EDITORIAL : THE INDEPENDENT. ie, IRELAND

Global events must keep us on our toes

TURMOIL in financial markets is a daily occurrence. Yesterday was different because the turbulence sprang from such an unusual source.

The Standard and Poor's credit rating agency gave a "negative" rating, not to some debt-burdened, misgoverned small country but to the rich and powerful United States. Yet the reason was simple and predictable. The US has a staggering public deficit. It is one of only three countries in the developed world -- the others being Ireland and Japan -- with a deficit of more than 10pc.

Both President Barack Obama and his Republican opponents in Congress recognise the need for dramatic action. Both propose budget cuts amounting to an astronomical $4 trillion. But they are divided on the timescale and the method of achieving the cuts. In particular, the Republicans dislike any proposal for tax increases.

No doubt a compromise will be reached. Any other scenario is too bleak. Yesterday in Washington, there was speculation that S&P had made its extraordinary move specifically with a view to achieving the political and fiscal objective of reducing the deficit to manageable proportions.

It is needless to labour the worldwide effects of America's difficulties, especially the dampener on prospects for a general and sustainable economic recovery.

It is harder to measure the likely effects of a concurrent, and ominous, European development: the advance of the True Finns party in the Finnish elections.

The True Finns opposed the Irish and Greek bailouts and object to the Portuguese bailout at present under negotiation. In this, they undoubtedly reflect not just a large section of Finnish public opinion but a popular view across the European Union. At home, with 19pc of the vote, they will probably form part of the next coalition government.

Their success owes a great deal to the dismal lack of political leadership everywhere in Europe. We have gone beyond the stage of a financial and economic crisis to a point where the common currency and the future of the EU itself are at risk.

In Ireland, we have to look to our own survival.

Events in Washington and Helsinki do not help. Taoiseach Enda Kenny calls on public servants to implement the Croke Park deal quickly and in full; Tanaiste Eamon Gilmore repeats the warning of further pay cuts if they fail to comply.

Their words should have extra force, and gain extra attention, because they are spoken against such a threatening background.  

Miscarriage scandal goes to very heart of humanity

DOCTORS make mistakes in diagnosis every day. Most can be rectified; some have harmful results; a few can be fatal. But one kind of misdiagnosis has a poignancy all its own. To hear from a doctor that "your baby is dead" must be unbearable for any pregnant woman.

Often, in the past, the doctor who gave them that news had got it wrong. In the last five years, in 16 Irish maternity units, there have been 18 cases of misdiagnosis in early pregnancy. A trawl back over a long period has found a further six.

Most of the babies were alive and healthy. The mistakes occurred because the doctors involved -- consultants or registrars -- could not detect a heartbeat. They were not required to seek a second opinion. But determined young women questioned the decisions and persevered with their pregnancies.

The story broke in June 2010, and the Health Service Executive set up an inquiry under Professor William Ledger. His report was published yesterday, and it is to the credit of the HSE that it has appeared within a relatively short space of time. It has also done well to issue an unequivocal apology and to give an assurance that there will be second scans once sufficient people are trained.

But it contains less comforting sections. Progress appears wretchedly slow on support services for families. These should be a priority on a subject so basic and so emotional. This scandal goes to the heart of humanity.

  

EDITORIAL : THE AUSTRALIAN, AUSTRALIA

Middle East shames inner west

GREENS have much to learn from Marrickville's meddling.

Chutzpah, in the true Hebrew meaning of the word, is not the admirable sort of audacity for which we tend to use the word now. Real chutzpah, it is said, is the sort of impertinence that sees a man accused of murdering his parents beg for mercy on the grounds that he's an orphan. So the term is apt to describe the brazen way the Marrickville Council, in Sydney's inner west, has gotten above its station by implementing an economic boycott against Israel.

Section 51 (xxix) of the Australian Constitution makes it very clear that the federal parliament is responsible for foreign policy or, in the jargon of the time, "external affairs". The local government authority upon which councils such as Marrickville exist is not even mentioned in the Constitution. These are the cold, hard facts that underscore the absurdity of the council and its Greens Mayor, Fiona Byrne, attempting to play their jaundiced role in Middle East power politics. The council's support for BDS (boycott, divest and sanctions) action against Israel has been condemned by the national leadership of the Greens, the Labor Party and the Liberals. Yet even as she prepares to tear down her metaphorical wall against Israeli infiltration, Ms Byrne continues to argue that her council has a role to play in resolving the intractable dilemmas of international relations. As Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd pointedly put it, she might first concentrate on collecting the garbage and looking after the parks and gardens. Mr Rudd succinctly described this provincial excursion into the heady realms of foreign policy as "just plain nuts".

While this affair seems ripe for satire, there are serious issues at play. The persistent inconsistency between Ms Byrne, Greens federal leader Bob Brown and senator-elect Lee Rhiannon demonstrates a shambolic policy development apparatus within a party now in a powerful alliance with the Gillard Labor government. Senator Brown needs urgently to assert leadership on foreign policy issues and eliminate the loopy anti-Israel sentiment from his ranks. The Labor Party, unfortunately, is not blameless, with four of its councillors having backed the BDS move. When the council votes to overturn the policy, they intend to put this right, but Julia Gillard must ensure that her party's strong support for Israel is not compromised again by such jejune antics from elected officials.

Never a defence for sex abuse

EXISTING law enforcement should handle new allegations.

Sexual abuse can have a lasting and debilitating impact on victims who, for various reasons, can take many years to comprehend the full repercussions of their trauma or summon the fortitude to seek legal redress. So, given the widespread publicity about the Australian Defence Force Academy Skype-sex scandal, it is hardly surprising that allegations of previous sex-abuse incidents in defence force institutions have come to light. Defence Minister Stephen Smith clearly expected this development when his initial announcement of a series of inquiries into the ADFA incident and defence force culture included the appointment of an independent legal team to examine fresh allegations and recommend ways to deal with them.

Since then we have seen increasingly detailed allegations made public and lawyers have reported an increase in inquiries from people contemplating legal action. Mr Smith has admitted the Commonwealth could be liable for compensation claims and he has flagged the possibility of a judicial review of one kind or another to consider these complaints. There also is potential for these processes to investigate allegations of non-sexual abuse through the bastardisation practices that have dogged Defence for years. Certainly, any victims of abuse deserve to have their allegations tested so they can seek justice and, if appropriate, receive compensation. Every effort should also be made to pursue offenders and seek criminal or military convictions. The Australian believes appropriate penalties for any perpetrators will be important to provide comfort for the victims and confidence within the defence forces and broader community about serious attempts to rectify any cultural shortcomings. The minister has not ruled out a royal commission and he is probably right to leave all options on the table until he has seen preliminary assessments of some of the allegations.

However, given the potential for such an inquiry to be distracting and morale-sapping for the defence forces, it should be contemplated only if there is a demonstrable need. The current inquiries examining processes and cultural issues ought to deal sufficiently with any entrenched problems. Claims of rape and sexual abuse, if true, would constitute crimes that can be investigated and prosecuted under existing legal mechanisms.

Unions an early-warning device for Labor leaders

PM must address the workers' backlash on carbon tax.

Paul Howes is as ambitious as he is young, but the national secretary of the Australian Workers Union is finding a way to eat humble pie when required. Mr Howes took a while to hear the message from the shop floor, but his call for steel to be exempt from the carbon tax suggests he is now reading the mood of his members.
There is self-interest in Mr Howes's intervention: it shores up his own standing within his union to take the fight to government. But Julia Gillard and her Climate Change Minister should listen to the messages coming from union members, many of whose jobs depend on coal-based energy production. They know that a carbon tax imposed on trade-exposed industries will filter down through costs -- and potentially job losses -- to workers. They understand that while Greg Combet can promise some households will be better off under his plan to compensate for electricity rises, it won't be much use if the breadwinners don't have jobs.

A market-based price mechanism -- which is Labor's ultimate aim -- will be the most efficient way to reduce carbon emissions. The call from the AWU leader to protect steel production has focused the mind of a government that today must sit down with big companies and convince then the tax won't hurt their viability. Mr Howes could be doing the Prime Minister a real favour in the long run. His statements remind us of an earlier era when unions were a useful sounding board for Labor administrations, tapping into the cost-of-living concerns of working Australians. Such shop-floor intelligence is even more vital these days when Labor is losing touch with its base. The government faces a big task to convince Australians of the value of its tax. The public consensus for action is under strain as voters begin to worry that they could be affected by a reduction in Australia's international competitiveness. A carbon tax is no longer an abstract concept but a real impost that could lead to an increase in prices, a message reinforced by food and grocery producers, who have joined miners to argue that jobs, living conditions and investment in local industries are at risk. The high dollar is not helping, with manufacturers anxious a carbon tax will make imports even more attractive.

Mr Howes and his union are powerful players: the union's support was crucial to Ms Gillard's success in moving against Kevin Rudd last year. Mr Howes had earlier backed the ill-conceived original mining tax, judging his members would embrace a proposal that was framed in class-warfare terms as a "super-profits resources tax". He, like Wayne Swan, was wrong about that tax, underestimating the ability of his members to see that hitting mining could damage their jobs in the sector. They failed to see that a campaign by the big mining companies would gain traction with voters.

It seems Mr Howes has learnt his lesson, and is taking a very public stance on behalf of his members, recognising that attacking the "big polluters" without understanding commercial realities could harm ordinary people. The ball is in the court of former union leader Mr Combet. His task is to carefully calibrate a carbon price that balances the interests of big companies and households in a policy that will genuinely reduce emissions.

EDITORIAL : THE DAILY NATIONAL POST, CANADA

Municipalities need support to do the job

Canadians understand something Jack Mintz doesn't: Cities matter. Mintz suggests that the federal government has no place in Canada's cities. When I talk to Canadians, I hear differently: they want all governments working together to create jobs, to grow the economy and to protect our high quality of life.

Until recently, federal and provincial governments largely ignored cities and communities, except when it was convenient to balance their books by downloading responsibilities. These new responsibilities pushed municipalities to the tipping point, where responsibilities outstripped revenues and cities were forced to balance their budgets by reducing infrastructure investments. The result: a crippling $123 billion municipal infrastructure deficit, and an erosion in the foundation of our economy's competitiveness -core local infrastructure and services that we rely on to reduce congestion, to support affordable housing and to keep our streets safe.

Municipalities need support to get the job done and are looking to parties in this election to talk about their vision for cities and communities. All parties have made welcome and significant commitments: for example, the NDP and Liberals have each made new funding commitments to cities and communities worth billions in the next two years. All parties have committed to working with municipal and provincial governments to develop a longterm plan to fix the municipal infrastructure deficit and build the cities and communities Canadians expect, and our economy needs to stay competitive. We look forward to getting on with it, with the new government and indeed all parliamentarians, starting on May 3.

Hans Cunningham, president of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, Ottawa Jack Mintz has needlessly attacked our cities and communities. No matter how big or small, our cities are the places where we raise our families and they are the engines of the Canadian economy. From the schools we attend, to the parks and arenas we visit, to the roads, buses and trains that we take to work, these are the real, tangible things that determine the quality of life of all Canadians.

Our cities and towns are under increasing pressure to invest in infrastructure and services while keeping property taxes under control. In 2004, a federal Liberal government recognized this challenge and proudly committed to transfer $2 billion annually in gas-tax revenue directly to Canadian cities and communities.

The Liberal party believes more must be done to support our municipalities, not less. While Stephen Harper and Jack Mintz think the priority should be giving billions of dollars in tax breaks to the largest corporations in the midst of a $56-billion deficit, a Liberal government would make a different choice, we would invest in families and partner with our municipalities to invest in priorities such as education, health care, affordable housing, public transit and the improvement of local infrastructure.

John McCallum, Liberal candidate for Markham-Unionville, Ont.

It is time that government was considered subordinate to taxpayers, not the other way around. We don't need mayors to tell us how much another level of government "owes" them. It's our money and our responsibility. If municipalities need more money, they can raise taxes and see what that does at the ballot box. Similarly, if other levels of government have too much money, it's our responsibility to remedy that.

There is the issue of urban deterioration due to inadequate funding and/or attention. It is unlikely that the situation is the same in all urban municipalities, but it is an argument which has merit.

Then there is the issue of who is best positioned to address any urban deficiencies and how this is to be funded. How many elected municipal officials have anything in their background that would remotely prepare them for management of utilities? Are they skilled in waterworks? Do they have engineering backgrounds in construction of sewers? How about roads and bridges? They appear to endorse public transportation. Have any of them ever driven a bus, subway or streetcar? There is an element of management philosophy embraced by business schools that if you can manage, you can manage anything. Is there something similar about politics?

The planning and development of physical properties of municipalities are well beyond the capabilities of the vast majority of successful municipal politicians. If our municipalities are deteriorating due to neglect, this is a reflection of the manner in which they have been managed. It's time that some agency was developed with responsibility for municipal physical assets -probably at the provincial level of government -where expertise consistent with the requirements of the task may be developed with a minimum of duplication. Municipal politicians might then be more fully engaged with the tasks for which they are qualified.

My figures were from Calgary website

Jack Mintz replies: Mayor Nenshi is refreshingly open to debate and discussion, which is a highly appreciated. No doubt he makes a great mayor doing that. If he agrees with me that cities should get their own funding and be politically accountable to their own electorate, then we are on the same page.

Given that municipalities are creatures of the province, it is my view that a province should be dealing with municipal affairs. The federal government should not, except in those areas of federal jurisdiction. That is why I caution against federal transfers to municipalities that extend beyond federal responsibilities. It has not worked well in some federations like Brazil.

As for my figures on the increase in Calgary's property tax, I lifted those from the City of Calgary website: www.calgary. ca/portal/server.pt/gateway/PTARGS_ 0_0_104_0_0_35/http%3B/content.calgary.ca/CCA/City+Hall/Business+Units/ Finance+and+Supply/Property+tax/ Statistical+data/Tax+Levy.htm

If Mayor Nenshi is now convinced that he should no longer plead for federal GST revenue, I am even that much happier coming to Calgary, which is a great city for sure.

The $10-billion gap

I was thrilled when Jack Mintz moved to Calgary, and I am looking forward to outstanding things from the new School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary. It's clear that Dr. Mintz is really enjoying himself in our great city, with all its amazing services and endless vistas under a big Prairie sky, not to mention the incredible cultural scene. What else but urban distraction could explain how he manages to get nearly every number wrong in his muddled and messy piece published last Wednesday?

Let's start with the facts: Mintz suggests that between 2005 and 2010 Calgary increased its property tax an average of 8.3% annually. False. The city's share of the property tax rose an average 6.5% during this period. Since these figures include one extraordinary year when the province ceded (and the city accepted) some tax room, it may be fair to look at the combined provincial and municipal property tax rate. That rose by an average of less than 5% annually -all while Calgary's population increased by 115,000 people. Five per cent annually is, in fact, quite close to the rate of municipal inflation plus population growth.

Mintz states that local government spending increased 55% between 2000 and 2009, which is higher than the total of all governments. I can't speak to all governments, but I can speak to Calgary. It's true that our operating expenditures increased significantly over this time period -as did our population and inflation during the boom. However, so did the spending of the government of Alberta; indeed, we were almost in lockstep. It seems that his characterization of "bloated municipal governments" needs a bit more nuance.

Mintz further states that Calgary has "warned it will need to raise property taxes by almost 25% in the next three years." Also false. The closest I can come to figuring out what he's talking about is a PowerPoint slide that highlights various scenarios for Calgary's operating budget, ranging from a three-year tax freeze to a very large increase that no one wants. Nothing has been advocated or warned of.

Although Mintz glosses over the difference between capital and operating expenses, this is the heart of the argument cities are making. We'll handle our operating costs and service delivery, even with the horrible, regressive, inelastic property tax as our main source of revenue.

Capital, though, is a whole other matter. In Calgary, we have somewhere between $6-billion and $10-billion in infrastructure needs -from fixing roofs to building new roads and LRT lines. Mintz criticizes our council for "splurging" on building a $25-million bridge. Fine. I agree. The prior council should not have done that. That leaves us with $9.975-billion to go. Next?

The numbers are this: Calgary's total operating budget for 2010 was $2.5-billion. Of that, our total property tax take was about $1.2-billion. A single new LRT line costs between $1-billion and $3-billion. So, no matter how much waste is cut (and we are cutting waste, believe me), it's impossible to fund these kinds of investments with only the property tax.

He also argues that taxpayers in smaller cities and rural areas should not fund infrastructure in larger cities. One could argue that, in fact, they should. Cities do form the economic heart of the country and are where growth happens. People in smaller centres use services in big cities far more than the reverse. But this is the reddest of red herrings.

In fact, Calgary taxpayers send over $10billion a year more to Ottawa than we get back in the sum total of all federal services. This is the true fiscal imbalance in the country. So, to turn Mintz's question on its head, why should the people of Calgary pay for services in Belleville or Halifax?

What mayors are asking for is not a tax grab but a rebalancing. The services that cities provide -police, fire, clean water, roads, transit, recreation, parks -are the ones that Canadians use every hour of every day. Yet they are provided by the level of government with the least ability to pay for the infrastructure needed to provide them. Worse, we can engage in a never-ending game of buck-passing, since we have divorced the responsibility for services from the authority to pay for them.

I'm asking that we fix the system so that I can take full credit, or blame, for providing the infrastructure and paying for it. On that, I think Dr. Mintz and I agree.

Everyone benefits from TFSAs

A sleeper in the upcoming federal election is the Conservative proposal to double contribution limits for Tax Free Savings Accounts, once the deficit is eliminated.

The left is opposed to this, with some suggesting "caps" be imposed on contributions so the "rich" will not make undue tax-free gains. What critics don't seem to comprehend is how more TFSA room equally benefits the poor and middle class.

Those who think the TFSA overly "generous" clearly don't realize how mercilessly investors are taxed, when you add income tax to taxes on investment income, property taxes and ultimately consumption taxes. Mercer partner Malcolm Hamilton says saving outside tax shelters is "futile" because of the twin evils of tax and inflation.

Having toted up all my T-3 slips for my 2010 taxes, I agree it's futile holding interest-bearing instruments outside RRSPs or TFSAs. And while Canadian dividends generate a dividend tax credit this is partly negated by the requirement to "gross up" the dividend income received: a tax on phantom income.

To appreciate the benefits of more TFSA room, let's examine how investment income is taxed outside tax shelters. Worst case is the fixed-income investor in top tax brackets (which could very well be today's risk-averse seniors). We'll assume, however, someone still working, whose last dollar earned is taxed at 46%.

Let's say this person wants to invest $5,000 in a GIC paying interest (if you can get it) of 4% a year. To come up with that much capital in the first place, this person must earn $9,259, paying $4,259 income tax.

Even the most ardent socialist must admit this person has "done her bit" in supporting the welfare state. After earning $9,259, she gave up almost half to income tax. In a fair world you'd think the remaining $5,000 would be hers to allocate as she sees fit. Indeed, if she splurged the remaining $5,000 on a cruise or a large-screen home theatre system, beyond upfront consumption taxes, Ottawa would not dare "tax" the resulting enjoyment.

But that's exactly what it does if instead of consuming, this person chooses to save or invest. Watch what happens over time if the after-tax $5,000 is invested in a bond or GIC. After a year, at 4%, this yields $200 in interest. Remember, if the original $9,259 had not been subject to income tax, this person would have been able to invest the whole amount in the bond and it would have paid $370.36 in interest every year rather than $200. So when she paid that income tax to come up with the original capital, she not only lost the $4,259 on income tax but also the extra $170.36 per year the investment would have yielded if the whole amount could have been put to work.

It gets worse. Not content with the upfront tax and the confiscation of the extra interest that might have been earned, the $200 of annual interest that remains is taxed in this case at the same 46% tax rate. That's another $92 of tax paid on capital acquired in the first place with after-incometax dollars. So our investor each year nets just $108 of interest on an investment that would have yielded $370.36 in a world without tax.

But this still isn't the end, since you must also consider the hidden tax of inflation. As Hamilton puts it, "even the $108 of interest the saver keeps after paying tax first on employment income and then on interest income is entirely bogus." At 2% inflation, $100 of the $108 simply compensates the saver for the loss in the purchasing power of the $5,000 invested. "So at the end of the day, the reward for saving the $5,000 versus spending the $5,000 is $8 per annum after tax and inflation: hence the futility of saving outside tax shelters."

Even then, Ottawa isn't finished taxing. At some point the paltry sum that remains will be spent, at which 13% HST will be levied.

When TFSAs were first floated, the C.D. Howe Institute suggested the more descriptive term, Tax Prepaid Savings Plan or TPSP. In our example, the investor "pre-paid" tax of $4,259. After that, the investor has a fighting chance to grow her capital with what remains: she becomes like our cruiser or TV watcher: she's no longer taxed on her enjoyment of her remaining capital.

Yes, the affluent would also benefit from higher TFSA limits, but for the rich the proposed $10,000 a year maximum contribution is a drop in the bucket. For the middle class, TFSAs are an absolute boon: last week's columns showed how almost any full-time worker can save $2,000 a year, which if saved in a TFSA would generate more than $2-million by retirement age.

As a final blessing, when you withdraw money from TFSAs in old age, it won't result in clawbacks of the Guaranteed Income Supplement (for the elderly poor) or Old Age Security benefits (for middle-income seniors). This is a benefit unavailable to the "rich," who won't be drawing either OAS or GIS.

A museum that Canadians support

 

As the National Post reported earlier this month, Michael Marrus, professor emeritus of Holocaust studies at the University of Toronto, is skeptical of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights being built in Winnipeg. "This is supposed to be a human rights museum and it has started off by being highly divisive," he told the Post. "The only thing they can do is to start all over. I am despairing of the whole thing."

It is most unfortunate that Mr. Marrus would take this position. The very fact that he believes the museum "started off by being highly divisive" shows that he is unaware of how long this project has been in development, and the kind of grassroots support it always had.

The museum was first conceived over 11 years ago and was announced publicly on April 17, 2003, by my father, the late Israel Asper, who invested $22-million of his own money to support its development. Prior to that time, detailed presentations had been made to several ethnic and human-rights groups to ensure that they understood the project and endorsed it. After the announcement of the museum, these groups wrote enthusiastically to Jean Chrétien to express their full support for the project. This includes many aboriginal groups whose human rights stories are still being told and resolved, francophone organizations, ethnic groups whose communities had faced discrimination in Canada, as well as groups representing the disabled, women, gays and lesbians, labour and many more.

Over the past eight years, the Friends of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights have made over 1,500 presentations to individuals, groups and corporations to explain the museum and raise funds to build it.

The museum has been brilliantly designed by world-renowned museum developer Ralph Appelbaum & Associates, creators of dozens of awardwinning museums around the world. Although this is a national federal museum, which would normally re-ceive all of its funding from the federal government, Ottawa is contributing less than a third of the capital costs of $310-million. We sought and received support for the museum from the city of Winnipeg, province of Manitoba and over 6,000 donors from around the world who have contributed $130million toward a $150-million privatesector campaign goal.

There has been virtually no acrimony among the dozens of groups who understand the museum's objectives, mostly because they are excited that something, for the first time in Canadian history, is actually being done to explore their human-rights stories. This is something which is being celebrated, and is in fact greatly appreciated, notwithstanding Mr. Marrus' comments.

There will always be one or two groups that are determined to undermine a project such as the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, but they are few and far between. Of course, if we had received negative reactions from everyone with whom we spoke back in 2002, the Asper Foundation would have proceeded to simply continue taking Canadian students to Washington for its nationally recognized Human Rights & Holocaust Studies Program. My father certainly had better things to do with his time and money than waste them on something no one wanted.

Canadians can be assured that this museum will open and provide a transformational journey, starting in 2013. I think that all the Canadians who have supported this museum so far should be proud of what they will be creating for future generations.

? Gail Asper is a member of the board of trustees of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights.

EDITORIAL : THE NEW YORK TIMES, USA

The Court and Global Warming

The case about global warming scheduled to be argued on Tuesday before the Supreme Court is a blockbuster. Eight states — from California to New York, plus New York City — sued six corporations responsible for one-fourth of the American electric power industry’s emissions of carbon dioxide.

Rather than seeking money or punishment for the defendants, they seek what everyone should agree is the polluters’ responsibility: abatement of their huge, harmful part in causing climate change. The purpose is not to solve global warming or usurp the government’s role in doing so. It is, rightly, to get major utilities to curb their greenhouse-gas emissions before the government acts.

Because there is no federal regulation of this problem in force, it is fortunate that there is a line of Supreme Court precedents back to 1901 on which the plaintiffs can build their challenge. When this lawsuit began seven years ago, one of the defendants’ main defenses was that, because the Clean Air Act and other laws “address” carbon dioxide emissions, Congress has “legislated on the subject” and pre-empted the suit. The pre-emption claim was spurious when they made it and remains spurious now.

Seven years ago, neither Congress nor the Bush administration showed interest in pushing comprehensive laws or rules to curb these gases. Since then, the Environmental Protection Agency has found that greenhouse gases endanger public health as “the primary driver” of climate change and has regulated vehicle emissions.

But the electric power industry is working to scuttle this regulation, with the help of the Republican-controlled House. In court, the industry pushes for letting the E.P.A. regulate. On Capitol Hill, it tries to torpedo that authority.

For the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, two Bush appointees (one by the father, the other by the son) held that the prospect of regulation by the federal government is not enough to make this lawsuit go away. What the judges noted remains incontestable today: “E.P.A. does not currently regulate carbon dioxide” by requiring “control of such emissions” from existing power plants.

The judges reviewed five other major statutes that directly address the issue of climate change, beginning with the National Climate Program Act of 1978 a generation ago and running through the Energy Policy Act of 2005 passed while this lawsuit was under way.

They use italics to devastating effect, noting that these laws call for assessments, data collection, forecasts, improvements in understanding and all manner of other ground-laying efforts, but not one concrete action “to regulate greenhouse gas emissions in any real way.”

Yet the failure of the federal government to act, which has gone on for many years, doesn’t mean the plaintiffs must wait until it does. As the Second Circuit writes, they “may seek their remedies under the federal common law,” including made by justices. The Supreme Court has upheld a lawsuit preventing the discharge of sewage that made the Mississippi River unfit. It has upheld limits of noxious emissions of sulfur from copper foundries in Tennessee that were destroying Georgia forests. There are other clear-cut precedents.

The appellate court’s opinion closes by paraphrasing a Supreme Court opinion from almost 40 years ago. New federal regulation may pre-empt the federal common law of nuisance, but, until then, federal courts are empowered to address the public nuisance caused by major, undisputed and destructive sources of greenhouse gases.

Iceland’s Way

In the go-go years leading up to the financial crisis, Iceland’s banks were hugely irresponsible, luring foreign depositors with high interest rates and putting the money into risky loans. When Iceland’s big banks went under in 2008, they were 10 times as big as the country’s economy.
The government of Iceland failed to rein in bankers’ excesses. But its refusal to take on bank debts, forcing creditors to take losses and share in the pain, looks increasingly smart as Iceland’s economy begins to recover.
The European Union and the International Monetary Fund — their bailouts of Greece and Ireland were designed to make creditors whole — should learn from Iceland’s example. As they negotiate a rescue for Portugal, they should realize that taxpayers cannot bear the entire cost of the banks’ misdeeds.
The government of Iceland wasn’t intentionally daring or smarter than others. It couldn’t afford to bail out its banks, so it let them fail. It transferred domestic deposits and loans, at a discount, into new banks, with some $2 billion in money from taxpayers. And it left the banks’ foreign assets and foreign debts behind. Some foreign creditors could get as little as 27 cents on the euro.
Britain and the Netherlands have pushed Iceland to cover about $5.8 billion lost by British and Dutch depositors when the bank Landsbanki went belly up in 2008. (The British and Dutch governments reimbursed their citizens in anticipation of Iceland paying up.)
Iceland twice agreed to those demands, despite the fact that the amount is about 45 percent of its gross domestic product. Iceland’s taxpayers refused to go along. In a referendum last week, voters rejected a deal for the second time.
Iceland has felt considerable pain. Its currency lost half of its value against the euro in 2008. A $2 billion loan from the I.M.F. managed to stave off a complete meltdown, but the economy still shrank 7 percent in 2009 and the unemployment rate quadrupled. Government debt is expected to peak at about 100 percent of G.D.P. this year — up from 42 percent three years ago.
Britain and the Netherlands are suing Iceland before the court of the European Free Trade Association for failure to pay its debts. And there is talk in London and The Hague about further punishment, including possibly stalling Iceland’s application to join the European Union.
Still, it is pulling through. The I.M.F. expects it to grow 2.5 percent this year. Unemployment is falling. Compare its case to Ireland, where the government put the banks’ debts on the shoulders of taxpayers. Its economy shrank at least as much as Iceland’s, and it is recovering more slowly. The I.M.F. expects Ireland’s debt to peak at 125 percent of G.D.P. in two years. That looks optimistic.
As investors recover confidence, insurance on Icelandic government debt is cheaper than that on debt from Ireland, Greece or Portugal.

Real Prisoners, Phantom Residents

The New York State Legislature took a stand for electoral fairness last year when it banned prison-based gerrymandering, the cynical practice of counting prison inmates as “residents” to pad the population of legislative districts. The new law required that inmates be counted as residents of their home districts.

State lawmakers who are at risk of losing political clout are predictably eager to turn back the clock. They have challenged the law in court. The common sense case against prison gerrymandering is two-fold. Prisoners who cannot vote or move freely in a community can hardly be said to be residents there. Prisoners typically return to their real home, often hundreds of miles away, the moment they are released.

This lawsuit is all about self-interest. The lead plaintiff is State Senator Elizabeth Little, whose upstate district contains 11 state correctional institutions, one federal prison and an estimated 12,000 inmates. According to an analysis by the Prison Policy Initiative, a research group based in Massachusetts, Senator Little’s current district is one of seven in New York that meet federal population requirements by counting inmates as residents.

Senator Little wrongly argues that the state is constitutionally required to count inmates as “residents” because the census counts them there. But New York’s Constitution allows the state to use other information as well and states clearly that a person cannot be assigned a new home address simply because he or she is serving a prison sentence.

Many county governments with large prisons, including counties represented by Senator Little, have emphatically rejected the strategy of counting inmates as “residents.” Those governments rightly determined that the practice unfairly inflated the voting power of towns with prisons while diluting the power of others. Given the facts, the court should have an easy time dismissing this suit.

What Stories These Lice Can Tell

Were there many bird and mammal species while dinosaurs still lived? Or did they diversify only after dinosaurs were wiped out some 65 million years ago? The fossil record hasn’t been much help answering this fundamental question. But a study published recently in the Royal Society’s Biology Letters may have found an answer based on a different kind of fossil: fossilized lice.

Imagine a louse not as a repulsive human pest (this may take some doing) but as a scientific marker of sorts. Lice reproduce quickly, and they tend to co-evolve with the species they infest, adapting to fit one kind of host. This means that a wide variety of lice presupposes a wide variety of hosts. Using genetic markers, a team of scientists led by Vince Smith of the Natural History Museum in London determined that lice families began to radiate, or diversify, before the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction, which killed 75 percent of the species on earth. They may have begun to diversify as long as 145 million years ago.

That suggests that bird and mammal species also began to diversify in the Cretaceous period. It corroborates new genetic evidence, from birds and mammals, though it is still unclear how many of them survived the extinction that marks the end of the Cretaceous period.

We may now have to reimagine the age of dinosaurs, picturing a wider array of birds and mammals moving among them. We may also have to picture feathered dinosaurs pestered by lice just the way modern birds are. Those could well be ancestors of the postextinction lice that specialize in mammals, including the three species that specialize in us.  

EDITORIAL : THE GUARDIAN, UK

           

Nigeria: Zoned out

Nigeria is a country which still looks to a fair and credible election as a clean break with the past

Nigeria is a country which still looks to a fair and credible election as a clean break with the past. After Laurent Gbagbo's defiance of the popular will in the Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation, still had something to prove both to itself and to the region. It is too early to say whether it has passed this test.

The incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan bolstered national institutions to ensure credibility. He appointed a respected academic, Professor Attahiru Jega, to chair the Independent National Election Commission (INEC). Prof Jega has acknowledged the faults of previous elections, such as the snatching of ballot boxes and missing names on the register, as embarrassing challenges. And the first two polls of the election season, the National Assembly vote on 9 April and Saturday's presidential poll, went better than past elections, although neither was free of violence or claims of electoral fraud. Jonathan himself, who has an unassailable lead of 10m votes over his nearest rival, will not declare victory until the results are announced by the INEC. So far so good.

But if he has bolstered the process, Jonathan has also swept away an unwritten power-sharing agreement called zoning. It was decided by a clique in the ruling party, not the electorate, and it ensured that the People's Democratic party (PDP) dominated Nigerian politics whichever candidate won. It was profoundly undemocratic, but it kept the ethnic peace and provided predictability. Under this informal agreement, the presidency alternated for two terms between the Muslim north and the Christian and animist south. A president from the north should have been in power until 2015. That was cut short by Umaru Yar'Adua's death, and Jonathan, a vice-president from the south, should have stepped down after completing his predecessor's term of office. He did not, and went on to defeat a northern Muslim challenger, former vice-president Atiku Abubakar, for the party's presidential nomination. Try as Jonathan did to woo the northern elites, he was unable to hold campaign events in the north.

There was an obvious danger. The PDP no longer represented the north, and should the supporters of a northern candidate decide that the election was rigged – whether the INEC blesses the process or not – violence could erupt. This appears to be what was happening yesterday. The north largely voted for the losing candidate, the former military ruler Muhammadu Buhari. Yesterday his supporters set fire to homes bearing ruling party banners in Kano and there were reported to be numerous deaths in Kaduna. One police spokesman there described the fighting as an uprising. Let us all hope he is wrong.

AV referendum: The Dave and Dr No show

If you want to know why you should vote yes in May's electoral reform referendum, just listen to Dr John Reid's peroration for the noes yesterday

If you want to know why you should vote yes in May's electoral reform referendum, just listen to Dr John Reid's peroration for the noes yesterday. He damned the alternative vote not on reasoned grounds, but "above all" because it was "not British". Tony Blair's warhorse had been wheeled out of retirement to help the Conservative prime minister argue that the way the UK does politics should be left just as it is. The two men stood together and made an impassioned case for the old political class, which is itching to forget all about the electorate's refusal to entrust any party with a mandate last year and get back to business as usual.

Dismal as the pitch is, it is making inroads, at least according to today's Guardian/ICM poll, which has the naysayers 16 points ahead. Reformists have just 16 days to transform things, by countering a campaign of unremitting negativity, whose garish posters are explicit in saying that because the NHS matters democracy doesn't, and carry the implicit message "vote no or the baby gets it". The yes side must stop indulging in its own fear-mongering, with its irrelevant British National party fixation, and instead get stuck into the half-truths and flat falsehoods that were served up by David Cameron and Lord Reid yesterday.

With faux atonement, Mr Cameron admitted John Major had roundly deserved the boot in 1997 and warned that AV would have prevented the clean sweep of the Commons that the country had wanted. In fact, all the projections show that in a year when the Tories were virtually nobody's second choice, they would have taken a still bigger hit, arguably even too big. Moving seamlessly on, and needing his full measure of Etonian nonchalance to avoid embarrassment, the coalitional prime minister spoke of his grave fear that AV would result in more coalitions. Most brazenly of all, Mr Cameron, who owes his own position to a succession of preferential votes within the Conservative party, redefined the founding principle of democracy. Instead of being that everybody deserves a say, the acid test suddenly becomes that no opinion ought to count for anything except where it is boiled down to a single cross. Dr Reid weighed in with his amplifier here – the reformers wanted, he said, "to usurp the right to an equal vote".

This is tosh. Bringing second preferences into play where first choices are disappointed is not the same as allowing multiple votes. The Liberal Democrat Jo Swinson memorably dispatched this slur on Question Time recently, where she explained to a reactionary fellow panellist that if she had agreed to pick her up a Mars from the canteen but returned with a Twix because they had sold out, she would still have one chocolate bar. Sadly, few of the arguments made on the yes platform yesterday were landed with the same punch. Perched alongside Labour's Alan Johnson and Ed Miliband, Vince Cable looked as if he was enjoying himself more than he has for some time. Planted firmly back on the progressive side of the political divide, he cracked some gags about the voting rules on Strictly Come Dancing. Mr Johnson breezily explained how first past the post had become an anachronism in a country where ever fewer voters identified with the big political tribes, while Mr Miliband showed bravery in returning to the reformist fray in a contest that many of his fellow partisans would rather see him use to punish Nick Clegg.

The modest electoral change on offer will not deliver proportional votes, and does not easily lend itself to inspirational oratory. Certainly, none was heard yesterday. It is, however, a first step in restoring the severed link between the governing and the governed. If the shop stewards of the old politics are allowed to prevent it now, they will dismiss all potential future reforms as obsessions of the chattering class. Instead of rationalising our political rules, we will be told to stop moaning and get used to them, because – after all – they're British.

In praise of … the Peak District

Britain's first national park deserves support in its battle to balance the needs of locals and protection of the environment

The Peak District national park, 60 years old this month, famously lacks any peaks and isn't a park. But as Britain's first national park, and almost certainly its busiest, it has played a proud part in preserving a special part of the English landscape and encouraging the public to enjoy it. The high gritstone Dark Peak countryside remains a true wilderness, even though on a mist-free day you can see the fringes of Manchester and Sheffield from its tops. The soft limestone countryside of the White Peak is still quietly rural, and a refuge for the millions of visitors who come each year from the Midlands and beyond. As Roger Redfern's country diary records twice a month on these pages, the Peak District is part of the life of the cities on its borders, and has been since well before the famous Kinder mass trespass of 1932, which saw ramblers demand their right to walk across the Duke of Devonshire's shooting estate. The national park authority has often found itself caught in the middle of a debate between access, development and preservation, and has done a decent job at all three. With limited resources, it has restricted quarrying and tried to balance the needs of locals for new homes with the protection of a delicate environment. It deserves strong support in this battle – as do the rights of all national parks, reported to be under scrutiny in a crowdsourcing exercise to test red tape. This Easter, there can no better place than the Peak to tramp the moors or wander past meadows and spring lambs.


 

EDITORIAL : THE GLOBAL TIMES, CHINA

West pressuring China like former USSR

The "battle of democracy" is at the heart of the long-term friction between the West and China, which has affected this country and altered certain views about national reform. The West continuously exerts pressure on China, which is a reminder of the former Soviet Union.

In 1938, Mao Zedong first proposed Chinese Marxism, but was opposed by the Soviet-controlled international communist bloc. What does this process mean?  As everyone knows, the Communist Party of China had suffered losses due to the dogmatic following of Marxism. Marxism had to be "sinified" before becoming a guide to the Chinese revolution.

From China's democratic revolution to the early stages of China's socialist establishment, the Soviet Union tried to control China as its offshoot, and it was difficult for the CPC to do away with such control. Despite some extreme consequences, overall, this movement was greatly successful and China is still benefiting from it.

Now the Soviet Union no longer exists, but a huge shadow that seems opposite to the Soviet Union but is actually similar has surrounded us, namely the West. The West is promoting democratic politics in China, not only bringing the concept, but also requiring us to treat "separation of powers" and "one person, one vote" in a similar way as Biblical tenets. China is constantly criticized by Western public opinion while exploring democratic politics.

The concept of democracy has been spreading in China for over a century. The need for democracy has become a community consensus among the Chinese society. The current dispute between the West and China is that the West emphasizes its democratic model as being "universal" and that China should accept it without alteration. However, China will not follow dogmatism and will persist on fixing problems with "Chinese characteristics."

History will judge whether the West's pressure or China's insistence is correct. The reality is that the West only cares about the "democratic" principles without considering China's reality. However, Chinese society should be more cautious before any reform.

Democracy is a part of real life, and it cannot deviate from this. The democracy that Chinese people pursue is a better life. The West asked China to single out democracy and compare itself with Western democratic politics, but this is impossible to achieve. Some countries follow Western requirements, and often fall prey to social unrest.

China is the first country with 1.3 billion people in history, and is in a period of rapid development. It must be wrong if one says that some external model can be set in China. China cannot copy any country. This is the most valuable experience that Chinese people have obtained in the past 100 years of pain and blood.

Reform of public services presents golden opportunity

After more than three decades of reform, China is finally planning to crack one of its toughest nuts – reshaping its 1.26 million or so government-funded public institutions.

Last week, the Chinese government issued blueprints for the reform that will affect more than 40 million staff members and retirees in the public service sectors, such as schools and hospitals, which are the backbone of public service providers nationwide, Xinhua reported.

In modern times, the functions of the government, market and society should be clearly outlined. However, this is not the situation in China at present.

Government-funded institutions are the fruits of a decades-long "body identity system," stemming from the planned economy adopted after the establishment of New China in 1949. At that time, Chinese people were simply classified into three groups: farmers, workers and cadres ranging from low to high levels.

Unbridgeable gaps existed between these three groups.

For a long time, individuals recruited by public institutions usually had a "steel bowl," namely a regular salary and a job there until retirement, regardless of performance.

With the deepening of its reform, China's public service sector faces a widening gap due to the unsatisfactory supply provided by state institutions and an increasing demand for efficiency by the general public.

This reform reflects the government's resolution to address public complaints over a lack of access to public services, such as education and healthcare.
For example, there are now 20 million teachers, accounting for half the staff of government-funded institutions. More than half of local financial budgets at county-levels and above are used in the field of education and for paying teachers.

The general goal of this reform is to set up a system by 2020, under which non-profit institutions will effectively provide public services which the public will enjoy equal access to.

According to the reform plans, China is planning to transform public institutions that perform administrative functions into government agencies, while those conducting for-profit, commercial activities will become full-fledged enterprises, according to the Xinhua report. Those left over after the restructuring will focus on providing public services in a non-profit manner.

In the past, the government used to disperse redundant employees into public jobs whereby many laid-off staff are returned to government departments.
To avoid detours during the reform process, a simultaneous reform should be seen among administrative organs.

In recent decades, China has adopted a reform strategy in both easy and difficult sectors.

The reform of public institutions will be a great chance for the nation to develop a completely new public service system. For this purpose, the full ending of public service institutions may be an ultimate solution.

EDITORIAL : THE DAILY YOMIURI, JAPAN

       

 

TEPCO must act on its recovery plan

The Yomiuri Shimbun

Tokyo Electric Power Co. has finally revealed a timetable for ending the ongoing emergency at its Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.

Under the announced schedule, the power utility will seek to halt the continued escape of radioactive substances from the crippled nuclear complex within six to nine months, a task essential for delisting the areas designated as evacuation zones in the wake of the cataclysmic March 11 earthquake and tsunami that left the plant severely damaged.

The utility should steadily translate its plans into action, and do all it can to implement the envisaged measures ahead of schedule.

TEPCO's announcement of the timetable came after the government instructed the firm to put together a set of steps to overcome the nuclear crisis as soon as possible. The government's instruction reflected its belief that revealing a medium-term target aimed at overcoming the emergency was vital to allaying a great deal of fear at home and overseas.

The announcement of the timetable may well be regarded as an indication that the Fukushima facility is being pulled out of the highly critical situation that prevailed there for some time.

In fact, little was known about the exact extent of damage suffered by reactor buildings and other facilities at the nuclear complex, because high levels of radiation made them inaccessible. However, TEPCO is gradually finding it possible to determine the condition of damaged structures at the compound by, for example, using a remote-controlled robot.

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Cooling is 1st goal

With this in mind, the power utility has defined the next three months as "Step 1" and the three to six months following that as "Step 2" under the timetable.

The biggest target for Step 1 will be to ensure the reactors at the facility can be stably cooled. TEPCO will strive to fill containers for the Nos. 1 and 3 reactors with water and then circulate it to confirm the facility's cooling system functions the way it should.

The second step will seek to stop leakage of radioactive materials into the air. To achieve this, TEPCO is considering enclosing each of the buildings in a cubic framework covered with sheets of protective material.

However, questions can be raised about whether the utility will be able to make smooth progress in carrying out these measures in accordance with its own timetable.

The greatest worry about the planned measures is the presence of radioactive contaminants at the nuclear complex. A possible increase in contamination would make it difficult for the power utility to make headway in the work. Adding to this anxiety is the sequence of large aftershocks that has struck areas surrounding the nuclear plant.

TEPCO needs to brace itself for such dangers. The utility must know that if a new crippling crisis strikes, the firm can not get away with defending itself by describing it as "beyond all expectations."

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Remember evacuees

We also hope the power corporation's attempt to achieve the intended target will be complemented by paying adequate attention to residents who have fled from the evacuation zones.

About 100,000 residents who have been told to leave the evacuation zones are increasingly apprehensive about how long it will take to lay the ongoing nuclear emergency to rest, as well as when they will be able to return to their homes.

Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Banri Kaieda has said, "Most likely within six to nine months, we want to ensure that people who fled certain areas are notified whether they'll be able to go home."

We believe the government and TEPCO should let the evacuees know more about what will be in store for them during their fight against the nuclear crisis. These people should be provided with clear, timely and precise information about progress in the work and any changes in the levels of contamination in the evacuation zones.

It also will be necessary to consider how to rehabilitate the areas to which the evacuees will have returned, while also studying specific assistance measures for such residents.

Response to disaster reaffirms Japan-U.S. ties

The Yomiuri Shimbun

Japan's strong partnership with the United States, it may be said, has been reconfirmed through joint disaster response efforts after the March 11 catastrophe.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in Sunday talks with Prime Minister Naoto Kan and Foreign Minister Takeaki Matsumoto after her arrival in Japan, pledged "steadfast support" for Japan in the process of rebuilding from the aftermath of Great East Japan Earthquake. Kan expressed thanks for "outstanding support" from the United States and told her, "We'll never forget U.S. assistance."

A joint news conference of the two foreign ministers was also attended by Hiromasa Yonekura, chairman of the Japan Business Federation (Nippon Keidanren), and Thomas Donohue, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The two countries agreed to promote joint public-private efforts to support Japan's reconstruction.

In addition to its Operation Tomodachi, which involved up to 20,000 U.S. military personnel, the United States has so far extended a wide variety of assistance that ranged from material supplies and the dispatch of nuclear experts and relief teams to the provision of a robot.

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'A friend in need'

A fierce debate was conducted between Japan and the United States, with the latter assessing the nuclear power plant accident in Fukushima Prefecture as more serious. But in interactions including such heated discussions, the Japanese side has been reminded of the proverb, "A friend in need is a friend indeed."

The Self-Defense Forces and the U.S. military joined hands in transporting goods and materials to the disaster-stricken areas and in conducting search-and-rescue operations for missing people. This served as a valuable experience for both sides.

After the end of the Cold War, the two countries revised defense cooperation guidelines and have conducted joint military exercises responding to hypothetical emergencies. This time around, they had a real joint field experience.

What went well in the bilateral cooperation? What were the problems? It is important for the SDF and U.S. forces to thoroughly study these points to learn lessons for future collaboration.

Matsumoto and Clinton agreed to hold a Japan-U.S. Security Consultative Committee meeting ahead of a visit by Kan to the United States that the two sides are in the process of arranging to hold in late June. The meeting, to be attended by the foreign and defense ministers of the two countries, should be held as soon as possible.

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Many issues still pending

The so-called two-plus-two meeting was originally scheduled for April 29 in Washington but has been postponed because of Japan's priority on post-disaster measures. Another factor is said to be that there has been little progress toward resolving the issue of relocating the U.S. Marine Corps' Futenma Air Station in Okinawa Prefecture.

Needless to say, implementing post-disaster measures is a top priority for Japan. But it will have adverse effects if Japan uses this as an excuse to put off what should be done.

A host of issues are still pending between Japan and the United States. Among them are the Futenma relocation issue, the transfer of U.S. marines stationed in Okinawa Prefecture to Guam, finding ways to deepen the bilateral alliance and bilateral consultations over Japan's participation in the multilateral Trans-Pacific Partnership free-trade framework. All these challenges call for steady progress.

Japan is supposed to be capable enough to tackle these issues simultaneously. At least, its bureaucratic machinery is ready for that. If this country cannot do it, blame will be put on politicians--above all on the prime minister and members of his Cabinet.

EDITORIAL : THE DAILY MIRROR, SRILANKA

More skeletons than bats or balls

When former Sports Minister C.B. Ratnayake branded the current Interim Committee running Sri Lanka Cricket as the most corrupt public institution in the country, he got on to a bad wicket with the powers that be. He became a laughing stock when a few days later he retained the same officials he publicly pledged to throw out. Ultimately his bouncer was hurled back at him.

Most politicians today work largely for personal gain or glory. But Mr. Ratnayake, wherever he is, can be satisfied though he lost the vital toss, he won the match or what he said was proved largely right. Not that celebrating the downfall of someone or some organization is an accepted norm of decency, but what else can right thinking people do other than cheer when the rot is exposed in a country where hypocrisy and bluff holds sway.

With captain Kumar Sangakkara and vice captain Mahela Jayawardena stepping down from their posts in the Sri Lanka team, the selectors resigning for reasons best known to them and a report highlighting that the game’s administration has gone bankrupt, Mr. Ratnayake must be in a most comfortable situation to realise he is no longer the head of a so-called Sports Ministry that is supposed to uphold the norms of fair play.

We believe that whatever has happened, little or nothing will change in cricket administration because when one set of questionable administrators leave, another set of the same breed, or may be worse, enter the fray for their turn. The government politicians themselves have been the biggest threat to the progress of cricket ever since they stepped in ten years ago and got a taste of cricket with interim committees and their stooges to run the administration instead of an elected body.

It seems now that some officials are shedding crocodile tears for the thousands of people who were cheated without tickets to witness the World Cup at their doorstep. When millions of rupees were ripped off in the name of the World Cup, these opportunists were apparently asleep and should ask themselves what wisdom is there left in crying ‘no ball’ after the match is over.

At least the lilywhites or purists will have just one man in the whole world to thank for the string of resignations. If not for Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s innings of 91 Sri Lanka would have won the World Cup and the maggots and leeches would have been buried under the pitch.

The question must now be asked whether the selectors headed by Aravinda de Silva resigned for the reasons they have stated or to save face over a disastrous selection blunder for the final. Will their resignations be seen as hoodwinking the public to stave off any impending inquiry, the outcome of which will probably not be made public.

Kumar Sangakkara may have had his reasons to resign, but we take our caps off to him for he had the wisdom and courage to tell the truth in an establishment where most officials have skeletons instead of bats or balls in their cupboards.

EDITORIAL : THE HINDU, INDIA

Regime change under UNSC cover

It is now obvious that Nato's purported mission, under United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973, to protect civilians in Libya is expanding into a flagrantly illegal attempt at regime change. With fierce fighting between rebels and government forces reported in the eastern city of Adjabiya and the western one of Misrata, President Barack Obama has stated that a military stalemate obtains. That means Nato has failed to protect civilians and prevent Muammar Qadhafi's ground forces from recapturing key rebel-held areas, with civilian casualties as a tragic consequence. In response, however, Mr. Obama and his main Nato collaborators, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister David Cameron, have published a joint article in The Washington Post, The Times, and Le Figaro, holding that “it is impossible to imagine a future for Libya with Gaddafi in power” and that “so long as Gaddafi is in power, Nato and its coalition partners must maintain their operations.”

The main problems in this exercise in military adventurism have been caused by the Resolution's lack of a clear political objective; it is the political issues that are now proving the most troublesome for the Alliance. One major miscalculation was the assumption that Mr. Qadhafi might be sufficiently influenced by the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) or the League of Arab States (the Arab League) to consider an agreement with the rebels or even to leave office. The Libyan President's defiant reaction exposed that idea as vacuous. Now Mr. Cameron refuses to rule out the deployment of ground troops, despite the fact that the U.N. Resolution specifically excludes that. The coalition's disarray is further confirmed by France's proposal, with which the United Kingdom disagrees, of a new Resolution; in any case Russia and China are likely to oppose anything that authorises regime change. Nevertheless, the evidence is increasingly clear that, even before they obtained the existing mandate, Washington, London, and Paris wanted only to remove Mr. Qadhafi. The U.S. has since approached various African Union member states about giving asylum to Mr. Qadhafi provided he leaves office. Secondly, at a recent coalition conference, Qatar and Italy pressed for arms supplies to the rebels. The most damaging evidence, however, is that the U.S. has sent an envoy to Benghazi to learn more about the rebel grouping, the Interim Transitional National Council. In effect, going through the U.N. was only a smokescreen for regime change. The Obama administration and its allies are repeating all the mistakes and miscalcuations made by George W. Bush and Tony Blair over the infamous and illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Free this man

No angle of the Khalil Chishty episode provides a pretty view. The octogenarian Pakistani was recently convicted in a 1992 murder case and handed down a life sentence by a trial court in Ajmer. Two weeks ago, the Rajasthan High Court turned down his plea for suspension of the sentence. For the nearly 20 years the case took to be decided, Dr. Chishty — a highly-qualified virologist — was out on bail, but remained hostage to the shockingly slow pace of the proceedings. His passport impounded, he could not return to his country. The case in which he was one of four accused related to a group clash in Ajmer that resulted in one person succumbing to a gunshot injury. Dr. Chishty, on a visit to Ajmer from Karachi, was present when the clash took place, apparently between two sets of his relatives. The trial court was evidently not impressed with his claim that he was only an onlooker and played no part in the violence. Independent of the merits of the case, it defies comprehension that a sessions court should have taken 19 long years to decide the matter. This is glacial speed even by the standards of the Indian judiciary. Even less comprehensible is the Rajasthan High Court's observation while turning down Dr. Chishty's plea for suspension of the sentence that “no leniency” could be shown to him as he was a Pakistani national, even as it granted identical appeals by the three others convicted in the case. Dr. Chishty, who is unable to walk unaided, began his sentence at the end of January this year; he is warded in the Ajmer jail hospital. While the courts may have decided to make an example of Dr. Chishty, awarding an old, infirm and ailing Pakistani, a life sentence after a delay of two decades is hardly a shining example of the Indian judiciary at work.

Dr. Chishty's saga stands out all the more in the light of the generosity of spirit Pakistan demonstrated by releasing Gopal Dass, an Indian citizen who had been incarcerated for 27 years, on an appeal from the Supreme Court of India. The recent thaw in relations has also seen Pakistan and India release a number of each other's nationals from jail. The two governments have decided to speed up the release of other prisoners. It seems to have finally dawned on the two sides that prisoners — mostly arrested for minor offences such as overstaying their visa or crossing the border — must not be used for settling scores between the two countries. In keeping with this, it would only be right for the Indian government to respond positively to the appeals for the release of Dr. Chishty by his family and human rights activists in both countries. He should be allowed to return to Pakistan and to his family immediately.

EDITORIAL : THE DAWN, PAKISTAN

Reconciliation efforts

PULL together the various Pakistani strands on Afghanistan and a tenuous picture begins to emerge. From President Zardari’s visit to Turkey to Gen Pasha’s trip to the US to the trio of Prime Minister Gilani, army chief Gen Kayani and the ISI chief meeting with the Afghan government in Kabul, three things are becoming clearer. One, the rapprochement between Afghan president Hamid Karzai and the Pakistani leadership, particularly the security establishment, is continuing. The overt animosity of years past has given way to noises about serious engagement. Two, the Karzai government and the Pakistani security establishment have found common ground on the need to pursue a political settlement to bring the war in Afghanistan to an end. ‘Reconciliation’ is the byword in the Karzai and Pakistani camps and both sides believe there is some possibility of enticing the Taliban to the negotiation table. Three, the Americans have for now chosen to not interfere in the Pak-Afghan attempts to explore the possibility of a political settlement to the war in Afghanistan. While the US does not appear willing to abandon its military-led counter-insurgency strategy yet, the Americans will be aware that July is fast approaching — at which point American strategy will definitely be reassessed.

Going forward, however, the same questions as before remain. Asfandyar Wali Khan, the leader of the ANP, has suggested that the Taliban insurgency was a political problem and could not be solved by military means. Given that the ANP had for years decried the Taliban as ‘savages’, Mr Khan’s latest statement appears to be a nod to the realities on the ground. Savage or not, defeating the Taliban insurgency through military means appears increasingly unlikely as opposed to trying to put in place the pieces for a political settlement. Common ground between the Taliban and the Afghan government is perhaps some way off, but there may be certain baselines. For one, parsing the insurgency in terms of the ‘nationalist’ Taliban and the ‘internationalist’/pan-Islamist Al Qaeda appears to hold some promise. Ten years into the war in Afghanistan, the Afghan Taliban have shown little interest in making their fight international — which means there could be something to negotiate between the Taliban and the anti-Taliban forces.

But will the Afghan Taliban bite at the opportunity to deal with Afghan government or insist on speaking to the Americans directly? Mullah Omar is the uncontested spiritual leader of the Taliban, but does he control the insurgency? Is the younger generation of Taliban commanders battle-hardened or war-weary? There are few answers about the Taliban’s mindset, making it extremely difficult to predict how the reconciliation efforts will pan out.

CJ’s advice

BY an extraordinary coincidence, the chief justice’s advice to the armed forces on their constitutional obligation came the day Pervez Musharraf told DawnNews TV that the basic law was nothing but a piece of paper, and that it was the country — whose interests, judging by his remarks, were defined by the armed forces — that mattered. Reminding a delegation of officers from Command and Staff College that they should concentrate on their job, CJ Iftikhar Chaudhry said on Saturday he was shocked to learn during his interaction with army officers that they were not fully aware of the significance of their oath under the constitution. A week earlier, Mr Chaudhry had asked the bureaucracy’s civilian segment not to take illegal orders from their superiors. The CJ’s advice and the retired army chief’s articulation of his political philosophy represent two strains of thought whose collision and collusion have shaped Pakistan’s history. Since 1958 four army chiefs have usurped power, abrogated or mauled the constitution, ruled with the help of claque and by design or default pre-empted the growth of democratic institutions. Their civilian counterparts willingly collaborated with the dictators and helped in the persecution of dissenters, while regrettably many in the higher judiciary considered it prudent to legitimise the military takeover more than once under the law of necessity.

Have the armed forces learnt the lesson? Going by Mr Musharraf’s virtual repetition in the second decade of the 21st century of similar remarks by Ziaul Haq, it would not be irrational to assume that anti-democracy sentiments still lurk in certain immature minds in the grip of the saviour syndrome. While we would like to believe that Mr Musharraf’s was the last military intervention, it will entail considerable resolve and sacrifice on the part of civil society to remain vigilant and thwart extra-constitutional measures to control Pakistan’s destiny through direct intervention or behind-the-scenes manipulation. Mr Chaudhry’s mild rebuke should prompt civilian and military bureaucrats to re-read Pakistan’s history. It would not take too much intellectual effort to discover the incalculable harm which anti-democratic aberrations have done to this country and its people.

Threat to trees?

A NEW phenomenon in the flood-affected parts of Sindh merits the authorities’ attention. On April 8, this newspaper published a photograph taken in a still-inundated part of Khairpur Nathan Shah, depicting trees cocooned in what appears to be a dense, cloud-like film resembling a spider web. Their appearance led local people to conjecture that spiders, displaced by floodwater, had taken refuge in the trees. No effort has been made to call in experts and determine what organism is responsible. This exercise must be undertaken, however, for the infestation may involve a hardy parasite. A senior botanist has pointed out that this phenomenon is more likely to be the work of spider mites, which are entirely different from spiders. Spider mites damage and kill plant cells; the web is there to protect their colonies against predators, not to capture insects. A single mature female spider mite can spawn a million-strong colony in less than a month. Their rapid reproductive cycle allows the species to adapt and become resistant to pesticides. Consequently, an infestation can lead to the large-scale death of trees.

Worryingly, most of the trees thus affected in Sindh are of the Acacia Nilotica species, referred to as the golden tree of Sindh due to its environmental suitability. High-density plantations of the species, which is considered a very productive forest system, have been cultivated along the plains of the River Indus. It bodes ill for the environmental health of the area if they are in danger. While spider mites are not unknown in Pakistan, it is possible that the effect of the floods was to concentrate and restrict their colonies to certain areas where Acacia Nilotica trees became easy prey. The Sindh Forest Department must ensure that steps are taken to counteract any danger.