Here’s a dab of complex politics for you. First, the set up, from a recent article by my comrade Patrick Bond available in its entirety here
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This is a little old, but it’s tremendously revealing of the state of mind of the World Bank staff. They feel, it seems, that Wolfowitz is an inappropriate person to head their organization. And, check this. It’s not only because he doesn’t know anything about development. It’s because he may or may not be shagging a staff member. I suppose with six billion of us on the planet, one of us had to find the man attractive. Hard to believe, but I suppose if there’s one of them, there might be more. I look forward to a Boeing-like scandal, or maybe even shenanigans with the interns, in the near future.

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I swear, I’m going to rename this blog “Done, but with errors on page.” Seems I can’t actually finish a single fucking post without some fuck-stupid grammatical error creeping in. Will try to sweep some of these out. Apologies to those hooked up to Class Worrier’s syndication thingy, who will over the next couple of days be receiving updates that contain nothing new of any merit.

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It really wouldn’t work as food, but as music it’s deeevine. DK has cooked up a fearsome mix of Italian and Indian influences over at his Norwegian blog. Not only for drum and bass fans, but certainly only for folk with a fast connection. Sorry. Check it.

When you’ve had it up to your eyeballs with the pissfights that routinely mop up spare time on the Left, it’s always fun to be reminded that the Right aren’t immune to the occasional spat.

The background is that Narendra Modi, Chief Minister of Gujarat in 2002 when he orchestrated a pogrom in which more than 2000 Muslims were killed, hundreds of women and young girls raped, and over 200,000 rendered homeless, was planning a trip to the US. He has never been held to account for his part in these crimes. No one has. Instead, he has been lionised as a hero of Hindu nationalism and of his Bharti Janata Party. You can find out more about the background at the splendid Coalition against Genocide site here.

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Paul Wolfowitz is the U.S. nominee to head the World Bank, replacing ‘Jim’ Wolfensohn, who retires this year. The U.S. gets to pick the head of the Bank, the Europeans pick the head of the IMF, and it’s unlikely that the U.S. will brook any criticism of its annointed candidate.

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Ace flash movie of the moment available here. Best with sound.

Update
As part of Class Worrier’s week of revisionism, this post has been updated to include the killer facts that
1. This flash movie contains a text by Kim Il Jong on post-capitalist sex and
2. Ryan sent this my way.

Another considered verdict from Class Worrier this week: Tony Blair’s Commission for Africa is a bunch of wank.

Actually, it’s a great deal worse. It’s precisely the kind of unctious toss that we’ve expected to spurt from Labour’s glands. And, now that they’ve released this sticky little report, we can only hope that Blair will roll over, fart, and go to sleep. Not likely that he will though. More than anything, the Commission for Africa looks like it’s a manifesto for yet more fiddling about with Africa, once again in the name of ‘development’. Consider: Keep Reading »

Continuing a couple of themes from the previous post, I went to a fine talk today by the splendid David Moore. David bounced off the thoughts of E.M.Forster, from whose excellent What I believe the title of this post is taken, and which is well worth a read if you’ve not come across it. It’s the most eloquently qualified defence of democracy I’ve come across, smarter than it is objectionable.

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It’sYesterday was [ahem], international women’s day and, for good reasons, I was at the New Yorker’s Cartoon Bank searching for “tofu“. Give it a go, and you’ll not be unhappy. But search for “feminism” and you’re going to end up annoyed. Few of the results are by women (an endemic problem) and the ones that the New Yorker has are neither particularly feminist, nor – with perhaps this exception – particularly funny. Two years ago, there was an International Feminist Cartoon Exhibition and some fine drawing hit the net. Not this year which, judging by the quality of 2003’s entries, is a great shame. It’s not like Ann Telnaes is the only feminist cartoonist around.