Thursday World roundup

Sherwood Forest, 2003, by Tancread

Some more World News this week that you may have missed:


UK - We need Robin Hood back: Sherwood Forest is dying. Yes, that Sherwood Forest. It's a real place. But what was once 100,000 acres of trees is now down to a measly 450. Much of the wildlife diversity is gone, and the old-growth trees are in trouble. Still, environmentalists and their allies won't raise a peep about the real cause: the surging population growth of the island, almost entirely due to immigration (see here for example).


USA/IRAQ - Stop crying: A letter from a Foreign Service Officer at the State Department's official blog outrages some fellow FSOs over the issue of forced assignments to Iraq. Basically, he tells them to stop acting like spoiled brats (the same thing I said), including: "I do not think many Americans feel sorry for us and it is embarrassing for people with our privileges to paint ourselves as victims." This even made the mainstream media.


MAURITANIA - Tragedy at sea: 50 Africans died at sea attempting to cross from Senegal to Spain via the Canary Islands. Increased patrols have cut down the numbers of such voyages and deaths, but they just keep coming. Make no mistake; these were adults and they knew exactly what they were doing. But these deaths are also a direct result of Spain's lax immigration policies, including a general amnesty in 2005, and transporting asylum seekers to the mainland, where they can easily disappear in the EU system. This situation is not going to go away by itself.


MEXICO - Hope sliding away: Recent mudslides claimed up to 16 deaths in Mexico. I hate to state the complete obvious, but you don't have to be a radical environmentalist to know that when you cut down all your trees, you will get mudslides. That's just the way it is. Mexico knew this at least 9 years ago.


USA - We don't need no badges: This can't be good: "Two Dozen Illegal Immigrants Arrested Using Fake Badges to Work at O'Hare International Airport". What's incredible is, I guarantee, when these workers are to be deported, we will hear all kinds of local pleas to allow them to stay. I would be surprised if, in the end, half of them end up back in their home countries.


IRAQ - Dedicated photographer: Interesting article from Michael Yon on what cameras he prefers for photography in Iraq. It doesn't apply so much to me - soldiers need more portable devices than what Mr. Yon uses. It's still a great article though. Incidentally, his shot yesterday of Iraqis restoring the cross on top of St. John's Church in Baghdad is all the rage on several web sites.


USA - Family loss: I can hardly even write about this - an Iraqi vet with a traumatic brain injury suffered additional loss when his three children perished from injuries sustained in a car crash on their way to visit him. The soldier, Spc. John Austin Johnson, has survived five IED attacks during his tour but his children were not as lucky. Loss doesn't get much worse than that.


USA - Interpreter madness: OK, this is one legal action that will fail. Some immigration advocacy groups are filing an official discrimination complaint over pharmacies in the NYC area. Why? Because they don't provide translations of their prescriptions for each of the (at least) 138 languages spoken in the city. If it doesn't fail in court, it will fail by the sheer impossibility of it. Even those pushing the suit must know this. Par for the course at the NYT, no one is quoted in the article who thinks this is a bad idea, or wonders why a pharmacy in America should be forced to provide anything in any other language than English, or why customers cannot find their own interpreters (if they want to live in the USA, they will need them elsewhere as well). Found via Overlawyered.


FIJI - So that's where they went: "Bainimarama defends Fiji arrests", when I read this, I thought: "Cool, so that's what happened to that obscure 1980s pop group - exiled in Fiji!" But I was greatly disappointed to find out, no, it wasn't "Bananarama" after all. Believe it or not, they are trying to make a comeback, although in music, not in third world politics. They still look fantastic.


MEXICO - Wedding guest heist: Thieves in Mexico stole over $100,000 worth of valuables belonging to guests at the "Eurostars Blue hotel", who were staying in Tulum, about 60 miles south of Cancun, for a wedding. The valuables were taken from hotel safes without forced entry, which suggests, of course, an inside job. This can't be good for future tourism, and this nonsense is one reason why corrupt nations are generally poor, and non-corrupt ones are not. Nevertheless, the hotel and the police were actually hostile with the vacationers. My recommendation? Don't ever stay at a "Eurostars Blue hotel".





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