Archive | July, 2010

  • Strand

      Rouzbeh Rashidi, born in Tehran in 1980, is an independent Iranian filmmaker.  He has been making films since 2000 when he founded the Experimental Film Society in Tehran, devoted to avant-garde, experimental, and low-budget filmmaking.  He is currently based in Dublin.  Strand (Iran-Ireland: Experimental Film Society, 2009) was shot in Iran in 2008.  For […]

  • Has the Congressional Budget Office Joined the Push for Cutting Social Security?

    Over the last three decades the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has built up a reputation for solid impartial analysis of economic and policy issues.  While the party controlling Congress gets to select the head of the agency, both parties have generally turned to the CBO’s respected academics who did not attempt to use the agency […]

  • Give Me A Little Hand

    Uncle Sam: “Israel!  You need to come and give me a little hand. . . .” Tomás Rafael Rodríguez Zayas (Tomy) is a Cuban cartoonist.   This cartoon was published in Cambios en Cuba on 29 July 2010.  Translation by Yoshie Furuhashi (@yoshiefuruhashi | yoshie.furuhashi [at] gmail.com). | Print

  • The Calm City

    Mohammad Shirvani, born in Tehran in 1973, is a filmmaker.  See, also, Mohammad Shirvani, “Iranian Conserve.” | Print

  • “Work”: In Search of a New Slogan

    In 1972 Selma James, founder of the International Wages for Housework Campaign and, more recently, Global Women’s Strike, wrote the following: “We demand the right to work less.”  Her reasoning was clear — when women work for a wage for 40 hours a week and still carry the weight of childcare and housework, what is […]

  • Sanctions, the TRR, and the Future of Nuclear Diplomacy: An Iranian Perspective

    Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu said earlier this week that the Islamic Republic is prepared to stop enriching uranium to the nearly-20 percent level required to fabricate fuel for the Tehran Research Reactor (TRR), if others agree to provide new, finished fuel for the TRR, in line with the Joint Declaration that Iran negotiated with […]

  • Afghanistan

    Eneko Las Heras, born in Caracas in 1963, is a cartoonist based in Spain.  This cartoon was published on his blog . . . Y sin embargo se mueve on 30 July 2010.  | Print

  • Post-Tax-Credit Downward Pressure on Home Prices to Come

    The Case-Shiller 20-City index rose by 1.1 percent in May, its second consecutive increase.  Prices rose in 19 of the 20 cities, with Las Vegas being the only city with a price decline. Minneapolis had the sharpest jump in prices, with prices rising 2.8 percent in May.  This is the second consecutive monthly increase after […]

  • Economic Recovery for the Few

    Where is this elusive recovery?  The banks, some say, have “recovered.”  Yet they remain dependent on Washington, they do not make the loans needed for a general recovery, and many medium and small banks keep collapsing.  The stock market shows no recovery.  The Dow index was 14,000 in late 2007 when capitalism hit the fan, […]

  • Killing Azad: Silencing the Voice of Revolution

      To suppress the most articulate voice of the Indian revolutionary movement, the state indulged in the brutal assassination of Cherukuri Rajkumar, popularly known as Azad, spokesperson of the Communist Party of India (Maoist), along with freelance journalist Hemchandra Pandey, on July 2.  Azad was supposed to meet a courier at Sitabardi in Nagpur, Maharashtra […]

  • Latin America: Stop Using Colombia against Left-wing Governments

    In March I wrote about the Obama Administration’s contribution to the election campaign under way in Venezuela, where voters will choose a new National Assembly in September.  I predicted that certain things would happen before September, among them some new “discoveries” that Venezuela supports terrorism.  Venezuela has had thirteen elections or referenda since Hugo Chávez […]

  • Ties of Friendship

    The Colombian government thanks Uncle Sam: “Thank you for helping me tighten the ties of friendship that unite the neighboring countries.” Tomás Rafael Rodríguez Zayas (Tomy) is a Cuban cartoonist.   This cartoon was published in Cambios en Cuba on 26 July 2010.  Translation by Yoshie Furuhashi (@yoshiefuruhashi | yoshie.furuhashi [at] gmail.com).  See, also, Mark […]

  • Dead Man Walking

    Amir Sulaiman is a poet based in Rochester, New York.  This poem was performed at the University of London during the Dangerous Ideas Tour (2008).  For more information about Sulaiman, visit .  See, also, Jordan Flaherty, “Manifest Liberation” (Al-Awda Newspaper, August/September 2005). | Print

  • Unlikely Emcees

      Sukina Abdul Noor and Muneera Rashida, born in Bristol and based in London, are the hip-hop duo Poetic Pilgrimage.  For more information about Poetic Pilgrimage, visit <www.myspace.com/poeticpilgrimage>. | Print  

  • Tehran Zoo

      Arash Khakpour and Arash Radkia are filmmakers based in Tehran, Iran.  For more information, visit <www.tehran-zoo.com>. | Print  

  • Egypt: Growing Protests over Water Shortages

    Tens of thousands of people in Egypt — Africa’s second most populous country — have taken to the streets in recent months to protest against water shortages, a fact which goes some way to explaining the government’s reluctance to relinquish its current share of River Nile water. On 26 July, 600 people from the southern […]

  • Export Dependence and Sustainability of Growth in China and the East Asian Production Network

      Excerpt: [T]he conventional growth accounting based on the national income identity does not provide an adequate framework for assessing the contribution of components of demand to growth.  The standard exports/GDP ratio overestimates the income (value-added) generated by exports because it ignores the foreign (import) contents of exports, which tend to be particularly high in […]

  • The strategic victory

    Within a few days the book titled The Strategic Victory, in which I narrate the battle waged for the extermination of the little Rebel Army, is to be published.

    I begin it with an introduction in which I explain my doubts as to its title “…I didn’t know whether to call it ‘Batista’s Last Offensive’ or ‘How 300 defeated 10,000,'” the latter of which sounded like a science fiction story.

    It includes a small autobiography: “I did not wish to wait for the publication some day of the responses to numerous questions asked me about my childhood, adolescence and youth, stages which converted me into a revolutionary and armed combatant.

  • Our Century

    Artavazd Peleshian, born in 1938, is an Armenian filmmaker.  USSR: Yerevan Film Studio, 1982.  Cf. “One of the central motifs is the rhythm of the 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 countdown that leads up to the launch of the rockets.  Often, this rhythm dissolves into the sound of a heartbeat.  […]

  • Iceland after the Fall

      Financial crises and uncertainty go hand in hand; some make sacrifices and others plan on having to.  But how many countries stricken by the global crisis actually feel existentially threatened? Iceland does.  Since the start of the kreppa (“catastrophe” in Icelandic) in the fall of 2008, the small island nation of 320,000 has had […]