A direct link to each entry is obtained by using the button below the entry.
Sunday, 31/8/2008:
20:58 - CLINTON SAID "END", REINFELDT HEARD "MEND":
The Swedish prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt said to Financial Times:
"The Swedish people want to have the Swedish model. The core for us is to be able to show we can manage, reform and develop the model in terms of the welfare state. I think Bill Clinton used the term ‘mend, not end’ welfare, and I think that is a very effective way of putting our agenda."
But Reinfeldt is wrong. Clinton used those words about another subject, where he didn´t accomplish anything:
"Affirmative action is good for America... Let´s mend, not end it..."
When it comes to welfare, where Clinton really made a huge impact by signing a bill that reduced welfare dependency and unemployment, he said something very different:
"...we will offer a plan to end welfare as we know it."
02:50 - SHCHTO DELAT?:
How do we react to a new authoritarian, aggressive Russia? One of my favourites on the subject, Edvard Lucas, just wrote a to-do list. Here is no. 6:
"Stop talking about ´Russia´ (except where journalistic convention demands it). These guys aren´t Russia. They are criminal gang of bullies, crooks and murderers who have hijacked Russia."
Friday, 29/8/2008:
23:13 - OBAMA´S OUTSOURCING:
What Barack Obama would say about his celebrity fans if they were a steel company or a car manufacturer.
22:51 - PIRAT-FRA:
Christian Engström noterar att vi i dag fick bekräftelsen på att FRA redan spanar på kabeltrafiken utan något om helst lagstöd, och Ny Teknik rapporterade häromdagen att FRA kan ha avlyssnat svenskars telefonsamtal genom ett samarbete med baltstaterna.
Det minsta vi kan begära innan riksdagen ger mer makt till FRA är en sanningskommission som utreder på vilka vis FRA har brutit mot lagen och vem som gav order om det. Som Thoreau konstaterade: Den som verkligen tror på lag och ordning är den som protesterar när staten bryter mot den.
15:04 - FRÅN DEN ENA SOFFAN TILL DEN ANDRA:
Jag missade det eftersom jag firade födelsedag och grubblade över livets större frågor, men via alltid påpasslige och saklige Andreas Bryhn ser jag att Petter Larsson i Aftonbladet avslutar sitt angrepp på moderaternas nya råbarkade integrationspolitik så här märkligt:
"Det känns förtvivlat länge sedan Bengt Westerberg marscherade ut ur TV-studion. Frågan nu är hur länge Birgitta Ohlsson, Johan Norberg och andra riktiga liberaler kan fortsätta stötta en moderatledd regering. När reser de sig ur soffan?"
Som Bryhn konstaterar reste sig undertecknad redan den 23 juni och för säkerhets skull stängde jag dörren efter mig den 15 juli.
Det enda Bryhn har fel i är att jag tackar för tillfället att leverera en straffsparksreplik i Aftonbladet. Någonting får man väl låta passera, någon gång, bara för att känna hur det känns.
Vad gör man förresten när man har rest sig ur soffan? Tja, det är ju inte som i forna tider då man bara fick lämna statskyrkan om man gick in i ett annat samfund, så den där andra soffan känns nog bekväm. Men om jag ska spekulera väldigt fritt: Om miljöpartiet går till val på att angripa regeringen om FRA-lagen, rysk statsgas i Östersjön och tvångsanslutning till a-kassan och sedan bara ger mig några symboliska eftergifter åt teknikvänlighet och marknadsekonomi (t ex genom att föreslå ett system för individuella fiskerättigheter eller kärnkraft och GMOs mot miljöförstöring) så skulle det kännas som en rätt kul proteströst.
14:55 - HÖGTIDSDRÄKT:
Karolina Ramqvist berömmer våra kycklingar som utmanade Arena till Kleindebatt häromkvällen. Och från en deltagare på tillställningen fick jag höra att kycklingarna var väldigt sympatiska och artiga. Vi fick inga svar men en klar indikation på att svensk debatt behöver fler upptåg i kul kostym.
(Karolina: Sedan nästan tre år jobbar jag inte på Timbro. Det var Voltaire som skickade frilanskycklingarna.)
14:21 - IRAN, EGYPT AND OTHER PRO-GLOBALISTS:
Some think that Muslim populations are hostile to the effect of trade and globalisation to their countries. But on the contrary, they seem more enthusiastic about it than Americans and Europe, according to a poll by WorldPublicOpinion.org in Egypt, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Iran, Indonesia, the Palestinian Territories, and among the Muslim population of Nigeria.
63 percent say that globalization - specifically economic integration - is good for their own countries, and only 25 percent think it is mostly bad. The enthusiasts are a plurality in all countries. A majority also think that international trade is good for the economy, consumers, companies and jobs.
One interpretation is that they know what the alternative to globalisation is and have suffered from it, whereas Europeans and Americans can dream.
11:37 - YES WE MUST:
"Yes, we must provide more ladders to success for young men who fall into lives of crime and despair. But we must also admit that programs alone can’t replace parents; that government can’t turn off the television and make a child do her homework; that fathers must take more responsibility for providing the love and guidance their children need."
Smålandspostens Marcus Svensson är en av försvinnande få försvarare av FRA-lagen i offentligheten. Nu senast hånar han Mark Klambergs uppfattning att många skeptiska riksdagsledamöterlurades att rösta ja (som känns självklar för alla oss som har hört ledamöter förklara att de inte begrep vad lagen och tilläggen innebar), och frågar vad det finns för vetenskapligt belägg för den.
Den inbjudan skulle han inte ha bjudit på: Klamberg svarar dräpande.
Thursday, 28/8/2008:
14:07 - MORE POVERTY - THE SAME POVERTY REDUCTION:
It took some time, but now the World Bank´s revised poverty figures 1981-2005 have been published, taking better purchasing power statistics into consideration - and introducing a new and higher povert line, $1.25 a day instead of $1.
The bad news is that the world is poorer than we thought, but the good news is that the world has been no less successful in reducing poverty than we thought. In other words, we had more people in poverty in 1981 than previously estimated but that number has been reduced by as much as previously estimated. Another way of putting this is that the decades before the 1980s were worse than we thought, but the decades since were just as good as we thought - and that´s important to keep in mind since at least Swedish radio presented this as if the number of poor increase dramatically right now.
The proportion in absolute poverty in developing countries 1981-2005 was reduced by half, from 52% to 26%. And despite an increase in world population by 2 billion, the number in absolute poverty was reduced by 500 million, from 1.9 to 1.4 billion. This means that 57.000 people have left extreme poverty every day since 1981. And the last decade has been the best one.
One word of warning though: This study does not cover the last two years when food prices increased dramatically, and poverty probably increased. We´ll have to wait for those figures.
Just like before we see dramatic regional differences. In globalised East Asia, poverty was reduced from 79 to 17 percent, in marginalised Sub-Saharan Africa it stayed around 50 percent the whole period (even though it has come down from 57.5% in 2006).
01:36 - AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT:
En bra artikel i Dagens Arena:Magnus Linton om nyktherhet och moralpanik.
01:16 - SELEKTIV POSTMODERNISM:
Som jag har noterat tidigare verkar flera av Jan Björklunds påståenden om krisen i skolan inte ha stöd i de undersökningar han åberopat sig på. Per Wirtén i Dagens Arena är rasande: Björklund har "nollkoll", "har bluffat", är på gränsen mellan "slarvfel, okunnighet och ren lögn" och måste avgå.
Helt okej för min del - om kravet hade kommit från vem som helst utom just den man som struntade i att Naomi Klein har fejkat belägg, förfalskat kronologier och lyft citat ur sitt sammanhang därför att det viktiga inte är "myllret av detaljer" utan att hon av dessa detaljer bygger en "sammanhängande berättelse" som är aptitlig.
Wirtén kritiserar inte Björklund för att berätta sagor, utan för att berätta fel sagor.
(Wirtén tillhör dem jag och Boris Benulic har utmanat på Kleindebatt i dag igen, eftersom ingen av dem har tackat ja.)
01:04 - HÄRSKARTEKNIKER 2.0:
Hur du vinner en debatt när du har fel. Mattias Svensson har hela listan med tips av typen "Varför är du så arg?" och "Jag har fått elaka mail".
Wednesday, 27/8/2008:
11:13 - NÄR (S) BLIR FÖR LIBERALT:
Vänstermannen och (s)-reklamfilmaren Roy Andersson anklagar numera socialdemokraterna för högeravvikelse och träder fram till sverigedemokraternas och Rysslands försvar i en intervju i Realtid.se.
10:37 - FRÅGAN ÄR VARFÖR LÖSNINGEN ALLTID ÄR FÖRBUD:
"Frågan är inte varför folk reser utan varför detta är tillåtet!"
- Kajsa Ekis Ekman recenserar Jenny Dielemans bok om turism i DN Kultur.
(Tack till min gode reskamrat Fredrik)
10:30 - KRIS PÅ UTBILDNINGSDEPARTEMENTET?:
Missa inte P1:s detaljerade granskning Kris i skolan? av Jan Björklunds påståenden om den svenska skolan, som tycks visa att det inte är så illa som han hävdat. Björklund svarar bitvis övertygande i Svenska Dagbladet i dag, men lämnar många påståenden obesvarare.
10:20 - MEANWHILE IN THE MODERATE STATE:
In the media, Saudi Arabia is often called a "moderate" Arab state just because it does not intend to wipe Israel off the map. This is the country where a male biochemistry teacher and a female student were just sentenced to a total of 950 lashes and 12 months in prison. Their crime: Academic advising over the phone, or in other words: An unsupervised contact between unrelated members of the opposite sex.
Tuesday, 26/8/2008:
19:29 - NEXT IN LINE FOR INDEPENDENCE?:
I don´t object to independence for South Ossetia and Abkhazia as such (even though I am surprised that so few mention that it comes as a result of the ethnic cleansing of Georgians). My primary objection is that Russia is just using this to destablise neighbours that choose another path.
If Russia´s new principle really were that ethnic groups should have their own state we should now look forward to independence for these groups that now live within Russian borders (number of people in parenthesis):
(From Wikipedia, only those over 100,000 included)
UPDATE 2008-08-29: A clever person who knows about these things just let me know that my figures above are absolutely useless since the concept of ethnicity in Russia has been changed and manipulated again and again for all sorts of reasons. I accept the argument and must admit that I have no idea what the real figures are. But whatever they are, they would cause Kreml tremendous problems if they really believe in the new principle they talk about.
14:43 - NO WAY:
I´ve been wondering why we haven´t seen any segways on the streets of Sweden. Stefan Fölster explains why:
The Swedish Road Administration decided to classify the segway as a moped. And when they saw that this new moped didn´t look like a moped it was immediately banned from the streets.
14:29 - THE CHINESE WAY:
As Clive Crook points out in Financial Times, Barack Obama has shown a lack of decisiveness by giving the convention stage to both Hillary and Bill Clinton - two people who are desperate to see him lose (so that Hillary gets a chance in 2012).
So how should he deal with the risks? Here is one good idea.
(Thanks Fredrik)
11:39 - OS PÅ GOTT OCH ONT:
I Dagens Industri (endast prenumeranter) skriver jag i dag om hur Peking-OS å ena sidan har inneburit ökad repression och å andra sidan en begynnande öppning av den kinesiska debatten.
11:34 - SVD HAR HELA LISTAN:
Centrum för rättvisa anger nio skäl till att FRA-lagen strider mot Europakonventionen.
Saturday, 23/8/2008:
10:30 - ETT STICKSPÅR I ARBETAREN:
I Arbetaren ställde Jens Stanislaus en svår fråga om FRA och liberalismen i dag, som vi liberaler har all anledning att grubbla över. Men innan den hann sjunka in förde David Munck in debatten på ett stickspår. Stanislaus hade nämnt mig så Munck visar med några citat från när jag var 20 år att jag är en farlig tänkare och varnar för att jag vill monopolisera FRA-motståndet.
(Jag såg att artikeln redan publicerats via Andreas Bryhn, som kommenterar välvilligt.)
Thursday, 21/8/2008:
23:59 - HE WAS THINKING OF HIS PERSONAL ECONOMY:
Now we learned what John McCain meant when he said that he still needed to be educated about the economy.
18:15 - CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN?:
Sometimes the most trivial ideas sound extraordinary if the right person express them. Just listen to this:
“We can’t give people so much security with their income that it affects their willingness to work. We can have equality in access to education and health but not in equality of income. ... We can’t have a situation where it is not work that gives access to goods”
Not that dramatic - if it wasn´t for the fact that it was said by Alfredo Jam in the economics ministry in one of the world´s last centrally planned economies, Cuba. Jam also told Financial Times that the Cubans are "over-protected” and refuse to work in important sectors like agriculture, construction and manufacturing because of the lack of incentives.
2005 sedan sände SVT dokumentärfilmen "Välfärdsmysteriet". Man frågade folk när de trodde att den svenska välfärden var bäst och välfärdsstaten var som mest generös och nostalgin tindrade i ögonen på männen på gatan när de svarade 50-tal, 60-tal, 70-tal eller 80-tal. Programmets producent Pär Fjällström tog då fram siffrorna som visade att det aldrig hade satsats så mycket som just exakt när programmet gjordes.
Enligt Svenska Dagbladet har Sveriges kommuner och landsting nu gjort en rapport med samma titel och de säger sig vara mycket överraskade över resultatet, "Den allmänna bilden har ju varit att de här välfärdstjänsterna tagit mycket stryk, dragits ned och tvingats spara", som ordförande Anders Knape konstaterar. Studien visar emellertid att utgifterna för vård, skola och omsorgsområdena har ökat med i snitt 50 procent sedan 1980. Bara 12 procent av ökningen beror på demografiska förändringar. Resten är helt enkelt mer pengar.
Ändå hävdar alla att samtliga fel och brister beror på för lite resurser. Och vad säger SKL själva? You´ve guessed it: Att kommuner och landsting behöver ett par miljarder till nästa år för att upprätthålla kvaliteten...
Wednesday, 20/8/2008:
21:40 - FRÅN EN SOM GÅTT VARVET RUNT:
"Jag får ibland för mig att det är lite med libertarianer som med Kramer i ´Seinfeld´.
Folk som inte bryr sig särskilt mycket om ´Seinfeld´ gillar alltid Kramer, han är liksom nybörjartittarens favorit. Ju mer intresserade fansen blir, desto mer utvecklas deras smak – den typiska Seinfeld-fanatikern föredrar förstås scenerna med George eller Elaine. Men det finns också de riktigt hängvina, som gått varvet runt och lärt sig älska Kramer igen.
På samma sätt är det med politisk mognad och libertarianism"
- Martin Gelin övertygar i alla fall mig genom att både skriva klokt om libertarianism och genom att använda Seinfeld som metafor (via Mattias Svensson).
Tuesday, 19/8/2008:
14:19 - HOT OCH ANDRA OBEHAG:
Jag intervjuades nyss till en kommande webbdokumentär om FRA-debatten. Jag fick då en fråga om de "yttre hot" som FRA ska få spana på.
Mitt svar var att detta begrepp är ett nytt påhitt som gör att signalspaningen inte bara gör det möjligt att avlyssna fler, utan också för fler ändamål. Tidigare riktades underrättelsetjänsten mot "yttre militära hot", men nu talas det mer obestämt om "yttre hot", och med det avses lite blandade "påfrestningar" och "utmaningar" som regeringen tycker är obehagliga. I propositionen (sid 17) exemplifieras med:
"olika typer av försörjningskriser, ekologiska obalanser, miljöhot, etniska eller religiösa konflikter, stora flykting- och migrationsrörelser samt ekonomiska utmaningar i form av valuta- och räntespekulationer." (via Mark Klamberg)
"Anti-terrorlagen" vill de att den ska heta, men den ska alltså också kunna användas mot folk som rör sig och investerar över gränserna.
00:58 - BEST T-SHIRT TEXT EVER:
"Draft beer - not soldiers"
- Spotted on Roslagsgatan, Stockholm
00:09 - CHAMPIONS - BUT NOT OF FREE SPEECH:
Hosting the Olympic Games would make China more open claimed Chinese officials and the International Olympic Committee. One good sign by Chinese standards was that people would be allowed to stage protests in specific areas after applying for permission. BBC reports how this little experiment in democracy turns out:
77 applications have been sent in
74 were "withdrawn"
2 were "suspended"
1 was vetoed
0 approved
(Thanks Janerik)
Monday, 18/8/2008:
09:38 - SOVIET OUT OF RUSSIA:
So many people came to Saturday´s demonstration against Moscow´s agreession that the police asked us to move to another location across the street from the embassy. In my brief speech I tried to make the point that Russia´s actions against Georgia, Ukraine and Estonia is the logical result of the KGB/FSB takeover of the Russian government. As Russia becomes a brutal dictatorship again it will start to act like one.
And therefore our demand - with thanks to Lennart Nilsson - should be:
If you can, please join us outside Russia´s embassy in Stockholm, Gjörwellsgatan 31, tomorrow, Saturday, at 12.00, to protest against the forces that still think it´s 1956 or 1968.
Many worry about the death of gas stations in Sweden and some demand subsidies for stations in rural areas. Few mention that one reason might be that the government forces all gas station that sell more than 1,000 cubic meters to offer one alternative fuel no later than March 2009, even if no customer demands it. 60 percent of all gas stations are forced to an additional investment cost of around SEK 400,000 each - in effect a subsidy to the ethanol industry.
Rondal Reagan wouldn´t have been surprised by the discussion:
"Government´s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidise it."
11:38 - MISSA INTE:
Mattias Svensson skriver om den nya höger som tycker att diktatur är ett lågt pris att betala för hög tillväxt och full sysselsättning.
10:55 - HOW TO GAIN THE TRUST OF WHITE PEOPLE:
"If you plan to engage in lengthy conversations or get high with white people it is recommended that you read No Logo or one issue of AdBusters. Failing that, it is acceptable to buy a copy to leave on your coffee table. When white people see it, they will recognize you as someone who can see through the advertising and has a proper perspective on life.
When engaging in a conversation about corporate evils it is important to NEVER, EVER mention Apple Computers, Target or Ikea in the same breath as the companies mentioned earlier. White people prefer to hate corporations that don’t make stuff that they like.
Following these simple steps can help you gain the trust and respect of white people in a relatively short period of time."
If you wondered how South Ossetia was run before the war, here is The Economist´s description:
"South Ossetia is a tiny patchwork of villages—Georgian and South Ossetian—which was much easier to drag into a war [than Abkhazia]. It is headed by a thuggish former Soviet official, Eduard Kokoity, and run by the Russian security services. It lives off smuggling and Russian money. As Yulia Latynina, a Russian journalist, puts it, ´South Ossetia is a joint venture between KGB generals and an Ossetian gangster, who jointly utilise the money disbursed by Moscow for fighting with Georgia.´"
Thursday, 14/8/2008:
16:10 - MANIFESTATION MOT MOSKVA LÖRDAG 12.00:
Pressmeddelande 14 augusti 2008
Manifestation mot Kremls krigshandlingar
”Vi är beredda att göra vad som helst för att hindra Georgien och Ukraina från att gå med i Nato.”
- Sergej Lavrov, Rysslands utrikesminister
Rysslands krigshandlingar mot Georgien väcker oro och vrede.
Att en stormakt som hade demokratin inom räckhåll har valt att slå in på en auktoritär väg är en tragedi. Men att Moskva dessutom försöker undergräva demokratin i sina grannländer är ett brott. Ryssland har de senaste åren tagit till internetattacker, energiutpressning och handelsblockader för att förhindra flera f d Sovjetrepubliker att gå sin egen väg. Nu har det gått över gränsen till regelrätt krig.
Magasinet Neo arrangerar tillsammans med liberala ungdomsförbundet, centerns ungdomsförbund, kristdemokratiska ungdomsförbundet och moderata ungdomsförbundet i Stockholm en manifestation utanför Rysslands ambassad på Gjörwellsgatan 31 i Stockholm nu på lördag (16/8) kl 12.00. Alla som vill visa att de stödjer ryska demokratiska krafter och tar avstånd från Kremls försök att med våld undergräva grannländers strävan mot demokrati och internationellt samarbete är varmt välkomna att delta.
Bekräftade talare:
Gunnar Hökmark, Europaparlamentariker (m) och vice ordförande i EPP
Johan Norberg, författare
För mer information:
Sofia Nerbrand, chefredaktör och VD för magasinet Neo, 070-765 84 45
Magnus Andersson, förbundsordförande för CUF, 070-201 04 34
Anna Broman, förbundssekreterare för LUF, 0708-544 90 33
Tina Ghasemi, ordförande för MUF Stockholm, 073-682 80 50
10:53 - OM LAGEN THAT DARE NOT SPEAK ITS NAME:
Medan moderaternas fem-poäng-marknadsföring-from-hell Per Schlingmanns svar på FRA-kritiken är att döpa om lagen så pågår den seriösa diskussionen i bloggosfären. Missa för allt i världen inte Mark Klambergs återkommande och överlägset pedagogiska genomgångar om vad avlyssningen innebär. Som Svenska Dagbladet var förr, som HAX kallar Marks folkbildning.
FRApedia är som vanligt en utmärkt startpunkt för den som vill sätta sig in i frågan.
10:39 - GÖR EN NOTERING I KALENDERN:
Den som är oroad över att Putin ser ut att vilja göra det han har kallat "1900-talets största geopolitiska katastrof" ogjord (Sovjetunionens sönderfall) är hjärtligt välkommen att demonstrera mot Moskvas aggression mot grannländerna i Stockholm kl 12 på lördag. Jag kommer att återfinnas bland talarna. Mer information följer snart.
10:20 - HUNGER TARIFFS:
Higher food prices cause hunger in Sub-Saharan Africa. One problem is export restrictions, another is import restrictions. The agriculutral trade barriers within Africa are the highest in the world - the food tariffs are 33.6% on average, according to Thompson Ayodele from Nigeria (where rice tariffs are 55%).
10:12 - HUR MAN BLIR INVADERAD UTAN ATT SKADA MILJÖN:
"Man [försvaret] har t ex hjälpt till att införa ett nytt miljöledningssystem i Georgien. På så sätt ska den georgiska försvarsmakten tänka mer miljövänligt från försvarsledningsnivån till förbandsnivån."
- Försvarsminister Sten Tolgfors om hur Sverige hjälper hotade demokratier, vis SvD:s ledarblogg.
Wednesday, 13/8/2008:
14:01 - SCHLOCK DOCTRINE, PART III :
Here is the third part of my video dicsussion about Naomi Klein´s latest book. Now it is about the record of liberalisation.
And on that subject - since many ask - no one has yet responded to our challenge to a debate. But people might still be away on vacation.
"Today, even the farmers in remote areas have satellite TVs. So whenever they see an election, such as the one held in Pakistan recently, they may wonder why, even though we have approximately the same economic conditions, they can elect their top leaders, and we can’t even vote for the leader of a small county. I think a consciousness of political rights has increased more than anything."
- He Weifang, a professor of law at Peking University in an interesting article in New York Times about what has and has not changed in China. (Via Tom Palmer)
Tuesday, 12/8/2008:
23:32 - THE SPARE TIRE WAR:
It seems like we have seen the worst of the fighting between Georgia and Russia for now. But how did it start?
One of my Georgian friends, Gia Jandieri, tells us this story about how the negotiations failed, which is amazing if it´s correct:
To try to prevent the start of a war after small-scale fighting had taken place, one Georgian minister (I think it was Temur Iakobashvili) traveled to the administrative center of the South Ossetian separatists in Tshkinvali to meet with them and the Russian mediator Yuri Popov.
But the Georgian minister had to wait, and wait, and wait. After two hours he started to wonder where the others were. It turned out that Popov did not come to the meeting, and the reason given was that one of the wheels on his car was damaged and he could not continue his trip to Tshkinvali. And the separatists said that they refused to talk unless the Russians were present.
So the last hope for a peaceful solution collapsed because the Russians claimed that they could not find a spare tire, or another car. That night the war started.
22:12 - MEANWHILE IN SAUDI ARABIA:
The Saudi Arabian "Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice" has just discovered a new form of vice: Men attracting women by walking their dogs or cats in public. But don´t worry, the religious police in Riyadh has now promoted virtue by banning the selling of cats and dogs and walking them in public.
10:33 - NOTE TO WORLD:
If Russia has the right to invade countries to protect Russians living there, here are some of the countries that could be next in line (with the approximate number of ethnic Russian inhabitants taken from Wikipedia):
Ukraine: 8 million
Kazakhstan: 4.5 million
Latvia: 650,000
Moldova: 500,000
Estonia: 350,000
Lithuania: 220,000
Germany: 180,000
Britain: 100,000
Sweden: 9,000
10:06 - THE F-WORD:
Today I start writing my column in Dagens Industri (subscribers only) again after the summer break - every second Tuesday. In my first column I remind the readers that what we see in Georgia is just a continuation of a unilateral trade war with military means.
The conflict really started two and a half years ago when Russia tried to destroy Georgia´s export market by banning wine, mineral water and agricultural goods from there. And when Georgia expelled Russian diplomats suspected of spying, Russia responded by stopping all traffic, trains, flights, post and gas to Georgia. And Russian authorities began to harass ethnic Georgians in Russia and deport hundreds of them, and their businesses and shops were raided and destroyed. Police in Moscow even forced schools to give them lists of students with Georgian names for possible future use.
The racism and the attacks were so brutal that The Economist asked if it was time to use the f-word about Russia (fascism). Indeed. This is Putin´s Abyssinia.
Monday, 11/8/2008:
10:02 - ABOUT SOUTH OSSETIA:
My views below do not mean that I support the Georgian decision to try to regain South Ossetia by force. I think it was wrong, bad and destructive, and if the South Ossetians really want to go their own way, they should be allowed to do it. What I am saying is that this is not about South Ossetia. It is about Russia´s old attempt to destroy a small fast-growing, western-oriented democracy before others get the idea. Yes Georgian democracy is imperfect and President Saakashvili has shown unacceptable authoritarian tendencies. But yet, it is the most democratic country the region has probably ever seen. Of course it has to be destroyed.
As Russia´s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov has said:
"[W]e will do anything not to allow Georgia and Ukraine to join NATO.”
And here are some other things that should come to general attention before people consider this as a simple Georgian-South Ossetian conflict:
- At least 25 percent (some sources say up to 40%) of the inhabitants in South Ossetia are ethnic Georgians. They did not participate in the referendum in 2006 that was supposed to show that all South Ossetians want independence (99% of the voters) because that would have forced them to abandon their Georgian citizenship.
- Not all of South Ossetia was controlled by the separatist before the war. It was a confusing mixture, where most of the East and large parts of the South was controlled by Georgia. In these regions, 90% are said to have voted in an alternative referendum for reunification with Georgia.
- When Russia says that they just defend Russian citizens, it has to be pointed out that the reason they can say this is that Russia chose to give Ossetians Russian passports and citizenship (which meant that they could travel and get a Russian pension).
09:31 - WHAT THE EU SHOULD DO:
Russia continues to attack Georgia even after having taken back South Ossetia. Of course. This is not about South Ossetia - Putin would immediately destroy the Russian-controlled North Ossetians if they demandeed the same independence that the south wants, just like he destroyed Chechnya.
The Russian agenda is twofold: To humiliate Georgia to accomplish regime change, and to humiliate EU and the US, to show other potential trouble-makers in the region that there is no use in turing westward because they´ll never help you when things get rough.
So what can the EU do? First of all: Show the Russians that we don´t just look the other way. Germany´s chancellor Angela Merkel meets president Dmitry Medvedev on Friday. She and other European leaders should make clear that they refuse to discuss anything else with the Russian leaders than the war as long as bombs are raining down. If that doesn´t help, the EU should look at possibilities of freezing Russian assets abroad that might help them to wage war.
Would Putin and Medvedev respond by using the gas weapon? Let them. It´s the kind of weapon that can only be used once by turning it off. Now they use it all the time, as a threat that keeps the whole of EU in a state of fear and cowardice. Let´s call their bluff.
The declaration on the Georgia-Russia war by Poland and the Baltic states can be read here, and has been translated to Swedish by Magnus Andersson.
01:33 - AND SO ARE VOTERS:
"SIR – So, Britain’s Conservatives are adopting the fashionable ideas of behavioural economists and want to “nudge” people who are “fallible: lazy, stupid, greedy and weak; loss-averse, stubborn, and prone to inertia and conformism…poor decision-makers, often incapable of their own happiness” (Bagehot, July 26th). Someone should tell David Cameron that governments consist of the very same kind of people."
- Letter to The Economist by a gentleman named Ken Good, Los Angeles.
00:20 - UTAN KVALITETSKONTROLL:
Mattias Svensson läser etnologdocenterna Oscar Pripps och Magnus Öhlanders bok "Fallet Nogger Black" (Agora 2008) och hittar felaktiga citat, uteblivna referenser och försök att tillskriva bloggare de åsikter som framförs i kommentarfälten.
Friday, 8/8/2008:
14:03 - WAR:
When an Olympic Game opened in ancient Greece three runners were sent out from Olympia to participating cities to announce the beginning of a general truce. The games should take place in a peaceful atmosphere.
Someone must not have listened. War has broken out between Russia and Georgia, and for me, with lots of good friends in Georgia, it feels very close.
Obviously Russian interventions and cross-border provocations have made it difficult for Georgia to ignore South Ossetia, but I still think that Georgia should have worked much harder to reach a modus vivendi and focused on building prosperity and freedom for its own people. That would have been the way to make the South Ossetians interested in rejoining Georgia. Unfortunately, President Mikhail Saakashvili has been obsessed with a rapid unification.
But this is not really about Georgia or South Ossetia. This is about Russia´s leaders, and their hatred of a former republic that has chosen its own way. It´s a testing ground for a neo-aggressive foreign policy. Russia´s leaders are trying to see how far they can go without getting a clear response from the rest of the world. If the West lets them get away with attacks on Georgian territory, they have learned a very disturbing lesson.
13:10 - MALM MINNS:
Sofia Nerbrand avslöjar Stig Malms selektiva minne när det gäller hur Metall och resten av LO stoppade arbetskraftsinvandringen till Sverige.
On Reason TV I discuss Swedish myths and realities with Michael Moynihan. Look for the very quick handshake at the end of it. It´s hard to do a good handshake and be serious about it. We had to repeat this one at least five times to get one take where we didn´t laugh too hard.
Wednesday, 6/8/2008:
13:45 - NOPE:
No one of the reviewers Boris and I challenged could or wanted to debate Klein with me today, so there won´t be a radio debate this afternoon.
UPPDATERING 2008-08-12: Tack för alla svar som har strömmat in om hur jag ska göra. Det ska nog lösa sig framöver.
12:06 - FOLKRÖRELSER VS SOCIALT KAPITAL:
"Jag frågar professor Bo Rothstein i Göteborg, som i femton års tid har närstuderat det svenska föreningslivet.
–Det är lätt att skönmåla de svenska 1950- och 60-talen som en rosenröd demokrati där alla människor gick på möten i stora folkrörelser och var med och formade och byggde landet i en evinnerlig, diskursiv, demokratisk process. Men du kan också beskriva de där organisationerna som hierarkiska, patriarkala helvetesmaskiner dit folk gick för att lära sig veta hut.
Hoppsan!
Allt prat om ökad tillit och skolning i demokrati, då?
Bo Rothstein fnyser:
–Man lär sig också en jädra massa mygel! Nej, den romantiserade idén om folkrörelsernas inverkan på demokratin har skjutits i sank av forskningen.
Studier visar att föreningsmänniskor inte alls utmärker sig på något särskilt sätt. I en svensk undersökning sjönk tvärtom förtroendet för andra ju längre man varit föreningsaktiv."
- SvD:s Catarina Baldo Zagadou får höra oväntade sanningar om det svenska föreningslivet.
11:13 - NOT YET:
Since you ask: no, we have not heard from anyone that we challenged yesterday, but obviously they have the right to think about it and it´s also holiday season. However, if Studio Ett can get one of them to agree to a radio debate today, we will be on the air after 17.00.
Sörmlands Nyheter and SvD´s ledarblogg writes about our challenge, and Mattias Svensson comes close to promising to dress in a chicken costume and follow the reviewers around if none of them agree to debate us.
Tuesday, 5/8/2008:
09:57 - WE AWAIT YOUR RESPONSE:
The Swedish reviewers love Naomi Klein and her Shock Doctrine. So today, in a one-page advert in Metro (pdf, last page) Boris Benulic and I name seven of her reviewers and challenge them to a public debate about a book that we claim is a fraud.
One libertarian and one Marxist who believe that facts still matter on stage vs seven reviewers about the ideas, assumptions and evidence in a book that they praised. Preferrably at the Göteborg Book Fair in September, but they can choose the date, location and moderator, and Boris and I will arrange it all.
I just got back from my vacation in Provence. Trust me - their wine and cheese do not need any tariffs and subsidies to survive in the market. And yet, it is in the arch-protectionist country which has a president who in his role as EU chairman attacked the EU trade commissioner for being too free trade-oriented right in the middle of the trade negotiations.
button below the entry.
