christina Aguilera. GWU has an account of the story here.

Bernie Becker has a similar blog story in the New York Times here.

In 1978, an Italian prisoner (of Baader-Meinholf, as I recall) was tortured by having loud classical music blasted into his ears, causing deafness.

There is a site with an open letter to “Close Gitmo New”, by that name.

Cuba denies "Generation Y" blogger right to travel

“Generation Y” is a blog for people in Cuba for people with names containing “Y”, with link here.

The Cuban government has refused Yoani Sánchez permission to travel to New York to receive an international journalism award. The Amnesty International link for the story (“Blogger denied freedom to travel outside Cuba) is here. Cuba has also blocked access to the blog within the country, but reportedly there are many workarounds to the block, some of which have been covered here before (and by Electronic Frontier Foundation), in conjunction with similar blocks in Iran.

The story was also carried this morning Oct. 14 on CNN’s American Morning.

Are Pakistan's suitcase nukes secure from "militants"?

MSNBC has carried an AP story questioning whether Pakistan’s suitcase nukes are vulnerable, given a recent assault on Pakistani military headquarters by “militants”. The link is here.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

The attacks come at a time when foreign policy makers debate whether the Taliban and Al Qeada are a single “enemy” or whether Taliban elements should be dealt with on a case-by-case basis. John McCain addressed this point last night.

It's well to bear in mind Sam Nunn's "Nuclear Threat Initiative" and the film "The Last Best Chance" about accounting for radioactive waste around the world.

Hillary Clinton talks about Twitter, cell phone technology in Iran, Afghanistan

Today, Saturday October 10, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the CNN Christine Amanpour on her “Power & Persuasion” hour that the State Department had worked with Twitter during the Iran election crisis to keep the site up, when it needed maintenance, so that dissidents could continue communicating. She also said that the department had place cell phone towers in Afghanistan in order to provide opposition to Taliban communications from FM broadcasts from mobile vehicles.

The CNN link is the “Amanpour eclusive interview with Clinton, Gates” here.

Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize, apparently for expression or publication of an intellectual "concept"

President Obama spoke briefly this morning from the Rose Garden after learning that he had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. His remarks are posted in his own blog (posting title "Building a World that "Gives Life to the Promise of Our Founding Documents") entry here.

Russia Today has a video on the award. There were 204 names on the committee’s shortlist. The award does not have the intrigue of the Irving Wallace novel or movie of “The Prize”. Most observers see the award as prospective, based on a concept that the president has laid out in his speeches and writings (generally following the steps of Jimmy Carter), not on positive accomplishments (resume-style) in the first nine months in office.



President Obama will address the Human Right Campaign national dinner in Washington on Saturday October 120.

Wikileaks: British government suspicious of many journalists

Wikileaks has a complicated story suggesting that the British government regards journalists (and perhaps bloggers) as potential security threats, along with hackers, members of disaffecte groups, and the like. The link is here. The leak comes from the “UK MoD Manual of Security Volumes”, not exactly calling for a book review!

The document goes on to describe particular concerns with links to both China and Russia, in comparison to more often touted concerns about Muslim extremism in Britain.

Iran make have backed down on Uranium

According to major media sources, Iran has agreed to open its uranium enrichment facility near Qum to international inspection (the IAEA) and to export most of its uranium to the West and to Russia. Officials are concerned, however, that Iran could very well conceal stockpiles of enriched uranium.

Iran is thought to have enough enriched Uranium to make at least one conventional atomic weapon soon. Tehran says that its reactor is intended to make medical isotopes and these are well below weapons grade, and have not been shaped into rods.

The New York Times story by Scott Erlanger and John Lander is here.

However, Jimmy Carter has said that the United States should work carefully with Iran and not threaten it, link here.

Eight years after 9/11 with relative safety at home

CNN National Correspondent Jason Carroll has a 3 minute video exploring why we have not had a major homeland attack since 9/11/2001.


Ironically the video offers subtitles in Arabic.

The video discusses the setup of the Department of Homeland Security in 2002 and the early efforts of Tom Ridge, who often appeared on Nightline and even answered public questions. The assimilation of Muslims into American society (compared to what happens in Britain, France and even the Netherlands) was mentioned. In the US, most cells are very small and have little motivation, unless they have an unusually motivated leader with contacts, as with the recent Denver and New York arrests of Zazi and others. The video interviews the head of the NYPD.

Iran makes verbal nuclear "threat", then backs down; Obama, others condemn Iran at G20

"God willing, this plant will be put into operation soon, and will blind the eyes of the enemies," That quote from an Iranian official has stoked fears in the West that Iran really is developing nuclear weapons and might try to deploy them, in the Middle East against Israel, or even conceivably for an EMP blast (a grim possibility that the Washington Times repeatedly brings up).

However, Iranian officials also say that IAEA can inspect their new plant. The CNN story is here.

All of this goes on while the president visits the G-20 conference in Pittsburgh, with this story in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette about the President’s condemnation of the 2nd site in Iran.

CNN has this video of the president with leaders of Britain and France.

On CNN on Sunday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates told John King that the major concern is that Iran puts its nuclear facilities deeply underground, increasing suspicion. Gates also said that there is no military option that does more than buy time, a couple years or so.

Obama addresses global warming, middle East at UN; Washington Post analyzes health care in France

On Tuesday, President Obama gave an address on global warming at the United Nations, the text of which is here.

One of the most important points in the speech was this sentence:

“We must also energize our efforts to put other developing nations -- especially the poorest and most vulnerable -- on a path to sustained growth. These nations do not have the same resources to combat climate change as countries like the United States or China do, but they have the most immediate stake in a solution.”

But The Washington Times, in a story by Jon Ward and Christina Bellantoni, put on a different spin Wednesday with the story "Chinese plan upstages Obama at U.N.Rate this story: U.S. warns world leaders of 'irreversible catastrophe'", link here.

At the same time, the administration is maintaining that Israel and the Palestinians must start making more progress on a two-state solution without insisting on resolving the psychologically and morally divisive issue of the West Bank settlements.

All of this is going on the same day that the Homeland Security department issued warnings related to the recent arrests in Denver and New York, as discussed on the TV blog.

Today (Sept. 23), Edward Cody of the Washington Post Foreign Service wrote an article in which he explains that the health care system in France has larger private components than most people think. The piece is titled “For French, U.S. Health Debate Hard To Imagine: But National Insurance Faces New Challenges” link here. I recall a conversation at a train station in Toulouse, France in May 2001 where a family told me that the French health care system “worked for them.”

Attribution link for Wikimedia Commons picture of UN General Assembly hall.