Saudi-British Corruption Case in UK Court

From The Guardian (UK):

Saudi Arabia's rulers threatened to make it easier for terrorists to attack London unless corruption investigations into their arms deals were halted, according to court documents revealed yesterday.

Previously secret files describe how investigators were told they faced "another 7/7" and the loss of "British lives on British streets" if they pressed on with their inquiries and the Saudis carried out their threat to cut off intelligence.

Prince Bandar, the head of the Saudi national security council, and son of the crown prince, was alleged in court to be the man behind the threats to hold back information about suicide bombers and terrorists. He faces accusations that he himself took more than £1bn in secret payments from the arms company BAE.

He was accused in yesterday's high court hearings of flying to London in December 2006 and uttering threats which made the prime minister, Tony Blair, force an end to the Serious Fraud Office investigation into bribery allegations involving Bandar and his family.

The threats halted the fraud inquiry, but triggered an international outcry, with allegations that Britain had broken international anti-bribery treaties.

Lord Justice Moses, hearing the civil case with Mr Justice Sullivan, said the government appeared to have "rolled over" after the threats. He said one possible view was that it was "just as if a gun had been held to the head" of the government.

The SFO investigation began in 2004, when Robert Wardle, its director, studied evidence unearthed by the Guardian. This revealed that massive secret payments were going from BAE to Saudi Arabian princes, to promote arms deals.

Yesterday, anti-corruption campaigners began a legal action to overturn the decision to halt the case. They want the original investigation restarted, arguing the government had caved into blackmail.

The judge said he was surprised the government had not tried to persuade the Saudis to withdraw their threats. He said: "If that happened in our jurisdiction [the UK], they would have been guilty of a criminal offence". Counsel for the claimants said it would amount to perverting the course of justice.

"Power Sharing" v. Parliamentary Democracy

All the talk of "power sharing" in Kenya from Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice made me curious about where this somewhat un-American sounding theory came from. Apparently, Arend Lijphart, an emeritus Yale and UCSD professor of political science who served as president of the American Political Science Association developed the theories of "consensus democracy" and "consociational" systems (based on the Dutch model) in opposition to Seymour Martin Lipset's theory of modernization--one that that called for supporting authoritarian leaders who could control their societies while preparing them for Westminster-style parliaments. Lijphart set up an election archive at UCSD among other things. His major work, after comparing 27 democracies, argued that the Dutch model was superior to the British or American system of what he characterized as "majoritarian" democracy. He argued that consensus democracy was appropriate for any society. He also advocated compulsory voting, as opposed to voluntary voting. Strange, then, to look up Professor Lijphart on the Federal Elections Commission donor database only to discover that a public advocate of consensus actively participates in America's "majoritarian" system--and only gives to one side. Doesn't look very "consensual" to this reader--rather partisan, and thanks to Nancy Pelosi, "majoritarian" in fact:

LIJPHART, AREND
SAN DIEGO, CA 92122
NONE/RETIRED

DNC SERVICES CORPORATION/DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE
09/23/2004 500.00 24991273637
10/14/2004 500.00 24981640952

LIJPHART, AREND
SAN DIEGO, CA 92122
RETIRED/RETIRED

BUSBY, FRANCINE P
VIA FRANCINE BUSBY FOR CONGRESS
10/12/2006 225.00 26950726282

LIJPHART, AREND
SAN DIEGO, CA 92122
UCSD/RESEARCH PROFESSOR EMERITUS

FILNER, BOB
VIA BOB FILNER FOR CONGRESS
08/01/2005 250.00 25971206645

LIJPHART, AREND DR.
SAN DIEGO, CA 92122
NONE/RETIRED

DNC SERVICES CORPORATION/DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE
02/18/2005 500.00 25990244213
02/09/2006 500.00 26920028073

LIJPHART, AREND DR.
SAN DIEGO, CA 92122
RETIRED/RETIRED

DNC SERVICES CORPORATION/DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE
01/30/2007 500.00 27950080272

LIJPHART, AREND PROFESSOR
SAN DIEGO, CA 92122
RETIRED

DNC SERVICES CORPORATION/DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE
01/18/2001 250.00 21990322094
04/12/2002 1000.00 22991352683
01/31/2003 1000.00 23990434129
12/24/2003 500.00 24990372533
03/01/2004 500.00 24991146805

Memo to Secretary Rice: Why not re-read some Seymour Martin Lipset? Since your are probably very busy, here's his bottom line, via Wikipedia:

Lipset was one of the first proponents of the "theory of modernization", which holds that democracy has a better chance of surviving in countries with a higher socio-economic development.

Der Spiegel Interview on Kosovo Independence

From Der Spiegel's interview with Dusan Reljic, of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP) on the meaning of Kosovo's declaration of independence:

SPIEGEL ONLINE: Was this since Bush visited Albania and spoke in support of Kosovo independence?

Reljic: I don't think the Bush administration paid a lot of attention to Kosovo until the last 18 months. Basically Kosovo's separation from Serbia is not the result of an uprising by the Kosovo-Albanians, it's the result of the NATO intervention of 1999. Once the US started this intervention, although (former President Bill) Clinton said that the intention was not to create a new state, in the end it lead to the creation of a new entity because that was the inherent logic of intervention.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: What do you think of the argument often made by the West that Kosovo could not go back under Serbian administration after the UN had taken over there?

Reljic: This argument is not valid. The UN has taken over in many areas of the world and not all of them have become secessionist countries. But the road to solving this problem in the UN has been closed now. Which means that we see another weakening of the global system. And this will encourage many to seek unilateral decisions and outcomes and they will use force to do so.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: So it will encourage more separatist movements?

Reljic: It doesn't have to be separatists. It will encourage all forces that think that violence might be a means to fulfil their political aims.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: The EU has offered the perspective of membership to both sides, Serbia and Kosovo. Can this make a difference?

Reljic: Although there is a nominal declaration by the EU that in future these countries might become part of the EU, I don't see any tangible way now, for both Serbia and Kosovo to become members. Kosovo is an EU protectorate now. So is the EU going to negotiate with itself about membership of the EU?

SPIEGEL ONLINE: And Serbia?

Reljic: Serbia will insist that Kosovo is part of its territory. It will become extremely difficult for the EU to negotiate anything with Serbia in the future.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: Has this weakened Serbia's pro-Western President Boris Tadic?

Reljic: Definitely. It has weakened all pro-European parties, pro-European powers in the region. The soft power of the EU relies on adherence to international law and peaceful outcomes and solutions. And none of this has happened in Kosovo. What we have seen is that violence pays. And this weakens all those people who think that the main value of the European Union is law and peace in international relations.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: How will this effect future cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal in The Hague?

Reljic: The Hague court is part of UN law. So I think that future compliance with the demands from The Hague will be weakened as well.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: Because the UN's role has been undermined?

Reljic: Yes, its reputation and role and even the instruments it has on the ground.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: What will happen when the EU mission arrives?

Reljic: Like UNMIK (the UN mission in Kosovo) the new EU mission has huge executive powers, which really means that Kosovo is not independent. It's not sovereign, it's run by the EU. It's really a protectorate, a neo-colonial situation.

There's already an interesting reaction in Canada, according to Reuters:

Kosovo's declaration of independence is a headache for Canada, which needs to find a way of recognizing the new state without boosting the fortunes of separatists in its French-speaking province of Quebec.

While major allies such as the United States, Britain and France quickly recognized the ethnic Albanian state despite objections from Serbia, Ottawa barely reacted.

"We note that the Parliament of Kosovo has adopted a declaration of independence. We are assessing the situation," said a foreign ministry spokesman.

Polls indicate that around half of Quebecers support the idea of independence for the province of 7.5 million.

Quebec governments run by the separatist Parti Quebecois (PQ) held referendums on breaking away from Canada in 1980 and 1995 but both failed, the last one very narrowly.

The Parti Quebecois, now in opposition in the Quebec provincial legislature, said that if Canada recognizes a unilateral declaration of independence by Kosovo it would have to treat a similar move by Quebec the same way.

UN Corruption Reports Now Online

According to Collum Lynch's article in Sunday's Washington Post, the US representative to the UN has posted corruption investigations on the internet. Unfortunately, the Post did not provide a link. Luckily, Google did, and you can read them here: http://www.usunnewyork.usmission.gov/Issues/oversight_main.php.

Most of the names of those targeted in the reports have been redacted by the United Nations, but the identities are easily deciphered. The documents' disclosure has shed light on some major U.N. mysteries, including the abrupt retirement of Jacques Paul Klein, a former American diplomat who served as the U.N. special representative in Liberia until April 2005. A two-page document labeled "strictly confidential" accuses Klein of an improper relationship with a local woman suspected of passing on secrets to Charles Taylor, the former Liberian president now on trial for war crimes.

Klein was one of the most visible U.S. nationals at the United Nations, where he served as special representative in Eastern Slavonia in 1996, and later as the U.N.'s high representative in Bosnia. In 2003, Klein was chosen to lead the U.N. mission in Liberia (UNMIL), the organization's largest peacekeeping operation at the time, where he oversaw the transition from Charles Taylor's rule to the election of President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, a former World Bank economist.

Klein developed a reputation for bullying Bosnian or Liberian power brokers into yielding to U.N. demands, and he presided over missions in Bosnia and Liberia that faced sexual misconduct scandals involving U.N. personnel.

Klein met Linda Fawaz, a 30-year-old Liberian American woman whose uncle headed a major timber company. According to the report, Fawaz (identified as "Local Woman") accompanied Klein (described as "Senior Official") to diplomatic functions and regularly traveled on U.N. aircraft in violation of organizational rules.

"Senior Official has invited Local Woman to functions both with UNMIL staff and persons outside the UN, some of which have been of an official nature," the report said. "A number of staff interviewed by [U.N. investigators] expressed concern that the Local Woman was passing information which she had gathered from Senior Official to Mr. Taylor" and others.

Efforts to reach Fawaz through a former employer were unsuccessful. Klein declined to discuss the investigation, saying, "I think I've put my family . . . through enough misery." But he defended his tenure in Liberia, saying that he had helped to bring a crippled nation "back to its feet" and paved the way for democratic elections. "I'm just trying to put all this behind me and get on with my life," Klein said.

Among the documents posted on the Web are 32 reports, completed in 2004 and 2005, by a U.N. investigative task force into misconduct at the internationally operated airport in Pristina, including bribery, bid rigging and sexual harassment. The reports document allegations that airport staff members received payment to forge documents from Kosovars seeking entry into European capitals, and demanded kickbacks from companies seeking contracts, and sex or payments from locals seeking jobs.

Memo to Ambassador Wallace: Transparency is spelled "T-r-a-n-s-p-a-r-e-n-c-y."

Mayor Bloomberg: Bush "Giving a Drink to an Alcoholic"

New York's Millionaire Mayor, Michael Bloomberg, who knows about Wall Street and business, doesn't like President Bush's cash rebate scheme, according to the NY Daily News:

In an unusually sharp attack on Washington Thursday, Bloomberg compared the federal government's plan to hand out $600 tax rebate checks to "giving a drink to an alcoholic."

"They want to send out a check to everybody to stimulate the economy," Bloomberg said. "I suppose it won't hurt the economy, but it's in many senses like giving a drink to an alcoholic.

"The government's been doing exactly that. It's been spending money it doesn't have."

Bloomberg has been critical of President Bush's two-year, $168 billion plan to pump money into the economy by sending rebate checks to Americans making less than $75,000 a year.

It's typical of the simplistic way politicians are addressing the country's economic woes, he said.

"This country has a balance sheet that's starting to look more and more like a Third World country," Bloomberg said.

Chocolate Inspiration

Knowing how much I enjoyed eating these chocolates when we lived in Russia, someone I know sent me Maria Antonova 's article from The Moscow Times for Valentine's Day:

Vdokhnovenie chocolates come from an era when the greatness of the Soviet Union was defined by "rockets and ballet," as one well-known song goes. What looks like a regular chocolate bar on the outside actually consists of individually foil-wrapped chocolate sticks that resemble silver bullets. The extravagance of the packaging and the image of the Bolshoi illuminated against a dark blue background -- all made Vdokhnovenie seem like a special occasion.

The brand was created in the 1970s. Alexei Kosygin, the legendary premier of the Soviet Union, brought similarly wrapped chocolate from France. Kosygin is famous for the Soviet economic reforms of 1965 and the ensuing "golden five-year plan." He wanted to move the Soviet economy from heavy industry to the production of consumer goods. Excited about new chocolate opportunities, he wanted the Babayev factory in Moscow to start producing Vdokhnovenie, which was eventually hailed by Russians as the tastiest. Eventually, Leonid Brezhnev sidelined what Time magazine called Kosygin's "flirtation with profits," and focused on rockets again.

Like many other gourmet foods, Vdokhnovenie could be found in Moscow's theater buffets, along with Soviet champagne and canapes of caviar and white fish. Today Vdokhnovenie's package looks more or less the same, but the inside foil was recently replaced with thicker paper wrapping. In addition, there are other flavors besides the original dark chocolate with hazelnut bits: chocolates with hazelnut, cream or caramel filling. Kosygin would have been proud.

Cong. Tom Lantos, 80

From today's San Francisco Chronicle obituary of the Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee--whose life was saved by Raoul Wallenberg (Lantos worked for Wallenberg), whose mission in turn resulted from Peter Bergson's agitation for the establishment of the War Refugee Board in 1944:

Lantos lost nearly his whole family in the Holocaust. When he was named chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee last year, he told The Chronicle that "in a sense, my whole life has been a preparation for this job."

Lantos was born in Budapest in 1928 and was 16 when the Nazis took the city in March 1944. Most Jews outside the Hungarian capital were sent to Auschwitz, while young Jewish men from Budapest were taken to forced labor camps.
Lantos was taken to a camp at Szob, a village about 40 miles from the capital, from which he escaped twice. The second time he made it to a safe house in Budapest, where his aunt had also taken refuge.

The Red Army liberated Budapest in January 1945, and Lantos began to search for his family. Most had died, but he managed to contact Annette Tillemann, a childhood friend who had gone into hiding shortly after the German occupation and escaped to Switzerland with her mother. Like Lantos, most of her relatives perished in the death camps.

The two were reunited in Hungary later that winter and married in 1950.

Lantos began studying at the University of Budapest in 1946 and received a scholarship in 1947 to study in the United States. He earned bachelor's and master's degrees in economics from the University of Washington.

The Lantoses settled in San Mateo County in 1950, and Tom Lantos became an economics professor at San Francisco State. He made his first foray in to politics when he won a seat on the Millbrae school board, then in 1980 defeated GOP incumbent Rep. Bill Royer to win election to the House. Three years later he founded the Congressional Human Rights Caucus, which his wife has directed since.

Among his accomplishments over nearly three decades in Washington were preserving open space in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area and bringing millions of federal dollars to extend BART to San Francisco International Airport.

He was criticized in some quarters, however, for an unwavering support of Israel, and he wasn't afraid to be unpopular on a number of issues. As recently as October, he angered the Bush administration and some colleagues when he moved a bill through his committee that defined the killings of Armenians in Turkey in the early 20th century as genocide.

The Art of Carl Holzman

In Chicago for a wedding, stopped by to see the latest works by Carl Holzman--abstract oil paintings derived from Google Earth locations. I liked them very much. You can view an online portfolio at CarlHolzman.com.

France Readies Chad Troops

The AFP reports that President Sarkozy declared France will "do its duty" in the troubled Francophone African republic...

NDJAMENA (AFP) — Chad's government controlled the capital and its immediate surroundings, the French ambassador to Chad said Tuesday, as France said it was ready to intervene militarily if need be.

"Today, the city of Ndjamena is under (government) control, at least within a 10-kilometre (six-mile) radius," French ambassador Bruno Foucher told reporters in Ndjamena.

Chadian president Idriss Deby Itno had appeared "very confident" when they had last spoken Monday night, he added.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Tuesday that France, with 1,450 troops and Mirage fighter jets stationed in Chad, was ready to "do its duty" and intervene if need be.

France has 1,450 troops based in Chad and Paris sent an extra 150 troops to help evacuate foreign nationals.

"Now there is a legal decision taken unanimously by the Security Council, and if Chad was the victim of an aggression, France could in theory have the means to oppose such action," he said in the French coastal town of Aytre.

"Everyone needs to think carefully about this."

Tony Blair's Official Portrait

Heard about this on my BBC Radio Four podcast this morning, so had to find it on the web. An article about artist John Yeo ran in the Daily Mail not too long ago.

CIA Chief Can Keep His Job

A friend--who played quarterback in High School--emailed me today:

By the way, you must have more faith in our CIA director now...He only missed the spread by one point. And he was right about the how close the game turned out to be. I was rooting for the Giants, too... His prediction was nearly spot on! Go Giants!

Final score was actually 17-14, not General Hayden's predicted 28-24, so I can't believe the Agency had it wired... It was an exciting down-to-the wire game, too.

CIA Chief Predicts Giants Will Win Super Bowl

According to the Air Force Times, CIA head General Michael Hayden tipped the Giants to with the Super Bowl today.

CIA Director Gen. Mike Hayden picked the New York Giants to upset the New England Patriots, 28-24, in the Super Bowl as part of ESPN’s poll of celebrities on who is going to win the big game.

Meanwhile, legendary ace pilot Chuck Yeager picked the favored New England Patriots to win.

If Hayden is right, I'll feel better about the CIA. If he's not, he might want to think about looking for another job...for, if you can't handicap an NFL game correctly, how confident can Americans be that you are able to predict what the Iranians will do?

If You Can't Trust the Food Section...

...what can you trust?


Someone I know sent me this recent post from LanguageHat.com:

THE LYING TIMES.

Every time I think I'm inured to the idiocies of the press, even what are allegedly its finest representatives, something comes along to get me frothing in rage again. The latest comes via Bill Poser at Language Log, who writes:

The New York times contains a brief article entitled One Pot describing the Spanish dish known variously as cocido or olla podrida literally "rotten pot" According to the dictionary of the Real Academia Española, podrida may have an admiring connotation, similar to the use of "filthy rich" in English. Curiously, instead of the correct olla podrida, the article gives the name of the dish as olla poderida, which it explains as a derivative of poder "strength", because it gives you strength.

Reader Jim Gordon wondered about this and emailed the author of the article. Her response: she and her consultants and editors were aware of the correct name and etymology but thought that some readers might be put off by the notion of rotten food, so they changed the name a little and made up a fake etymology. It seems clear that they were not trying to deceive anyone with evil intent, but I am still taken aback that a respectable newspaper would make up a fake name and etymology.

"Curiously"? "Taken aback"? I guess I admire Bill's sangfroid and charity, but I'm not going to mince words: I think this is a complete dereliction of the first duty of a newspaper, which is to tell the truth. What's next, not reporting on vote fraud or covering up a slaughter in the Congo because "some readers might be put off"? Furthermore, they're not just making it up themselves, they're putting their lie in someone else's mouth:

“Olla means pot, and the original name was olla poderida, which comes from poder, which means strength,” said Alexandra Raij, an owner of Tía Pol, the tiny Spanish restaurant on 10th Avenue in Chelsea.

I presume Ms. Raij (a Spanish equivalent of Reich, apparently) said no such thing; if I were her, I'd put the fear of a lawsuit into the paper for knowingly making her look like an ignoramus.

Eisenhower Endorses Obama

Susan Eisenhower, granddaughter of the President, in today's Washington Post,. joined Senator Ted Kennedy in endorsing Barack Obama:

The last time the United States had an open election was 1952. My grandfather was pursued by both political parties and eventually became the Republican nominee. Despite being a charismatic war hero, he did not have an easy ride to the nomination. He went on to win the presidency -- with the indispensable help of a "Democrats for Eisenhower" movement. These crossover voters were attracted by his pledge to bring change to Washington and by the prospect that he would unify the nation.

It is in this great tradition of crossover voters that I support Barack Obama's candidacy for president. If the Democratic Party chooses Obama as its candidate, this lifelong Republican will work to get him elected and encourage him to seek strategic solutions to meet America's greatest challenges. To be successful, our president will need bipartisan help.

Given Obama's support among young people, I believe that he will be most invested in defending the interests of these rising generations and, therefore, the long-term interests of this nation as a whole. Without his leadership, our children and grandchildren are at risk of growing older in a marginalized country that is left to its anger and divisions. Such an outcome would be an unacceptable legacy for any great nation.

Kazakhstan May Become Election 2008 Issue

Did Bill Clinton arrange for special treatment with Kazakhstan's President, Nursultan Nazarbayev for Canadian businessman Frank Giustra, and did the multi-million dollar deal lead to the former US President's endorsement of Kazakhstan's leading the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe despite that nation's problematic human rights record?

Apparently little "transparency" can be found in this murky "corruption" scandal involving a President attempting to secure a political dynasty, according to today's front-page NY Times story by Jo Becker and Don Van Natta, Jr.:

Records show that Mr. Giustra donated the $31.3 million to the Clinton Foundation in the months that followed in 2006, but neither he nor a spokesman for Mr. Clinton would say exactly when.

In September 2006, Mr. Giustra co-produced a gala 60th birthday for Mr. Clinton that featured stars like Jon Bon Jovi and raised about $21 million for the Clinton Foundation.

In February 2007, a company called Uranium One agreed to pay $3.1 billion to acquire UrAsia. Mr. Giustra, a director and major shareholder in UrAsia, would be paid $7.05 per share for a company that just two years earlier was trading at 10 cents per share.

That same month, Mr. Dzhakishev, the Kazatomprom chief, said he traveled to Chappaqua, N.Y., to meet with Mr. Clinton at his home. Mr. Dzhakishev said Mr. Giustra arranged the three-hour meeting. Mr. Dzhakishev said he wanted to discuss Kazakhstan’s intention — not publicly known at the time — to buy a 10 percent stake in Westinghouse, a United States supplier of nuclear technology.

Nearly a year earlier, Mr. Clinton had advised Dubai on how to handle the political furor after one of that nation’s companies attempted to take over several American ports. Mrs. Clinton was among those on Capitol Hill who raised the national security concerns that helped kill the deal.

Mr. Dzhakishev said he was worried the proposed Westinghouse investment could face similar objections. Mr. Clinton told him that he would not lobby for him, but Mr. Dzhakishev came away pleased by the chance to promote his nation’s proposal to a former president.

Mr. Clinton “said this was very important for America,” said Mr. Dzhakishev, who added that Mr. Giustra was present at Mr. Clinton’s home.

Both Mr. Clinton and Mr. Giustra at first denied that any such meeting occurred. Mr. Giustra also denied ever arranging for Kazakh officials to meet with Mr. Clinton. Wednesday, after The Times told them that others said a meeting, in Mr. Clinton’s home, had in fact taken place, both men acknowledged it.

“You are correct that I asked the president to meet with the head of Kazatomprom,” Mr. Giustra said. “Mr. Dzhakishev asked me in February 2007 to set up a meeting with former President Clinton to discuss the future of the nuclear energy industry.” Mr. Giustra said the meeting “escaped my memory until you raised it.”

Wednesday, Mr. Clinton’s spokesman, Ben Yarrow, issued what he called a “correction,” saying: “Today, Mr. Giustra told our office that in February 2007, he brought Mr. Dzhakishev from Kazatomprom to meet with President Clinton to discuss the future of nuclear energy.”

Mr. Yarrow said his earlier denial was based on the former president’s records, which he said “show a Feb. 27 meeting with Mr. Giustra; no other attendees are listed.”

Will the OSCE, under Kazakhstan's leadership, send monitors to keep an eye on our American elections and the activities of the Clinton foundation--or provide anti-corruption training sessions for President or Mrs. Clinton and their staff?

Curiously, Frank Giustra's name shows up among the list of 2004 donors to Canadian MP Belinda Stronach ($2,500), a former Conservative who changed parties. Reportedly herself heiress to a mining fortune and contributor to the Clinton Library, Stronach is rumored to have been romantically involved with the former President.

Interesting commentary on this story from retired LA Times reporter Ken Reich:

Why did the New York Times endorse Sen. Hillary Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination when it had a story in the works suggesting that her husband, former President Bill Clinton, took a huge bribe from a Canadian mining magnate in exchange for helping him to close a Kazakhstan uranium mining deal?

Here's an interesting tidbit for NGO-watchers from The Vancouver Sun's profile of Giustra:

Giustra, the son of a Sudbury nickel miner, was CEO of Yorkton Securities in the '90s, founder of Lions Gate Entertainment and now chair of Endeavour Financial, a merchant banking firm which finances mining companies.

Giustra is also a director of the International Crisis Group (Crisis Group), an independent, non-profit, non-governmental organization, established to prevent and resolve conflicts...Giustra's wife is Alison Lawton, 36, a human rights activist and producer of documentary films on humanitarian crises. She also knows Clinton and has worked with him on humanitarian efforts related to the civil war in Uganda -- a war which was the subject of her recent documentary Uganda Rising.

Ciao, Rudy!

The inevitable seems to have happened, according to an AP report. Rudy Giuliani is dropping out of the race for the Presidency.

He ran such a lackluster campaign, I had wondered if his heart were in it. If you can't run a Presidential primary campaign, you can't become President, it's that simple... It was painful to watch, one reason I wasn't blogging about the primaries, it hurt to see Rudy Giuliani fizzle.

I liked Hizzoner, as all my readers know, for a lot of reasons. Not least of which is because I'm a New Yorker born and bred, who saw how Rudy Giuliani transformed my "radnoi gorod" (as the Russians say), despite the protests of The New York Times among others. To me, the resurrection of New York City is a miracle due to his efforts.

It's sad that he blew his Presidential run, bittersweet. Yet this feels something like when Humphrey Bogart said, "We'll always have Paris," to Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca. Sad that Rudy's exiting, but...

We'll always have New York.

A Winter Weekend Getaway in Montreal

Can't say enough nice things about our 48 hours in Montreal visiting old college friends at -19 degrees Celsius. The city has really been spiffed up. We had a delicious French dinner, only $50 US, including appetizer, soup, main course, and desert (BYOB) at O Thym restaurant.

Next day, it was a walking tour of Old Montreal/Vieux Montreal, where we saw evidence of the failed American Occupation of 1775-1776.

Photo: Chateau Ramezay, Montreal, Quebec. This revolutionary epsiode was explained in an article by Norman P. Goldman on Suite 101:

On a Sunday Nov 12th 1775 the Americans under the leadership of Major General Richard Montgomery landed on the Island of Montreal...General Montgomery did not stay very long in Montreal and his replacement Brigadier-General David Wooster proved to be a very harsh and oppressive administrator. As a result, the possibility of gaining the support of the Montreal inhabitants slowly dissipated.

In order to save the situation Benjamin Franklin was sent to Montreal a few months after the American invasion in order to see if he could win the support of the citizens. Franklin was even accompanied by a Jesuit priest, Father Carroll, in the hope that the latter may have some influence over the Catholic clergy. However, all of this maneuvering proved in vain and the Americans were never able to win over the support of the citizens.

After 188 days the Americans retreated and the British were once again in control...

Result of all this? The Quebecois preserved their language, religion, culture and privileges, avoiding the fate of the Irish, Scots, and Welsh, among other victims of the Saxon oppressor--forming some sort of buffer province to keep British Canada from attacking the USA, at least after the War of 1812 had been concluded.

Overall, the shrewd Quebecois seemed to have negotiated a good deal for themselves--and preserved a charming place with delicious French food, where Americans can enjoy the equivalent of a weekend in Europe, at dollar (not Euro) prices.

George W. Bush, McGovernik Liberal...

President George W. Bush's announced "stimulus package" to give every American between $300 and $1200 (numbers subject to change) reminded this citizen of Senator George McGovern's much-mocked 1972 economic plan to give every American $1000, one of his campaign promises.

Strangely enough, I haven't seen any published objections from Republicans this time around, not even from conservative guru William F. Buckley, who wrote in 1972 about the Democratic convention:

...a convention that sometimes seemed to be saying that the most you can do for your country is evade the draft, smoke pot, abort babies, have a homosexual affair, and receive in return for nothing at all, a thousand dollars a year from your fellow citizens....If McGovernism triumphs, nobody will ever be off the public payroll, not even for a dreadful, reactionary sixteen minutes.

Curious irony of fate, that President Bill Clinton, who actually worked for McGovern, signed balanced budgets and cut government spending, while President George W. Bush has responded to Wall Street's meltdown with McGovernism.

IKEA Opens in Almaty, Kazakhstan

Joshua Foust reports on Registan.net that Sweden's most famous furniture store--already established in Moscow--has opened in Kazakhstan's capital and largest city:

IKEA, the discount Swedish retailer which furnished a swath of my apartment, is opening two stores in Kazakhstan—one in Astana, and one in Almaty. Ben notes the many positive spillover effects this move should bring to the country, despite the fact that far too many people will find even IKEA too expensive, and despite the much longer and more problematic supply chain (think of the woes Lufthansa faced with overflight rights with Russia).

Which reminds me of my 2003 visit to the FAYZ furniture factory in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, where with a delegation from either the UN or EBRD we met with the former worker's Communist Party chief, now running the factory--a glamorous Uzbek woman CEO, by the way. FAYZ had just received some computerized German manufacturing equipment, and a trainload of Russian wood had just arrived in the yard to coincide with our delegation. Still, the furniture was not up to world standards, somehow the design was a little old-fashioned. Why not make a deal with IKEA? I asked the chief. She paused, said that she knew about IKEA, but that Uzbekistan was not yet ready for IKEA.

Now that Kazakhstan is ready for IKEA, can Uzbekistan be far behind?

The Kite Runner

Saw The Kite Runner over the holiday weekend. Haunting. Marc Forster's direction is subdued, and unobtrusive, a welcome change from exploding fireballs. Better than Khaled Hosseini's book, which seemed a little paint-by-numbers contrived and plot-driven. Same story, different touch. Screenwriter David Benioff puts his dialog in Dari (Persian dialect), with English subtitles, may have made the difference. Felt more realistic, even though highly stylized. In a way, a film about the immigrant experience in America, reflecting complcated relations with one's identity and past. The final caper, to rescue an Afghan orphan, had a dreamlike quality--did it happen, or was it a wish motivated by guilt? The ambiguity strengthened the impact of the picture.

The Kite Runner is about guilt, redemption and second chances. The scenes of life in Afghanistan reminded me of Uzbekistan. From the credits, it seems that it was filmed in Xinjiang Province of China--aka Chinese Turkestan, pretty close. Scenes in the San Francisco Bay area reminded me of college in Berkeley. It's not easy to watch, a little slow at times, yet powerful. The cast, including Khalid Abdalla, Atossa Leoni, and Shaun Toub are all excellent.

Ahmad Khan Mahmidzada, the child actor playing Hassan, Amir's Hazara servant, is best of all. His amazing performance carries the film's message on his face:

Hassan is Afghanistan.