Today was a great day: we bought the property next to ours! That is a huge milestone towards our dream of owning horses, because that property includes a 2-acre pasture.

When we bought our house, we were just excited about having a horse pasture next door. We befriended the two horses who lived there, Stormy and Little Bits. We secretly hoped that one day maybe the owner would want to sell the pasture.

That day came sooner than we had thought, a few weeks ago we found a “land for sale” sign next to our driveway, and a quick search of the real estate listings revealed that, indeed the property with the pasture was the land in question.

We did not hesitate and called our real estate agent, Charles, and he contacted the seller. Very quickly we agreed on a price and on the terms of the sale. We had a little bit of excitement getting the seller to move some junk off the property, but it got done in time for the closing.

The land slopes downhill from the East; the Eastern edge is almost at the top of the small hill we live on. About half of the 4.7 acres are wooded, the other half is pasture with some nice, big shade trees. There is also a small pond at the Western edge of the pasture. The property is a bit neglected and needs some work. The pasture has been a bit overgrazed and needs to be reseeded. The ground is very rocky and there is very little topsoil. But with some care and some time to recover it’ll make a fine pasture for our horsefarm-in-the-making.

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Yesterday I saw a hummingbird on the home security camera, so we set up the feeder last night. Sure enough, this morning, as I enjoyed my first cup of coffee, I saw a hummingbird and it went straight for the feeder. Welcome back, little helicopters!

In a recent interview about his TV Show, Dr. Stephen Hawking questioned the wisdom of trying to make contact with alien civilizations. When one of the few bona-fide geniuses of our time weighs in an any debate, it is significant. And I think the debate over whether to send signals into space or just to listen for them – active SETI vs. passive SETI – is a pretty interesting one.

I don’t think anyone with an inkling of the enormity of our galaxy and the probability of intelligent life out there can help be immensely curious about aliens. But any creatures technically advanced enough to reach us would likely view us the way most European explorers viewed the indigenous peoples of America or Africa: as “primitive” creatures sitting on land they want. So unless the earth is really completely useless to these creatures, if some advanced aliens in fact found us, we’d probably face colonization.

So I’m with the genius on this one – let’s cut out the powerful radio signals into space, let’s minimize any signal leakage into space, let’s go into stealth mode. I say we focus on evolving our own species another couple millennia on Earth and learn more about our planet and how to be decent stewards of our home. With our silly little rockets we’re not going to get far anyway. But we can certainly explore our solar system with remote probes. And we can watch, listen and learn about the universe until we’re really ready to face E.T.

Of course, no one can say with certainty what would happen if a life form  from another corner of the universe found our planet. But there is just no way of knowing until it’s too late. For all we know, a perfectly peaceful, well-meaning species might enter orbit of the earth and look down and say: “Pretty planet – shame it’s infected with this terrible disease!” and then proceed to cure Planet Earth of the disease that calls itself humanity.

Google has long ago ceased to be the little search engine that could. The Mountainview Chocolate Factory has turned into a massive data-slurping behemoth with growth aspirations that make me think of Skynet:

Last fall, Google released a brief video of a data center it built in 2005. The facility held 45 shipping containers, each housing 1,160 servers. Google is now operating about 35 data centers across the globe, and if you extrapolate, its total server count – server consolidation aside – is around 1,827,200. That figure is well above recent press estimates. And it may be low. After all, that data center was built in 2005.

According to a recent public presentation from the company, Google is intent on scaling its worldwide infrastructure to between one million and 10 million servers, encompassing 10 trillion directories and a quintillion bytes of storage. And this would span “100s to 1000s” of locations around the globe.    (The Register, 22nd April 2010)

So Google probably operates around 1.8 Million servers , may plan to scale to 10 Million servers,all connected by its private Googleweb, and runs 13 % of all websites on the Internet. Now they also want to own the last mile to your home by providing gigabit Internat access to household and businesses in some communities … aka Google Fiber.

Yeah – a light-speed fiber Internet connection would be cool, but I won’t be signing up for Google Fiber. Here is why: they already know why too much about me … about you … about all of us.

For example, when Google’s Streetview cars cruise through your neighborhood, they don’t just take pictures, they also record WiFi signals, including the MAC  address for your WLAN AP. If you have a Gmail account, they know whom you’re communicating with, they know your calendar, they know what you’re searching for on the Interwebs, what computer you’re using, etc, etc. All just to find out what ads you might be interested in. So once you sign up for Google Fiber, they know your address, whether you have WiFi, They will have financial info about you, maybe even know who your employer is. They can then connect your virtual life with your real life. All that just to find out what ads you might be interested in?

Saturday thru Wednesday we were at the beach and besides lounging, eating and drinking beers I also did a fair amount of running. The weather was great – lower 70s, sunny with a pleasant breeze.

So since last Sunday, I ran a total of 28.35 miles (45.62 km) in 5 runs – all barefoot of course. At the beach, I ran 5 miles (7km) on Sunday, then my first 8-miler (13km) on Tuesday and the next day I ran 8 miles all on the street. Both runs were immensely enjoyable! No real problems at all. And on my second 8-miler I got real close to 80 Min, too.

Today, I did my lunch-run routine, together with Gordon. The weather was great and we got in the groove, so we circled East Campus 3 times and logged 6 miles between Brightleaf Square and Dain’s Place! Gordon kept on truckin’ … I had lunch and then I ran back via Green St and Duke St. and logged another 2 miles.

This is not just another story of how a large corporation exploits poverty in Africa to extract the wealth from African soil and make lots of money. Even if you don’t care that much about whether the Touareg people have a place to live and whether they can breathe, you might still want to pay attention to what is happening in the dusty, scorched plains of northern Niger.

The Touareg people’s traditional homeland is one of the world’s most forbidding places to try and scratch out a living: the Sahara desert.

Tuaregs are mostly nomads. For over two millennia, the Tuareg operated the trans-Saharan caravan trade connecting the great cities on the southern edge of the Sahara via five desert trade routes to the northern (Mediterranean) coast of Africa. The Tuareg adopted camel nomadism, along with its distinctive form of social organization, from camel-herding Arabs about two thousand years ago, when the camel was introduced to the Sahara from Arabia.  (wikipedia)

These days, many of the proud former masters of the Sahara are reduced to scratching out a living in the cities of West Africa, hawking trinkets like keychains and little knifes to tourists. Their homeland has been divided between five nations, the governments of which have very little regard for the nomadic desert dwellers. The Touareg would probably be fine to be left alone so they could live their lives in peace (or what at least what a Touareg would consider peace) but the problem is that parts of their homeland, in particular in northern Niger are rich in Uranium. Very rich. In fact, most of Europe’s nuclear power is produced using Uranium extracted in Niger. Uranium extraction is a very dirty business and the environmental effects in Niger have been disastrous.

Der Spiegel ran a story about the struggle of Almoustapha Alhacen trying to draw attention to the ongoing environmental and public health catastrophe in northern Niger. He himself is a worker of the French mining company Areva that operates all the mines in that area. Apparently, the only safety equipment the Areva mine workers get are simple dust masks. If that. When workers get sick, they go to the only hospital in the area, which is run by Areva. The doctors at that hospital have yet to ever diagnose a single case of lung cancer. Frequently, mine workers get sick and develop painful coughs, have trouble breathing and waste away. They are diagnosed with diabetes, AIDS or malaria. The few who managed to go to other hospitals were only diagnosed with lung cancer when they saw doctors who weren’t on Areva’s payroll.

The mining does not just make people sick. It uses huge amounts of precious fossil water reserves, destroys the fragile, sparse vegetation and kills the livestock the herdsmen rely on. The open dump where the radioactive waste from the mining activity is piled up is right outside the town of Arlit. Strong winds disperse radioactive dust all over the region.

The region is also politically unstable. The discontent with the mining problems were a big part of a violent Touareg revolt in the 90s. Even today,  outsiders only get to Arlit by military convoy. And this is where this problem get another dimension: apparently Al Queda has a foothold in the Aïr Mountains. I have no idea what this presence looks like, but I can well imagine how attractive this situation is for an international organization intent on wreaking international havoc: a remote, mountainous area; discontented Touareg rebel groups and regular transports of Uranium yellowcake. Seems like an outfit like Al Queda would be all over it.

Of course it’s a complicated process to turn yellowcake into a weapon. But it is a critical ingredient for a simple kind of radioactive WMD a terrorist might consider using. The situation in Niger is ripe for Al Queda getting their hands on a significant amount of yellowcake. The question is whether we leave it up to Al Queda to exploit that situation, or whether the international community takes charge of the situation, forces Areva to clean up its act and helps protect the homeland of the Touareg. Personally, that’s what I care about most: the health of the workers has to be protected, they need decent medical care, and the environment needs to be protected. And let’s not give Al Queda an opportunity to exploit this situation.

Read more about the effects of the uranium mining in this report by Almoustapha Alhacen’s organization Aghir in Man.

Over at Au Village, Togbui posted his account of the CMAF protest in Washington, DC against the fraudulent “election” in Togo earlier this month. (Yeah – you guessed it … the ruling RPT’s candidate “won” by a landslide.) Togbui writes:

We marched from the Togo embassy to the White House singing Togolese independence songs and scanding anti-RPT slogans like “Freedom for Togo”, “Fabre is the real winner of the elections”, “Free Togo now!”. We were holding signs that read “Togo is not a kingdom”, “Obama help free Togo” and others. The secret service at the White House let us protest near the fence of the White House after we showed them our authorizations.

The RPT’s mouthpiece republicoftogo.com had a snarky story about the demonstration and I think they tried to sound clever and dismissive. However, they come across more as relived that the demonstration was not bigger and that Obama was not in town to see the protesters. The headline is “Le flop de Washington” and that shows you exactly how much regard the RPT has for freedom of expression. They know that they are defending an impossible situation – the son of Togo’s late dictator, who was installed by the military after his dad’s death and who has an ethnic-minority controlled power apparatus behind him, wins an election by a landslide??!! They know this story stinks to high heaven, and I think they are really worried that Obama gets a whiff of this and decides to take sides. They should be worried.

(If you care to read the piece, search for “flop Washington” on republicoftogo.com  (in french) I won’t post a link)

All I have to say is that I am glad that the protesters made their voices heard. Next time I hope I can make it. Ablode!!

The answer to life, the universe and everything!

Tomorrow, the Togolese anti-RPT diaspora in the US will demonstrate to protest the ridiculous “election” that confirmed Togo’s president earlier this month.  Apparently a North Carolina representative has arranged for a meeting of representatives of the protesters with President Obama. Not that I expect much of that. Obama has got bigger fish to fry right now than the woes of a small West-African nation. But it’s still a good thing for the Togolese democratic opposition to make its voice heard. I am hoping to get some pictures and/or videos and a report from the event. So check back soon.

Ablodé!

Endangered Durham has a great post about the Watts and Yuille tobacco warehouses, nowadays known as Brightleaf Square. The post includes this aerial shot of the warehouses (this is just a cropped version). I was looking for some evidence of how old the trestle is. This question keeps coming up when people ask why the trestle is so low – too low for many trucks, so they keep crashing into the trestle. I am also particularly interested in these photos because I work in this building (the one in the front). The old warehouses were converted to retail and office space in 1980, and Duke rents most of the second floor of the South building (where I work).

Check out the post on Endangered Durham for some other great historic photos of the warehouses (and the  trestle).

Surprise! The Gnassingbes did it again! 40 years in power and counting!

The CENI published the “election” results and Faure Gnassingbe, son of  Togos late dictator apparently won by a landslide. To celebrate this victory he had a couple hundred protesters in Lomé teargassed. The military is in the streets of Lomé, making sure no  sore “losers” try to spoil the RPT’s victory celebration. Some say that opposition leaders were arrested. The AP says that there was a serious disagreement at the CENI about the way the  results were reported to the comission:

From morning until late at night on Saturday, the commissioners sat around a large table in a conference room as the representatives of each district presented their results. In the early afternoon, two opposition-allied commissioners stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind them.

“I would have like to be able to say that, I, Jean-Claude Codjo, election commissioner, agree that this election is free and fair,” he said. “But we are only being allowed to see a synthesis. I have no way of knowing if these numbers that are being read out are real. I say ‘no.’ I cannot accept this,” said Codjo as he left the parking lot.

The satellite-system would have allowed the results from each of roughly 5,900 polling stations to be sent directly to the election commission’s headquarters in Lome. By contrast each of the 35 districts whose results were being read out were an aggregate of dozens, sometimes hundreds, of individual polling stations.

Well, it looks like the RPT did it again, and they had their way with Togo electorate. But it also looks like turnout was really low in the opposition strongholds. And who can blame them. Why bother to vote when you just get cheated every time. I just hope the frustration over being cheated like this does not boil over in violent form. That would just give the RPT thugs a cause for more repression. I guess the only thing the opposition can do is patiently chip away at the support for the RPT among the Kabyie people and among the military. Once that support crumbles, it’ll be time for change in Togo.

Today is election day in Togo. The borders are closed, the military patrols the streets and 6000 polling stations are open across the west African nation. Fraud and violence marred the last election in 2005, so several hundred international observers have been deployed across the country. The hope is that this presence of observers can prevent egregious fraud. The opposition is certainly very optimistic they will carry the day (see comments to a previous posting). But with the election commission, the constitutional court and the military all deeply enmeshed with the ruling RPT and the Gnassingbe clan, I’d be surprised to see Gnassingbe concede defeat  anytime soon. Still, a strong showing of the opposition, and a peaceful, disciplined reaction to the results may loosen the RPT’s grip on the country.

Among the seven candidates are two former prime ministers of the current regime, the first female presidential candidate, the main opposition candidate Jean-Pierre Fabre and, of course the ruling party candidate, son of Togo’s late dictator Eyadema, Faure Gnassingbe. Short candidate bios from the RPT mouthpiece republicoftogo.com:

Seven candidates are vying for the top job in the small west African country of Togo in elections on Thursday. Among the candidates is the incumbent Faure Gnassingbe, 43, son of the late ruler Gnassingbe Eyadema, who held power for 38 years??.

One of the strongest contenders is Jean-Pierre Fabre, 58, candidate of the main opposition party, the Union of Forces for Change (UFC) led by Gilchrist Olympio, son of the country’s first post independent president.
An economist by training, Fabre is in the presidential race for the first time.

Former prime minister Yawovi Agboyibo, candidate of the Action Committee for Renewal (CAR), and another leading opponent to Gnassingbe, is trying for “third time lucky” after he lost twice already in 1998 and 2003.

A lawyer by training, Agboyibo, 67, is one of the most prominent figures of the Togolese opposition, who began his political career after political unrest that rocked the country in 1990.

Another former prime minister, Agbeyome Kodjo, of the Organisation for the Building of a United Togo (OBUTS), defected from Faure’s Togolese People’s Rally (RPT) to set up his own party in 2005.??Holder of a doctorate in management sciences, Kodjo, 56, was also speaker of the national assembly in 1999 to 2000 after holding several ministerial portfolios in Eyadema’s government.

This is the first time he is taking part in a presidential election.

Brigitte Kafui Adjamagbo-Johnson, a member of the Democratic Convention of African Peoples (CDPA opposition) is the only woman in the race and the first to seek the highest office in Togo.

Born in December 1958, Adjamagbo Johnson holds a doctorate in law.

The others are 57-year-old businessman Nicolas Lawson of the Party for Renewal and Redemption (PRR) and Bassabi Kagbara, 68, a former school teacher trying his presidential luck for the first time as candidate of the Panafrican Democratic Party.

Let’s hope for positive and peaceful change in Togo.

Every year the earth’s rotation slows a bit and so we have to add a second to our time keeping once in a while to keep it in sync with the old rock. Large earthquakes like the devastating tremor last week in Chile, or the Sumatran quake that triggered the massive tsunami 0f 2004 can move huge amounts of rock a bit closer to the axis of the earth. That results in an increase in speed of the earth’s rotation, NASA says:

JPL research scientist Richard Gross computed how Earth’s rotation should have changed as a result of the Feb. 27 quake. Using a complex model, he and fellow scientists came up with a preliminary calculation that the quake should have shortened the length of an Earth day by about 1.26 microseconds (a microsecond is one millionth of a second).

Perhaps more impressive is how much the quake shifted Earth’s axis. Gross calculates the quake should have moved Earth’s figure axis (the axis about which Earth’s mass is balanced) by 2.7 milliarcseconds (about 8 centimeters, or 3 inches). Earth’s figure axis is not the same as its north-south axis; they are offset by about 10 meters (about 33 feet).

On March 4, voters in Togo for the first time ever will have a choice between two young-ish leaders, as a new generation of politicians is slowly emerging from the shadows of the aging post-colonial crop of politicians. At least they are supposed to be able to choose. Considering that the election committee that oversees the contest is deeply enmeshed with the ruling party RPT, they can hardly be considered impartial. Nevertheless, this is an interesting and important election because it pits two interesting candidates against each other: President Faure Essozimna Gnassingbé and the main opposition candidate Jean-Pierre Fabre.

They both represent a new generation of politicians, albeit at different ends of the political spectrum. Faure Gnassingbe just took over the family business of ruling Togo after the death of his dad Gnassingbe Eyadema in 2005. Eyadema made a name for himself for staging Africa’s first post-colonial coup d’etat in 1963, and killing Togo’s first and only freely elected president Sylvanus Olympio. Eyadema ruled Togo with an iron fist for over 40 38 years. His rule included all the classic ingredients of African dictatorship: purges and prison-camps, tanks in the streets and death squads knocking down doors in the middle of the night. Under Faure’s management Togo has become much less repressive and some of the ethnic tension has abated. Still, last April (while we were visiting Togo) Faure had his brother Kpatcha arrested for treason. Kpatcha was charged with attempting to overthrow Faure and was locked away. Also the last election was pretty much a farce, and this time around, too, several candidates had their papers rejected on flimsy pretenses, probably because they were considered too popular. Yet – in comparison to his dad, Sorbonne educated Faure presents a new approach to dictatorship. An new, gentler dictator.

Fabre, 14 years older than Faure, is still downright youthful among the anciens combattants of Togo’s fragmented opposition, like 74-year-old Olympio, 80-year-old Emmanuel Bob-Akitani, 74-year-old Edem Kodjo, or 67-year-old Yawovi Agboyibo. No disrespect to these men. They have fought their battles valiantly, and, I’m sure, in the best interest of their country. But they also had to spend most of their lives in exile – thanks to Eyadema and his thugs. Fabre, however, returned to Togo after his studies in France, taught at the Universite du Benin in Lome, edited several newspapers, and was founding member of Olympios UFC in 1992. Since then, Fabre was one of the opposition’s main work horses, albeit in the shadow of Gilchrist Olympio,  president of the UFC and son of Togo’s first president Sylvanus Olympio. Yes – the guy Faure Gnassingbe’s dad killed in 1963. And now that Olympio junior himself is too old and too ill to run, it is time for Fabre to step out of his shadow and run for president.

I think it is unlikely that the opposition will actually win. The reality is that a fractured opposition and a UFC fraught with internal disagreements is hardly in a position to wrest power from the deeply entrenched RPT and the “heir to the throne” Faure Gnassingbe who is backed by the military establishment. Yet, there is movement in the political landscape. A new generation is taking over and things will change. If Fabre can mobilize the voters and the international observers can prevent egregious fraud, then maybe a stronger showing of the opposition can wrest some concessions from Gnassingbe Junior. Maybe they can begin to loosen the grip of the Gnassingbe clan. And maybe, just maybe, Faure can eventually become the Gorbachev of Togo.

[Correction – Eyadema ruled Togo for 38 years, not “over 40.” After he killed Olympio, his associate Nicolas Grunitzky ran Togo from 1963 – 1967]

The last few days we had a bit of a spring-teaser and I was able to go out and run on some new and interesting ground. Friday (50F/10C sunny, dry) I did another lunch run in town, from my office to my favorite bar. And today (65F/18C sunny, dry) I did my first real trail run on the 3-mile Ridge Trail at Little River Park. Some of the sidewalks in the old neighborhoods in Durham are just as challenging to run on as the trails in the woods – old tree roots have pushed up the asphalt or concrete and some sidewalks are cleaner than others. Whether you run in the woods or on the city, you really have to be alert and pay attention to where you put your feet and how you put them there. And that’s part of the fun.

The Ridge Trail at Little River is not terribly technical overall – a nice, single-track wooded hiking trail that varies between gravel, leaf-litter, pine needles, some muddy patches and some rocky areas. It’s mostly rolling hills with a couple of steeper descents and climbs. Along the river, the trail is sandy and soft, which feels really nice. The biggest hazards I found are pointy rocks hidden in the leaf litter and pine cones. I learned quickly to tread lightly on the leaf litter, because you often just don’t know what’s hiding underneath. And those damn pine cones! Pointy, sneaky booby traps! I think I have one of those spikes stuck in my foot right now. Still, running barefoot in the woods is fun. The rocks and roots teach you to lift your feet. The pine cones teach you … to look out for pine cones. And if you tread lightly you glide quietly through the woods like a deer.

Last Thursday around lunchtime a truck with a huge industrial freezer crashed into the Gregson St railroad trestle – the “truck guillotine”  as some are calling it. This time I was there and I had my camera with me, so in addition to the actual crash footage I also shot some footage of the crash aftermath and the “extraction” of the truck from under the bridge. Well, technically it was really wedged under the crash beam the NCDOT railroad division installed in 2003. If you’re not familiar with my collection of truck crash videos, you should know that this is a regular occurrence at this underpass. Enjoy :)

Also, for the record, I missed a crash that happened on Dec. 26 – I was out of the office for while around the holidays, and by the time I found out about the crash the video file had been overwritten. Sorry …

The North Carolina constitution actually bars atheists from public office – in Article VI, Section 8:

Sec. 8.  Disqualifications for office.

The following persons shall be disqualified for office:

First, any person who shall deny the being of Almighty God.

(…)

NC Constitution, Article VI, Section 8

This, and all other religious tests for public office were invalidated by the Supreme Court of the United States in the 1961 decision in Torcaso v. Watkins. That means that the people who are trying to deny Asheville City Councilman Cecil Bowell and the citizens of Asheville their electoral rights have really no legal leg to stand on. They argue that because Bowell is an atheist he is not eligible for public office in NC. Of course the SCOTUS invalidated that  bigoted “argument” half a century ago. (Full story on Alternet)

But it’s time the NC Constitution be updated for the 21st Century. Nonsense like this should be repealed and struck from the books, once and for all, so that hard-working, honest godless folk can serve in North Carolina without getting hassled by the hypocrites and bigots.

It was bad enough when the convoy of  Togo’s national football team was machine-gunned by a rebel army in Angola’s Cabinda Province as the team was traveling to the Cup of African Nations. Two staff members and the Angolan driver died. Several are still in the hospital and it seems clear that the whole team was traumatized by this tragedy.

But the spat that followed between the Togolese government and the Confederation of African Football (CAF) had consequences that added insult to injury for the team. After some finger-pointing, and heated phone calls between the Togolese government and CAF officials, Togo’s President ordered the national team to come home. Saturday, the CAF issues a statement that Togo is banned from the next 2 CAN tournaments and imposed a fine of $50,000 on Togo’s team. CAF’s rationale for this decision is that the team had decided to play, but the Togolese government intervened and ordered them home. Political interference is a very touchy issue in African sports, where most national football federations depend on government funds, and the CAF has very strict rules prohibiting political meddling in CAF events.

However, neither the Togo’s Football Federation nor the CAF are renown for their diplomatic skill, and so it seems to me that some big egos on both sides got bruised in the aftermath of the tragedy in Cabinda, and now they are using the team in a stupid power play. Sadly, no one will win this game. Togo’s football functionaries managed, yet again, to get the Hawks into non-football related headlines and the CAF looks like a bunch of total jerks for punishing a team that was attacked on the way to a CAF event. AND they look stupid for issuing that press release a day before the CAN final. That way they had BOTH the tournament opener AND the final overshadowed by headlines that make them look bad.

Way to manage the image of African football.

The team and their staff and families meanwhile mourn those they lost. I am sure it causes them additional grief to be treated like this – as pawns in a powerplay of some bruised bureaucrat’s egos.

The BBC’s Pier Edwards has some interesting insight into one of those egos:

When I asked Caf President Issa Hayatou earlier this month whether he regretted bringing the Nations Cup to Angola following the Togolese tragedy, his answer was enlightening.

For the Cameroonian proceeded to explain that there was no real problem having only three teams in Group B after Togo’s withdrawal as it had happened before (when Nigeria withdrew from South Africa in 1996).

At that point, an aide came over to explain that the question had actually been about the deaths – whereupon Hayatou addressed the attack with little empathy.

BBC – Piers Edwards Blog – 30 January 2010

Seems like that is a pretty typical attitude among football functionaries – the players are just pawns, and it’s all “the show must go on.”

But maybe there are some football officials out there who can muster some empathy and will invite Togo to their regional tournament. One of the comments to Edward’s story points out that CONMEBOL has invited other nations to the Copa America. I personally think that – if this decision stands – UEFA would make a bold and very positive statement inviting Togo to the next Euro Cup. I know, I know … but a guy can dream, right?

P.S. – congratulations to Egypt … and congrats to the Black Stars for making the Pharaos sweat in the final :-)

On January 21, the Supreme Court of the United States produced a ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission that removes any regulation of what corporations can say, and when they can “say” it to influence elections in the United States. Corporations are now free to pump as much cash into the political process as they desire, whenever they desire. The majority’s rationale for this ruling is based on the legal notion that corporations are “persons” under the law and that therefore the First Amendment right to free speech applies to such persons. And, as we all know now, speech = money.

This ruling reverses 100 years of legal precedent and pulls the rug out from 100 years of efforts to stem the tide of corporate cash in the American political process.  This ruling will drown what was left of Democracy in this country in a flash flood of cash from the rich coporate giants in America – the likes of Walmart, Goldman Sachs, Exxon Mobil, Google, GE, AT&T … etcetera.

If you have been following the health care reform debacle last year, you witnessed the healthcare companies fighting against health care reform – with one arm tied behind their back.

Were you bothered by the recklessness of the Wall-Street speculators who almost drove this country’s economy over the cliff? Were you put off by their complete shamelessness to accept tax-payer bailout money only to pay themselves bonuses from these funds? That was the banking industry manipulating Washington with one arm tied behind its back.

The SCOTUS just untied their arms, and and the arms of all corporate interests, and handed them the keys to Washington. This ruling paves the way for a hostile takeover of the US government by corporate America – a corporatist coup of sorts – in the next couple of elections. Lobbyists can now march into any elected official’s office and tell them how to vote, because they can threaten to march into their district or state and unleash a firestorm of propaganda that will end that politician’s career.

In addition, the SCOTUS left wide open the important question of the status of US subsidiaries of foreign corporations. It is very conceivable that the US subsidiaries of Chinese, Venezuelan or Saudi state-owned corporations (to name just a few examples) could wield significant influence on US elections and government.

Fundamentally, though, the absurdity of the legal notion of personhood for corporations has to be explored. A corporation is an abstract, legal entity, that has exactly the rights that the law confers upon it. No more, no less. It has no inherent moral right – no inalienable or natural rights. Incorporating is nowhere near as exciting and magical as birth (unless you’re a lawyer). Dissolving a corporation is no more murder than putting a car in a crusher, and I know more cars that have a personality than corporations.

It makes a lot more sense to discuss the inalienable rights and personhood  of trees than those of corporations. A tree growing on US soil is a singular, natural being and as  such it probably has more natural right to protection as a “person” under the constitution than a corporation. A corporation is an  artificial, virtual entity that can change shape faster than a shape-shifter, and that can move off-shore with the stroke of a pen. The tree has a firm allegiance to this country because it is literally rooted in American soil. A corporation’s allegiance is solely to its owners or shareholders. So many of the natural creatures in this country just barely have the right to exist, but they are not afforded any “inalienable rights” under the constitution. Yet, these are real, living, breathing creatures on American soil. Not some abstract legal construct that really only exists to facilitate commerce.

As a person, I find the notion of personhood for corporations offensive. This absurd ruling makes a mockery of the United States Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. It effectively legalizes bribery and political blackmail. This ruling has now cemented the Corporate States of America – with a government of the people, by the people, for the corporations.

… this year has been a bit of a pisser!

Most of all in Haiti, of course. Please contribute what you can afford to relief organizations who work in Haiti. My favorite is Doctors without Borders; they seem quite efficient, appropriately god-less, and they were helping in Haiti before the earthquake. And also reach out to the Haitians in your community.

Just days before that, rebels in Angola carried out a the deadly attack on the convoy of the  Togo Nat’l Team on it’s way to the CAN in Angola

But also the crazy, unusually cold weather, the death of health care reform, the demise of AirAmerica and the Supreme Court’s slaughter of American Democracy (that pale, skinny child of the American Revolution) on the altar of Corporatism. Damn it!

Once again, the idea that a new year brings some sense of renewal has been thoroughly debunked. 2010 picked up where 2009 left off – hang on … it’ll be a wild ride.