The News About the Internet

The News About the Internet – The New York Review of Books

Jordan: Water crisis looms, urgent measures needed reveals study

Insufficient access and availability of quality water and high poverty levels in Jordan are inextricably linked, found a rapid water assessment commissioned by World Vision in six of the kingdom’s governorates in May 2009.

Programmes addressing water scarcity and increasing its availability at the household and community level can assist in poverty alleviation, the assessment by the Interdisciplinary Research Consultants (IdRC) of Jordan revealed.

Ranked among the 10 most water deficient countries in the world, scarce water resources and other natural resources have been contributing factors to debt, poverty, and unemployment in Jordan, according to the assessment. It also cited that poverty amongst children is higher than poverty amongst the overall population, according to the Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation (April 2007).

Read more…

Jordan’s Reformers Met with Skepticism

An article written by Suha Ma’ayah on Jordan’s reform process…

“The government is seriously considering reforms, but it is not clear how far it will go,” said Bassam Haddadin, an independent member of parliament. “Internally the situation has become ripe for reform. The internal political process is fragile and does not allow for the development of the country.”

Read more…

Controversy and the International Prize for Arabic Fiction

 

 

One of the shortlisted authors for the new but prestigious International Prize for Arabic Fiction, Egyptian Youssef Ziedan, has caused a stir with his novel “Beelzebub.” Ziedan and the other nominees — Mohammad Al-Bisatie (Egypt), Fawwaz Haddad (Syria), Inaam Kachachi (Iraq), Ibrahim Nasrallah (Jordan-Palestine) and Habib Selmi (Tunisia) — expect to hear who will take the prize on Monday.

Read more…

The Thirty Days of Barack Obama

Here’s a great analysis in the New York Review of Books… 

As carefully as Barack Obama prepared for it, the presidency has held some surprises for him—some foreseeable, some not, and some of his own making. Seeking to avoid the mistakes of the early Clinton era, Obama concluded that, unlike Clinton, he didn’t want to hold the numerous meetings that can chew up so much of the president’s time. Instead, according to his press secretary, Robert Gibbs, Obama’s style is to drop by an aide’s office—a restless man, he roams the White House corridors—or stop an aide in a hallway and ask, “How are you coming on that thing we were talking about?” Gibbs says, “The worst thing is not have an answer.” Asked what happens then, Gibbs replied, “He gets that disappointed parent look, and then you better go find an answer.”

Samantha Power on a Complicated Hero

 

Samantha Power tells a story of a complicated hero, Sergio Vieira de Mello.

This UN diplomat walked a thin moral line, negotiating with the world’s

worst dictators to help their people survive crisis. It’s a compelling story

told with a fiery passion.

Watch Samantha Power speaking

Samantha Power Returns

Power gets a White House job

 

Some good news for Samantha Power, author and expert on genocide and humanitarian intervention. She will be an Obama aide.

Power, a noted human rights expert who won the Pulitzer for her 2008 book “Chasing the Flame: Sergio Vieira de Mello and the Fight to Save the World” about the late U.N. diplomat, made headlines last March during the height of the fierce fight for the Democratic presidential nomination when she called Clinton “a monster” in an interview with a Scottish newspaper. Her remarks set off angry exchanges about the tenor of Obama’s campaign. 

A few hours after her comments were published, Power announced her resignation, saying the remarks were inexcusable and contradictory to her admiration for Clinton.

Check my other posts on Power:

1. American Military Interventions
2. A Cast of 300 Advises Obama on Foreign Policy
3. A Good Pick by Obama: Samantha Power

Friedman on the Two-State Solution

 

 

 

 

Here’s Tom Friedman’s column in the New York Times. He mentions one thing that is vital for any peacemaker: “a peacemaker has to be both a nation-builder and a negotiator.” But as far as his conclusion goes ‘freezing settlements’ is not the only thing required from the Israelis–there’s a lot more that needs to be done. 

What makes it so challenging for the new Obama team is that Mideast diplomacy has been transformed as a result of the regional disintegration since Oslo — in three key ways.

First, in the old days, Henry Kissinger could fly to three capitals, meet three kings, presidents or prime ministers and strike a deal that could hold. No more. Today a peacemaker has to be both a nation-builder and a negotiator.

Al Sijill: Great Jordanian Media Outlet

I have found Al Sijill to be one of the few media outlets in Jordan that present in-depth, professional and investigative news reports and analysis. I know also two people that contribute regularly to the newspaper that are very professional in their field. 

I am glad that we have this weekly newspaper online as well. I hope Jordanians and others will begin to give it the attention it deserves. You can also read the whole issue in PDF form and view archived issues. 

 

College Panel Calls for Less Focus on SATs

Here’s an article in the New York Times today on the recommendation by the college admission commission which includes some of the most influential colleges in the US that are advocating for less reliance on SAT scores and more focus on curriculum and achievements of the student. 

Some very interesting points raised…

- that test scores appear to calcify differences based on class, race/ethnicity and parental educational attainment.” 

-Dean of admissions and financial aid at Harvard, says amid growing concerns that the frenzy over standardized college admissions tests is misshaping secondary education and feeding a billion-dollar test-prep industry that encourages students to try to game the tests.

-The report suggests that what is needed is a new achievement test, pitched to a broad group of students, that would predict college grades as well as or better than available tests.

Music stars join in Pavarotti memorial concert for Afghan refugees in Jordan

A year after his death, Luciano Pavarotti’s legacy of generosity lives on in a tribute charity concert and memorial ceremony to be held in Petra, Jordan on 11 and 12 October.

For over ten years, until his death in September 2007, Maestro Pavarotti actively supported UNHCR projects in Kosovo, Pakistan, Zambia, and Iraq. For his continuous commitment to refugee causes, Luciano Pavarotti received UNHCR’s Nansen Refugee Award and was named a UN Messenger of Peace.

To read more…

Watch Palin on Gibson

Here it is: What is Sarah Palin’s view of the Bush Doctorine? Charlie Gibson, getting tough.

A Speech on Education by Obama

Here’s a speech by Barack Obama (September 9, 2008) on improving education. Is it a debate we should be having in Jordan?

Here’s some highlights:

Well, the day of reckoning is here. Our kids and our country can’t afford four more years of neglect and indifference. At this defining moment in our history, America faces few more urgent challenges than preparing our children to compete in a global economy. The decisions our leaders make about education in the coming years will shape our future for generations to come. They will help determine not only whether our children have the chance to fulfill their God-given potential, or whether our workers have the chance to build a better life for their families, but whether we, as a nation, will remain in the 21st century the kind of global economic leader that we were in the 20th century.

The rising importance of education reflects the new demands of our new world. In recent decades, revolutions in communications and information technology have broken down barriers that once kept countries and markets apart, creating a single, global economy that is more integrated and interconnected than ever before. In this economy, companies can plant their jobs wherever there’s an internet connection and someone willing to do the work, meaning that children here in Dayton are growing up competing with children not only in Detroit, but in Delhi as well.

What matters, then, isn’t what you do or where you live, but what you know. When two-thirds of all new jobs require a higher education or advanced training, knowledge is the most valuable skill you can sell. It’s not only a pathway to opportunity, but a prerequisite. Without a good pre-school education, our children are less likely to keep up with their peers. Without a high school diploma, you’re likely to make about three times less than a college graduate. And without a college degree or industry certification, it’s harder and harder to find a job that can help you support your family and keep up with rising costs.

A Cat Story: Lost Cat Returns Home After 9 Years.

Cat Returns After 9 Years

Sorry, I love cats. Here’s a great story.

Dixie, a 15-year-old ginger cat, disappeared in 1999 and her owners thought she had been killed by a car. She was found less than half a mile from her home in Birmingham after a concerned resident rang the animal charity to report a thin and dishevelled cat who had been in the area for a couple of months.

The View for Some New Yorkers

For some New Yorkers living in Manhattan, they view ground zero on a daily basis. Here’s their views in a New York Times article  published today. 

The question of how New Yorkers view their view may seem abstract, trivial, remote, compared with the pain of thousands upon thousands who lost loved ones, friends or colleagues when the World Trade Center towers fell. But for a broad swath of New Yorkers for whom the two towers were primarily the crowning jewel of a cherished vista, the amputated skyline was a daily reminder of loss. The way they have reached accommodation, or not, with the transformed view provides yet another window into the city’s infinitely long process of recovery.

Conversations with dozens of New Yorkers this week, when the end-of-summer light is just so and passing planes induce a wince, found them poised somewhere between Never Forget and Enough Already. Some confessed to occasional pangs of survivor guilt when they catch themselves enjoying the cityscape, diminished but still quite impressive, that gleams in their windows and draws them to park benches.

Transcript of Bob Woodward on Larry King

Here’s the full CNN transcript of Bob Woodward on Larry King.

Some highlights:

 WOODWARD: That is a massive land army. This is a war that’s not over. We have  always been surprised in Iraq, since the invasion, when there was no — there were no weapons of mass destruction. It’s been violence by the insurgency, Sunni/Shia violence, the homegrown al Qaeda rising up. General Petraeus, who’s still commander there, is keeping that massive army there because, as he has said, it is fragile and reversible. The next commander in chief is going to get the job of dealing with the Iraq war. 

WOODWARD: Well, I don’t think it’s indifference. I think he got this view that we have to kill lots of them and that we will kill our way to victory. And, of course, General Petraeus, the current commander, says you can’t do that. We are in Iraq to stabilize the country and turn it over to the Iraqis. You can’t launch these kinds of massive operations that are mass killing exercises.

KING: White House Press Secretary Dana Perino, who admits she has not read the book, says she doesn’t think your conclusions about the Bush administration and the surge are necessarily supported by the facts.

And here’s part of her comments from earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DANA PERINO, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Sometimes in Washington when you can’t attack the results of something, you attack a process. I would submit to you that President Bush initiated and oversaw a very comprehensive, thorough, well-managed process that, in some cases — and some people might say that it was too slow in its development.

But when you are making a decision, when you are asking young men and women to put their lives on the line, that it was the right type of assessment.

It was sober. It was very clear-eyed. It was brutal in terms of the amount of hours.

And I also take issue with the notion about a war within. I can’t Imagine that anybody in Washington would be shocked that if you bring people together to talk about one of the most difficult problems in our time, that they might have a disagreement.

Iraqi Journalist Narrowly Escapes Assassination

Here’s the story on the unfortunate attempt to murder yet another journalist in Iraq.

The attempt against Jawad al-Hattab, Baghdad bureau manager for Al-Arabiya television, illustrates the dangers facing Iraq despite the decline in violence.

Hurray! NBC Shows On iTunes Again

Finally, ITunes settled it with NBC and now you can watch your favorite NBC shows. I have a lot of catching up to do when I find the time. Law and Order: SVU here I come.

Watch Out for those Polls

We’ve been seeing a lot of numbers and polls in the past few days regarding the American elections. Here’s a good analysis on why we are seeing what we are seeing and what to watch for.

Some polling experts say the changing state of party affiliation in the field is slow to be reflected in polls themselves. Democratic pollster Anna Greenberg told the Huffington Post that “when it comes to registration and turnout, the polls often do a very bad job of taking those [factors] into account,” because newly registered voters aren’t in the voter files used by firms that survey public opinion. “You could make the argument they are under-representing new registrants,” she said, which would mean that the Democrats new edge would not be taken into account.

Watch a Video on the Impact of the ‘Daily Show’

Here’s a video on the importance of programs like the Daily Show hosted by Jon Stewart and its influence on young Americans and the elections. 

If you watch the news and don’t like it, then this is your counter program to the news. -Jon Stewart

In Syria…

Here’s an article published today by AP on Syria’s economy opening up to the West and the rest of region as well. It seems what is happening economically in Jordan and many countries in the region, is trickling into Syria as well. This is good news, but political and social development need to go hand in hand with economic development. They all should be intertwined. 

These days, with the government encouraging investment, money has flowed in from oil-rich Saudi Arabia, Iran and other Gulf nations, and Turkey. The government has released no figures, but observers estimate foreign investment at nearly $800 million in 2007, up 30 percent from the year before.

The openness so far has been confined to the economy. Dozens of government critics are languishing in prison. Bloggers have been jailed for allegedly posting criticism of the government, and Syria restricts access to much of the Internet, including blocking YouTube.

Jordan & the Nepalese Human Trafficking Suit

A story was just published by AFP regarding a Jordanian subcontractor for a US construction and services giant KBR which denied accusations of human trafficking to Iraq after a group of Nepalese workers sued the two companies last month.

A Nepalese man and relatives of 12 slain comrades filed a lawsuit in the US state of California in August against KBR and a Jordanian subcontractor, accusing them of tricking the men into working in Iraq.

If the lawsuit is filed by the families of the 12 Napalese workers who were brutally murdered on their way from Jordan to Iraq then Jordan needs to open an investigation into the offices that are accused of doing this. Regardless of who they happen to be owned by. We have to be more transparent with the workers and the Jordanian people as well because these are the kind of stories that give Jordan a very bad image especially regarding Human Rights. The Interior Minister mentioned this same point today. If this story is not true, then that’s different. However, that is why an investigation needs to take place. What is more worrying is this: If the story is true,  are these agencies still sending workers to Iraq when the workers actually think they would be living in Jordan? . 

THE FLORENTINE

I read Machiavelli’s The Prince in graduate school and found it quite fascinating. Here’s a great article written by Claudia Roth Pierpont from today’s New Yorker on the man behind one of the most famous books ever written.

The Prince,” Machiavelli’s how-to guide for sovereigns, turned out to be “a scandal that Western political thought and practice has been gazing at in horror and in fascination since its first publication,” to quote from Albert Russell Ascoli’s introduction to Peter Constantine’s new translation. Circulated in manuscript for years, the book was not published until 1532—nearly five years after Machiavelli’s death—and received its first significant critique within the decade, from an English cardinal who pronounced the author “an enemy of the human race.” 

The Need to Structure and Organize the Web

Patricia Handschiegel writes an interesting piece yesterday on the need to structure and organize the web.

In this vast, dark environment, there is plenty that you’d miss. Only the most popular or recognized sites would be easy to locate. You can only dream what this would create for advertisers. It would be very difficult to know where to spend money, how to reach people, and potentially raise the cost to do it.

Bob Woodward on 60 Minutes

Watch Bob woodward’s interview highlights on ‘60′ minutes regarding his new book, “The War Within”. It is the fourth book about the Bush presidency by this author and it declassifies the secrets of America’s political and military involvement in Iraq.

The Iraqi Exodus

More than 2 million civilians have fled the kidnappings, car bombs and killings of war-ravaged Iraq for the relative safety of Jordan, Syria and other Arab neighbors. The greatest refugee exodus in the Middle East since the Palestinian flight of 1948 is impoverishing the Iraqi middle class – and straining relations in an already volatile region.

Read Matthew Hay Brown’s blogs from the Baltimore Sun about Iraqis living in Jordan, Syria and what Washington has to say regarding this refugee crisis.

 

A sign close to the Jordanian-Iraqi border

Watch Comedian Jon Stewart on Sarah Palin and the hypocrisy

Watch Jon Stewart on Sarah Palin and the hypocrisy of some in the GOP.

Watching ‘Friends’ in Gaza: A Culture Clash

Here’s a great article on the power of music. Get a glimpse into life in Gaza.

“Ruled by Hamas, penned in by Israel, grappling with daily shortages of food and supplies, Gazans need an escape. Culture turns out to be not just an afterthought but, many say, essential to surviving here. Especially for young Gazans, what’s on satellite television and the Internet, on tapes and compact discs, is a window to the world beyond the armored checkpoints, and a link to Arab society elsewhere and, crucially, to the West.”