URL: http://bloodandtreasure.typepad.com/blood_treasure/

<h>December 26, 2006

<h>memories of the left handed

   <p>Not much to say about Ethiopia's offensive against the Somali ICU,
   other than that its early stages seem to replicate the invasion of
   Iraq, with the Somalis being apparently unable to stand up to superior
   Ethiopian firepower while in open country. Let's see what happens if
   and when the Ethiopians try to enter Mogadishu.
   <p>The other point is that this conflict isn't a straightforward
   Islamist/Christian match up everyone seems to be assuming; or at least
   that the religious aspect of the fight ties in with traditional Somali
   irredentism from way, way back.

     <p>In Ethiopia the damage which [Ahmad] Gragn did has never been
     forgotten," wrote Paul B. Henze. "Every Christian highlander still
     hears tales of Gragn in his childhood. Haile Selassie referred to
     him in his memoirs. I have often had villagers in northern Ethiopia
     point out sites of towns, forts, churches and monasteries destroyed
     by Gragn as if these catastrophes had occurred only yesterday."[11]
     While acknowledging that many modern Somali nationalists consider
     Ahmad a national hero, Henze dismisses their claims, stating that
     the concept of a Somali nation did not exist during Ahmad's
     lifetime.

   <p>More recently, there have been two border conflicts in the last 45
   years. I think that Ethiopia's main interest in this conflict lies in
   keeping Somalia weak, rather than putting an end to Islamism in the
   country. Meles Zenawi seems to be saying as much here:

     <p>Meles has said he does not intend to keep his forces in Somalia
     long, perhaps only a few weeks. He has told visiting dignitaries
     that his goal is to severely damage the Islamic movement's military
     capabilities and allow both sides to return to peace talks on even
     footing.

   <p>It looks like it might be Eritrea's turn to make a move, though they
   may hold on to see whether more troops are sucked into the conflict.

<h>universal bereavement, an inspiring achievement

   <p>My conscience told me I should get this. But I ended up getting this
   instead.

   <p>Goes well with Wray and Nephew overproof I find.

 <h>December 23, 2006

<h>a bum's christmas

   <p>As is traditional round here, we mark the season with H L Mencken's
   Christmas story for atheists:

     <p>It was an unendurable outrage, he argued, to invite a poor man to a
     free meal and then make him wait for it while he was battered with
     criticism of his ways, however well intended. And it was an even
     greater outrage to call upon him to stand up in public and confess
     to all the false steps of what may have been a long and much
     troubled life. Fred was determined, he said, to give a party that
     would be devoid of all the blemishes of the similar parties staged
     by the Salvation Army, the mission helpers, and other such
     nefarious outfits. If it cost him his last cent, he would give the
     bums of Baltimore massive and unforgettable proof that philanthropy
     was by no means a monopoly of gospel sharks--that its highest
     development, in truth, was to be found among freethinkers.

   <p>Tomorrow, we'll be torturing Santa. Actually, it's probably over and
   out from me for a bit. Champagne for your real friends and real pain
   for your sham friends and so on. Back soonish.

<h>on getting a life

   <p>So you're one of those Second Lifers and you want to deal in property?
   Here are your friendly virtual estate agents:

     <p>Since 2004 Anshe Chung Studios Ltd., has been the global leader in
     virtual real estate trading and development. What began as a game
     with an initial investment of 9,95$ for a Second Life account has
     grown into a serious business.

     <p>Today ACS already turns over several million US$ worth of virtual
     land, goods and services per year, with an average monthly growth
     rate above 10%. In 2006 the government of Hubei, China has granted
     Anshe chung Studios special status as priviledged hightech
     enterprise, recognizing its potential as innovator and creator of
     highly qualified jobs in Wuhan. Currently Anshe Chung Studios
     employs about 20 people in China and abroad.

     <p>With its expert team of virtual world artists, realtors and service
     representatives ACS has been servicing both end users and
     organizations. Its customer base is as varied as the population of
     the virtual world platforms it serves, ranging from the average
     gamer to educators, real life billionaires and celebrities.

   <p>Via. The odd thing about this is that you can't buy and sell real land
   in China.

<h>December 22, 2006

<h>war on Christmas: the Eastern Front

   <p>We seem to be taking our own whiny, pseudo-academic maunderings about
   cultural imperialism and forcing them on the hapless natives of China:

     <p>As Christmas draws near, ten philosophy and education PhD students
     from China's top universities jointly publicized a petition on the
     Internet, calling on netizens, especially the young, to be less
     excited about the exotic holiday, Shanghai-based Xmnext.com
     reported December 21, 2006.

     <p>This is the latest instance of public resistance to western culture
     and lifestyles in China. In the online petition, titled "Out of
     Cultural Collective Unconsciousness, Strengthen Chinese Cultural
     Dominance" and dated with traditional Chinese Era Calendar, PhD
     students from China's most authoritative universities including
     Beida, Tsinghua and People's University hope to "wake up the
     Chinese people to resist western cultural invasion".

   <p>So what kind of western cultural imperialism are we talking about?

     <p>On the same day another report from the Henan Business News in
     central China's Henan Province said a commercial chamber was
     planning a nude running event on the evening of December 24, and
     had received more than 1,700 applications to join in the activity.

   <p>Granite Studio takes up the theme:

     <p>Citing the increasing popularity of the holiday among the younger
     generation, protest organizer Wang Dashan published an article, "to
     awaken the Chinese people and to resist Western cultural
     expansion."

     <p>He argues that Christmas is a form of "soft power" that if left
     unchecked will dilute traditional Chinese culture. Wang and his
     associates fear that too many Chinese young people are simply
     "rejecting what is old and embracing what is new" (¤¯) and are
     adopting an attitude of "what is Chinese is inferior and what is
     Western is excellent" (­£¿).

   <p>I'm trying really, really hard not to say that Wang Dashan's Cantonese
   name is Ba Hum-bug, but I'm clearly failing in this.

   <p>I was in China once in mid-January. The Christmas stuff was still up
   there. A woman who ran a bar I drank at told me that she was going to
   keep her decorations up till after lunar new year, the aim amongst a
   lot of retailers in Beijing being to apparently establish a festive
   season in the, well, seasonal sense, running from mid December till
   February. This isn't cultural imperialism. It's a bunch of sharp,
   commercially aware people in China taking a hard, cold look at the
   thing and extracting as much utility from it as possible. Oh, yes:
   these folks know what Christmas means.

<h>government petition tomfoolery

   <p>Over here.

     <p>While we are aware of similar initiatives already in existence, the
     Government does not currently have any plans to make monkeys
     available to people with disabilities.

   <p>Damn them.via.

<h>December 21, 2006

<h>prezzies off the reaper

   <p>We've been having a few of them lately, what with Pinochet going, and
   now the Turkmenbashi. Here's part of the official announcement,
   reproduced for lovers of sycophantese:

     <p>"The glorious years during which the Great Serdar ruled the Turkmen
     people confirmed his heavenly faculty to foresee and his ability to
     determine priorities. His unique abilities in the art of leading
     the nation revealed his talent as a diplomat and a wise and humane
     person," the statement says.

     <p>"The objectives he set served the interests of the people, while
     the large-scale projects that were implemented were in harmony with
     the national spirit of the Turkmen people and were accepted by
     every ethnic Turkmen and all other people living in Turkmenistan,"
     it says.

   <p>Via Nosemonkey, who has more to say. It's customary at this point to
   offer some pious hopes on the subject of a transition to democracy, or
   some such, but maybe the best you can do here is just keep your
   fingers crossed for the Turkmen and hope the the successor's not a
   total fruitcake. Nayazov renamed bread after his mother. Maybe the
   next one will just mistake his wife for a hat or something.

<h>awesome understanding

   <p>I don't accept the overall premise of this George Packer article,
   since it seems to embody a lot of the same hubris we've seen in
   foreign policy over the past few years, except that this time we're
   going to outwit them with our awesome understanding rather than
   destroy them with our awesome firepower. Still, it's good on the
   detail:

     <p>A war on terror suggests an undifferentiated enemy. Kilcullen
     speaks of the need to "disaggregate" insurgencies: finding ways to
     address local grievances in Pakistan's tribal areas or along the
     Thai-Malay border so that they aren't mapped onto the ambitions of
     the global jihad... as an example of disaggregation, Kilcullen
     cited the Indonesian province of Aceh, where, after the 2004
     tsunami, a radical Islamist organization tried to set up an office
     and convert a local separatist movement to its ideological agenda.
     Resentment toward the outsiders, combined with the swift
     humanitarian action of American and Australian warships, helped to
     prevent the Acehnese rebellion from becoming part of the global
     jihad.

   <p>Relevant to which: Zawahiri attacks Hamas.

     <p>Zawahiri slammed Hamas for recognizing President Mahmoud Abbas and
     running in elections last January.

     <p>"Accepting the legitimacy of Mahmoud Abbas, the head of the
     national authority, America's man in Palestine, and mandating the
     PLO which recognizes Israel to negotiate with Israel is an abyss
     which will ultimately lead to eliminating the jihad and recognizing
     Israel," Zawahiri said.

   <p>So what do you do about this? Exploit the enmity between Hamas and
   al-Qaeda or just write them off as an undifferentiated arc of
   extremism? And how do you expect anyone to take you seriously when you
   include Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States in your list of countries
   that practice "democracy and moderation?"

   <p>And back to the Daily Star article:

     <p>Participation in the polls in turn led to "respecting international
     [UN] resolutions," which was followed by accepting to form a
     government of national unity, and later by attempts to "get them
     [Hamas] out of government," he said.

   <p>It seems that the Z-man's got Blair's current Palestinian strategy
   nailed. After it happens, he'll be there to say "I told you so."

<h>unto a virgin

   <p>Topical, not to mention seasonal:

    <p> A virgin birth is expected this Christmas, though this particular
     nativity scene will be set in a zoo instead of a stable.

     <p>That's because the virgin in question is Flora the Komodo dragon, a
     giant lizard at Chester Zoo in England that has laid fertile eggs
     despite never having had a mate.

   <p>Perhaps Flora was visited by the Holy Lizard. And is that David Icke,
   bearing gifts?
   
  <h>the enemy

   <p>Enemies all around I see...

     <p>A British soldier has been charged with passing secret information
     linked to the military campaign in Afghanistan to Iran, The Times
     has learnt. Corporal Daniel James, 44, appeared at City of
     Westminster Magistrates' Court in London yesterday, charged under
     Section 1 of the Official Secrets Act with communicating
     information "useful to the enemy".

     <p>The case was considered so sensitive that after the charge had been
     read out, reporters were told to leave and the remainder of the
     hearing was held in camera...

     <p>...However, The Times has learnt that the soldier was charged in
     relation to the passing of confidential information about British
     activities in Afghanistan to Iran, which shares a border with
     western Afghanistan, and has a strategic interest and influence in
     the region.

   <p>So far as I'm aware, the OSA has various provisions against revealing
   any secrets at all, to anyone. And I know that you don't actually have
   to be in a shooting war with another country to identify it as
   belligerent. But what's the actual legal basis for a prosecution
   identifying Iran as "the enemy"? Or is this an attempt to establish
   one?

<h>December 20, 2006

<h>oh, that's the reason

   <p>Anthony Selsdon tells us why US diplomacy has been so effective over
   the past few years:

     <p>Insiders insist that only with the release of documents,
     particularly the extraordinary videotaped conferences that take
     place weekly between Bush and Blair, will the true nature of this
     relationship be understood. These documents, they claim, will
     reveal an intimate partnership, with Bush relying heavily on
     Blair's evaluation of European and, indeed, world leaders and Blair
     emerging as a core player in the internal politics of the
     administration.

   <p>I take it there's a large amount of hype in this statement, but it's
   hard to believe given America's recent track record in winning friends
   and influencing people that this is a credible line of defense. On the
   other hand:

     <p>Blair's advisers believe that further progress on Europe was made
     almost impossible by his French and German counterparts, Jacques
     Chirac and Gerhard Schröder. These relationships have not been a
     success, and so Angela Merkel's defeat of Schröder raised spirits
     in No 10. Some of Blair's defenders, however, whisper that fate's
     cruellest blow was for his premiership to have coincided with the
     presidency of George Bush. Others say the same thing about Gordon
     Brown.

   <p>There's an almost gargantuan sense of thwarted entitlement in this; as
   if the whole world should be organized around What Tony Wants.

<h>noted animator's passing noted

   <p>I don't want to sound like some postmodern media tosser, at least not
   without getting paid for it, but I can't let the passing of Joseph
   Barbera go by without noting that the local nickname for the cops in
   Manchester is the Dibble. I think of this as an example of the great
   tradition working itself organically down through the common culture.

   <p>And while we're here let's ask a vital question. Who was your
   favourite wacky racer?

   <p>UPDATE: UPDATE: Martin Rowson draws the line:

     <p>In his Guardian obituary only about seven lines are given over to
     Barbera's post-Tom and Jerry career, despite the fact that it took
     up most of his professional life and made him his millions. That
     strikes me as fitting. Although everyone born in the last 60 years
     might imagine that they have happy childhood memories of The
     Flintstones, Yogi Bear, Huckleberry Hound or, God help us,
     Scooby-Doo, the truth of the matter is that they're crap. Complete
     and utter crap. Worse, they're shoddily made crap, after
     Hanna-Barbera devised what they called "limited animation", more
     than halving the number of drawings from 26 per second to 3000 for
     five minutes, the better to fill the empty moments on TV between
     the ads. And thus they effectively destroyed animation for at least
     two generations, before it slowly began to claw its way back to
     respectability in the mid-90s.

   <p>Well, yes and no. In terms of Tom and Jerry there's the post Fred
   Quimby era, where there was a definite falling off in quality. And the
   TV cartoons certainly looked pretty shoddy. But they weren't all crap
   either. In the plus column there's Top Cat and Wacky Races, and in the
   minus...well, all the rest really.

   <p>Curiously enough, when I came to read Clockwork Orange I was reminded
   of the lavish ultraviolence of the early Tom and Jerry. And Top Cat is
   a kind of kiddie version of Gangs of New York. Top Cat's gang were
   called Fancy Fancy, Spook, Benny the Ball, The Brain, and Choo Choo,
   which is reminiscent of this:

     <p>The Whyos were the most powerful downtown gang between the Civil
     War and the 1890s...whose most pre-eminent figures included such
     coloufrul names as Hoggy Walsh, Fig McGerald, Bull Hurley, Googy
     Corcoran, Baboon Doyle, Red Rocks Farrell, Slops Connolly...

   <p>...and so on, from Luc Sante's Low Life.

<h>December 19, 2006

<h>some Chinese law enforcement

   <p>OK, in reference to the last entry, let's do some newsgathering.

   <p>Dissident lawyer Gao Zhisheng, probably best known for defending Falun
   Gong members, was kidnapped in Beijing by Chinese security forces last
   August. He is now detained on various charges pertaining to
   "subversion." Even before that happened his life was somewhat crowded:

     <p>I went out this early this morning to exercise in the park. Several
     plainclothesmen were around me. Compared to before, the scale of
     the surveillance has clearly gone up. On the way back home, several
     plainclothesmen shadowed me closely. After breakfast, my wife took
     my daughter to the place of the music tutor. As soon as they
     stepped out, the plainclothesmen followed them. While my daughter
     took lesson for one hour, the plainclothesmen waited idly outside.
     Afterwards, they followed them home...

     <p>... When we arrived at KFC, we ordered food and we sat down to eat.
     A big plainclothesman even came right up and stood across my wife
     not more than 1.8 meters away. The others also came up. From their
     wooden expressions, it was clear that they have done this sort of
     thing often enough. So we ate while they stared. When we were done,
     we went home escorted by the cars front and back again.

   <p>Now he's out of the way, the cops have started on his daughter.

     <p>On Saturday, December 16, Little Gege went to the school for
     remedial lessons. She rode to school on a bicycle by herself. As
     usual, the Ministry of National Security police followed her on
     four bicycles and seven Buick MPV's. At noon, Little Gege got out
     of school. Her classmates were going to play tennins. Little Gege
     knew that she could not go with them, but she walked with them to
     the bus stop. Since the classmates have not eaten, Little Gege
     bought them a bowl of fried noodles. At that moment, the Ministry
     of National Security police told Little Gege that she cannot go
     with her classmates. So she kicked the police officer's bicycle.
     The police walked up to her and confronted her, whereupon Little
     Gege threw the bowl of noodles at his face. Then three male and
     three female police surrounded the 13-year-old girl and proceeded
     to pummel her. A tall police man picked her up and threw her on the
     ground. A police woman pulled her hair and cursed her. Her
     classmates heard the the police woman cursed her: "F**k! This
     little bitch's hair is long!" and then she stomped her foot on
     Little Gege's thigh. Eventually the police officer hauled Little
     Gege into the police car. During the process, Little Gege felt
     someone pinching her back hard. All her classmates were stunned,
     and nobody tried to stop the police. When the police officers took
     Little Gege back to her home, they complained to her mother that
     Little Gege had been uncooperative and refused to come home.

   <p>Ech. I don't normally try and get everyone to link to this kind of
   stuff, but publicity has been known to help in cases like this.

<h>are you gathering news here?

   <p>The Beijing cops have produced a guidebook for their members on how to
   talk to foreign journalists attending the Beijing Olympics, including
   a number of sample conversations in English:

   <p>P(oliceman): Excuse me, sir. Stop, please.
   F(oreign journalist): Why?
   P: Are you gathering news here?
   F: Yes.
   P: About what?
   F: About Falun Gong.
   P: Show me your press card and your reporter's permit.
   F: Here you are.
   P: What news are you permitted to cover?
   F: The Olympic Games.
   P: Falun Gong has nothing to do with the Games.... You should only
   cover the Games.
   F: But I'm interested in Falun Gong.
   P: It's beyond the limit of your coverage and illegal. As a foreign
   reporter in China you should obey China law and do nothing against
   your status.
   F: Oh, I see. May I go now?
   P: No. Come with us.

 <h>the broken country theory of economics

   <p>Via Jim Henley, the combat economy:

     <p>It may sound unreal, given the daily images of carnage and chaos.
     But for a certain plucky breed of businessmen, there's good money
     to be made in Iraq. Consider Iraqna, the leading mobile-phone
     company. For sure, its quarterly reports seldom make for dull
     reading. Despite employees kidnapped, cell-phone towers bombed,
     storefronts shot up and a huge security budget--up to four guards
     for each employee--the company posted revenues of $333 million in
     2005. This year, it's on track to take in $520 million. The U.S.
     State Department reports that there are now 7.1 million
     mobile-phone subscribers in Iraq, up from just 1.4 million two
     years ago. Says Wael Ziada, an analyst in Cairo who tracks Iraqna:
     "There will always be pockets of money and wealth, no matter how
     bad the situation gets."

   <p>Well, yes: people can afford IED triggers, and handy devices to warn
   the folks next door that the militia/cops/US army has rolled into the
   neighbourhood and it's time to rally the locals. And how else will you
   hear about the ransom demand? The "rebuilding the stuff that's been
   blown up" industry is also doing well, as is the demand for new
   premises for the people who've been ethnically cleansed. Thanks to the
   wisdom of its open borders policy imports are booming as well. Nothing
   to do with the fact that domestic production is somewhat hampered by
   endemic civil strife.

   <p>There's something very creepy about taking the transaction costs of
   civil war, separating them from their origins and presenting the
   result as good news. How about including the per diems of the folks
   who plant IED's and the wages paid to militia members?

 <h>December 18, 2006

<p>there's no I in menswear

   <p>In it's own small way, this is perfect:

     <p>England's struggling rugby players are to appear in a World Cup
     warm-up match against France in August without their famous white
     shirts.

     <p>Instead, the team will sport a new "away" strip whose colour
     Twickenham is refusing to reveal.

     <p>The move, which takes a leaf out of football's book, is part of a
     drive to lift struggling merchandise sales, depressed by the team's
     bad results.

   <p>Here, in the year of our Dawk 2006, is exactly how any British
   institution responds to failure.

   <p>Never mind. I bet those la-di-dah Frenchies are already running up the
   white flag at the thought of our world-beating mauve and taupe
   combination bearing down on them.

<h>December 16, 2006

<h>amid laughter and merriment

   <p>It's an internetty old world. Explananda Chris in New York finds an
   article in a Surrey paper about a pigeon cull. It attracts one of the
   best comment threads I've seen in ages:

     <p>I think the correct solution would be to hack the wings off as many
     pigeons as possible before joining them together to create one
     large wing. This could be wafted at the pigeons by any member of
     the townsfolk when numbers got too high. Children could also
     shelter under it at times of heavy rain or possibly loud thunder.

   <p>It gets better. In fact, it makes me want to sing...

   <p>So if Sunday you're free, why don't you come with me,
   And we'll poison the pigeons in the park.
   And maybe we'll do in a squirrel or two,
   While we're poisoning pigeons in the park.

   <p>We'll murder them all amid laughter and merriment,
   Except for the few we take home to experiment.

   <h>all ifs, no busts

   <p>In his examination of the recent unpleasantness re the Serious Fraud
   Office and Saudi Arabia, Martin Kettle finds much to criticize in the
   response of the public. Quelle fucking surprise.

     <p>Everybody's ordinary life is littered with compromises,
     inconsistent behaviour and morally questionable decisions. It's far
     easier to say what you are against than what you are for. Yet we
     beat up on politicians as though expecting them to inhabit a
     different moral universe. It's a pathetic and very British habit.
     It is worth stopping to ask why we are so unrealistic and so wrong.
     The real wonder is that politicians manage to remain as honest and
     sensible as most of them do. It all says at least as much about us
     as it does about them.

   <p>No, you crawling twat; we beat them up because we expect them to
   inhabit the same moral universe as the rest of us; the one where
   allegations of fraud are not excused on the grounds of political
   inconvenience. Or "no ifs, no buts" is just for the little people,
   right? That and the other 3000 ways in which the government have
   thought it appropriate to improve our collective behaviour by means of
   legislation.

   <p>What makes Kettle's pusillanimity even more galling is that any
   charges would likely have been brought under legislation that the
   government introduced itself in 2002. They're not just given a pass on
   obeying rules against fraud everyone else is subject to, they're not
   liable to full investigation under laws they make themselves.

 <h>December 15, 2006

<h>think of danger

   <p>Remember that poll on the BBC a year or so back which found that Marx
   was the top bloke philosopher of all time or some such? It's found its
   way to China, and an instructional DVD for party cadres:

     <p>THE 70 million members of the Chinese Communist Party have all been
     watching a series of eight DVDs - not Yes, Minister, but Think of
     Danger While Living in Safety: The Lessons From the Collapse of the
     Soviet Union Communist Party...

     <p>...The programs place most of the blame on Mikhail Gorbachev for
     "the extinction of the party, which must mean the extinction of the
     country" after 74 years in power. By extension, the same equation
     may thus be applied to China: the end of the party's rule - 57
     years so far - will mean the fragmentation and collapse of the
     country.

     <p>The party presentation says: "Collaborating with nationalists, the
     so-called democrats within the party sped its split and that of the
     Soviet Union encouraged by concepts advocated by Gorbachev,
     including democratisation, openness and diversity of public
     opinion."

     <p>The "disastrous results" of the ensuing "shock therapy prescribed
     by the Americans" included a 52 per cent collapse of economic
     output over a decade, 5000 per cent inflation, and average life
     expectancy cut by four years.

     The programs cite a survey by the BBC - whose website is barred in
     China - that made Karl Marx the leading thinker of the last
     millennium, followed by Albert Einstein. "This shows that many
     people believe we still need Marx, as natural science needs
     Einstein's theories."

   <p>This was strictly not for consumption by the general public in China.
   It is, however, compulsory viewing for cadres, who have to turn in a
   report on what they've seen (this is fairly common as a means of
   enforcing party discipline in China, with the result that there's
   quite a thriving market in faked reports).
   The Chinese public, meanwhile, has been getting an educational TV
   series of its own: The Rise of the Great Nations.

     <p>Its stentorian narrator and epic soundtrack present the emergence
     of the nine countries, from Portugal in the 15th century to the
     United States in the 20th, and cites numerous achievements worthy
     of emulation: Spain had a risk-taking queen; Britain's nimble navy
     secured vital commodities overseas; the United States regulated
     markets and fought for national unity.

     <p>The documentary also emphasizes historical themes that coincide
     with policies Chinese leaders promote at home. Social stability,
     industrial investment, peaceful foreign relations and national
     unity are presented as more vital than, say, military strength,
     political liberalization or the rule of law. In the 90 minutes
     devoted to examining the rise of the United States, Lincoln is
     accorded a prominent part for his efforts to "preserve national
     unity" during the Civil War. China has made reunification with
     Taiwan a top national priority.

   <p>So it's Marx for the bosses, Lincoln for the masses. The interesting
   thing is that the world's last great leviathan state seems to be
   promoting a remarkably whiggish view of history: peace, trade,
   development and measured progress towards social, economic and
   political openness ballasted by the steady, sure, accretion of wealth
   and power. It could have been something by Braudel.

   <p>Sun Bin argues here that this is basically the official line of the
   government, and the aim is partly to curb popular nationalism by
   picking and choosing bits and pieces from the Western and Japanese
   experience that make countries strong and sustainable.

   <p>On the face of it this doesn't make a good fit with the message the
   cadres are getting. But then it's horses for courses really. The TV
   series is meant to promote acceptance by the public that they're part
   of a kind of developmental matrix under the guidance of a wise, open
   and forward looking leadership, while the cadre DVD is meant to
   promote discipline within the party. It's significant here that the
   Chinese government is relaxed enough about public opinion to permit a
   favourable discussion of the Glorious Revolution and the framing of
   the US constitution but nervous enough about the state of the
   Communist Party to insist on a Leninist model of discipline. It
   indicates a belief that the main threat to CPC rule comes from within
   the Party rather than from the public.

<h>interested parties

   <p>Says the Attorney General:

     <p>"It has been necessary to balance the need to maintain the rule of
     law against the wider public interest. No weight has been given to
     commercial interests or to the national economic interest.

   <p>And so ends the Serious Fraud Office's attempt to investigate the al
   Yamamah deal. People seem inclined to lift an eyebrow at this,
   especially since the campaign against the investigation was based on
   apparent Saudi threats to pull out of the Eurofighter deal.

   <p>But let's take it seriously for a minute. What "threats to national
   security" were caused by the SFO being "on the brink of accessing key
   Swiss bank accounts"?

     <p>The prime minister and the foreign and defence secretaries have
     expressed the clear view that continuation of the investigation
     would cause serious damage to UK/Saudi security, intelligence and
     diplomatic cooperation, which is likely to have seriously negative
     consequences for the UK public interest in terms of both national
     security and our highest priority foreign policy objectives in the
     Middle East."

   <p>So, in this ruthless war of ideas against Islamic fundamentalism,
   we're more dependent than ever on the goodwill of the Wahhabi state.
   This seems to tie in to Juan Cole's contention of an emerging
   US/UK/Saudi/Israeli front in the Middle East.

   