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Tuesday, December 21, 2004
No Place Like Home Tomorrow I board a plane to Australia, after a three year absence from my home country. During my trip I may or may not feel like blogging. Let the summer of cricket begin! Also, I added a comment to reply to the comment in the last post but the counter stayed at one. In case the person who wrote the original comment hasn't figured this out.
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Sunday, December 12, 2004
Can Cremated Remains be Used for DNA Testing? This is a good question brought up in the comment to my last post. I don't have the answer but the potential difficulty of this task was discussed by the Japan Times. The Asahi also deals with this. I don't know if the Japanese are going to reveal how they were able to do the tests on the cremated remains. I would like to add though, that I'm inclined to believe the Japanese over the North Koreans, especially in light of the last attempt: The article also notes that the body was exhumed and then cremated. It seems dodgey to bury someone and then exhume it to have it cremated - especially since Koreans are traditionally not inclined to cremate bodies. Thursday, December 09, 2004
North Korea Tries to Diddle Japan The recent finding that North Korea sent Japan the remains of someone other than the Japanese abductee is one of those occasions that highlights just how unpredictable North Korea is. Firstly, no-one in the North Korean regime could possibly have been stupid enough to think they could get away with this stunt. Following that premise we have to try and fathom what they thought Japan would do once they discovered their chicanery. It would seem pretty obvious that the reaction would be negative, possibly to the point of inducing Japan to follow through with their threat of imposing sanctions. This would likely bring Japan and US in closer alignment and exacerbate tension. Moreover, it wouldn't serve to foster any sympathy from China or South Korea. It seems almost as if North Korea would have been better served by remaining belligerent and resisted requests to send remains rather than insult the Japanese by sending bogus dead body parts. Their actions here just don't seem to make much sense. (Or I'm missing a bigger picture.) Wednesday, December 08, 2004
Further to the Prevalence of Liberals in Universities The Economist joins debate on how lack of diversity among academics in universities is a bad thing. While the argument is fair I would re-postulate that the lack of diversity should be first addressed by finding out how and where the conservative academics are hiding. I would guess a few have taken residence at places like Heritage and the American Enterprise Institute but surely that is not the bulk of them. Next would be to look into the matter of discrimination against conservative professors and how (or if) this is affecting the diversity of opinions and quality of free expression in universities. Friday, December 03, 2004
Study reveals that smart people tend to be liberal I'm not usually a frequenter to Instapundit but I was aimlessly wandering in cyberspace and found myself visiting his page where I found this Boston Globe article, which struck me as highly deficient in making anything close to a reasonable argument about a subject which is quite important - left-wing dominance on campuses The survey, which seems to be objectively handled, shows that the predominant number of professors in common fields from University of Houston to UCLAUCLA are leftist leaning to greater or lesser degree. But from this information the article jumps to the conclusion that this means students are being "brainwashed" because professors "frequently comment of politics in class," which is not overly helpful. The first argument goes directly to the quote given by Ben Shapiro who made the "brainwashed" video (which my computer refused to bother downloading so I didn't see it) that liberalism in universities goes "under higher education's facade of objectivity." Much as I knew, private universities were not under any obligation to be objective. Their private, you don't like them, you don't go there. I might mention Bob Jones University, I also found Abilene Christian University. Plus a google check of "conservative university" revealed a high number of seemingly very organised conservative groups and a conservative national association of some kind. This would indicate that despite a prevalence of liberal professors campuses remain open to all kinds of political discourse and persuasions. But that aside, lets suppose you do expect universities to provide a more balanced view in educating students. The next question to ask might be, "if there are so many liberal professors WHERE are the right-wing ones?" Are they being discriminated against in employment opportunities? Is there a mass of unemployed conservative political science and liberal arts professors? Or, could it be that most people with half a brain are not conservative-leaning? (that is putting it in a provocative way but the question remains as to why are the majority of them liberals in the first place?) And then to the crux of the matter. So what? The questions that needed to be asked here are not whether professors talk about their political views in class but whether they prevent students from presenting their own views or whether or not students feel that professors mark them based on political orientation. If that were to be discovered, that would be a MAJOR problem. But just talking politics in a classroom doesn't make the prevalence of leftism "radical, aggressive, and deeply intolerant." that comment is unsubstantiated in the article and until such time as evidence is produced to back it up, it is unfair to make such an accusation. Thursday, December 02, 2004
World Bank in Asia
Wednesday, December 01, 2004
Join the Financial Hub of Asia! (Non-Koreans need not apply) The doyens of the Financial Supervisory Commission have apparently decided that to help Korea realise their long-held but poorly defined dream of becoming an "Asian Financial Hub" (notice the bit that says, "We need to... improve our infrastructure and brand image to attract more expatriates who are key in any regional financial hub.") they should control foreign bank directors. This would include welcoming moves such as, imposing residency requirements on foreign directors of domestic banks, and limiting the number of foreigners allowed on boards. The argument for this, In the context of how well Korean bank managers handled the financial system in the lead up the to 1997 Asian financial crisis makes this comment all the more laughable. The other arguments of anti-foreign sentiment along with the need for local knowledge are simply ruses. The real information is in the last line of the article: "This is seen as a move to ensure Woori Bank will remain in Korean hands when privatised next year." Being an "Asian Financial Hub" is apparently only acceptable if it is a "Korean Financial Hub" where the local regulatory environment is more important than the regional or global arena.
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