2014-05-31

 

5000 years in Afghanistan

There were a lot of people who said that there was no chance of Afghanistan embracing democracy, and they pointed towards things like the fact that in a 5000 year history there had never been a democracy or willing transfer of power. And because of this they opposed trying to change politics in Afghanistan in 2001.

They were so wrong.

Karzai is an honorable man and will certainly transfer power in the coming months. What a beautiful result. And from this civilian to the militaries of the free world - thankyou for your blood sacrifice, it is absolutely the right thing to do in my eyes.


|



2014-05-25

 

Iraq Elections 2014

The results of the 2014 election are now in. I favour the secular parties, but that is not what the Iraqi people are voting for. The top 3 parties are religious to some extent. So I think what needs to be acknowledged is that the Shiites need to be allowed to do whatever they want. They can vote for moderate Shia (Maliki) or radical Shia (Sadr and Muwatin) or secular Shia (Allawi).

The non-Shia parties need to passively support the best Shia party. That is far preferable to the religious Shia all allying together. If the top 3 parties (all Shia religious) ally it will create 157 seats out of the 165 needed to govern.

It would be better if the top Sunni party (Muttahidoon with 28 seats) and the Kurds (Kurdistan Democratic Party 25, Patriotic Union of Kurdistan 21, Gorran 9) with a total of 55 seats were to be passive partners of Maliki, giving 92+28+55 = 175 seats.

The long-term challenge is to get the Shia split on a left/right basis instead of hardcore religious, moderate religious and secular. And to get the Shia to support secularism too. As such, it is better for Allawi to remain in opposition so that he can say "I am the opposition to Maliki as I am secular, and you should vote for my secular party next time because it's better!" (and the only way to prove that is to elect him). The Sadrist and Muwatin provide another opposition party - that of strong Shia religion. Hopefully that "3rd pole" will be eliminated over time, but the scary thing is that they will get stronger with their message "strong religion is better" (and the only way to prove that is to elect them).


P.S. What we need is for Allawi to reach about 70 seats, to Maliki's 92, and then the Sunni Arab block vote of 43, and the Kurdish block vote of 55 can sweep in to anoint Allawi, with 70+43+55=168. But for now, Maliki is king.

P.P.S. As per this, the Arab Sunnis and Kurds should not make any demands on Maliki. Just cement him in power and let him do whatever he wants.

P.P.P.S. Just to be perfectly clear, the Arab Sunnis and Kurds should not even demand a single cabinet post. If Maliki chooses to give posts to the Arab Sunnis and Kurds, that is great, but the choice is his. He must feel confident about abandoning his ex-allies like Sadr.

P.P.P.P.S. In the long term we need 6 parties. Secular Arab Shiite Left, Secular Arab Shiite Right, Secular Arab Sunni Left, Secular Arab Sunni Right, Secular Kurdish Left, Secular Kurdish Right. The non-Shia need to hold their noses and support the most secular party they can in order to gain a majority, and after securing a secular party they need to start thinking left/right.

P.P.P.P.P.S. It looks like my favorite candidate, Mithal Al-Alusi, is back in parliament.



|



2014-05-06

 

Honesty in Religion

Around 1990 I was having a conversation with a German. The German said that he was ashamed to be German when he had to explain the Holocaust to his children. But I asked why the Germans supported Hitler's conquest of other countries, and he explained that that was natural - a great conqueror. I asked him whether other Germans would support a great conqueror now, and he said he thought so. Basically we have no choice but to keep Anglophone troops in Germany to ensure they don't become a rogue state again.

Anglophone pacifism as seen before WW2 was disastrous. It is very clear that Jesus's pacifism is a bankrupt ideology. Mohammad saw the need for perpetual warfare, and he was right. I wish Anglophone Christians would acknowledge that their (correct) ideology is closer to that of Mohammad than Jesus, and simply say that they are Muslims, and that Christian ideology is horrendous.


|



2014-05-05

 

Nuking America

I was an atheist for decades, and as an atheist I sought to produce Heaven on Earth instead of waiting for some theoretical paradise only visible after death and without a shred of evidence.

My idea of Heaven is that everyone in the world knows English, we all use the ISO date format (YYYY-MM-DD) and we all use metric. That is in addition to every country being a liberal democracy like Taiwan and Australia.

I am happy to adopt American (ie not British) English as the standard language, since English is defined by common usage, and Americans dominate. But at the end of the day, the Americans are too intransigent to switch their date format and measurement system.

So at some point in human evolution we need to get rid of (or quarantine) intransigent Americans.

Note that I believe America has an absolute human right to stick to their ridiculous MM/DD/YY date format. And I also believe that America today is doing more for freedom than any other country in the world. But none of that alters the fact that at the end of the day, I will cross swords with the Americans to try to create Heaven on Earth. Also I am willing to nuke China to prevent them from changing the international language to Chinese (unless we decide that Esperanto is what is spoken in Heaven). But the Chinese are not as intransigent as the Americans.

Basically if I were in charge of the world there would be a shitload more dead people!


|



This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?