Blogging the democratic revolution
Imagine for a second that you’re the head of a secular authoritarian regime in the Middle East. The West is pressuring you to liberalize your political system, but elections are bringing to power grassroots Islamist groups who are looking to take you out of power. The root of this, you realize, could always be due…
Rage across the Muslim world persists and grows for another week over cartoons published in a Danish paper depicting the prophet Muhammed. It has culminated in violent protests with chants of death, the burning of embassies, and a round of condemnations from governments in the region. Meanwhile, in Europe, the cartoons have been reproduced by…
Global Crisis Watch/ClandestineRadio.com’s Nick Grace and Rich Lafayette hosted an interview with Aryo B. Pirouznia of the Iranian opposition movement SMCCDI and the newly-founded Iranian National Secular Party and with me. Listen to it here . The interview begins from the minute 8’30.
Jacqueline Mackey Paisley Passey in Costa Rica now has a tremendous gallery of photos on Costa Rica’s cliffhanger presidential election that are beautifully taken and beautifully laid out. That election has about 3100 votes’ difference now between Oscar Arias and Otton Solis, 40.5% to 40.3%, and 12% of the votes still to be counted –…
Adriana Saftoiu, the spokeswoman for Cotroceni (the Presidential Palace) told Cotidianul daily that, ???????President Traian Basescu called Cristian T. Popescu, the President of the Romanian Press Club and asked him to take the necessary steps in order to stop the publication in mass-media of the respective cartoons.??????? Up to this press release there were no…
Ollanta Humala’s presidential campaign in Peru is bedevilled by charges from peasants from remote mountain areas that he tortured them in 1980s under the nom de guerre of ‘Captain Carlos.’ What a charmer. It’s not enough that he is leftwing and pro-Hugo Chavez, a failed military coupster, and an anti-Semitic racist. He’s also tortured peasants…
Jacqueline Mackey Paisley Passey has first-rate overview of the election along with lots of photos in this entry here, and a terrific news roundup full of lots of blogs I didn’t know about. Be sure to see all her new stuff here. One of the links she has, on Babalu blog (which I admit I…
Costa Rica’s election, like Honduras’ election earlier, is turning into a cliffhanger. Frontrunner Oscar Arias is ahead, but only by about 0.4 percentage point. It could turn. This referendum on free trade – for his opponent, Otton Solis, is opposed to it – is suddenly a matter for speculation. Will Arias win? Keep fingers crossed….
No one has a penchant for coming down on the wrong side of the issue like Spain’s Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero. Whenever there is a critical juncture, a challenge from brute force, he has a way of placing himself on the illiberal side of the issue. So now he’s made a new string…
Oscar Arias, a powerful, luminous, fearless advocate for free trade is winning in Costa Rica’s exit polls in what looks like a decisive victory. Reportedly taking in 45% of the vote in a three-way field, it means his victory so strong he will avoid a runoff, if these numbers hold, putting this election on a…
Thousands of Venezuelans rallied against Venezuela’s dictator today, protesting the anniversary of the awful day in 1992 when then-Colonel Hugo Chavez tried to seize power through military means. But Hugo Chavez had a surprise of them – a demonstration of his own to insist that this attempted military coup, I kid you not, was a…
Islamofascist fanatics have set fire to the Danish, Norwegian, Swedish and Chilean embassies in Damascus, blaming all four for the Danish cartoons that offended Koranic commands not to make graven images of religious figures in a bid to halt idolatry. Anyone who looks at those cartoons can be pretty sure he wouldn’t be tempted to…
Thais have had it up to here with Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and 100,000 people are now in the streets demanding his resignation. The billionaire-army cop-turned prime minister has used his office to pocket billions for himself in yet another ‘Corporate State’ business deal while the rest of Thailand languishes in the aftermath of the…
Venezuela’s dictator is now celebrating his seven miserable years in power with self-satisfying congratulations and an obligatory trip to Fidel Castro in Cuba. This extravaganza is happening as Venezuelans find themselves poorer, bleaker and less free than ever before. Teodoro Petkoff, an intrepid dissident editor of the left in Venezuela, writes a moving essay on…
Cuban dissident Guillermo Farinas Hernandez is on the 2nd day of hunger and thirst strike in Cuba. Hernandez – whose health was already deteriorated during his time in jail – is striking for protesting against repression and the threats of closing his Cubanacan press agency. Hernandez said: “May they know that if God wants me…
As part of my previous explication of the Hungarian political parties, and in order to convey how the parties involved are pretty counter-intuitive to American standards, I????????m presenting excerpted transcriptions of speeches regarding the upcoming elections. The first is by Viktor Orb????n, head of FIDESZ, who is presenting his eighth ???????state of the country??????? address…
Two more Italian newspapers reprinted the Mohammed cartoons. L’Opinione and Libero are two center-right-leaning newspapers that consider themselves as “libertarian” and “unpolitically correct”. Here is L’Opinione frontpage today. And below is Libero’s . For those who don’t read Italian, this is the translation of the title: “Here Mohammed gives orders-What a shame. Europe caves in…
Hey everyone, Thanks for hanging around. The past two days have seen huge server problems as I’ve been changing hosting companies. Lots of stuff I didn’t expect to happen, along with having to now go in and manually add the last ten days worth of posts. But now, hopefully, Publius will be back to normal.
I watched the President’s State of the Union address with a French diplomat friend and my friend remarked that about 2/3 of Bush’s speech was on foreign policy, with a significant amount of it on democracy movements. “As it should be,” he added. I thought there was a nuance to it, though, and it was…
First of all, I’ve to admit that I’m impressed by the courage and determination of the Cuban freedom fighters to keep fighting against the regime despite an increase in repression. Friends in Cuba tell me they’re convinced that the regime uses intimidation against dissidents because it knows its days are numbered. The more the regime…
Peru’s April election just keeps getting more interesting. It’s a real black and white choice for Peruvian voters, nothing complicated, quite simply a contest between the good dignified low-key free-market lady and the racist tinpot dictator wannabe. There’s also plenty of sideshows to keep it interesting. In fact, this Peruvian election is shaping up to…
It was 364 days ago that King Gyanendra suspended democracy by sacking parliament and began a new war against Nepal’s civil society in the face of a Maoist insurrection. Since then, thousands of people protesting against the government have been arrested, from major politicians and journalists to the everyday man and woman. Just today, on…
After being targeted with a violent ‘repudiation act’ , the Sigler Amaya family is once again attacked. But this time, one of the family’s members, Juan Francisco Sigler Amaya, suffered an attempt to his life while going to work. A woman????????s voice yelled ???????worm,??????? ???????worm,??????? and several male voices exclaimed, ???????we????????re going to squish you,…
The Washington Post published an editorial over the weekend entitled, “U.S. Policy Seen as Big Loser in Palestinian Vote” that is well worth a read for anyone who wants to know exactly what it’s like to be completely oblivious to what democracy actually is and the institutions that are needed to sustain it. Staff writer…
Last week, I got an email from Darsi Ferrer of the Center for Health and Human Rights,which is a dissident organization member of the Assembly to Promote the Civil Society. Darsi , who is living in Havana and has been victim of numerous ‘repudiation acts’ ( during one of which he was wounded to his…