Noam Chomsky - On Terrorism

Environemental Disaster 2002: Oil Tanker Prestige

Here is a series of images from the sinking of the oil spill in 2002 on the atlantic coast of Galicia. Do some research on the event and comment below on the criticisms that the PP received for its handling of the event and contrast that with the civil society(NGO´s , citizens, volunteers, etc...) movements and how they reacted to the event.

Carmen Chacon : Minister of Defense

Above is a political cartoon from the conservative newspaper in Andalusia(http://pepecontreras.blogspot.com/2008_04_06_archive.html). It shows Carmen Chacon on the "Day of the little Flag" greeting the military. What are your opinions on our first female minister of defense and do you think that the criticism seen in the cartoon has some validity? Should a pregnant women with no experience in the military be placed in such an important position?

Religious Fundamentalist Attack the Freedom of Speech

The video above is of protesters boycotting a theater performance of Leo Bassi, an Italian comic, and the events that followed. His performance in Madrid was called "The Revelation" and was directed at criticizing the church. He calls himself a "Buffon"(clown in English). What are your thoughts or comments?

In American crisis, anger and guns

– Bernd Debusmann is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own. —

In the first two months of this year, around 2.5 million Americans bought guns, a 26 percent increase over the same period in 2008. It was great news for gun makers and a sign of a dark mood in the country.

Gun sales shot up almost immediately after Barack Obama won the U.S. presidential elections on November 4 and firearm enthusiasts rushed to stores, fearing he would tighten gun controls despite campaign pledges to the contrary.

After the November spike, gun dealers say, a second motive has helped drive sales: fear of social unrest as the ailing economy pushes the newly destitute deeper into misery. Many of the newly poor come from the relentlessly rising ranks of the unemployed. In February alone, an average of 23,000 people a day lost their jobs.

Tent cities for the homeless have expanded outside a string of American cities, from Sacramento and Phoenix to Atlanta and Seattle, for people who are living the American dream in reverse. First they lose their jobs, then their health insurance, then their homes, then their hopes. The encampments are reminiscent of Third World refugee camps.

Often former members of the middle class, tent dwellers’ accounts of their plight to television cameras have a common theme: “I never thought this could happen to me.” Unlike the victims of Katrina, the 2005 hurricane that destroyed much of New Orleans, many of the newly-poor are white.

The FBI says it carried out 1,213,885 criminal background checks on prospective firearms buyers in January and 1,259,078 in February, jumps of 28% and 23.3% respectively. Keen demand turned the stocks of publicly-trade firearms companies like Smith & Wesson (up 80% since November) and Sturm Ruger (up more than 100%) into shining stars on the New York Stock Exchange.

There are no statistics on how many guns are bought by people who think they need them to defend themselves against desperate fellow citizens.

But, as columnist David Ignatius put it in the Washington Post, “there’s an ugly mood developing as people start looking for villains to blame for the economic mess.” In November, an analysis published by the U.S. Army War College’s Strategic Studies Institute listed “unforeseen economic collapse” as one of the possible causes of future “widespread civil violence.”

The American economy is down but not out, and in mid-March some experts reported signs that the pace of the decline was slowing. But it hasn’t slowed enough to sweep away the sense of anxiety and fear that comes through in many conversations and commentaries about the future of this normally optimistic country.

While Obama’s approval rating remains high, at 59%, almost two thirds of the population thinks the country is on the wrong track, according to a poll commissioned by National Public Radio in mid-March.

“What is really remarkable about all this is that there hasn’t been social unrest,” remarked an executive with business interests in Latin American countries where riots and street demonstrations in response to economic squeezes are routine. “The conditions for it are all there.”

ANGER ABOUT BAILOUTS

Anger is building. Just under half of those surveyed in a poll by the Pew Research Center this month expressed anger about “bailing out banks and financial institutions that made poor decisions.” The poll was taken before details became known of the full extent of the bonus-paying spree to members of the very team that brought the insurance giant AIG close to collapse.

The government propped up AIG with close to $200 billion and now owns 80% of the company. The argument that $165 million in bonuses had to be paid under contractual obligations went down particularly badly with workers of the three U.S. car companies whose leaders appealed for support from the Bush administration last year when the economic crisis gathered steam.

One of the conditions for the billions that were dispensed to the car industry was that contracts between auto workers and their union, the United Auto Workers, had to be renegotiated to cut costs. The union agreed, and the question arises: are contracts with blue-collar workers less binding than those with highly-paid derivatives traders?

Some see this as another sign of the inequalities that Obama promised to address. Remember his famous exchange with Joe Wurzelbacher, aka Joe the Plumber, during a campaign stop? “I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody,” Obama told him.

There’s less wealth to spread around now as trillions of dollars has evaporated with increasing speed in the deepening crisis. In housing alone, more than $5 trillion has vanished. The gap between rich and poor, a gap of Third World proportions, has not changed. A full-time worker, on average, made $37,606 last year, considerably less than in 1973, adjusted for inflation.

While CEOs made 45 times as much as workers in 1973 they make more than 300 times as much today, according to Holly Sklar, author of “Raise the Floor, Wages and Policies that Work for All of US.”

To what extent those gaps will shrink under Obama remains to be seen and the outlook for swift action is not promising. There are, in fact, not many things for which the outlook is promising. Exceptions include Smith&Wesson. They expect revenue to double within the next three years.

Wind drives change in Spain

By Victor Mallet and Mark Mulligan in Madrid

Published: March 5 2009 22:27 | Last updated: March 5 2009 22:27

Spain’s windmills produced a record amount of electricity on Thursday, underlining the growing importance of renewable energy to Europe and the challenges of matching new and sometimes erratic power sources to the continent’s demand.

At 11.09am, the windmills were producing 11,203MW – the highest output ever – equivalent to 29.5 per cent of Spanish demand at that time, according to Red Eléctrica, the national grid operator. For much of the day, wind was Spain’s single largest source of electricity. Before dawn, when demand was low, wind turbines contributed up to 42 per cent of electricity supply.

Spanish investment in subsidised wind energy has been so intense – hilltop ranks of huge white windmills can be seen across the country – that Red Eléctrica has been forced at times to shut some of the turbines because the grid can’t cope with the excess supply.

“Wind is no longer a marginal supplier for us,” Luis Atienza, Red Eléctrica’s chief executive, said recently in one of its control rooms in Madrid, eyeing huge, illuminated displays showing power flows and wind speeds. Over the year, wind already supplies about 12 per cent of Spain’s electricity, more than hydropower.

“It’s going to catch coal in the next few years and it represents a special challenge,” he said, referring to the difficulty of reducing the output of coal and other thermal power stations to compensate for strong winds at night when demand is low. “Renewables are very demanding in terms of networks,” he said.

Iberdrola of Spain, the world’s biggest wind energy generator by installed capacity, said on Thursday that this winter had been particularly blustery, contributing to a 37 per cent increase in the company’s domestic electricity production from wind.

“Wind is not only a good clean alternative,” it said, “but is getting close to becoming competitive with conventional energy sources in terms of production costs.”

The European Wind Energy Association said that in 2008 more wind power capacity was installed in the European Union than any other power source. Of the 23,851MW of new EU capacity, 36 per cent was wind, 29 per cent gas and 18 per cent solar photovoltaic cells.

By year-end, Spain expects to be producing almost a quarter of its electricity from renewable sources.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009

Midterm Exam

First of all, I would like to admit that the midterm exam that you took on Thursday demands much more time than the 2 hours that are given. I normally give the students all the extra time they need. I did not mention this to Raquel so i am sorry any worries it may have caused some of you when you did not have enough time to finish. Please don't worry about this as I will take this very much into account when i grade the exams and will come up with a democratic formula through which to grade them. As for now, Jaime has his leg elevated most of the day and did not like having gone under the knife one bit. However, he is looking forward to reading your exams and trying to create a virtual classroom from home. Please visit the blog soon for upcoming readings, assignments, and general info.

Economic Crisis

Below is a unique interview taken from the daily show with John Stewart and Jim Crammer a CNBC anchor. Beyond the individuals present, the ideas about the economic crises and various other themes listed below make for an interesting reflection. Copy and paste the following link to your browser and watch the three videos.

http://seekingalpha.com/article/125804-cramer-grilled-on-jon-stewart?source=article_sb_popular


I would like to hear your comments and reactions posted here on the blog. The themes I want you to focus on in your commentary are the following:

-Role of the Media-
Entertainment vs. Factual Reporting
Objectivity of Media

Where does the blame lie when we speak of the Economic Crises?

-Two stock market realities: Short term speculation vs. long-term investment

ETA urges blank ballots in election

France 24
Saturday 28 February 2009

AFP - Basque separatist group ETA criticised this weekend's elections in the region as undemocratic and told supporters to return blank ballots, amid fears it could stage new attacks to coincide with the poll.

The regional parliament that will result from these "anti-democratic elections" will be a "fascist parliament," ETA said in a statement released by the pro-independence Basque newspaper Gara Friday.

"For those in favour of independence, of sovereignty, the only vote is blank," it said.

The group also denounced the "apartheid policy" in Spain's northern Basque Country, where pro-independence parties are banned from Sunday's regional election due to their links to ETA and its outlawed political wing Batasuna.

Radical Basque separatist parties draw support from approximately 10 percent of Spain's Basque voters.

ETA has been blamed for the deaths of 825 people in a four-decade campaign for an independent Basque homeland straddling northern Spain and part of southwestern France.

Hours after the Supreme Court banned two pro-independence parties this month, ETA responded with its first attack in the Spanish capital since December 2006, setting off a van packed with explosives in a business district. The blast caused extensive damage but no injuries.

The decision also provoked violent protests by radical Basque leftists in the Basque city of Bilbao.

Last week, another ETA bomb exploded outside the headquarters of the Basque Socialist Party in the town of Lazkao, causing major damage but no injuries.

The bombings raised fears that the regional elections could be marred by further ETA attacks.

The Basque interior ministry said it plans to deploy 5,000 police throughout the region, or more than half of its entire force of 8,000, on election day.

Around 1.78 million people are eligible to vote in Sunday's elections to the 75-seat regional parliament.

Polls show the moderate centre-right Basque Nationalist Party is at risk of losing its nearly 30-year hold on power in the region to the Basque Socialist Party.

The PNV is led by the head of the regional government, Juan Jose Ibarretxe, whose plans for referendums on self-determination were rejected by the Madrid government.

If they win, the Socialists are hope to boost the already substantial autonomy enjoyed by the region.

A Socialist government "must rid itself of any sort separatist temptations," Basque Socialist deputy Jose Maria Benegas told AFP.

Elections are also being held in the rugged northwestern Galicia region, with polls indicating the ruling Socialists could be re-elected with a slightly increased majority over the centre-right Popular Party.

For Spain's Socialist Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, the polls are a chance to gauge his support as the country reels from an economic crisis and Basque separatist violence.

The polls will be the first since national elections in March 2008, in which Zapatero was re-elected for a second four-year term.

In his first term, Zapatero had made resolving the Basque problem one of his priorities.

But negotiations with the armed Basque separatist organisation ETA failed, and the group resumed its attacks.

Cash crisis forces California to free 55,000 prisoners

New Zealand Herald
12:16PM Sunday Feb 15, 2009
Guy Adams

LOS ANGELES - There's not been a greater escape since Steve McQueen jumped aboard his motorcycle. The state of California has been ordered to release more than 55,000 prison inmates to ease pressure on its ailing penal system.

Federal judges ruled last week that California's 33 adult jails have become so overcrowded that they violate the constitutional rights of inmates, subjecting them to "cruel and unusual" punishment that is causing at least one death a month. Just over a third of the state's 158,000 prisoners must be set free by 2012 to ensure that basic healthcare is provided to those who remain behind, the judges said. The majority will go through early release and parole schemes.

Critics claim the ruling amounts to throwing open the doors of the biggest prison system in America, and will endanger the public. California's Attorney General, Jerry Brown, announced an immediate appeal to the Supreme Court, saying: "This order is a blunt instrument that does not recognise the imperatives of public safety, nor the challenges of incarcerating criminals, many of whom are deeply disturbed."

Jerry Powers, who heads the state's chief probation officers' association, called it "a game of Russian roulette".

But regardless of their concerns, something needs to be done: California's prison population has increased by nearly 80 per cent since 1990, and its penitentiaries are operating at nearly double their intended capacity of 84,000. A rise in the number of elderly prisoners is also affecting resources; 11 per cent of inmates are aged 50 or over and the average cost of housing a single prisoner is now US$46,000 a year.

Building more prisons is not an option, since state finances are in such disarray that public workers are forced to take two unpaid days' leave each month. The state government is running an annual deficit of US$12bn.

The prison crisis is not limited to California. In Des Moines, Iowa, county officials plan to start charging prisoners for toilet paper. Michigan, where Detroit has America's highest murder rate, will release 4,000 prisoners who have served their minimum sentences. New Jersey, Carolina and Vermont are putting drug-addicted offenders into treatment rather than prison. Louisiana, which has one of the highest incarceration rates in the developed world, is hoping to reform a system that spends more on prisons than on higher education.

These measures are controversial in a nation that views prison as a place for retribution rather than rehabilitation. Many states have a "three strikes" rule that means relatively petty criminals are given life sentences.

New York Post Chimp Cartoon causes uproar

Our conversation in class into the realm of social exclusion and race has exploded in the American political scene. A cartoon published by the New York post (the image above) has caused anger with readers and many criticisms. You can read the article published by the Huffington Post online with updates to the story as it evolves at the bottom of the article. I would like to hear your comments and reactions.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/02/18/new-york-post-chimp-carto_n_167841.html

Shift Happens: Globalization

Comments?? Opinions??

Judges’ strike sparks controversy in Spain

Source: earthtimes.org

A debate was rolling in Spain on Thursday on whether an unprecedented strike planned by the country's judges was legal. Such a way for judges to press their demands was "inadequate" and "disturbing," the prosecutors' association UPF said, while the association Judges for Democracy stressed that the law did not prohibit judges from staging a work stoppage.

Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's Socialist government is engaged in a power struggle with the judges, who regard its plans for judicial reform as insufficient.

Four judges' associations are planning a day of protest for February 18 and a strike in June to press demands for higher salaries and better working conditions.

The judges say they struggle under huge workloads.

The increase of court cases has clogged courts which still had 2.5 million cases left to resolve in the end of 2008.

The government says the judiciary is a power of state which cannot go on strike.

Experts on constitutional law disagree on the matter, with some saying the constitution does not directly prohibit such a protest, while others say it would be like the government or parliament going on strike.

The government is seeking negotiations with the judges' associations, and the Socialist Party wants them to appear in parliament.

Judges first started protesting in solidarity with a colleague, Rafael Tirado, who came under criticism for not having jailed a paedophile who then killed 5-year-old Mari Luz Cortes a year ago.


Do judges have the right to strike? Would this ever happen in the USA? I would like to hear your opinions and comments.