Kathreb

Sunday, December 11, 2005

Race Riots in Sydney

Violent mob attacking people in race riots in Australia! Look at that picture! I can't even begin to understand what is going on here.

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Saturday, December 10, 2005

The Mighty Pen

British Playwright Harold Pinter has won the Nobel Prize for literature for 2005. I was not really aware (or interested) in this fact until I stumbled across part of his acceptance speech, which can be found in full at the first link. To say he is a little anti-war and anti-American would put it mildly. A snippet of his highly interesting writing:

The crimes of the US have been systematic, constant, vicious, remorseless, but very few people have actually talked about them. You have to hand it to America. It has exercised a quite clinical manipulation of power worldwide while masquerading as a force for universal good. It's a brilliant, even witty, highly successful act of hypnosis.

I put to you that the US is without doubt the greatest show on the road. Brutal, indifferent, scornful and ruthless it may be but it is also very clever. As a salesman it is out on its own and its most saleable commodity is self love. It's a winner. Listen to all American presidents on television say the words, "the American people", as in the sentence, "I say to the American people it is time to pray and to defend the rights of the American people and I ask the American people to trust their president in the action he is about to take on behalf of the American people."

It's a scintillating stratagem. Language is actually employed to keep thought at bay. The words "the American people" provide a truly voluptuous cushion of reassurance. You don't need to think. Just lie back on the cushion. The cushion may be suffocating your intelligence and your critical faculties but it's very comfortable. This does not apply of course to the 40 million people living below the poverty line and the 2 million men and women imprisoned in the vast gulag of prisons, which extends across the US.

The US no longer bothers about low-intensity conflict. It no longer sees any point in being reticent or even devious. It quite simply doesn't give a damn about the United Nations, international law or critical dissent, which it regards as impotent and irrelevant. It also has its own bleating little lamb tagging behind it, the pathetic and supine Britain.

...

Look at Guantanamo Bay. ... This criminal outrage is being committed by a country that declares itself to be the leader of the free world. ... At present many are on hunger strike, being force-fed. No niceties in these force-feeding procedures. No sedative or anaesthetic. Just a tube stuck up your nose and into your throat. You vomit blood. This is torture.

The invasion of Iraq was a bandit act, an act of blatant state terrorism, demonstrating absolute contempt for the concept of international law. The invasion was an arbitrary military action inspired by a series of lies upon lies and gross manipulation of the media and therefore of the public; an act intended to consolidate American military and economic control of the Middle East masquerading ?? as a last resort, all other justifications having failed to justify themselves ?? as liberation. A formidable assertion of military force responsible for the death and mutilation of thousands and thousands of innocent people.

We have brought torture, cluster bombs, depleted uranium, innumerable acts of random murder, misery, degradation and death to the Iraqi people and call it "bringing freedom and democracy to the Middle East".

Strong words indeed and with added benefit of being spoken from a such a notable platform as the Nobel Organisaiton.

North Korean Human Rights

Blogger nomad, Andy Jackson, has been updating events from the Seoul Summit on North Korean human rights. By all accounts this was a pretty big event. The BBC has also reported on the event. I had a friend staying at the Shilla during the week for an unrelated conference and told her to go in and take any propagandada they might be handing out but said it was packed. I don't think she got any stuff for me.

And just a quick boast that I am leaving winter behind and heading south to wonderfully sunny Australia in less than a week to spend Christmas at home!

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Sunday, December 04, 2005

Made in Korea

Nautilus has a copy of a recent Joong Ang Ilbo opinion piece regarding the tricky matter of labeling goods produced in the Kaesong Industrial Complex. The article discusses the dilemma of whether to label products as "made in South Korea" or "made in North Korea. If the former, then they can enjoy better status and access to world markets than a "made in North Korea" tag. However, the decision is not just a choice but a matter of legality. As a 2004
op-ed piece by Marcus Noland notes:

North Korea is among the few countries that the United States does not grant normal trade relations (NTR) status to, and North Korean exports are subject to the so-called column 2 tariff rates established by the infamous Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930. These tariffs tend to be the highest on labor-intensive products such as garments, in which North Korea is conceivably competitive

Even the EU and ASEAN which originally agreed to treat the products from Kaesong as South Korean are now having second thoughts. As the article notes:

Last month, some members of the Association of South East Asian Nations refused to recognize products from Kaesong complex as made-in-South Korea. ASEAN said that under World Trade Organization regulations, the origin of the country must be the place where the industrial process was completed. They said it is difficult to consider products made in North Korean territory as having been made in South Korea.

Given the amount of money being poured in and the hopes South Korean policy makers have regarding the success of this project this is no small matter. While the over-riding goal of the project might be improving inter-Korean relations, if the complex is not economically successful, then the main goal will surely not be achieved. To ensure success then depends on the export-ability of the products. The only alternative would be for South Korea to play the role of both producer and buyer. South Koreans have proven themselves capable of such emotionally charged activities - I might mention gold donations during the financial crisis, Korean brand loyalty especially cars, and the current wave of egg-donations - and a big "Buy North Korean" push is not out of the question. But hopefully it won't come to that.

In the international market a possible threat to the success of the Kaesong Industrial Complex is the rising awareness of North Korea's human rights situation. It would not be surprising for human rights groups to advocate a boycott of products coming from the complex. Especially if the view is that profits, rather than going to pro-poor spending, would line the pockets of the elite and military.

Book Review: "The Girl Most Likely" by Rebecca Sparrow

Rebecca Sparrow, like Nick Earls (recently reviewed on this site) is a Brisbane based author. This is her first novel and was recieved by me from the same friend who sent me some of Mr. Earl's novels. This book is very funny, and I enjoyed it more than the first Nick Earls although much of the Bris Vegas humour is quite similar.

Rachel Hill is the girl voted most likely to succeed in high school. It should be noted that "success" of course is a subjective term. And indeed, the book essentially does analyse the meaning of "success". As a "success" Rachel Hill has a good job, rents an apartment in town, and has a boyfriend. However, we never meet Rachel the success, we meet her when she has lost her job, has moved back with her parents and whose husband wants a divorce after only a few months of regrettable marriage. While retrospectively trying to work out what went wrong and to work out where to go from there Rachel discovers, of course, that making lists of things to achieve is not nearly as satisfying as enjoying what she already has. It also helps that she falls for the handsome, smart, talented, funny and caring guy who lives next door to her parents.

And now for favourite quotes of the book:

"Creeping Jesus. Its someone who's a fawning person. Which personally I think is a bit rough. Since when is Jesus associated with creepiness? Sure, he hung out with lepers - but that's not creepy. Social suicide maybe...Imagine next time someone's following you around and wont' leave you alone, you can say, 'Fuck off Nadine, you are such a Creeping Jesus."

"So I walked up to him and he gave me a kiss and told me I looked beautiful. And then the bartender asked us what we'd like to drink. I asked for a vodka and lemonade. And..."
"And?"
"I ordered myself a vodka and lemonade and Greg ordered himself a West Coast Cooler."
There's silence in the car.
"You understand what I'm saying right? He ordered himself a girlie drink. I mean, I tried to pretend that it didn't matter but the whole time I was thinking, "I can't date a guy who drinks girlie drinks". And I wanted to say, "Whoa, whoa, hold it right there buddy. What do you think you're doing?" I mean a Stoli, Two Dogs, a Sub Zero I could have handled but a West Coast Cooler for fuck's sake?"...I wanted to scream at him, "Order a beer for Christ's sake you big girl's blouse"

I have emailed Dave Howard porn. "I HAVE JUST EMAILED DAVE HOWARD PORN" I scream to no-one in particular. I pick up the phone. Zoe is still there.
"WHAT?"
"My interview questions were called PS - for Perfect Summer. I just emailed Dave Howard your porn story."
"By accident?"
"Of course by fucking accident. Oh God. I'll have to phone him. Hope he doesn't open it. Tell him to trash it. I can't believe I sent him porn."
"I'd really prefer it if you called it erotic fiction. Porn makes it sound so cheap."
I ring his number but it rings out. He must be on-line. On-line and reading porn.

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