51 Replies to “Reader Tips”

  1. Ok, here is the solution;
    Al Gore can keep his $100 Million if he reverses global warming — yes, man made global warming.
    Big Al wins and we win —- saved from frying.
    All he has to do is paint all the Stevenson Screens.
    Deal ?

  2. Good evening, ladies & gentlemen. Tonight we have a special edition of SDA Late Nite Radio in honour of the recently departed Mr. Oscar Peterson. We’ll always treasure you Mr. Peterson, even as we miss you. I listened to a couple of my Peterson LPs yesterday; y’all can find a lot of Mr. Peterson’s works at video.google.com by searching for “Oscar Peterson”. Of the dozens I’ve listened to there so far, I’d say start with this, here’s Goodbye by the Oscar Peterson trio in 1961:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Ebo12xg4ws

  4. In the video, GM’s Bob Lutz says “we made a mistake” on hybrids because GM did not think it would be “important.”
    Well, not exactly a mistake the way Bob puts it because there were “legitimate reasons.” Bob says U.S. corporate structure with their “fiduciary duty” would mean going to the board to green light a “multi-hundred million dollar program that was going to lose money” and that would be difficult, of course. While at Toyota, where the “name is on the building,” the “quasi-owners” can say “I want to build a hybrid and I don’t care if it costs me a couple of hundred million dollars.”
    AutoblogGreen.com
    = TG

  5. Why boys should be allowed to play with toy guns
    By Laura Clark and Sarah Harris
    The Daily Mail, 2007-12-28
    tinyurl.com/25tkar
    “Playing with toy weapons helps the development of young boys, according to new Government advice to nurseries and playgroups. Staff have been told they must resist their “natural instinct” to stop boys using pretend weapons such as guns or light sabres in games with other toddlers. Fantasy play involving weapons and superheroes allows healthy and safe risk-taking and can also make learning more appealing, says the guidance.”

  6. Physician, Heal Thyself.
    Back at Gristmill, Andrew Dessler stands by his cancer/doctor analogy in the in-whom-do-we-trust war, after some comments on his blog:
    The complexity of climate change does not suddenly make a sociologist, economist, computer programmer, etc. a credible skeptic. In fact, the weakness of Inhofe’s list is readily apparent by the very fact that he had to include such people on his list.
    The crown jewels of skeptics are Lindzen, Christy, Singer, etc., but as I’ve said before, there are only a small number of them. In order to bulk up the list, Inhofe lowered his criteria to basically include anyone who doesn’t believe in climate change — regardless of their technical background in the subject.
    As far as my analogy being unsuitable, I stand by it. If your child is sick, you take him/her to the experts. Ditto if your planet is sick. You don’t take either your child or a planet to a sociologist or economist.
    For the uninitiated, here is the lowdown: Andrew Dessler is a professor at the Department of Atmospheric Sciences, Texas A&M University. He is complaining about a US senate report which listed hundreds of individuals who have been reported in the media during 2007 as speaking against the “scientific consensus” on climate change, claiming that they are scientists. The report naturally challenges the very principle of the consensus, which has given climate policies the authority they have needed to be carried forward. The global warming camp have sought to undermine the value of this new list, by claiming that the scientists lack scientific qualifications, expertise, or moral integrity.
    But Dessler has made a significant concession here. He is visibly shifting from the idea that the power of the consensus comes from the weight of scientific opinion – numbers. An “overwhelming number” of scientist’s opinions might indicate that the “science” had been tested. Now, you have to be qualified to have an opinion on climate change. But Dessler doesn’t tell us exactly how we are to measure the qualifications, we just have to take his word for it that the 400 sceptics aren’t qualified, but the IPCC scientists are. So it’s not simply a consensus, it’s a qualified consensus, and he gets to call the qualification. So much for science. So, apparently, the IPCC scientists who represent the consensus are more qualified than their counterparts. They are akin to the experts you would trust your desperately ill child to, not the ragbag of mavericks you would avoid. Worse still, many of the sceptics are in fact mere computer programmers or – gasp – sociologists!
    We decided to test Dessler’s claim. So we downloaded IPCC WGII’s latest report on “Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability”. …-
    http://tinyurl.com/32pxm9 (climateresistanceorg)

  7. In a bit of a change from its usual strategy, “Al-Qaeda denies killing Bhutto.” From the report:
    “Islamabad — Al Qaeda-linked Pakistani militant Baitullah Mehsud was not involved in the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, his spokesman said on Saturday.
    “‘I strongly deny it. Tribal people have their own customs. We don’t strike women,’ Mr. Mehsud’s spokesman Maulvi Omar said by telephone from an undisclosed location.”
    “Pakistan’s government asserted Friday that al-Qaeda was behind the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, and offered the transcript from a phone tap as proof. Hundreds of thousands mobbed her funeral as the army tried to quell rioting across the nation that left 27 dead.
    “President Pervez Musharraf’s government also said Ms. Bhutto was not killed by gunshots or shrapnel as originally claimed. Instead, it said her skull was shattered by the force of a suicide bomb blast that slammed her against a lever in her car’s sunroof….”

  9. Dead Trees have found another use, in addition to lighting wood stoves, lining bird cages, wrapping fish/chips, etc. MSM is being buried, literally. Say, Amen, wk. Amen, wk. …-
    ‘Green funerals’ feature biodegradable coffins
    […]
    Cynthia Beal with an Ecopod, a biodegradable coffin made out of recycled newspaper.[…]
    the Ecopod, a kayak-shaped coffin made out of recycled newspapers. […]
    http://tinyurl.com/29n9zw (cnn)
    …-
    Elsewhere, the green mania evolves:
    Theodore Dalrymple
    Separation Anxiety
    Divorcees are bad for the environment. Do environmentalists care? […]
    Will environmentalists march down the streets with banners reading SAVE THE PLANET: STAY WITH THE HUSBAND YOU HATE?
    For myself, I doubt it. Yet these figures, if true, are certainly suggestive. The fact that there will be no demonstrations against environmentally destructive divorcees, who probably emit as much extra carbon dioxide as the average SUV, suggests that the desire to save the planet is not nearly as powerful as the desire to destroy a way of life. http://tinyurl.com/yt3m9t
    (city journal)

  10. Locky the Locksmith is a skeptic/denier; says the i-snake is no buggywhip. The “experts” call him for advice/help all the time. Even bankers/estate executors/trixs rely on him for opening moribund safety deposit boxes. Locky is a real expert and knows keyhole surgery inside out with 35 years of keyhole surgery experience. …-
    i-Snake ‘will transform surgery’
    Experts are developing a flexible surgical robot, known as the i-Snake, which they say could revolutionise keyhole surgery. (national newswatch)

  12. Interesting, but the G&M has a poll asking whether the West should continue to send aid to Pakistan. The majority, as of 11:00 am, is over 60% rejection of aid.
    I agree. Pakistan is imploding and must be allowed to implode. It’s an entangled morass of two contradictory social structures, the tribal and the industrial. If we send aid, we enable this gangreneous entanglement to continue, and the situation will actually worsen.
    Only one social structure can operate in a population; we must allow the implosion so that only one emerges. It will be the industrial one; then, and then only, should the West step in to help. Not now.
    As for the fears of their nuclear ability, I’m going to say that’s irrelevant. Yes, irrelevant. Not only because if they used it, we, via our unacknowledged protection of the USA, would obliterate them – but, they won’t use it. We shouldn’t continue to support a degenerate morass because of ‘nuclear blackmail’. That blackmail only exists because of that entangled morass.
    First, allow the internal implosion to end the morass. Then, assist them to develop in a constructive manner.

  13. Scan through the comments in this Daily Mail article to realize there are still a few British Bulldogs railing against the ever-encroaching Nanny State:
    New super-cameras mean no hiding for drivers who smoke, eat or use a phone.
    Digital speed cameras that capture drivers smoking or eating at the wheel are being introduced nationwide in a new move to hammer motorists.
    Drivers will also face fines, bans and even jail for infringements such as driving without a seatbelt or using a hand-held mobile phone…
    http://tinyurl.com/ytpafd

  15. (from the Guardian)
    “I just read that a Catholic newspaper in Malaysia is not being allowed to refer to God as “Allah” as it has always done. I guess the government thinks that Muslims have a monopoly over the word.”
    Good thing. Allah does not mean God in Arabic. Ilah means God, or Diety. And of course, it’s Arabic anyhow. A very alien language in Malasia, I would think.

  16. Canadian MSM’s bias would never allow this:
    Shami Karim, Iraqi, said: “we appreciate the Americans.”
    …-
    Baghdad calm one year after Saddam’s death
    By Damien McElroy in Baghdad
    […]
    ““We fought the terrorists and we won,” said Shami Karim, a 27-year-old fruit stall holder and gun-toting Knight of Mesopotamia, the name given to the £150-a-month guards co-opted to control the district.
    “We like to live in peace and are glad that no one in Baghdad can call us terrorists. It has taken a long time but we appreciate the Americans.””
    http://tinyurl.com/236eco (telegraph-uk)

  17. Anyone know the criteria for getting the Order of Canada?
    It seems a bit like the Nobel Prizes, it’s been somewhat bastardized.
    Sure are a lot of them being handed out,which must mean a lot of people must have gone beyond the call of duty and made a difference to Canada and/or the world.

  18. ET, I strongly disagree with your Pakistan and nuclear arms comments. It is not irrelevant at all. States can be deterred from using nukes for the reasons you stated – it invites total destruction as retaliation. The same cannot be said for the Islamofascists nutbars.
    If Pakistan fails, which you both think will happen and should be permitted, then the rules of the nuclear game could change in an instant. Pakistani intelligence, the ISI, is allied to some degree with AQ and other Islamist elements. The possibility of a rogue providing AQ with nuclear weapons, even dirty bomb technology, would trump deterrence.
    Why – because AQ cannot be deterred from using nukes. OBL and his ilk have no problem nuking people, or in the resultant total war, with millions dead. They would have their holy war, which we know they would lose badly, but they feel they would win, as it fits in with the messianic, medieval vision.
    So, leaving Pakistan to its own devices is foolhardy for two reasons. First, if we don’t help the forces of democracy there, as weak and immature as they are, nation states such as China, India and Russia will fill the void; or worse still, AQ gains foothold, and a new caliphate in the face of crushing defeats in Afghanistan and Iraq.
    IMHO, the only alternative to constructive engagement (or at least try) with Pakistan is to station massive forces (a million or so troops) along the Afghan/Pakistani border with ruthless rules of engagement and a zero tolerance policy for Islamists.
    No matter how you slice it, this is a dangerous land strategically important part of the world. Closing our eyes to that will achieve no good, and could very well result in a nuclear catastrophe, which only the harcore Islamists want, and can’t be deterred from.

  19. ET says: “As for the fears of their nuclear ability, I’m going to say that’s irrelevant. Yes, irrelevant.”
    I’ve been vacillating on that one. At first I thought it was really critical that we contain the situation. Now, I’m leaning more in your direction. If we believe Islamofascism can’t work and is going to fail eventually, then the only issue is: how much harm this death cult can do before they implode?
    Which is the most harmful?
    1. Nukes in the hands of Islamofascists in the Battle of Pakistan. Answer: they’d only use it once, then the source region would be turned into glass.
    2. The core evil of Islamofascists that think nothing of wrapping a bomb around a baby. These guys are really sick. Answer: More and more of the general public are beginning to understand that we cannot tolerate this sickness and must treat it like any other contagious disease and inoculate ourselves from it .. like we do for Diphtheria .
    3. The enemy within. Our own MSM and academia that preach self-loathing cultural relativism. Answer: sell the CBC, stop the multiculti industry and return our country to common sense with a pledge of allegiance that includes the separation of Mosque/church and State; also a pledge that treats women as equal to men.
    The 3rd is the most dangerous. But maybe with the martyrdom of Bhutto then we’ll start to deal with this difficult problem of the enemy within.
    Shamrock says if we don’t help then “nation states such as China, India and Russia will fill the void” … I wish that were true.

  20. Khomeinei and the Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD):
    “We do not worship Iran, we worship Allah. For patriotism is another name for paganism. I say let this land [Iran] burn. I say let this land go up in smoke, provided Islam emerges triumphant in the rest of the world”.
    Poll: 46% of Pakis approve of bin Laden; Bush gets 9%.
    If you take the global jihad seriously you must concede that Pakistan is an enemy country. Therefore it’s obvious that there be no further immigration from Pakistan. None.

  21. Nomdeblog, c’mon – be careful what you wish for. Despite the idiot revisionist history, the situation in Afghanistan can be traced to Russian invasion there, not nonsense argument of US arming Islamists (check out weapons being used, spare the BS about stingers and think about AK47, and other Russian munitions).
    China will cause major problems in Pakistan. Does anyone think China will stabilize this region? They don’t believe in democracy and will look after their interests (think about lead laden kids toys here). Iran interfering would be a good thing? Not at all.
    It is naive to think disengagement by the West will mean all players stay out. Last time we tried that, we reaped 9/11. We are at war with Islamists, not Pakistan. We must use our economic clout to ensure the players named above never gain foothold in Pakistan.
    Making comments about turning area into “glass” are misinformed and dangerous. There would be no limited, tactical nuclear war in Pakistan. No way. China considers Pakistan part of their sphere of influence and will react acccordingly to use of massive miltary forces.
    If we station forces along Afghan border with Pakistan, then we have better solution.
    Let’s discuss realistic options, bearing in mind solution will be elusive and best, dangerous at worst. Just accepting that AQ will get nukes and use them, then we can nuke Pakistan is misguided, ignorant and extremely dangerous.

  22. shamrock, I fully agree with your suggestion of massive forces on the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.
    I’m talking about the situation within Pakistan which is a gangreneous, cancerous decay of two opposing sociopolitical systems: the tribal and the industrial. Think of it as a kind of Gorgon, dual-headed Monster. There can only be one mind or head that triumphs; it can only be industrial with that size of population. How does one destroy the other mind, the tribal?
    There is no way that the West can, now, assist the democratic side while the tribal side exists in the strength that it does. The result of such assistance will actually strengthen tribalism as its followers fight the democratic movt in their midst. So- if the West tries to assist democracy in Pakistan the end result will be to weaken it and strengthen fanatic tribalism. I’m saying that if we move in now, when the fanatic tribalism is so strong, AQ will get even stronger there.
    It’s a fine balancing act. The West has to sit back and allow the entangled two-headed monster situation in Pakistan to implode naturally. Don’t strengthen reactive fanatic tribalism by promoting only one side of this monster. All you’ll get is an even more fanatical reaction from tribalism. But, if left alone, with that size population, the tribal must weaken. It’s the population base that will promote the change. Not any external ideology.
    Then – the West moves in to help the emerging democratic mode. Not before. And if it’s India or China that moves in to help with industrialism, I agree with nomdeblog – so what? And don’t overestimate the strength of the Chinese industrialism. They can move into Africa, but, they are still industrially fragile, with their own huge peasant population that requires transformation.
    shamrock- the situation in Afghanistan can’t be traced simply to the Russian invasion but also to their basic tribalism. They weren’t industrial. They are quite different from Pakistan, which is an entanglement of two opposite political and economic systems, the tribal and the industrial
    China’s capitalism is moving it to democracy; capitalism and democracy are hand in glove. The one is the economic mode, the other is the political mode; both exist together. Just be patient.
    Again, I concur with your idea of forces along the Afghan-Pakistan border. I’m talking about interference with the mess that is within Pakistan now. We mustn’t interfere until the tribal side has, on its own, weakened. It must weaken – because of the population base.

  24. Shamrock “China will cause major problems in Pakistan.” There already are insurmountable problems there, the status quo must end. China could help. It has interests in the region, we all do …oil!!!
    “We are at war with Islamists, not Pakistan.” Right , but they are not mutually exclusive. Pakistan was founded 60 years ago on the flawed idea of being an Islamic State. A State founded around 7th century Islam will not work for a 160 million people whose only common thread is the tribal religion.
    I’m not “wishing” to turn Pakistan into glass.
    The best way to avoid it is to say we’ll do it if we have to. You might as well disarm if you won’t threaten to use your military advantage.
    An ideal situation would be a fleet of aircraft carriers in the Arabian Sea, off the coast of Karachi, with guns pointed up toward Islamabad. The fleet would be composed of China, India, Russia , the USA , France, Britain, Japan. The message would be simple: “have your civil war if you want to, we plan to contain it”.
    If we had a functional UN, that’s what would happen. But of course the UN is a very large part of the problem. The UN was founded at the same time Pakistan was founded. Neither have adjusted to the realties of the post Cold War era in a globally connected economy dependant upon oil . Nor has our MSM and academia adapted to the new realties as I noted in #3 above which is why we are in danger .. the public is misinformed.

  25. nomdeblog – very nice analysis.
    Your suggestion of the industrial nations effectively saying – have your civil war, as long as it’s contained’ – is right.
    Yes, the UN is part of the problem. The UN has degenerated to a corrupt morass of its own, setting the G8 nations up as both The Enemy and The Bank.
    The reality is, the post coldwar globe is an intimately networked economy, operating primarily by the energy of oil. The oil comes primarily from nations that existed and exist in tribalism and haven’t matured to an industrial and civic mode. Since their populations have exploded far above a tribal political capacity, they must move to a civic mode – and that’s difficult for them.
    The West has to move out of oil as its energy focus, and the oil nations have to mature to a civic political mode and a service rather than resource economy. They need to education their population, they need to enable a middle class – they have a lot of work to do. Their religion of Islam, which is also a political and economic rather than only a theological system, makes it extremely difficult for them to mature.
    Pakistan is caught in the entangled web between two different social structures. We have to stand back and allow one of these structures to collapse.

  28. And now for some GOOD news. In the “not waiting for the asteroid” category, Bloomberg says:
    “While (Hollywood) revenue will surpass the $9.45 billion record set in 2004, attendance was little changed, Media By Numbers said. Ticket sales dropped in 11 of the past 14 weeks from a year earlier as films including Iraq war dramas “In the Valley of Elah” and “Redacted” made less than $2 million each in their opening weekends. “(The Golden) Compass,” a fantasy based on the book by Phillip Pullman, fell short of analysts’ expectations.”
    In other words, people are staying away from Hollywood movies this year in droves. The reason given in the article is increased competition from big TVs and video games. This may certainly be part of it, but I think it more likely that Hollywood has forgotten who their audience is.
    Regarding The Golden Compass, I would hazard that people with even rudimentary leanings toward Christianity will find it objectionable. I read all three of the books in that series, quite frankly I wouldn’t let a child within a hundred feet of them. Too adult, replete with torture, and atheistic to a fault. Perhaps I will rent the movie, but no child will see it under my roof.
    Conversely I will most likely see the National Treasure movie in the theater. Appealing story line.
    It appears I am not alone in my assessment. Perhaps the Hollywood crowd will learn at least to hold their noses regarding audience likes and dislikes, and leave off the post modern preaching. But I doubt it. Most likely they will go bankrupt first. Hate has a way of erasing reason, and the Hollywood liberals hate America big time.

  29. ET most people don’t even know what you are talking about when you use “tribalism”. They don’t understand where its ecological roots are and how it drove economies centuries ago and why the utopian Islamofascists want to stop the world and return to that time.
    If our highly paid University professors would deal with the “tribalism” subject in a contemporary economic way then they’d pack their classes .. It is even relevant to MBA’s who want to build international careers. I can’t understand why the Boards of our universities don’t insist that the social science departments must get re-engineered like everything else in our lives does.

  30. That’s an easy one, Nomdeblog. Social science departments these days are packed with no-talent hacks who get tenure for following The Template and being the best suck-ups. The requirement that they do actual science would kill half of them and cripple the rest.
    The near-future of education will be found in the private sector I fear. I lack the chops for it, but if you’ve got ’em you should write up a course and sell it to the banks and brokerages. It would beat kissing socialist bootay at U of T.

  31. Tribalism is an economic and political structure. It defines a population as a Set of Blood Relations. This Set is the economic and political unit. It is closed to non-blood membership. You have to be born into the Set. Or, married into the Set – in which case, you abandon your previous allegiance.
    Economically, the Set of blood relations operates as a singular unit. If the population is large enough, it may be made up of smaller units (clans) and even smaller units (families). But they are all part of this blood-related hereditary Unit.
    Economically, they will operate as a singular unit (clan, family or tribe). Political authority is also blood-defined; one family will have hereditary authority over all other clans. In the family, it’s usually the males who have hereditary authority over the economic and social decisions in the family.
    It’s been the basic structure for social, economic and political organization for thousands of years. It is extremely stable; its hereditary authority means that there’s no concept of one individual gaining power by fighting or merit.
    As a stable mode of organization, it rejects individual aspirations, individual thought. It rejects change. Indeed, it has no capacity for change because it rejects individualism.
    It works great in populations about the size of 100,000 up. But, once you get into populations in the millions, which require more food and services than a tribal mode can produce – you must move into a civic mode.
    The civic mode developed in the West because of its exponential rise in population in the 13th c. The civic mode is a mode of economic and political organization that is focused around the work of the individual. Not hereditary families or clans. Just the individual. The individuals as a group form the middle class – an extremely flexible Set of people who are open to change, who can invent, whose economic rewards are due to their own work, not their place in a clan or tribe.
    The civic mode is required, in an industrial economic mode. The civic mode rejects hereditary authority and focuses on democratic or ‘authority by work and merit’.
    Most people don’t understand the difference. But it’s vital in understanding the problems of the ME, locked in tribalism, and in Pakistan, locked in a conflict between tribalism and industrialism.

  32. ET spake thusly: “Pakistan is caught in the entangled web between two different social structures. We have to stand back and allow one of these structures to collapse.”
    Madam, I must humbly disagree. Why wait for gravity when you can give ’em a shove? Or a nice bayonet charge. That’d be just the thing.

  33. Thanks ET.
    “As a stable mode of organization, it rejects individual aspirations, individual thought. It rejects change. Indeed, it has no capacity for change because it rejects individualism.”
    Which explains why the left has bonded with the movement to perpetuate 7th century ideas; they both agree that everything has to be defined, equal for all, no choices.
    Without a capacity for change then these cultures would just implode .. so now that they can be contained, let’s just stand back and let it happen. Bush was pretty nuanced to figure this out, he must have taken a course from Iggy at Harvard, back before Iggy sold his soul to the Librano$.
    Phantom, if we had healthy universities, places where real learning happened, then you and ET could pack Hart House at Uof T with a debate called “Gravity or Shove?” The Lesser of Evils, Iggy, could moderate.

  34. Nice. How dare those mean Jews set up checkpoints? Those poor Palestinians should be able to fire as many Kassam rockets as they want, and there should be no repercussions for them doing so, right?
    http://www.jpost.com
    IDF: Chemicals were disguised as EU aid
    The IDF and Shin Bet uncovered 6.5 tons of potassium nitrate hidden in sacks that were disguised as aid from the European Union, the army announced on Saturday
    Security forces discovered the stash in the cargo of a Palestinian truck at a West Bank checkpoint earlier in December. According to the IDF, the material, hidden in sugar sacks, was planned to be used by terrorists in the Gaza Strip.
    “Potassium Nitrate is a banned substance in the Gaza Strip and the Judea and Samaria region due to its use by terrorists for the manufacturing of
    explosives and Kassam rockets,” the IDF spokesperson wrote in a statement.
    “This is another example of how the terror organizations exploit the humanitarian aid that is delivered to the Palestinian population in the Gaza Strip with Israel’s approval,” the statement read.

  35. Sir Phantom, my recommendation of Stand By is because if we ‘push’ in one direction (ie in favour of democracy) this will incite the other Gorgon Head of Pakistan (tribalism) to incendiary fanatic fervour. It will actually strengthen tribalism.
    We must stand back and allow the internal fight between these two modes to take place. At the tipping point, when democracy is just gaining some leverage – then, we can step in and help. Not before.

  36. Norway: The shoes that survived a Nazi escape
    The extraordinary story of a war hero’s flight to freedom from the Nazis has been revealed by his daughters, after they retraced his steps and reclaimed the shoes he wore on the epic 200-mile trek.
    Sven Somme was pursued by 900 German soldiers with sniffer dogs across the mountains of occupied Norway before he reaching safety, having being arrested for spying for the Allies.
    Sixty years on his daughter Ellie Targett, a radio presenter in Herefordshire, and her sister Yule, who lives in Devon, set out on foot to retrace their father’s daring escape, meeting some of the people who helped him along the way.
    Mrs Targett recalled the emotional moment when his battered lace-up shoes were returned to her in a brown paper bag by a family who had sheltered him. They had kept the shoes as a reminder of the young man they had found hiding in a frozen mountain hut.
    …-
    http://tinyurl.com/yrkhk8 (telegraph-uk)

  37. Tribalism – industrialism. Both not being able to co-exist … let Pakistan implode … etc.
    That’s a fallacious binary theory, I feel. Of course industrialization and tribalism exist side by side, the former being the advertisement for the better way — the way forward to an easier more prosperous life — which, everybody wants.
    The process is a gradual one. Our own advanced societies gradually changed from the primarily agricultural to the industrial as the tools and capital accumulation allowed a much greater yield to be gotten out of a unit of effort.
    Again the key role of ISLAM is being left out of the equation. Islam creates a kind of turbo-charged tribalism. Pakistan can’t be understood via the standard tribalism analytics.

  38. Rewrite headline:
    Taliban Jack Layton-NDP and Liberal MP Jim Tamil Tigers Karygiannis bloviate, bluster, and blab at Pak Muslim meeting.
    …-
    Federal politicians say Canada must play role in investigating Bhutto’s death
    By THE CANADIAN PRESS

  39. “Again the key role of ISLAM is being left out of the equation.”
    No it isn’t, that’s exactly where blood relationships come from that ET talks about. It is about putting the caliphate as both head of the religion and head of the State. Ataturk got rid of the last caliphate in Turkey. We need an Ataturk to surface in Pakistan because it was created to be an Islamic State and there is no separation of Mosque and state in Islam .. .that’s the point.
    “ Islam creates a kind of turbo-charged tribalism”
    Bingo!

  40. No, me no dhimmi – the West most certainly did NOT ‘gradually’ move out of its own tribalist mode into an industrialist mode. It was a bloody and vicious and catastrophic fight that lasted for over four centuries, from the 11th through 15th centuries in the West.
    It was a fight. Not a gradual transition. People do NOT ‘see’ that the industrial mode is more productive; the industrial mode does NOT exist as some kind of imagized model, a shining TV advertisement, which one can, in the safety of the seminar room, examine and choose.
    The industrial mode meant the destruction of an old, tested and valued mode of life, the tribal or hereditary mode of kinship economics and political authority. There was most certainly no image/advertisement showing that industrialism would produce a ‘better way of life’.
    Furthermore, the change from a peasant agriculture to a market agriculture changed in the West only under duress. People don’t change their political, economic and social structures like a change of clothes. The change in Europe came only as an End Phase, under duress, when the other ‘tactics’ of dealing with the economic problems had failed.
    What was going on in Europe in the 10thc? Overpopulation. Normal tactics of dealing with overpopulation, without changing one’s ideology, are Natural. That is, the normal ‘tactics’ will be due to lowered nutrition, which leads to famine, disease (eg, plagues, influenza etc). these will decimate a population, but, the numbers will rise again.
    The next ‘normal tactic’ will be war, to try to gain more resources; war will also decimate a population.
    Only after these basic ‘tactics’ fail, will a people change their beliefs and behaviour. That’s what happened in Europe. Again, it was a vicious, bloody fight between the old tribalism and the new civic mode of societal order.
    Islam happens to be an ideology that operates within tribalism. I have NOT left it out of the picture. As nomdeblog points out, until Islam is reformed, and permits individual reason, and until the ME nations separate church and state, they will be unable to modernize.

  41. From The Sunday Times:
    Teenage son to take on Benazir Bhutto’s legacy
    BENAZIR BHUTTO’S 19-year-old son Bilawal will be thrust into a dangerous spotlight today as Pakistan’s most powerful political dynasty prepares to pass the baton to the next generation.
    …
    At 3pm today Pakistan time Bilawal will read out his dead mother’s political testament to leaders of the Pakistan People’s party (PPP), which his grandfather founded and the family has always controlled.
    …
    Benazir Bhutto wanted Bilawal to complete his education before becoming involved in politics. Although she would have liked him to lead the party, she did not want him to feel compelled to do so or to make the kind of sacrifices that she had to make when her father was executed.
    Her widowed husband, Asif Ali Zardari, will make a bid today to lead the PPP in order to keep power firmly in the hands of the Bhutto family and to ensure that Bilawal can eventually inherit his mother’s political mantle.

  42. Yeah, the “advertisement” metaphor is pretty embarrassing! It certainly doesn’t capture the violence attending major social change.
    Perhaps I misunderstood you. I had thought you mean that the two couldn’t exist together — that seemed binary: 0 1, off on. Obviously both exist together and one overruns the other.
    Another point: massive Saudi funding of madrassas in Pakistan. I bet, despite the 46% approval rating for OBL, parents would jump at the chance at the prospect of their children getting a real education (instead of mostly learning to recite the Koran in Arabic). I’m not a big believer in money aid , but in kind aid like schools and moder curriculum would probably be a good investment.

  43. For what it’s worth ,Mr. Kinsella is slagging this site again. He doesn’t understand how Kate can call muslims the ‘religion of detonation’ knowing that Bhutto was a woman and a muslim.. I’m sure his point makes sense to him and his imagined groupies…..But Warren,muslims don’t like uppitty women,in fact they kill them.N’uff said.

  44. me no dhimmi – I think that you misunderstand. A society cannot operate within two contrary infrastructures. It can only operate within ONE infrastructure.
    Imagine Canada, with laws that said that women and men were equal; and laws that said that women were not equal to men. Or, a mode of behaviour where only members of one family could get a job in the govt – versus our system where MERIT is the only criterion for the job.
    The two systems, a tribal mode of social governance and a civic mode of social governance, cannot co-exist. It’s one OR the other.
    The problem in Pakistan is that BOTH are operating, and thus, all decision-making is contradictory and in conflict. Imagine making a decision about Who Gets The Job when you have BOTH systems considered valid – one set of people believes in one; another set believes in the other. It’s a mess.
    Again, a tribal mode is only functional in a small population, in a non-industrial economy. When you get populations in the millions and an industrial economy, you must move into a civic political mode. But, Pakistan hasn’t done that.
    No, you are projecting YOUR values onto the Pakistan people, when you say that the parents would ‘jump at the chance’ for a ‘real education’. You are quite wrong. Those parents who believe firmly in the traditional system would consider the ‘real education’ a corrupt and useless education.
    You are assuming that the industrial system and the civic mode is, inherently, better. It isn’t; it is just better IF, IF, the population is in the millions. If the population was as small as it used to be, a generation ago, then the old traditional tribal ways would be OK.
    Until the Pakistani people, themselves, demote tribalism, and focus their future on an industrial and civic mode, my view is that we must stay out of the area. As soon as that focus is shifted from the one to the other, then, we can help. If we do it now, we’ll be setting up a fight between the old tribalism and the new civic mode, and the West will be seen as an Evil Intruder trying to force ‘western ways’ on the people.

  45. Now I get your drift ET. Thanks. I hadn’t been thinking of the contradictory modes of governance and now it’s quite clear that I misunderstood you. No of course not — you can’t have two contradictory modes of governance. Good examples by the way. But you can have the beginnings of industrialization within that mode I believe.
    Yeah, I sorta cringed when I wrote about “parents jumping” for a better kind of education. I think I just wanted to talk nice like a good liberal for a little break. Richard Landes (Augean Stables) calls this liberal cognitive egocentrism, a rare sin for me.
    I was wrong too to suggest you “left out” Islam. I really meant that you seem to overplay the tribal and underplay the Islam and, as discussed too may times already, I feel you are too idealistic vis a vis the prospect for reform in Islam. I see a epochal Islamic revival: even Turkey — which disbanded the caliphate in 1924 — is leaving Ataturkism behind and re-islamizing. We won’t mention the prospect of western-supported Islamic jihad states in Palestine and Kosovo. Anthropomorphisizing (a word?), Jihad is eternal — it only takes naps when Islam feels week. Looking at the shocking suicide of Europe and the implosion of western values from political correctness (aka cultural marxism) it now sees the caliphate as a very real possibility. Even the head Crusader Bush appeases it when referring to it as a religion of peace and takes it to dinner in the Whitehouse. And when Canadian blog posters say things like “we can’t stop immigration from Pakistan” or “muslim immigration” in general, it feels fortified.
    I also agree with you in the matter of interference. In fact, I believe Bhutto’s death is a direct result of the US State Department’s fantasy-thinking vis a vis premature, idealistic democracy-promotion under the brilliant but delusional Condi Rice, fresh from Anapolis!
    I have wondered if you are in contradiction at all when you remain a fierce advocate of democracy promotion in Iraq, which I now see as a fool’s errand as, to use your terminology, Islam and Democracy are totally contradictory infrastructures.

  46. Me No Dhimmi, good for you, for moving forward quite a bit on this.
    ET … just to push your argument here at home, we get complacent that tribalism is over and done with .. I think not. You say:
    “Again, a tribal mode is only functional in a small population, in a non-industrial economy.”
    Well, we have 2 official languages and one represents only about 1/5th of the population yet our senior civil servants must speak both. It might have made sense years ago in a smaller population that was agriculture based … not now.
    We also have our First Nations. We aren’t helping them by allowing a parallel legal system in Caledonia to continue. As ET says “A society cannot operate within two contrary infrastructures.”
    We also have multiculturalism which is actually tribalism but with a fancy postmodern name. It won’t work. Because it says all cultures are equal, they aren’t. Cultures, need to duke it out and adapt and become one within whatever sovereignty they reside in. The notion that there is an “other” is a European idea that does not encourage assimilation and we see what happens with the car-b-q’s in Paris. Tribalism must be rejected for democracy to work.
    As mentioned earlier we should have a pledge of allegiance to encourage adaptation to our tried and true constitutional order. An order that has separation of powers (including church and state) that has one man , one vote. That insists women and men are equal. That all are equal before the law.
    Without constant reinforcement of the basics of democracy we will backslide into tribalism. Just like we can backslide into socialism even though it has been proven not to work.

  47. me no dhimmi – yes, now you ‘get it’!
    I continue to support democracy in Iraq because it has separated ‘church and state’. Furthermore, I consider that Islam is reformable. It was made by man and can be remade by man. I am especially heartened to read the works of Muslim scholars intent on reforming and reinterpreting Islam to modernize it.
    nomdeblog – I agree completely with your excellent post. Our bilingualism is indeed tribalism, where we state that only members of one select group (bilinguals) can become political and economic authorities in our country. It effectively disbars the majority of the Canadian population from playing key roles in their own govt. It’s a terrible mistake.
    Multiculturalism is equally tribal and a serious error.
    We’ve set up, in Trudeau’s Charter, a terrible mess. I hope that Canadians have the vision and courage to change it, rather than doing the Usual Canadian Way – which is to meekly go along with whatever the Tribal Authorities say.

  48. Spracht ET: “At the tipping point, when democracy is just gaining some leverage – then, we can step in and help. Not before.”
    Damn. I was so looking forward to a nice bayonet charge, too. Must be the Scots in me. Or possibly the scotch.

  49. ET:
    Afterthough: “Industrial mode” between the 11th and 15th centuries?
    Iraq: separation of church and state? With sharia law in the constitution? I think not! My theory is that we have a sham democracy here — some of the superficial trappings which will last as long as the jizya is flowing. The thinking hasn’t changed.
    China: “moving into democracy”. No it’s not. Certainly capitalism (free market economy) can’t exist without democracy, but as discussed earlier — and I think you conceded this point — we don’t have “capitalism” (properly understood) in China. The Communists maintain their iron rule. Whether the Communists can voluntarily give up their political hegemony and allow true multi-party representative democracy remains to be seen. But China is not “moving into democracy”. That would be like being a “little bit pregnant”.

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