Opinion
Editorial Roundup
By The Associated Press Wed Jul 23, 10:33 AM ET
July 17
Jacksonville (Ill.) Journal-Courier, on China's crackdown before the Olympics:
Many people hoped that holding this year's Olympic Games in Beijing would serve as a lever to induce China to act more as a mature member of the international community.
The Chinese government has relented on a few issues it didn't veto a U.N. resolution imposing sanctions on Iran; it has offered limited cooperation on reining in the genocidal regime in Sudan; and it has agreed to a smoking ban at Olympic venues (this is a key human-rights issue?).
However, as the August 8 opening of the games approaches, it has become clear that the Olympics have led to more repression in China rather than less. The reason is not hard to understand. Beijing wants to present a harmonious face to the world during the Games.
So, it has rounded up street beggars in Beijing and shipped them off to the provinces. And it is rounding up political dissidents and potential troublemakers as well. ...
Human Rights Watch just issued a report saying that Chinese promises to allow journalists access to the rest of China during the Olympics have been broken, and Chinese journalists have been put on notice not to do anything remotely provocative.
China will no doubt put on an impressive Olympics. But it will be worth remembering that, amid the pageantry, spectacle and inspiring athletic competition, the image of harmony will have been achieved at a steep price.
___
On the Net:
http://www.journal-courier.net
___
July 21
Press & Sun-Bulletin, Binghamton, N.Y., on Al Gore and the environment:
Former Vice President Al Gore can be annoyingly self-righteous in his adopted role as spokesman for Earth, but he does serve to keep the environment in the public conscience. ...
Last week Gore challenged the United States to do away with all carbon-emitting forms of electricity production within 10 years — replacing them with alternatives such as solar, wind and geothermal power, conservation and "clean-coal technology" (which captures and stores all carbon emissions). ...
Gore did not call for an increase in nuclear power, which produces about 20 percent of electricity. Coal-fired plants generate about half; natural gas and hydroelectric dams most of the rest (oil isn't commonly burned for electricity). Renewable sources account for only 3 percent of the nation's electricity.
That 10-year timetable is ambitious bordering on absurd, but as Gore noted the nation went from blowing up rockets on launch pads to putting a man on the moon within that span in the 1960s. ...
He acknowledged that his plan would initially drive energy prices higher but proposed a payroll tax cut to offset those costs.
"I see my role as enlarging the political space in which Senator Obama or Senator McCain can confront this issue as president next year," Gore said. ...
If the next president does that, Gore's 10-year timetable will become a lot more realistic.
___
On the Net:
___
July 22
The Salina (Kan.) Journal, on fuel prices:
City sidewalks are seeing a lot more foot traffic lately and rising fuel prices are the reason. Ditto for the flood of bicycles, motorized scooters and tiny electric cars we see on city streets.
While they come with a steep price, especially for the poor, these prices have done what Americans should have been doing all along — thinking more about conserving fuel than finding new ways to burn it. Today, we are seeing fuel prices that other countries have had for years, and our streets are starting to reflect their traffic.
Large SUVs are rare sights overseas, partly because of narrow city streets, but also because it costs a fortune in fuel to operate. ...
At long last, we are looking to wind farms for producing electricity, a means that has been employed elsewhere for decades. A massive project is under construction along Interstate Highway 70 west of Salina and news reports highlight the exploding wind-power industry in oil-rich Texas. ...
Sure, the short-term pain of fuel costs is affecting nearly every family and business, especially those lower on the earnings ladder. Fuel costs consume a larger part of their budget and any increase hurts.
But eventually, our society will adjust. In place of the heartburn will come a decrease in our dependence on foreign oil, and ending our reliance on places like Iran will be worth it.
___
On the Net:
http://www.saljournal.com/rdnews/story/tom-oil-edit
___
July 20
The State Journal, Frankfort, Ky., on banks surviving investigations:
In ordinary times, banking news tends to elicit yawns of indifference from people who have no direct stake in the business. But these are extraordinary times. ...
In March, the Bear Stearns investment bank, established in 1923, found itself financially embarrassed. ... Last week there was panic out in California when the government seized IndyMac Bancorp after it became the second-largest failure of a financial institution in American history. ...
Before much of this occurred, American Founders Bank of Frankfort was taking steps to address management concerns last year upon being cited by state and federal regulators for "unsafe or unsound banking practices." ....
While trying to reassure customers and stockholders of its reliability, American Founders is also busy answering litigation that charges it made bad loans supporting the luxurious lifestyle of a banker who has since left. ...
This is a sticky situation for the 7-year-old bank. While trying to steady the ship in rough seas, it declines to comment on the pending litigation because of privacy and ethics issues. Those are legitimate concerns, but with imprudent lending at the heart of the national financial crisis, bankers everywhere may have to find ways to come clean about past mistakes before they can make a convincing case that their businesses deserve trust in the future. Sometimes airing dirty linen is just a necessary part of fiscal housekeeping.
___
On the Net: http://tinyurl.com/6dy8xe
___
July 20
News-Tribune, Jefferson City, Mo., on the value of a human life:
What's the value of a human life? ...
We do have an answer, courtesy of our national nanny — the federal government.
A human life is worth $6.9 million. To be more precise, that amount is the statistical value in today's dollars, calculated by the Environmental Protection Agency.
Making matters worse is that your value is decreasing. You are worth nearly $1 million less than your $7.8 million value five years ago.
Before you start feeling seriously undervalued, keep in mind the assessment is for statistical purposes only. The government is not attempting to stimulate the economy by creating a new industry merchandising people.
In addition to quality-of-life issues, federal agencies find quantifying life helps justify decisions. Bureaucrats then can weigh the cost of a proposed federal regulation against the lifesaving benefits. ...
The Bush administration is being accused of devaluing human life to discourage adoption of new federal regulations, particularly environmental rules.
Placing a value on human life is not without precedent; insurance companies write life insurance policies for specific amounts and juries assess monetary damages in wrongful death judgments.
But these are practical assessments, not solutions to an elusive puzzle.
The value of a human life, like the depth and breadth of the cosmos, remains a mystery to ponder and celebrate.
___
On the Net:
___
July 22
The Record, Hackensack, N.J., on U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg's ticket requests:
We know that Bruce Springsteen is "The Boss." It was a surprise to discover that Sen. Frank Lautenberg is "The Ticket Master."
As reported Sunday by Record Columnist Charles Stile, Lautenberg's campaign requested 40 tickets to Sunday's Springsteen concert at Giants Stadium from the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority. It's not uncommon for politically connected people to make such requests. The campaign would be charged $108 a ticket.
While the special treatment is offensive enough, that Lautenberg's campaign was planning on packaging the tickets with a dinner reception in Secaucus and charging $1,500 a person is obscene. It is a flagrant abuse of a dubious privilege. There are perks that go with being in high office, but scalping should not be one of them. ...
But on Monday, reacting to the outrage over the ticket deal, the Lautenberg campaign rescinded its request for the tickets and canceled the event. In a true show of chutzpah, the campaign tried to turn the focus away from its request for the tickets and toward the sports authority's policy of giving tickets to VIPs. ...
Springsteen's Giants Stadium concert is not a Lautenberg fundraiser, and the sports authority is not the senator's personal ticket broker. In the future, given the senator's penchant for pork, he might want to try staging a fundraiser around a performance of "Spamalot."
___
On the Net:
___
July 22
The Palm Beach (Fla.) Post, on the price of FDA's slow salmonella investigation:
Florida growers take no consolation from the federal government's announcement last week that all kinds of tomatoes are safe to eat. The damage — more than $100 million of it — has been done to sales of the state's crop. The fear now is that damage might last longer.
Four months ago, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration pointed to tomatoes as the primary suspect for the salmonella outbreak that was spreading across the country. To date, more than 1,200 people in 42 states have gotten sick from something, but the government can't figure out what. No evidence exists to connect any of the illness with any of the state's produce.
Florida tomato growers correctly blame the FDA for stigmatizing their product without working more closely with the industry early on to trace the problem to its source. It appears that the government jumped to a convenient conclusion under public pressure to come up with an answer — any answer. Tomato sales have plummeted, and growers have no assurance that things will get better with the next harvest. Some farms may switch to other crops in the fall to avoid the risk of more wasted effort and heavy losses. ...
The FDA's inept and irresponsible response to the outbreak cost Florida growers mightily. They want compensation from the government, and they deserve to get it.
___
On the Net:
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/content/opinion/index.html
___
July 22
The Times-Picayune, New Orleans, on resource protection:
Gov. Bobby Jindal laid out in compelling terms this month how urgently Louisiana needs resources to protect and rebuild our coast.
And he argued persuasively for President Bush to give the state financial relief to ensure that there's no lag in levee work or coastal restoration projects.
For now, the federal government is insisting that Louisiana pay its $1.8 billion share of levee construction costs up front. The figure includes $200 million more for that work than would have been required before Hurricane Katrina.
That is unfair. President Bush ought to give Louisiana 30 years to pay its share and reduce the cost to pre-Katrina levels, as Gov. Jindal is asking. All it would take is an executive order. The long-term payment plan is allowed under the 1986 Water Resources Development Act, and California and Nevada have been given those terms on similar projects.
Louisiana should be given the same consideration. After all, if the federal government's levees had held up during Katrina, much of New Orleans would have been spared. This community shouldn't be made to suffer further in the name of safety — and neither should other Louisianians.
___
On the Net:
___
July 23
Sydney Morning Herald, Australia, on the arrest of Serbia's Radovan Karadzic:
The arrest of Radovan Karadzic, the fugitive Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect, is a welcome breakthrough for those trying to strengthen the international justice system to handle wartime atrocities. ...
A former psychiatrist who liked to write plays and children's poetry, Karadzic is no ordinary ethnic thug. He faces charges of genocide and crimes against humanity relating to Europe's worst atrocities since Adolf Hitler's Third Reich. ... He is accused of orchestrating the expulsion of a million Muslims and Croats from their ancestral homes, by a systemic pattern of killings and rapes. His indictment covers the 10,000 civilian deaths incurred in the 43-month siege of Sarajevo by his forces, and the massacre of more than 7000 Muslim men and boys captured in the town of Srebrenica in July 1995. ...
If he is successfully extradited, Karadzic will be the 44th Serb sent to The Hague. But his former military chief, Ratko Mladic, remains at large, so the ad hoc Balkans tribunal must remain in being until he is caught. Meanwhile, the tribunal's work will inform the permanent International Criminal Court, which has jurisdiction over war crimes committed since July 2002 (when the court was formed) that national courts will not address. By the arrest, Serbia embraces more tightly the European enlightenment, and rejects the dark ethnic attraction of the pan-Slavism emanating from Vladimir Putin's Russia.
___
On the Net:
http://www.smh.com.au/editorial/index.html
___
July 20
The Observer, London, on aid to Afghanistan:
It would be hard to deny the evidence that Afghanistan is at a crossroads as Democratic nominee Barack Obama yesterday met the country's President Hamid Karzai. Despite the claims by some British officers that the Taliban is being tactically routed, no one seems to have told the Islamist insurgents. ... Despite $15 billion in aid that has been disbursed, Afghanistan remains mired in pervasive poverty with unemployment standing at more than 40 per cent. ...
Confronted with these multiple failures, the temptation, voiced yesterday by Barack Obama, and by his Republican opponent John McCain already, is to throw more military forces at the problem in a replication of the Iraq 'surge.' A parallel attraction, encouraged by Karzai, is to insist that the international community provide ever more money in the hope that some of the billions will stick. But in a country beset by rapidly increasing pessimism..., what is needed is a large-scale rethinking of what we are doing in Afghanistan, not more violence and more largesse. ...
More widely, there needs to be acceptance that this is not a local conflict but a regional one. Pakistan's failure to tackle the Taliban's safe havens in the tribally administered areas is stoking Afghanistan's woes. Finally, there needs to be an end to the cozy client relationship with Karzai, who has yet to show himself a capable leader, and a retreat from the West's view that he is the country's only possible savior.
___
On the Net:
___
July 21
Asahi Shimbun, Tokyo, on climate change:
Alarm bells are beginning to ring around the world over global warming and security — two seemingly unrelated issues.
In June, the National Intelligence Council (NIC), a U.S. government organization that analyzes foreign policy issues based on data provided by the Central Intelligence Agency and other intelligence bodies, published its assessment of the security threats posed by climate change. ...
Global warming is projected to have disastrous consequences--a rise in sea levels and more frequent droughts and flooding. That means the natural conditions that have made the development of modern civilization possible will change. ...
If the fallout brought on by global warming causes conflicts to break out all over the world at the same time, even the overwhelming military power of the United States or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the world's largest military alliance, will be powerless to handle this intractable situation. ...
Reducing carbon dioxide emissions to mitigate global warming would be an effective approach in terms of national security. Policymakers should keep that in mind. Fierce competition among countries for oil and coal to fuel economic growth can only heighten international tension. The massive CO2 emissions from the burning of these fossil fuels just adds to the problem of global warming. ...
The world must be better prepared to tackle the effects of global warming and help nations in need. The only way to achieve this is to establish solid and effective cooperation among all members of the international community.
In doing so, perhaps Earth can be rescued from falling into the environmental abyss.
___
On the Net:
___
July 17
Daily Nation, Nairobi, Kenya, on the Zimbabwe elections:
The agreement reached on Monday between Dr. Robert Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai should hopefully deliver the people of Zimbabwe from misery. But there should be no illusions about the complexity of the problem. ... The document they signed before South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki was merely an agreement to start talking. ...
The negotiated settlement in Kenya that brought the country back from the brink of disaster following a disputed presidential election has been hailed as a model for Zimbabwe and other countries facing similar political problems.
Such a settlement may well be necessary to head off a complete national breakdown, but it should only be as a last resort. ...
Citizens of any nation who exercise their right to vote for leaders of their choice do not troop to the polling stations in expectation of an abortive election followed by some arrangement between the contenders. If such deals become the norm then democracy as we know it is not worth the ballot paper.
The trend could also encourage incumbents to defy the will of the people and hang on despite the electoral outcome, confident in the knowledge that they will retain power, or partial power, by other means.
So if the Zimbabwean leaders get to actual negotiations, they must seek to go beyond the Kenyan model and look for a formula that actually tries to address the will of the people.
___
On the Net:
___
News Search
Related Searches:
Elsewhere on the Web
- The Christian Science Monitor: Nepal's ex-guerrillas take on civilian rule
- ABC News: Does Cervical Cancer Vaccine Work?
- USATODAY.com: Post-Katrina, Miss. regains people but lacks housing
Copyright © 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.