Karazi calls for “Peace Talks” with the Taliban, Mullah Mohammad Omar, Supreme Commander of the Taliban rejects talks. Once the Taliban were ‘friends’ of the United States. They met with President Reagan, even Mullah Omar sat in the Oval Office. They met with in Houston, Texas with Unocal in 1997 to discuss the Afghanistan Pipeline Project. Houston is known as the Kabul of the United States. Read more here.

President Reagan and Mullah Omar and Taliban Delegation in Oval Office

‘The people of Afghanistan will not agree to negotiation which prolongs and legitimises the invader’s military presence in our beloved country. Afghanistan is our home,’ a Taliban statement quoted Omar as saying. The elusive leader of the militia, which were unseated in the 2001 US-led invasion of Afghanistan, accused foreign powers of seeking negotiations to ‘prolong their evil process of colonization and occupation. The cunning enemy wants to attack people’s crowded places such as mosques and other similar places in order to malign the Mujahideen,’ Omar said. The one-eyed militant commander called on his fighters to ‘guard against these activities of the enemy and fully avoid carrying out any similar activity. The well-being and prosperity of the people should be your priority.’ The United States and Britain — which have the most troops in Afghanistan — have also opened the door for talks with militants they call ‘moderate Taliban,’ or those who do not have links to Al-Qaida. Omar is a founder of the Taliban and is often referred to as its ‘supreme commander’ or spiritual leader. Many analysts and diplomats believe he is hiding out in Pakistan, although Islamabad denies his presence. Click here for more.

After 8 years of fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, the British have come up with a plan (of course, with U.S. approval) to include the Taliban in Karazi’s government. Who’s running Kabul? Is President Karazi just a puppet? That is what the Taliban believe, and this makes that look true.

Taliban to play role in Afghan govt: UK

EDINBURGH (Scotland): Ending the war in Afghanistan would include senior Taliban commanders sitting in Afghan government, Britain’s foreign secretary said on Tuesday.
David Miliband also told a meeting of Nato’s parliamentary assembly that military action must be accompanied by a political surge to restore Afghans’ faith in their corruption-scarred government.
He said the vast majority of Taliban fighters were not committed to a global jihad and could be persuaded to stop fighting. He said a settlement must include the top Taliban commanders prepared to renounce violence. ‘Once reintegration gains momentum, and the insurgency is starting to fray, we will need to support President Karzai in reaching out to those commanders that can be persuaded to renounce Al Qaeda and pursue their goals peacefully within the constitutional framework,’ he said. Click here for more.

Malalai Joya’s story will be on our Blog every day for the next month. Please buy her book and visit her site.. Read her San Jose Mercury Opinion: “U.S. is doing no good in Afghanistan” here.
On Saturday, Nov. 7, Malalai Joya was at a gathering at San Jose State University in California to promote her book “A Woman Among Warlords” and to gather support for her people in Afghanistan. Malalai is a very brave woman to take on her own government and also the U.S. government, the occupiers of her country.

Malalai Joya signing her new book, A Woman Among Warlords, a JB photo

Our story on Malalai Joya can be seen here. Buy a copy of her book, “A Woman Among Warlords” here, or at your favorite bookstore. A great Holiday gift idea. The subtitle is “The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Who Dared to Raise Her Voice”. Visit Malalai’s website here for more information on how you can help.

* * *
Take Action Now: It is not too late !
Call President Obama: To reach the U.S. Capitol Switchboard: 202-224-3121 or 202-225-3121 Leave a message: No more Troops. End the War(s). Call Leon Panetta at (703) 482-0623, CIA headquarters, leave a message: Stop the South Waziristan War and don’t attack Quetta, End the War(s).

How much does the War Spending cost your congressional district (if you live in the U.S.)? Find out at the National Priorities Project (click here). Only YOU can stop this.

Today, please tell your member of Congress and U.S. Senators to End the War in Afghanistan, sign this petition. If you live outside the United States, write to your leaders, End the War Now.

……

Pô tanta gente pra escolher, logo o Bill Gates?

BIG ANNOUNCEMENT DECEMBER 1, ON TELEVISION: PRESIDENT OBAMA TO LAY OUT THE PLAN HOW MORE TROOPS WILL BRING AN END TO THE WAR. FUZZY PLANNING?

“It’s my intention to finish the job,” Obama said Tuesday in the East Room of the White House at at a joint news conference with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. “I feel very confident when the American people hear a clear rationale for what we’re doing there and how we’ll achieve our goals, they’ll be supportive.”

This is our message to you, Mr. President.

Photo Denice Rehse Watson www.barewitness.org

* * *
Take Action Now: It is not too late !
Call President Obama: To reach the U.S. Capitol Switchboard: 202-224-3121 or 202-225-3121 Leave a message: No more Troops. End the War(s). Call Leon Panetta at (703) 482-0623, CIA headquarters, leave a message: Stop the South Waziristan War and don’t attack Quetta, End the War(s).

How much does the War Spending cost your congressional district (if you live in the U.S.)? Find out at the National Priorities Project (click here). Only YOU can stop this.

Today, please tell your member of Congress and U.S. Senators to End the War in Afghanistan, sign this petition. If you live outside the United States, write to your leaders, End the War Now.

A garage door can be a prominent focal point so it’s worth matching the style of the door to the style of your home. Think of the garage as an extension of your home’s theme, not an afterthought. Let your home’s architectural style, the shape and size of the existing windows and entry doors and exterior design details influence the design of your garage door.

Since 1996, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has put its considerable resources to work to “ensure that life-saving health advances reach those who need them most” (Gates Global Health Overview).  But, due to the extent and range of the foundation’s giving, it has been difficult to figure out who is receiving what and why.  Recently, McCoy et al. analyzed the foundation’s global health funding and published their findings in The Lancet (McCoy et al. 2009, Lancet citation).  They reported that in 1996-2007 the foundation gave more than 1000 grants for a total of $9 billion primarily to:

-global health partnerships, like the Global Fund to Fights AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria; the Global Alliance for Vaccine and Immunizations (GAVI); and Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition ($5.85 billion was given to 20 organizations);

-nongovernment and non-profit organizations involved in research, health-care delivery, and public awareness/advocacy ($3.3 billion to 100 organizations with the bulk going to Seattle-based PATH which has received close to $1 billion); and

-universities and research hospitals ($1.84 billion to 78 institutions).

To give an idea of scale, the authors note that the amount spent by the foundation in 2007 ($1.65 billion) was almost the same as WHO’s budget that year.  The authors acknowledge, though, that knowing the final disposition of the funds is problematic since many of the recipients re-granted the money, and I assume tracking all of their disbursements was belong the paper’s scope.  Hence, figuring out how much funding went into specific efforts, such as my interest, creating those life-saving health advances through product testing, manufacture, and distribution (product development), will require more investigation.

What is clear from their analysis is that the foundation does not directly fund for-profit organizations, for example, companies developing products for global health (with one exception, Aktiv-Dry LLC; see my posting of October 28).  This is a notable omission for an foundation built with profits from the selling products that many people found worth buying.  One would think that directly funding product development in companies, with appropriate milestones and pricing guarantees, would be worth a try.  But, in general, foundations rarely give grants or make investments in for-profits, although this bias seems to be eroding as foundations seek that sustainable solutions that have not resulted from charity alone, and funding companies carries the baggage of possible adverse publicity.

There is one avenue for companies to receive direct funding from the Gates Foundation.  The Grand Challenges Explorations, a grant program started in 2008 and intended to “to expand the pipeline of ideas to fight our greatest health challenges,” is open to applicants from any type institution  (Grand Challenges Explorations).  The program has an initial grant of $100K, a mercifully short application (2 pages) and review time (4 months), and  successful projects have the opportunity to receive additional funding of $1 million although the approval process seems yet to be determined.  The applications are reviewed by unnamed reviewers who have “broad expertise and experience in discovering inventive approaches to daunting issues” without identification of the applicants.

Since its start, the program has made 262 grants, totaling about $8 million per year (less than 5% of total granted annually by the foundation).  I reviewed the list of recipients and found academics well-represented but few companies (17 or 6.5%).  The difference has at least two explanations:  few companies applied and/or company-based scientists submitted uncreative or non-innovative ideas.  Without reviewing the applications, one can’t say, but I would think that the Grand Challenge Explorations Program would be well-served by encouraging, maybe favoring, scientists and organizations that, in addition to having a creative idea, also have the experience, resources, and motivation to convert the idea into a solution.  Or perhaps, when awarding the $1 million grants, the foundation could require the awardees to be teamed with a entity with experience in developing and delivering products.  It will be interesting to see which of the 262 ideas, and how, result in solutions.

BULLETIN: With the national debt now topping $12 trillion, the White House estimates that the government’s tab for servicing the debt will exceed $700 billion a year in 2019, up from $202 billion this year, even if annual budget deficits shrink drastically. Other forecasters say the figure could be much higher. In concrete terms, an additional $500 billion a year in interest expense would total more than the combined federal budgets this year for education, energy, homeland security and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. [Ed. Note: Just on the financial costs to the U.S. for the WARS, it is enough to turn off the funds. We are not doing any good with our troops on the ground there. Read on. Sign the petition at the bottom of the Post, and call President Obama, his number is there also.]

The Top Contracts
Who Got What in Iraq and Afghanistan, 2004–2006

Many Pallets of 100 US Dollar Bills are necessary to pay these contracts

Ok, let’s guess how much the top contract was for, and who got it? I want you to think about this for one moment. The Center for Public Integrity put out this study of the top 100 contracts, and also, the top 100 contractors. How much was the #1 contract worth? How much was the last one on the list, the 100th contract worth? Here’s the results:

The top contract was for $15 Billion US Dollars and it went to KBR (formerly Kellog, Brown and Root) Look at the link to see what they got this money for. KBR was a subsidiary of Halliburton during this time, Dick Cheney was CEO of this company before becoming Vice President under George W. Bush.

Contract # 100, the lowest on the list was for $51 Million Dollars to L-3 Communications Holdings Inc. That’s right readers, 51 MILLION US DOLLARS ranks 100th in the least costly contract for the Iraq-Afghanistan Wars in 2004 through 2006. More dollars are needed now to keep the war(s) going. It is estimated to be over 100 Million US Dollars every day right now, plus the loss of lives on all sides, the wounded humans on all sides, and the totally innocent lives lost while the sides continue to kill each other. Enough is Enough.

Out of Iraq, Into the Gulf by Nick Turse and Tom Engelhardt, November 23, 2009

They report: “So here’s the mystery. You have a country that only recently had upward of 300 military bases, monster to micro, in a single war-torn land, Iraq. It probably now has something like 300 bases combined in Iraq and Afghanistan (where base-building is on the rise). Outside of those war zones, it has perhaps 800 more “facilities” (as they’re called) around the globe and thousands more at home. Some of them are absolutely enormous, the equivalent of small American towns with all the amenities of home.”

No more money for base expansion. Cut 10 bases a month for one year, how much will that save?

Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan Google Image 2009

Malalai Joya’s story will be on our Blog every day for the next month. Please buy her book and visit her site.. Read her San Jose Mercury Opinion: “U.S. is doing no good in Afghanistan” here.
On Saturday, Nov. 7, Malalai Joya was at a gathering at San Jose State University in California to promote her book “A Woman Among Warlords” and to gather support for her people in Afghanistan. Malalai is a very brave woman to take on her own government and also the U.S. government, the occupiers of her country.

Malalai Joya signing her new book, A Woman Among Warlords, a JB photo

Our story on Malalai Joya can be seen here. Buy a copy of her book, “A Woman Among Warlords” here, or at your favorite bookstore. A great Holiday gift idea. The subtitle is “The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Who Dared to Raise Her Voice”. Visit Malalai’s website here for more information on how you can help.

* * *
Take Action Now:
Call President Obama: To reach the U.S. Capitol Switchboard: 202-224-3121 or 202-225-3121 Leave a message: No more Troops. End the War(s). Call Leon Panetta at (703) 482-0623, CIA headquarters, leave a message: Stop the South Waziristan War and don’t attack Quetta, End the War(s).

Today, please tell your member of Congress and U.S. Senators to End the War in Afghanistan, sign this petition. If you live outside the United States, write to your leaders, End the War Now.

How to build a picket fence

Build your own decorative timber fencing and gates easily with the ADF Construction guides and detailed plans. Adjust the sizes to suit your area and start building straight away.

Build a timber picket fence

The ADF Construction guide covers everything you need to know to build your own decorative front fences and gates including picket, paling, panel, horizontal slat and more. Incorporate entrance pergolas, arbors, radial pergolas, lean-to pergolas, garden gazebos and other garden structures as explained in this easy to follow construction guide.

All Guides include photo illustrations, step by step instructions, material lists, suppliers, tips from the experts and over $25 of free bonus books with each purchase.

Was $19.95 RRP, buy online for under $7.95. Most plans are under $5! And receive the book immediately by return email!

Many guide books and construction guides are available including how to build a timber deck, staircase, attic ladder, bookshelf, install windows and doors, and much more.

Visit our website where you can view the whole range of DIY plans and guides. www.alldayfencing.com.au/adfshopdiy.php

Build your Own Horizontal Timber Privacy Screens!

Build your own horizontal timber slat privacy screen easily with the ADF Construction guides and detailed plans. Adjust the sizes to suit your area and start building straight away.

The ADF Construction guide covers everything you need to know to build your own privacy screens quickly and easily. Includes a free guide to foundations and footings to help with your project. Many other projects available including, Radial pergolas, lean-to pergolas, garden gazebos, fencing, gates and screens. All privacy screen designs are explained in this easy to follow construction guide.

The Guides include photo illustrations, step by step instructions, material lists, suppliers, tips from the experts and over $25 of free bonus books with each purchase.

 Was $19.95 RRP, buy online for under $7.95. Most plans are under $5! And receive the book immediately by return email!

 Many guide books and construction guides are available including how to build a timber deck, staircase, attic ladder, bookshelf, install windows and doors, and much more.

 Visit our website where you can view the whole range of DIY plans and guides. www.alldayfencing.com.au/adfshopdiy.php

  Build your Own Horizontal Timber Slat Fencing and Screens!

Horizontal Timber Slat Fence Construction

Build your own horizontal timber slat fence or screen easily with the ADF Construction guides and detailed plans. Adjust the sizes to suit your area and start building straight away.

The ADF Construction guide covers everything you need to know to build your own slat fence quickly and easily. Includes a free guide to foundations and footings to help with your project. Radial pergolas, lean-to pergolas, garden gazebos, fencing, gates and screens are explained in this easy to follow construction guides. All Guides include photo illustrations, step by step instructions, material lists, suppliers, tips from the experts and over $25 of free bonus books with each purchase.

 Was $19.95 RRP, buy online for under $7.95. Most plans are under $5! And receive the book immediately by return email!

Build a timber slat fence

 Many guide books and construction guides are available including how to build a timber deck, staircase, attic ladder, bookshelf, install windows and doors, and much more.

 Visit our website where you can view the whole range of DIY plans and guides. www.alldayfencing.com.au/adfshopdiy.php

1. Change outdated light fixtures
2. Add landscaping
3. Illuminate at night, angle low lights up at trees and bushes and down pathways
4. Plant a tree
5. Add details such as shutters, decorative moldings and fun elements like weathervanes to the outside of your house

Zardari and Aides Granted Immunity in Graft Cases
[Ed. Note: Several weeks ago, we predicted that President Zardari's days as President of Pakistan are limited due to these corruption/graft cases that were dismissed by President Musharraf two years ago. Now, the cases are active again, due to the Parliament rejecting the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO)]

Pakistan President Zardari and photo of Past-President Musharraf

UPDATES: LAHORE: PML-Q Secretary-General Mushahid Husain Syed has demanded that Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani should seek resignation from the ministers who have benefited from the National Reconciliation Ordinance. And Corruption and the NRO.

Who’s running this Country and Why? Noam Chomsky dissecting state propaganda slogans.”Support our Troops”, Excerpt from “Class War: he Attack On Working People” (1998). Thanks Anna Ng.

Malalai Joya’s story will be on our Blog every day for the next month. Please buy her book and visit her site.. Read her San Jose Mercury Opinion: “U.S. is doing no good in Afghanistan” here.
On Saturday, Nov. 7, Malalai Joya was at a gathering at San Jose State University in California to promote her book “A Woman Among Warlords” and to gather support for her people in Afghanistan. Malalai is a very brave woman to take on her own government and also the U.S. government, the occupiers of her country.

Malalai Joya signing her new book, A Woman Among Warlords, a JB photo

Our story on Malalai Joya can be seen here. Buy a copy of her book, “A Woman Among Warlords” here, or at your favorite bookstore. A great Holiday gift idea. The subtitle is “The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Who Dared to Raise Her Voice”. Visit Malalai’s website here for more information on how you can help.

* * *
Take Action Now:
Call President Obama: To reach the U.S. Capitol Switchboard: 202-224-3121 or 202-225-3121 Leave a message: No more Troops. End the War(s). Call Leon Panetta at (703) 482-0623, CIA headquarters, leave a message: Stop the South Waziristan War and don’t attack Quetta, End the War(s).

Today, please tell your member of Congress and U.S. Senators to End the War in Afghanistan, sign this petition. If you live outside the United States, write to your leaders, End the War Now.

O acordo de parceiras e buscas e anúncios online entre Yahoo! e Microsoft pode ser assinado ainda nesta semana. As duas empresas teriam finalizado o texto a pouco tempo e estariam prontas para finalizar as negociações.

De acordo com o IDGNow!, os termos incluem o uso do Bing, ferramenta de busca, nas páginas de pesquisa do Yahoo!, que recebeira 88% da receita dos anúncios.

No mês passado, as empresas perderam o prazo para mostrar detalhes do acordo. Mas, o prazo foi estendido sem uma data específica. Para ser colocado em prática, ele precisa de aprovação de agências reguladoras da Europa e dos Estados Unidos.

Redação Adnews

Me, the unstoppable force.
You, the immovable object.

If the force truly is unstoppable, then there is no such thing as an immovable object, and vice versa. Simple logic suggests that if one exists, the other can not. Others, like myself, believe that one simply becomes the other. That the mass from the object absorbs the kinetic energy, sending it off as an unstoppable force, and the force then becomes the immovable object with infinite mass.

Together, we are a walking omnipotence paradox.

Receive a Free Keyless Entry with the purchase of any LiftMaster Elite Series garage door opener now through December 25th. (a savings of $65.00)

Save $75 to $150 on select Clopay garage doors purchased now until November 30, 2009. Call Broten Garage Door & Gate for all the details!

800-683-2768

Its Apple products that their kids want says one shareholder and Microsoft is seen as the "evil empire"? Now, I wonder what past actions have caused Microsoft to get such a bad image?

Here for your enjoyment are the best bits of the Microsoft annual shareholders meeting 19/11/2009.  If you wish, you can download the complete document for yourselves here.

Before we delve a little into that, lets consider what opinions on the net are saying about some Microsoft technologies, we are seeing Zune making attempts to dethrone the household name of Ipod, we see Bing foraging in the scraps left from Googles dinner table (IMO) and we see Windows 7 being presented by some as being great because…..”its better than Vista”

I’ve often said that Microsoft has its fingers in too many pies and instead of being able to concentrate on making a few world class products it has become “jack of all trades, master of none” (IMO) The sheer size of the corporate slug Microsoft means in my opinion that its revenue stream just cannot support all the employee’s, schemes and innovations that it currently has.  To me Microsoft is well aware of its bad image and that’s why I think we see Microsoft selling parts of its patent portfolio in the hope of attacking its competitors by proxy.

So now we move onto the shareholders meeting.

It certainly makes interesting reading and for me asks the question “how focused and organized are Microsoft?” Read the answers that Steve Ballmer gives to some of the questioned put to him.  Do they sound like the answers of a well crafted plan or an attempt to merely defend the company?  I’ll let you answer that yourselves.

So whilst Microsoft tries to become trendy (IMO) it again seems to miss the mark when even its shareholders can’t convince their own children that Microsoft products are the ones they want and it seems that Apple gets the prize with them for producing the tech which is used.

I don’t really think this shareholders comment will come as a surprise to anyone.

All four of my kids in undergraduate got Macs. When they went on to graduate school, they all got Macs. They claim that 65 percent of college students have Macs. They claim that Microsoft, the evil empire, is stodgy on the current ad that Apple has, you all look like a buffoon.

If Microsoft are not aware of the stiff competition it appears in my opinion that atleast its shareholders are:

Just a really short question. I’m a rather new shareholder and I would like to know why Microsoft can’t beat, together with Nokia, Apple iPhone, and Google’s Android. What are you going to do about it?

and if I was present at that meeting representing Microsoft, I’d shout proudly “Zune and Bing!” and possibly “Oh yeah and Winmob. I know we messed up last time, but dig deep and give us another go!” – Yep that ought to pacify the shareholders!?!?

Its coincidence in the last article I covered Bill Gates and his comment about people “stealing” Microsoft products and working out how to get a return later, lets look at that comment again (said in the early 90’s)

Although about 3 million computers get sold every year in China, but people don’t pay for the software,” he said. “Someday they will, though. As long as they are going to steal it, we want them to steal ours. They’ll get sort of addicted, and then we’ll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade.

and now Steve Ballmer 2009 at the shareholders meeting:

…I think we feel very good about our position. Whether we prevail or not, we’re going through the legal process in China…..

So, there’s a lot of work to be done on intellectual property protection in China. We both want to be at the forefront of doing that well ourselves. And we expect to see our own intellectual property much better protected in China. That is very important to us.

It sure seems time to pay the reaper.

So with Microsoft shareholders even making comments like evil empire and buffoon.  Has Microsoft still got “the right stuff” to last as the biggest player in the IT world?  Whilst in my opinion Microsoft is trying to cash in with old concepts that have already established a customer base (Zune/Bing) whilst also trying to convince people that they’ve got it wrong about Vista, Windows 7 is great and XP is only supported with security updates, one has to wonder if in fact the comment Mr Ballmer made about Google being a “house of cards” is more relevant to Microsoft?

Mr Ballmer says at this meeting,

And we are excited to be bringing our cloud computing platform to market with Windows Azure and SQL Azure, which we announced this week, will be available commercially by the first of next year.

which is strange because Andre Da Costa seems to imply that we are far away from a cloud computing future.  Having said that, if Andre has seen the comments where Mr Ballmer calls Google a house of cards, maybe Andre holds no worth in what Mr Ballmer has to say.

But wait….it does get better!?!?!

Of course theres “great” news which wasn’t mentioned at this meeting and I would suggest that maybe you don’t get too comfortable with Windows 7….Why? because according to the Microsoft road map (and this article) Windows 8 is on its way for 2012!  So enjoy Windows 7 and get ready to buy into Windows 8 in just over 2 years…remember, “its always better the next time”.

Goblin – bytes4free@googlemail.com

Auguste Rodin with his
‘The Creation of Man’
Being repeatedly rejected by the school of your dreams needn’t always be a setback. Auguste Rodin made three unsuccessful attempts to get into École des Beaux-Arts, continuing to work on his craft in spite of the rebuffs. His first major work, the Age of Bronze, was both hailed and condemned for its authenticity. The bronze statue of a man raising his arms toward his head was so lifelike that many of Rodin’s critics accused him of casting a mold of the model. Eventually, Rodin’s work drew great acclaim, and he was commissioned to create the door for a proposed Musée des Arts Décoratifs. Called the Gates of Hell, some of Rodin’s most famous pieces — e.g., The Thinker and The Kiss — were created for it. Auguste Rodin was born on November 12 th of 1840.

Lou Dobbs “Mr. President, bring ALL the troops home now, not just from Iraq and Afghanistan, but from Germany, Italy, Japan, and every country they are stationed in“

Michael Moore says “We need to leave, this is not our business. No more Troops, bring the troops home. It is unwinnable. The President of Afghanistan’s brother is a leader in the Opium trade? When is this going to stop?”

Malalai Joya’s story will be on our Blog every day for the next month. Please buy her book and visit her site.. Read her San Jose Mercury Opinion: “U.S. is doing no good in Afghanistan” here.
On Saturday, Nov. 7, Malalai Joya was at a gathering at San Jose State University in California to promote her book “A Woman Among Warlords” and to gather support for her people in Afghanistan. Malalai is a very brave woman to take on her own government and also the U.S. government, the occupiers of her country.

Malalai Joya signing her new book, A Woman Among Warlords, a JB photo

Our story on Malalai Joya can be seen here. Buy a copy of her book, “A Woman Among Warlords” here, or at your favorite bookstore. A great Holiday gift idea. The subtitle is “The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Who Dared to Raise Her Voice”. Visit Malalai’s website here for more information on how you can help.

* * *
Take Action Now:
Call President Obama: To reach the U.S. Capitol Switchboard: 202-224-3121 or 202-225-3121 Leave a message: No more Troops. End the War(s). Call Leon Panetta at (703) 482-0623, CIA headquarters, leave a message: Stop the South Waziristan War and don’t attack Quetta, End the War(s).

Today, please tell your member of Congress and U.S. Senators to End the War in Afghanistan, sign this petition. If you live outside the United States, write to your leaders, End the War Now.

Interview by Sandra Hiari published on JO

Whether experimenting with the traditional stone facade or building crystal towers, Jafar Tukan has been one of the driving forces in Jordanian architecture. Sandra Hiari ponders the themes of his influential career.

Jafar Tukan at home in his apartment. (Joseph Zakarian)

THERE WAS A TIME when architecture students in the Jordanian school system were taught that there were two pioneer architects in Jordan, and only two.

When instructors presented slides of “good” Jordanian architecture, it would never be of the vernacular. It would be the work of Rasem Badran, who would be described as a romanticist of the Islamic Arab city, or it would be that of Jafar Tukan, the modernist who reshaped the use of masonry in Jordan altogether.

Like the buildings shown in the classroom slides, these descriptions would be set in stone. In a report on architecture of the 1970s and 1980s in the Middle East, architect and historian Udo Kultermann identified Tukan and Badran as the “two most important Arab architects in Jordan.”

In July 2009, Abdali Investment and Development Psc., the company developing Ammanʼs “new downtown,” announced that it was presenting Tukan with a “Life Achievement Award” to recognize his exceptional work, which “reflects a combination of modern thinking with a deeply rooted historical touch.” The award was presented simultaneously with the first group of “Abdali Innovation Awards,” which the company created to recognize students and young people who came up with innovative solutions to challenges in architecture and engineering.

Tukan himself is a reserved, intellectual figure. Despite his fame, heʼs a quiet person, with a decidedly low-key attitude toward self-presentation.

Professionally, he describes his identity as built around an ideal of function and “rationality” in architecture. He says he considers himself a modernist, and among his favorite architects are famous figures of the movement such as I.M. Pei, Frank Lloyd Wright and Mies van der Rohe.

“The whole idea of architecture was implanted in my mind during the prime era of the rational style, which followed World War II,” he says. “This was really the beginning of the ‘modern movement,ʼ where architecture gave away all the decorations and unnecessary forms to strip down architecture to its most basic functional elements.”

Modernism, he says, means to “be creative in contemporary terms and not simplistically copy the past.”

When he talks about local architects he respects, he also mentions Rasem Badran—perhaps surprisingly, given how their professional philosophies are often set up as total opposites. Badran is commonly described as choosing to extract ideas from local Islamic or Arabic motifs, while Tukan is seen as preferring to localize the international style of architecture.

Certainly the styles they look to are very different. Modernist architects have tended to create open spaces with few visual or physical barriers in them; Islamic architecture takes hierarchical differentiation and the enclosure of space as its fundamentals.

One of Tukan's recent public projects is the still-unfinished Jordan Museum, which is being built next to Amman City Hall (which was also designed by Tukan, along with Rasem Badran). (Courtesy Jafar Tukan Architects)

The Jordan Museum Project (Courtesy Jafar Tukan Architects)

For Tukan, function always came first, and tradition second. In an article he wrote in Alam Al Bena magazine in the late 1990s, about the original and the contemporary in his work, he admitted that he didn’t give much importance to studying Arabic and Islamic architectural heritage during the first 15 years of his career.

Later, he says, he did develop particularly Islamic elements in his work, but only so far as they fit his prevailing framework of rationalism.

“I would initially liberate myself from the strict restrictions of the Islamic style,” he explains, “but when I had completed the functional design and fulfilled the requirements of the projects, I would then introduce some Islamic elements in order to relate the project to the local atmosphere. These elements had to be justifiable, and with a certain function.”

But neither was Tukan looking to upset the status quo or challenge local values with his designs.

For example, women have long faced a form of spatial segregation in much Islamic architecture: not only physically separated from men, but often relegated to lower-quality spaces, basements and the back doors of mosques.

For Tukan, this was a very delicate matter, particularly when he was asked to design mosques. In several cases, he says, he placed womenʼs prayer areas on a mezzanine which overlooked a large cavity in the mosque; in other cases they were put on the same level, and segregated by a screen.

“In one other example, in Kuwait, I used a completely separate hall, and in another project in the Emirates, I designed a separate building for women,” he says. “I would say that I moved with the norm,” rather than challenging it.

TUKAN EARNED HIS BACHELOR’S degree in architecture in 1960, at the American University of Beirut. Shortly afterward he moved back to Amman, where he worked at the Ministry of Public Works, designing a spectrum of government buildings and facilities. But after only a year, he quit and moved back to Beirut.

“At that time Beirut was the hub of culture and arts,” he says. “I had gotten an offer there at a big firm [Dar Al Handasa] that was owned by one of my professors, so I immediately accepted it. …The firm was working beyond Lebanon to include Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and countries of the Gulf, so the opportunities that it had were much bigger.”

Seven years after that, Tukan opened his own practice in Beirut. In the late 1960s, he established a regional firm with George Rais, and they carried out many projects in the Gulf. But in 1973, Tukan dissolved the partnership, and three years later, after the beginning of the Lebanese Civil War, he moved back to Amman.

“Some of my colleagues from Beirut had taken off to France and Greece, but for me, Amman was a very perfect alternative,” he says. From then onward, Tukan would grant Jordan the lion’s share of his career.

“Well,” he says, in a straightforward manner, “I am Jordanian to begin with.”

Amman in the 1970s welcomed Tukan, who began adapting elements from international post-war trends that he believed were suitable for Jordanian architecture. His first contribution was probably the rejection of adornments and decorations, and the “stripping down” of architecture to basic functional elements.

This choice is functional in an economic sense, as well as an aesthetic one, he says. “Global economics have changed and there are much higher financial demands, so one has to fulfill the functions that are intended for architecture at the minimum initial cost as well as the maintenance cost.”

Like many other exceptional architects, much of Tukanʼs early work focused on private housing. In the 1980s, his work on apartment buildings and villas flourished, and though he also built many commercial projects during this time, it is his iconic residences that are best remembered.

In their monograph on Tukanʼs early work, Mario Pisani and Ali Abu Ghanimeh describe how “innovative solutions to housing problems have been its hallmark, resulting in the construction of the Villa Rizk and the Villa Salfiti.” Likewise, Kultermann cites two houses built by Badran as “of greatest significance for the development of contemporary Jordanian architecture.”

This is, perhaps, unsurprising, for in a sense, iconic architecture has almost always been an elite endeavor. In Amman, a city built under British occupation and grown through migration and refugee crises, the majority of people still build by stacking concrete boxes on hills. In this milieu, the most likely task for an architect who experimented and innovated would be to try to reinvent the villa, enabled by the existence of an upper class that could afford such services. It would be a matter of time before the new building practices introduced in these elite homes would begin to trickle down to more mundane public and private structures, built by and for other classes.

Later in his career, Tukan began to embrace more public-sphere projects, including the Amman City Hall (which he co-designed with Rasem Badran) as well as projects like the SOS Childrenʼs village in Aqaba, the Royal Automobile Museum in King Hussein Park and the National Museum in Ras Al ‘Ein.

But while a number of the famous modernists he admires thought of architecture as a tool to advance a progressive social agenda, Tukan is one of those who see the essential core of the movement in its embrace of simplicity and functionality.

“I donʼt see modernism as a social agenda for planning a city,” he says. “I see it as a natural cultural development that relates architecture to its time and place: functionally, economically and culturally.”

TUKANʼS STORY SHOWCASES THE challenges of trying to introduce Western ideographies into an Arab locale. It’s hard to determine whether the architect was witnessing a rupture between two styles—the modern and the Islamic—or whether he was trying to grasp the best of both worlds.

A close look at his buildings typically reveals two well-defined spheres. The fluid interior spaces are undefined by barriers, in contrast to the conservative outer shells, which adhere to more traditional rules of what a building is expected to look like.

“Open space, in my mind, is basically about flexibility,” Tukan says. “Flexibility can fulfill the most functional requirements, and then it can also help space to adapt to changing programmatic requirements.”

But, he adds, “Iʼm from those people who believe that architecture must blend in its context.”

So as much as his buildings draw on the modernist movement, especially in the interior sphere, Tukanʼs work has generally been contextually driven to suit the Jordanian built environment.

He is known for using stone extensively, and for much of his career has maintained a focus on applying various stone textures to buildings’ facades. Over the course of the day, the changing angle of sunlight would give the buildings a constantly shifting appearance. His villas and other early projects didnʼt challenge their surroundings, at least as far as appearances are concerned—though their interiors were often liberated from external formalities.

As Tukan advanced in his career, his relationship with the city evolved. In 2003 he merged his firm with Consolidated Consultants, a large local engineering company—a move that has become increasingly common in the local architecture scene.

“The nature of projects has changed,” Tukan explains. “They are more of public nature; they are bigger and they are more complex. The boutique type of practice cannot cope with the complexity of these projects. Working together with a wider technical base can fulfill the requirements for the present times.

“Itʼs a healthy change, and currently, the whole world is moving toward institutionalizing the practice of architecture,” he adds.

Under this new professional setup, the architect who once used a subtle play of light on the stone surfaces of his buildings, while making sure they blended in their urban context, has now designed the city’s tallest high-rise, the Jordan Gate project off the Sixth Circle.

The Jordan Gates project

The incomplete Jordan Gate Towers viewed from west Amman in August 2008

THE TWO 44-STORY TOWERS are being built on land that was designated as a park for residents of Um Uthaina—an area where buildings rarely exceed four stories in height.

Jordan Gate is a radical development by all measures, and may be the most controversial project in Amman’s history to-date. As a development, it wasn’t only the precedent of its height, but its divorce from the uniformity of the Amman’s skyline that raised objections. The Greater Amman Municipality, once a partner in the project, withdrew and created a new policy for high-rise buildings which explicitly prohibits the construction of similar structures. The municipality has cited Jordan Gate as a major reason for the new regulations.

Tukan defends the project, though in his description it seems, more than anything, like an interesting puzzle to be solved.

“The challenge has been to keep such a large project sympathetic to the dominant low rise fabric of the city,” he says. “The architectural decision [we reached] was to create a low-rise podium that is in a harmony [with] the surroundings, and upon which two towers rise high, as minimalist crystals that dissolve in the sky with their completely glazed facades.”

Itʼs debatable whether his work on a project like Jordan Gate means Tukanʼs philosophy of modernism has itself been reinvented in the latest stage of his career. Comparing the towering glass crystals with the subtle stone-faced villas of the 1980s, it seems hard to believe they are the products of the same process. Yet Tukan himself describes them in similar terms: minimalism, simplicity and rationality, giving forms meaningful functions and creating aesthetic statements from the interplay of materials and light.

Still, the change in scale from a villa to a skyscraper is not negligible, and seems to have placed Tukan in a different trajectory of modernism altogether. Take the case of Mies van der Rohe, one of the pioneering modernists Tukan admires.

Van der Rohe designed numerous high rises in New York and Chicago along minimalist lines. His work was embraced by many in the American establishment, but also earned harsh criticism.

American philosopher and political scientist Marshall Berman, in his well-known take on modernism, All That Is Solid Melts Into Air, critiques Van der Rohe, “whose modular glass boxes, identical everywhere, were coming to dominate every metropolis, equally oblivious to every environment, like the giant slab that springs up in the midst of the primitive world.”

For many, the twin towers rising above West Amman are the embodiment of the money and international investment that has flown across borders with similar obliviousness to where it lands. (Jordan Gateʼs developers, Gulf Finance House, Kuwait Finance and Al Hamad, are based in Bahrain, Kuwait and Sharjah, respectively.)

Tukan does not seem especially perturbed by the criticism leveled at Jordan Gate. In an article he wrote in 2007, published in I magazine, he admitted to the project’s uniqueness as the first—and perhaps last—high-rise to occupy such a prominent location. But he also celebrated it as part of an ongoing process of modernization and transformation.

“In the last decade the city of Amman witnessed extensive social, political and economic transformations,” he wrote. Factors like rising oil prices and increasing investment from the Gulf have “created new economic realities which will…transform the city of Amman urbanistically and architecturally as well.”

So while “for the romantic Ammani’s Amman cannot and should not change…Amman cannot anymore remain the quiet, low-profile, sleepy city” that it once was, he concluded.

In Bermanʼs philosophy, the kind of modern transition that Tukan describes is the root of modern distress and discontent: a modernity that “annihilates everything that it creates…in order to create more, to go on endlessly creating the world anew.”

For Tukan, such questions seem irrelevant; his focus is on form.

“I see my architecture as an exploration of the unlimited possibilities that the philosophy of rational architecture offers,” he says. “What I am trying to prove is that rational architecture produces architecture that belongs to its time and place.”

Sandra Hiari studied urban design, and has worked as an architect for Sahel Al Hiyari & Partners and as a researcher at the Center for the Study of the Built Environment. She now works for the Amman Institute for Urban Development.

The other day I was on a bus, travelling toward Bangor,  when we were stopped just outside the Castle in Conwy. It turned out that a large articulated lorry, with an even larger flat-bed trailer, had tried to get through one of the narrow gates in the wall on the Bangor road. Obviously, it didn’t make it.

The bus was asked to back up by some of my friends in the Police, so as to let the Wagon reverse right back to the bridge!

It held everyone up for about half an hour.

So maybe this was one time that following a Satnav  wasn’t such a good idea.

OUR FIRST RE-RUN: On October 1, 2009 we posted the following story. It is the most sought after story by TAGS on our site so we are reposting it today for a portion of the day. There’s a following story that is on topic also.You can also read “Blood Borders: Kurdistan, Pashtunistan, Balochistan, and other Ethnic homelands divided are the problem; Britain ended its military mission in Iraq; Pakistan Poll: “U.S. greater danger than India” HERE.

BULLETIN:Ayman al Zawahiri, al Qaeda’s second in command, has sung the praises of former Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud on a videotape produced by As Sahab and distributed on jihadi forums. Zawahiri used Baitullah’s death to praise the Taliban’s fight against NATO and the US in Afghanistan. This story outlines what al Qaeda believes about the Pakistan Government and Military, that they work for foreign governments, not for the people.]

Artificial lines separating Tribes are causing the problems that can not be solved with guns/bombs/drones.

Two of the Huge Problems that no one is facing in Iraq and Afghanistan/Pakistan are due to artificial borders laid out years ago. The Iraq problem is what to do with the Kurds, who lay claim to Kirkuk (after Saddam sent Iraqi’s into Kirkuk and chased out/killed many Kurds so now the population is not a high majority of Kurds like it was before Saddam’s action), the richest underdeveloped oil fields in Iraq. Who gets this oil? Will the Iraqi’s kill all the Kurds? Will the Turks help out as many Kurds are in what is known as Turkey? The Turks battle and kill Kurds when they please. Read our story 40 Million? Leyla Zana speaks for them.

Kurdish Woman's headdress

Pashtun Women in headdress

The splitting up of land masses and calling the areas within artifical lines “Countries” has led to much damage in Central Asia and many other places. Let’s look at Pashtunistan, an area of land that is made up primarily of people of Pastun descent. It happens to not be a country at all. It was divided by an artificial line, the Durand Line in 1893. Pashtunistan is now the area that is under the most fighting in Afghanistan and Pakistan as Pastunistan covers most of what is now called Afghanistan, and a majority of the lands now called Pakistan, which was known as British India before Pakistan was cut out of India. Here’s Pashtunistan:

The Green Area is Pashtunistan (2007 map) The Green line is the Durand Line with a small change since 1893

Let’s take a quick look to Kurdistan. The Kurds have a small area of Iraq on the North that they are left to self-govern. This is all of the recognized areas that the Kurds now have, even though there are over 40 Million Kurds in four different countries, all held down by their new Nation. Here’s what Kurdistan should look like:

A different map of Kurdistan Area

Balochistan and the other three areas that should be countries

Gowar Shakar Bibi, founder of Baloch Women Panel(BWP) at a press conference in January 2005 condemning the Pakistani operation against Baloch people in New Kahan.

Action YOU can take:

Congress Should Vote "No" on 2010 Military Budget! To reach the U.S. Capitol Switchboard: 202-224-3121 or 202-225-3121 Leave a message: Vote No on the Military budget. End the War(s).

Today, please tell your member of Congress and U.S. Senators to End the War in Afghanistan, sign this petition. If you live outside the United States, write to your leaders, End the War Now.

What Kurdistan Could Look Like, 40 Million People Deserve their own Country

The Kurdistan Alliance, however, has rejected giving any special status to Kirkuk simply because it has a Kurdish majority. If the oil-rich area is given special status, then, by equal measure maintains the Alliance, so should other disputed territories where Kurds happen to be minorities. To implement a quota system would indeed be profoundly undemocratic. Read it all here.

It’s Kirkuk OIL, the largest field yet to be explored in Iraq. Delovan Barwari writes at the Kurdish Herald “According to various studies, Kurdistan sits on 43.7 billion barrels (bb) of proven oil and 25.5 bb of potential reserves. In addition, the majority of the estimated 200 trillion cubic feet of gas in Iraq is reported to be in Kurdistan Region. Against the backdrop of challenges by the Iraqi central government over the past few years, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has granted over 30 contracts to foreign companies for the exploration, development, and production of petroleum in the Kurdistan Region, and has began exporting crude oil via Turkey. In addition, a number of refineries are currently being built to meet its domestic energy needs.” Read his full story here. Great Map of the Oil Fields in the Kurdish region of Iraq is presented here.
A KIRKUK OIL Map for your viewing:

Fringing Reef (Oligocene) of Kirkuk Oil Field (Dunnington, 1958)

There should be an Independent Kurdistan, much larger than the current Iraq Kurd area. There should also be an Independent Pastunistan, since 2/3 of Afghanistan’s area is Pashtun populated, Pashtuns number over 40 Million and have no home country. There should be an Independent Balochistan, with over 7 Million population, and over 45% of the Pakistan country lands. The Durand Line that cut up parts of Central Asia in 1893, and other political divisions were wrong. See our Durand Line story here.

Malalai Joya’s story will be on our Blog every day for the next month. Please buy her book and visit her site.. Read her San Jose Mercury Opinion: “U.S. is doing no good in Afghanistan” here.
On Saturday, Nov. 7, Malalai Joya was at a gathering at San Jose State University in California to promote her book “A Woman Among Warlords” and to gather support for her people in Afghanistan. Malalai is a very brave woman to take on her own government and also the U.S. government, the occupiers of her country.

Malalai Joya signing her new book, A Woman Among Warlords, a JB photo

Our story on Malalai Joya can be seen here. Buy a copy of her book, “A Woman Among Warlords” here, or at your favorite bookstore. A great Holiday gift idea. The subtitle is “The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Who Dared to Raise Her Voice”. Visit Malalai’s website here for more information on how you can help.

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Take Action Now:
Call President Obama: To reach the U.S. Capitol Switchboard: 202-224-3121 or 202-225-3121 Leave a message: No more Troops. End the War(s). Call Leon Panetta at (703) 482-0623, CIA headquarters, leave a message: Stop the South Waziristan War and don’t attack Quetta, End the War(s).

Today, please tell your member of Congress and U.S. Senators to End the War in Afghanistan, sign this petition. If you live outside the United States, write to your leaders, End the War Now.

Dainel Ellsberg and Matthew Hoh brought to you by Brave New Conversations. Please listen to their conversation about our involvement in Afghanistan, and why we need to get out now. Please send this to all your mailing list.

Thank you Robert Greenwald and Brave New Films. Join their cause and help get the truth out.

To further understand the Pastun society that Matthew Hoh refers to, read Thomas Johnson and M. Chris Mason’s work entitled ” No Sign Until the Burst of Fire”, Understanding the Pakistan-Afghanistan Frontier”. It is a MUST READ to see how futile our efforts are in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Malalai Joya’s story will be on our Blog every day for the next month. Please buy her book and visit her site.. Read her San Jose Mercury Opinion: “U.S. is doing no good in Afghanistan” here.
On Saturday, Nov. 7, Malalai Joya was at a gathering at San Jose State University in California to promote her book “A Woman Among Warlords” and to gather support for her people in Afghanistan. Malalai is a very brave woman to take on her own government and also the U.S. government, the occupiers of her country.

Malalai Joya signing her new book, A Woman Among Warlords, a JB photo

Our story on Malalai Joya can be seen here. Buy a copy of her book, “A Woman Among Warlords” here, or at your favorite bookstore. A great Holiday gift idea. The subtitle is “The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Who Dared to Raise Her Voice”. Visit Malalai’s website here for more information on how you can help.

CIA Chief Leon Panetta in Islamabad

[Ed. Note: Leon, tell President Zardari that we're leaving, but we will give them 5 Billion a year to keep up the fight. Get out now, dear friend, Leon Panetta, tell President Obama "It's not worth it". We are propping up a Failed State and Zardari only has support in the Teens, under 20% approval rating. Stop the killing of innocents.]

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Take Action Now: Pass our link to your friends right now. Call your Member of Congress and tell them to support Rep. Barbara Lee’s bill “To prohibit any increase in the number of members of the United States Armed Forces serving in Afghanistan.” Bill # H.R.3699. Do it now please. Then call President Obama: To reach the U.S. Capitol Switchboard: 202-224-3121 or 202-225-3121 Leave a message: No more Troops. End the War(s).We will demonstrate in 100 cities if President Obama sends ANY troops to Central Asia ! Call Leon Panetta at (703) 482-0623, CIA headquarters, leave a message: No More Drone Assasination attacks, and don’t attack Quetta. End the War(s) NOW.

Today, please tell your member of Congress and U.S. Senators to End the War in Afghanistan, sign this petition. Tell them you will march in 100 cities if President Obama sends ANY troops to Central Asia. Tell them to support Barbara Lee’s bill HR 3699. If you live outside the United States, write to your leaders, End the War(s) Now.

In Memory of Jeanne-Claude, originally uploaded by CVerwaal.

Artist Jeanne-Claude, co-creator of the Central Park installation ‘The Gates,’ has died at the age of 74.
“The Gates,” (2005) by conceptual artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude consisted of an installation of 7,500 saffron-colored fabric panels hanging from 16-ft.-tall portals along 23 miles of walkway in Central Park, New York City.
I remember not liking the idea at all at first, but then falling in love with The Gates when they were up. The snow made them even more spectacular. I spend days wandering underneath them…it was magic.!!