links for 2008-07-26

• We knew the web was big... - Official Google Blog
• My Experience at Indy Mac: Fraud, Corruption, Criminality - The Big Picture
• More Reflections on the Tax Duel - Economists for Obama
• How Free Trade Can Help Solve the Energy Crisis - WSJ.com
• What's really killing the land-line telephone business - Daniel Gross
• Global sourcing: Evidence from French firms - Vox EU
• How can we end poverty? The determinants of development - Vox EU
• Educational inequality persistence - Vox EU

Comments

[anne]

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/26/business/worldbusiness/26tourists.html?hp&pagewanted=print

July 26, 2008

Flush With Cash, More Asian Tourists Flock to Japan
By MARTIN FACKLER

SHIRETOKO NATIONAL PARK, Japan — Once prohibitively expensive, Japan is suddenly drawing soaring numbers of Asian tourists who splurge at the nation's department stores, lounge in its hot spring resorts or explore remote corners, like this stretch of pristine mountains and forests on Japan's northernmost tip.

While a boon for Japan's faltering tourism industry, the new tourists are also a sign of larger economic changes in one of the world's most dynamic regions.

Japan itself was once known for its free-spending tourists, who flocked to boutiques from Hong Kong to Fifth Avenue. But as Japan's economy stalled for the last dozen or so years, rapid development in countries like China and South Korea raised living standards there.

Those countries are now catching up with slow-growing Japan, long the region's dominant economic power. Indeed, Japan's dwindling, but still potent, lead in technology is a major draw for Asian tourists, who are as likely to visit a Toyota car factory as a Zen temple.

At the same time, there has been a decline in the number of people going abroad from Japan. The number of Japanese traveling abroad has fallen 3 percent from the peak in 2000 of 17.8 million, the government-run Japan National Tourist Organization said.

The decline was particularly pronounced among Japanese in their 20s, whose trips abroad fell 40 percent from a decade ago to 2.8 million last year. Officials from the tourist group attributed the drop among the young Japanese to falling wages and more modest lifestyles.

By contrast, the number of visitors to Japan from South Korea, Taiwan, China and Hong Kong almost doubled last year from five years earlier, to 5.36 million, according to the Japan's tourist organization. Those four regions alone accounted for nearly two-thirds of all foreign visitors to Japan last year, the organization said.

But far from being concerned about yet another sign of their nation's declining status, many Japanese seem to embrace this change. The government helped open the gates five years ago by waiving visa requirements for tourists from Taiwan and South Korea.

Asian visitors are now regarded by a growing number of Japanese as an economic shot in the arm for Japan, whose vitality has been sapped by economic maturity and an aging population.

"Asia has closed the gap in economic power," said Yukiko Fukagawa, an economics and politics professor at Waseda University in Tokyo. "And Japan is slowly realizing that maybe this is not such a bad thing."

In the Ginza shopping district of Tokyo, the excitement these days is all about the large numbers of rich Asian tourists, most from China. This has pushed stores to begin hiring Chinese-speaking clerks and keep stacks of Chinese bills by cash registers

At the marble-columned Mitsukoshi department store, one of Tokyo's fanciest stores, wealthy Chinese buy Japanese and European-brand clothes and handbags by the dozen, and spend hundreds of thousands of dollars, apparently on a whim, for a watch or painting in the store, said Shoji Saito, manager of overseas-related business.

Mr. Saito said the store had not experienced such big-spending shoppers since Japan's own go-go era in the 1980s.

"Asian tourists are our new growth market," he said.

Many Asian tourists interviewed said they liked to shop here because Japan has the latest fashions first, and at prices way below many other Asian countries, where tariffs are steep. They also said they liked visiting Japan because it was close, safe and cleaner than much of the rest of Asia.

But many also say they are drawn by a deep fascination for Japan. Now that they can afford to come, they say they want to see the country that has long been the region's front-runner in high technology, fashion and other realms of popular culture. They said they feel envy and respect for Japan as the region's only fully developed nation, even if they do not always see eye to eye on matters like the events of World War II.

"We feel very close to the Japanese culturally, but they are also still ahead," said Kao Yu-jeng, a 50-year-old schoolteacher who was part of a Taiwanese tour group visiting Shiretoko park, on Japan' s northern island of Hokkaido. "We want to know more about what makes them tick." ...

[anne]

http://www.juancole.com/2008/07/obama-ist-ein-berliner.html#c8162853338919053355

July 25, 2008

I just sent the Obama campaign [ postmaster@barackobama.com, info@barackobama.com ] a note letting him/them know that if he keeps up the tough talk and threats against Iran and truly intends to send troops TO Afghanistan rather than REMOVE troops from Afghanistan I'll be voting for Ralph Nader.

-- Mark Konrad

[anne]

http://angryarab.blogspot.com/2008/07/british-soldiers-in-afghanistan-today.html

July 26, 2008

"British soldiers in Afghanistan today killed four civilians and injured three more after opening fire on a vehicle that failed to stop at a checkpoint, Nato and defence ministry officials said." *

* http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/jul/26/military.afghanistan1

-- As'ad AbuKhalil

[JeffF]

I would not be surprised if land line telephone revenue per phone were also dropping.

Even my grandmother is now calling me on her brand new cell phone because any US call is free on it.

Similarly I would imagine that voice mail and similar things which land lines at least used to (it has been about ten years since I have had one) charge for are being forsaken as people use cell phones for those services.

[anne]

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/7/24/headlines#10

July 24, 2008

Cancer Researcher Warns on Cell Phone Use
By Amy Goodman

In science news, the head of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute has issued what has been described as an unprecedented warning to his faculty and staff to limit cell phone use because of the possible risk of cancer. Dr. Ronald Herberman said children should only use cell phones for emergencies and that adults should keep the phone away from their heads by using a wireless headset or the speaker phone. According to the Associated Press, * no other major academic cancer research institutions have sounded such an alarm about cell phone use. Devra Lee Davis, the director of the University of Pittsburgh's Center for Environmental Oncology, said, "The question is do you want to play Russian roulette with your brain. I don't know that cell phones are dangerous. But I don't know that they are safe."

* http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hwzQ6Jsq3cSWa721yR84l99_pnlAD923S7T82

[anne]

There might have been reason to think that Barack Obama would learn and change and soften in tone, but continually Obama has now shown that he is completely determined to be as fierce as President Bush, even using the same expressions now in urging more war in Afghanistan and threatening Iran. From Afghanistan to Iraq to Israel the threats continued, but I thought and hoped there might have been a softening in Europe. No such softening, but new fierceness.

Germans can be recruited for war, while being told to tear down walls that are long torn down in Germany. For the French there are reminders of Napoleonic imperial grandeur, as though the French needs such reminders.

[anne]

There we have it, as a magazine cover newly explains. "Afghanistan: The Right War." Which pleases me in a way, because I wouldn't want still another wrong war. Sarkozy and Obama, whoever is chief among equals, which should be quite the contest, will make Afghanistan safe for millions of little girls to go to school.

While battling for the girldom of Afghanistan, Obama and Sarkozy will be assuring that dread Iranian hordes thought before to be interested only in shopping Paris will be prevented at all costs from stealing Parisian women. (I know, I know, all comes down to sex.)

[anne]

Imagine then after warring in Afghanistan since 2002, seemingly fruitlessly, and Iraq since 2003, at astounding human expense, the opposition candidate is running on more war, on the right sort of war, on a war in a land of need beyond understanding. So much for a peace movement, when all we need was to be turned from the wrong war to the right war, while leaving room for side wars in Somalia, Pakistan and an "extraordinarily grave" threatening Iran.

[anne]

http://angryarab.blogspot.com/2008/07/jan.html

July 26, 2008

"Zoriah Miller, the photographer who took images of marines killed in a June 26 suicide attack and posted them on his Web site, was subsequently forbidden to work in Marine Corps-controlled areas of the country. Maj. Gen. John Kelly, the Marine commander in Iraq, is now seeking to have Mr. Miller barred from all United States military facilities throughout the world. Mr. Miller has since left Iraq." *

* http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/26/world/middleeast/26censor.html

-- As'ad AbuKhalil

[anne]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/03/opinion/l03military.html

The Photograph of a Dying Soldier

To the Editor:

I am writing to express my profound disappointment in The New York Times's decision to publish a photograph of a mortally wounded American soldier.

Not only are the photograph and video offensive, the clear depiction is also directly counter to the written agreement made by the reporter and the photographer before publication.

The article that accompanied the photograph and Web site video, " 'Man Down': When One Bullet Alters Everything," by the reporter, Damien Cave, and the photographer, Robert Nickelsberg, was a story of soldiers operating in and around Haifa Street in Baghdad.

This story can and should be told. That is not in question. What is disturbing to me personally and, more important, to the family of the soldier depicted in the photograph and the video, is that the young man who so valiantly gave his life in the service of others was displayed for the entire world to see in the gravest condition and in such a fashion as to elicit horror at its sight.

This photograph will be the last of this man that his family will ever see. Further, it will cause unnecessary worry among the families of other soldiers who fear that the last they see of their loved ones will be in a New York Times photograph lying grievously wounded and dying.

To achieve a mutually agreed upon standard of working together, all reporters and photographers are required to sign the Multinational Forces-Iraq News Media Ground Rules. In it, they agree to the following:

"Media will not be prohibited from covering casualties provided the following conditions are adhered to: (a) Names, video, identifiable written/oral descriptions or identifiable photographs of wounded service member will not be released without the service member's prior written consent."

No such consent was sought or provided.

All of us bear a responsibility to provide for the dignity of our service members in combat. This soldier and his family deserved better.

(Lt. Gen.) Raymond T. Odierno
Cmdr., Multinational Corps-Iraq
Camp Victory, Iraq, Feb. 2, 2007

[anne]

http://www.bobdylan.com/songs/farewellangelina.html

1965

Farewell Angelina
By Bob Dylan

Farewell Angelina
The bells of the crown
Are being stolen by bandits
I must follow the sound
The triangle tingles
And the trumpet play slow
Farewell Angelina
The sky is on fire
And I must go.

There's no need for anger
There's no need for blame
There's nothing to prove
Ev'rything's still the same
Just a table standing empty
By the edge of the sea
Farewell Angelina
The sky is trembling
And I must leave.

The jacks and queens
Have forsaked the courtyard
Fifty-two gypsies
Now file past the guards
In the space where the deuce
And the ace once ran wild
Farewell Angelina
The sky is folding
I'll see you in a while.

See the cross-eyed pirates sitting
Perched in the sun
Shooting tin cans
With a sawed-off shotgun
And the neighbors they clap
And they cheer with each blast
Farewell Angelina
The sky's changing color
And I must leave fast.

King Kong, little elves
On the rooftoops they dance
Valentino-type tangos
While the make-up man's hands
Shut the eyes of the dead
Not to embarrass anyone
Farewell Angelina
The sky is embarrassed
And I must be gone.

The machine guns are roaring
The puppets heave rocks
The fiends nail time bombs
To the hands of the clocks
Call me any name you like
I will never deny it
Farewell Angelina
The sky is erupting
I must go where it's quiet.

[anne]

http://angryarab.blogspot.com/2008/07/jan.html

January 18, 2005

[Picture]

An Iraqi girl after her parents were killed by American gunfire in Tal Afar.

[anne]

I am reminded that the American soldier who was early on photographed carrying an Iraqi child to safety, returned from Iraq and was never the same as before and finally took his life not long ago. I somehow cannot remember the name of the soldier.

[anne]

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/15/opinion/15tue4.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

July 15, 2008

Losing Private Dwyer
By LAWRENCE DOWNES

The photo to the right* captures everything that Americans wanted to believe about the Iraq war in the earliest days of the invasion in 2003. Pfc. Joseph Dwyer, an Army medic whose unit was fighting its way up the Euphrates to Baghdad, cradles a wounded boy. The child is half-naked and helpless, but trusting. Private Dwyer's face is strained but calm.

If there are better images of the strength and selflessness of the American soldier, I can't think of any. It is easy to understand why newspapers and magazines around the country ran the photo big, making Private Dwyer an instant hero, back when the war was a triumphal tale of Iraqi liberation. **

That story turned bitter years ago, of course. And the mountain of sorrows keeps growing: Mr. Dwyer died last month in North Carolina. He was 31 and very sick. For years he had been in and out of treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder and addiction. He was seized by fearful delusions and fits of violence and rage. His wife left him to save herself and their young daughter. When the police were called to Mr. Dwyer's apartment on June 28, he was alone....

* http://images.usatoday.com/news/_photos/2003/07/07-dwyer.jpg

Iraqi girl....

** http://bp0.blogger.com/_O5OuU90ru-Y/SIs24Sl6mQI/AAAAAAAABqo/3bm-ib-V4nk/s1600-h/17mideast.600.jpg

[anne]

http://www.juancole.com/2008/07/taliban-resurgence-threatens-elections.html

July 26, 2008

Taliban Resurgence Threatens Elections
By Juan Cole

Obama in Newsweek: *

' Our success in Afghanistan is going to be deeply dependent not just on getting more troops there, which we need, but also some sustained high-level engagement with Pakistan—something that I discussed before but I think is significantly more urgent than even I had imagined. Basically there doesn't appear to be any pressure at all being placed on Al Qaeda, on these training camps, these safe havens, in the FATA [Federally Administered Tribal Areas].'

Although there have been cease-fires between the Pakistani military and FATA militants at certain points and with regard to some groups (and as part of political negotiations), the Pakistani military took on tribal forces in Khyber recently and it is not fair to say that nothing is being done. Hundreds of Pakistani troops have died fighting the tribes and al-Qaeda in recent years. In his Berlin speech Obama also talked about terror training camps "in Karachi." None existed to my knowledge. Karachi is a stronghold of the secular MQM. There is lots to criticize about the Pakistani government, but this level of animus and misinformation is odd and you have to wonder where it is coming from.

* http://www.newsweek.com/id/148986

[anne]

http://www.juancole.com/2008/07/taliban-resurgence-threatens-elections.html

July 26, 2008

Taliban Resurgence Threatens Elections
By Juan Cole

There is lots to criticize about the Pakistani government, but this level of animus and misinformation is odd and you have to wonder where it is coming from.

http://www.juancole.com/2008/07/cole-in-salon-obama-is-wrong-on.html

July 23, 2008

Obama is Wrong on Afghanistan
By Juan Cole

Excerpt: *

' The governor of the North-West Frontier province, Owais Ghani, immediately spoke out against Obama, saying that the senator's remarks had the effect of undermining the new civilian government elected last February. Ghani warned that a U.S. incursion into the northwestern tribal areas would have "disastrous" consequences for the globe.

The governor underlined that a "war on terrorism" policy depended on popular support for it, and that such support was being leeched away by U.S. strikes on the Pakistan side of the border and by statements such as Obama's. A recent American attack mistakenly killed Pakistani troops who had been sent to fight the Pakistani Taliban at American insistence. The Pakistani public was furious. Ghani complained, "Candidate Obama gave these statements; I come out openly and say such statements undermine support, don't do it." '

* http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/07/23/obama/index.html

[anne]

When then do we have? What is the point of Barack Obama speaking with such belligerence, making such threats, urging more war, over and over? There was the personal and wrong attack on Hugo Chavez, for no possible reason. Repeated threats against Iran. Slighting of Palestinians. Then Pakistan, then Afghanistan. Where is this coming from?

[anne]

http://www.juancole.com/2008/07/taliban-resurgence-threatens-elections.html

July 26, 2008

Taliban Resurgence Threatens Elections
By Juan Cole

Although there have been cease-fires between the Pakistani military and FATA militants at certain points and with regard to some groups (and as part of political negotiations), the Pakistani military took on tribal forces in Khyber recently and it is not fair to say that nothing is being done. Hundreds of Pakistani troops have died fighting the tribes and al-Qaeda in recent years. In his Berlin speech Obama also talked about terror training camps "in Karachi." None existed to my knowledge. Karachi is a stronghold of the secular MQM. * There is lots to criticize about the Pakistani government, but this level of animus and misinformation is odd and you have to wonder where it is coming from.

* Muttahida Quami Movement, a middle-class secular political party.

[What terror training camps in Karachi? I was amazed at such a statement.]

[Barkley Rosser]

anne,

I quote you in a posting I put up yesterday on econospeak entitled, "Could Afghanistan become Obama's Vietnam?"

[anne]

Thank you, but I do simply not understand what is happening.

[anne]

There was the perfect opportunity, we have a simple and moral reason to leave or significantly leave Iraq since there is a sense here that Iraq is peaceful and we can quietly credit ourselves. Suddenly, we have the opposition candidate selling war for war though and doing so repeatedly and in terms dire enough to make war appear utterly necessary however little that may be so.

Suddenly the situation in Afghanistan becomes "significantly more urgent than even I had imagined," and Pakistan must of course be included in the urgency.

A candidate who could have stood for peace-making is pitching anything else with a vengeance.

[anne]

I remember watching Prince Andrew, all contentedly red-haired, firing a machine gun of a sort at a scrubby hillside in Afghanistan, that was before he was hurried back to the castle for safe-keeping, and wondering what is Andrew doing? Am I supposed to be impressed by a Prince firing a gun against a hillside that might have people on it? Why?

So little Afghan girls can go to "Nicolas Sarkozy Elementary Schools?"

Vivat!

[elvis]

Anne,
Barack continues to disappoint...
My humble guess is that to please the powers that be he has to play give and take. Take away from Iraq, give to Afghanistan.

The Mil-Ind-complex must be placated. It's the only part of the economy that's doing well, after all. Can't have complete chaos now.

About the photos of dying soldiers....
Could this be a litmus test for how "just" a war is? If you can show pictures of your dying soldiers and take comfort in the fact that it's not totally senseless...

If you have to hide the "ugly truth" about what's happening on the Eastern Front...

[elvis]

Cynthia Mckinney might get my vote. She has everything.
She's a woman, she's black and she's green. (and she was right about Iraq from the start).

[anne]

Elvis:

About the photos of dying soldiers....

Could this be a litmus test for how "just" a war is? If you can show pictures of your dying soldiers and take comfort in the fact that it's not totally senseless...

[Wow.]

[hari]

Re: Problems of development - Vox EU

I find the comparative analysis based on (1) geography and (2) institutions

- very instructive from a historical perspective.

From professional preference, I'd consider instituitional development more fundamental to address the impediments to economic modernization.

British colonialism, for example, left behind hardly any or few institutional infrastructure to manage economic development - it had to be developed over time by the independent sovereign state.

A very time consuming and intellectually difficult task in an under-developed setup.