In case you’re wondering what that is all about, go here for the LA Times explanation and here for the Smart Bitches revenge.

Firstly, let’s talk about the ICC, of which neither the USA, Russia, China or India are party to. An article at First Drafts (the blog of Prospect magazine) also informs me that:

So far, the ICC has pursued cases only in Africa, and has not investigated any western complicity in alleged war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide, whether they be in Iraq, Afghanistan, or most recently in Gaza.

Man, can I tell you something? As a person of the Global South? We’re so so so so sick of this. Americans can dump phosphorus on civilians in Fallujah (confirmed by Italian journalists and TV crews) and not a goddamned thing happens. Israel can dump phosphorus on civilians in Gaza (confirmed by world + dog) and not a goddamned thing happens. But one African dictator is complicit in the murder of other people and suddenly the whole world is alight with righteous indignation. Yes, yes, of course what happened is a bad thing, but talk about double standards, people!

Donald Rumsfeld can handwrite on a memo that he wants prisoners (who have been convicted of nothing, by the way) tortured. “Make sure this happens!” says Donny, and it gets quietly sunk in a morass of convenient concussed-goldfish amnesia. A US President, UK Prime Minister and Australian Prime Minister can collude to invade another sovereign country based on lies, leading to more than one million deaths, and … nothing happens. But one pissant dictator in some African country does something wrong, and suddenly everyone’s aghast.

The Security Council was responsible for referring the Darfur case to the ICC … after the United States conveniently made sure that its own citizens were immune from any subsequent prosecution. Do you think we don’t notice these things?

Can I share a dirty little secret with you? The average ex-second- and third-world person is actually quite happy that the Western economies are in meltdown. Gives you less chance to play colonial master to the rest of the world. My father was a UN peacekeeper in the Belgian Congo more than forty years ago. He came back to Malaysia hating the Belgians for how they treated the Congolese. Heard about that one? The arbitrary chopping off of hands and feet from the people famous for their chocolates? How about the cold-blooded execution of children (from a sniper’s rifle to the back of the head in one pure and perfect shot) from the descendants of the Holocaust™? How about the murder of Asians whose only crime was the desire to govern themselves, by a list of the who’s-who of Western powers? How about the entire attemped genocide of a people from the friendly and “multicultural” land Down Under?

And so you’ve finally decided to (yet again) pick on some small-time bully while letting all the really big players, like yourselves, off the hook. Congratulations. What’s next? Stealing pocket money from poor kids?

Well, a panel of Japanese scientists have pored over the climate change data and, in a report that will — in all probability — never see the light of day in English, have come to a variety of conclusions, of which the following are just two:

* The global mean temperature rose continuously from 1800-1850, even though the sudden increase in CO2 emissions only began occurring after 1946.

* The global mean temperature has plateaued since 2001, despite increasing CO2 emissions.

Just those two facts, by themselves, should be enough to halt the global warming train. As the Japanese put it (via The Register):

the IPCC’s (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) theory that atmospheric temperature has risen since 2000 in correspondence with CO2 is nothing but a[n] hypothesis.

The Japanese are of the opinion that the temperature fluctuations we’ve seen are connected to sunspot activity, although they’re not completely sure, for reasons that will become evident anon. From satellite findings in 1980, it has emerged that times of no sunspots produces more transported energy and light emissions from the Sun than times of many sunspots. More transported energy, in this case, means more heat, although the scientists are also quick to point out that there is no perfect correlation between lack of sunspots and higher temperatures. What they are asking for, however, is a complete revamp of the climate change model to take into account the “enormous sum of energy” that even a 0.5% variance in transported energy from the Sun can make to the Earth. They also note that sunspot activity affects the level of UV rays, our ionosphere and ozone layer and are asking for more research into this area. Sounds reasonable to me. As they put it:

When constructing models, if our scientific understanding is poor, we are not able to capture the model.

Sounds like basic common sense, doesn’t it? Here’s the thing. Not only have we failed to take into account fluctuations in the Sun’s energy and its effect on the Earth (obvious, when one thinks about it), the IPCC climate change model also neglects the effects of aerosols on climate systems, the mechanics of cosmic ray ionisation processes, and the lack of true analysis of systems feedback data.

So, you’re saying, if you agree with this, Kaz, where’s the scam? Well, first, it’s in the Western nations now blaming the developing nations for all its global ills. (Remember Ben Bernake blaming us for the financial meltdown? Pure ballsy gold, that statement. Also a blatant lie, but let’s not let truth get in the way of a damned good excuse.)

Secondly: global warming is good for the corporations. For one thing, it’s yet another way they can manipulate consumers and pull a “bait and switch” at the same time. Oh look, my company GrCo (Green Company) is soooooo much more environmentally friendly than that other mob. And while gullible consumers are trampling a path to GrCo’s  door, the fact that GrCo is literally killing people by dumping toxic sludge into a river in the Amazon basin is passing everybody by.

Thirdly, the preferred way to tackle climate change is through the “cap and trade” method of tradeable concessions, rather than the more straightforward strategy of straight out carbon cuts. Why the preference? Well, as Matt Stoller points out:

By creating tradable financial assets worth tens of billions of dollars for governments to distribute among their industries and plants and then monitor, a global cap-and-trade program also introduces powerful incentives to cheat by corrupt and radical governments. Corrupt governments will almost certainly distribute permits in ways that favor their business supporters and understate their actual energy use and emissions.

Of course, Matt mentions “corrupt” governments, but I think we’re pretty clear on which governments are in the pockets of industry, which is what we’re really talking about here.

Global warming, as it’s being portrayed now, plays straight to the unthinking consumer, of which there are too many to contemplate without wanting to slit your wrists. It pats on the head all those little, lazy, PC do-gooders like “Mark” who, according to Anna Shapiro said:

“What a relief …. Finally, I can stop arguing in my head with all these conservatives, trying to sway faith with reason, you know? …. Obama’s much smarter than I am. I’ve handed it off to him. [my emphasis]“

What a lovely attitude to have. Democracy? Nah, we don’t have to fight for it, watch it, know that its price is eternal vigilance and constant criticism. No, if someone who even looks a quarter-decent comes along, I’ll just hand the entire responsibility over to him. Likewise, global warming? Nah, we don’t have to think about it, try to understand it, read up on it more. So what if the effects will last multiple generations? What this mob say (the IPCC) sound okay, and those pictures of penguins are heart-breaking, so I’ll go with them.

You know what first tipped me off to the fact that some players (corporations and Western nations) are going to make huge financial, economic and political gains out of climate change? Al Gore. On the one hand, you have his Inconvenient Truth documentary (his words). But, on the other, you have his unbelievable annual electricity bill and the fact that, when he was Vice-President for Clinton, he vehemently opposed the Kyoto Protocol and advised the President to do the same (his actions). That’s why the US never signed Kyoto. It was because of Gore.

Right now, in the IT field, I can already see a huge PR war beginning over which company is “greener”. They’re not doing it for the environment. They’re doing it purely because it’s another weapon in their competition arsenal. They’re doing it for profit. That’s what capitalism is all about and that’s what you should be thinking about every time you’re confronted by dogma. Who profits?

We’re — well, you’re — being scared into taking for granted something that has not been fully vindicated. It’s a big responsibility (and takes a lot of time) to go wading through the facts and come up with your own independent opinion. What a pity most people aren’t going to bother. After all, it’s only the future economic and political landscape of our planet that’s at stake. We can leave it to the big guys, right? I mean, they did such a good job on finance, what the hell’s there to worry about?

For anyone interested, the Reg’s article is here.

Bullying. Bullying. At all the International and Australian private schools I passed through, bullying was part of the rich, natural fabric of life … usually directed against me. Although all said schools had a supposedly “zero tolerance” of bullying, nothing was done, even when I was desperate enough to go to the Office, or to my class teacher, and report it myself. That’s not to say that all the blame lay with the schools. My parents also contributed to the problem by not wanting to rock the boat or upset any authority, so there was never parental support backing me up in that regard.

With a jaundiced eye, then, I heard the “absolutely no tolerance” statement about bullying coming from the Vice-Principal of the current school and mentally yawned at the appropriate juncture. Until Little Dinosaur emerged from the school bus crying on Monday afternoon, followed soon after by The Wast with a stunned look on his face. It seemed that a boy from Primary-1 decided to bully our kids by pulling LD’s hair, taking some stickers she’d got at school and slapping TW across the face. (The kids, having been moved around countries for the past couple of years, and home-schooled part of the time, have no experience of such behaviour. Neither of them retaliated, being more confused and hurt than anything else. This kind of incident has rocked their naivety which, I’m sorry to say, is no bad thing, the world being what it is.)

The bus driver refused to give the boy’s name, and we were livid. After taking down the particulars of what happened from our kids, J charged down to the school first thing on Tuesday morning, ready to do battle and wave the “no bullying” policy in their faces. (It was decided that J should do it because he’s an orang putih (white man), but more about that in the second part of this blog.)

And he got the wind taken out of his sails completely. The Vice-Principal was utterly apologetic, explained that the young boy had already been told of punishment through a period of ostracisation, the bus driver informed, and parents told of consequences (J didn’t ask what they were, but we’re pretty sure it’s corporal punishment) should he repeat the behaviour. So, between the end of school on Monday, and the start of it on Tuesday, everything appeared to be settled. Subsequent bus trips have been uneventful, but we’re monitoring on an ongoing basis. That’s the good news.

Okay, so let’s get to the orang putih bit. If I want something down in this part of the world, I get J to do it. The hierarchy of status around here goes something like this: white man, Asian man, white woman (depending on her position), Asian woman. Sometimes, the white woman scores below the Asian woman, but not in casual encounters. The result of this is a lack of courtesy that drives me insane.

The men here see absolutely no problem in charging first into the elevator or a room or a queue of any sort. J tells me that, where he works in Singapore, the women always tell him to get into the elevator first and are stunned when he holds back and insists that they precede him. In a recent encounter, J and I were joining a male and his two female cohorts in the car. When J made to offer me the front seat, the man told him not to be silly. “You’re the man,” he said bluntly, in front of all of us. “You should be in the front.” “And that’s okay,” I replied sweetly, “because if we’re involved in a crash, you’ll cushion the impact.” Needless to say, Zaharin and I are not subsequently on the best of terms.

It’s the same in the corporate environment. I’m often the peer (or higher) of the suits I normally rub shoulders with, yet I’m relegated to invisibility status purely because I’m a woman. It doesn’t help that I have brown skin. When we go to a restaurant, the menu gets given to the males first. The drinks get given to the males first. The door is opened for the male; if I’m in front, or alone, I have to struggle with it myself. And it doesn’t seem confined to one race. If they’re Asian, chances are they’re chauvinists. Chinese, Malay, Indian, Korean, Japanese. The occasional skerrick, the single grain, of courtesy that I get from the rare Asian man only serves to highlight the fact that better behaviour is possible, but just not important enough for anyone else to emulate.

Do you know what impression you give, gentlemen? Not only to Western-educated women like me, but to Western businessmen as well? That you’re primitive fucks. (I do believe that’s the first time I’ve sworn in this blog, and please forgive me, but this is an emotional subject for me.) You want to know why Americans and Europeans hold you in some contempt? It’s because of your combination of sleazy toadying to them and arrogant sexism towards women. It’s the mark of bullies, not mature adults. The Westerners may discuss serious things with you, but they’re laughing at you behind your backs. I know, because I’ve been party to such discussions. I’ve even received apologies from some of them on behalf of thoughtless behaviour from their Asian colleagues. So let’s just say you aren’t making yourself any fans here, boys.

As for Asian women? Well, if they continue to accept this behaviour, then they’re nothing more than doormats who deserve to be stepped on. I don’t accept this behaviour. Neither does J. We are both appalled by the singular lack of manners in this region. But we’re also appalled by the fact that the women just seem to accept it. We don’t, but we’re specks in a sea of entrenched chauvinism. I don’t put up with such behaviour but will my actions to redress the balance make the slightest bit of difference? I don’t think so. In which case, should I even continue trying? I feel like Canute with his insight into kingly power. Fight something I know I will never change, or ignore it? What do you think?

Firstly, the USA and the Patriot Act. I’m not sure how many of you are aware of this, but the Act — ostensibly passed to fight terrorism in a post-9/11 world — is being used to also pursue animal and environmental activists. The rub lies in the term “domestic terrorism”, which the Act defines as when a person engages in activity:

that involves acts dangerous to human life that violate the laws of the U.S. … and appear to be intended: to intimidate or coerce a civilian population [or] to influence the policy of government by intimidation or coercion.

Note the dove-grey shaded “appear to be intended”, as well as the similarly-hued “influence the policy of government”. Note also that there is a lack of definition surrounding, not only these words, but also “intimidate” and “coerce”. But wait, there’s more. Harbouring, aiding, concealing or lending material support to groups designated by the Attorney-General and Secretary of State as being terrorist organisations is also enough to get you arraigned under the Act. As the ACLU points out:

Such groups as the World Trade Organization protesters, the Vieques protestors and even People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), would, on the basis of minor acts of violence or vandalism [by only one or two hotheaded individuals, I may add], meet this overbroad definition. Non-citizens who provide assistance to such groups — such as paying membership dues — will run the risk of detention and deportation.

Sign a petition. Buy a t-shirt. Get kicked out of the country. The potential for entrapment is also enormous with such fuzzy legislation. And, for environmental activists, that’s even before we bring up the 2006 Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act. Merely threatening “an animal enterprise” (you might tell a lazy and cruel slaughterhouse owner that you’ll be proceeding with criminal charges against the establishment, or you may try to stop a cock fight) is enough to get you jailed. Whistleblowers might legitimately be prosecuted by the companies they expose under this legislation.

For some background on this whole area, read the Guardian report. And here’s a link to a strange little two-step about a retracted 9 November article from the UK’s Observer newspaper that was obviously trying to beat on the eco-terrorism drum itself. If you want to read what the article actually said, this blog seems to have a fair chunk of it quoted, as The Observer deleted its original report.

I’ll admit, I was happy to just keep such trivia in the back of my mind. After all, I’m an avowed carnivore. I’m also still trying to think through the whole global warming argument … and it hasn’t got me completely convinced, to be honest. So don’t get the idea I’m a vegetarian tree-hugger here. This is the blog of a mere observer of the action.

So there I was, happily skipping along, until I read some news from Tasmania, Australia. It appears that an avowed police “terror exercise”, carried out last week, involved the scenario of “a forest activist hijacking a plane and threatening to crash it into a pulp mill” (article here). There has always been a rather antagonistic dynamic between Australian logging activists and the Tasmanian business establishment, and I see this exercise as the latest salvo in a propaganda war between the two sides. Of course, the scenario was slammed as being offensive, unnecessary and irresponsible, especially as no activists have ever carried out any violent action in the history of Tasmanian anti-logging activities. And the police didn’t help their case with their own statements. (Where do they get these spokesmen?)

Assistant Commissioner of Police, Steve Bonde, went on record to say that the training exercise “which [was] designed to test the capabilities and co-ordination of various police agencies — [was] designed around the most unlikely scenario envisaged by Tasmania Police so that the community would not be alarmed.”

Huh? What was that? You were training your police to respond to a terror exercise that was deliberately unrealistic? Surely I must have misread something?

“We deliberately draw up a scenario unconnected with events in history, unconnected with current events or what police expect in the future,” Mr Bonde said. “They are not based on police intelligence or threat assessments.”

Ah, Tasmania is the gift that keeps on giving. So, Mr Bonde (James Bonde … sorry, couldn’t resist), why even have an exercise at all if it’s not modelling anything that police expect to happen? Or am I missing something here? On the chance I’m not, may I suggest that, next time, the Tasmanian Police Force act out a giant invasion by insectoid aliens in huge metal flying saucers? According to your criteria, it would give the same net result, but the special effects (lots of fireworks please) would be awesome. And I’m convinced the kiddies, and a fair few adults, would love it.

Actually, while it’s very easy to make fun of the police force, there is deeper inculcation afoot, and that is the training of law enforcement officers across the globe to regard activists as terrorists. And the training of the general public (that’s you!) through media channels to equate activists with terrorists. And those, gentle reader, are never laughing matters.

Example One

Andrew Wheeler recently blogged about the obvious and incorrect bias in a cartoon by Lisa Benson about Detroit and the UAW. Go here for his blog. As well as proving that I have no life by commenting on recent actions of the UAW, my comment on Andrew’s blog contained the following:

Putting my conspiracy theorist hat on for a moment, what is the tie between the media organisations where these cartoons appear and the auto-makers? How is public opinion being manipulated via satire in order to push a particular agenda?

Okay, all well and good. It’s Kaz being her usual narrow-eyed, cynical self again. Let’s move on.

Example Two

I’m a regular reader of the China Matters blog and, also recently, China Hand wrote a blog about General Motors. (If you’re wondering about the coincidence of two successive blogs on the automotive industry, it’s because it’s a big subject at the moment. No more.) CH’s post (“Buying a Sick Horse and Turning It Into a Dead Horse”, Wednesday 19 November 2008) was, as usual, illuminating and interesting and also contained this little snippet:

The tubes of the Internet have been abuzz concerning a report on the auto industry website www.allaboutcars.com headlined “Breaking News—Chinese May Buy GM and Chrysler”. … The Chinese appear to have no plans to acquire GM. And perhaps Allaboutcars was getting vigorously massaged by Deloitte-Touche, which has a vested interest in all things M&A, China-wise.

CH quotes, as always, excerpts from the items in question to bolster the argument. (That’s one reason I like reading the blog. No namby-pamby I’ll-just-say-what-I-want-and-damn-the-facts rhetoric. Here are references I can follow, if I’m so inclined.)

During the consolidation [i.e. a conclusion to the possibility that some Chinese industrial manufacturers will successfully internationalise as the global economic climate reduces resistance to Chinese penetration of European and American manufacturers] , Chinese enterprises could begin by purchasing GM suppliers and GM’s China joint ventures, Deloitte Touche China believes. [my emphasis] …

I bet they do! So Deloitte Touche China has a vested interested in Chinese matters concerning the manufacturing and automotive industries and they just happen to drop a statement in a news article that would increase their own business tenfold (at least) if proven correct? It isn’t the comment itself that raised my eyebrows (such moves are common in the business world), it’s the brazenness of it, considering that Deloitte is trying to obviously influence the Chinese government in the matter. Ten out of ten for chutzpah, guys, but I’m not confident of your chances, tbh.

Example Three

Possibly the most worrisome one of all. But first, some background. The GISS (Goddard Institute for Space Studies) is … well, let me use their words:

The NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), at Columbia University in New York City, is a laboratory of the Earth Sciences Division of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and a unit of the Columbia University Earth Institute. Research at GISS emphasizes a broad study of global climate change.

But what does this mean? From their About page:

A key objective of GISS research is prediction of atmospheric and climate changes in the 21st century. The research combines analysis of comprehensive global datasets, derived mainly from spacecraft observations, with global models of atmospheric, land surface, and oceanic processes. Study of past climate change on Earth and of other planetary atmospheres serves as a useful tool in assessing our general understanding of the atmosphere and its evolution.

Essentially, the GISS is the go-to body for climate change data. So far, so good. The problem is this. Their October data, which prompted the report that October 2008 was the warmest October since reliable record-keeping began in 1880, was wrong, because September data from Russia was used in place of October’s. (And, as anyone in the northern hemisphere knows, September is a warmer month than October.)

If you want to know more about this issue by the person who first nailed the October anomaly, check out Steve McIntyre’s Climate Audit blog. Further investigation leads to the conclusion that, in fact, many terrestrial temperature-monitoring sites (which the GISS uses more than would seem evident from their quote above) tend to err on the side of higher temperatures, usually through bad station placement. So Question Number One for the dilettante scientist (that’s me and perhaps thee) is, as Anthony Watts puts it:

If Russian weather stations are located in cities that have [a hot water/steam pipe ] district heating plan, and a good percentage of the pipes are uninsulated, how much of the waste heat from the pipes ends up creating a local micro-climate of warmth?

This dodgy data (from all over the place, not just Russia) gets collected by the GISS to present a, shall we say, less than accurate picture of global warming. But it gets worse. Considering its importance, the GISS (with a billion-dollar annual budget) only allocates one quarter of one resource (25% of one person’s time) on checking the data it uses. Just the kind of priority a peak scientific establishment should give to its source data, right?

But that’s not all. The baseline data has changed. The 1930s temperature data is now (in 2008) lower than it was during the 1990s. Which means that today’s average temperatures are, of course, seen as relatively higher. Can you see the picture forming here?

But wait. There’s more. An algorithm that caters for missing historical temperature data arbitrarily increases the temperature by 0.1 degrees Celsius regularly throughout the 20th Century without any apparent justification.

The Register puts it succinctly:

GISS makes unannounced, unexplained changes, and this practice is confusing and gets in the way of scholarship. GISS calibrates its data to 0.01°C. This implies a very high degree of accuracy and low margin of error. But their aggregate adjustments [the aforeto mentioned algorithm] add up to tens of times greater than this scale. Therefore to provide data in hundredths of a degree is a clear case of misplaced precision.

Can all of this surreptitious tweaking be traced back to one person? Like GISS Director, James Hansen? A man who would like to see oil company executives prosecuted for their contribution to global warming? Is he stacking the GISS data deck so he can make the statement:

Global warming has reached a level such that we can ascribe with a high degree of confidence a cause and effect relationships between the greenhouse effect and the observed warming

a vindication of his own personal views? This is a passionate man who believes that the actions of oil executives, their lobbyists and pandering politicians are undermining democracy. But how far can he be trusted? And should such a person be put in charge of a premier, supposedly unbiased, longitudinal scientific study? What do you think?

Conclusions

Straight news items, especially when they concern big-ticket items like car companies or the environment, never are, as these examples illustrate. In each, you have the vested interests of a person or organisation trying to push a particular agenda. I’ve written this long-assed post to hopefully get you to act a little more sceptically in the face of news, no matter how wholesome the source may appear to be. (NASA? But they’re my heroes!)

On the NASA GISS front, the example I cited is particularly troublesome. I ascribe to the personal view that I cannot believe the accumulation of humanity’s agricultural, social and industrial interventions on the planet throughout history have not contributed in some way to some change in how the Earth’s biosphere works. However, I cannot condone the tricks undertaken by the GISS in the name of science and the environment. Fudging data may work in the short term, but it only hurts its own cause, no matter how noble that may be. Science should not work like that.

As for Hansen, as head of a public service organisation of critical importance to the whole world, his personal views should remain exactly that. Personal.

Bear in mind, that I love/adore cooking, and have done for more than 2 decades. We have hundreds of cookbooks on our bookshelves. I can watch an episode of “Iron Chef” and criticise them because they didn’t remove the pistils from courgette flowers before frying them, or because they believe pizza pie originated in Italy.

So, as an exercise, let’s see if you can spot this incidence of repetitive inanity.

Did you know that the traditional cuisine of northern Italy depends on fresh ingredients, sourced locally? And that the traditional cuisine of China depends on fresh ingredients, sourced locally? How about the traditional cuisine of Mexico? Fresh ingredients, sourced locally. Having absorbed all that, can you tell me … what the traditional cuisines of south-east Asia depended on? Go on, give it a shot. Got it? Yep, they depended on freakin’ fresh ingredients, sourced freakin’ locally! Would never have guessed that one, Anthony Bourdain!

Is that all these people can say nowadays? Who are the vacuous clones writing this rubbish? I lift my eyebrow disdainfully as I stare at the TV screen. “So you’re saying there were no Concorde flights transporting white truffles in oil halfway across the world back in the fourteenth century, then?” With an entire region’s cooking repetoire to choose from, are the phrases “fresh ingredients” and “sourced locally” really the only things one can think of?

Because God hates me(*), I was also subjected to a dreadful series called “Sugar”, where some bimbo concocts nouveau yuppie food in an ersatz house setting that makes Ikea catalogue photos look cosy and traditional. And do you know what she said when preparing a sweet pastry base for a pie? “Prick the bottom of the pastry with a fork or it will spread when it bakes in the oven.”

I almost fell off the sofa. It will spread? We’re talking pastry here, woman, not chocolate. And, in fact, pastry has a tendency to shrink when it’s baked. Good gods! It was oh-so-obvious that this woman — who stands in front of a camera, being paid an obscene amount of money to teach people how to make the equivalent of twee canapes — had never cooked a goddamned pie in her life. Because, gentle reader, if she had, she would know that one pricks the bottom (and sides) of fresh pastry to stop layers of pastry ballooning up/out and filling the pie cavity. I know this because I’ve cooked dozens of pies and it’s happened to me. But this woman can — either through stupidity or ignorance — stand there under a cloak of authority, collect a fat fee and lie through her back teeth over, not just one but two, facts. I wouldn’t mind so much, except some newbie is going to take this piece of drivel as gospel and live a life filled with culinary falsehood. (I take food very seriously.)

I can understand that cooking programmes are chic, and that various producers are falling over themselves to come up with the next biggest name. But could somebody please think of the words they’re putting in these people’s mouths? Just to help me regain my composure, I’ll finish with one of Julia’s priceless comments:

How much garlic you add depends on how you feel about garlic

Amen, Julia. We still need people like you around.

(*) Actually, S/He doesn’t. We have a cordial agreement, God and I … I don’t bother The Supreme Being; The Supreme Being doesn’t bother me.

And, make no mistake, with the current financial crisis, we are talking about a HUGE collapse of confidence in financial systems due to FREE MARKET, UNREGULATED, CAPITALIST strategies. Sorry to have to put all that in boldface, but I think it’s appropriate that people think on that for a bit. When we talk about Cuba or spoke about the former Soviet Union, the terms used are/were invariably the ills associated with “communist regimes”. However, now that we’re talking about the meltdown of finance and a looming global recession (I’ve been following Roubini), it’s “banks” and “financial systems” that are mentioned, not the ills associated with “capitalist regimes”. And, make no mistake, we’re talking regimes here. Definition please, Ms. Dictionary:

regi’me, n. method of government; prevailing system of things.

But, of course, we can’t use that term, can we? It’s “communist/repressive regimes” and “capitalist democracies”. As if, by opposing bailouts of banks who should have known better, you’re somehow also, ipso facto, against democracy. Keep your eyes open next time you peruse a paper and tell me I’m wrong.

So, that’s the first quibble: an unequitable distribution of emotion-laden nouns and adjectives. The second is the use of the term “socialism”. How did it come about that rich, white guys managed to talk their friends in government (*) into (1) getting rid of all regulation regarding leverage limits on lendings, and then — when it all went pear-shaped — (2) convince the US Treasury to hand over a minimum of US1.3 trillion to keep themselves in business, and have the newspapers and various politicians call it “socialism“???? It beggars the mind. Shouldn’t we, instead, be calling it a thieving conspiracy? The rise again of the Robber Barons? Extortion? Laziness? Greed? Irresponsibility? But, no, the term that sticks to the wall is “socialism”.

Well, I’m a socialist, and I don’t approve the use of that term in that context. Especially as Noam Chomsky points out in a recent essay in the Irish Times:

Such interventionism [where narrow sectors are calling for massive state intervention to rescue collapsing financial institutions] is a regular feature of state capitalism [my very decided emphasis].

Chomsky goes on to say that:

A study by international economists Winfried Ruigrok and Rob van Tulder 15 years ago found that at least 20 companies in the Fortune 100 would not have survived if they had not been saved by their respective governments …. Such government intervention “has been the rule rather than the exception over the past two centuries”, they conclude [again, my tedious emphasis].

Get it? It’s capitalism in a non-democratic environment that’s producing the current quakes and I’m sick to the teeth of having the word “socialism” act as the propagandistic shield behind which all this extortion and greed is taking place.

(*) Oh, didn’t you know that Paulson was Chief Executive of Goldman Sachs before he took the position of Treasury Secretary? And that Goldman’s biggest rival was Lehman which, unfortunately, the US Treasury refused to bail out? But that AIG was/is heavily invested by Goldman and — lookee here — it got rescued (saving Goldman Sachs US$20billion)? So, a third point is, when you start talking about “the government”, be very very sure you’re really talking about “the government” and not clearly transparent “personal agendas”, m’kay?

I’m positive there’ll be loopholes which will enable those executives to take that money away in other instruments (shares, for example, or some other kind of options; deferred quasi-pension payments; post-employment “consultation” fees; etc.), so it’ll stop exactly diddley-squat.

But sentiment in the blogosphere was still adamant that this was an Important Provision that Had To Pass. Well, in Bloomberg this morning, under a headline that read “Blankfein’s $70 Million Would Survive Paulson’s Rules”, I read that:

Blankfein, 54, was Wall Street’s best-paid CEO in 2007, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. He “could still make tens of millions of dollars if he continues to receive stock grants and Goldman’s stock rises,” said David Schmidt, a senior consultant for New York-based compensation firm James F. Reda & Associates.

With the added detail that,

While performance-related pay over $1 million has been tax-deductible, companies were able to write off only $1 million of salary since 1993 [my emphasis, which shows that some irritant has been in place since 1993 ... but it still didn't change anything].
…

As a result, bankers’ salaries were often set beneath the $1 million cap. Blankfein’s was $600,000 last year, with the rest of his package coming in incentive compensation and services, including a car and driver, according to regulatory filings.

Doesn’t sound like much until you realise that Blanfein’s “official” salary was $600,000 last year, BUT “the rest of the package” meant he managed to walk away with total compensation of $70,300,000 for 2007 alone. Man, that’s some “package”. Wonder where I can get me some?

So I think that makes it Kaz’s Cynicism, 1; Laudable Naive Sentiment, 0.

POSTSCRIPT: I know, why am I blogging every day this week? Especially when I specifically said I’d be cutting down? My own perversity, I suspect. It’s an enemy I’ve yet to defeat.

And it’s true. While it may all have started with C—ese company Xu.zhou An.ying advertising a miracle “protein powder” booster, North American pet makers bought into it in a big way by lapping up their claims and using the magical E.S.B. “protein powder” as, firstly, a pet food extender. Consequence: remember that massive pet food recall, was it last year?

But it was still a good product for boosting protein levels even though: (a) it had absolutely no nutritional value despite its masking effect as a protein and, (b) ahem, led to kidney problems that could kill the user. And, besides, C—a had a growing surplus of mel.a.mine and, like all good budding capitalists, was probably wondering what to do about it in order to turn a profit. Enter Xu.zhou An.ying. (For more details on casual mel.a.mine substitution in feed, see these articles from the New York Times.)

(So one tip, right off the bat, is to watch out for any meat products originating from C—a too, even though the FDA says:

“Based on information currently available, FDA and USDA believe the likelihood of illness after eating pork from swine fed the contaminated product would be very low.”

But, then again, you already know how cynical I am.)

Back to the story. Really, this mel.a.mine saga began as an intro to the blog, but is getting so interesting in its own right, that it might just take over completely.

So, rightly suspicious, the FSIS and USDA (Food Safety and Inspection Service & U.S. Department of Agriculture, respectively), after a couple of events, like a bag of mel.a.mine being repackaged as a bag of food-grade wheat gluten, decided — way back in 2007 — to begin testing a variety of imported wheat-related food products coming into the US from C—a. And good on them, I say. If we depended solely on “self-regulation” and the “free market” and “enlightened self-interest”, then we’d all be dead, to be blunt.

While this was a laudable move, the ingenuity of the C—ese once more sidestepped a potential containment of the problem by moving to … in.fant formula! Well, I mean, it’s a win-win people. You get rid of your “mel.a.mine scrap” surplus AND boost a food’s protein level at the same time. I mean, where’s the downside? Oh yeah, people can die. But profits can soar. What are you, some kind of damned socialist?

Continued next blog…

* Oh yeah, you’re wondering about the dots, dashes, spaces and strange formatting, aren’t you? I know that certain terms together can’t get past C—ese internet filters, but am not sure which ones they are. I’m making a guess that it could be C—ese and mel.a.mine together. And I know I have at least one reader in C—a, so I’m hoping this will get through. For some strategies in circumvention, go here.