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Fresh Water. Essential for human Survival or a Commodity for Profit.

30 Monday Mar 2015

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The most valuable commodity in the world today, is not oil, not natural gas, not even some type of renewable energy. It’s water—clean, safe, fresh water and it is being privatized for short-term profit. 

A gift of nature, or a valuable commodity? A human right, or a luxury for the privileged few? Will the agricultural sector or industrial sector be the main consumer of this precious resource? Whatever the answers to these and many more questions, one thing is clear:

That water will be one of the defining issues of the coming decade, not the internet, not the current conflicts, not poverty or Inequality, nor climate change, or the far of distant stars. 

SAVE THE PLANET, WHEN WE DON’T KNOW HOW TO SAVE OURSELVES. 

Some estimates say that 768 million people still have no access to fresh water.

Water isn’t traded on commodity exchanges yet but you would wrong to think that the most valuable commodity more valuable than oil will remain so.

These days we hear that sustainable development is the only way forward. There will be no sustainable development while the water issues remain unsolved.

It is our responsibility that fresh water does not become a commodity to be exploited for short-term profit to pump out billions in profit.

The Oil Industry wastes 2 million gallons each day in California Fracking.

Across the world Nestlé is pushing to privatize and control water resources. In 2000 at the world Water Forum Nestlé successfully lobbied to stop water being declared a universal right. Profits over people and corporate rights over human rights.

There is now a hunting season on local water resources by multinational corporations looking to control them. This means billions in profits with us paying 2000 times more for drinking water because it comes in a plastic bottle.

Safe water will become a privilege only affordable for the wealthy.

What are our Out of Date World Organisations doing to safeguard the human right to water other than more verbal diarrhea. (They are discussing the goals)

The World Water Forum which is described as a mouthpiece for transnational companies and the World Bank are falsely claiming to head the global governance of water. (See Below)

Water is essential for human survival and well-being and important to many sectors of the economy. However, resources are irregularly distributed in space and time, and they are under pressure due to human activity. Today, freshwater is used unsustainable in the majority of the regions of the world.

Everyone is demanding more of everything, more houses, more cars and more water. And we are talking of a world where temperatures are forecasted to rise by two to three degrees Celsius, maybe more. The situation is already dire.

China’s energy needs alone will grow by 100 percent by 2050. Since 1990, half the rivers in China have disappeared.

 

Globally, water pollution is increasing.  Around 60 percent of the worlds nation’s groundwater resources are already polluted.  In developing countries, an estimated 90% of waste water is discharged directly into rivers and streams without treatment.

At present, most water policy is still driven by short-term economic and political concerns that do not take into account science and good stewardship. State-of-the-art solutions and more funding, along with more data on water resources, are needed especially in developing nations.

Here are some hard facts.

Fragmentation of river systems due to dams is the single greatest threat to freshwater ecosystems’ health.

There are an estimated 800,000 dams worldwide, including around 45,000 large dams (over 15 metres high) and 1,000 mega-dams over 100 meters high. Over 60% of the world’s 227 largest rivers have been fragmented by dams, diversions and canals . An estimated 60 to 80 million people have been displaced by dams and nearly 500 million people have had their lives and livelihoods negatively affected.

Some 20 percent of the world’s aquifers are facing over-exploitation, and degradation of wetlands is affecting the capacity of ecosystems to purify water supplies.

People use 54% of the planet’s “blue water” (water that flows through rivers, lakes, and groundwater). Estimates suggest that this may increase to 70% by 2025.

2.3 billion people live in river basins which are under water stress, where less than 1,700 cubic meters of water is available for each person per year. If current consumption patterns continue, at least 3.5 billion people will live in water-stressed river basins in 2025 – half the world’s projected population.

Our Freshwater Living Planet Index (which tracks changes in populations of 714 species of fish, birds, mammals, reptiles and amphibians found in temperate and tropical lakes, rivers and wetlands) showed populations of freshwater species fell by 35% between 1970 and 2007 – a larger decline than in marine and land ecosystems. In tropical regions the decline was almost 70%.

Around 10,000 of the world’s 25,000 known fish species live in fresh water. An average of 300 new freshwater fish species are discovered every year.

Wetlands around the world provide goods and services to people worth an estimated US$70 billion a year.

Climate change is predicted to have a whole range of impacts on water resources. Variation in temperature and rainfall may affect water availability, increase the frequency and severity of floods and droughts, and disrupt ecosystems that maintain water quality.

Over the last 50 years, the frequency of severe flooding and the damage it causes have increased, in part due to the degradation of freshwater ecosystems.

In parts of the United States, Europe, Australia and New Zealand, over half of wetlands were destroyed in the 20th century, and many more were degraded across the rest of the world.

Water running into sink

 

Freshwater is a highly valuable resource for a large number of competing demands, including drinking water, irrigation, hydroelectricity, waste disposal, industrial processes, transport and recreation, as well as ecosystem functions and services.

There is only one direction for water prices at the moment, and that’s up.

The United Nations estimates that by 2050 more than two billion people in 48 countries will lack sufficient water.

Approximately 97 percent to 98 percent of the water on planet Earth is saltwater (the estimates vary slightly depending on the source). Much of the remaining freshwater is frozen in glaciers or the polar ice caps. Lakes, rivers and groundwater account for about 1 percent of the world’s potentially usable freshwater.

95 percent of the world’s cities continue to dump raw sewage into rivers and other freshwater supplies, making them unsafe for human consumption.

Agriculture is responsible for 87 % of the total water used globally. Fresh water is crucial to human society – not just for drinking, but also for farming, washing and many other activities. It is expected to become increasingly scarce in the future, and this is partly due to climate change. Approximately 98% of our water is salty and only 2% is fresh. Of that 2%, almost 70% is snow and ice, 30% is groundwater, less than 0.5% is surface water (lakes, rivers, etc) and less than 0.05% is in the atmosphere.

Climate change will have several effects on these proportions on a global scale. The main one is that warming causes polar ice to melt into the sea, which turns fresh water into sea water, although this has little direct effect on water supply.

The direct impact of climate change is not the only reason.

The increasing global population means more demand for agriculture, greater use of water for irrigation and more water pollution. Rising affluence in some countries means a larger number of people living water-intensive lifestyles, including watering of gardens, cleaning cars and using washing machines and dishwashers.

Rapidly developing economies also result in more industry and in many cases this comes without modern technology for water saving and pollution control. Therefore concerns about climate change must be viewed alongside management of pollution and demand for water.

If we allow poverty related to water to exist in other countries, then we can expect jealousies between nations to rise, and we can expect acts of vengeance from those who are jealous. It is already a source of conflict in some parts of the world such as the Indus River, which runs between India and Pakistan. Another one would be, in fact, in Iraq, where the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers, rising in Turkey, flow into Syria, then into Iraq. And, in fact, much of Iraq’s water supply is from Turkey.

Fresh Water is why Palestinian must strive for a one nation-state solution with Israel.  It is why we must stop oil exploration in the Arctic.

By the middle of the 21st century, 2 billion to 7 billion people will be severely short of water. The WHO estimates that more than 5 million people die each year from diseases caused by unsafe drinking water. By 2030, global demand for water will outstrip supply by 40 percent, a surefire recipe for war.

It takes some 5000 liters of water to produce 1 kg of rice.

General Electric Chairman Jeffrey Immelt said the scarcity of clean water around the world will more than double GE’s revenue from water purification and treatment by 2010—to a total of $5 billion.

Saudi Arabia is expected to invest more than $80 billion in desalinization plants and sewer facilities by 2025 to meet the needs of its growing population.

While China is home to 20 percent of the world’s people, only 7 percent of the planet’s freshwater supply is located there.  Asian countries will have severe water problems by the year 2025. (demand is increasing)(supply is decreasing)

In France agricultural production is exempt from the Polluter – pays -principle and that it continues to deteriorate the quality of groundwater with impunity.

The state of the world’s fresh water warns that decreasing water supplies could lead to epidemics and international conflict.  Over the next 20 years, the average global supply of water per person is expected to drop by one-third.

What does the future hold? 

How can water resources be managed sustainable while meeting an ever-increasing demand?

We always have the same amount of water.

The six billion people of Planet Earth use nearly 30% of the world’s total accessible renewal supply of water. By 2025, that value may reach 70%. Yet billions of people lack basic water services, and millions die each year from water-related diseases.

And you Wonder why we have terrorism.

Water is a basis of international conflict.

Basic human needs for water should be fully acknowledged as a top international priority. Education and research will be essential to providing the knowledge, skills and technology needed to combat fresh water scarcity in the future.

 

The World Water Forum is a large-scale international conference that is held every three years since 1997 in cooperation with the public, private sectors, academia, and industries.

It was first launched in an effort to facilitate international discussions on global water challenges.

The last Forum attracted more than 35,000 participants in Marseille 2012.

This Council is made up of.

  • 15 heads of State, of governments and European Commissioners.
  • 145 represented countries.
  • 112 Ministers, Vice-Ministers and Secretaries of State.
  • 176 national delegations and international organisations taking part in the Ministerial Declaration.
  • More than 750 elected officials among which 250 mayors and 250 parliamentarians.
  • More than 500 sponsored persons.
  • 3,500 NGOs and civil society representatives.
  • More than 2,600 children and youth.

Like all our Unfunded World Organisations it is an other gossip shop that lacks financial clout to make a differences.

There is only one way we can guard our Fresh Water we must Buy It.

Which can be achieved by Placing a World Aid Commission on all High Frequency Trading, on all Foreign Exchange transactions ( over $20,000) and on all Sovereign Wealth Funds Acquisition.

We than can create Drought Banks, that give Farmers an allocation of water.  He must then decide what is the best return he can get from that amount of water on his property.  It might be a big wheat crop or a small cotton crop.  It doesn’t matter.  The water is the fixed in the equation, not the type of crop.

Drought in China: Chongqing Municipality

folsom lake

Foot Note:

Just in case you think that all of this is Hog Wash:

Here are over 80 organizations (community, academic, governmental, funding, and more) working on water and sanitation issues in multiple countries around the world.

Technologies are actually available but most of them are too expensive or far to time consuming to implement simultaneously with ongoing progress and changes.

Even within the European Union an estimated 20 to 30 million people do not have access to safe sanitation, and little action has so far been undertaken to address this problem.

The question is not whether we can afford it but can we afford not to do it?

For example, what is the cost of no action? Water is already under severe pressure and this will only increase with climate change. We cannot afford to lose the services and benefits that a healthy aquatic ecosystem provides. We need clean water in sufficient quantities for our living and for economic activities. In order to keep that, we need a determined action to protect water resources.

The global population is likely to reach 9.1 billion in 2050, if not sooner. While this alone has potentially dire consequences in terms of pressures on natural resources, especially water,  Climate change sets its own agenda,

The world is changing faster than ever and becoming more and more complex.

Uncertainties about water availability and demand are increasing, as are the associated risks to development and well-being of people, societies and the environment. Unless we can generate the awareness and political will to react now, the crises we are experiencing now are likely to escalate and the odds of meeting our developmental goals will degenerate. This is why the most recent economic crisis could be seen as an opportunity; it provides an occasion for reflecting on a desired collective future.

For once we might act as one to the benefit of all. The future of the planet and the human race both depend on it.

Water is a common heritage of humanity and of future generations and must be protected as a public trust in law and practice. Water belongs to the Earth and other species. Water might teach us how to live together. How to tread more lightly on the earth — in peace and respect with one another.

Just in case you want the whole picture.

Click to access WWDR4%20Volume%201-Managing%20Water%20under%20Uncertainty%20and%20Risk.pdf

 https://youtu.be/sQZd2_1q2F0

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WE CAN ALL BE PROUD. Four million Syrian refugees in 2015.

15 Sunday Mar 2015

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We are made to believe that we are all connected in an interconnected world.

But in fact we seem to be shackled to fear, misconceptions, false ideologies, material reward and held ransom to rules and laws laid down to safeguarded the interests of the few.

Syria’s civil war is the worst humanitarian disaster of our time. The number of innocent civilians suffering — more than ten million people are displaced, thus far — and the increasingly dire impact on neighboring countries can seem to overwhelming to understand.

So take a few minutes to understand the magnitude of this crisis.

Syria dayTHEY CAN TAKE A BOW. YOU ARE ALL DOING YOUR PART.

Nearly four years after it began, the full-blown civil war has killed more than 220,000 people, half of whom are believed to be civilians.

The U.N. estimates that over 7.2 million people are internally displaced — an increase of more than three million in just a year.

23 million is need urgent humanitarian assistance, whether they still remain in the country or have escaped across the borders.

In 2012, there were 100,000 refugees. By April 2013, there were 800,000. That doubled to 1.6 million in less than four months. There are now more than three million Syrians scattered throughout the region — an increasing number that will soon surpass Afghans as the world’s largest refugee population.

The worst exodus since the Rwandan genocide 20 years ago.
<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> <span class="field-credit"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> Lisa Hoashi/Mercy Corps </span><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> The majority of refugees — about 70 percent — live outside camps.

The UN is asking for $5 billion in humanitarian aid to help the millions affected by the Syria crisis.

In December 2014, the U.N. issued its largest ever appeal for a single crisis — according to their estimates, $8.4 billion is necessary to meet the needs of all those affected by the crisis, both inside and outside Syria, an increase from last year’s $6.5 billion.

Yet that previous appeal was only funded less than 50 percent.

After four years of conflict, it is clear President Assad’s allies have been more determined to keep him in power than his enemies have been to remove him.

It is already clear that international divisions over the greatest crisis of the 21st century have contributed to its severity and longevity.

With China – which had also opposed the overthrow of Saddam Hussein – it vetoed a UN resolution condemning Syria.

The paralysing cold war-style battle lines that split the UN’s top table have not changed since.

There is little or no clear Arab demand for intervention.

Iraq and Algeria backed Assad while Saudi Arabia and Qatar encouraged the flow of money and weapons to rebel units, some linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, others to hardline Salafis.

Syria’s bloody stalemate thus seems destined to continue indefinitely beyond this anniversary.

So we are looking at another 10 years, or more, of conflict?

And what, in the meantime, is the best way to support people caught up inside Syria and in refugee communities?

Germany has provided 30,000 places. Norway and Sweden have taken 2,500 each.

In January 2014, Britain announced its own scheme to help the most vulnerable – victims of torture or rape, or suffering severe ill-health. So far, the scheme has helped exactly 143 people.

Here is the proud list March 2015.

Résultat de recherche d'images pour "pictures unhcr"

Pledges received since 2013:   61,648

Visas granted under other forms of admission: 12,354

Resettlement submissions made to the USA: 10,715

TOTAL confirmed pledges to date: 84,717

Country Total confirmed pledges (persons) received since 2013

Argentina humanitarian visa program.

Australia 5,600 resettlement and Special Humanitarian Program.

Austria 1,500 humanitarian admission.

Belarus 20 resettlement.

Belgium 300 resettlement.

Brazil open-ended humanitarian visa program.

Canada 200 resettlement 1,100 private sponsorship 10,000 resettlement/private sponsorship.

Czech Republic 70 resettlement.

Denmark 390 resettlement.

Finland 850 resettlement.

France 1,000 humanitarian admission/resettlement.

Germany 20,000 humanitarian admission 10,000 individual sponsorship.

Hungary 30 resettlement.

Ireland 310 resettlement.

Italy 400 resettlement/ 50 private sponsorship.

Liechtenstein 25 resettlement.

Luxembourg 60 resettlement.

Netherlands 500 resettlement.

New Zealand 100 resettlement.

Norway 2,500 resettlement.

Poland 100 resettlement.

Portugal 23 resettlement 70 emergency scholarships for higher education.

Spain 130 resettlement.

Sweden 2,700 resettlement.

Switzerland 3,500 resettlement and humanitarian visas.

United Kingdom Vulnerable Persons Relocation scheme.

United States of America open-ended resettlement.

Uruguay 120 resettlement.

TOTAL 61,648 + additional number to the United States of America  IN ADDITION…

Brazil has so far issued 6,053 humanitarian visas. Individuals admitted to Brazil under this program have the right to apply for refugee status.

Switzerland initiated a temporary extended family reunification program for Syrian refugees from September to November 2013. Under this program, 8,200 applications were received, and nearly 4,700 visas have been issued to date.

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland has so far accepted 143 Syrian refugees under the Vulnerable Persons Relocation scheme (number of arrivals as at last quarterly published statistics).

Ireland has accepted 111 Syrian refugees under the Syrian Humanitarian Admission Program.

Since 2012, France has provided close to 1,400 asylum visas for Syrians, which enable them to travel to France for the purpose of applying for asylum.

UNHCR has so far submitted 10,715 Syrian refugees to the United States of America for resettlement consideration (as of 28 February 2015).

A number of scholarship programs have been created for Syrian students whose education has been interrupted by the conflict.

And you wonder Why we have ISIS.

All I can say is Bravo. That leaves 22,938,352.

“Our greatest motivations in life come from NOT knowing the future.”

14 Saturday Mar 2015

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“If you think we’re electronically dependent now, you haven’t seen anything yet.”

Wireless communications will dominate everything, everywhere.

“Humanity will change more in the next 20 years than in all of human history.”

From the web to wildlife, the economy to nanotechnology, politics to sport, even transforming what it means to be human.

In my last three post I addressed the subject of Society changes due to Technologies : The Internet, Big Data, and Smart Phones.  So it would seem remiss of me not to inform the sixteen years old of today what is in store for them when they are, lets say 65.

It’s hard to focus on the future when the present is changing so rapidly before our very eyes let alone what will happen in 50 years’ time.

I could predict that this and that is going to happen.

From the capturing and digitizing the entire information content of your brains to chips that will eventually may have the ability not just to store information, but to learn and remember, just as real brain cells do to create complete copies of our brains’ content.

I could draw up a list of WHAT IF’s:

Like: Like what if you could finding a method of copying and uploading human consciousness into a machine, or even a holographic virtual body — basically, a software replica of a person. Or what if Traditional pharmaceuticals is replaced by hyper-individualized medicines that are manufactured at the time they are ordered, or that most people will have stopped taking pills in favor of a new device that causes the body to manufacture it’s own cures.

I am sure they are (without looking) many sites that are doing exactly this; covering Science, Nature, Transport, Medical, and every other aspect of Life.

Happiness is a direction, not a place or perhaps it is dark matter yet to be discovered.

One way or the other it’s pretty clear that the future remains radically uncertain, and there’s not much we can do about it.

Living a public life is the new default.

It is not possible to live modern life without revealing personal information to governments and corporations. Few individuals will have the energy, interest, or resources to protect themselves from ‘data surveillance’; privacy will become a luxury.

It is also clear that there will be a need for a trusted infrastructure to be created in order to prevent massive fraud and massive public distrust in online transactions, and in online life, in general.

We will have to reinvent the entire Internet as we know it, shifting power from a few American tech companies to the individual who creates, and therefore owns, the data.

It is also clear that greed makes monsters of men and unless we put a harness on greed and make it serve the needs of humanity the next 50 and beyond will not be worth living.

We will need to create a personal dashboard, a safe haven, for every individual’s dossiers, transactions, money, and profiles.  In this dashboard, you could set your privacy and communications settings.

All of this will create a big struggle about the question: Who owns (my) data?

My statement:

There is no way the world’s varied cultures, with their different views about privacy, will be able to come to an agreement on how to address civil liberties issues on the global Internet.

In 2065, we will have a post-Facebook and post-Google world.

We will have new business models in which facilitating data is more lucrative than owning data. As I have said if we do not make this transition, we face a privacy and fraud nightmare in which our lives are dominated by a few global tech companies.

We will have new generations of psychoactive drugs and eventually emerge, cognitive technology is likely to really, really rock our world.

We will run out of resources. We will have Climate change. We will have wars, and massive inequality, we will get humans to the nearest stars, we will be using English if not in the same form.

We will be wearing smart cloths connected to the internet (and even have linked stuff inside their bodies), we will be walking into internet-connected rooms and down networked streets, driving in the connected cars and public transit, get food and other goods from smart refrigerators/toasters/ovens, move through spaces bristling with connected sensors, and monitor remote places via apps and cameras.

Hal Varian on the future of privacy

The backlash against this most egregious privacy invasions will bring a new equilibrium between consumers, governments, and businesses—and more-savvy citizens will get better at hiding things they do not want others to see.

However predicting how it will all shake out is just fantasy.

Governments trying to protect themselves and their cultures might split the global internet into divided mess of networks.

The situation will worsen as the Internet of Things arises and people’s homes, workplaces, and the objects around them will ‘tattle’ on them.

The incentives for businesses to monetize people’s data and governments to monitor behavior will become extremely potent.

On the other hand citizens and consumers will have more control thanks to new tools that give them the power to negotiate with corporations and work around governments. Individuals will be able to choose to share personal information in a tiered approach that offers varied levels of protection and access by others.

The constellation of economic and security complexities will get bigger and harder to manage, belittling micro religions and what it means to be ‘educated’ will be replaced by other capacities.

People will get used to this, adjust their norms, and accept more sharing and collection of data as a part of life—especially Millennials and the young people who follow them some will complain but most will not object or muster the energy to push back against this new reality in their lives.

Society’s definitions of ‘privacy’ and ‘freedom’ will have changed so much by 2025 that today’s meanings will no longer apply.

We will certainly leave nothing behind that survives long in the digital age other than a future of “unevenly distributed” one with more social fissures might arise, presenting hurdles to people who do not have the resources to afford the gadgetry or the skills and tech-literacy to navigate the more complicated environment of 2025 never mind 2065.

Over 50% of today’s Fortune 500 companies will have disappeared.

The terms of citizenship and social life will rapidly change.

70% of today’s occupations will likewise be replaced by automation, with most coming back in different forms in different industries, with over 50% structured as freelance projects rather than full-time jobs.

50% of traditional colleges will have collapsed, and India will have overtaken China as the most populous country in the world.

Advocacy groups, service providers, large e-commerce companies, Google/Amazon/Facebook/Twitter, secret services, security officers in companies and consultancies, and individual Internet users… will  also be very much involved with ongoing tension between these groups,

We’ll play games to solve problems.

There will be an extensive rise of anti-capitalism.

The Future will be an eerie spot.

Predicting the Future is much like predicting the weather, the farther we move into the future, the less accurate our predictions become. So why do we make them?

So we don’t wake up one morning and get a shock.

Feel free to giving serious consideration to each of them and deriving your own conclusions for good or bad.

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Constantly Connected Impacts Our Lives. After humans , the Smartphone

12 Thursday Mar 2015

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Right, this is the last post on the subject of what is shaping our technology driven Society.

We are living in a world that relies on data communications.

It is hard to think of any tool, any instrument, any object in history with which so many developed so close a relationship so quickly as we have with our phones.

The Mobil Phone/Cell phone/I phone what ever you wish to call it has evolved into the Smart Phone. > voice and text services, cameras, alarm clock, and radio, access to the internet> all of which will be on your wrist shortly > Apple Smart Watch.

1 in 4 people check it every 30 minutes, 1 in 5 every 10 minutes.

There are almost as many mobile subscriptions (6.8 billion) as there are people in the world (7.1 billion)

I start this post by saying there is no argument when it comes to positive benefits to Society, that the mobile phone has contributed more to the individual than the Internet or Big Data has done to date.

On the other hand I believe it has also contributed to : The mess we have on our hands, to spreading the inequalities of the world, to fueling terrorist Organisations, to spreading non-thrusts, to making today, now it’s tomorrow, and to leading us to expect more from Technology and Less from Each Other.   

The Mobil Phone has become an indispensable feature of technology that is rapidly changing the face of communication not only in the most remote areas of the world but also the family structures of the world.

Returning to an Individual and an overall view:

Mobile phones are helping under served populations access the critical skills and empowering information they need to make informed decisions for themselves and their families, and move toward economic self-sufficiency.

They have done more than all the Aid given to Africa and beyond. In fact they are being used to facilitate and promote economic development and growth.

They reduce search costs and increase information availability, which makes markets function more efficiently.

In terms of the diffusion of ideas and knowledge, mobile phones make available information about market prices and employment.

The people who are growing your food, making your clothes, and assembling your electronic devices are often poor, low-wage workers around the world who don’t have Internet access. The way we are able to connect with them is through mobile,” it provides workers with a voice — individually and collectively — by having an anonymous tool to provide feedback.

But we’re also learning that organizations — large, for-profit corporations and small, nonprofit social enterprises alike — are using mobile technology to operate better and smarter. Organizations are using mobile phones to gather real-time data that help them make informed business decisions and that yield social impacts.

But what effect are they having on Society as a whole.

Smart phones have brought a whole new meaning to the term multitasking.

Smart phones are changing the way that people interact with each other, allowing the users to be in a conversation without showing their personal expressions. As a result, we are beginning to lose the face-to-face contact that was such an important part of our lives in the past. The need to belong.

They provide farmers with information on market prices and weather reports, and they link micro and small entrepreneurs to markets and potential buyers. And, they provide mothers with important information to keep themselves and their children healthy.

Just look at

Taro Works, a mobile enabled tool with a cloud-based back-end. In non-tech lingo, this means field-based workers can gather and submit data through a mobile phone, providing real-time intelligence to their home offices. One organization using Taro Works is Honey Care Africa, a social enterprise that promotes sustainable beekeeping and economic development by providing micro finance, training, and other services to bee farmers.

Vision Spring is another social enterprise that uses Taro Works for better business and social impact. Vision Spring fights poverty by selling affordable eyeglasses to the poor, enabling them to work and learn. Why reading glasses? Studies of the economic impact of reading glasses in India showed a 35% increase in individual productivity and 20 percent increase in individual monthly income.

We knew there is great potential for mobile phones. But how to approach the issue of development using mobile technologies, remains contentious. In conjunction with Big Data, the Internet, their impact on economic development and growth are numerous.

There is no doubting their ability of time-saving capabilities/conveyance or getting assistance in an emergency. Therefore, smart phone is an important device which people cannot leave home without it.  A social necessity that we teens and adults, cannot be without, an addiction.

It would make uninteresting reading to list all the possibility of Mobil usages.

There are a few to high light how they are changing our world and could be used to change it further.

Before the appearance of the smart phone; it was impossible to shop online during lunch time without a PC or laptop. However, with the support of smart phones, shopping online in these days is as easy as making a phone call.

Services to transfer money can also help counter human trafficking, crime.

Services/Apps have changed the way healthcare is delivered globally, with the potential to provide individuals with an unprecedented amount of access to health resources.

Mobile phones eliminates the need for clients to spend time traveling to the physical banks, enabling greater access to capital, which facilitates investment and productivity.

Services to conduct Surveys, to Petition government. To impose Western ideals and culture upon other nations, resulting in a “practical elitism, but smart phones also emit radiation which some believe may be harmful to human health.

The growth of the cell phone industry itself, adding more jobs and creating more demand for products and services is another way in which mobile phones have contributed to economic growth.

Recent studies show that radiation from mobile phones are interfering with navigation system of bees and causing them to lose their way back to their hive.  As a result of this their colonies are collapsing.

Cell phones have led to social evils such as ‘sexting’, harassment and bullying of teens, in addition to creating less unity with families and friends.

Social interaction does not lead to greater concern for others, and in fact may have the opposite effect of reducing concern for others, leading to decreased pro social behavior. Eroding people’s ability to write sentences that communicate real meaning and inhibit the art of dialogue resulting in a negative impact on people’s interpersonal skills. The next generation (or so) is not going to ever be able to connect with another person, confront someone, or talk to someone face to face.

Trans formative tool for Science, Research, Surveys.

And how much about our lives and work and relationships is left to be completely transformed as a result? is anyone’s guess.

Conclusion: 

For me all three ( Internet, Big Data, Smart Phones) are all connected to each other.

You will see from previous posts that I advocate that the power of Mobil phones as a lobbing force is untapped.  It could be used to force the United nations to pass a people’s resolution to place a 0.05% aid commission on all electronic trading on the world stock exchanges. ( See previous posts.)

We hear more and more communication, but less and less to communicate.

Half human, half machine almost god, this new link in the evolution will continue its exploration beyond the enclosure of time and space. Fortunately there are, not that our smartphones are intelligent.

R. Laing  already wrote in 1967: “The machines have become more and more able to communicate with each other as humans.

If we want a world that is more equal, access to information should be universal – it should not be limited to the privileged groups in a society, but available to all of us including the impoverished.

So what will be their future applications.  Feel free to add to my list.

Brain training.

iPod Finger, Smart Phone Finger, insurance will become big business.

Increase literacy.

 

Suddenly my smartphone vibrates mystique.

“The digital revolution is over, the digital won!  Because the more you consume, the more it abounds. The more stores, the more it circulates. The more you distribute, the more it flows.

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Cell phones can also be used to deliver important information about health and to

 

 

 

You Are not a Gadget. Yet!

04 Wednesday Mar 2015

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This is what I call – A run up the flag pole post – see who salutes.

Sorry it’s also another rather long-winded post.

We can’t go anywhere, do anything without our Gadgets.

In my last post I said that Inequality was at the heart of most of our troubles in the world.

But is the Internet (which is without the qualities of Love and Tolerance) also contributing by having an effect on Society/Community and spreading discontent by highlighting these Inequalities? I would say (All technologies have their downsides) Yes.

To Say that humankind is now almost entirely connected, albeit with great levels of inequality in bandwidth, efficiency, and price, is not quite yet a reality.

There are about fifteen billion devices presently connected and there will be around forty billion devices connected by 2020.

There are about 16 million subscribers of wireless devices in the world.

In 2013 it was close to 7 billion (in a planet of 7.7 billion human beings). In 2014, nearly 75% (2.1 billion) of all internet users in the world (2.8 billion) live in the top 20 countries, sending around 114 billion e mails each day of which 68.8% are spam.

Ninety eight percent of all information existing in the planet is digitized and most of it is accessible on the Internet and other computer networks.

Think about what happens when we connect all of those unconnected devices.

We will all turn into Me-centered society.

Does anyone care other than those that have being effected that another Social relationships is being reconstructed on the basis of individual interests, values, and projects, and not on the values that are shared through out the World.

Today, social networking sites are the preferred platforms for all kinds of activities, both business and personal, and sociability has dramatically increased — but it is a different kind of sociability that conveys the best and the worse in humankind.

Technology is already a second skin for young people. 

While highlight the gaps between the Haves and Haves Nots. The Internet is on one hand desensitizing us as individuals.

It is doing this by disintermediating government and corporate control of communication.

Horizontal communication networks are creating a new landscape of social and political change. The consequences of which are not understood and will not be for some considerable time to come.

More than 50 billion ‘things’ are projected to be connected to the Internet by 2020, which, combined with advanced big data analytics, will constitute a giant, intelligent network that will change the way we govern, trade, and interact.

Technology is a material culture and the Internet is the technology of freedom that allows us to do what we wish with this material culture.

To date we are overwhelmed by it, out of sheer ignorance of its effects. It is like a Bulgarian riddle – Here I am, there I am, and yet they cannot catch me.

At the moment we are unable to access its effects and implications, so there will always be a gap between social change and its understanding. To the full understanding of the world in which we live is becoming an impossibility due to consent distraction.

So let us address some effects before virtual life becomes more social than the physical life, but it is less a virtual reality than a real virtuality.  If you get what I mean.

Community is formed through individuals’ quests for like-minded people in a process that combines online interaction with offline interaction, cyberspace, and the local space. Our social environment, how we enjoy ourselves, how we buy, what we study, how we travel,… Everything we do has changed thanks to the Internet and a host of spin-off technologies. From the alphabet to clocks and printing, every major new technology has profoundly altered the way in which humans think.

Take for instance Facebook users: They visit the site daily, and they connect on multiple dimensions, but only on the dimensions they choose.

Unquestionably this change has also reached the business world. How will the business of the future function? Big data is undoubtedly one of the key ingredients for a successful transformation that has already begun. Networks are global and know no boundaries,  but the network society is a global network society with no rules.

Many public issues and social voices are pushed to the margins of society by market values and commercial communication, making it difficult to get the attention of those living in the “walled gardens” of consumerism.

For example:

In work (entrepreneurship), in the media (the active audience), in the Internet (the creative user), in the market (the informed and proactive consumer), in education (students as informed critical thinkers, making possible the new frontier of e-learning and m-learning pedagogy), in health (the patient-centered health management system) in e-government (the informed, participatory citizen), in social movements (cultural change from the grassroots, as in feminism or environmentalism), and in politics (the independent-minded citizen able to participate in self-generated political networks).

If the dominant cultural trend in our society is the search for autonomy, and if the Internet powers this search, then we are moving toward a society of assertive individuals and perhaps cultural freedom.

Yet, the global network society is our society, and the understanding of its logic on the basis of the interaction between culture, organization, and technology, in the formation and development of social and technological networks is key to what society is going to be in the future.  For example the Intense use of the Internet increases the risk of isolation, alienation, and withdrawal from society.

Already from this Internet-based culture of autonomy here is emerging a new kind of sociability, networked sociability, and a new kind of sociopolitical practice, networked social movements and networked democracy.

Did it lend a hand in the creation of Jihad John and ISIS.

Whether it did or not the Web constitute the technological infrastructure of the global network society, yet it continues to feed the fears and the fantasies of those who are still in charge of a society that they barely understand.

The digital gadgets on which we now depend, have already begun rewiring our brains. We are offloading thinking to technology, using our phones as our extended minds.

Smartphones users Worldwide will surpass 2 billion in 2016 i.e. ¼ of the Global population and will be 3 billion by 2018. 

From a society that valued the creation of a unique storehouse of ideas in each individual, man is moving to a socially constructed mind that values speed and group approval over originality and creativity.

Some evolutionary biologists claim that the scholarly mind is a historical anomaly: that humans, like other primates, are designed to scan rapidly for danger and opportunity. If so, the net delivers this shallow, scattered mindset with a vengeance. Hyperlinks and over stimulation mean the brain must give most of its attention to short-term decisions.

The digital technology is already damaging the long-term memory consolidation that is the basis for true intelligence. 

In particular clicking, skipping, skimming—and especially on working and deep memory.                           Is Google Making Us Stupid?

Something is always lost, and something gained.

Here are a few unanswered Questions.

  • How will privacy issues impact upon the uptake of the Internet of Things in democratic institutions?
  • What is the role of Government in an age of Smart Cities and algorithmic regulation?
  • How can civil society institutions ensure that the Internet of Things is harnessed for the public good?
  • How can technologies be designed to create deeper civic engagement?
  • What are the global implications on foreign policy of connecting the unconnected?
  • How can the Internet of Things impact developing countries?
  • What is the potential impact of the Internet of Things on transnational crime?
  • Cyber crime and Cyber security.
  • How will the Internet of Things affect critical national infrastructure?
  • Hyper connected Diplomacy.
  • Encryption and Integrity.

And then you have Humor.

To what extent does the Internet function as a mediator of ‘old’ or traditional humorous forms and topics (e.g. jokes), and to what extent does it facilitate‘new’ humorous forms and topics (e.g. digitally manipulated photographs) in cyber-humor.

Since visual language can move across cultures more easily than verbal language ask yourself if the Internet has become a major actor in the production and distribution of humor.

Internet use empowers people by increasing their feelings of security, personal freedom, and influence, all feelings that have a positive effect on happiness and personal well-being.

Humor appears in many kinds of Websites, spanning personal/amateur blogs that provide funny and lighthearted commentary on events to commercial or professional Websites which often link to mass media such as newspapers (e.g. http://www.theonion.com) and television (e.g.www.comedycentral.com).

How do the new forms and topics of online humor relate to fundamental characteristics of the Internet, specifically interactivity, multimedia and global reach?

The joke might indeed be dead as an oral form since visual language can move across cultures more easily than verbal language. Jokes have been transformed to a popular Internet-based written form-home video’ and ‘media slapstick’ humor.

Why are the types of ‘home video’ and ‘media slapstick’ so popular on You Tube.

Is it because they are personal pieces that seem to reflect the bottom-up nature of the Internet as a space in which everyone, and not only professional comedians, can create humorous content. This kind of humor is not culture specific – a man who slips on a banana peel will probably be regarded as funny in many parts of the globe, by members of various age and gender groups.

How does comedy undermine or reinforce our attitudes towards race, gender, religion, class and ethnicity?

Does what makes us laugh reveal our deep social norms and taboos?

In viral Internet-based commercials, humor is an integral, almost obligatory component but violence as a means of humor in advertising is on the rise.

Viral advertisements,’  Top ten things men know about women’ or ‘Twenty excuses to miss a day of work.

Not only are the vast majority of texts in English, but they also reflect the values and priorities of Western, capitalist and youth-oriented cultures.  However, the definitions of interactivity, as well as the methods for their ope rationalization, remain in dispute.

Culture jamming argue that culture, politics, and social values have been bent by saturated commercial environments, from corporate logos on sports facilities, to television content designed solely to deliver targeted audiences to producers and sponsors. The Internet is wide open to this form of brain washing.

When it comes to humor has the Web has been corporatized?   Interactivity is perceived as an important key to understanding the social implications of the Internet.

That everything is worth making fun of, nothing should be taken seriously, not even a guy getting punched in the face until he bleeds or Hitler reacting to an incident.

Last but not least we come to the Question of Porn.

The Internet is saturated with porn that is debasing us all.

Should there be a safety door into a segregated area of the internet into which all pornographic content should be placed. Viewable only by those how supply online personal details, such as age, positive Id. It would be a step in the right direction. Not Censorship but sensible Stewardship.

If you are not already Gadgetry I would be interested to hear you views.

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The Trans Pacific Partnership is a trade agreement so significant and important, its details can’t be disclosed.

28 Saturday Feb 2015

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As Promised in my last post. Sorry this is another long winded post.

My blog has numerous posts on Inequality. The principal reason that we have such a messed up world.

In my view Inequality is the fundamental driving force behind, Conflicts, Poverty of all Correlations, Climate Change, Slave Labor, Immigration, Corruption and the pending collapse of Capitalism as we know it.

I have pointed my figure at Sovereign Wealth Funds, Electronic Trading, Foreign Exchange Manipulation.  Each one of them is at this every moment plundering the world willy nilly in adoration of the God Greed/Profit.

I have said that it is naive to think that we can change or remove any of the them from our Technological Capitalist driven world.  On the other hand with our collective power through Social Media we can demand that a COMMISSION of 0.05% is placed on their activities. Creating a perpetual fund to tackle Inequality and return the world to a more even keel. ( See previous posts)

The possibility of this happening within our out of date World Organisation is Zero. It can only happen if we all exert pressure as global citizen on the United Nations to pass a people’s resolution to apply such a commission.

So we are left with business as usual.

And that is exactly what is taking place with The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) a proposed regional regulatory and investment treaty. Which appears from what I can gather is a primary goal of the Obama administration in the United States of America.

So here we go again.

Profit before everything else with a vast potential to exacerbate economic inequality. A recipe for less protection for citizens and more rights for Big Business.  To increase trade for trade’s sake.

This agreement is basically a permanent power grab by corporations and financial companies that will make it impossible for the citizens of countries joining the TPP to choose what laws and rules they want to live under.

Now you might say with all the problems we have in the world so what.  It is just another Trade Agreement, it will have little or no effect on me.

You could be right.  It’ll be hard to notice at first, and it will depend on who you are and where you are.

Anyway if you’re just now hearing about the Trans-Pacific Partnership, don’t worry: Like me you’d also be forgiven for not hearing about it:

But in the off-chance that you might be interested here is what I have learned to date.

Its has now been under negotiation for nearly a decade.

It began in 2005 as an agreement between Singapore, Chile, New Zealand and Brunei, before the U.S. under George W. Bush took the lead in 2009. The last round of meeting was in Ottawa from 3–12 July 2014. The negotiations now include 600 corporate advisers.

The countries currently party to the agreement — currently include Australia, Brunei, Chile, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Canada, Peru, Singapore, Vietnam, most critically Japan and potentially Korea — are some of the U.S.’ biggest and fastest-growing commercial partners, accounting for $1.5 trillion worth of trade in goods in 2012 and $242 billion worth of services in 2011.

So what  big country is not in the TPP …That’s right: China. I wonder why not.

Probable like you I thought we already had a World Trade Organization. So why do we need a separate Asia trade deal? and without China.?

Is this trade agreement another neoliberal project. To maximize profit and domination, and to set the working people in the world in competition with one another so as to lower wages to increase insecurity.

Is it the currency manipulation, which wouldn’t directly affect China as a non-member the real target.

So just what are we talking about here.

Fortunately for those of us who live like mushrooms it has not gone totally unnoticed.

In March 2013, four thousand Japanese farmers held a protest in Tokyo over the potential for cheap imports to severely damage the local agricultural industry.

Malaysian protesters dressed as zombies outside a shopping mall in Kuala Lumpur on 21 February 2014 to protest the impact of the TPP on the price of medicines, including treatment drugs for HIV.

On 29 March 2014, 15 anti-TPP protests occurred across New Zealand, including a demonstration in Auckland attended by several thousand people

On 27 January 2015, protesters hijacked an US Senate hearing to speak out against the TPP and were promptly removed by capital police officers.

It is serving only the interests of the wealthiest.

Is it a secretive, multinational trade agreement that threatens to extend restrictive intellectual property (IP) laws across the globe and rewrite international rules on its enforcement?

It is a 21st-century trade agreement involving 11 Asian countries along the Pacific Rim, and said to cover 40% of the world’s economy. Representing 792 million people and accounting for 40 percent of the world economy.

Yet it’s been devised in secret. Written behind closed doors by the corporate world.

Trans-Pacific Partnership-2

Trade negotiations are usually conducted in private, on the theory that parties won’t be able to have a meaningful dialogue if their positions are disclosed to the public. Accordingly, TPP parties have signed a confidentiality agreement requiring them to share proposals only with “government officials and individuals who are part of the government’s domestic trade advisory process.

” So but wait, how will this actually affect my life?”

Global health advocates, environmentalists, Internet activists and trade unions are deeply concerns about what the deal might contain.

It’s expected to eliminate tariffs on goods and services, tear down a host of non-tariff barriers and harmonize all sorts of regulations when it’s finished early next year..

It raises significant concerns about citizens’ freedom of expression, due process, innovation, the future of the Internet’s global infrastructure, and the right of sovereign nations to develop policies and laws that best meet their domestic priorities.

What few seem to realize is that this agreement, if approved as is, could make it virtually impossible for the United States to meet its current and future climate pledges. 

In sum, the TPP puts at risk some of the most fundamental rights that enable access to knowledge for the world’s citizens.

Former national security adviser Tom Donilon called it  the “centerpiece of our economic re balancing” and a “platform for regional economic integration” — after too many years of American foreign policy being bogged down in the Middle East.

How is it different from other trade deals done? 

The entire process has shut out multi-stakeholder participation and is shrouded in secrecy.

Leaked draft texts of the agreement show that the IP chapter would have extensive negative ramifications for users’ freedom of speech, right to privacy and due process, and hinder people’s’ abilities to innovate.

The TPP — encompass a broad range of regulatory and legal issues, making them a much more central part of foreign policy and even domestic lawmaking.

Everything from financial services to telecommunications to sanitary standards for food.

Some parts of it have significant ramifications for countries’ own legal regimes, such as the part about regulatory coherence,” which encourages countries to set up a mechanism like the U.S.’ own Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs to conduct cost-benefit analyses on new rules.

One of the contentious issue of the TPP negotiations has been currency manipulation, where in a country devalues its currency to boost exports and gain a trade advantage. Organisations such as the WTO or IMF cannot control such currency manipulation, so some are calling upon the US to “use the free-trade talks to force an end to such actions.

The US has been seeking trade rules that secure and extend their patents, trademarks, and copyrights abroad, and protect their global franchise agreements, securities, and loans. But they want less protection of consumers, workers, small investors, and the environment, because these interfere with their profits.

What is wrong with trade rules that allow them to override these protections.

For example, that the pharmaceutical industry gets stronger patent protections, delaying cheaper generic versions of drugs. That will be a good deal for Big Pharma but not necessarily for the inhabitants of developing nations who won’t get certain life-saving drugs at a cost they can afford.

In other words, the TPP is a Trojan horse in a global race to the bottom, giving big corporations and Wall Street banks a way to eliminate any and all laws and regulations that get in the way of their profits.

Why You Should Care about the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

It’s worth considering the ramifications of  such an agreement which has unbelievable potential to exacerbate economic inequality.

Here are a few good reasons for consideration.

At a time when corporate profits are at record highs and the real median wage is lower than it’s been in four decades, most of us need protection — not from international trade but from the political power of large corporations and Electronic Stock Exchange Trading.

There are provisions in the TPP that will prevent whistle blowers and journalists from accessing or ‘disclosing’ trade secrets through a computer system.

The TPP also gives global corporations an international tribunal of private attorneys, outside any nation’s legal system, who can order compensation for any “unjust expropriation” of foreign assets.

The foreign subsidiaries of U.S.-based corporations could just as easily challenge any U.S. government regulation they claim unfairly diminishes their profits — say, a regulation protecting American consumers from unsafe products or unhealthy foods, investors from fraudulent securities or predatory lending, workers from unsafe working conditions, taxpayers from another bailout of Wall Street, or the environment from toxic emissions.

Even better for global companies, the tribunal can order compensation for any lost profits found to result from a nation’s regulations.

Philip Morris is using a similar provision against Uruguay (the provision appears in a bilateral trade treaty between Uruguay and Switzerland), claiming that Uruguay’s strong anti-smoking regulations unfairly diminish the company’s profits.

It is protecting the interests of the largest multinational corporations at the expense of workers, consumers, the environment and the foundations democracy.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a secretive, multinational trade agreement that threatens to extend restrictive intellectual property (IP) laws across the globe and rewrite international rules on its enforcement.

The TPP would force the adoption of the US DMCA ( see below appendix) Internet intermediaries copyright safe harbor regime in its entirety. For example, this would require Chile to rewrite its forward-looking 2010 copyright law that currently establishes a judicial notice-and-take down regime, which provides greater protection to Internet users’ expression and privacy than the DMCA.

It will compel signatory nations to enact laws banning circumvention of digital locks( technological protection measures on TPMs) that mirror the DMCA and treat violation of the TPM provisions as a separate offense even when no copyright infringement is involved.

This would require countries like New Zealand to completely rewrite its innovative 2008 copyright law, as well as override Australia’s carefully-crafted 2007 TPM regime exclusions for region-coding on movies on DVDs, video games, and players, and for embedded software in devices that restrict access to goods and services for the device—a thoughtful effort by Australian policy makers to avoid the pitfalls experienced with the US digital locks provisions.

In the US, business competitors have used the DMCA to try to block printer cartridge refill services, competing garage door openers, and to lock mobile phones to particular network providers.

Dangerously vague text on the misuse of trade secrets, which could be used to enact harsh criminal punishments against anyone who reveals or even accesses information through a “computer system” that is allegedly confidential.

Create copyright terms well beyond the internationally agreed period in the 1994 Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). The TPP could extend copyright term protections from life of the author + 50 years, to Life + 70 years for works created by individuals, and either 95 years after publication or 120 years after creation for corporate owned works (such as Mickey Mouse).

The U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) is putting fair use at risk with restrictive language in the TPP’s IP chapter. (see below Appendix)

US and Australia have proposed very restrictive text, while other countries such as Chile, New Zealand, and Malaysia, have proposed more flexible, user-friendly terms.

Adopt criminal sanctions for copyright infringement that is done without a commercial motivation. Users could be jailed or hit with debilitating fines over file sharing, and may have their property or domains seized even without a formal complaint from the copyright holder.

In short, countries would have to abandon any efforts to learn from the mistakes of the US and its experience with the DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) over the last 12 years, and adopt many of the most controversial aspects of US copyright law in their entirety.

At the same time, the US IP chapter (see below Appendix) does not export the limitations and exceptions in the US copyright regime like fair use, which have enabled freedom of expression and technological innovation to flourish in the US. It includes only a placeholder for exceptions and limitations.

This raises serious concerns about other countries’ sovereignty and the ability of national governments to set laws and policies to meet their domestic priorities.

Don’t worry: Negotiations over the huge trade agreement — which, when finished, will govern 40 percent of U.S.’ imports and exports.

In sum, the TPP puts at risk some of the most fundamental rights that enable access to knowledge for the world’s citizens.

And I thought that Trade agreements used to deal mostly just with goods:

The TPP will affect countries beyond the 11 that are currently involved in negotiations. 

Like ACTA,( Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement or Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement) is an agreement secretly negotiated from 2007 to 2010 by a small “club” of countries (39 countries, including 27 of the European Union, the United States, Japan, etc) the TPP Agreement is a plurilateral agreement that will be used to create new heightened global IP enforcement norms.

Countries that are not parties to the negotiation will likely be asked to accede to the TPP as a condition of bilateral trade agreements with the US and other TPP members, or evaluated against the TPP’s copyright enforcement standards in the annual special 301 process administered by the US Trade Rep. (See below Appendix)

Six of the countries presently negotiating the TPP, and who have reportedly caved in and agreed on copyright term extension, would have been about to contribute cultural icons of their own to the public domain, enriching their own countries and the world with home-grown art, music, and film that is otherwise at risk of being forgotten. These countries are Brunei, Canada, New Zealand, Malaysia, Japan, and Vietnam.

We are left with the obvious question. Why is it that none of countries can see the damage this Agreement is going to inflict.

Many of the TPP’s current provisions are designed to exclude China, like those requiring yarn in clothing to come from countries party to the agreement, and could possibly invite retaliation.

As far as I can see the TPP is“disastrous”and its purpose should be denounced. It will extend problematic US laws into international law. One example: the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, which prosecutors used to hound open-web advocate Aaron Swartz.

Any of the six countries above can stop this deal!

If even one of the countries—Brunei, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand or Vietnam— is brave enough to stand up to the United States and block the extension of the copyright term, then that ill-advised deal could still fall through.

If you are from one of those countries, you can call your Member of Parliament, or your trade ministry, and demand that they save the public domain, by retaining the life plus 50 year copyright term that is your right under the Berne Convention.

If you are in the US, your best avenue to stop term extension, and the TPP’s other anti-user threats, is to support the Fast Track action group. For instance, there is a scuffle around the TPP’s rumored treatment of Digital Rights Management tools, which corporations use to limit access to digital devices – often to prevent piracy. TPP has provisions that make it a crime to break these locks, and to do things that aren’t even copyright infringement.

It includes provisions on intellectual property and copyright that are usually outside the boundaries of trade, critics say.

If it comes to fruition it will only encourage another regional pact that will just add complexity and undermine existing institutions.

The WTO ( World Trade Organisation) is too cumbersome.

Brussels, Jan. 7, 2015 — The European Commission published a raft of texts setting out EU proposals for legal text in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) it is negotiating with the US.

Not much different than the TTP other than it is more transparent. 

So let me ask you. You still think that it will have no effect on your life. Think again.

If you have concerns about the TPP,or the TTIP now is the time to speak up.

These trade negotiations are an assault on democracy. I would vote against them except… hang on a minute, I can’t Like you, I have no say whatsoever in whether TPP or TTIP goes through or not.

All I can do is tell as many people about it as possible, as I hope, will you.

We may be forced to accept an attack on democracy but we can at least fight against the conspiracy of silence.

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Appendix:

⌈Digital Millennium Copyright Act⌋

⌈The IP Chapter covers topics from pharmaceuticals, patent registrations and copyright issues to digital rights. Experts say it will affect freedom of information, civil liberties and access to medicines globally.⌋

⌈Special 301 is an annual review process led by the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR). U.S. trade law (“Special 301”) requires an annual review of intellectual property protection and market access practices in foreign countries. Effective action under Special 301 by USTR has been essential in stemming the tidal wave of losses in U.S. jobs and competitiveness that have threatened one of our country’s most productive and fastest growing economic sectors. Special 301 and its leverage are a full-time process for the copyright industries which work with local private sector representatives, U.S. government officials, and U.S. Embassy officials to address and resolve copyright problems in scores of countries.⌋

 

The fewer young people that vote. The worse for the future.

26 Thursday Feb 2015

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We are all too busy living our lives. Its time to wake up.

In my last post I endeavor to height-light just how complacent we are all becoming to the effects of Technologically advancement. ( The Internet is dissolving National Borders. Are we heading towards Electronic Governance)

It’s the 21st century! Why aren’t we voting online yet?

After all, we trust billions of financial transactions to the Internet every day: Why can’t we use technology to do something simple like vote? 

What if voting were extended to mobile phones?

Shifting to online voting would lower the costs of conducting elections by reducing the need for polling places, staff, and equipment. Just as it’s less expensive for Amazon to take an order via the Web, states could lower their costs conducting elections online.

Few would argue requiring citizens to show up in person at schools, churches, Mayor halls and other locations to cast votes is a perfect system.

In this technological, gadget-crazy world, where everyone is addicted to their Smartphone or their iPad or their laptop – or all three – it is hard to believe that voters are still having their say by placing a simple paper slip in an envelope through a slit in a cardboard box.

Estonia has offered online voting since 2007, with roughly a quarter of its population of 1.3 million voting online — although, it should be noted, Estonia also has a national smart-card ID card system.

The problem is even if we have all the software and connectivity necessary to operate widespread electronic voting, implementing it will probably involve at least as much politicking as technology.

So we are left with the problem of enfranchisement, empowering democracy by enabling more eligible voters to cast ballots – especially the Youth.

Instead of producing the leaders of tomorrow, the voting system is producing a bunch of sheep that are trained to take orders and that are pretty good at taking multiple choice tests.

On the other hand our early education systems are too focused on educating for the work market place. It absolutely amazes me that these days how students can get all the way through school without ever learning how to read, write or speak at a functional level.  They do not know how to form a sentence. They cannot write an intelligible paragraph but they can vote.

And we wonder why Young people today do not feel they have much of a stake in society.

What is more depressing is simply that in many places, young people do not feel that there is anyone worth voting for.Voting Printables

Well the freedom of speech lie at the tips of our fingers.

We know, from the hash tags that flood our screens, that there are other ways to get things done..if we don’t start now, in 20 years’ time there’ll be a huge swathe of 40-something year-olds with no idea how to interact with the electoral system.

With two major General Elections coming up this year – Spain, England,  there is never a better time for the Young to get involved.

Young people have borne the brunt of austerity because politicians knew they could get away with it, that there would be no repercussions come election day. The less the young vote, the more politicians will feel they can ignore them without risk of being punished at the ballot box.

We are just seeing the Results of the Greek Election.

We the people simply must recapture a sense of power, ideology, and imagination in our politics. Only with a massive turn out by Young educated voters can this be achieve.

The question is?  How do we achieve a fair Political system.

Here are some suggestions (in no particular order) that could transform how current day Politics are conducted.

1)  Remove money:

Reduce the number of seats in Parliament. Make the monetary reward sufficiently for those elected to fulfill they elected duties and term. Make it a legal offence with large finds against lobbied for favors, commercially or otherwise, applicable to both sides.

Another words Money is power; take money out of the electoral system, and you take away the corporations’ power and corruption.

2)  Introduce. Internet vote, same-day voter registration, and an Election Day Bank holiday.

The most practical way to validate people for online voting may be to send them one-time V PIN numbers via postal mail. The Pin opens My Vote app with the list of Candidates relevant to their post code.  The Pin self destruct on voting. This would make it impossible to hack.  

3)  Apathy and inconvenience need to be conquered.

The prolonged period of abnormally low-interest rates, combined with quantitative easing, has inflated the value of assets, which are concentrated in the hands of the more advanced in years. Sadly, cynicism breeds cynicism. If people think it is more “normal” not to vote than it actually is. If elected officials acted more on “bread and butter” economic issues, most people of all ages would consider their votes much more meaningful.

4) The point of a manifesto is to offer a bold and alternate vision for the future, for a party to declare what it is fighting for, what it thinks the country needs, regardless of how many votes it will win.  The issues in Manifesto presented by parties need to be more relevant to daily life-rather than visions of pie-in-the-sky utopianism.

We on the other hand need to re imagine the point of policies and manifesto’s. Policies aren’t there to win votes.

5)  Enriching and utilising social media and e-petitions instead of belittling them as the work of ‘keyboard warriors’.  Everyone says social media should be part of the solution and all the parties are trying to exploit it, but little of their effort is imaginative.

6) The current system of winner-take-all elections is out of date.

It is raising the threat of ever decreasing turnouts at elections and governments with less and less claim to have a proper mandate from the people.

Through the implementation of a PR system, the voice of more voters can be heard-and a more representative government created.

The lower threshold of votes needed to elect a candidate under PR will allow smaller groups to elect representative officials more in tune with their political philosophy without the having to constitute the majority of the voting body.

By providing a greater number of people voting incentives, paired with the increased likelihood that third-party candidates can be voted in, PR insures a more representative government that will better serve the people.

Furthermore, PR will eliminate much of the opportunity to predetermine elections through the mastery of gerrymandering, again allowing for a more accurately representative government.

The system of Proportional representation, allows for the evolution by creating a governing body that will change with the electorate, rather than one that continually alienates voters by ignoring their demands.

By implementing proportional representation we will be moving towards actually making every vote count and every perspective heard.

Proportional representation, if used in conjunction with programs to increase voter awareness and voting ease, will ensure a more politically involved youth and a more democratic democracy. This also translates into the vote of each person carrying a greater weight, thus giving that person more of an incentive to become involved in the political process. Then representative democracy could really have a chance to work again.

But the adoption of PR alone is not enough.

7) It has to be paired with the implementation of Internet voting that will engage the Youth vote. If people were allowed to vote over the Internet, many that did not vote previously would do so due to the ease with which it could be done.

If we don’t address this deficit in our democracy, it will become everyone’s problem at every election.

 8) We must change the dream from the success of the individual to the success of the group.

9)  The ideological platform of various parties should be introduced to student in schools so that when they come of voting age they have the background to vote for the parties that will best represent their interests. The better-informed youth are about the facts of issues, the more informed a decision they could make during elections. Better educated about the political process and the issues that they will face as voters.

10) We are often told that every vote counts but unfortunately in today’s system this is false, and a great deal of our votes count for nothing at all.

11) Reform the electoral registration system to bring it into the 21st century.

Young people should be automatically registered when they reach voting age. Online voter registration and automatic registration for young people as soon as they turn 16. The reason the young don’t get on the electoral register is that they move about more and are harder to capture on party databases.

12) Introduce a British version of the Skimm, a daily chatty breakdown of the main news stories of the day, sent straight to their inbox. This would shatter the illusion of impenetrability that lots of young Brits assume goes hand-in-hand with politics. The less politics has to offer to the young, the less they are likely to vote. Youth tend to get most excited about issues rather than politicians.

I don’t see a great future for Britain if it turns into a gerontocracy in which the political classes privilege the interests of the old over investing in the young.  British Politics is becoming little more than a brawl for the middle ground, devoid of ideology or passion. The only way to reverse this is through the adoption of a system of proportional representation. Thus, an alternative electoral system should be seriously considered.

By failing to get the young to the polling stations in May it could be said that we are raising the stupidest generation in English History.

The “illusion” of political democracy is under attack. We need to wake up. If you don’t believe me read my next post. THE – PACIFIC-PARTNERSHIP- AGREEMENT.

There you have it.  Even though you can’t do it from your smart phone or computer, please do vote.

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As this is my 200 Posting I expect those that read this post either to comment or pass it on, I don’t want your like vote.

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It’s one thing to be famous. It’s quite another to be notorious,

21 Saturday Feb 2015

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Some time ago I wrote a post under the Banner  “Adam and Eve were Black. They lived in Africa at the same time – but probably never met. ” Adam and Eve

Although there are much more serious subjects to be addressed for some unknown reason this post seems to be popular with my readers.

So let’s have another look.  Did they exist?  Did they meet?  What did they look like?

The Sumerian records reveal that “Adam” and “Eve” were not created by “God”, but rather they were genetically engineered by an advanced race of extraterrestrials called the Anunnaki.

Right so they did exist in alien form. They certainly did not exist in the form of human as we know it.

Leaving us with perhaps the most convoluted puzzle to ever exist, a timeline which pits some of today’s most dominant dogmas, whether scientific or theological, in an unrelenting war against one another.

The history of human civilization and evolution.

As Far as we know life on Earth began more than 3 billion years ago, evolving from the most basic of microbes into a dazzling array of complexity over time – to life in the universe develop from the primordial soup?

The question is :  Did the Garden of Eden exist before this soup.

Genesis puts Adam and Eve together in the Garden of Eden, but geneticists’ version of the duo — the ancestors to whom the Y chromosomes and mitochondrial DNA of today’s humans can be traced — were thought to have lived tens of thousands of years apart.

There is a saying that if you believe in God, you can’t believe in evolution. If you believe in evolution, you can’t believe in God.

According to the scientific knowledge that we have to-day man fell out of a tree, eventually stood up on two legs and walked out of Africa.

Now the problem is Adam was created as a Selfie of God and if he arrived at the time humans evolved (and I mean on offense to God) God would look like an Ape.

However God created Adam using the lowest element of the Earth, the dust. This part of the account of the creation of Adam being made from the dust indicates that man has a thanatos origin (an unconscious urge to die) being made up of the lowest form of the elements.

If ignorance is bliss, than Adam and Eve were the happiest people ever but they were set up by God.

Adam’s primary loyalty is meant to be towards God, while Eve is meant to submit and be loyal to Adam rather than God. For Adam, the constant gaze of the Other is almost maternal; to live without it would be to cease to exist. He just wants things to stay the same. Adam, who was once lifeless, could now move and speak and becomes a living organism that can learn and progress under the direction of with his newly found father, God.

The fact that God created Adam first “suggests that God saw Adam as having a leadership role in his family” (Grudem, 1994).  According to Genesis 2:18 and 2:20, Eve was created to be a helper for Adam.

So was Adam a superior to Eve?

He was created in the image of God, she in the image of man. Adam and Eve are created by the same God and have nature in common, but in some ways nurture separates them. Adam is given the gift of life and the responsibility of caring for God’s creation. Eve is created shortly thereafter as a companion and partner.

At the point of creation they knew no evil. It simply did not exist in their minds. In essence, children lose their innocence following the acquisition of knowledge. Knowledge is a powerful tool.

So why would God put the tree or the fruit or the knowledge of good and evil in their path unless he had wanted them to partake.

“Good and Evil, if they exist at all, are after all two sides of the same state of being.

Life is mapped out with no regard for individual choice while contrary belief tells us that mankind is capable of free will and therefore has control over his own life and the consequences of his actions. So once God has set things in motion, he pretty much exits.

So how does the story of Adam and Eve end?

They (or shall I say “we”) are still evolving.

If we compare the Bible to the Qur’an, we can clearly see that Eve, the mother of all human beings, has a different standing in each book.

Could that be why there has been so much abuse and disregard in the past for women; or why women have never received full equality rights with men, even if they are more qualified?

Do the men within the Christianity faith blame it on Eve?

Is this where Fundamentalism finds its origins.

Fundamentalism: The belief in old and traditional forms of religion, or the belief that what is written in a holy book, such as the Christian Bible, as being completely and literally true.

The Cambridge International Dictionary of English Fundamentalism: a: a movement in 20th century Protestantism emphasizing the literally interpreted Bible as Fundamental to Christian life and teaching; b: the beliefs of this movement; c: adherence t such beliefs.

Webster’s English Dictionary: Fundamentalism is a religious phenomenon which has taken 20th century politics by storm. As defined by Webster’s English dictionary fundamentalism has a direct correlation with Protestant Christianity; however, it has in the past, and is currently, impacting many other forms of religion. Since the 1970’s many religious movements have emerged into political governments and ideologies all over the world.

The dominating religion in Europe is Catholicism; Hinduism is very strong in eastern Asia; Judaism is the ranking religion in Israel and Israeli’s political decision; and finally, Islam is the principal religion in the Middle East.

According to Kepel (1994) all of these religions share the characteristic of challenging the way society is organized: either its secular foundation, or the way it has deviated from a foundation based upon religion, as in the United States for example. When the American government was constructed by its founding fathers, the guidelines for America’s laws and ideas were based on what Biblical principles, Christian values and morals.

Fundamentalism. How far can each be understood as a reaction to liberal-capitalist modernity?  Islam is the second largest religion in the world, second only to Christianity which has been the main religion in the United States and is actually making a strong comeback in America.

The roles of father and son played by God Adam was created on the 6th day..Gods intentions regarding this human capacity is very much in doubt.

Adam is the first man and the father of mankind. He prefigures the human race, representing the perfect male form. Adam is all fathers, sons and brothers rolled into one. Formed in the image of God, he is God-like, but not a God.

He and Eve are illusions, a Dreamboat of Fundamentalism and the original sin.
 

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Is Britain heading for an EU exit?

19 Thursday Feb 2015

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The issues here are so complex there is a danger that voters may go with their gut instincts and unwittingly take Britain out the EU.

Membership of the EU cannot be weighed solely in pounds and pence. But any decision about membership will inevitably be shaped by the economic costs and benefits. Unfortunately, the British debate has lacked objective analysis of these, with both ‘outs’ and ‘ins’ using evidence selectively to make their case.

Here are some what I consider disputable pros and cons from an outsider.

A Certainty:  In a referendum, the question is simple : Britain will have to choose between national sovereignty and unimpeded access to EU markets.

What exactly would be the consequences be for Britain if it voted to leave the EU.

It would necessarily mean that more than 50% of the population had bought into the vision of a right-wing and isolationist government. So it would do well to ask what kind of national identity would assert itself if it went it alone.

A Probability:  An exit will lead to collapse of the United Kingdom with Scotland separating. Northern Ireland & Ireland Reunited. Wales A Federal UK State.

A Certainty:  After 44 years of half-hearted membership it would be a bleak move in cultural terms – with huge cultural ramifications.

The trade-off that the UK must make is quite simple:

A Fact: It is between regulatory sovereignty – which would not transform Britain’s growth prospects – and unimpeded access to the EU’s single market. At present, around 30% of the UK’s gross domestic product is exported in the form of goods and services. Of that, around 45% goes to the EU. As a result, Britain exports roughly 14% of its GDP to the EU.

A Certainty: If it leaves the EU, the UK will have to negotiate terms. Britain will face an invidious choice: access to the single market, but less influence on the rules that govern it; or freedom from the rules, but loss of access to the single market.

Britain could trade with the EU under WTO rules in order to regain regulatory sovereignty. But its exporters would face EU tariff s, and would have to comply with EU product standards if they wanted to sell their wares on the continent.

A Fact: Britain’s economy is far smaller than the EU’s – and would be less of a priority for the US or China.

The UK would be free to negotiate trade agreements with countries outside the EU. But it would not inherit the EU’s existing bilateral trade agreements that are already in existence: it would have to negotiate new ones. So, upon exit, it would have less access to markets outside the EU, not more. While membership of the EU is as much about broader, political questions as economics, the economic case for staying in the Union is strong.

It is hard to believe that Britain would find it easy to forge new deals.

To persuade a trading partner to start negotiating, it would need to be able to offer something attractive. The UK is already very open to imports and inward investment, so it would have little to offer in return for its demands that other countries reduce tariffs and other trade barriers.

A Fact: Britain benefits from the EU’s size in trade negotiations, which gives it something to bargain with.

And as Britain has one of the least regulated economies in the world, according to the OECD, any economic gains from repealing the EU’s rather limited social legislation would be small.

A Fact : Half of Britain’s FDI stock is owned by companies with headquarters in other EU countries. A sizeable chunk of the rest is from non-European companies who seek a base for their European operations in a lightly regulated economy.

A Probability:  There is the question of London’s huge financial services sector. Will it decides to stay put or decamp to Frankfurt, Dublin or Zürich.

The alternatives to EU membership are unsatisfactory: they either give Britain less control over regulation than it currently enjoys, or they offer more control but less market access. The EU’s single market has brought sizeable benefits to Britain that it could not have won without sharing some sovereignty in the European institutions.

A Fact : Eurosceptics are wrong to say that the EU offers little market access for a good deal of red tape, or that it constrains Britain’s trade with fast growing economies outside Europe. The EU has no tariff s and quotas on internal trade, while common rules have further reduced trade costs

If Britain walked away entirely—the most extreme scenario—it would quickly see some benefits.

A Fact : The country would no longer have to transfer funds to the EU to subsidise farm incomes or poorer regions. Treasury figures suggest it would be £8 billion ($13 billion) better off each year. Food could become cheaper. Under WTO rules, countries may slash import barriers unilaterally as long as they do not favour some countries over others. Britain could do this for agricultural produce. It would regain control over fishing rights around its coast.

Some irksome regulations could be ditched, too.

A Fact : First to go (if the Tories are in power when Britain leaves) would be the working-time directive. This limits how long people can be at work without a break or a holiday and caps the working week at 48 hours. The scrapping of the EU’s agency-worker directive, which gives temporary staff the same rights as regular employees, would be cheered by business, too. Britain would be free to set itself a less exacting target for green-power generation than it is bound to under the EU’s renewable-energy directive. That could mean cheaper power.

If it looks to Norway that is not a member of the EU but is a member of the European Economic Area, which means it is part of the European single market.

They will see that Norway’s access comes at a price: Norway has to accept EU laws and regulations without having a say in how they are made.

Even Switzerland, which has a set of bilateral agreements with the EU, has limited access to those areas of the single market whose rules it cannot stomach, such as financial services.

A Fact : If the UK were to retain some links with the EU in order to benefit from access to the single market, it would find it difficult to avoid payments to the EU budget.  In recent years, Norway has paid £524 million annually (£106 per capita) and Switzerland £420 million (£53 per capita). Since the UK net contribution amounts £117 per capita, if it withdrew to the EEA and paid into the EU budget on the same basis as Norway, it would reduce its contribution by 9 per cent. 

A Certainty:   Immigration to and from the UK will require Visas. The free movement of people – one of the ‘four freedoms’ of goods, capital, services and labour – is a fundamental principle of the EU’s single market.  

A Certainty: Its UN AND WORLD POWER STATUS WILL CHANGE.

A Probability: Sterling could be forces to join the US Dollar if it will have it.

A Certainty:    High Tech Industry will move. Should Britain leave, more research funding will have to be made available to make up the shortfall, to avoid damage to the country’s scientific base.

A Fact:  Say good-bye to the Royal Family as you know it, and the present voting system, say hallow to Proportional Representation and higher taxes. .


 

 

 

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A Certainty:   If Britain seeks a looser relationship with the EU, but one which includes full access to the single market, it will have to pay for it. Both the Swiss and the Norwegians make contributions to the EU budget. If it joins the EEA, it will have to sign up to all new single market rules with little hand in their drafting.

A Fact :  Switzerland provides an alternative model. It is neither a member of the EU nor the EEA, but has negotiated agreements with Brussels that give it tariff-free access to the single market for its exports of goods. Exports of services, including financial services, are not covered.

A Fact : If Spain’s Podemos party continues to grow, then the contrast between northern and southern Europe will be even more striking. Britain would be well advised to put off calling a referendum till the dust from the Greek Crises is well settled – whether Britain should control its own destiny or be part of a family of European nations – rather than rely on a narrow cost-benefit analysis Britain needs to wake up to the real world.

A Result:  HashtagEuropeBritian wins for me.

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Abracadabra – Can 1.3 trillion of Imaginary Money save the Euro.

18 Wednesday Feb 2015

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European institutions appear weak and incapable of defending European principles and the proper functioning of the euro.Euro coins on fire

Greece is on the verge of balking on billions of Euro it has borrowed.

If they do it will trigger a free for all and the end of the Euro.

The euro is seen as the ultimate underpinning for the edifice of European integration. The financial crisis and its aftermath have shown that the euro instead has the potential to destroy the whole project.

Political reform is needed to sustain the euro but this is unlikely to pass the political feasibility test with the current governments of Europe. At present the European Union is a club with virtually no economic union: no fiscal union, no banking union, no shared economic governance institutions, and no meaningful coordination of structural economic policies.

The Greek crisis will pitted debtors against creditors.

Not with standing the deep interdependence between them Debtor countries want salvation through solidarity and are thus committed to policy solutions that distribute the costs beyond their borders. Creditor countries, on the other hand, want to insulate their tax payers from exposure to the debtor states and are reluctant to discuss large-scale burden-sharing.

We all know that Greece cooked the books to join the euro in the first place. However, France and Germany also broke the very rules that they had insisted on for everyone else. In 2004, Greece announced it had lied to get around the Maastricht Criteria. Surprisingly, the EU imposed no sanctions! Why not?

Because the EU wanted to strengthen, not weaken, the power of the euro in international currency markets. A strong euro would convince other EU countries, like the UK, Denmark, and Sweden, to adopt the euro.

Greece has been a chief benefactor of the EU budget; Since 2009, Greece has been kept on life support by two bailouts from the European Union, European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund worth a total of €240 billion ($320 billion).

In 2009, EU transactions summed up to 2.35% of GDP. From 1994-99, about $20 billion in EU structural funds and Greece federal financing were exhausted on projects to urbanize and build up Greece’s transportation system in time for the Olympics in 2004.

GERMANY-ECB-EU-FOREX-RATE-EUROZONE-BANK-MONEY

Would a Greek default  plunge the world into a  financial crisis? No. It prove systemic for the EU as a whole.

Greece, Ireland and Portugal, are already in their fourth year of austerity, face many difficult years ahead, as do states with high levels of debt. 

If the single currency survives, it will survive on the basis of more integration within the euro area as the ‘hardest of hard cores’ and hence deep divisions between the ‘ins’ and ‘outs’.

There is also the deeper question of the consent of the people. If the euro area reaches a federal moment and a federal question, then the consent of Europe’s peoples must be sought at least within the euro area.

Without it the currency the European Union as we know it would not be sustainable in the longer term.

Whether an exit for Greece can be achieved without triggering a massive financial crisis is doubtful. The result will be a disorderly collapse of the euro and probably of the single market as well.

The result of a Greek walk away would be substantial losses for established governing parties and more electoral success for extreme populist parties and National elections remain the most legitimate channel for selecting political office holders in Europe. European parliament elections are second order political events.

Next in  line would be Italy: It is too big to fail and too big to bail.

Greece’s creditors must accept the necessity of a write-off of at least a portion of Greek debt. The current practice of extending the terms of Greek loans and pretending that Greek will – some day – make good on its commitments cannot be sustained.

A Greek default would have a more immediate effect. First, Greek banks — already on the brink — would go bankrupt. Next, losses would threaten the solvency of other European banks, particularly in Germany and France. Even worse, the EU’s central bank (ECB) holds a lot of Greek and other sovereign debt. If Greece defaults, it could put the future of the ECB at risk. Other indebted countries might decide, or be forced, to default. Without a central bank to bail them out, the EU itself may not survive.

The crisis requires collective action from the ECB and the 17 member states in an environment of deep divergence of preferences and interests.

Make no mistake: this is going to end badly. By this time next year, either Greece will be out of the euro – or Syriza will be out of power.

Luckily I have thought of a solution.

Why not give the Greeks a huge pile of imaginary Quantitative Easing Money. Then they can give this imaginary money back to pay off their debts.

Abracadabra the Euro is saved.

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