Counting
I used to count just blogs, a fairly harmless exercise in optimism. But one which has left me feeling the scales are a little unbalanced. So, with an the absence of new blogs to count, I decided to try something new today. This is a personal decision, not expecting anyone else to follow suit.
And before my detractors start calling for the kerosene and kindling, I am going to count a variety of things.
Beginning now (in no particular order) ~
- Seats for women in Iraq's parliament; 33.3 % (easily outvoteable, Juan Cole has details, read right through).
- Internally displaced persons and refugees in Iraq; 1.4 million (Anthony G Brown scroll to 10/02/04 open letter)
- Iraq Body Count running total; min 16121, max 18393 (here)
- US Coalition Body Count; running total 1493; in Feb; 53 (here)
- Number of troops the Ukraine plans to pull out of Iraq; 1,650 (here)
- Number of troops Australia might be sending to Iraq; 450 (here)
- Blogs counted this month; 3
- number of times emigre has said to herself "one day we will do away with war"; countless.
19 Comments
i agree that being optomistic all the time isnt good, but when exactly are you optomistic about things in iraq? i must have skimmed over those posts. maybe you're an extremely positive person all day long and use your keyboard to take out your negative frustrations on the world? if you had a balance of optomism and pessimism, than that would be a whole lot more beneficial.
John
We will never do away with war so long as there are dictators, tyrants, and unelected "leaders" of nations/states/territories.
"emigre is a pessimist, tie her to the stake"
You saved me the strokes, anyway you forgot one, new milblogs. We want our side, our story told too. Where are the new milblogs.
your current list is outdated. Get out there and find me new blogs, and stop all this pessimism.
Since when is 33% "easily outvotable"? That is a greater percentage than that held collectively by Kurds and they are considered "king makers" in the newly elected council.
When you consider that about a third of those "king making" Kurds are also women, and without them, the Kurds face a serious loss of power, I don't see how the female votes are anything but a powerhouse.
It would be more reasonable to expect that the Kurdish block (which is for a secular state), the secular Arab blocks, and the female members of all parties would be powerful front for tamping out any (minority) Islamist tendencies among the Shi'a.
I think only the most zealous Islamofacist is as hopeful that Iraqi women will be oppressed as Emigre and Juan Cole are.
cmar ii
Little revision in balance shall we.
Half of 100% is 50%. Most populations have an almost 50-50 balance of females to males, although left to it's own devices a population will swing slightly towards female, so your balance might be more like 51% female and 49% male. Surpising aye.
During times of war, when more men then women go off to blow stuff up and shoot things (usually themselves) the balance swings even more towards woman, because more women end up left alive (we are better at surviving).
So bearing all this in mind - why has Iraq's parliament only allocated 33% of seats to women? It just doesn't make sense. That means 66% seats are allocated to men - double the number of women!!! This was supposed to be a "representitive parliament", and yet men are represented two times more then women. Mad isn't it?
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0023
Oh come on, since when did men in parliament start practicing equal gender balance? It's not going to happen unless all parliaments all over the world have a 50-50% gender balance law written into their constitutions.
So, while Iraq's writing their constitution, how about everybody else re-write theirs too.
In fact, Australia could write a Bill of Rights too while they're at it. Did you know Australia doesn't have a Bill of Rights? No, it doesn't. And that's why Australia has what are essentially concentration camps hidden away in it's deserts.
Which is why I am so incredibly dubious about this whole "democracy" thing. If the US and UK are torturing detainees in Iraq, and if Australia has concentration camps in it's own territory - well, phoo, you'd be mad not to question the unravelling of certain events.
So you see, 0023, this is why i'm putting forward this positive motion - all governments all over the world should have 50-50% parliamentary gender distribution written into their constitutions.
emigre, why would any country want a 50%-50% gender balance in their congress? if a woman didnt earn their right to be there, why should they be allowed to represent their people? being given something you havent earned is called....communism! and who cares if australia doesnt have a bill of rights. the bill of rights is an american invention, and just because australias constitution doesnt express strictly in words the rights their people are allowed doesnt mean they are savage cavemen living in a society of lawless chaos. its a sad thing that the bill of rights was even invented in the first place. who would have thought that people would have to put in writting that guns and freedom of speech should be legal? the past governments made this a must in the US constitution, but times have changed. civilized nations today do not need to be as specific about things.
australia has concentration camps? let me guess, arabs are being enslaved for oil right? the answer for every bizarre conspiracy theory is oil. do you have any evidence of this genocide? pictures? video? a link to a news story that isnt from one of your fellow crackpot bloggers?
Frank the Tank
emigre, why would any country want a 50%-50% gender balance in their congress? if a woman didnt earn their right to be there, why should they be allowed to represent their people? being given something you havent earned is called....communism! and who cares if australia doesnt have a bill of rights. the bill of rights is an american invention, and just because australias constitution doesnt express strictly in words the rights their people are allowed doesnt mean they are savage cavemen living in a society of lawless chaos. its a sad thing that the bill of rights was even invented in the first place. who would have thought that people would have to put in writting that guns and freedom of speech should be legal? the past governments made this a must in the US constitution, but times have changed. civilized nations today do not need to be as specific about things.
australia has concentration camps? let me guess, arabs are being enslaved for oil right? the answer for every bizarre conspiracy theory is oil. do you have any evidence of this genocide? pictures? video? a link to a news story that isnt from one of your fellow crackpot bloggers?
Frank the Tank
emigre, why would any country want a 50%-50% gender balance in their congress? if a woman didnt earn their right to be there, why should they be allowed to represent their people? being given something you havent earned is called....communism! and who cares if australia doesnt have a bill of rights. the bill of rights is an american invention, and just because australias constitution doesnt express strictly in words the rights their people are allowed doesnt mean they are savage cavemen living in a society of lawless chaos. its a sad thing that the bill of rights was even invented in the first place. who would have thought that people would have to put in writting that guns and freedom of speech should be legal? the past governments made this a must in the US constitution, but times have changed. civilized nations today do not need to be as specific about things.
australia has concentration camps? let me guess, arabs are being enslaved for oil right? the answer for every bizarre conspiracy theory is oil. do you have any evidence of this genocide? pictures? video? a link to a news story that isnt from one of your fellow crackpot bloggers?
Frank the Tank
emigre, why would any country want a 50%-50% gender balance in their congress? if a woman didnt earn their right to be there, why should they be allowed to represent their people? being given something you havent earned is called....communism! and who cares if australia doesnt have a bill of rights. the bill of rights is an american invention, and just because australias constitution doesnt express strictly in words the rights their people are allowed doesnt mean they are savage cavemen living in a society of lawless chaos. its a sad thing that the bill of rights was even invented in the first place. who would have thought that people would have to put in writting that guns and freedom of speech should be legal? the past governments made this a must in the US constitution, but times have changed. civilized nations today do not need to be as specific about things.
australia has concentration camps? let me guess, arabs are being enslaved for oil right? the answer for every bizarre conspiracy theory is oil. do you have any evidence of this genocide? pictures? video? a link to a news story that isnt from one of your fellow crackpot bloggers?
Frank the Tank
emigre, a 50%-50% gender requirement is weird and dumb. why should a woman that is not chosen by her people to be in congress be admitted because of her gender? should we have a percentage of minorities in the government based on their percentages as well? 12% of the population in the US is black, but if there were a few extra good politicians running that were black....too bad for them. only 12% is allowed. maybe after politics we can make laws saying that a 50-50 gender spilt in doctors, lawyers, garbage men and teachers is a good idea too. the marine corps is too dominated by men, so half of them should be kicked out and replaced by women....drafted if need be. this would make the world so much better. it sounds familiar though, as if it has been tried before. receiving a benefit that you didn't earn....thats communism!
australia has concentration camps? let me guess, arabs are being enslaved to produce oil, right? to drill for oil? to fill drums with oil? it seems that every bizarre and insane conspiracy theory has oil as the reason behind it. im sure you have tons of pictures and videos to support your statement, right?
Frank the Tank
STUPID!!! how many different ways can i say it!
Frank the Tank
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emigre, im not sure if you can be incredibily dubious about democracy, considering the word is an adj and not a verb. i agree that this whole "democracy" thing has many flaws, but what is the alternative? you mention only focing people have representatives that they didnt vote for...so that sounds like it will work. you are obviously a small minded little girl that can't grasp the concepts seen in the big picture. perhaps your elementary school teacher has told your class that war is very very naughty and should be stopped. i can't imagine you come up with these crazy psychotic ideas yourself.
Frank, 00 etc
Well well, the misogynist psy-operatives are really crawling out of the woodwork now, aren't they.
What you are obviously all afraid of, is how well my plan would work ~ and how it would effectively de-fuse your weak grasp on power.
You see, your grasp on power is faltering. And that's why you have been making all those recent "alterations" to your constitutions, and your bills of rights, to try and wrest away any rights that ordinary people have left.
Of course you don't want constitutions and bills of rights really, they hinder your money grubbing plans. The next best thing for you to having no law, is to have law that gives you power over other peoples lives.
Your biggest problem is trying to create enough lawlessness to hide your crimes while at the same time maintaining a facade of so-called order. And this is where you will fail. Your weak point - you cannot eat cake and pretend that everyone else has cake too. Sooner or later people cotton on to the sawdust in the icing sugar.
richsanter
As I said, your weak grasp on power is faltering. Thus we see your inability, richsanter, to engage in debate manifesting in laughable smear campaigns re above false user profile with attached profanity.
Can I be bothered deleting the umpteenth time you have posted that peice of solicitous trash using a fake "clone" blogger-profile in my name? Well, maybe later. In the mean time, post as many items as you like richsanter, we are collecting them all and adding them to your case history.
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