Back in August

Hopefully the hiatus will be over.

Stark out.

Radovan Karadzic At Large No More

Reuters Segment:

Be sure to also check But I am a Liberal! for more on this.

Stark Out.

Obamamania Around the World?

Some would like you to think that it is a big deal Obama is winning the world poll when it comes to the upcoming election in November. The numbers are pretty clear, a good majority favor Obama over McCain. Yet how do you explain Kerrymania?

This is nothing new, and with the "firstness" of the election, it's a given.

Harry's Place Blogburst

You know what's unfair? This. Show your support. Email admin@neoconstant to add your name to the growing list of sites that support Harry's Place. To read more about this, go to NeoConstant.

Election 2008: McCain, Obama, and What the Future Holds

Yeah, I'm falling behind a bit, I still have 30 articles (all bookmarked, a good portion of them very long) to read. In the mean time, some commentary on the election.

Currently, the RCP average (as of July 17, 2008) shows Barack Obama with only a 4 point lead over John McCain. That's pretty darn close. John McCain is doing really well considering the historical negatives he has against him. This is despite being from a party (i.e. Republican) that isn't very popular in public opinion, being from the same party of a President with low approval ratings, a bad economy that most will connect to his party affiliation, campaign organizational issues, and a significant enthusiasm gap between Democrat and Republican voters. There is no doubt about it; McCain is the underdog in this election. It's relevant to contrast the position the McCain campaign is in today to that of Fall of 2007 (when even I doubted his chances). From his failed 2000 Republican primary run to his near collapse in the summer of 2007 to him becoming the presumptive nominee for the Republican Party in 2008, he has come a long way.

Barack Obama on the other hand, the rising star of the Democratic party, whose 2004 Convention speech propelled him into national stardom, is a man with both historical advantages and opportunity. For someone with such limited amount of experience, like no other in modern American history, he has really shown considerable skill in solidifying his place as presumptive nominee for the Democratic Party. This is after defeating one of the most powerful political families in America (the Clintons).

He has also attained his status as leader of a new wave in the Democratic Party (i.e. a change from the 90's Third Way Democrats, which could be attributed as representing Hillary Clinton during the primary). What is this movement to be called? Maybe the blue progressive movement; a mixture of economic protectionism, strict institutional multilateralism in foreign policy (emphasis on superpower fatigue), extreme stances on key issues (Environment, Abortion, and Guns) and collectivist orientated solutions for societies problems. Obama might be the leader of this movement, yet it started without him (i.e. 2004 Primaries with Howard Dean) and can probably sustain itself without him in the future. There seems to be even reluctance on Obama’s part to accept the status of leader, by his recent repositioning towards the center on some issues and the calming of his inner messiah. If Obama wins in November, change will come to the White House, that’s a given (by any candidate). It’s what kind of change that takes place that is the problem.

No matter who takes the position of leader of the free world (no matter how out of date that phrase seems), there will be many international challenges they will face. Iran with an irrational leadership hell-bent on Israel's destruction, two ongoing wars, and the rise of autocratic states with no regard for liberal democracy, just to name a few. No easy job. All we can do now is wait.

2008 Election: The longest and most expensive election in American history.

Three Story Sunday

Who is the boss in Russia? That is the question many observers are asking.

WHEN the other G8 leaders met their new Russian counterpart in Japan this week, they may all have had a similar question on their minds: are we talking to the right man? Is Dmitry Medvedev, described by George Bush as a “smart guy”, a real president? Or is he merely Vladimir Putin’s puppet and stand-in? So far, the answer seems to be: neither.

Russian Politics.


The story of Ahmed Batebi, Iranian dissent, and how he came to America.

After three days on the run, Ahmad Batebi picked his way down a rocky slope to the stream that marked Iran’s border with Iraq. His Kurdish guides, who had led Mr. Batebi, an Iranian dissident, through minefields and dodged nighttime gunfire from border guards, passed him to a new team of shadowy human smugglers.

Quite the journey. The lengths some have to go to reach freedom. In Batebi's case, the fight continues.


The Iranian government shows its true colors.

“Collective punishment” is a term used often used to describe Israel’s retaliation against Hamas terrorist attacks. Tehran is the first government to talk in the strongest possible terms of the actions of the Israeli government. The Iranian regime’s claim to represent the interests of Arabs better than the Arab League is belied by the brutal persecution of indigenous Ahwazi Arabs living within its own territory, which have been under direct rule from Tehran since the end of self-government in 1925.

Iran has no interest but control.

Just another Sunday.

Where I found these articles:
Gateway Pundit
Sigmund, Carl and Alfred

Protesting in a Fear Society: Iran and You

A few days ago I came across this video featuring a librarian (presumedly a protester by my assessment) being removed from a building hosting an event with John McCain. I was confused by various far left outlets showing this as proof that we are living in oppression in the United States. If you don't believe me, read the comments at Crooks and Liars in this post. Under the pseudonym of John Stone I tried to reason with people that this incident is exaggerated...

I’m sorry, obviously the sign was meant to imply that McCain is nothing more than another Bush term. Plus the deal with Banana man accompanying her, I mean come on.

I want a challenge for you to find a conservative person, make a sign that says “Obama=Kerry”, bring along Banana man with pictures of Kerry and Obama plastered all over it, and see how far they make it inside one of Obama’s events.

The lady obviously wanted to create a ruckus. You all are over exaggerating this incident.

Someone replied that the librarian was outside the event, yet by view seemed to still be inside a building, nonetheless, I replied...

Secret Service I’m sure had a legitimate reason for removing from the premises (she seemed to still inside a building, whether or not McCain’s event was inside another section). Plus there is the fact that the video is made by a supporter, and we don’t know the entire detail on why she was removed. We don’t know the whole story. Plus, I’m sure the same thing would happen with a protester (which this lady clearly was, despite her backdrop story) at an Obama event. Secret Service makes these calls.

Second, I find it quite odd that a lot of people here (not all) are claiming tyranny and that we are in oppression. I’m sorry, go to Ethiopia and go to an event where the leader is speaking, and try a stunt like this. I guarantee you the response won’t be the same as in this video. That would be real oppression.

This isn’t oppression, this is an inconvenience for the lady and her banana man.

I picked a country that is authoritarian and a current ally of the United States like Ethiopia to appeal to them, and it seemed to have no effect. Being removed from a building is hardly a qualifier as being in a state of oppression; it's an inconvenience (you could make the point it is offensive to your 1st Amendment rights, yet it doesn't necessarily prove anything other than protesters being unwelcome at town halls).

Of course the person didn't take too kind to this response and replied...

Your spinning and right-wing apologetics are masterful. Kudos. Your brethren at The National Review must be golf-clapping themselves silly.

Understandable response given the outlet, yet completely untrue. I was trying to make the point that this outrage over something this trivial lacks comparison to actual oppression. So it came to a surprise to me today that I would come across this article. It's a story about Ahmad Batebi (a protester for freedom) who was tortured and put in prison for simply speaking out in Iran. Code Pink would like you to believe that in the United States we got it bad. Read about what happened to Batebi...

During his interrogation he was blindfolded and beaten with cables until he passed out. His captors rubbed salt into his wounds to wake him up, so they could torture him more. They held his head in a drain full of sewage until he inhaled it. He recalls yearning for a swift death to end the pain. He was played recordings of what he was told was his mother being tortured. His captors wanted him to betray his fellow students, to implicate them in various crimes and to say on television that the blood on that T-shirt was only red paint. He says he refused.

He was sentenced to death for “creating street unrest”. But after a global outcry, the sentence was commuted to 15 years in jail. He speculates that his high profile made it hard to kill him without attracting negative publicity. For two years, he was kept in solitary confinement, in a cell that was little more than a toilet hole with a wooden board on top. He was tortured constantly. Only when he was allowed to mingle with other prisoners again did he begin to overcome his despair.

Remember, this is for simply protesting and having his picture on the cover of a magazine. I would really like to see how this compares to the treatment the librarian received, who seems to run in circles that obviously show her intent to protest.

If you're wondering what a real fear society is, read this quote about the town square test by Natan Sharansky in his book The Case for Democracy:

If a person cannot walk into the middle of the town square and express his or her views without fear of arrest, imprisonment, or physical harm, then that person is living in a fear society, not a free society. We cannot rest until every person living in a "fear society" has finally won their freedom.

Ahmad Batebi: A true hero.

Obama wants YOU...to speak another language

Barack Obama in a recent town hall said it was embarrassing that Americans could not speak more than one language. Is it embarrassing or just another fact of being American? As the Foreign Policy Passport points out (at least one of the authors), there is little incentive, muddling the need for a citizen maintain another language. This is not to say I disagree with the assessment to increase the need for Americans to become bi-lingual. I just would not go out there and say it is embarrassing, definitely in comparison to a place like Europe (with various different languages in close proximity). Spanish is a big one today in public schools systems, and as another author at the Passport points out, it's needed (for future implications).

Yet I would also point out travel, which is connected to the incentive for learning and maintaining the knowledge of speaking another language. Americans don't travel as much as other industrialized citizens. While some may say this is out of apathy, others can rightfully claim it to be related to work issues (i.e. lack of vacation time and preparation, not paid enough to afford travel) and/or the United States being the third largest country in world (with various locations to be visited at a cheaper cost).

This brings me to my mother. In High School, she learned French, as a language requirement most American students have to complete to graduate. She entered the workforce with no language requirement except English, and to this day all she can say is Comment t'appelles-tu?, as little as Obama pointed out in his little talk. Now my mom has worked her entire adult life, she raised my brothers and me as a single mother and has been through some tough times. She has never been outside the United States, not able to afford the cost that comes with it. Yet recently things have been looking up for my mom. She bought her first new car (i.e. not an old one), and has recently traveled to Nevada and Florida after not being outside the state of Minnesota for 23 years. I am happy for her. If the time ever comes when she indeed has enough money to travel to France for a vacation, and all she can say is “Merci beaucoup” as Barack Obama has pointed out in his town hall talk, I will be far from embarrassed. I will be proud of my mom for finally being able to experience another country. I will be proud that she made it.

Like I have already pointed out above, I agree with the assessment that more Americans need to become bi-lingual, yet I would not go out and say it is embarrassing. That is condescending.

The Stark Tenet: Wishing I took the opportunity to learn Arabic (a language actually available) in my high school when I had the chance.

The Iran Test

Follow the link here.

Jul 9 - State media reports test firing of nine weapons including one capable of reaching Israel and U.S. military bases.

The tests come at a time of increased tension between Iran and Israel over Tehran's disputed nuclear programme, which the West fears is aimed at making nuclear weapons but Iran says is for civilian nuclear power.

Paul Chapman reports.

Iran testing the world's nerves.

FARC, You Guys Are Terrorists

The words from a man deprived of liberty for five years at the hands of FARC.



FARC: Let the hostages go.

Where I heard of this video:
Hot Air

Four Story Sunday

Two leaders, both from South East Asian countries (Thailand and Malaysia), are struggling to maintain power.

Seizing on rising fuel prices and coalition-party stresses, political opponents are pushing to unseat the leaders of two Southeast Asian democracies, only months into their elected terms, raising the prospect of prolonged instability and social tension.

In recent weeks, both Thai Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej and Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi have faced mounting calls to resign.

Mr. Badawi won a symbolic vote on June 23 in Malaysia's parliament over recent pump-price hikes, after the defection of a minor coalition partner.

Thailand's opposition called for a no-confidence vote against Mr. Samak's government on a range of issues last week, including economic policies and a territorial dispute with neighboring Cambodia. Sumak survived the vote Friday.

Hopefully there won't be another coup anytime soon.


Colombian President Uribe deserves at least some credit, according to Reason Magazine's Michael Moynihan.

A rather different tactic was employed by Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, whose special forces freed 15 hostages held by the Marxist terror group FARC on Wednesday. The hostages included three American contractors and former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt. Dressed like a group of slightly menacing Berkeley baristas, the army infiltrators disguised themselves in Che Guevara t-shirts (seriously) and camouflaged uniforms, easily convincing the FARC that they too were fist-clenching, Lenin-reading members of the jungle politburo. It was an elaborate, cleverly plotted ruse—one that was guaranteed to fool a platoon of knuckle-dragging, forest-dwelling communist revolutionaries.

For all his faults, Uribe is exactly what Colombia needs right now.


Hugo Chávez, the antisemitic leftist leader of Venezuela.

As this list may suggest, there is something else, aside from simple anti-Americanism, at work in Chávez’s foreign policy. He and his supporters are in the grip of another age-old obsession, albeit one with a few indigenous twists: an obsession, that is, with the supposedly excessive power of world Jewry, and in particular of Venezuela’s few, prosperous, and increasingly imperiled Jews.

Another characteristic of Hugo we now know.


But I am a Liberal! has part two of his two part series on the United States and Poland. Part one can be accessed here.

Russian-Polish Relations

Polish-Russian relations have been historically poor. Polish leaders continue to argue that Russia has not come to terms with its past crimes against the Polish people. In May of 2005, Kwasniewski was invited to Moscow to attend the 60th anniversary celebration of the end of World War II. He was “given what the Poles regarded as intentionally conspicuous second-class treatment.

As always with Dodds, very interesting.


Just another Sunday. Stark out.

Biofuels to Blame for Food Crisis?

The drawbacks of using biofuels.

Biofuels have forced global food prices up by 75 percent — far more than previously estimated — according to a confidential World Bank report published in a British newspaper on Friday.

The assessment is based on a detailed analysis by Don Mitchell, an internationally respected economist at the Washington-based global financial body, the Guardian said.

I think it is time to really review biofuels and see if they are really necessary. The output isn't that great, it jacks up food prices around the world, and overall it doesn't have the desired effect on the environment that we want.

Biofuels: Back to the drawing board.

Happy Independence Day!

Some videos for the occasion:

"Kate Smith - God Bless America"


"US National Anthem drowned out by cheers at 91 NHL ASG"


Everyone have a great day.

Photo from:
LIBERTAS

Rescued From FARC

Amazing.

Where I found this video:
Bill's Blog

Zimbabwe Solution?

Mark Rosenberg of Freedom House talks about possible avenues of reform within the Zimbabwe government and ways to remove Mugabe.

NOW that President Robert Mugabe has been sworn into a sixth term after an election widely viewed as illegitimate, what is the rest of the world going to do about it?

So far, the response has been slow or ineffective; the United Nations Security Council has managed to pass only watered-down condemnations of Mr. Mugabe’s electoral terror because of resistance from South Africa, China and Russia. And Tuesday, the African Union urged Mr. Mugabe to join in a power-sharing agreement — a government of national unity.

If the South African government won't stand up (which some observers see as a power of influence) hopefully those elected officials within Zimbabwe will.

I would also like to point out the organization Freedom House, which has a wealth of information on various countries around the world (and does yearly freedom ranking reports). Here is Freedom House's description:

Freedom House is a clear voice for democracy and freedom around the world. Since its founding in 1941 by Eleanor Roosevelt, Wendell Willkie and other Americans concerned with the mounting threats to peace and democracy, Freedom House has been a vigorous proponent of democratic values and a steadfast opponent of dictatorships of the far left and the far right.

There is of course criticisms of bias, yet there is plenty of that to go around.

All in all, a good organization with a good cause.

Freedom House: Solution for Zimbabwe?

Fareed Zakaria on War

Fareed Zakaria has a new article on whether we should seek someone to fit the mold of a “wartime president” and whether or not we’re actually in a “war.”

George W. Bush is fond of describing himself as a "war president." And he has made many decisions involving soldiers and battle. But does this make the description an appropriate one? For many people the answer is obvious. We're engaged in conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, after all. But Bill Clinton initiated hostilities in the Balkans twice, George H.W. Bush invaded Panama and Iraq, and neither president ever described himself as a "war president."

I agree with Zakaria on some points, such as the conflicts we are in lack a sense of day-to-day sacrifice domestically (like say in WWII with rationing and even to a certain extent the atmosphere of war and death). My grandmother, just a youngster during WWII, described the atmosphere to me a few years back, “People were always talking about the war, who went in, who was drafted, who was killed.” So I agree there is a difference between a full out war such as WWII and conflicts we are engaged in today. In both Afghanistan and Iraq we’re in a post opposition government setting (i.e. the Taliban and Baathist governments have been overthrown), meaning we won the “war” yet still are engaged in a conflict (which can still be described as being at war with American soldiers being killed).

However, there are some problems I have with Zakaria’s piece. This is mostly in terms of his description of our engagement in Iraq and Afghanistan. These two episodes in American history are more significant than say past American involvements like that in the Balkans or say Panama (both in an economic sense and in terms of the amount of soldiers being used). I give the same critique towards his fixation of the “wartime president” label. Now I’ll admit we are not in a full-blown war, yet clearly, with the amount of troops in a foreign land, with soldiers constantly being killed, the president can still be described as a “wartime president.” Whether we should seek a “wartime president” or someone to fit that role is really a preference of the voter.

The issue on whether we are in a war does have large acceptance with the American public. With the events of 9/11, definitely with the Pentagon being hit, the national reflect was then, and to a considerable extent now, that we’re at war. Some view this war as one only against Al-Qaeda while others view it as one that encompasses the entire threat posed by radical Islamism (I know I’m generalizing here, yet these two camps I’m sure make up the two biggest blocs). Really, this upcoming election pits both these camps against each other, with the Democrats representing the former and the Republicans the latter one. Maybe the outcome of the election will show a way in defining the war. On the other hand, maybe not (but it is something to think about).

Overall, I think Zakaria is being meticulous with his definition of war.

Zakaria on war: Agree, disagree?