http://www.megaupload.com/?d=CPUU148U

How Peter L Bernstein’s work helps us make the safest decision with regard to global warming.

Probably like me you hadn’t heard of Peter Bernstein. He was instrumental in understanding risk and that alone makes him worth knowing about.  Here’s the entry from Wikipedia:

Peter Lewyn Bernstein (January 22, 1919 – June 5, 2009) was a financial historian, economist and educator whose development and refinement of the efficient market theory made him one of the country’s [USA] best known authorities in popularizing and presenting investment economics to the general public.

Watch the YouTube video before reading on:

You could not have missed a fundamental message in the interview – if the consequence of something is critically harmful then don’t take ANY risks. Bernstein’s book on risk is Against the Gods.

Some weeks ago, we started a debate on Learning from Dogs about Climate Warming.  It was between Prof Alan Carlin who is sceptical about the evidence being presented and Patrice Ayme, (a nom de plume) a mathematician and scientist, who is certain that mankind is harming the global climate.  You can read both sides of the debate by clicking on the On Climate Warming theme link.  If you do, you can see that there was some pretty vigorous ball play between both gents which is all very well but it isn’t helping the common man work out what to do.

The challenge for ordinary thinking persons is that we have to make a judgement as to which ’side’ is right.  We don’t have the tools or the knowledge to review the core science and come to an independent decision.  Acknowledging this, the author sent an email to both Alan and Patrice:

It seems to me that there are some fundamental, rational questions that need asking and I hope that each of you wise men, in a final contribution to this topic, will address them.

1. Is mankind having an effect on the atmosphere of this planet which will be harmful?

2. Is there any room for error in your answer to Q.1.?

3. CO2 levels in the atmosphere are higher than has ever been known by science.  Is that a correct statement?

4. Are the activities of mankind causing the increasing levels of acidification in the oceans of the planet?

5. Are the activities of mankind causing the rising sea levels of the planet’s oceans?

6. Is man-made global warming happening: yes; no; unclear?

7. Is there a rational argument for assuming global warming will threaten mankind’s existence on the planet?

Unfortunately Alan Carlin replied saying:

Paul,
I have now concluded that I do not currently have time to respond to your seven good and interesting questions and still meet my high standards for documentation and references.  I could, of course, simply express my current opinions based in some cases on limited research on those topics that I either have not researched or have not recently done so.  But I do not think that would help anyone.  The issue is really not my opinions but rather how and why I arrived at them.  That takes time and research, which I cannot currently undertake because of other continuing obligations.
Thank you for your interest and much needed concern to better illuminate the current wide differences between alarmists/warmists and sceptics.

These are the answers to the questions supplied by Patrice:

1. Is mankind having an effect on the atmosphere of this planet which will be harmful?

Two degrees Celsius warming globally, planet wide, in the average, may mean twenty degrees Celsius warming at the poles, on current trends, extended linearly (non linear effects ought to make the situation even worse, quicker). Thus Alaska would become  tropical. Amazingly, not only did it happen before, but it seems to be the Earth preferred climate.   Our present BIOSPHERE is not adapted to this though: crocodiles could swim to tropical Alaska, but where are all temperate and polar fauna and flora going to go?

2. Is there any room for error in your answer to Q.1.?

Not really: when the plane is going to hit the mountain, it does not matter where if it’s a few degrees higher or lower.

3. CO2 levels in the atmosphere are higher than has ever been known by science.  Is that a correct statement?

It is correct for the last 15 million years, according to the latest (2009) research, when CO2 concentration was limited to 300 ppmv (except for possible transient peaks; extreme volcanism can rise and lower CO2 quickly). It is not true for the warmest geological periods (which were much more extensive than the glaciated periods)

4. Are the activities of mankind causing the increasing levels of acidification in the oceans of the planet?

Half of the increased CO2, so far, has gone in the ocean, some reacting with water to make carbonic acid. Latest research suggests that plankton will start dissolving by 2100. A lot of CO2 was just dissolved, as in a carbonated soda, (e.g. Perrier), and may, most likely will, come out if warmed up and shaken (as is now happening in the Antarctic ocean).

5. Are the activities of mankind causing the rising sea levels of the planet’s oceans?

The giant icecaps of Greenland and Antarctica are, overall, melting. Since some Antarctic temperatures have gone up 4.5 degree Celsius, if one ascribes that spectacular rise to man, then so it is.

6. Is man-made global warming happening: yes; no; unclear?

The warming is just a degree of freedom of the system in which increased energy is flowing, as the lower atmosphere warms. Warming can involve the oceans, or the ground itself. When one looks at the temperature gradient in the latter, by digging holes and measuring the temperature gradient, the signs of irresistible warming are blatant. As the warming proceeds, new sinks for the increasing heat open up, slowing down the apparent warming, as they suck up the energy. So looking only at a temperature gauge is a mistake. So far, the temperature rise in the temperate and tropical areas has been tiny, but the effects in the polar areas, where the refrigerators and sun shades are, have been tremendous.

7. Is there a rational argument for assuming global warming will threaten mankind’s existence on the planet?

The problem is more global carbon than global warming per se. Global carbon threatens an imminent collapse of the food chain in the ocean. This has happened before, and was caused by volcanoes (which belch SO2 and CO2). Mankind’s ongoing existence is a military problem. As the biosphere collapses, nuclear world war has a high probability of occurring. As the defeat of Britain and France in May-June 1940 showed, and the victory at Midway confirmed, one time extraordinary events, not easily reproducible in war games, do happen in real war. So it is not clear that civilization will survive. But it is clear that billions of people will die.

So back to Peter Bernstein.  I do not know if Alan Carlin or Patrice Ayme represent an accurate scientific understanding of the future of our climate and world.  Probably the majority of the Learning from Dogs readers are in the same camp.

Governments are no help at all because the cynic in me thinks that anything that assists the taxation of people (and global warming is a great ’sales’ pitch) won’t generate impartial evidence.  Even independent research centres that spend government monies may be loathe to ‘bite the hand that feeds it’.

Bernstein gives us the answer.  If the probability of global warming/excessive global carbon were happening then the consequences for all the children and grandchildren on this planet would be critically damaging.  On that basis, there is no choice.

We must step up the political force across the world’s governments to make sure the next generations have a viable planet on which to live.

By Paul Handover

NEW YORK (AP) — Despite a likely end-of-year slowdown in fixed-income trading, Goldman Sachs will top Wall Street expectations by cutting the percentage of sales it sets aside as compensation, an analyst said Monday.

Analyst Brad Hintz also added that the seasonal slowdown doesn’t signal that the bank’s ability to profit from a recovery in credit markets has ended.

Nashville business calendarAhead of the Bell: Willbros Group upgraded (AP)

In October, I wondered whether emails between Bank of America and its outside counsel regarding the bank’s acquisition of Merrill Lynch may eventually end up in the hands of plaintiffs lawyers.  Despite the bank’s assertion that handing over the sensitive documents created only a limited waiver of its privilege, it looks now like the class action firms may be getting their wish. Susan Beck at The American Lawyer reported on Thursday that Manhattan federal district court Judge Denny Chin lifted the statutory discovery stay in the fraud case:

Chin’s ruling does not carve out an exception for privileged materials. The protective order issued by Manhattan federal district court Judge Jed Rakoff in the SEC’s case against Bank of America states that BofA is not deemed to be waiving its privilege “regarding other information that may be of interest in related private lawsuits.” That language can be construed to mean that BofA can still claim privilege over materials government investigators didn’t ask for — not necessarily that plaintiffs in private lawsuits can’t have access to the documents the bank did turn over.

The class action plaintiffs asked Judge Chin to lift the discovery stay automatically imposed by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act in an Oct. 6 letter to Chin. The three-page letter — signed by co-lead counsel from Kaplan Fox & Kilsheimer; Bernstein Litowitz Berger & Grossmann; and Barroway Topaz Kessler Meltzer & Check — argues that the discovery stay, which typically remains in place until after motions to dismiss have been decided — placed the class at a disadvantage compared to others investigating BofA’s merger with Merrill.

Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, representing BofA, immediately objected to lifting the stay…

With this latest ruling and the fact that the protective order may have been flawed, the sharks are smelling blood.  It’s looking more likely than ever that Bernstein Litowitz, Kaplan Fox, and Barroway Topaz will get their way.

Trade between countries can be good for the societies, or bad.

William Bernstein, author of A Splendid Exchange, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about inequality.

Bernstein is worried about it; Roberts is not. Bernstein argues that inequality is damaging to the health of low-status people and hurts the health of the economy. Roberts challenges Bernstein’s empirical evidence. It’s a lively conversation on the economics of status, productivity and the progressivity of taxes.

Bernstein on Inequality | EconTalk | Library of Economics and Liberty

MP3 audio

Non può essere definito altrimenti: un capolavoro.

Nel 1957 debuttò in teatro a  Broadway e nel 1961 comparve la versione cinematografica sotto la regia di Robert Wise e musiche di Leonard Bernstein.

Una colonna sonora assolutamente splendida , che consegna alla storia del cinema e della musica brani bellissimi  ed unici, avvolge delicatamente una storia che potrebbe essere tranquillamente dei nostri giorni.

In una periferia degradata di New York, eletta simbolo delle periferie degradate di tutto il mondo, due bande di teppistelli adolescenti , una locale l’altra portoricana, si contendono il territorio con scaramucce e scazzottate.

La morte accidentale ma preannunciata del leader degli indigeni Riff, la vendetta impulsiva consumata da Tony con l’uccisione di Bernardo leader dei latini e l’amore contrastato e poi spezzato con la portoricana Maria, accelerano la maturazione, la consapevolezza di questi ragazzini e fanno intuire che la violenza e le morti siano state di insegnamento per una convivenza finalmente paritetica e pacifica.

In realtà la finzione filmica non può non seminare  una speranza. Che la realtà, soprattutto ai nostri giorni, massacra quotidianamente con la ferocia , l’ incomunicabilità e l’indifferenza.

Nel musical spaziano diversi piani di lettura: dalla rivisitazione di Romeo e Giulietta, in chiave rock, alla intolleranza verso il diverso, lo straniero (che oggi tanto ci tocca da vicino), alla violenza figlia del degrado, della povertà e  del fallimento della famiglia e della società.

Tutti siamo colpevoli se periferie e situazioni descritte nel film  continuano non solo a perpetuarsi  ma a manifestarsi con ferocia , brutalità e indifferenza crescenti.

E’ recentissima, vivida l’immagine di quella donna che scavalca tranquillamente , fumando come se nulla fosse il corpo di un uomo appena ammazzato da un killer  tra la folla ormai “abituata” a queste scene. Killer che a sua volta si allontana con molta seraficità sicuro che nessuno oserà intralciarlo e certo dell’ammirazione suscitata.

A parte la musica, assolutamente indimenticabile, ottima anche la sceneggiatura, le coreografie e gli attori che si mostrano a loro agio anche in performance particolari quali canto e ballo.

A mio avviso uno dei più bei film visti e Il Musical per eccellenza.

]]> http://rebelstarr.wordpress.com/2009/11/19/likwuid-of-rebel-starr-featured-on-h2c2/ Thu, 19 Nov 2009 20:34:35 +0000 rebelstarr http://rebelstarr.wordpress.com/2009/11/19/likwuid-of-rebel-starr-featured-on-h2c2/

Check out the Queen of the Queendom and Rebel Starr front lady as the feature artist on the Hip Hop Culture Center’s website.

She’s also been published along with over 100 other powerful womyn…..

Check out Rebel Starr next Saturday at SouthPaw

The Broadway production of West Side Story, now playing at the Palace Theatre, is electric; the story of Tony and Maria, torn by their opposing ethnic groups, is timeless, and Bernstein’s score has an enduring freshness and vitality. The production has sparked controversy because some of the Puerto Rican characters’ lines are delivered in Spanish; this technique does add authenticity, but my literal mind was sometimes frustrated by not being able to comprehend the exact meaning of passages. Josefina Scaglione shone as the radiant, charming, sweet Maria; her singing was clear and crisp and subtle in dynamics, and her duets with Tony—“Tonight”,  “One Hand, One Heart”, and “Somewhere”—were captivating. The sets are simple and effective—an imposing steel bridge backdrop nicely sets the scene under the highway. The highlights of the production, for me, were the “Dance at the Gym” mambo (fantastically energetic and well-choreographed) and “America”, with its brilliant, infectious lyrics by Sondheim. I never tire of hearing the Shark girls praise the virtues of America (“I like to be in America, Okay by me in America, Everything free in America”) while the boys offer a more cautious outlook (“Everywhere grime in America, Organized crime in America, Terrible time in America”).

Palace Theatre
1564 Broadway
New York NY 10036

West Side Story

How best to describe slide trumpeter Steven Bernstein’s singular quartet Sex Mob?
Maybe we should start with mercurial musical magician Bernstein himself, whose exotic career as sideman, musical director, arranger and composer has included ten years with John Lurie’s Lounge Lizards and stints alongside everyone from Bill Frisell to Sam Rivers, the Flying Karamazov Brothers and, oh yes, Bootsy Collins. Or maybe we should look at his career as bandleader, which includes the trumpet-slide guitar-tuba trio Spanish Fly and the boisterous, cataclysmic nine-piece Millennial Territory Orchestra. Or maybe we should just listen to Bernstein’s own summing up of Sex Mob (which began life in residency in 1995 at the Knitting Factory’s “late night hang” as a vehicle for Bernstein’s own compositions and quickly morphed into a band covering everything from film composer John Barry’s James Bond music to Duke Ellington to Prince): “Jazz used to be popular music. People would go out to clubs, listen to the music, go home and get laid. Simple as that. We’re bringing that spirit back.”"That spirit”—one of wailing, riotous abandon mixed with eccentric song choices, high musicianship and healthy doses of funky downtown grit—is on ample display on the group’s first live recording, Meets Medeski, waxed at Switzerland’s Willisau Jazz Festival. Less of a meeting than a reunion—groove god John Medeski is an old cohort of the band and can be found on the group’s first release, 1998’s Din of Inequity—the disc is divided into three seamless “suites,” each of which intersperses a couple of originals with covers of Ellington’s “Black and Tan Fantasy,” Count Basie’s “Blue and Sentimental,” two Prince tunes, four Barry “Bond” cuts and (I kid you not) “Down on the Farm” and “Little Liza Jane.”

It is, in short, an absolute gas. And it works, thanks to Bernstein’s impeccable taste and leadership. For all his mischievous rambunctiousness, Bernstein is both a rigorous designer of musical soundscapes and an exacting conductor; no matter how loose the band seemingly hangs, he keeps it under a watchful eye and the music stays concise and true. (Case in point: the longest tune on the CD clocks in at just over six minutes, a somewhat astonishing achievement for a live jazz disc.) As with any Sex Mob show, the Bond tunes are a highlight: both the calamitous “Oddjob,” with Bernstein’s ragged trumpet soaring atop Medeski’s alternately delicate and bombastic Hammond B3, and Barry’s gorgeous “You Only Live Twice,” done as boozy, woozy, soul-inflected ’60s scream, are sublime. Medeski, as expected, sounds terrific in this context (check out his brusque, rampaging solo over Kenny Wollesen’s tumbling drums on “Down on the Farm”).

Sex Mob at All About Jazz.
Visit Sex Mob on the web.
Track listing: Mob Rule Invocation; Mob Rule 1; Black and Tan Fantasy; Mob Rule 2/Little Liza Jane; Sign O The Times; Down On The Farm; This Never Happened to the Other Guy; Mob Rule 3; This Never Happened Part 2; Blue and Sentimental; Kenny Supreme; Darling Nikki; Odd Job; You Only Live Twice; Mob Rule 4; Artie Shaw.

Personnel: Steven Bernstein: slide trumpet; Briggan Krauss: alto saxophone; John Medeski: organ; Tony Scherr: bass; Kenny Wollesen: drums, percussion.

Back in the early 80’s, while my mother was working on her masters in music at American University, she had a friend name Mel who had a part time job working backstage at the Kennedy Center. In those few years she met any number of Very Important People in the classical music and arts world in general, and in my youth would often regale me any number of stories therefore, many of which are thoroughly hilarious. As such, I wish to share!

We’ll start with one of her best: an encounter with the one, the only, Leonard Bernstein. Before we get started, it must be noted that Leonard Bernstein was married and had children. He was also bisexual and had extramarital affairs with both men and women. Got it? Good! Onward and upward!

All righty! So Mel was performing one of her regular duties, which was to lock up the practice rooms before the building closed for the night. A mundane task, to be sure: open door, check room, lock.

However, on this particular night, she came upon a room with the light still on. Not so unusual, she thought, someone must have forgotten to turn it off before they left. She opened the door and reached for the light switch.

And stopped. Before her was the most fascinating tableau. There was Leonard Bernstein, in his boxers. There was a slim young man, also in his boxers. Mr. Bernstein was leaning into the man’s face, his hand thrust forward so that the tip of the cigarette between his fingers almost grazed the guy’s nose. The great composer growled, in low tones that nevertheless carried:

“Light it.”

There was a pregnant pause (purely metaphorical, of course).

Bernstein noticed Mel, standing in the doorway, and his entire face changed. Suddenly he was all joviality, and not the sort you take on when you’re trying to cover up an uncomfortable moment. It was genuinely sincere, as if she had just walked in on them writing dynamics into the score and her unexpected presence was a welcome break from the tedium.

“Hello, sweetheart!” he said, positively beaming. “How are you? We’re almost done here. Will you be at the concert tomorrow?”

And that was it. The light got turned off, the door locked, and Leonard Bernstein did not care that he had been caught in his boxers with a young man that was not his wife.

Moral of the story: if you find yourself chilling with Bernstein in heaven (or possibly hell; who knows?) and he asks for a light, you better bloody well give him one. (This will be a lot easier in hell. Kinda makes you think, doesn’t it?)

Incidentally, the BSO performed Bernstein’s Mass last season. They have a very nice recording of it available for sale.

The New York Philharmonic’s concert at Avery Fisher Hall on Friday night opened with the beauty and brilliance of Beethoven’s Egmont overture. The orchestra moved effortlessly through the ebbs and flows of the music, from the dramatic and deep opening bars to the swelling, melodic themes, which built to a thrilling conclusion and engulfed the audience. Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3 in C minor was wonderful, but marred by the extended symphony of coughing from the audience between the first and second movements; the soloist Emanuel Ax made a good-humoured hushing gesture indicating that it was time to be quiet. (I cannot stand coughing for the sake of coughing between movements; unfortunately, this problem is rife.) Bernstein’s Symphonic Dances from West Side Story performed by the New York Philharmonic could never be anything but spectacular. Masterful music played by a masterful orchestra. ‘Somewhere’ was beautiful and lyrical, and the ‘Mambo’ was explosive; the percussionists sounded amazing, especially the drum kit player, as did the string, brass, and woodwind sections. The complex rhythms were produced with precision, and the power of the whole sound was impressive. Falla’s The Three-Cornered Hat, Suite No. 2, concluded the concert. The orchestra already seems to have formed a strong rapport with new music director and conductor Alan Gilbert, who brought a lot of energy and enthusiasm to the stage.

Alan Gilbert

Today’s Wall Street Journal ran an opinion piece entitled Pay to Play Torts: Pension middlemen get investigated; lawyers get a pass. The column echoes many of the concerns outlined in this blog:

The Louisiana State Employees’ Retirement System is among the most litigious in the nation. John Kennedy, the state treasurer who helps decide when Louisiana’s major pension funds should bring a law suit, has received tens of thousands of dollars in political donations from Bernstein Litowitz, which has offices in New York, New Orleans and San Diego and was the country’s top-grossing securities class-action firm in 2008. The law firm has represented Louisiana’s public pension funds at least 13 times since 2004, and its partners donated nearly $30,000 to Mr. Kennedy’s two most recent campaigns, even though he ran unopposed both times.

In Mississippi, the state attorney general determines when the public employees retirement fund should bring a securities class action and which outside firms will represent the fund. Would you be shocked to learn that AG Jim Hood has frequently chosen law firms that have donated to his campaigns?

Mr. Hood is also partial to Bernstein Litowitz. On February 21, 2006, he chose the firm to represent the Mississippi Public Employees Retirement Fund in a securities class action against Delphi Corporation—just days after receiving $25,000 in donations from Bernstein Litowitz attorneys. The suit was eventually settled, and the lawyers on the case received $40.5 million in fees. Mr. Hood’s campaign would appear to deserve a raise.

The only thing I know about Sean Coffey’s political ideology is that he’s a Capitalist.  That said, his upcoming campaign to be New York’s next Attorney General is unlikely to emphasize the fortune he’s amassed as a senior partner of the law firm Bernstein Litowitz Berger & Grossman.  For those who don’t know, Mr. Coffey earns a living by collecting hundreds of millions of dollars in attorney fees for his part in bringing (and usually settling) lawsuits against companies (like WorldCom, for instance) over violations of securities laws.

I may be jumping the gun a bit but I’d give 20 to 1 odds that the central theme of Coffey’s campaign will be something along the lines of:  ”A tough fighter (and former Navy Captain) who has spent his career fighting corporate greed and corruption on behalf of the little guy.”  It sounds pretty good and some of it’s actually true!  Unfortunately the rest is a crock of shit.

I don’t question the propriety of punishing corporate malfeasance, but Sean Coffey is no Robin Hood. Unlike most attorneys in private practice, Mr. Coffey finds a defendant to sue before he finds a plaintiff to represent. And who are these plaintiffs willing to surrender outrageous fees to subsidize Mr. Coffey’s lifestyle?

You, the taxpayers, of course.  In a nutshell, Mr. Coffey’s law practice works like this:

1. Identify the officials making decisions for major public pension funds.
2. Hire former insiders (like, e.g. Carl McCall) to lobby current officials for business.
3. Become a major donor, fundraiser, and bundler for such politicians/trustee(s).
4. Identify an SEC action alleging that a company’s conduct violated securities laws.
5. Locate a pension fund with a sizable equity investment in the defendant company.
6. Paraphrase the SEC’s complaint and file a private suit on behalf of that fund.
7. Settle the case for a billion dollars (or on a rare occasion, take it to trial).
8. Take home $200,000,000.00 for all your hard work
9. Run for Attorney General on the platform that you only took 20% of $1 billion.

I don’t begrudge the man his personal largess; only the way he earned it.  There are a lot of talented litigators in the world and Mr. Coffey didn’t make his fortune because he’s just that much better than the rest. He made his money by paying to play with influence peddlers in state governments who turn a blind eye to his outrageous fees.  The plaintiff’s bar would argue that such eight or nine figure fees are typical in these cases (which may well be true) and the judges sign off on them as the accepted current state of play in the securities class action industry.

Contingency fee arrangements agreed to in advance by individual clients and their attorneys are not the ethical equivalent of such fee arrangements between fund trustees on one side and law firms financing the fund trustees’ political careers on the other. Sean Coffey made his millions by ripping off pensioners and taxpayers and calling it “investor protection.”  I’m calling him out on it because he’s now decided he should be New York’s chief law enforcement officer.

If Mr. Coffey was really more interested in protecting investors than lining his own pockets with their money, why did he go to work for Bernstein instead of the SEC in the first place?  Or better, why not bring the same kinds of securities suits, but instead of getting “super” wealthy off cash-strapped state pension system clients, just extract enough from the settlements to be “kind of” wealthy?  I don’t know his answer but I’m sure it too would be rich.

Beim landesweiten Wettbewerb “Die lebenswerteste Stadt Rußlands” belegte Wladimir einen Platz unter den ersten Zwanzig. Ein Achtungserfolg, wenn man weiß, daß insgesamt etwa 1.500 Kommunen teilgenommen haben. Freilich bedeutet das noch lange nicht, Wladimir wäre sauberer und aufgeräumter, hätte bessere Straßen und Bürgersteige als die Mitbewerber. Die gute Platzierung erklärt sich nämlich vor allem durch Wladimirs Anspruch auf den Titel der “historischen Hauptstadt Rußlands”. Und so verlieh man denn gestern Wladimir in der heutigen Hauptstadt Rußlands, in Moskau, den Spezialpreis der Jury ”Für die Arbeit zur Erhaltung des architektonischen Erbes und der Entwicklung nationaler Traditionen im Bauwesen”, eine Auszeichnung, die bei dem Wettbewerb Mängel in anderen Bereichen auszugleichen vermochte und Wladimir so weit nach vorne brachte. 

Gleichzeitig erhalten Wladimirer Ambitionen auf dem Kongreß der Archäologen in Susdal einen unerwarteten Dämpfer von Nikolaj Makarow, dem Direktor des Archäologischen Instituts Moskau: “Wladimir ist eine Stadt, deren Namen mit Wladimir Monomach, nicht mit Wladimir Swjatoslawowitsch verbunden ist. Das liegt auf der Hand. Daß man Wladimir und seine Geschichte um 100 Jahre älter gemacht hat, entbehrt jeder Grundlage. Leider feierte man dieses Jubiläum ohne Abstimmung mit der Russischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.” Das ist starker Tobak, war es doch gerade das Erzbistum Wladimir, das 1990 sein tausendjähriges Jubiläum feierte. Fünf Jahre später tat es ihm die Stadt nach und beging den eigenen Geburtstag rückwirkend. Seither zählt man bei jedem Stadtfest im September fleißig weiter und ist schon bei 1019 gelandet. Ob man nun auch offiziell zur alten und wohl richtigen Auffassung zurückkehrt, Wladimir sei 1108 gegründet worden, muß man abwarten. In jedem Fall hätte man ein weiteres rundes Datum versäumt.

Im Zentrum der Diskussionen der führenden russischen Archäologen stehen aber die außergewöhnlichen Funde der jüngsten Zeit: das erste finnische Grab aus dem 3. Jahrhundert und mindestens drei große Schätze. Den Wert des vormongolischen Schmuckes versucht man gerade, in Moskau abzuschätzen. Einzigartig aber die Ausgrabung von 213 kg Bernstein aus dem frühen 13. Jahrhundert mitten in Wladimir. Schon bald will man den weltweit aufsehenerregenden Schatz in Wladimir der Öffentlichkeit zugänglich machen. Man darf gespannt sein.

Mit Spannung erwartet werden jetzt schon die Grabungen der kommenden Saison, denn die Wladimirer Erde bietet wohl noch viel zu entdecken, wenn sie nicht zugebaut wird. Mehr als 300 Verstöße gegen den Denkmalschutz listen die Fachleute auf, ein Großteil davon in Susdal, wo widerrechtlich immer wieder auf den Fundamenten historischer Gebäude Privathäuser und Hotelanlagen errichtet werden. Der Wettlauf um die Geschichte ist in vollem Gang.

You should go check out Brian’s blog, Political Risk Explored. He is currently reading some great books!

• Bremmer and Keat The Fat Tail
• Bremmer The J Curve
• Kindleberger and Aliber Manias, Panics and Crashes
• Bernstein Against the Gods
• Bouchet, Clarke and Groslambert Country Risk Assessment

Nobody else says things this nice about me except on my birthday. Thank you! Seriously, thank you for attending Fletcher’s conference Managing Political Risk 2009.

I also wanted to thank Munish, Benjamin, and Andy for being so nice to me.  I’m happy I came up even though I’m approaching my 23rd hour of straight consciousness and feel sick.  I’ll probably wrap up some of the things I learned on Sunday/Monday after I’ve recovered from the conference and/or weekend!

…

A nice gentleman by the name of Benjamin Mazzotta showed me his desktop picture of the world sized to population.  Awesome. The map (and him).

By Max Kantar *

Earlier this week the New York Times published an op-ed article, ‘Rights Watchdog, Lost in the Mideast‘ written by Robert L. Bernstein, the founding chairman emeritus of Human Rights Watch.

The editorial amounts to one regurgitation of Israeli propaganda after another in an effort to delegitimize mainstream criticism of Israeli policies in the international human rights community. The timing of Bernstein’s article is instructive; its publication in the New York Times comes on the heels of the release of the Goldstone Report as the intellectual apologists for Israeli crimes in the U.S. go into ultra-hysteria mode to save the already eroding image of their favorite client state. Bernstein decries HRW for its supposed anti-Israel bias and unleashes a tirade of familiar accusations routinely invoked by ’supporters of Israel’ to deflect criticism of the Jewish state. To make the case that HRW–and presumably the international human rights community in general—has ‘lost critical perspective’ on Israel-Palestine, Bernstein cites six major points:

1) There is no “moral equivalency” between the “democratic and non-democratic worlds”

2) HRW spends more time criticizing Israel than it spends criticizing individual neighboring states

3) Hamas and Hezbollah use civilians as human shields and do not fight fairly

4) The government of Iran supports Hamas and Hezbollah and seeks to destroy the state of Israel and exterminate all Jews

5) Weapons are making their way into Gaza and Lebanon and might be used to strike Israel

6) Israel only commits wrongs in self-defense while Hamas and Hezbollah do so intentionally

These claims are all demonstrably false. What is interesting is that someone in Bernstein’s position surely must be aware of this. In his analysis Bernstein wisely chooses not to inform his readers of the general political context surrounding Israel-Palestine–a point to which I will return. For the moment, let’s have a look at Bernstein’s primary talking points.

Moral Equivalency and the Democratic and Non-democratic Worlds

Bernstein begins by explaining that HRW in its birth originally “sought to draw a line between the democratic and non-democratic worlds in an effort to create clarity in human rights” in order “to pry open closed societies, advocate basic freedoms and support dissenters.” More to the point, “we wanted to prevent the Soviet Union and its followers,” Bernstein declared, “from playing a moral equivalence game with the West.”

Bernstein’s suggestion that there is no comparison between alleged human rights violations inside democratic states as opposed to abuses in authoritarian and undemocratic states seems to be, at face value, reasonable. However, the HRW reports of Israeli human rights violations are almost always (the exceptions being the wars in southern Lebanon) documentations of Israeli practices and policies in the occupied Palestinian territories where Palestinians most certainly do not live under the rule of a democratic state, but rather under the rule of a ruthless, foreign military occupation. Palestinians in the occupied territories (henceforth OPT) are systematically denied freedom of movement, assembly, and speech; they are routinely subjected to violence–often times lethal–at the hands of the IDF and paramilitary Jewish settlers, both of which act with virtual impunity and are totally unaccountable to the Palestinians. Jewish settlers living illegally in the occupied Palestinian territories enjoy all the rights and privileges that one would attribute to “the democratic world” while Palestinians in the same territorial entity essentially live under martial law, in what amounts plainly to an extremely violent military/police state. Palestinians have absolutely no rights and no say in the (Israeli) government and military that effectively rules over them. Bernstein’s inference that documented Israeli human rights abuses take place in “the democratic world” is perhaps his most absurd and irresponsible assertion. By any standard of law and government the OPT is a part of–to use Bernstein’s terminology–”the undemocratic world.” Of course, the existence of systematic violations of human rights (like those attributed to Israel) proves that those being subjected to the abuses are not part of anything that could be even remotely called a “democracy.”

Furthermore, it should be understood that empty and elite rhetorical concoctions like “moral equivalency” are simply terms of propaganda used to justify applying to official enemies standards one refuses to apply to favored states. Suggesting that favored states (Israel or the West in general) have an inherent moral superiority compared to disfavored states/parties is totally meaningless. It has been illustrated time and time again that the internal democratic character of a state does not necessarily inhibit it from committing gruesome atrocities outside of its official national boundaries. What difference does it make to the victims of state violence if the perpetrator has democratic institutions and provisions in its own national territory? The real issue at hand is Israel’s human rights record, which leads us to the next point.

Why Does HRW Write More about Israel Than Other States in the Region?

To illustrate HRW’s failures, Bernstein points to the fact that although “the region is populated by authoritarian regimes with appalling human rights records,” (which it surely is) it is Israel who receives the most condemnations from HRW. The basis for Bernstein’s objection to this fact (assuming that Israel does receive the most condemnations) is that Israel is a democracy–rationale that falls flat on its head when juxtaposed with the reality in the occupied Palestinian territories, as illustrated above.

That being said, perhaps Israel receives more attention from HRW than its neighbors because it does indeed have the worst human rights record in the region. For over forty years it has been a belligerent occupier, constantly threatening its neighbors and attacking them at will. Israel’s savage repression of the primarily nonviolent first intifada in the OPT almost makes the recent crushing of the Iranian popular uprising look like a tea party. When one thinks of the thousands of home demolitions, the draconian siege, the multiple invasions of Lebanon, the constant atrocities and arbitrary killings, the “separation” wall, and the 300 children murdered in cold blood last winter, it is not difficult to conclude that Israel likely holds the regional title for “worst human rights record.”

Moreover, why should Western human rights activists not focus on exposing Israeli practices in the OPT? I imagine that supporters of white supremacy in Apartheid South Africa decried what they saw as the overemphasis on South African human rights abuses as well. Like South Africa was, Israel is largely dependent on Western military, economic and diplomatic support which therefore warrants a corresponding degree of critical attention in light of the massive abuses. It is also widely recognized that Israel is imposing an apartheid regime on the Palestinians in the OPT, as alluded to above. Both Israel’s leading human rights group and its leading newspaper (Ha’aretz) have acknowledged this much, as have Former President Jimmy Carter and countless South African anti-apartheid activists, including John Dugard and Desmond Tutu. Apartheid is considered to be a “crime against humanity” and warrants an international solidarity effort to overthrow it. Instead of complaining about the fact that rights groups are exposing Israeli crimes, Bernstein and his ideological cohorts should use their influence to help put an end to the abuses.

Human Shielding

In the most familiar accusation leveled against anyone Israel attacks, Bernstein desperately parrots the claims of Israel’s state department, noting that Hamas and Hezbollah “use their own people as human shields.” Unfortunately for Bernstein, the documentary record reveals that by in large, the accusations of the use of human shields on the part of Hamas and Hezbollah are false, or at best, unsubstantiated.

Taking the most recent conflict with Hezbollah in 2006, the US Army War College carried out a study on counterterrorism and guerilla warfare.Despite their heavy reliance on Israeli military contacts and interviews, the study discovered that there was no “systematic reporting of Hezbollah using civilians in the combat zone as shields” and “little or no meaningful intermingling of Hezbollah fighters and noncombatants.”

An Amnesty International report on the 2006 Hezbollah-Israel war also concluded that no evidence existed that would suggest the use of civilian shielding on the part of Hezbollah. However, the study did find that Hezbollah officials “encouraged or assisted people who had been unable to leave their villages in south Lebanon to do so.” As for Israel, Amnesty noted that convoys of fleeing civilians were deliberately attacked by Israeli forces as they attempted to evacuate the area.

Human Rights Watch also reached similar conclusions in its own analysis and report on the 2006 war noting that “available evidence indicates that in the vast majority of cases Hezbollah fighters left populated civilian areas as soon as the fighting started and fired the majority of their rockets from pre-prepared positions in largely unpopulated valleys and fields outside villages.” They went on to report that “Hezbollah fighters had not mixed with the civilian population” and that “Hezbollah stored most of its rockets in bunkers and weapon storage facilities located in uninhabited fields and valleys.”

During “Operation Cast Lead” Israel constantly accused Hamas of using civilians as human shields in an attempt to explain the massive civilian causalities it was inflicting on the people of Gaza. None of the independent reports to emerge since the assault on Gaza have found any evidence to substantiate Israel’s claims. The Goldstone Report did however discover multiple cases (PDF) of Israeli military forces and units using Palestinian civilians as human shields during “Operation Cast Lead” and dedicated twenty full pages to the chronicling of these abuses (pgs. 280-300). Israeli soldiers have also since came out and testified as to the IDF’s use of Palestinian civilians as human shields in Breaking the Silence.

The Devil in Tehran

Bernstein cites Hamas and Hezbollah’s relationship with the Iranian regime as yet another reason why HRW should sympathize with Israel. The Iranian regime seeks to destroy Israel and all of the world’s Jews, Bernstein says.

Bernstein should know that Iran does not seek to destroy Israel anymore than it seeks to destroy itself. If Iran were to even contemplate an attack on Israel, the entire country would be flattened within moments by the United States, as everybody knows. I’m afraid that such statements on the part of Bernstein simply play into the hysteria conjured up by the US and Israel in service of American state power.

In fact, Iran has accepted the international consensus on resolving the Israel-Palestine conflict. Like every other Muslim state, it has endorsed the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative (PDF) which calls for the establishment of a Palestinian state in the OPT alongside Israel in its pre June 1967 borders–precisely the international consensus on the conflict’s resolution. If Iran seeks to “destroy” Israel, why would it endorse this mainstream peace plan which recognizes the right of Israel to live in peace and security in its internationally recognized borders? Let us not forget that it is Israel and the United States who have continued to threaten Iran with annihilation and obliteration. These threats are also violations of the UN Charter.

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

Bernstein also warns that HRW “know[s] that more and better arms are flowing into both Gaza and Lebanon and are poised to strike again.”

Israel has the fourth most powerful military in the world and a stockpile of nuclear weapons big enough to wipe Lebanon, Gaza, and Iran off of the face of the planet. Last winter Israel slaughtered 1,400 people while sustaining only 13 casualties of its own. The number of Palestinians killed by Israel in the first three minutes of “Operation Cast Lead” greatly exceeds the number of Israelis killed by Hamas in the previous six years.

Nevertheless it is Hamas and Hezbollah that we should be worried about, Bernstein tell us. While Israel starves the Gaza Strip into the Stone Age we are supposed to believe that Hamas fighters are developing serious deterrence capabilities. Putting aside the complete lunacy of Bernstein’s false alarms, readers should keep in mind that the Hezbollah organization was established to resist the brutal Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon. Likewise Hamas was created for the same reason–to resist Israeli military occupation of their land.

In any event, it truly surpasses belief that these absurdities could be even be contemplated in a free society, let alone appear on the pages of the country’s most prominent newspaper.

Self-Defense and Occupation

Implying that Israel acts with proportion and in self-defense and that the Palestinians are the aggressors, Bernstein declares that “there is a difference between wrongs committed in self-defense and those perpetrated intentionally.” It takes true intellectual discipline to read these words without breaking into laughter–or tears. Israel is the military occupier and has been for over forty years. By definition, Israel is the aggressor. How can Israel claim to be defending itself while it is militarily occupying other people’s lands? By any reasonable standard, one could not call what Israel does “self-defense.”

And while Gaza is still considered “occupied territory” by all relevant observers, the illegal economic blockade is considered to be “an act of war” under international law. What are the Palestinians supposed to do? Does Israel have a moral ‘right’ to impose illegal collective punishment on the Palestinians in Gaza?

While no party is entitled to attack and target civilian populations, readers should not forget the root cause of Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians, which is unending military occupation and colonization. Virtually the entire world–including both major Palestinian political groupings and every Arab and Muslim state–has accepted the principle of resolving the conflict peacefully via a full Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories and the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza with East Jerusalem as its capital. It is Israel—backed by the United States–who refuses to accept these terms.

Until Robert Bernstein can come to terms with these basic facts, it is he–not Human Rights Watch–who is lost in the Mideast.

* Max Kantar is a Michigan based human rights activist and freelance writer. He can be reached at maxkantar@gmail.com