STRAY STATISTICS:

WHAT IS WORSE:

Here's a little moral puzzle for our puzzle fans. Which is worse ?

1)Twenty eight years- less than 300 deaths ?

2)Seven and a half years- more than 1,000 deaths ?

Mark your choice and place it in the sealed envelope provided. The first refers to the number of people killed attempting to cross the Berlin Wall in all of its 28 year history. The second refers to the number of Mexican people who have died in the desert while trying to cross the Mexican/US border since the year 2000.

A bit of a contrast, no ? The source is an briefing article in 'The Economist' magazine (Oct. 4) entitled 'Good neighbours make fences' .

HOW FREE IS THE USA?:

NOT VERY MUCH:

While reading the September 17th edition of Time Magazine Molly came across an interesting item in their 'Dashboard' section. Entitled 'How Free Is Your Country ?' it has a world map that gives a visual about how various countries size up on the 'Voice and Accountability' indicator of the Worldwide Governance Indicators project. Think the USA is the "land of the free" ? Guess again. This indicator is a measure of how free citizens are to voice their opinions and select a government. The World Governance Indicators actually compare 212 listed countries on six different parameters ie

Voice and Accountability

Political Stability and Absence of Violence

Government Effectiveness

Regulatory Quality

Rule of Law

Control of Corruption

On most of these indicators(except for one-more on this later) the USA scored fairly high, but in no case was it the top country or even close. The 'Voice and Accountability' section measures basic parameters of democracy and freedom of speech. In this field the USA has dropped from a rank of 22nd in 2005 to the level of 35rd in 2006, a reflection of both increased distrust of public officials and further restrictions on freedom of the press. Most West European countries score as "freer" than the USA as do Australia, New Zealand and Canada (at the 12th ranking). Some of the countries that beat the USA, however, are interesting. Italy ! Hungary ! Chile ! Now, I can see that there may indeed be more freedom of speech in Italy. Probably a heck of a lot more. But is it possible that Italians distrust their government less than Americans do.

If you examine the indicators two things strike you. One is that this is not a set of biased estimates by some obscure left wing think tank. The estimates are produced by the WORLD BANK INSTITUTE, an outfit that nobody in their right mind could accuse of "left wing biases". The second is that each estimate of the six parameters is produced by integrating a number of different reports from up to 24 different organizations. The estimates vary from organization to organization. What the world Bank has tried to do is draw a composite picture. Some "in house' groups such as Freedom House or Global Insight Business Conditions and Risk Indicators give the USA much higher ratings than say the Economist Intelligence Unit which puts the USA down at position # 83 rather than 35. The Gallup World Poll puts it even further down the list at position # 106. The latter is, of course, biased, but no less so than such things as Freedom House. All told those outfits that have the least to lose or gain by their opinions, other than the fact that they are selling them as "the truth" to those who depend upon them for business decisions, tend to cluster around the aggregate estimates that the Governance Indicators bring out as the best opinion.

There is one of the indicators that is particularly damaging to American self perceptions, perhaps even more so that pricking the balloon of America's preeminence in "freedom", something that most of us foreigners doubted in the first place. Being the 35th freest country in the world is still a fairly high score. Where the USA really scores low is on the 'Political Stability and Absence of Violence' indicator. Here the USA comes in at the 89th place. This has fallen tremendously in the last 7 years. All other indicators have also fallen, but none so dramatically as this one. It should be noted that the Gallup World Poll played no part in compiling this particular index. This is not the perhaps biased general world public opinion that the USA is a violent country both domestically and internationally. This is the estimate of people who have to base business decisions on such estimates.

Anyways, the WGI isn't just about the USA and its trials and tribulations. Drop on over to see how your own country and others rate on this yardstick.

POISONED PET FOOD AND TAINTED TOOTHPASTE TOO:

The Itchmo Blog has an interesting article today announcing that the same Texas laboratory, Expertox, that found acetaminophen in pet food has now found cyanuric acid in an unopened can of Science Diet Canine Light. The can had a best before date of 01 2009 and lot number T0520917 7048.The cyanuric acid was found at a concentration of over 400 micrograms per gram. This food is not on the present pet food recall list. Hills has refused comment to date. To read more about this item including readers comments go here.

Meanwhile today's Houston Chronicle reports that Gold City Enterprises LLC of Hallandale Florida has issued a recall on about 170,000 units of their toothpaste because it may contain diethylene glycol. The brands named are Shir Fresh Mint Fluoride, Shir Fresh Ice, Shir Mint Fluoride , Shir Fresh Cool and Shir Mint Flouride.

Finally, today's edition of the business magazine The Economist has an article titled 'China's Food Safety' discussing same. It is from their Intelligence Unit Newswire and not only gives an overview of the problem but also warns companies that they could be legally liable if they continue to import unreliable products from China. Interesting read.

The Whites of Their Eyes:
The 'Science and Technology' section of the latest edition of The Economist (Nov 4th-10th) has an interesting article entitled 'Eyeing up the collaboration'. The article reports on research done at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Liepzig Germany. The researchers decided to compare adult chimpanzees, gorillas and bonobos with human children of either 1 year or 18 months in terms of their response to tracking where the experimenters were looking. The experimental parameters were moving only the eyes, moving the head and eyes or moving the head with the eyes closed. Later the experimenters tried showing the subjects only the back of the head and either tilting the head or keeping still.
The results were interesting. All of the apes, including the "yard apes" tended to look towards where they thought the experimenters were looking. The human children, however, paid the most attention to the direction of gaze of the experimenters' eyes and were relatively indifferent to the direction of the head. The other apes focused on the direction of the head and were indifferent to the direction of gaze. Unlike other apes human have evolved a prominently visible sclera- the white of the eyes that allows other humans to notice the direction of gaze much more easily. The authors correlate this with other findings such human children are much more willing that apes to cooperate with others in manipulating objects and that they children spend a great amount of time during these interactions in observing the adult's face to find the direction of gaze. The authors say that this is at least preliminary evidence that humans have evolved to have a sociobiology that is much more cooperative in comparison to the sociobiology of their near relatives. The idea is that the prominent sclerae of humans have evolved as a signalling device that aids in the highly cooperative social interactions of humans.
The study's main author was Michael Tomasello, and the results have already been published online at the site of The Journal of Human Evolution. They will see print in an upcoming edition of this journal.

The Other Affirmative Actions:
There's an interesting article in the latest issue of 'The Economist' to arrive at my door (Sept 23rd-29th). The title is 'Poison Ivy', and it's under the Lexington column, written by The Economist's American columnist. The columnist discusses the research of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Golden who has recently expanded his observations into a book titled 'The price of Admission: How America's Ruling Class Buys Its Way Into Elite Colleges-And Who Gets Left Outside the Gates'. The author Lexington says,
"Mr Golden shows that elite universities do everything in their power to admit the children of privilege. If they cannot get them through the front door by relaxing their standards, then they smuggle them in through the back. No less than 60% of the places in elite universities are given to candidates who have some sort of extra "hook" from rich or alumni parents to "sporting prowess". The number of whites who benefit from this affirmative action is far greater than the number of blacks."
So...when you think "sport related acceptances" don't just think basketball and football. Think the "sport admissions" that Lexington and the author he reviews mention. Think "...preppy sports such as fencing, squash, sailing, riding, golf and, of course, lacrosse. The University of Virginia even has scholarships for polo players."
The way that the American ruling class perpetuates itself would put the Soviet nomenclatura to shame. Notre Dame University, for instance, accepted 70% of the children of university employees as opposed to 19% of regular applicants despite the fact that the "hooked" applicants had a far lower average SAT score. The author asserts that university applicants without connections compete for only 40% of the class placements. The rest are "reserved" for the children of privilege.
All this is occurring at a time when the income inequality is growing and social mobility is lessening in the USA, not just in comparison to other countries-where the USA has usually cut a poor figure- but in absolute terms.
Have a look at the article in the print edition of 'The Economist'. The website presently puts it under the "privileged" category so you'd have to subscribe to read it there. Remember who really benefits from a much larger form of "affirmative action" the next time the subject is raised.

"An Affair To Remember"
The July 29th-August 4th edition of The Economist has on the 1956 Suez Canal/Arab Israeli War. This is a Special Report and is unattributed. The report gives the background of this conflict that saw Israel, Britain and France pitted not just against Egypt but also a coalition of both the USA and the Soviet Union. The USA even applied pressure on Britain by making it plain that the IMF would not give emergency loans to a foundering British economy unless the Suez adventure was ended. Britain caved in. The Suez crisis was the last time in history that America acted strongly against Israeli interests, and the results of 1956 set the tone for most of the uneasy relationship between America and Europe during the Cold War. Nasser was the greatest beneficiary of the 1956 war. The canal was nationalized, and the revenues so obtained were diverted to paying the Soviet Union for development of the Aswan Dam, a dam that was far from an unalloyed good. Egypt's jails were filled not only with supporters of the monarchy that Nasser had overthrown in 1952 but also with supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood and the Communists. Despite the latter the Soviet Union became and remained Egypt's good friend. Real geopolitical interests trumped "proletarian internationalism". As usual one might say.
What is most significant in terms of what the world may yet see is that the Suez crisis was a spur to the development of the EU. The French foreign minister was at a meeting, along with the French prime minister Guy Mollet, with German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer when they were informed by the British that they were terminating the invasion of the Canal Zone. Adenauer said to them, "France and England will never be powers comparable to the United States...Not Germany either. There remains to them only one way of playing a decisive role in the world:that is to unite Europe...we have no time to waste;Europe will be your revenge."
In years to come, as America's empire weakens as all empires eventually must, it remains to be seen what Europe's revenge will be.

From the Editorial section of 'The Economist', Aug 5th-11th, 2006 edition:
'Sins of Emission' is an editorial that discusses "carbon offset trading". There is a more detailed article on page 53 of this issue. More later when I read this. The greatest admission of this editorial is that there are two reasons for carbon offsetting. The first is "allows consumers to quell their eco-guilt even as they jet off to distant climes on holidays, and drivers of sports-utility vehicles to argue that they have atoned for the emissions produced by their gas guzzling cars". The second is that "image polishing companies that declare themselves carbon-neutral may have public relations as well as environmental benefits in mind". In other words the priests of a managerial market cater to the religious desires of a leftoid demographic that wants ritual absolution.
The editorial discusses various flaws of the carbon trading schemes, but perhaps a fuller discussion would best be left to the time after I have read the full article AND ALSO read the article in 'The New Internationalist' that anticipated this article by about a month. Not that carbon trading hasn't been up for discussion for some time, but I'd like to compare 'The Economist' and 'The New Internationalist'.