This is from the “No comment” sections of the EuroNews website. Their description of the section: “Images speak for themselves: the most striking pictures from around the world, unedited, with original sound: draw your own conclusion”. Even so I’d like to know what is really going on in this Real Video Stream (doesn’t work directly, please see the update below). It looks as if a dog is dressed as a Shinto priest and then participates in a religious ceremony; his handler is turning the pages of the prayer-book for him. I googled around but could find no reference of dogs joining the Shinto clergy, so my interpretation is probably wrong. Here is the No comment section and this is the English language main page of EuroNews, in case somebody’s interested. They have a pro-EU bias, but some of the footage at their website is quite interesting. Update: The direct link to the stream doesn’t work, so I took it down. Just go to the No comment section and click on the video stream from Tsuru, Japan.
Jacques Chirac, Stand-Up Comic
I finally saw the footage of Chirac’s alleged outburst at Brussels where he told the East Europeans that they lost a great opportunity to keep quiet. It was anything but an outburst, though, more like a comedic performance. His tone, facial expressions and gesticulation made me laugh, as it did the Presidents and Prime Ministers of the countries he criticized. Their replies were also delivered in good humor without being in the least conciliatory. There is nothing humorous about the situation, though. Chirac’s remarks were coldly calculated, however hilariously delivered. That’s worse than having him blurt out some threats in a fit of pique, he actually thought he could bring New Europe to heel. This speaks of a dangerous level of delusion and makes me wonder if he is even capable of realizing when he is beaten (like right now, for example). He can and probably will do a lot of damage until his own people make him stop. It was a double loss to humanity when he decided to become a politician instead of a comedian. I have tried in vain to find a video stream or file of the event. Should I find one I’ll post the link.
Sorry
My apologies for the light posting of the last days. I’ve written quite a lot lately, but delayed posting a number of entries because they grew to unexpected size; once they become longer than a page I really don’t feel like putting them on the blog offhandedly and want to polish them first. I even had to shelve projects entirely because I had bit off more than I can chew and they started to mushroom to at least term-paper length. I still have the manuscripts lying around, but am unlikely to ever finish them. At least they were good practice, you really learn how to write just by writing.
The Chairwoman Speaks Up
Angela Merkel, the chairwoman of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the largest opposition party, has written an article for the Washington Post: Schroeder Doesn’t Speak for All Germans. As a citizen of former East-Germany she has as much claim to being a “New European” as any Pole or Czech and never had much time for (West-) Germany’s political establishment. The Schroeder government reacted to the article by accusing her of embarrassing Germany by publicly sucking up to America, or at the very least of taking domestic disputes overseas, basically washing dirty linen in public. In my opinion it is obvious who really embarrassed Germany by his behavior and I myself do not hesitate to let my views on domestic German affairs be known at blogs which are mostly read by Americans. I’m as patriotic as the next fellow, but I won’t defend the indefensible and from a certain point on I have to make my disgust known. As I see it the disagreement over the war on Iraq isn’t really one between nations like Germany and America anyway, rather a left-right policy dispute, one more reason to let my voice as a German conservative be heard here.
Worrisome Trend or Meaningless Blip?
The real-money odds of Saddam Hussein’s defeat, as determined in an online market established by an Irish betting shop, have drifted lower recently. The odds of his defeat by March 31 were last priced at only 27 percent, down 6 percent today; odds he will be out by June 30 were last at 73 percent, down about five points in the past few days.
Look at this as an options market. If the market’s expectations for the date of a U.S. attack on Iraq were converging on April or May, one would expect March odds of overthrowing Hussein to decrease but June odds to increase. By the same reasoning, market expectations of an attack in March or earlier would raise the odds for all expiration dates. And if there were increased uncertainty about the timing of our attack but no change in the expectation that we would overthrow Hussein (i.e., a situation analogous to higher implied volatility), one would expect the March odds to increase, and the June odds to increase or remain unchanged. Yet in the actual market both March and June odds are lower in the short term, which suggests either that there is less likelihood that we will attack than is popularly believed or that there is less likelihood that we will depose Hussein if we do attack. Neither possibility is attractive to those of us who want to purge Hussein ASAP.
The odds outlook can always change, however. In particular, a resumption of the long-term upward trend (click on “IRAQ.SADDAM.JUNE03” in this window to see a chart) in the June odds would suggest that the odds were converging on a post-March attack date, which would be encouraging. It would probably not be as good as attacking earlier, but it’s not so bad given diplomatic delays (Turkey) and what we can speculate about the pace of U.S. preparations.
Still, the real concern is whether U.S. involvement with the UN will substantially delay or ultimately prevent our attack. I doubt it, but it’s possible, and that’s why these short-term retracements in the odds make me nervous. I think the case for invasion is crystal clear, but it’s easy to forget that lots of people see things differently. I hope that the people who don’t want us to attack Iraq will change their minds, and that my blog-centric view hasn’t distorted my judgment about what’s likely to happen.
UPDATE: On the other hand, this article suggests that Iraqis are optimistic, which is a very good sign indeed. (Via Iain Murray)