International News

This is a breaking story about which I'll have more to say in a column next week, but today the National Governors' Association announced that 46 states and the District of Columbia have joined a coalition in favor of common academic standards. Only South Carolina, Alaska, Missouri, and Texas have held back. From the NGA press release:

By signing on to the common core state standards initiative, governors and state commissioners of education across the country are committing to joining a state-led process to develop a common core of state standards in English language arts and mathematics for grades K-12. These standards will be research and evidence-based, internationally benchmarked, aligned with college and work expectations and include rigorous content and skills.

The caveat here is that once the coalition develops the standards, each state will be able to choose whether or not it will actually adhere to them. Unless the federal government provides some sticks and carrots, there will be little incentive for politicians from low-performing states, like Mississippi, to enact the standards. After all, doing so would reveal just how little those states' school children are actually learning, and to what a pitifully low standard they've been held.

But this is still big news. It wasn't that long ago that proponents of common standards believed the best they could hope for were regional standards. In other words, instead of our current system of 50 different state curricula, groups of states would band together and agree to share one system. But in recent months, the political calculus has shifted considerably, with national standards emerging as education reform common ground between teachers' unions and some of their opponents within the Democratic coalition -- those who broadly support teacher merit pay, an expansion of charter schools and vouchers, and alternative-certification programs for teachers. All of these folks can agree, seemingly, that the system would benefit from some regularization.

Of course, anti-testing advocates are likely to be quite skeptical of this move, which has the potential to lead to national assessments. At this early stage, though, it is totally unclear whether common assessments would even be an outgrowth of common standards.

--Dana Goldstein

A month ago I noted that New Hampshire was expected to become the sixth state where gay marriage is legal. Today it did. It is the second state, after Maine, where the legislature, rather than a court, has extended marriage to same-sex couples. 

Reason coverage of gay marriage here.

The European Union is close to banning all Canadian seal products, and a grassroots campaign to boycott Canadian fish and seafood is gaining momentum. But what of Europe's own barbaric culinary practices? In response, Full Comment will call attention to European hypocrisy and demand an immediate end to the brutal slaughter of helpless creatures. Today's poor victim of continental cruelty: mice...or possibly rat. It's hard to tell.

Thousands of years ago, Roman legions on the march brought along specimens of mice, known as edible dormouse or glis glis, which could be quickly fattened and then consumed as an emergency source of food, should the unit find itself unable to live off the land. That tradition lives on today, concentrated primarily in European Union member Slovenia, though glis glis poaching remains common in parts of Italy, as well.

The dormouse is a rodent, of course, and bears some superficial similarities to the common North American squirrel. A nocturnal creature, their loud squeaking makes them an easy target for human hunters, who can paralyze them with flashlight beams before killing them with a firearm or a well-thrust skewer. Various forms of wire or bladed traps are also common means of capturing dormouse. Dormouse hunting was especially popular in Slovenia due to a belief that Satan is their shepherd, meaning that the slaughter of a dormouse is not only a way to eat, but also a way to strike a blow against Satan. Even in modern times, stewing dormice with red wine and vegetables is a popular dish, as is fried chopped dormouse.

In Italy, where the hunting of dormouse is illegal, they have been poached almost to the brink of extinction in certain areas. Some Italians, facing increasing difficulties in finding dormice in the wild, have taken to raising dormice domestically, fattening them up before turning them into stew. Italian chefs, arrested for serving such stew, have offered as a defence that they aren't really serving the protected creatures, but are merely lying to their customers and feeding them common rats, instead. The wisdom of this legal defence remains in question, as serving rat is also illegal.

The National Post calls on all Canadians to boycott Slovenian agricultural products, until such time that this barbaric practice is brought to an end, and further calls upon the Italian government to crack down on the illegal poaching of dormice within their national borders that is threatening this peaceful species with extinction.

Matt Gurney
National Post

matt@mattgurney.ca

As I stated in the last update the Book,
WILL begin printing this month, June 2009 and I will have and begin signing, numbering and shipping the copies to those who ordered a signed/numbered copy THIS month, June 2009.
As for the process inwhich Barnes and Noble goes through in ordering books I cannot tell you at this point. I will tell you that Barnes and Noble has not once listed information correctly as is listed by Books In Print or Bowker Indentifiers.
I will receive the copies ordered directly from the printer when printing begins shortly and when that starts I will post it here for all to see as well as on the company web site at http://www.sinclairpublishingllc.com/ .
Once printing begins I will then post a link on the Company web site where the book can be ordered directly through Sinclair Publishing, Inc for anyone wanting to do so.
Again, let me make it clear, printing of the book WILL begin this month as will shipping of those signed/numbered copies ordered through this blog.

Copyright 2009 by Larry Sinclair/larrysinclair.org/larrysinclair-0926.blogspot.com/LarrySinclair0926.com and Larry SinclairBarackObama.com. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

John Nance, the former FAA administrator, and now an aviation consultant to ABC News, says that there's a 50-50 chance that the missing Air France jet went down in an explosion. The story was just on ABC. They tended to downplay Nance's comments, but I have to admit, i was wondering about the possibility of terrorism as well. Obviously, it's too soon - and it's suspicious that no terrorist group is claiming credit, since they're usually not very shy about such things.

North Korea?"s underground detonation of a nuclear device on May 25 has rattled the global community and confronted President Barack Obama with a major national security challenge. It seems every so often that the regime in Pyongyang engages in provocative behavior, so as to bind world attention. ?SWe are unpredictable and dangerous, so world, you better pay attention to us,? appears to be the radioactive clarion call being uttered from North Korea. In the past, these unorthodox tactics on the part of the ?SDemocratic People?"s Republic of Korea,? or DPRK, have been employed as an effective means of blackmail. In the wake of the DPRK?"s first nuclear test, in October 2006, then U.S. President George W. Bush agreed to American concessions to North Korea that seemed inconceivable based on his prior rhetoric. Many of these concessions involved economic support for the ailing North Korean economy, especially with regard to the supply of energy and foodstuffs.

The latest nuclear escapade by North Korea is being interpreted as continuity with its longstanding policy of using its possession of weapons of mass destruction as a means to creatively employ economic blackmail. However, the North Korean political economy is so dysfunctional, I think there may be a much more radical calculation emanating from Pyongyang.

There are few countries on the planet that have economies as shattered as North Korea?"s. Officially a Marxist-Communist state, its reality is in fact much different. Peculiar for a nation supposedly based on Marxism, North Korea is ruled by a family dynasty. The founder of North Korea, Kim Il-Sung, is worshipped as a God, and his lifeless corpse is constitutionally still the president-for-life of the DPRK. The son of Kim Il-Sung, Kim Jong-il, is the current ruler of North Korea and it is rumored that one of his sons is also being groomed for political succession. Like his father, Kim Jong-il is also deified, and referred to in every proclamation as ?Sthe Great Leader.? However, despite his exalted status, his people have endured repeated famines that have snuffed out the lives of millions, according to international relief organizations. Furthermore, with the demise of the Soviet Union and the termination of its subsidies to North Korea, the nation?"s industrial infrastructure has essentially collapsed. Men still show up for work in the factories, but nothing is produced, for the most part, and the pay is a pittance. It is the women who actually run the economy of North Korea, largely through the black market. Though theoretically illegal, this otherwise draconian police state largely tolerates the female-dominated black market, estimated by some observers to represent 80% of the DPRK?"s meager economic output. The women of North Korea are the breadwinners in that society, having rediscovered entrepreneurial skills and are engaged in craft production and trading goods smuggled into the DPRK from China.

Having a national economy largely based on the black market is actually in conformity with other aspects of North Korea?"s unique political culture. Another example is how its communist-indoctrinated diplomats are expected to engage in profitable capitalism while posted abroad, so as not to bother Pyongyang with inconsequential and mundane matters, such as paying the rent on their embassies. For that reason, numerous North Korean diplomats have been expelled by their foreign hosts for engaging in activity ?Sincompatible with their status.? That term usually means espionage; in the case of the DPRK, the diplomats were expelled for engaging in narcotics trafficking.

In this basket-case of an economy, North Korea has had only one export commodity that has consistently been a strong earner of foreign exchange; armaments. In the past, ballistic missiles have been a hot export commodity for the rulers in Pyongyang. However, many of North Korea?"s traditional missile buyers, including Iran, now manufacture their own rockets. With demand for its medium range missiles potentially drying up, North Korea must look at new products that will stimulate demand. Long range ballistic missiles that can strike targets in the United States are one example of product diversification that may explain the DPRK?"s recent test of a supposed satellite launch. However, the crown jewel in North Korea?"s product portfolio is its nuclear weapons capability.

Though most analysts believe that the recent detonation of a nuclear device by North Korea was just its traditional blackmail-driven saber rattling, I think there may be a far more dangerous motive behind the atomic weapons test. North Korea?"s first nuclear test in 2006 is widely viewed as being a dude. While the basic concept of creating a nuclear blast is relatively simple-bringing together a critical mass of fissile materials-the means of achieving full yield requires sophisticated physics and engineering. The small yield of the blast in 2006 revealed that the DPRK had not yet mastered the technique of ?Sextending the generation,? meaning prolonging the natural onset of a nuclear explosion by a ten millionth of a second. What seems like an insignificant time factor makes all the difference between an explosion that is in the same category as a large conventional bomb, and a blast on par with the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in 1945. Until the DPRK had demonstrated its ability to ?Sextend the generation,? potential foreign buyers of nuclear weapons would have little faith in North Korean nuclear weapons technology.

The May 25 nuclear test by the DPRK was, by all accounts, successful. The Russians estimate that the device detonated by the DPRK had a yield of between 10 and 20 kilotons, on par with the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Potential customers, including both rogue nations and non-state actors such as Al-Qaeda, have now received a ?Sproduct demonstration? that is convincing.

While my theory that North Korea?"s recent actions are based on a policy decision to begin surreptitiously marketing nuclear weapons technology, and possibly fully assembled nuclear weapons to the highest bidder, may seem far-fetched, there are signs that key decision-makers in the U.S. national security establishment have adopted a similar viewpoint. Recently, the Department of Homeland Security has abandoned plans to place radiation detectors in most ports of entry to the United States. This decision was based on the conclusion that technology does not exists that would reliably detect a well-planned attempt to smuggle a nuclear weapon or its components into the United States. However, there is another area that the Department of Energy, in particular, is aggressively moving forward on. A new field has been invented, called ?Snuclear forensics.? It is based on the belief that a nuclear detonation is so unique, post-blast analysis can reveal the origin of the fissile materials that were used in the weapon. This seems to be the new deterrent doctrine; if a country such as North Korea sells a nuclear weapon to a terrorist organization that then used it to destroy an American city, the U.S. will be able to scientifically determine the point of origin of the nuclear device, and launch a retaliatory response against the offending nation. The Obama administration considers North Korea a major nuclear proliferation threat

As if the Global Economic Crisis was not enough to worry about, we now may be witnessing the emergence of nuclear proliferation as an export-based strategy for capital formation. It makes one hope that nuclear blackmail is all that North Korea is truly interested in. President Obama will have many sleepless nights worrying about North Korea.