(Re)Enter Sandman ..err.. -monkey

Enter Sandman ..err.. -monkey
Sandmonkey says that as all the familiar old faces emerge to start their activism at square one again, he’s back too.
I have to agree, at least partially, with the sentiment. We’re back to 2004 with all the political “actors” and activists beginning to reemerge and feel each other and the scene out. [...]

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Arundhati Roy on “Democracy” and the state of the world

This is really too good for me to pick excerpts out of. It really expresses so much of what I believe is wrong with the world and to cut it up would diminish it. While focusing mainly on India, Arundhati Roy, author of the God of Small Things (a book I think is overrated since [...]

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The Egypt-Israel Gas Deal

I stumbled upon this post by Mo-ha-med and discovered a pretty good blog. I am reproducing the post in full. It’s about time someone put this much investigation into such a politically and economically critical yet entirely opaque issue. Don’t neglect to check out the first post (referenced in the first line) and the comments [...]

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Arabs Lose In Any Iran Outcome

I couldnt let this one by with just a delicious bookmark. Rami El Khouri comments on Arab (regime and popular) perceptions of and reactions to the events unfolding in Iran. I think he hits a crucial point whith this article in highlighting that they’ve trapped themselves in a lose-lose situation regardless of the outcomes in [...]

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AUC adds Israeli to Trustees

Here’s the announcement from the AUC website:

Retired U.S. Diplomat Named to AUC Board of Trustees
June 21, 2009, Cairo, Egypt – The American University in Cairo announced today the appointment of former US ambassador to Egypt Daniel C. Kurtzer as a member of its Board of Trustees.  Kurtzer, the S. Daniel Abraham Professor of Middle East [...]

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Gaza Activist Arrests in Cairo

I just heard that Salma Said, Khaled AbdelHamid, Malek, Sabri El Sammak and at least 3 journalists have been arrested outside of the Arab League building in  Tahrir.  The activists were protesting in support of Gaza
UPDATE 1:05pm The number i am getting is 13-15 arrests. Apparently they have been shoved into micobuses. The few that [...]

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Police State 2.0

Once Again, Naomi Klein is right on the money. The disaster capitalism complex has found yet another (err.. repeated) field to plough in the Olympics. And somehow, they’ve managed to find a loophole to avoid legislation regulating what’s sold to china (both for security and human rights reasons), turning huge profits and setting up the [...]

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Hillary least electable Dem

One (several actually) more reason to hope Hillary doesnt get the Dem ticket.
While Clinton maintains her lead in national polling among Democrats, in direct matchups against Republican presidential candidates, she consistently runs behind both Barack Obama and John Edwards.
[..]
By contrast, Obama beats every major Republican candidate: He beats McCain 45 percent to 38 percent; Guiliani [...]

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More on the Brazilian Oil Find

This is pretty much what i was implying earlier.
With the attention of a great power like the United States, and a regional power like Venezuela, Brazil finds itself in a position of power that gives it several opportunities. Whether or not the Brazilian government headed by President Lula Ignacio da Silva will choose a [...]

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Human Development Report

The UN’s Human Development Report for this year is out and it focuses on, surprise surprise, climate change. Havent read it yet. But here’s the press release.

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Egyptian academics step up activism

Speaking of Egypt; I dont really follow university politics, but it seems university professors are escalating their activism:
“Demonstrations staged by workers and teachers demanding the government honour their financial rights have proved successful, demonstrating that the state will respond when confronted with a strong stance,” Adel Abdel-Gawwad, chairman of the Cairo University Teaching Staff Club, [...]

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Oil prices: speculative distortion

I realize i’ve been posting disproportionately frequently on oil and energy. I would post more on Egypt and the region but my time is quite limited these days.  I feel there’s no point in just posting links without commentary when someone else (the Arabist) already does it far more efficiently and including most of what i [...]

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OPEC Summit aside

Apparently an oil company consortium led by Brasilian company Petrobras has announced the conclusion of well tests that indicate the deep water Tupi field to be enormous. When the field comes online (it will require the cutting edge of oil drilling technology), it could place Brazil in league with the other major new world fuel [...]

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Oil prices: unstable subsidizers

As OPEC looks set to request assurances that demand wont decrease (hah!) as especially the US and Europe pursue other sources of energy in return for investing significantly in expanding production capabilities, someone finally looks at what these prices mean to people other than the gas excreters and guzzlers swimming in dollars and debt, respectively.
The [...]

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The Age of Insufficiency

One thing i like about oil prices so close to $100 is the fact that it’s forcing a lot of people to stop and think about our dependence on petroleum. There is so much coming out these days that it’s difficult to keep track of. Micheal Klare has an interesting piece in the Nation that [...]

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