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GS(3) Intelligenc Briefing 7-20-06: Turkey & Serbia Troubled, US Economic Insecurity, Global Warming, Over-Population, Singapore Censures Popular Blog, & More!
By Richard Power
Here are highlights from 12 items, including both news stories and op-ed pieces, from 11 diverse, international sources: Der Spiegel, EU Observer, Independent/UK, Asia Times, Xinhua, Reuters, Inter Press Service, Mercosur, Telegraph/UK, Human Resources Reporter, and WorldWatch Institute. This issue of the GS(3) Intelligence briefing explores tensions in Serbia and Turkey, the impact of global warming on Africa, Indonesian lessons unlearned concerning tsunamis, typhoon season, the revival of Buddhism in Monogolia, the economic insecurity of the US, energy security in Latin America, the relationship between over-population and global warming, business risks of employee e-mail and blog usage, and government control of freedom of speech in the blogosphere. (NOTE: I am monitoring the conflict in Lebanon, the Bird Flu threat, and the disputed Mexican presidential election, and will continue to post related Hard Rain Journal entries or GS(3) Thunderbolts, as warranted.)
Here is a summary. Longer excerpts and links follow below. Customized analysis is provided for clients.
EUROPE, MIDDLE EAST & AFRICA
It hasn't been a good year for Serbia: First Montenegro voted to secede and now Kosovo wants independence….It's an understatement to say that 2006 so far hasn't been a good year for Serbia. Indeed, it's rare to see a country -- in peacetime -- forced to endure so many setbacks and disgraces in such a short time span.
(Der Spiegel, 7-13-04)
Turkish foreign minister Abdullah Gul has warned of a looming anti-west backlash among his country's citizens due to the EU hesitation over Ankara's membership in the European club as well as the US approach in the Middle East....."If our young, dynamic, educated and economically active people become bitter, if their attitudes and feelings are changed, it is not good. Their feeling has changed towards these global policies and strategic issues. This is dangerous," said Mr Gul.
(EU Observer, 7-20-06)
Climate change could have a devastating impact on Africa, wiping out all the benefits from the measures to help the continent agreed by the world's richest nations last year….
(Independent /UK, 7-13-06)
ASIA PACIFIC
Tropical storm Bilis continued to wreak havoc in south China with the death toll reaching 198 Tuesday, said an official. Ten more people were confirmed dead from the rainstorms and flooding triggered by the killer storm in south China's Guangxi Zhuang region. Eight people are still missing, said the official. In Guangxi, 4.5 million people were affected and the economic losses stood at about 890 million yuan ($111 million). A total of 557 reservoirs in the region were forced to discharge floodwater as torrential rains continued.
(Xinhua, 7-18-06)
As the death toll in the earthquake and tsunami that struck Java island's south coast on Monday passes the 500 mark, Indonesian officials admit they were caught by surprise - despite the elaborate precautions they took after the bigger December 2004 tsunami that killed an estimated 167,700 people in Aceh….
(Asia Times, 7-21-06)
When Gendenjav Choijamts thinks of praying, he thinks of vodka. The 62-year-old monk at Mongolia's oldest Buddhist monastery remembers when his father and his friends had to pretend they were gathering for a drinking session to hide the fact they were gathering in prayer. "My father was a monk but because people were persecuted for that; it wasn't widely known," he said in the lush green grounds of Erdene Zuu, which dates from the 16th century. "He was a herder. He hid his shrine and would chant in secret in the evening," he said. (Reuters, 7-19-06)
AMERICAS
The United States is heading for bankruptcy, according to an extraordinary paper published by one of the key members of the country's central bank. A ballooning budget deficit and a pensions and welfare timebomb could send the economic superpower into insolvency, according to research by Professor Laurence Kotlikoff for the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis, a leading constituent of the US Federal Reserve. Prof Kotlikoff said that, by some measures, the US is already bankrupt.….The scenario has serious implications for the dollar. If investors lose confidence in the US's future, and suspect the country may at some point allow inflation to erode away its debts, they may reduce their holdings of US Treasury bonds. Prof Kotlikoff said: "The United States has experienced high rates of inflation in the past and appears to be running the same type of fiscal policies that engendered hyperinflations in 20 countries over the past century."
(Telegraph/UK, 7-14-06)
The pipeline for transporting natural gas between Colombia and Venezuela got underway Saturday with the welding of two pipes in the presence the president of Colombia, Alvaro Uribe, of Panama, Martin Torrijos, and of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez. The segment on which construction began Saturday will be 225 kilometers (140 miles) long, 89 (55) of them in Colombian territory and will require an investment of $230 million, to be paid for entirely by Venezuela….The Trans-Caribbean Gas Pipeline, as it has been officially dubbed, is planned to eventually continue on to Panama and from there to the Pacific Ocean and the Central American market…
(Mercosur, 7-8-06)
GLOBAL
According to Vital Signs 2006–2007, released today by the Worldwatch Institute, economic indicators are on the rise: in 2005, more steel and aluminum were produced than ever before, vehicle production reached a record 45.6 million units, and gross world product reached a record $59.6 trillion. The number of Internet users worldwide topped 1 billion in 2005, and cell phone sales reached an estimated 816 million units. However, while these trends point to unprecedented levels of commerce and consumption, they are set against a backdrop of ecological decline in a world powered overwhelmingly by fossil fuels. In 2005, the average atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration increased 0.6 percent over the high in 2004, representing the largest annual increase ever recorded. The average global temperature reached 14.6 degrees Celsius, making 2005 the warmest year ever recorded on the Earth’s surface. As of late last year, an estimated 20 percent of the world's coral reefs had been destroyed, as were 20 percent of mangrove forests over the last 25 years alone. (Worldwatch Institute, 7-12-06)
According to the U.S. Census Bureau's population clock, the world's population is now 6,527,525,419. Every 14 years, one billion people are added to the planet. At this rate, the total number of people in the world will be a little more than 9.1 billion in 50 years….According to a report by the Washington-based group Population Connection, more than half of the world's population will live in cities by 2007, "Making us, for the first time, an urban species."
Emissions of greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming have also increased significantly since the 20th century. There are greater concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2), one of the chief contributors to global warming, in the atmosphere as a result of continued burning of fossil fuels….As the population increases, particularly in urban areas, the demand for more energy requires power plants that already emit huge volumes of greenhouse gases to produce even more. And as people in lesser developed countries gain access to electricity, more power plants that emit greenhouse gases are built. Population growth also goes hand-in-hand with deforestation and clearing of land to make way for urban sprawl. While living forests act as "carbon sinks", absorbing greenhouse gases, dead and decaying trees emit carbon into the atmosphere….
(Inter Press Service, 7-11-06)
CYBERSPACE
Already the state has harshly rebuked one of the country's most popular bloggers, Lee Kin Mun who writes under the online moniker of ‘'mr brown.'' His offence was poking fun at a spike in prices and the rising cost of living for the country's 4.2 million people.
‘'It is not the role of journalists or newspapers in Singapore to champion issues, or campaign for or against the Government,'' wrote Krishnasamy Bhavani, press secretary to the ministry of information, communications and art in an article to the state-owned ‘Today' newspaper last week. ‘'If a columnist presents himself as a non-political observer, while exploiting his access to the mass media to undermine the Government's standing with the electorate, then he is no longer a constructive critic, but a partisan player in politics.'' (Inter Press Service, 7-12-06)
Twenty-four per cent of organizations have had employee e-mail subpoenaed and 15 per cent of companies have gone to court to battle lawsuits triggered by employee e-mail, according to the 2006 Workplace E-mail, Instant Messaging and Blog Survey by the American Management Association and the ePolicy Institute. Employers are fighting back by firing workers who violate computer-use policies. Twenty-six per cent of the 416 employers surveyed have terminated employees for e-mail misuse, two per cent have dismissed workers for inappropriate instant messenger chat and nearly two per cent have fired workers for offensive blog content. Employee bloggers face an increased risk of termination as employers struggle to control legal claims, regulatory fines and security breaches….Some of the risks associated with blogging include copyright infringement, invasion of privacy, defamation, sexual harassment, trade secret theft, security breaches and productivity drains, according to Flynn's new book.
Despite these risks, only nine per cent of organizations have a policy governing athe operation of personal blogs on company time. (Human Resources Reporter. 7-13-06)
EUROPE, MIDDLE EAST & AFRICA
It hasn't been a good year for Serbia: First Montenegro voted to secede and now Kosovo wants independence….It's an understatement to say that 2006 so far hasn't been a good year for Serbia. Indeed, it's rare to see a country -- in peacetime -- forced to endure so many setbacks and disgraces in such a short time span. The European Union slammed its door in Serbia's face in early March, indefinitely suspending talks over future Serbian EU membership. It was punishment for Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica's government's failure to hand over former General Ratko Mladic, the man accused of the mass murder of almost 8,000 Muslims in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica. On March 20, unflattering television coverage of the funeral service for deceased dictator Slobodan Milosevic was broadcast around the globe. Montenegro then declared its independence from Serbia in May. And, of course, there was Serbia's catastrophic showing at the World Cup in Germany….But 2006 isn't over yet -- nor is Serbia's steady disintegration. The next item on the region's agenda is a decision over the future of breakaway province Kosovo. It'll likely end with Albanian-dominated enclave declaring independence from the Republic of Serbia. And then there is Vojvodina, an autonomous province threatened by separatism. Balkanization has undoubtedly returned to the Balkans….Belgrade's misery is so deep-seated that all hopes for improvement are shattered as quickly as they appear. Fifty percent of the city's youth are unemployed. The average monthly income is €200, with incomes four times as high in neighboring Croatia. Unlike Serbia, Croatia enjoys excellent economic ties to the rest of Europe....Ironclad nationalism shows its ugly face all over the city. Street vendors sell T-shirts depicting war criminal Mladic. A giant portrait of Milosevic, soiled by tossed eggs, hangs from the top of a four-story office building opposite a bank building. His death in a prison cell made Milosevic a martyr to many Serbs....Young people are forming right-wing parties and action groups with names like "Marching Column," "Blood and Honor" and "Serbia Now." Their heroes are Bishop Nikolaj Velimirovic -- who was canonized by the Serbian Orthodox Church and who considered Adolf Hitler "Europe's savior" -- and people wanted for war criminals like Ratko Mladic.….If Kostunica's administration collapsed and elections were held tomorrow, the radical left and right could expect to capture the majority of seats in the Serbian parliament. But this is less a reflection of the country's political preferences than of its desperate emotional state.
Erich Wiedemann and Renate Flottau, Serbia's Darkest Year, Der Spiegel, 7-13-04
Turkish foreign minister Abdullah Gul has warned of a looming anti-west backlash among his country's citizens due to the EU hesitation over Ankara's membership in the European club as well as the US approach in the Middle East....."If our young, dynamic, educated and economically active people become bitter, if their attitudes and feelings are changed, it is not good. Their feeling has changed towards these global policies and strategic issues. This is dangerous," said Mr Gul. The anti-US views have been sparked mainly by Washington's support for Israel's attacks on Hezbollah in Lebanon but also by its links with the Iraqi government which indirectly supports the Kurdish guerrillas that operate on its borders, according to Mr Gul. Concerning the EU, the Turkish foreign minister views the contentious issue of Cyprus as "poisoning" the process for negotiating Turkey's membership. In October, the European Commission is due to present a regular report on the progress Ankara has made in reforms and meeting the entry criteria to join the club. It is expected that its key objection will be Turkey's failure to open its ports and airspace to Cypriot ships and planes as it was obliged to by the EU last year before kicking off the membership talks....Mr Gul reiterated in the interview that it would be "impossible" for any elected government in Turkey to win approval for such a step in the national parliament unless Nicosia also lifted its veto on an EU trade deal with the Turkish enclave of northern Cyprus. EU ministers agreed to end the isolation of the enclave in 2004, after its citizens voted in favour of a UN plan on unification of the island - divided since 1974 - while Greek Cypriots rejected it.
Ankara warns of rising anti-EU sentiment among Turks, EU Observer, 7-20-06
Climate change could have a devastating impact on Africa, wiping out all the benefits from the measures to help the continent agreed by the world's richest nations last year….The serious threat posed to the developing world will be highlighted when Hilary Benn, the Secretary of State for International Development, publishes his first White Paper setting out his department's strategy. It will warn that people in poor nations, while producing much lower carbon emissions than rich countries, could be the biggest victims of climate change. They will have to cope with more droughts, more extreme temperatures and sudden and intense rainfall causing greater food insecurity, loss of income, higher death rates and more diseases. Research by the department to assess the impact on Africa by 2050, taking account of poverty forecasts, suggests that southern Africa and the Sahel, the Great Lakes areas and the coastal zones of eastern and western Africa will be particularly at risk.
In some parts of east Africa, higher rainfall and and temperatures will help crop production in the short term but there will be more frequent crop failures in the future. "What is clear is that Africa appears to have some of the greatest burdens of climate change impacts, certainly from the human health and agricultural perspective," the research concluded….Mr Benn said yesterday: "Climate change is happening faster than any of us anticipated even five years ago. It is the most pressing global challenge of all, yet does not have a global framework for solving it. Climate change knows no boundaries and neither should we."
Andrew Grice, Global Warming 'Will Cancel out Western Aid and Devastate Africa', Independent / UK, 7-13-06
ASIA PACIFIC
Tropical storm Bilis continued to wreak havoc in south China with the death toll reaching 198 Tuesday, said an official. Ten more people were confirmed dead from the rainstorms and flooding triggered by the killer storm in south China's Guangxi Zhuang region. Eight people are still missing, said the official. In Guangxi, 4.5 million people were affected and the economic losses stood at about 890 million yuan ($111 million). A total of 557 reservoirs in the region were forced to discharge floodwater as torrential rains continued. Hunan province is the worst hit as 92 people have been confirmed dead and more than 100 are missing. Floods and rainstorms set off by Bilis that landed in China Friday also claimed several lives in Fujian and Guangdong provinces. Traffic resumed on the flood-ravaged trunk railway linking Beijing and Guangzhou after the efforts of more than 5,000 workers to fix damage over the past three days, the Guangzhou Railway Group said. The finance ministry approved 65 million yuan ($8 million) to fund disaster relief efforts in Hunan, Guangdong, Fujian and Jiangxi provinces. Bilis claimed at least 14 people in Luzon region of the Philippines before landing in China, according to Philippine disaster officials.
China typhoon death toll rises to 198, Xinhua, 7-18-06
As the death toll in the earthquake and tsunami that struck Java island's south coast on Monday passes the 500 mark, Indonesian officials admit they were caught by surprise - despite the elaborate precautions they took after the bigger December 2004 tsunami that killed an estimated 167,700 people in Aceh. Indonesia's Social Ministry estimates that at least 530 people have been killed, 240 people are missing and hundreds injured in the latest natural disaster to ravage Indonesia. In the worst-hit Pangandaran beach town in southern Java, hotels, restaurants, houses and public facilities were destroyed….Monday's tremor measured 6.8 on the Richter scale, according to an official at Jakarta's National Meteorology and Geophysics Agency. The quake then created 5-meter-high waves that crashed into Java's southwest coast, sending thousands of residents scrambling for higher ground. Officials said 42,000 people living along Pangandaran beach had taken refuge in higher inland areas, while 52,000 residents of Cilacap, Central Java, had fled their homes and were now in refugee camps situated in the island's interior. Soon after the initial earthquake, which caused tremors both on Java and underwater, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center (PTWC) in Hawaii warned Indonesia of a possible tsunami wave. But Indonesian officials, who received detection equipment and technical assistance after the 2004 Aceh disaster, were unable to put the technology to timely use. Surono, an official of the Meteorology and Geophysics department, said the tsunami detector was not functioning when the killer waves struck. He said one reason for the government's inadequate response was a strong belief among scientists that Java's south coast was a tsunami-free region. "Our predictions were wrong," said Surono….On Cilacap beach in Central Java, where 107 people have so far been reported dead, the tsunami destroyed the area's largest power plant, cutting off electricity to the entire province. It's still unclear how much crucial infrastructure the killer waves damaged or destroyed.
Kafil Yamin, Indonesia pays dearly for tsunami folly, Asia Times, 7-21-06
When Gendenjav Choijamts thinks of praying, he thinks of vodka. The 62-year-old monk at Mongolia's oldest Buddhist monastery remembers when his father and his friends had to pretend they were gathering for a drinking session to hide the fact they were gathering in prayer. "My father was a monk but because people were persecuted for that; it wasn't widely known," he said in the lush green grounds of Erdene Zuu, which dates from the 16th century. "He was a herder. He hid his shrine and would chant in secret in the evening," he said. Monastic life, which took hold in Mongolia in the 1500s, was nearly wiped out within 15 years of communist rule, mostly during Stalinist purges in the 1930s when an estimated 17,000 lamas were executed. But since the country emerged from decades of Soviet dominance, the Yellow Hat sect of Buddhism -- also practiced in Tibet -- is making a comeback. In 1990, three monasteries were allowed to reopen. The number quickly mushroomed to 170 across the country. Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, has visited Mongolia five times since the early 1990s, most recently in 2002, when he delivered religious discourses to thousands of followers.
Lindsay Beck, Buddhism revives in Mongolia's grasslands, Reuters, 7-19-06
AMERICAS
The United States is heading for bankruptcy, according to an extraordinary paper published by one of the key members of the country's central bank. A ballooning budget deficit and a pensions and welfare timebomb could send the economic superpower into insolvency, according to research by Professor Laurence Kotlikoff for the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis, a leading constituent of the US Federal Reserve. Prof Kotlikoff said that, by some measures, the US is already bankrupt. "To paraphrase the Oxford English Dictionary, is the United States at the end of its resources, exhausted, stripped bare, destitute, bereft, wanting in property, or wrecked in consequence of failure to pay its creditors," he asked. According to his central analysis, "the US government is, indeed, bankrupt, insofar as it will be unable to pay its creditors, who, in this context, are current and future generations to whom it has explicitly or implicitly promised future net payments of various kinds''. [SNIP] Experts have calculated that the country's long-term "fiscal gap" between all future government spending and all future receipts will widen immensely as the Baby Boomer generation retires, and as the amount the state will have to spend on healthcare and pensions soars. The total fiscal gap could be an almost incomprehensible $65.9 trillion, according to a study by Professors Gokhale and Smetters. The figure is massive because President George W Bush has made major tax cuts in recent years, and because the bill for Medicare, which provides health insurance for the elderly, and Medicaid, which does likewise for the poor, will increase greatly due to demographics….The scenario has serious implications for the dollar. If investors lose confidence in the US's future, and suspect the country may at some point allow inflation to erode away its debts, they may reduce their holdings of US Treasury bonds. Prof Kotlikoff said: "The United States has experienced high rates of inflation in the past and appears to be running the same type of fiscal policies that engendered hyperinflations in 20 countries over the past century."
Edmund Conway, US 'could be going bankrupt', Telegraph. 7-14-06
The pipeline for transporting natural gas between Colombia and Venezuela got underway Saturday with the welding of two pipes in the presence the president of Colombia, Alvaro Uribe, of Panama, Martin Torrijos, and of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez. The segment on which construction began Saturday will be 225 kilometers (140 miles) long, 89 (55) of them in Colombian territory and will require an investment of $230 million, to be paid for entirely by Venezuela….When finished the pipeline will connect the east coast of Venezuela's Lake Maracaibo with the Colombian gas fields of Puerto Ballena west of the Guajira Peninsula and will be able to transport up to 200 million cubic feet of methane gas per day. The stretch that began construction Saturday was dubbed "Antonio Ricaurte" after the Colombian officer who fought in the Liberator Simon Bolivar's patriot army during the War of Independence. The Trans-Caribbean Gas Pipeline, as it has been officially dubbed, is planned to eventually continue on to Panama and from there to the Pacific Ocean and the Central American market…Besides the Trans-Caribbean Gas Pipeline, Venzuela is planning a Great Southern Gas pipeline which will go from deposits in the eastern Venezuela all the way to Argentina. Detractors call that project, which has a projected cost of $20 billion, pharaonic.
LatAm Gas pipeline Begins, Mercosur, 7-8-06
GLOBAL
According to Vital Signs 2006–2007, released today by the Worldwatch Institute, economic indicators are on the rise: in 2005, more steel and aluminum were produced than ever before, vehicle production reached a record 45.6 million units, and gross world product reached a record $59.6 trillion. The number of Internet users worldwide topped 1 billion in 2005, and cell phone sales reached an estimated 816 million units. However, while these trends point to unprecedented levels of commerce and consumption, they are set against a backdrop of ecological decline in a world powered overwhelmingly by fossil fuels. In 2005, the average atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration increased 0.6 percent over the high in 2004, representing the largest annual increase ever recorded. The average global temperature reached 14.6 degrees Celsius, making 2005 the warmest year ever recorded on the Earth’s surface. As of late last year, an estimated 20 percent of the world's coral reefs had been destroyed, as were 20 percent of mangrove forests over the last 25 years alone. Both can provide a natural buffer for coastlines against weather-related disasters, the cost of which hit a record $204 billion in 2005, with $125 billion of this caused by Hurricane Katrina. The findings in Vital Signs 2006–2007 build on those of the United Nations-sponsored Millennium Ecosystem Assessment released in 2005, which notes that degradation of Earth's natural systems has been brought about by human activity. For example, deforestation accounts for 25 percent of annual human-caused carbon emissions, and nearly 1 percent of the global forested area was lost between 2000 and 2005 (with the greatest losses posted in Africa and Latin America, at 3.2 percent and 2.5 percent respectively). The decline of ecosystems is undermining the vital services they provide, including the provision of fresh water and food and the regulation of climate and air quality. Ecosystem decline is also increasing the risk of disruptive and potentially irreversible changes such as regional climate shifts, the emergence of new diseases, and the formation of low-oxygen “dead zones” in coastal waters. “Business as usual is harming the Earth's ecosystems and the people who depend on them," said Erik Assadourian, Vital Signs 2006–2007 project director. "If everyone consumed at the average level of high-income countries, the planet could sustainably support only 1.8 billion people, not today's population of 6.5 billion. Yet the world’s population is expected not to shrink but to grow to 8.9 billion by 2050."
Vital Signs 2006 - 2007: Economic Gains Mask Underlying Crisis, Worldwatch Institute, 7-12-06
Consider the following statistics: at the beginning of the 20th century, the world population was less than two billion, but at the dawn of the 21st century, there were more than six billion people on earth. According to the U.S. Census Bureau's population clock, the world's population is now 6,527,525,419. Every 14 years, one billion people are added to the planet. At this rate, the total number of people in the world will be a little more than 9.1 billion in 50 years….According to a report by the Washington-based group Population Connection, more than half of the world's population will live in cities by 2007, "Making us, for the first time, an urban species."
Emissions of greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming have also increased significantly since the 20th century. There are greater concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2), one of the chief contributors to global warming, in the atmosphere as a result of continued burning of fossil fuels….As the population increases, particularly in urban areas, the demand for more energy requires power plants that already emit huge volumes of greenhouse gases to produce even more. And as people in lesser developed countries gain access to electricity, more power plants that emit greenhouse gases are built. Population growth also goes hand-in-hand with deforestation and clearing of land to make way for urban sprawl. While living forests act as "carbon sinks", absorbing greenhouse gases, dead and decaying trees emit carbon into the atmosphere….The U.S. currently has five percent of the world's population, but produces 25 percent of the world's global warming pollution, according to a report by the U.S.-based environmental group Sierra Club. Together, the most industrialised nations consume 60 percent of the world's fossil fuels…."The Kyoto Protocol was designed to be a first step in what is to become a more progressive effort," said Tim Herzog, a research associate at the World Resources Institute. "China and India will have to be addressed in a significant way in subsequent meetings." …John Seager, the president of Population Connection, said that too often, the debate about population growth and global warming ignores the fundamental question of population control....According to Seager, people everywhere should control basic decision-making about when and whether to have children. This, he said, would in the long run curb population growth and, eventually, the effects of unchecked population growth on global warming…..The transition to cleaner fuels must be swift and widespread, according to Herzog. He said that people everywhere should become less reliant on coal and petroleum. "Because growth results in increased GDP, governments should explore hydropower and wind energy," Herzog said.
Fritzroy A. Sterling, WORLD POPULATION DAY: Crowded Planet Feels the Heat, Inter Press Service, 7-11-06
CYBERSPACE
Already the state has harshly rebuked one of the country's most popular bloggers, Lee Kin Mun who writes under the online moniker of ‘'mr brown.'' His offence was poking fun at a spike in prices and the rising cost of living for the country's 4.2 million people.
‘'It is not the role of journalists or newspapers in Singapore to champion issues, or campaign for or against the Government,'' wrote Krishnasamy Bhavani, press secretary to the ministry of information, communications and art in an article to the state-owned ‘Today' newspaper last week. ‘'If a columnist presents himself as a non-political observer, while exploiting his access to the mass media to undermine the Government's standing with the electorate, then he is no longer a constructive critic, but a partisan player in politics.''
Over the weekend, another high ranking official of the same ministry echoed a similar piece of Singaporean government-speak. ‘'If you feel there is a problem with cost of living, say so, let's collectively explore solutions. But don't in the name of humour distort or aggravate on an emotional level,'' Dr. Vivian Balakrishnan, second minister for the ministry of information, communications and art, was quoted saying by the website of Channel NewsAsia, a Singapore-based television station. ''That sort of discourse does not generate solutions. It generates more heat than light.''
And as is typical in Singapore, where the mainstream media serve as cheerleaders for the government, the ‘Today' newspapers did the obvious --on Jul. 7, it suspended the column written by ‘'mr brown.'' It was the previous Friday that the paper ran the blog on the economy, which is still available on Lee's website, that roused the ire of officialdom….Yet, this confrontation between the government and a symbol of the country's expanding cyberspace community is giving rise to resistance by sections of the Singaporean public that are nor ready to fall in line with the government's iron law of thought control. On Sunday, some 30 supporters of the banned blogger conducted a silent protest at a busy subway station. They were dressed in brown clothes as a mark of solidarity to this latest victim of state censorship, media reports said. Such open defiance is rare, given the laws that require a police permit if more than five people want to gather in public to stage a demonstration.
Marwaan Macan-Markar, Crackdown on Satirical Blogging, Inter Press Service, 7-12-06
Twenty-four per cent of organizations have had employee e-mail subpoenaed and 15 per cent of companies have gone to court to battle lawsuits triggered by employee e-mail, according to the 2006 Workplace E-mail, Instant Messaging and Blog Survey by the American Management Association and the ePolicy Institute. Employers are fighting back by firing workers who violate computer-use policies. Twenty-six per cent of the 416 employers surveyed have terminated employees for e-mail misuse, two per cent have dismissed workers for inappropriate instant messenger chat and nearly two per cent have fired workers for offensive blog content. Employee bloggers face an increased risk of termination as employers struggle to control legal claims, regulatory fines and security breaches. In the United States, bloggers' jobs aren't protected by the constitutional right to free speech, said Nancy Flynn, author of Blog Rules and executive director of the e-Policy institute…."Bloggers who work for private employers in employment-at-will states can be fired for just about any reason, including blogging at home on their own time or at the office during work hours." Employers eager to minimize the risks associated with e-mail, instant messaging and blogging, and maximize employee compliance should develop and communicate clear rules and policies, said Flynn. Seventy-six per cent of organizations have e-mail use and content policies and 68 per cent have a policy governing personal e-mail. But even more importantly, organizations need a retention/deletion policy to ensure business-critical e-mails are archived for future reference. The inability to produce subpoenaed e-mail resulted in million-dollar lawsuits last year. However, only 34 per cent of companies have such a policy in place and 34 per cent of employees don't know the difference between business-critical e-mail and insignificant messages that can be deleted.
Some of the risks associated with blogging include copyright infringement, invasion of privacy, defamation, sexual harassment, trade secret theft, security breaches and productivity drains, according to Flynn's new book.
Despite these risks, only nine per cent of organizations have a policy governing athe operation of personal blogs on company time.
"With 55 per cent of business blogs 'facing out' for customers and other third parties to read, the lack of written blog rules is a potentially costly oversight," said Flynn.
One-quarter of U.S. bosses have fired workers for e-mail misuse, E-mail, instant message and blog misuse can cost companies millions in lawsuits: study, Human Resources Reporter. 7-13-06
Richard Power is the founder of GS(3) Intelligence and http://www.wordsofpower.net. His work focuses on the inter-related issues of security, sustainability and spirit, and how to overcome the challenges of terrorism, cyber crime, global warming, health emergencies, natural disasters, etc. You can reach him via e-mail: richardpower@wordsofpower.net. For more information, go to www.wordsofpower.net
Geopolitics, Global Warming, Energy Security, Environmental Security, Alternate Energy, Sustainability, Renewable Resources, Climate Change, Indonesia, Mongolia, Typhoons, Blogosphere, , Human Rights, Buddhism, Nuclear Proliferation, Turkey, Serbia, Hugo Chavez, Columbia, Population
