By Richard S Ehrlich BANGKOK – When Country Joe and The Fish performed their famous satirical protest song I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-to-Die during the 1960s, they influenced many people’s decision to oppose America’s disastrous Vietnam War. Today, Barry “The Fish” Melton – still a self-proclaimed “leftist” – grimly predicts that the US is doomed to also lose its war in Afghanistan. “I don’t think we should be involved in Afghanistan, I think it is a waste of time and energy,” Melton said in an interview on April 3, when he arrived in Bangkok for his first visit to Southeast Asia. “I’ve got to … Continue reading ‘The Fish’ talks Afghanistan and acid trips

THE ROVING EYE Nuclear Obama By Pepe Escobar United States President Barack Obama’s 47-nation nuclear security summit, a sort of Group of 20 meeting on steroids, may have been the biggest schmooze-in of global leaders hosted by an American president since the 1945 San Francisco conference that founded the United Nations. There’s hardly any need for a monster, Washington-gridlock, public relations exercise to convince global politicians of the threat of highly enriched uranium or plutonium being grabbed by an al-Qaeda-style jihadi group, or some terror freelancers for that matter. Yet US analysts such as Steve Clemons of the New America … Continue reading Nuclear Obama

Israel evades ‘ambush’ at nuclear summit By Victor Kotsev When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu decided at the last moment to cancel his attendance at this week’s 47-nation nuclear security summit in Washington, a great deal of speculation ensued about the bad blood between him and Barack Obama and about whether the United States president might allow the conference to turn into a forum for criticism of Israel’s nuclear program. That possibility was alarmingly real for the Israelis. “I think that the sense amongst the Israeli delegation coming back from [Washington] DC right now is that they fell into a … Continue reading Israel evades ‘ambush’ at nuclear summit

Not all religious explanations of tragic events are harmless Instead of searching for such meanings, we humanists accept that the universe is unjust David Flint The Guardian Madeleine Bunting accuses the “New Atheists” of mistakenly claiming “that religion started out as a clumsy stab at science – trying to explain how the world worked” (My stuffed bookcase shows that God is attracting more debate than ever, 5 April). But this mistake, if mistake it be, was made first by believers who composed accounts of how the world was made. It is a mistake that continues to be made by Christian and … Continue reading Instead of searching for such meanings – accept that the universe is unjust?

Keep our war veterans out of prison That so many ex-servicemen end up in prison is shocking. We owe our veterans help returning to civilian life David Ramsbotham guardian.co.uk Today a conference will be held by Veterans in Prison, of which I am president, to examine a problem that was drawn to the attention of the public last year by the National Association of Probation Officers, which published the surprising and shocking figures that some 20,000 ex-members of the armed forces were in the hands of the criminal justice system, more than 10,000 of them in prison. The ministries of … Continue reading Keep UK war veterans out of prison

Dancing girls of Swat back in business Where women outside cloak themselves in dupattas, Swat’s dancing girls go without headscarfs and their readiness to even shake hands with men seems shockingly intimate in Swat. – File Photo MINGORA: Their cousin was kidnapped and killed in a hail of bullets – her body dumped at a roundabout, dripping blood. That was 15 months ago when the Taliban roamed Swat with impunity. Today Shabana and her sister Shabnam are back in business, proffering their favours and their dancing skills for discerning gentlemen with cash to spare now that Pakistan’s army say they … Continue reading Dancing girls of Swat

The Pakistani woman’s crusade against the system By Sadef A. Kully dawn.com “We are such a strange nation, we are carrying feudal values with us, we are carrying tribal values with us, and we are carrying capitalist values,” said Mahnaz Rahman, Resident Director of Aurat Foundation. – Photo on file KARACHI: Although, it has been twenty something odd years since Dr. Kauser Saeed Khan has been participating in and witnessing women protest for equal rights, there still seems to be some fight left in her…probably more than just some. “We are not going to be quiet, or give up,” said … Continue reading We are not going to be quiet, or give up – Pakistani Women

Evolving campus politics Posted by Nadeem F. Paracha In 1947 the only established student organisation in the newly created country of Pakistan was the Muslim Students Federation (MSF), the student-wing of the Muslim League. The Muslim League began to disintegrate as Pakistan’s first ruling party. Consequently, the MSF too started to reflect the fragmentary nature of its mother party. In 1950, a group of students in Karachi formed a progressive student organisation called the Democratic Students Federation (DSF). The organisation’s rapid growth led it to becoming a powerful platform for the students, and it was this initiative that instigated the … Continue reading Pakistan – Evolving campus politics.

US needs to do more in Bajaur, says Pakistan In Damadola one can see a warren of caves and tunnels so well dug into the hillside that no aerial boming could damage them. – (File Photo) dawn.com DAMADOLA: Pakistan is so weary of being told it needs to “do more” to fight militants that in one area cleared this year it has the same message for the Americans on the other side of the border in Afghanistan. “In their language, they need to ‘do more’,” says Colonel Nauman Saeed, who has led Pakistan Army operations in Bajaur tribal agency, which … Continue reading US needs to do more against Terrorism

An Easygoing Approach to Faith Sheikh Salman al-Oadah Religion is human nature. Allah created religious awareness as a component of the human being. Our very natures recognize essential moral values. This is what makes those values universal. When a person acquires religious knowledge, he or she discovers something about his or her inner self, something that was always there. As for taking things in an easygoing manner, this leaves people with fertile ground for their innate upright natures to grow and develop naturally. It gives people leave to conduct their own affairs as long as they do not transgress against … Continue reading An Easygoing Approach to your Faith