text:
How to mock a dictator
As Muammar Gaddafi digs in for his final stand, mockery of the brutal dictator is spreading across the web. A couple of samples are below:
The clip below "Zenga Zenga" by Israeli musician Noy Alooshe mocks the dictator's speech last week. The video has garnered over 1.6 million views and is a hit in the Arab world. Using Autotune to turn an excerpt of his speech to song the dictator promises that he will clean Libya "inch by inch, house by house, room by room, alley by alley." At the edges bikini clad women gyrate to the music. The Israeli origins of the video have not prevented it from becoming a hit in the Arab world.
Vanity Fair which previously cataloged Gaddafi the fashionista now gives you the opportunity to craft your own hard line speech with Gaddafi as your muse.
The nuclear nightmare of a collapsed Pakistan
Pervez Hoodbhoy has this pessimistic take on the perils of a nuclear-armed failing Pakistani state. For all the opprobrium it received for the Mumbai attacks, Pakistan has still not brought the attack planners to justice or commenced dismantling its terror infrastructure. Incredibly the bankrupt Pakistani state appears to be betting all its chips on the nuclear shield. So a state which survives on financial aid is risking an arms race with its larger and stronger neighbor that will make its fragile condition even worse.
Hoodbhoy is probably right in that another attack on India is only a matter of time. How will India then react to the rogue state on its western border? Indians have noted that the Bush doctrine allowed the United States to invade Afghanistan, but the United States limits the Indian response to its terrorism sponsoring neighbor. This perpetuates the Pakistani faith in its nuclear deterrent as a shield for any foreign misadventures.
It must be noted that the second and less appreciated part of Pakistan's shield will eventually disappear. The US will get out of Afghanistan and will no longer need Pakistan as a supply route for its troops. Similar to 1989, it will be far easier for Washington to cut Pakistan loose after it withdraws from Afghanistan. With China already sponsoring North Korea and Burma, will it want the Pakistani basket case in its lap? Given its size, location and the size of its nuclear arsenal, the collapse of Pakistan will be a far greater geopolitical nightmare than the fall of the rickety regime in Pyongyang.
The Caudillo tweets his support for Gaddafi
I posted earlier in the week that Gaddafi's Latin American friends other than Daniel Ortega were not sticking their necks out for him. The silence of the garrulous Chavez was particularly unusual. The Caudillo finally broke his silence a few hours ago on twitter by embracing Fidel Castro's theory that this was an American plot to invade Libya. Tweet below:
Vamos Canciller Nicolás: dales otra lección a esa ultraderecha pitiyanqui! Viva Libia y su Independencia! Kadafi enfrenta una guerra civil!!less than a minute ago via Twitter for BlackBerry® Hugo Chávez Frías
chavezcandanga
The tweet translates as follows: "Minister Nicolás [Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro]: Teach the far right yankee lovers" a lesson! Long live Libya and its Independence! Gaddafi is facing a civil war!"
Some context: "pitiyanqui" literally translates to little Yankee. It is an insult Chavez created to mock opponents he deemed to be Yankee lovers. The tweet followed a statement by Maduro echoing Castro's theory that the United States was creating a movement to topple Gaddafi.
Even a blowhard like Chavez cannot bring himself to openly support Gaddafi like Nicaragua's Ortega did. So he wraps himself in his reflexive anti-Americanism to try to mask his support for Gaddafi. Kinda pathetic.
Inmates running the asylum
I have little respect for the intelligence of many legislators, but some of the legislation that has been introduced in the last couple of months is truly breathtaking.
It started with anti-abortion Republicans in Congress trying to limit the Federal funding of abortions by attempting to redefine rape. Then, a legislator in South Dakota introduced a fetus protection bill so loosely drafted that it could have allowed a pregnant woman's immediate family to kill anyone (including doctors) who tried to provide that woman an abortion with her permission. Thankfully the legislator saw the dangers of legalizing homicide of doctors performing still legal acts and withdrew the bill. Undaunted a Nebraska legislator has introduced a similar bill that will grant such justifiable homicide rights to any third party vigilante.
Then you have Republican legislators in states like Montana discovering their inner John C. Calhoun and trying to pass nullification statues.
But this one takes the cake and is truly beyond belief. Georgia State Rep. Bobby Franklin has introduced a bill that would make women who miscarry felons unless they can prove that there was "no human involvement whatsoever in the causation" of their miscarriage. Such a felony could be punishable by death. So much for innocent until proven guilty. Even the infamously misogynistic Taliban never dreamed up such an obscenity.
So what is going on in Tripoli?
Robert Fisk of the Independent files this report. Given the regime's threats against journalists, hope he stays safe. Excerpt below:
There is little food in Tripoli, and over the city there fell a blanket of drab, sullen rain. It guttered onto an empty Green Square and down the Italianate streets of the old capital of Tripolitania. But there were no tanks, no armoured personnel carriers, no soldiers, not a fighter plane in the air; just a few police and elderly men and women walking the pavements – a numbed populace. Sadly for the West and for the people of the free city of Benghazi, Libya's capital appeared as quiet as any dictator would wish.
But this is an illusion. Petrol and food prices have trebled; entire towns outside Tripoli have been torn apart by fighting between pro- and anti-Gaddafi forces. In the suburbs of the city, especially in the Noufreen district, militias fought for 24 hours on Sunday with machine guns and pistols, a battle the Gadaffi forces won. In the end, the exodus of expatriates will do far more than street warfare to bring down the regime.
I was told that at least 30,000 Turks, who make up the bulk of the Libyan construction and engineering industry, have now fled the capital, along with tens of thousands of other foreign workers. On my own aircraft out of Tripoli, an evacuation flight to Europe, there were Polish, German, Japanese and Italian businessmen, all of whom told me they had closed down major companies in the past week. Worse still for Gaddafi, the oil, chemical and uranium fields of Libya lie to the south of "liberated" Benghazi. Gaddafi's hungry capital controls only water resources, so a temporary division of Libya, which may have entered Gaddafi's mind, would not be sustainable. Libyans and expatriates I spoke to yesterday said they thought he was clinically insane, but they expressed more anger at his son, Saif al-Islam. "We thought Saif was the new light, the 'liberal'", a Libyan businessman sad to me. "Now we realise he is crazier and more cruel than his father."
If he cannot feed his mercenaries, time is running out for Gaddafi. Time for the world to start freezing his assets.
Gaddafi cowers in his bunker to deliver his latest rant
The beleaguered Muammar Gaddafi was expected to appear on state TV to deliver his latest rant. But instead of appearing live he called in the latest paranoid delusions. Even though he appears to have locked down Tripoli, the dictator's failure to make a live appearance makes it seem he is afraid to appear in public. Video below:
Also worth seeing is this survey by Vanity Fair of Gaddafi through the years in full sartorial splendor. He will not be missed, but Gaddafi's fall will make state summits really drab.
Can a regime survive when its soldiers starve?
Be harmonious, enrich the soldiers, and scorn all other men.
– Roman Emperor Septimius Severus to his sons just before his death.
Keeping your soldiers happy and loyal has been the surest way to a ruler's survival since antiquity. The Roman Republic ultimately collapsed because the the oligarchs in the Senate could not control the loyalty of the troops in the field. When rulers like the Byzantine Emperor Michael VI forgot this maxim (on the advice of his bureaucratic cabal the emperor publicly humiliated his generals) the military coup and fall promptly followed.
In most of today's dictatorships the armed forces occupy a favored position. Business contracts are steered towards the generals. The troops are showered with generous fringe benefits not available to the general populace. Above all, since an army "marches on its stomach" it never ever starves.
It appears that the crumbling North Korean regime is losing the ability to feed its soldiers. People have noted that decades of starvation has stunted the growth of North Koreans – who are now markedly smaller than their South Korean kin. Now it appears that North Korea has had to lower the height requirements for military recruits who still remain malnourished. Were he alive today, Prussia's King Frederick William I would have shuddered at the sight of North Korea's diminutive and underfed soldiers.
Which begs the question posted above. At what point do hunger pangs (and the worse experience of their families) trump the decades of brainwashing North Korea's soldiers have undergone? Starvation helped speed along the German collapse in World War I which toppled the Kaiser. Will the same occur in the Hermit Kingdom? And what will be the spark that triggers the uprising to sweep aside North Korea's obese rulers?
"So confident in her ignorance"
Alaska's half-term quitter is having a rough year. First the panicky Republican establishment worried that she might actually win the nomination started waking up to her lack of curiosity, temperament and qualifications for the job. Then after taking heat in the aftermath of the Arizona shootings she botched an opportunity to engender sympathy (and look presidential) with a thin skinned aggressive response. Her poll numbers are sinking in the early Republican primary states and her media strategy to prevent her 15 minutes of fame from running out caused the snarky Wonkette blog to run the headline: "Desperate Sarah Palin Hinting Hard She's Running For President." Now comes a tell all book from a former aide who claims he has access to reams of emails. Then comes the even more damaging hit (again from Wonkette) that Sarah Palin may have a second Facebook account to praise Palin on her official Facebook account. I have no doubt of Palin's narcissism, but can she really be this pathetic? For the record Palin has denied having a second Facebook account (and some doubt the denial).
This was grist to the mill for MSNBC's Chris Matthews (no Sarah Palin fan) and the quote for the title of this post comes from Cynthia Tucker in the video below:
The crumbling Hermit Kingdom
Drowned out by the tumult in the Middle East, is the news of the crumbling North Korean autocracy. The rogue regime has spent the last few months begging for food. However, with its track record of diverting aid to the military, donor states are unwilling to prop up a crumbling regime.
North Korea's starving population increasingly appears willing to protest conditions in the Stalinist state. Even more unsettling for the regime is the willingness of the most brainwashed citizenry in the world to mock its leaders. A few months ago the ailing Dear Leader commenced preparations for the eventual succession of his 28 year old son Kim Jong-un. Even though state media started the usual absurd propaganda to buttress the thin resume of one of the few pudgy young men left in the country, the public appears to have greeted the new heir with derision.
A popular children's song "Three Bears" about a cute bear family with a chubby papa bear, a slim mommy bear and a cute baby bear in a house was modified to mock the Kims:
Three bears in a house, pocketing everything; grandpa bear, papa bear and baby bear. Grandpa Bear is fat, Papa Bear is fat, too, and Baby Bear is a doofus.
Meanwhile the cash starved regime is struggling to provide its people and elite with the usual bribes and gifts distributed to mark Kim Jong-il's birthday. Starved of cash, food and oil the military capacity of its million strong army is an open question. Even with its diminished capacity, North Korea is still as unpredictable and dangerous as ever.
However, its ability to manage a second dynastic succession is in doubt. Kim Jon-un faces a dynastic rival – his older, fatter and discredited brother Kim Jong-nam. From his Chinese exile Jong-nam has criticized the planned succession. There are rumors about his connection with North Korea's benefactor China, who has reason to be irritated with the ruling Kims. However, it is not clear that Jong-nam plans to give up his comfortable subsidized hedonistic lifestyle to rule a crumbling impoverished failed state.
The world is frighteningly unprepared for a North Korean collapse. China which does not want a flood of refugees across the Yalu continues to prop up the regime. It may also not want to share a border with a united and democratic Korea. South Korea (particularly its left) parrots the cause of eventual unification but may not want to inherit or pay for such a basket case. The cost of Korean reunification will dwarf the cost of unifying Germany. With no media access into the country, it is hard to estimate when North Korea will reach its tipping point.
So for now we wait and watch as the Hermit kingdom crumbles and starves.
(1) Comment Read More
Gaddafi's Latin American friends face a dilemma
With his back to the wall, his army crumbling and parts of his navy defecting to Malta, Muammar Gaddafi has lashed out at his people with little restraint. This presents his pals abroad with a dilemma. After providing an open embrace to Libya's leader for the last decade, what do they do when he resorts to large scale bloodletting.
Other than the usual pro-forma comment accusing the US of hypocrisy in Egypt and plotting to take over that country, Venezuela's caudillo has been uncharacteristically quiet. He cannot be happy at the repeated rumors (angrily shot down by both sides) that Gaddafi fled to his country (or the ease with which people like me made the assumption).
But two of his ideological comrades have finally spoken out. Nicaragua's President Daniel Ortega called Gaddafi to express support. The former Sandinista dictator had no words of sympathy for a populace assaulted by its own head of state.
Fidel Castro appears to have been a bit more circumspect, largely focusing on the alleged upcoming NATO invasion of the country. He avoided taking a position on the atrocities based on the difficulty of deciphering the news coming out of Libya thanks to Gaddafi's military blackout. Much easier to fall back on anti-American paranoia than condemning a dictator who just went on state TV promising to kill his countrymen.
Bolivia's Evo Morales has come closest to a critique of his former buddy by issuing a pro forma statement of concern for the loss of life.
The dilemma facing Gaddafi's Latin American friends highlights the risk of embracing rogues merely because they are enemies of your real or perceived enemies. For countries that spend so much time criticizing the United States, it is a pity they did not learn from the harm to America's reputation abroad for supporting apartheid South Africa, Zaire's Mobotu Sese Seko and other third world dictators under the banner of anti-communism. It is a lesson that Hugo Chavez, who actively seeks out the embrace of despots, and his acolytes need to learn.
A deranged dictator promises to shed blood
After a quixotic appearance on state TV yesterday night with his umbrella (clip in post below), the beleaguered Muammar Gaddafi made an appearance on state TV for a long rambling paranoid harangue that went on for over an hour. The speech contained many ominous overtones as he promised to kill the "drugged" youth who rose in revolt against him.
Some of the quotes compiled by Al-Jazeera are listed below:
Muammar Gaddafi is not the president, he is the leader of the revolution. He has nothing to lose. Revolution means sacrifice until the very end of your life
Muammar Gaddafi is not a normal person that you can poison.. or lead a revolution against
I will fight until the last drop of blood with the people behind me
I haven't even started giving the orders to use bullets – any use of force against authority of state will be sentenced to death
Also below is a video of a portion of the harangue.
The die is now cast. Gaddafi will fight to the bitter end. May that be soon.
Muammar Gaddafi's bloody final act
The slide is complete. Libya is now in civil war as Muammar Gaddafi pulls out all the stops in desperate attempts to hold on to power. The Libyan air force has been ordered to strafe the country's two largest cities and a few pilots defected by flying off to Malta. Earlier today there were reports of Libyan navy ships opening fire on Tripoli. Its been a long time since a ruler indiscriminately strafed his own capital from the air (Gaddafi's son claimed they were targeting ammunition depots) or the sea, let alone had such a gambit keep him in power. Later in the day came a declaration from some Libyan officers asking their troops to switch sides. Whether this will have any effect is still unclear.
Libya's diplomatic outposts appear to think that the die is cast. From New York to New Delhi the regime's ambassadors are turning in their papers refusing to obey the diktats of a ruler willing to massacre his own people on a scale not seen since Tiananmen or perhaps even since Syria's Hafez Assad blasted his own city of Hama (mention must be given to the Soviet pulverizing of Grozny, though the Chechens at the time were in open revolt and would have angrily denied suggestions that they were part of Russia).
On Monday, Khaled Al Ga'aeem, under-secretary of Libya's foreign ministry, phoned Al Jazeera to create a Baghdad Bob moment in stating all was well in Tripoli. Video below:
Also on Monday night, Gaddafi himself made a very brief and odd appearance on state TV with his umbrella to deny that he had fled Tripoli for the welcoming embrace of his buddy Hugo Chavez. Video below:
The usually impotent UN Security Council is expected to huddle behind closed doors on Tuesday to figure out an international response to the situation. Ironically, Libya is currently on the Security Council but no longer has any lackeys in New York willing to obey the beleaguered Gaddafi. Other than the usual platitudes, travel bans and sanctions there are two things that the UN could do. One is direct military involvement. The obvious candidate for such an action would be Egypt's bloated but well equipped army. I think that outcome is unlikely. The other would be to declare a no fly zone over Benghazi and Tripoli that would restrict Gaddafi's ability to draw blood. Whether China (which is actively censoring news of Middle East unrest) or Putin's Russia will allow such action remains to be seen.
It is hard to imagine Gaddafi surviving this revolt. If by some miracle he does wade through rivers of blood to hold on to power, his regime would revert to North Korea type pariah status. Having tasted the lures of international acceptability the last few years, would Gaddafi's henchmen be willing to put up with this?
If the insurrection does succeed, Libya is likely still headed for turmoil. United by the Italian conquest of the Ottoman provinces of Tripolitania, Fezzan and Cyrenaica in 1912, Libya like Iraq (the fusion of the Ottoman provinces of Basra, Mosul and Baghdad) is very much an artificial creation of the colonial era.
Ottoman provinces that make up modern Libya
Tribal loyalties are still paramount and Gaddafi's long rule has largely been a tribal balancing act instead of an exercise in nation building. One of the few things that were probably accurate in Gaddafi's son's incoherent rant yesterday is that a post-Gaddafi civil war cannot be ruled out.
Libya's ethnic quilt
Post Gaddafi Libya will have to devise means to balance the interests of its tribes and ethnicities without Gaddafi's brutality and cronyism. The oil hungry countries of the world looking to harvest Libya's oil wealth will be watching this exercise intently. But before we can flesh out the post Gaddafi scenarios, the tyrant still has to fall.
Libya slides into civil war as even more dominoes rattle
The regime of the longest ruling non-royal in the world is crumbling and the amount of blood likely to be spilled in its death throes should easily surpass that shed so far in the other Arab states. Used to pariah status in the west, Muammar Gaddafi was always unlikely to bow to international pressure of the type that cowed Baharain's al-Khalifas. True to form, his regime reacted to protests this week with bullets. With limited media and internet access, distinguishing fact from fiction in Libya is hard. But it does appear that the regime's forces shot to kill and the death toll was high.
And then things appear to have spiraled out of Gaddafi's control. Unlike Egypt and Tunisia, Libya is still a tribal society. Gaddafi's tribal balancing act appears to have collapsed when he ordered his troops to open fire. Reports indicate that parts of his army switched sides enabling insurgents to seize control of Benghazi, Libya's second largest city, and the fighting has now spread to Gaddafi's home turf of Tripoli. The Warfala tribe, one of Libya's largest, may have turned on Gaddafi as well.
The cornered dictator sent the respectable face of his regime, his son Saif, on state television to broadcast paranoid stories of foreign attempts to split Libya and the impending civil war. That civil war appears to have already begun. There may be no Saudi (or as rumored Venezuelan) exile for Libya's long time autocrat. He has indicated that he will fight to the "last man standing."
Western countries who allowed the lure of Libya's oil reserves to seduce them into rehabilitating Gaddafi can only sit and watch as this bloody denouement plays itself out. The fall of Gaddafi would be truly momentous and will cause more and more Arab autocrats to doubt the fealty of their armies. A sign of the times is a letter sent by senior commanders of Iran's revolutionary guard to their commanding officer promising not to open fire on demonstrators. If true, and if it holds up, Iran's rulers may soon be faced with a popular revolution instead of the reformation sought by the Green Revolution two years ago. In the latest bout of Iranian protests, the vitriol is increasingly directed at the true leader of Iran's autocracy, the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, instead of the President Ahmadinejad.
Protests also appear to have spread to Morocco. The still popular King Mohammed VI once allegedly indicated that he wished to emulate Spain's democracy bringing King Juan Carlos rather than his own father King Hassan II. While Morocco may have eased up on the worst excesses of Hassan's reign, it is time for the still absolute monarch to emulate his political idol more completely.
Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia's worried rulers have promised to support the al-Khalifas of Bahrain. The nature of that support is still unclear and for now Bahrain appears to have walked back from the brink.
With the Middle East convulsing, it will be interesting to see if the virus of unrest casts a wider web. China's rulers are on edge and Venezuela's caudillo appears to be uncharacteristically quiet. The next wobbly domino should emerge soon.
What to think about labor unions?
Looking at the protests in Wisconsin (funny how it is fine to kick public employees in the butt for a deficit shortfall, but an allegedly frugal governor can still make the situation worse via tax cuts to the his pet interest groups…oh yeah…evidently tax cuts don't contribute to deficits), got me thinking about what I felt about unions.
Generally my feelings are largely negative. Coming from an upper middle class background where almost everybody I know is on the side of management I was not reared in pro-union lore. Then there is the downside of politically militant trade unions, the frankly crappy record of unions on race and gender issues, the ease by which they were suborned by organized crime and how some unions became sinecures for corrupt fat cats. Add to that the inefficiency unions can cause, notably in the auto industry. Friends who have had the misfortune of working with UAW have regaled me with rants about the difficulty of working with the union.
But unions did not arise in a vacuum. If employers had treated workers fairly and provided safe working conditions, unions may have been cut off at birth (for that matter we would not have needed regulations like OSHA). Also as public company CEOs have shown in the last decade that there is no limit for their greed, it has become harder for me to begrudge a man for making a middle class wage based on the objections of a multi-millionaire.
Yet my feelings on the subject are still mixed. It is in essence the age old problem of worker safety and fair benefits versus efficiency and competitiveness. How to find the balance will depend on your own personal experiences and prejudices. Ezra Klein of the Washington Post asked his readers who belonged to a union to post on their experiences. Since the management perspective dominates the media narrative in recent years, it can be useful to read the other side. This is obviously not a representative sampling (and there are a few anti-union posts), but still makes an interesting read. One that stuck out to me is quoted below:
When I was a little younger I had the privilege of working for UPS and Fed Ex at the same time. Fed Ex will fire you if they find out that you work for UPS, but they never did. UPS is of course a union job (Teamsters) and Fed Ex is not. The difference was night and day.
At UPS I got a decent hourly wage, thousands of dollars yearly as a tuition benefit, good health insurance, and a pension. At Fed Ex I got the same hourly wage (a little bit more to be honest) and jack squat for benefits (literally nothing).
At UPS I got treated with a lot of respect, even though I was just a dockworker. If I felt sick or had something else I needed to attend to, I'd give the office a call and they wouldn't even ask me why I was missing work. They just told me to do what I needed to do. At Fed Ex calling in sick was treated like treachery. They let you know that you were an at-will employee and treated you like it.
And safety? Holy toledo. When I got hired at UPS they put me through a week of classes where they taught me proper lifting practices, how to safely and efficiently perform virtually every task I could possibly be asked to do, how to deal with hazardous materials, etc. When I showed up at Fed Ex they pointed to a trailer and said "empty it". They didn't even bother to give me the customary "don't lift with your back". UPS performed routine safe practices evaluations where a supervisor would watch you working for a little bit and give advice on how you could be safer and less likely to injure yourself. Fed Ex didn't bother. I ended up teaching proper lifting mechanics to a lot of guys I worked with there simply because I was worried about their health. Fed Ex didn't give a rat's ass if they blew out their backs, but I kind of liked the guys I worked with so I did what I could.
Twice while I was working at Fed Ex I nearly got crushed by heavy equipment due to the incompetence of the supervisors there. Both times I saved myself with a little running dive but it was close. The accidents were easily preventable but nobody cared and so they kept happening. After the second near-miss I didn't show up for work the next day and didn't bother to come back.
I don't work at UPS or Fed Ex anymore. I've got a good union job in a different line of work these days (thank the Lord for college!), but I know what difference a good union makes
With rising economic uncertainty, stagnant middle class incomes, exploding salaries for upper management and corporations cutting benefits at a time of rising profits we could face some labor unrest in coming years. Whether that leads to a revival of labor unions is still an open question.
Another tyrant blinks?
There may yet be hope for Bahrain. The Persian Gulf kingdom ruled by the Sunni al-Khalifa dynasty has been rocked by protests in recent days from its Shiite majority underclass. King Hamad then responded to peaceful protests by sending in the goons and using helicopters to strafe mourners at funerals.
And now the police have been abruptly withdrawn. Pearl Square in downtown Manama, the heart of the protests like Tahrir Square in Cairo, now belongs to the protesters.
Like many if the Middle East dictatorships the al-Khalifas appear to have been split among the hardliners (led by the King's uncle and long time Prime Minister) and the moderates (led by the crown prince and perhaps the King). The tensions between the two camps were documented by the WikiLeaks cables. Now the balance seems to have veered sharply towards the moderates, possibly helped along by admonishments from President Obama.
If the good news holds it appears that the virus of democracy is proving harder to suppress than previously thought. The inbred royals ruling Bahrain's neighbors must be looking at this in alarm. People tend to discount the value of social networks in the recent bout of Arab unrest. Personally, I think YouTube deserves far more credit. Without the horrifying videos of police brutality, it is unlikely that Bahrain's hardliners (who still value their ability to be integrated into world society) would have backed down so quickly. The absence of such videos in Libya, Syria and Saudi Arabia (no to mention the greater willingness of those despots to shed blood) poses a bigger challenge to regime change in those countries.
Next up Algeria? Yemen? Who knows….we live in interesting times.
The next dominoes rattle
The fall of the Pharaoh raises the question whether the Middle East tumult will subside, or if this is the beginning of an avalanche not seen since Eastern Europe in 1989. While it is easy to get carried away, regime change in Tunis and Cairo occurred because the men with the guns did not act against the protesters. As Iran showed a couple of years back, unfortunately that is not always true. When the generals obey their masters and when the grunts obey the generals, democratic hopes come to a bloody end.
It is also still not clear whether Tunis and Cairo were soft coups, where the public face of the regime changed but little else did. However, some local despots do need to be more scared than others. On cue the days of rage have commenced in three of the most vulnerable autocracies in the middle east.
Iran – When Egypt erupted, the mullahs hypocritically cheered the right of Egyptians to protest. They should have known that their restive masses were looking at Cairo and drawing encouragement. Now the embers of the Green Revolution are reigniting. The opposition leaders are already in preventive house arrest and the riot police are cracking skulls.
Algeria – Algeria was the rare Arab country that held free elections in the early 1990s. When it appeared the Islamists won, the military quashed the results (taking their cues from the Burmese junta who made the similar error of not rigging their elections a couple of years before). The next few years saw a brutal and bloody civil war. Though violence died down the last few years, unrest has always simmered underneath. Now it has erupted.
Bahrain – The Gulf monarchy's presence in this list may seem unusual to people who do not follow the Middle East, but the Sunni monarchy ruling a 70% Shiite population has had periodic bouts of unrest. After promising to respect peaceful rallies, King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa has opted for bullets. Warning: Violent video below.
The protests in all three countries already highlight one huge difference with Tunisia and Egypt. These autocracies are willing to spill blood. The men with guns and batons will have to refuse to take orders for these tyrants to fall or give way. The list above is also not exhaustive. Yemen, Jordan, Sudan and to a lesser extent Syria (where you have to frankly be foolhardy to publicly protest) have faced protests. Then there is the longest ruling autocrat in the region who has seen his fellow dictators on either side of his country fall. The recent cables leaked by Wikileaks revel how the 41 year regime of Muammar Gadaffi has been tarnished by his licentious progeny. Even Libya may be facing the unthinkable, public protests.
It is very likely that no more dominoes will fall this go around, but the yearnings for freedom and respect on the Arab street will be harder to bottle up again. And if one can dream, if Egypt actually manages to create a constitutional democracy the clock will start running out for the remaining autocracies in the region. The 1990s saw the demise of assorted military juntas in Latin America. Even though the Chavezs and Ortegas are threatening democracy in the region, by and large military rule is passe in the region. Lets hope this decade sees similar change from the Maghreb to the Fertile Crescent, and beyond.
As a final note, do notice how quiet the murderous thugs of Al-Qaeda have been at the sight of the Pharaoh being toppled without suicide bombers.
Supergran wielding a purse foils robbery
Now for something lighter and inspirational. Some of you may have already heard of this story. Six sledgehammer wielding robbers hammering away at the window of a Northampton jewelers store got the shock of their lives when an enraged 71 year old pensioner came trotting up and started hitting them with her handbag. This inspired bystanders (like the bloke taking the video) to step in and assist her foiling the robbery. Needless to say Ann Timson is now a national heroine. And the twerps she foiled will have a tough time living this down in the joint. Video below:
The Pharaoh leaves
Talk about timing…barely 30 minutes after blogging about Mubarak refusing to go, the tired old dictator leaves. An inspiring moment for Egypt and the World. Hopefully this does not signify an attempt to perpetuate the Nasserite military dictatorship. Suleiman can help by keeping his promise to repeal the 30 year emergency law and not running for reelection. May the Ayatollahs be next.
The Pharaoh who would not go
That was anti-climactic. With Egypt convulsing from the after-shocks from the Maghreb triggered by the self-immolation of a frustrated Tunisian fruit seller, rumors of Hosni Mubarak's impending departure spread rapidly. And then Mubarak doused cold water on those hopes with a vague rambling speech (blaming foreign influences) announcing that he was delegating unspecified powers to his man Friday, new Vice President Omar Suleiman. The crowd's displeasure is evident in the video below, particularly at the 12:30 mark where Mubarak tries to identify himself with the young people out in the streets.
Suleiman on whom the Obama administration has placed its wishful hopes for a transition to democracy the proceeded to rile the crowd by asking the protesters to go home. The Egyptian army which has played a two faced role in this crisis has endorsed Mubarak's plan, and Mubarak does seem to have handed some powers over to Suleiman.
So what now? Nobody knows. The White House was evidently blindsided by Mubarak's defiance and has limited leverage on the situation. Ultimately this is a crisis that must be resolved by the Egyptians. Washington's efforts should be focussed on preventing the army from initiating the type of bloody crackdown that crushed Iran's Green Revolution two years ago.
With no obvious opposition candidate in the wings, Egypt faces a period of prolonged uncertainty and probably instability. A big concern in Egypt is a silent military coup, of the type that may have overcome Tunisia's Jasmine Revolution. Suleiman is deeply tied to Mubarak's repressive regime and in his 70s is unlikely to be a long term solution in any case.
Concerns have been raised that elections could result in the Muslim Brotherhood to power. If the United States truly believes its pretensions of being the "defender of the free world", it needs to come to grips with the reality that democracy can result in unfriendly governments. For too long Washington has supported autocrats like Mubarak who provided "stability" in the form of stagnation and decay of their countries institutions, economies and societies. After some hesitancy the Obama administration seems to be veering towards support for a democratic transition. Here's hoping that the Egyptians can pull it off (and by their example reignite Iran's Green Revolution).
It is time to update the world map. As expected South Sudan voted overwhelmingly to secede from the largely Muslim and Arab northern part of the country. With Sudanese dictator Omar al-Bashir promising to respect the results, fears of a North-South civil war have receded.
The extremely impoverished new nation (whose name has not been formalized) faces a daunting task ahead. It is riven with feuds, has almost no infrastructure and the desire to be free from Khartoum appears to have been the only glue that held its warring factions together. It is blessed and cursed with an abundance of natural resources (and oil). Mineral wealth has generally been the bane of developing countries. Getting it out of the ground creates few jobs but generates a lot of revenue for venal kleptocrats to siphon into Swiss bank accounts. Revenue sharing arrangements with the North have to still be negotiated and Khartoum will be eager to exploit any rifts that appear.
The creation of South Sudan could provide added impetus to secessionist movements across Africa. The African Union has avoided opening up the Pandora's box of redrawing colonial borders. The sole exception to the rule, Eritrea could claim that it had been a separate Italian colony before being annexed by Ethiopia after World War II. Now the genie is out of the bottle and secessionist claims in places like (oil rich) Southern Nigeria could re-emerge.
Maybe my pessimism is unjustified. Having midwifed the creation of the new country (with the active encouragement of right-wing evangelical groups) it is likely that the United States will remain involved in the region and discourage mischief. Equally or more likely the combination of a weak resource rich state surrounded by unscrupulous resource poor neighbors could result in another Congo.


The U.S. tax code either federal or state needs a major restructure. In a sane world we would be just taxing consumption on the federal level and the states would tax how they feel via income, corporate, sales tax, property, etc. Simplicity to our tax code would provide much needed relief to our economy. The founding fathers always wanted the states to be ran by its citizens as they saw fit with very little federal interruption.
The current state of reality is our tax code through the federal and state IRS agencies give perks out to business through credits, abatements, write offs and subsidies government officials like and punish those who they don't care for. Here in Indiana, local officials like to give tax abatements to businesses under the premise they will flourish and bring jobs to the area. On the business side, projected job growth by business leaders to government officials is just a PR move. Businesses have a strategic plan for revenue growth before they do on employee growth. People being hired by business is a byproduct of money coming in, not the other way around.
Before I began with my example, this is not a post to say businesses need to pay their fair share. In fact, it is the other way around. Local government officials are usually not principled in economics to understand tax revenue coming in is not "static tax revenue". Meaning the based assumptions of "X revenue" will not actually happen. Tax revenue goes up or down which means its "dynamic tax revenue". Just like investors waiting for companies to announce their earnings, tax officials on all levels of government must wait to see what actual tax revenue comes into their treasury offices.
Flow International Corp., an ultra high-pressure water cutting manufacturer, will cease operations at 1630 Fabricon Boulevard in 12 to 14 months, according to a supervisor.
The company, which has been in Jeffersonville since 1995, received tax incentives for a $2.4 million expansion 2009. At that time, Jeffersonville granted Flow tax abatements on $1 million of new equipment and $500,000 in real estate improvements. The abatements lasted five years and have since ended.
The Indiana Economic Development Corp. also gave Flow up to $100,000 in performance-based tax credits and $52,000 in training grants, the News and Tribune previously reported.
The project was reported to add nine jobs to its 97 employees in 2009, boosting its average annual payroll by $500,000 with the new additions. It's unclear how many jobs will be lost with the departure.
Nine employees accounted for $1.5 Million in tax credits/abatements via local and state. That equates to $177,777 per employee. $52,000 in "training grants" is government speak for just handing the company money. Grants don't have to be paid back. Average salary of each employee added was $55,555. This number probably includes benefits.
Indiana on state and local levels need a major overhaul of their tax codes. Government officials usually feel empowered explaining complicated tax schemes like TIF or abatements, but in the end, money is money.
As Dr. Thomas Sowell says, "Money has no feelings".
If a company is given a tax abatement for a 10 year period and leaves the area before that period I'd over, is that company penalized in any way or is the area just out of the money they granted?


text:
Why Santa Fe Broke the K-12 Model and Chose a Different Curriculum for the Middle Grades
Choosing a new curriculum for New Mexico public school districts is no small task. Each content area goes through a six-year adoption cycle. So, before committing, districts solicit input from teachers, parents, administrators and even community members, in an effort to make the best choices for their kids.
One reason we chose MidSchoolMath is that the middle grades represent the critical time in a student's academic career.
When the Santa Fe Public School system had to select a new math curriculum last year, they went in search of something that met their pedagogical needs and best served their unique school population. And they found MidSchoolMath—much to the delight of Erica Wheeler, Lead Instructional Materials Coordinator for Santa Fe Public Schools.
EdSurge recently chatted with Wheeler, as well as some of her colleagues across the district, to learn more about why they chose MidSchoolMath, how it fits into their evolving needs and how teachers and students have responded to the changes so far.
Erica Wheeler
EdSurge: Why did you decide to adopt MidSchoolMath's core curriculum?
Wheeler: One reason we chose MidSchoolMath is that the middle grades represent the critical time in a student's academic career. We thought about elementary, middle and high school. Certainly, one model is to have one solution for K through 12 that we have implemented in the past. This time, we chose something different for the middle grades because middle school students are kind of a different band of learners. We knew we needed high engagement that would capture their attention and foster learning in a different way. So, it was that, as well as the big shift in pedagogy that we were looking for.
In terms of pedagogy, MidSchoolMath fosters a need in students to figure out the skills required to solve the problems that are posed. That's the beauty of story-based learning. It's not just, "Jane has a room that's 30 feet by 10 feet. How much carpet would you need?" These are high engagement stories that inspire kids to ask, for example, "OK, how would I build a new corral for my sheep? What are the dimensions? How many sheep do I want to fit in? So, how big a corral would I need? How much building material do I need?"
"I love the layout and the storylines, which help the kids remember the steps of a concept. I use it in a very structured way. Middle schoolers need this kind of structure for familiarity."
-Lana Wimberly, Milagro Middle School
How have teachers responded to the change in pedagogy?
One teacher said that she was going to retire this year. But we finally have MidSchoolMath, which is the way she has been wanting to teach for 20 years. So, she is going to do another year to experience teaching math the way she has always known it should be taught.
By and large, the teachers are making the shift and seeing the value in this way of teaching. It aligns with our goal of having less [top-down] direct instruction. Of course, you have to have direct instruction, but we want to have it sprinkled throughout a lesson that has activated student interest and sparked questions. If you have a question in your mind, and you get it answered, chances are, you're going to remember it better than just viewing a standard algorithm on the board. We're trying to shift away from the old "sage on the stage, skill and drill them" approach. This definitely fits into that.
Students in Ms. Wimberly's class at Milagro Middle School (MidSchoolMath)
More from MidSchoolMath
EdReports Review: MidSchoolMath received a perfect score on EdReports in the latest 2021 criteria for math curriculum. See the full EdReports reviews.
Jo Boaler Approved: MidSchoolMath is the only curriculum endorsed by Dr. Jo Boaler. Read her story on EdSurge to learn why.
Curriculum Catalog: See Core Curriculum by MidSchoolMath, and download a 2021 Product Catalog.
"It allows students to "own" the content in a way that I haven't seen from another curriculum. Its pedagogy really emphasizes students taking control of their own learning. I'm excited to use it in a face-to-face classroom. I think it will really shine."
-Hansen Bergamini, El Dorado Community School
How has MidSchoolMath helped you navigate instructional shifts during the pandemic?
One of the things that we looked at when we moved to fully remote learning was a flipped classroom. Kids would watch an instructional video at home and then get one-on-one or group support from the teacher in the virtual room. We had to maximize a small amount of time. With MidSchoolMath, kids watch and generate questions about the information they think they need to solve the problem. Then, they collaborate, and the teacher facilitates.
The materials have been super helpful because the high engagement videos are built in, and so is the individual practice. Teachers can closely monitor who's doing the work and who isn't. They can also use the Test Trainer Pro tool for asynchronous practice. MidSchoolMath is a combination of synchronous and asynchronous learning. That helps teachers maximize their instruction time.
"Students love the immersion videos and are willing to work through thorny questions to solve problems. The major difference is that it's okay to be wrong. It's going through and figuring out WHY you're wrong that matters. The Simulation Trainer might be my favorite component. It demonstrates proficiency, but also teaches perseverance. With the Progress Monitoring function, I can see the kids working in real time and intervene when necessary. I also started using pairs in breakout rooms for the Practice Printable. Kids not only support each other, I can jump in and catch misconceptions as they are happening. It's a GREAT program."
-Terri Blackman, Wood Gormley Elementary School
When kids start feeling successful, they're more engaged, and when they're more engaged, they're more successful.
How does MidSchoolMath foster a growth mindset in students?
Kids need to understand that their success in learning is about their investment and hard work. It's not just heaven-sent talent. When kids start feeling successful, they're more engaged, and when they're more engaged, they're more successful. And so, in the process of the small group discussions, what you can often see—depending on how you group your kids—are the quiet kids becoming leaders. They begin to feel empowered in their learning.
You need a teacher who knows how to facilitate that, but these materials are really designed for it. The goal is definitely individual learning, but MidSchoolMath is very clear about how and when you do whole-group discussion, small-group discussion, small collaborative groups and individual work. The materials are built to support all of those models.
MidSchoolMath also helps teachers shift their pedagogy so that they're not just talking at kids. They're in a conversation that is all about solving the problem. It's less about the right answer.
"I have seen students be able to apply mathematical skills to real world scenarios with much more ease. Students appear to build better problem-solving skills using MidSchoolMath."
-Philip Andrew Boyd, Milagro Middle School
Read more by clicking here
The Real Solution to Learning Loss: Valuing Teachers and the Teaching Profession
Supporting First-Generation and Low-Income Students Beyond the College Acceptance Letter
Apr 26 Education Policy

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Earned the Cheers to Independent U.S. Craft Breweries (Level 17) badge! Earned the Middle of the Road (Level 61) badge! Earned the Brewery Pioneer (Level 18) badge!
Earned the Wheel of Styles (Level 22) badge! Earned the Heavy Weight (Level 55) badge!
Earned the Hopped Down (Level 7) badge! Earned the Home Brewed Goodness (Level 5) badge!
Earned the Sky's the Limit (Level 72) badge! Earned the Winter Wonderland (Level 5) badge!
Earned the Photogenic Brew (Level 14) badge! Earned the 99 Bottles (Level 20) badge!
Earned the New Brew Thursday (Level 23) badge! Earned the Verified Adventure (Level 36) badge! Earned the Brewery Pioneer (Level 17) badge! Earned the I Believe in IPA! (Level 50) badge! Earned the Haze for Days badge!


So, let us start with Valery Kratokhvil's article Nommo Spaceship from Canis Major.
Since 1931, a team of French anthropologists led by Marcel Griaule and Germaine Dieterlen were studying customs and beliefs of the African people called Dogon, living in the territory of Western Sudan (the present-day Republic of Mali). Their thirty-year work resulted in The Pale Fox monograph dedicated to Dogon mythology, the first volume of which was published in Paris in 1965. Three years later, the famous British astronomer W.R. Drake noted the Dogon people's precise knowledge of the star Sirius parameters.
Not having even their own written language, in their cosmogonic myths the Dogon distinguish such different kinds of celestial bodies as planets, stars, and satellites. Stars are referred to as tolo, planets are called tolo gonoze ("stars that move across"), and satellites are called tolo tonaze ("stars that make circles"). The accuracy of these ideas is amazing, especially if we take into account the people's primitive lifestyle. Among the Dogon, only Olubaru priests are allowed to study ancient myths. They are members of the secret "society of masks", who know the special language Sigi so ("the language of Sirius")... In everyday communication the Dogon speak the Dogo so language.
The Dogon believe Sirius is a triple star consisting of the main star Sigi Tolo and the stars Po Tolo and Emme Ya Tolo. They remarkably precisely indicate the period of rotation of the two smaller stars around the main one – 50 earthly years (modern data: 49.9 years). Moreover, their ancient myths contain information that Po Tolo has a minor size along with enormous mass and density.
"It is the smallest and heaviest of all the stars, and consists of a metal called sagolu, which is more brilliant than iron and so heavy that all terrestrial beings together would not be able to lift even its particle..." Another part of the myth specifies: "the sagolu particle has a size of a millet seed and a weight of 480 donkey load packs" (i.e. about 35 tons).
Astronomers in different countries today debate whether the third component – Sirius C star – exists in this stellar system. Several astronomers even asserted "it had been observed a telescope"... Although such observations have neither been repeated nor confirmed, a number of experts believe the irregularity of Sirius A trajectory is due to the third star effect.
According to Dogon myths, when the star Po Tolo (Sirius В) that in the Dogon priests' opinion has an elongated orbit approaches the star Sigi Tolo (Sirius А), the latter starts shining brighter. In order to verify this statement, several years ago astronomer A.V. Arkhipov compared the measurements of the star brightness over 1.5 centuries. The researcher came to the conclusion that Sirius brightness indeed fluctuated with a period of 50 years, i.e. the period of Sirius B rotation around Sirius A. Moreover, when such fluctuations were compared with changes of the distance between the stars, it turned out the Dogon were absolutely right: the closer the satellite was to the main star, the brighter the star became!
The Dogon people also know that Saturn is encircled by a "regular ring", while Jupiter has four large satellites that were discovered by Galileo Galilei in 1610 by means of a telescope. The Dogon priests – keepers of the sacred "language of Sirius" (Sigi go) – explain their astronomy awareness by the fact that in the time immemorial their forefathers were relocated to this planet from Po Tolo, i.e. from Sirius B.
Babylonian, Egyptian, Greek, and Roman sources indicate that in ancient times Sirius – the bright blue-white star in the constellation of Canis Major (the Great Dog) – looked differently than nowadays. Thus, in Babylon it was called Shukkudu – the "red-hot copper", Ptolemy in his Almagest (the 2nd century AD) included Sirius in the list of red stars, while the Roman philosopher Lucius Seneca noted about two thousand years ago: "The redness of the Dog Star (Sirius) is deeper, the redness of Mars is softer, and Jupiter has no redness at all…" However, in the 10th century AD the Persian astronomer Abd al-Rahman al-Sufi described Sirius as blue and white, as we see it today.
One of the Dogon astronomical drawings depicts the Sun and Sirius connected by a curve that twists around each of the stars. At that, the diameter of Sirius exceeds the diameter of the Sun.
It should be noted that Dogon myths about deep space are very much in line with modern scientific views. For example, the Dogon know that our galaxy visible from the Earth as the Milky Way is a "spiral stellar world". They believe there is an infinite number of such "spiral stellar worlds" in the universe, while the latter is "infinite, though measurable".
Strictly speaking, Dogon myths mention not just one, but several "space journeys". The initial journeys were undertaken by a person named Ogo. Upon his third trip he got to the planet Earth where he turned into the Pale Fox – Yurugu.
Furthermore, in ancient Dogon myths and drawings the space NommoArk is described, in which ancestors of the Dogon descended from Sigi Tolo, having brought with them everything necessary for living on the Earth. Olubaru priests depict the Nommo Ark as a basket (tazu) resembling a truncated cone in which the upper plane represents a square and the lower plane represents a circle. On the cone sides there are ladders on which people, animals, plants, etc. were holding while descending to the Earth.
The Nommo Ark landed after eight years of "swinging" in the sky, "having raised a cloud of dust by an air vortex". Nommo was the first one to go out of the Ark, and other creatures followed him.
The Dogon priests indicate LakeDebo in Western Sudan as the place of landing. The lake is filled with water when Niger River overflows. On one of the lake islands there is a stone image of the Nommo Ark flying among the stars.
Anastasia: Generally speaking, there is no unity in versatile exploration of the single; there is neither broadening of the horizons nor the most important thing – man's knowledge about himself and his true Essence.
Rigden: Unfortunately, this is so. Let me give another interesting example in this regard. As I have already mentioned, there are the Dogon people in West Africa. At the end of the 19th century, when leading European countries started dividing Africa into their colonies, the territory where this tribe lived, just like their neighbours, got under the dominion of France. At that time, active slave trade from the African continent was developed. Nevertheless, the Dogon were not affected because they lived in inaccessible areas. So, the first person to learn about their existence was an official of the colonial troops who was making a list of "savage" tribes. His attitude towards these people corresponded to the stereotype created by politicians of his country, in other words, that "savages are not even human beings". At that, the culture of these people was discovered (though just for a narrow circle of specialists in Europe) by the French ethnographer and Africanist Marcel Griaule. First and foremost, he was interested in the spiritual side of the Dogon life, and that is why the priests of this people eventually revealed their greatest secrets to him.
Rigden: Perfectly true... However, the world learned about the cosmological system of the Dogon not from works of this ethnographer, but from works of an astronomer who was also keen on archaeology and ethnography and managed to compare all this knowledge. Thus, the Dogon and the kindred Bambara people are among few peoples who have preserved the original information practically with minimal distortions, often without even understanding the meaning of this information, while the latter is such that it is far ahead of all the modern scientific achievements.
Rigden: In the Dogon and Bambara cosmology there is information about the significant primary role of vibration and spiral movement in the creation of the Universe.
Anastasia: The Dogon possess knowledge about the spiral movement of the Universe?!
Rigden: They do. In the Dogon mythology there is a supreme deity – god-creator named Amma. One of the Dogon myths says the world originated from the word Amma.
Anastasia: Signs? Given that Shambala also communicates and creates events via signs... Signs are essentially a special topic. In regard to the above-mentioned legend, readers might ask a question: what do the "guiding and main signs" mean?
Rigden: Well, first of all, the very fact that the Dogon possessed such knowledge testifies to the fact that their ancestors received it through paleocontact. The two "guiding signs" are the signs which can be used only by the one whom they call Amma in their myths. The eight "main signs" are the creating signs which, when you apply certain power to them, figuratively speaking, like a key to a lock, open certain possibilities of managing the processes of both creation and destruction. It is very rare, but it happens so that the "main signs" become available to a human being.
Anastasia: It is very rare, but they become available to a human being… This is the Grail! I recorded this knowledge in Sensei of Shambala, Book IV. Once you mentioned the Grail consisted of twelve signs, and the Dogon mythology mentions eight signs excluding those two which are unavailable for people in principle, as far as I understand. Hence, the Dogon either had incomplete information, or it was partially lost with time, or concealed from the European researchers who wrote down their myths. But the fact that the Grail consists of the "main signs" with which the world may be designed and adjusted as one desires is indirectly mentioned in many legends of various peoples.
Rigden: Absolutely correct... Such knowledge, being "sacred" for one or another people, is almost never fully revealed by the tribe's priests, particularly to random people. As for the Grail, one should remember that when it was hidden, it was not coincidental that the 12 signs were split into four parts, three signs in each. This significantly complicated the process of arranging the signs and activating the Grail with sound. The signs of the Grail in a certain sequence are like a form, like a key to a lock which, when a certain power is applied (the sound formula of the Primordial Sound), opens otherworldly possibilities to a person.
Rigden: Incidentally, these ancient peoples have preserved records that number four embodies the feminine principle, number three embodies the masculine principle, and their sum equals to seven, which is the basis of the human Being (the principle of eternal life) and perfection.
Anastasia: Four embodies the feminine principle… Hence, since the Grail was composed of four parts, this indirectly points at the connection with the creating divine power of the feminine principle – Allat.
Rigden (grinned): Why indirectly? … By the way, speaking of Allat, in the cosmogonic myths of the Bambara people, which tell about the timeless initial stage of the creation of the world, it is mentioned that the world originated from the void endowed with motion – Gla. Gla in turn gave birth to a sounding twin. As a result, a pair appeared – Gla Gla. In general, after a number of conversions and transformations, owing to vibration, there appeared "signs" intended to be placed on objects that were not yet created in order to mark them. During the act of creation, the spirit Yo appeared (from whom the first powerful forces Pemba and Faro descended, which took part in the creation of the world), as well as 22 basic elements and 22 spiral coils. It is further mentioned that when these spiral coils "stirred" Yo it resulted in emergence of light, sound, all actions, all creatures, and all feelings… The myths mention that Pemba moved in space in a vortex and that he threw upwards that which was later called Faro. Faro in turn created seven heavens and the spirit of the air, and he spilt life on earth in the form of water. He is omnipresent and visits all waters. In actual fact, Faro continued to create the world; he put the Universe in order, classified all elements of the Universe, created people, and taught them the Word.
Anastasia: Faro put the Universe in order. Yet, these are the functions of the creating power of Allat!
Rigden: That is what I am talking about. By the way, regarding speech… In the Dogon mythology, the deities of water (the divine twins) shaped as half-humans and half-snakes were called Nommо. Legends remain that, when they saw from the sky the mother earth naked and devoid of speech, they made for her a skirt of ten wisps of filaments of heavenly plants. It is precisely the moist filaments twisted in a spiral, which comprised the word and were full essences of Nommo, that communicated speech to the earth – the first language of the world. So, some people should not have called the Dogon and Bambara peoples "barbarians". Those "barbarians" have preserved by far more information for future generations than "civilised people" have. Certainly, not without their elements of distortion, but still this is much better than nothing.
Anastasia: Well, after all that you have just said, a desire arises to give everything up and leave for Africa, since such knowledge is available there.
Here are the "savages"! I am truly interested why teachers did not give us such information at school. The question is far from being rhetorical, although now that I have read Anastasia Novykh's books I do know the answer. I think most of secondary school teachers and college professors of history themselves hardly know anything neither about the Dogon, nor about the actual events that took place in the remote and recent past of our civilization of humans who naïvely consider themselves rational. This is mostly the result of activities of the small group of people called Archons who are very interested in depriving all of us of an opportunity to know the Truth about our past, present, and nearest future. Well, it is also the result of efforts of a much greater number of individuals who represent the Archons' executive machine, in particular scientists, politicians, and priests who year after year shape consciousness and views of billions of people on this planet, maintaining rigid materialism and money rule. A striking example is shown in the article by the traveller and photographer Vladimir Alekseev, recently published on our website and entitled A real story of how discovered artefacts are replaced. Excavations in San Bartolo, Guatemala, not to mention that even MS Word marks the names of the aforesaid African tribes in red as non-existing in English.
Nevertheless, it doesn't befit us to give up, especially in the times when the entire Spiritual World is helping those who sincerely desire to discover and know the Truth and to share such knowledge with everyone craving for the real Life. Therefore, dear friends, we kindly ask you to send us interesting finds, information, articles, photographs, and everything that in one way or another relates to the Primordial Knowledge contained in the cultural heritage of mankind.
In the end, please view several more photographs.


Plus que 6016 en stock !
au lieu de 108.86£tax incl.
The thermochromic paint turns from a coloured and opaque state (when cold) to a transparent and colourless state when it reaches or exceeds the approximate temperature for which it is programmed. It is reversible, which means that when the temperature drops, the paint becomes opaque and colourful. This change can occur several thousand times. It is important to note that the thermochromic paint should not be exposed to sunlight, or overheated, as it is very sensitive to UV or high temperatures: After a long exposure to the sun or overheating, the paint can not change of colour or will be poorly responsive. Its resistance to radiations can be improved, by using our anti UV clearcoat, in thick coat. In all cases, this paint should not be applied over any object that stays outdoors.
MIX: Stir well or shake well before use. Filter if possible with a cone shape filter (190µm).
STORAGE:"paint can be store 6 month in a cold temperature , without UV light - Do not froze !"