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It’s all-out war, and yes, South Indians plan to relish every minute of it.

After all, it is rather gratifying to see the dignified Hindu getting down and dirty with the more boisterous Times. In a recent series of much-discussed ads, The Hindu wittily takes on the Times’ penchant for sensational and tabloid-centric news, urging readers to “stay ahead of the times.” The adverts sharply smack Times of India’s readers for being clueless about everything except inane Bollywood gossip.

Yet, the ads are another sign that South India’s grand old paper itself is finally catching up to the times. Established in 1878, and run by the family-owned Kasturi & Sons, The Hindu is one of India’s oldest English-language newspapers. Generations of South Indians have woken up to the paper’s steady, staid and reliable coverage of the news. Describing the paper, Jawarharlal Nehru once wrote that it reminded him of an “old maiden lady, very prim and proper, who is shocked if a naughty word is used in her presence. Not for it the shady side of existence, the rough and tumble and conflicts of life.”

Source: The Hindu

That steadiness has worked in the paper’s favor for well over a century, making it South India’s preeminent daily and India’s third largest English newspaper with a circulation of over 1.5 million. Yet, that preeminence is slowly being threatened by a new readership that perceives the paper as being overly conservative and orthodox. Unlike the West, India is enjoying a boom in print media circulation rates. The paper was already facing competition from less-priced dailies like The Indian Express and the Deccan Chronicle when the Times of India (TOI) decided to make it South Indian debut by launching in Chennai in 2008. Though TOI – published by Bennett, Coleman and Co. Ltd (BCCL) – has long enjoyed the widest circulation across India, with a readership of over 7 million, it has traditionally avoided the South Indian market. Since 2008, however, the paper has been slowly making inroads into The Hindu’s turf in the states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Over the last three months, TOI has bombarded its Southern rival with a fantastic ad that accurately hits The Hindu for its soporific treatment of the news.

For The Hindu, this external threat has been compounded by internal issues that have roiled the newspaper’s management. As a family-run establishment, the paper has traditionally been run by the extended members of the Kasturi clan, with the top leadership positions, including editor-in-chief, going to family members. Last year, however, the paper’s most visible face – its indomitable editor-in-chief, N.Ram – ran into significant family opposition when he attempted to “professionalize and contemporize” the paper by choosing a non-family member to succeed in his place. Court battles ensued, dirty linen was washed in public, and accusations and counter-accusations flew fast and furious. Circumstances have finally forced the old maiden to enter the rough and tumble and conflicts of life.

The dust has finally settled, with a few unhappy family members and a new (non-family) editor-in-chief, Siddharth Varadarajan, on board. The new chief is already getting kudos for his emphasis on journalistic standards. He recently apologized to readers when a Delhi edition of the paper carried a full-front page ad extolling Congress chief, Sonia Gandhi. Writing on (where else?) Facebook, he said that “this sort of crass commercialisation compromises the image and reputation of my newspaper.”

Journalistic standards or not, the newspaper is apparently sharpening its claws in response to the TOI threat. Insiders promise “more photos, sharper content and definitely fewer events coverage that Hindu is kind of known for.” It is a smart strategy, and it is gratifying to know that the paper isn’t dumbing down its news in response to the Times threat, but rather is being smarter about its substantive coverage of the news.

Photo by EuroWeb

The right to life is unquestionably one of the biggest human rights debates in the United States. Some argue there is never an acceptable reason for the termination of a pregnancy, others will allow it in the case of a medical emergency or to save the life of the mother, some are for the use of only early term abortion, others argue that it is simply the mother’s choice.  The recent March for Life in DC this month is only one manifestation of this debate, which has been a major battle amongst individuals and parties since the historic Roe vs. Wade decision. However, the U.S. is not the only country where the issue of abortion is controversial.

Many developing countries are losing the battle against harmful and illegal abortion practices that significantly impact female health and family planning.  The practice of unsafe abortions is one of the leading contributors to maternal death worldwide.  These practices are often conducted outside hospitals or clinics, or lack qualified or any real medical supervision. Women who undergo unsafe abortions are prone to dangerous infection or bleeding, many of these women then go untreated due to both fear or shame and a lack of access to adequate healthcare.

Recently, a new study entitled, Induced abortion: incidence and trends worldwide from 1995 to 2000, was released by the New York Guttmacher Institute.  The study found that the number of women having induced abortions has remained high since their 2003 report, which had shown an initial reduction in induced abortions.  The report stated that while abortion rates had fallen from 1995 levels, they have now leveled off. The rise in world population is only a partial explanation for 2.2 million more abortions in 2008 compared to 2003.

“The declining abortion trend we had seen globally has stalled, and we are also seeing a growing proportion of abortions occurring in developing countries, where the procedure is often clandestine and unsafe. This is cause for concern,” says Gilda Sedgh , lead author of the study and a senior researcher at the Guttmacher Institute. “This plateau coincides with a slowdown in contraceptive uptake. Without greater investment in quality family planning services, we can expect this trend to persist.”

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), complications from unsafe or illegal abortions  were the cause for an estimated 13% of all maternal deaths worldwide in 2008; almost all of these deaths occurred in developing countries. Globally, unsafe abortion accounted for 220 deaths per 100,000 procedures in 2008, 350 times the rate associated with legal induced abortions in the United States (0.6 per 100,000). Unsafe abortion is also a significant cause of ill-health. Each year approximately 8.5 million women in developing countries experience abortion complications serious enough to require medical attention, and three million of them do not receive the needed care.

The study also found that that laws restricting abortion were not not tied to lower abortion rates. In areas where abortion is heavily restricted, rates of the practice were actually higher.  The 2008 abortion rate in Africa was 29 per 1,000 women of childbearing age and in South America it was 32 per 1,000; while in Western Europe, where abortion is permitted by law, the rate was only 12 per 1,000.

 ”These latest figures are deeply disturbing. The progress made in the 1990s is now in reverse. Promoting and implementing policies to reduce the number of abortions is now an urgent priority for all countries and for global health agencies, such as WHO,” says Richard Horton, editor of The Lancet. “Condemning, stigmatizing, and criminalizing abortion are cruel and failed strategies. It’s time for a public health approach that emphasizes reducing harm – and that means more liberal abortion laws.”

The difference in rates has prompted many in the field to advocate for looser abortion laws on a global scale. However, others argue that better family planning programs, including education and increased access to birth-control, are they key to the problem.  As noted in the post, Leaders meet to put family planning on the global agenda, their are 215 million women worldwide without access to family planning, a staggering number that will only increase as the global population continues to rise.  Therefore, the issue of female health and family planning must become an international priority if there is to be a decline in maternal deaths.

• Facts on Induced Abortion Worldwide
• Regional factsheets on induced abortion (Africa, Asia, Latin America)
• Graphics illustrating key findings of report
• International Data Center
• In Harms Way: The Impact of Kenya’s Abortion Law
• Maternal Mortality and Morbidity Statistics from Unsafe Abortion

“Political opposition forces are using new technologies to carry out public events” lamented an exasperated Russian police chief yesterday.

What are these insidious technologies? Twitter? Talking spy rocks (wait, those are British!)? Putin’s beloved nano-particles?

Wait, he was getting to that. The protesters are “using toys with placards at mini-protests”, he concluded. That’s right: toys.

Protesters in Siberia have circumvented the ban on demonstrations by assembling a series of dolls, teddy bears and action figures in the snow, complete with miniature anti-government placards.

“They tried to tell us our event was illegal – they even said that to put toys in the snow, we had to rent it from the city authorities,” one protester told the Guardian.

Sure, the authorities’ overreaction to such a diminutive problem appears at first sight little exaggerated. However, it’s worth remembering that the Kremlin has always been most vulnerable against miniature threats.

Throughout the Cold War, Soviet air defense, guided by the mantra “if in doubt, shoot it down”, managed to successfully repel hundreds of flying Western intruders, no matter how big or sophisticated from U2 spy planes to entire civilian airliners. Yet all of the Air Force’s myriad defences proved utterly prostrate in the face of a small Cessna that landed right in Red Square in 1989.

But the fear of the Miniature Threat goes even further back. Which post-War Soviet schoolboy could have avoided learning the song “Little Button” about how an ordinary Russian boy who finds a tiny, lost button lying in the street, notices its unfamiliar, foreign design, and uses it to track down an enemy spy.

In its playful ingenuity, the Toy Protest is in close competition with the Belarussian Applause and Silent Protests, in which protesters turned applause and then silence against the Lukashenko government.

But the toys also carry an alternative, unwitting allegory – that the anti-government protests themselves remain a tiny affair in the national scheme of things, a plaything of the Westernised Moscow and St Petersburg based middle classes.

A year ago I stumbled onto an interesting website; after relatinged a short story, it asked the reader to guess the religious context in which the tale was set. The questions varied from the way women dressed (burqa-esque fully clad) to the practice of allowing men multiple wives. When I finished taking the quiz and looked up the answers, I realized how pre-programmed my perceptions were. As a Muslim, I was willing to accept that all listed societal vices were somehow traceable to acts of Muslims (albeit not in line with the true teachings of Islam); but what I was not expecting was for these to be stories from Christian and Jewish neighborhoods.

We are too quick to judge and hold other religious beliefs in contempt. Take for example a story of a group of men who have declared it against their religious sensitivities to allow girls to leave their homes wearing short sleeved shirts. Or segregated buses, banning women from appearing on billboards and pepper-spraying girls who appear in public with boys.  These are all tales from Jewish communities in Israel, but could very well have been stories from my home town of Lahore, Pakistan. If I have learnt anything, it is that inane acts are done in the name of religion every day and almost never do they rightly follow the tenants of that religion.

A popular belief is that religions have been interpreted or created to help men maintain power while disallowing the female population a voice. This is exactly what Dov Linzer, an Orthodox rabbi, said whilst writing in the NY Times: “It seems, then, that a religious tenet that begins with men’s sexual thoughts ends with men controlling women’s bodies.” During her tenure as Prime Minister of Israel, Golda Mier was asked to set a curfew on women to control the increasing cases of rape. She refused, saying: “It’s the men who are attacking the women. If there is to be a curfew, let the men stay home.

In 2010, Nicholas Kristof  printed a “Religion and Sex Quiz” that taught me that abortion was in fact not mentioned in the Bible, regardless of what the Republicans say. My personal favorite asinine rules are created within the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Some months ago clerics banned women from touching bananas and cucumbers to avoid “sexual thoughts”. Previously, Saudi cleric Sheik Abdel Mohsen Obeikan issued a fatwa, or Islamic ruling, calling on women to give breast milk to their male colleagues or men they come into regular contact with so as to avoid illicit mixing between the sexes (these men were now foster children and, therefore, social interaction would be deemed devoid of sexual context).

Disparity between what is pronounced as religion, and what it actually is, exist in all faiths mostly because we are all too willing to take someone else’s word for what is divinely ordained. As the Nigerian saying goes: “Not to know is a bad thing, to wish not to know is worse.”

News from Libya that torture is occurring in state and militia-administered detention facilities is horrific, but should be of little surprise. Amnesty International’s recent statements assert that torture is a wide-spread practice in Libya and has resulted in several deaths. The statements further that no investigations are occurring. Add to these statements a recent announcement by Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) that it has suspended its activity in Misrata’s prisons because prisoners are being tortured and denied medical care. Moreover, MSF’s announcement asserts that it was being used, in effect, to prolong torture: prisoners were sent to MSF staff for treatment so that they could then be submitted to further torture.

MSF’s role in the conflict is sensitive because it needs to maintain access to treat the victims of conflict; however, I find it discouraging that other agencies, such as Amnesty, are not offering up constructive criticism on what should be done about the abuses. The international community let out a limited outcry following clear signs of extra-judicial killings in Libya (e.g., Muammar Gaddafi’s death) and did not move to provide Libya with assistance to ensure that similar abuses would not persist. In short, Amnesty is right to draw attention to the horrible state of human rights in Libya but, as of yet, they are not offering up any recommendations on how Libya’s clearly limited government can tackle the problem.

With this, why aren’t we seeing positive steps taken by the Arab League, Turkey, Qatar, the UN, etc. to provide the National Transitional Council (NTC) with assistance to reign in the militias, establish a substantive system to ensure the protection of detainees, and ensure the parties are meeting international humanitarian law standards?

Civilian protection is more than just drawing attention to a problem – it’s about laying out steps that states and other actors can take to effectually safeguard civilians from violence, torture, and intimidation. In this regard, we have failed those Libyans who continue to find themselves victims of violence.

(Photo Credit: Marco Longari, AFP, Fighters with the National Transitional Council from the Tripoli Brigade guard blindfolded prisoners outside Bani Walid)

President Obama delivered his final State of the Union address to Congress last night before facing the voters in November. Although the speech was primarily concerned with economic matters and his efforts to build an “economy built to last,” it also contained several references to foreign policy and can be seen as a refutation of recent partisan criticism of his policies. In highlighting recent successes in the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the capture of Osama bin Laden, Obama sought to push back again criticism that he is leading America’s military into decline. And in noting a resurgence in world opinion of the U.S. and an active U.S. role, he pushed back against critics who say he apologized for America and lowered the profile of the U.S. on the world stage. As the following excerpt shows, it was an unapologetic defense of an assertive U.S. role in the world:

We gather tonight knowing that this generation of heroes has made the United States safer and more respected around the world. For the first time in nine years, there are no Americans fighting in Iraq. For the first time in two decades, Osama bin Laden is not a threat to this country. Most of al Qaeda’s top lieutenants have been defeated. The Taliban’s momentum has been broken, and some troops in Afghanistan have begun to come home. These achievements are a testament to the courage, selflessness and teamwork of America’s Armed Forces. [...] And we will safeguard America’s own security against those who threaten our citizens, our friends, and our interests. Look at Iran.  Through the power of our diplomacy, a world that was once divided about how to deal with Iran’s nuclear program now stands as one.  The regime is more isolated than ever before; its leaders are faced with crippling sanctions, and as long as they shirk their responsibilities, this pressure will not relent. Let there be no doubt:  America is determined to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and I will take no options off the table to achieve that goal. [...] The renewal of American leadership can be felt across the globe. Our oldest alliances in Europe and Asia are stronger than ever. Our ties to the Americas are deeper. Our ironclad commitment — and I mean ironclad — to Israel’s security has meant the closest military cooperation between our two countries in history. We’ve made it clear that America is a Pacific power, and a new beginning in Burma has lit a new hope.  From the coalitions we’ve built to secure nuclear materials, to the missions we’ve led against hunger and disease; from the blows we’ve dealt to our enemies, to the enduring power of our moral example, America is back. Anyone who tells you otherwise, anyone who tells you that America is in decline or that our influence has waned, doesn’t know what they’re talking about. hat’s not the message we get from leaders around the world who are eager to work with us. That’s not how people feel from Tokyo to Berlin, from Cape Town to Rio, where opinions of America are higher than they’ve been in years.

The State of the Union address is at best an opportunity for the president to be Cheerleader-in-Chief and to use the powers of the presidency to propose programs and initiatives that make all of our problems seem solvable if only the Congress would simply follow his lead. It’s an opportunity for him to deliver a national pep-talk that allows us all to feel good about the country and our role in the world. In the harsh light of day critics are sure to find fault in many of his statements, but for one brief moment (very brief if you watched the televised response from the opposition party following the speech) we can all cheerfully buy into the spin that all is well.

Should we allow doubts to enter, listen to the critics, and find fault with such a grand exercise in shared wishful thinking? We could, if we wanted to, note counter-examples to almost every positive statement. Yes, for example, the alliance between the U.S. and Israel is strong. And yes, the U.S. is resolved that Iran should not become a nuclear power. How then to explain the sudden delay in long-planned military exercises between the U.S. and Israel? Has deterrence suddenly become unfashionable? And yes, the U.S. is for free trade an open markets, but we are apparently not averse to a little populist protectionism (with China) when needed. And yes, the U.S. is back. But, excuse me, I wasn’t aware that we left.

Still, I’m inclined to bask in the moment for at least one night and to accept the picture presented by the president as a true representation of reality. It’s the U.S., and the U.S. role in the world, as we wish them to be, and perhaps if we try hard enough, as they will be.

Image Credit: Press Pool photo by Saul Loeb

In Berlin, farm ministers and policy makers criticized the food waste of developed countries and emphasized the importance of nutrition education programs. Every year, consumers in developed countries waste 220 million metric tons of food, while almost one billion people go hungry. These practices not only hurt those affected by hunger, but also those who over consume and, as a result, suffer from diseases such as obesity. The FAO said that at our current rate of consumption, food production would need to increase 70% by 2050 to feed the expanding population.

However, the FAO website also states that “given the limited availability of natural resources it is more effective to reduce food losses than increase food production in order to feed a growing world population.”  Furthermore, according to Jose Graziano da Silva, the director general of the FAO, ensuring food security in the future will take more than simply focusing on sustainable food production. More importantly, citizens of developed countries must change their consumption practices and ways of thinking. They must adopt a new set of values, eat correctly, and waste less.

Image credit: Blog de Auma/Well HOme

Posted by: Yekaterina Fomitcheva

The way to become a top CEO in Europe or the US has often come from societies that promoted the top achievers in schools and universities into positions of great influence and great wealth. With hard work and luck a person of normal means could often get into high positions, very few can achieve this, but the opportunities were made available. In Latin America, the limited resources in many education systems made it even more difficult to punch above ones own economic status and position in society to become a person with great expectations. Position and wealth in a hypercompetitive society gave little to no opportunities for average citizens to go beyond the status they were born in, and almost no opportunity for those to reach the status of a CEO of a major company, or the President of Brazil.

Two incredible women that must be mentioned here is President Dilma Rousseff, who was once a victim of assaults by Brazil’s past military government to become the President of the country. Another astonishing person and the recently appointed head of Petrobras, Maria das Gracas Foster will be made the CEO of one of the largest oil companies in the world. Foster was announced as the next CEO of the company after running one of its most profitable divisions of the company over the last few years. Foster’s 34 years with the company and her recent leadership of her division during one of the most difficult and exciting economic and regulatory periods in Brazil’s economic history lead her to the position. Foster, who has worked with President Rousseff in the past, is delegated with expanding Petrobras’ output and profits, taking charge of access to new oil deposits founds in Brazilian waters and with growing the company during Brazil’s still viable economic boom.

Foster grew up in a working class suburb of Rio and ended up studying Chemical Engineering. She worked her way up in the company over her 34 year career and demonstrated her skills in dealing with company issues and government agencies, having a lead role in almost every division in the company since 1978. Past working relationships with the current President Dilma Rousseff lead President Rousseff to support the appointment of Foster to the head of Petrobras. It is likely that beyond Foster’s qualifications, the tenacity and symbol of a working class hero becoming the head of the 5th largest oil producer in the world will not be lost on those young women who are working hard to punch above their weight and their position in society to become the next CEO in Brazil and throughout Latin America and abroad. The number of inspirational leaders taking Brazil into the future is an example for every country in the world of what is possible for anyone to work for their best self in their career and personal lives. For more information on Foster please see FT.com as well as the article here.

Foremost among these is the raging controversy surrounding Salman Rushdie’s scheduled appearance at the Jaipur Literary Festival, a saga that neatly encapsulates both the virtues and vices of the Indian polity. The gathering has fast emerged as the largest and most prestigious literary event in Asia, and it is a fine example of the soft power strengths India brings to the competition with China for influence in the region. This year’s installment attracted some 250 writers from South Asia and beyond (including talk show maven Oprah Winfrey, new age guru Deepak Chopra and Joseph Lelyveld, whose book on Mahatma Gandhi was greeted with a blast of invective from the Indian political class last year) as well as 70,000 visitors. Yet the imbroglio over Rushdie, who was supposed to be the main attraction at this year’s festival, has tarnished India’s credentials as emerging Asia’s brightest exemplar of democratic freedoms.

Rushdie, who was born in Mumbai to a Muslim family of Kashmiri descent, is the author of the 1988 novel, The Satanic Verses, which inflamed Muslim sentiment throughout the world and lead Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Iran’s supreme leader, to issue a notorious fatwa against his life. Concerned about the potential for upheaval among its sizeable Muslim population, the Indian government quickly banned the book, part of its familiar but disgraceful ritual of proscribing books that touch on sensitive issues or arouse passions in certain quarters. Rushdie, who continues to live under the threat of death, has traveled to India without incident numerous times in the years since, including an unannounced 2007 visit to the Jaipur gathering that is credited with putting it on the world’s cultural map.

But his headline participation at this year’s event brought forth a torrent of umbrage and threats. Muslim clerics started things off, including those at Darul Uloom Deoband, an influential Islamic seminary in Uttar Predesh, India’s most populous state which will hold legislative elections next month that many believe are critical to the survival of the Congress Party-led national government in New Delhi. Another seminary issued a fatwa calling for protests against the visit and a number of Muslim groups warned of “unprecedented protests” and burned Rushdie’s effigy.

Predictably enough, politicians soon took up the cudgels, many of them Congress Party leaders fearful of losing the allegiance of Uttar Pradesh’s large bloc of Muslim voters, who formed about a fifth of the state’s electorate. Ashok Gehlot, chief minister of Rajasthan, the northwestern state where the festival takes place, and a former general secretary of the All India Congress Committee, reportedly pressed the organizers to rescind their invitation to Rushdie and appeared indifferent to the threats being made against Rushdie’s safety. Chandrabhan Singh, head of the Congress Party’s Rajasthan unit, declared that “Rushdie has hurt the sentiments of many Indians. He must not be allowed to come to India.” Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi, the party’s national leader, maintained a studious silence, while one of Singh’s Cabinet members pronounced that Rushdie’s “presence is not desirable.”

In contrast to the poltroon instincts of the political class, India’s boisterous media leapt to Rushdie’s defense. The Times of India accused the Congress Party of playing identity politics and argued that “by catering to such intolerance, the Congress has further contributed to creating an increasingly illiberal atmosphere in the country.” The Hindu called the affair “a national shame” and charged that “India has again betrayed its heritage of providing sanctuary to persecuted individuals and ideas, not to speak of its Constitution.”

If the saga had ended at this point, it would have amounted to an embarassment to the country’s reputation. Instead it unexpectedly morphed into an outrage against free expression. On the eve of the festival’s opening, Rushdie suddenly withdrew when the Rajasthan police warned him of an assassination plot being hatched by a Mumbai underworld boss who has close ties to the Pakistani security establishment. Media outlets, however, soon reported that the death threat was concocted by authorities to scare him away. When Rushdie made plans to address the gathering via video link, Rajasthan officials attempted to throw up new impediments. In the end, the video conference was abruptly cancelled by the venue’s owner following police warnings about violent protests.

In solidarity with Rushdie, four Indian writers at the gathering staged an impromptu reading of passages from The Satanic Verses, a prohibited act that drew quick police notice. Advised by legal counsel that they had unwittingly opened themselves up to criminal charges, the writers hastily departed Jaipur and, in some cases, the country.

Unfortunately, the Rushdie affair stands out for its prominence but not its singularity. Currently, the Delhi High Court is considering a petition that seeks to hold Google and Facebook liable for not censoring content that might offend the sensibilities of Hindus, Muslims and Christians. The judge overseeing the matter ominously warned that if the companies could not police their own sites, “like China we may be forced to pass orders banning all such websites.” Prime Minister Singh’s government has lent its imprimatur to the petitioner’s cause.

Late last year, Kapil Sibal, a Harvard-educated lawyer who serves as Mr. Singh’s telecommunications minister, likewise threatened to censor social networking sites for objectionable content (here and here).  Similar to the rhetoric directed at Rushdie, he argued that “religious sentiments of many communities and of any reasonable person is [sic] being hurt because of content which is on the sites.” Last June’s death of M. F. Husain, the most acclaimed painter of modern India, also recalled how he had been hounded into self-exile by Hindu nationalist groups incensed at his nude depictions of Hindu deities. Prime Minister Singh called Husain’s passing in a London hospital “a national loss” but he did nothing to dampen the mob culture that caused Husain to spend the last years of his life outside of India.

Indeed, over the last two years, India’s illiberal tendencies have been in particular bloom:

• A fictionalized biography of Congress Party supreme Sonia Gandhi was banned;
• Government officials helped put the kibosh on plans to make a movie based on Indian Summer: The Secret History of the End of an Empire, a non-fiction book that sheds light on Jawaharlal Nehru’s furtive relationship with the wife of the British Raj’s last viceroy;
• An outcry organized by the family of Bal Thackeray, a Hindu nationalist politician, forced the University of Mumbai to drop Rohinton Mistry’s novel, Such a Long Journey, a finalist for the prestigious Man Booker Prize, from its English-language syllabus;
• And Arundhati Roy, a perennial bete noire to the political establishment and a Man Booker Prize-winner for her 1997 novel, The God of Small Things, was charged with sedition for her remarks on the Kashmir dispute.

All democracies are continuous works in progress. But this year’s Republic Day reveals just how far India still remains from the ideals of free expression.

In Obama’s third State of the Union, foreign policy and defense achievements were only used as opening and closing components to his one hour long speech. This was not a surprise considering the current domestic and economic situation of the US as well as the successes of President Obama in foreign affairs.

Obama opened his speech by listing his accomplishments in foreign policy: return of all combat troops from Iraq; the end of the threat from Osama Ben Laden and the perpetual attacks against his operatives around the world; and the progressive removal of troops from Afghanistan. The use of the foreign policy and military successes were used as a transition towards the core of his speech: how to transform America and shape a strong economy.

Obama started the core of speech with a reference to the end of WW2 when the US “built the strongest economy the world has ever known.” He then declared that the “defining issue of our time is to keep this promise [American dream] alive.” Very quickly President Obama launched his attack against Wall Street and the unregulated economy. With no surprise this State of the Union was directly oriented towards the domestic economic problems such as health care, education, tax reform, manufacturing, immigration, consumer protection, financial regulation, and energy independence among others.

Very interestingly, President Obama spent a considerable amount of time on the theme of the reform of the government and the American institutions. As a politician and individual, Obama strongly believes in role of institutions. Despite this philosophical conviction, he rightly declared that “Washington is broken.” His institutional and government reforms did not generate a large support among elected officials present in the House. President Obama talked about the corrosive influence between money and politics. He even called for bills ending the legal inside trading benefiting members of Congress, limit and monitor economic conflict of interests, as well as controlling the lobbying of Congress. He also discussed the need for a reform of the executive branch.

The last segment of his speech went back to foreign policy, as a virtuous circle, by underlining the killing of Osama and the perpetual attacks against Al Qaeda operatives around the world. Then, Obama spoke of the return of troops from Afghanistan and the progressive transition to the Afghan government. His mention of the Arab Spring was used in order to talk about the end of old authoritarian regimes such as the one in Libya, and soon to be in Syria. His claim was that even with an uncertain transformation and political direction in the region, the US will advocate for the same values shared at home: human rights and democracy. President Obama also reinforced his opposition to the Iranian nuclear program. His main strategy remains embedded in the power of diplomacy, which has generated international consensus leading to  increasing isolation of the Iranian regime. America is determined to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons and Obama “will take no options off the table.” However, a peaceful solution will be preferred.

For Europe, the turning point was obviously when Obama defined the US as being a ‘pacific power.’ Europe was nonexistent and never mentioned, not even the Euro crisis. President Obama did not talk about the share mission and success in Libya with the use of NATO. Two scenarios can be made from the non-mention of Europe: either, it is time for Europe to pick up the burden; or Europe was yesterday’s concerns. Let’s face it, this was not a surprise.

In the concluding segment of the speech, Obama shouted that ‘America is back,’ leading to a lasting applause. He argued that the people that speak about the decline of America “do not know what they are talking about.” Such statement put me in a strange position as I am teaching this semester a course on the decline of Great Powers, and the US is one of them. Hopefully, my students were not watching the State of the Union otherwise I may end up with a revolution in the classroom. Obama went on by declaring that US soft power and influence is still powerful across the globe and the US remains the leading world power. The closing statement of his State of the Union was based on a message and call for unity. In order to foster unity, promote success and fulfill American promises two elements were advanced: the protestant ethic and the military.

This State of the Union was a solid speech incorporating clear and feasible components for the coming years as well as points for his program of reelection. For Europe, this 2012 State of the Union is one more indication that the US is looking West; Obama has always looked towards Asia for personal and strategic reasons, rightfully so. Europe is and will remain America’s strongest ally. However, it is time for Europe to finally accept its role and responsibilities without having the US looking over its shoulder.

Pakistan struggles to make progress against polio Child malnutrition and vaccination refusals are hindering Pakistan’s effort to battle polio, and the health community is seeking new ways to address the problem. Despite authorities’ backing for an ambitious vaccination program last year, the number of cases in 2011 actually increased over 2010.

German researchers pave way to cheaper malaria drug Researchers in Germany have developed a way to synthesize artemisinin, a drug crucial to anti-malaria efforts, using oxygen and light — a breakthrough that should make artemisinin not only easier to produce, but more affordable. “The impact of this is hard to overestimate,” said one observer, industrial chemist Jack Newman.

Polio gains in Afghanistan threatened by outbreak Polio cases in Afghanistan nearly tripled in 2011 in a major setback to international public health efforts to eradicate the disease. Dr. Bruce Aylward of the World Health Organization said, “This is a national tragedy to end up with a major polio outbreak, especially with all the effort they have put into it. It increases the risk to neighboring countries and is both a local and national, and international, concern.

India sets sights on higher education Indian authorities are scrambling to build 1,000 universities and 50,000 colleges over the next decade to promote higher education and development. The number of young Indians entering the workforce is expected to reach 100 million by 2020, and authorities hope increased higher education opportunities will help propel India’s economy in the decades to come. 

Valuing Indian women, by the numbers A considerable drop in the number of girls in India as a result of sex-selective abortions and general neglect could, in fact, make women more valuable in accordance with the law of supply and demand. Not only could women begin to be paid better in relation to men, but their marriage value could rise too, ostensibly reducing the burden of dowries on families.

Kenyan faces legal action over child bride A Kenyan man facing charges for defiling a child bride he paid about $58 for has called for the girl’s parents to be brought in to corroborate. Child marriage remains commonplace in Kenya due to chronic poverty, tradition and the desire to protect family honor

Prioritizing the end of polio The last recorded case of polio in India affected an 18-month-old girl in West Bengal, Rukhsar Khatoon, who recovered from the disease without lasting paralysis — only a few years ago, the country recorded as many as 100,000 cases a year. Eradication of the disease can happen elsewhere, according to philanthropist Bill Gates, when there is “political will, quality immunization campaigns and an entire nation’s determination.

UNICEF officials talks of past, future challenges In an interview, Susan Bissell, chief of child protection programs for UNICEF, talks about influences on her career, as well as the reputation of the UN agency and the emerging global challenges it is facing. Among the programs she mentions is the public-private partnership, Together for Girls, for which the agency is conducting first-ever surveys of violence against children — including sexual violence — in households across the world.

Photo: AP

The return of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra to Thailand appears to be a formality at this point; a question of when, not if. It was inevitable as soon as the polls closed in Thailand’s last election this past July which saw Thaksin’s reincarnated Pheu Thai party, headed by his sister Yingluck, emerge victorious on a tidal wave of support from the country’s rural hinterland. Thaksin has been in self-imposed exile after being overthrown in a coup in 2006. He was subsequently prosecuted and convicted in abstentia of corruption and graft and given a two year prison sentence.

This past December, Thailand’s Foreign Minister, Surapong Tovichakchaikul, announced that he had planned to issue a new passport for Thaksin. Such a move would allow the former head of government and telecommunications billionaire to return home and, in all likelihood, for him to see his prison sentence commuted by his sister.

The consequences of such a political power play could be significant. Thailand’s political system has been defined by coups and, more recently, protests, since the country’s transition to constitutional monarchy. Thaksin’s ouster in 2006 touched off a series of events which saw both supporters and opponents filling the streets at different times. Airports were shut down, the tourism industry was crippled, and over one hundred people were killed in violent clashes with the state’s security services.

Will Thaksin’s return spur similar events? The pro-monarch Yellow Shirts, members of the Bangkok elite, took a trouncing in the elections this past summer, but have consistently proven that they are strongly organized and willing to come out and demonstrate against pro-Thaksin forces. The opposition Democrat Party, for its part, has already called for Yingluck’s impeachment over the matter of her brother’s passport.

Her first six months in office have hardly been smooth sailing for Yingluck. There was of course her bungled response to the devastating floods to hit the region this past fall. Now the Democrats, recovering from their heavy electoral loss, are finding an old issue to rally behind in an attempt to sandbag Yingluck’s young government.

Thaksin remains a lightning rod for controversy in Thailand, and this looming showdown between opposing forces will be sure to make for great drama in Thailand in the months to follow.

Last week, Ertharin Cousin was named by the United Nations to replace Josette Sheeran as the head of the World Food Programme (WFP).  Cousin currently serves as the U.S. ambassador to UN food agencies based in Rome, which include WFP and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

Cousin, described by Reuters as a “a stalwart of the U.S. Democratic Party…worked in the retail food sector and served as an executive of Feeding America, the largest U.S. domestic hunger organization. She led that organization’s response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005.”

CBS News described her previous work in government in the “Clinton Administration for four years, including as deputy chief of staff for the Democratic National Committee and White House Liaison at the State Department. In 1997 she received a White House appointment to the Board for International Food and Agricultural Development.”

Cousin will begin her post in April, when Josette Sheeran’s five-year term expires.

Photo credit: WFP/Giulio D’Adamo

In an ideal world, the search for justice would always trump the pragmatic workings of politics. However rarely do we live in that world. Instead amnesties are granted in the hopes of a peaceful regime change, dictators are allowed to flee their counties for the permanent and well financed vacations exile while their victims remain to put back together what oppressive policies and violence broke. If enough time passes, as Haiti is now discovering with Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier, those who grossly abused their power can often act like nothing happen. Of course justice is pursued by some countries determined to make sure that past wrongs are answered to, but success in those endeavors typically requires strong support from allied countries or organizations like the UN. Even then, messy politics makes for messy justice; accusations of bias in prosecution and worries about the cost of proceedings given the typically small groups of suspects tried are common, as are serious questions about the value of such proceedings for both victims and the political process. This, and not the ideal version we dream about, is the world we live in.

Recognition of these realities is one of the reasons why the International Criminal Court (ICC) took so long to come into being and is also a constant issue facing the court. In this battle between justice and politics, the biggest debate to date confronting the court is that of Kenya where it is believed high ranking politicians were involved in promoting the post-election violence that gripped the country in early 2008. The possibility of an ICC investigation was part of the agreement reached between President Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader (now Prime Minister) Raila Odinga, but was also contingent on the inability of the Kenyan parliament to pass legislation creating a domestic tribunal to try those responsible for the violence. After parliament failed to pass such legislation, the ICC opened an investigation and yesterday the decision on which of the “Ocampo Six” – the six people deemed most responsible for the violence – would be tried officially came down.

This is where the politics gets messy.  Not only was the post-election violence largely divided on ethnic terms which ended in a fragile peace, but the members of the Ocampo Six were and remain prominent political figures. For example, Uhuru Kenyatta is the current Deputy Prime Minister, Kenya’s wealthiest citizen and the son of the country’s first president, Jomo Kenyatta. On the other side is William Ruto, the former Minster for Higher Education and a prominent opposition politician. Both Kenyatta and Ruto enjoy significant support with their rural constituents and both have stated they would be running in the presidential elections later this year. Politically, these two are positioned on opposite sides of the conflict but may be facing the same fate. Unfortunately, they also have the ability to take down all of Kenya with them. Again, this is the world we live in.

So what is more important, justice or politics? By ruling that four of the six charged would stand trial, including Kenyatta and Ruto, the ICC stuck to their mandate and chose justice. Ahead of the announcement there was strong support for the court among Kenyans but also increasing fears that violence could once again break out. So far, that has not happened. But with politicians gearing up for their presidential campaigns and two of the major candidates now getting ready to stand trial for crimes against humanity, yesterday’s decision is only the start of this debate, not the end.

The Economist had a piece on South Africa in the latest issue that unintentionally contradicted itself. I usually try not to let others do my work for me, but these two paragraphs warrant regurgitating in full:

The ANC has marked up some notable achievements. It enshrined civil and social rights in the constitution. It abolished the death penalty. It has built more than 3m free or subsidised houses, and has brought clean water, sanitation and electricity to millions more. Every child now has a right to at least 12 years of education. More than 15m people, almost a third of the population, get some form of welfare. Severe malnutrition among children under five has been almost eradicated. Some 6m pupils get free school meals. Having at last accepted the link between HIV and AIDS, the ANC now has a grip on the epidemic, one of the world’s worst. Crime is coming down; the murder rate has fallen by half from its peak in 1994. The ANC has set up anti-corruption agencies in a proclaimed effort to bring corrupt people to book.

But for most South Africans, the stench of graft, patronage and greed surrounding the ruling party itself is now too strong. The romance, solidarity and heroism of the days of struggle have gone. In the popular mind, ANC people, from the president down, seem keener on power, status and ostentatious wealth than on improving the lot of the poor. Always a broad church, the ANC is riven with factionalism and in-fighting. Lip service is paid to the old ideals, but the party seems increasingly rudderless. It has lost its way.

It seems that the first of these paragraphs is hard to dismiss and the second does not hold up on the evidence. No one I know of in South Africa supports graft, patronage, or greed. But how can one possibly assert that the stench of those things “surrounding the party is now too strong” when the ANC will win the next national elections overwhelmingly and with a 60%+ tally? This is a peculiar and arithmetically-challenged definition of “most.” In fact, the first paragraph is empirically right and the second is empirically wrong.

Credit: AltaRock Energy

2012 could be the year that Enhanced Geothermal System (EGS) technology takes off and enters the public consciousness. And to highlight this, Altarock, the Seattle based geothermal energy developer, has recently announced plans to undertake field tests by 2012 on a volcanic site in Oregon, with expected support from the government department of energy and Google, whilst similar developments in Europe and Australia are at more advanced stages. Even China has outlined its plans to use EGS technology to provide 10 -15% of its total power generation by 2050. It is an ambitious technology that exploits the huge untapped energy potential in deep impermeable rock, or hot dry rock systems. Basically, water is drilled deep into impermeable rock to open up spores where the steam / hot water is piped back up to create energy. It bypasses the limitations of traditional geothermal technologies which are restricted to particularly conducive areas near the earth’s surfaces. It is more carbon neutral, can be used on virtually any land surface, creates a new economy or jobs and is renewable in the sense that the water it uses is interred in a continual closed loop.

In fact, the energy forecast is so high that in the U.S. 500,000 MW (potentially) could be utilized, which is around half of the electric power generation capacity currently used. In the other ‘hotbed’ of ESG research, Australia, Geodynamics is currently in the drilling stage of a huge 500 MW site at the Cooper Basin site. Furthermore, EGS technology is already commercially viable at Landau in Germany and at the Soultz-sous-Forêts site in France which is already partially energizing Paris Orly Airport.

However, there are still hurdles to be overcome and they are chiefly economic. In the U.S., AltaRock Chief Technology Officer Susan Petty says that the price incentives are just not competitive. On the technical side, reservoir connection and lifetime issues could be problems: fears of induced seismicity cause local communities to be wary. There is also the issue of  the necessary high level public and private investment to support energy developer’s claims of the bankability of EGS.

Overall, the betting is on EGS reaching maturity in the next few years with rising R&D successes and commercially viable plants coming into fruition. It is certainly a technology to keep an eye on.

Abuja National Mosque in Nigeria | Photo by Kipp Jones

A series of explosions ripped through Nigeria’s second largest city of Kano on Friday, targeting government and police offices. By Saturday, the militant group Boko Haram claimed responsibility for the deadly attack whose final death toll is not yet determined but is expected to be over 200 people.

Boko Haram was founded in 2002 as an anti-Western Salafi sect in Northern Nigeria. Since then, the group has evolved into a jihadist militia opposing the Nigerian government and all contact with the West. Starting 2009, Boko Haram began to carry out attacks against government outposts and critics of their ideology. But despite their violent past, the group has only recently gained international attention as their attacks grew in size and coordination. A series of attacks in Maiduguri and Abuja in June 2011 followed by the bombing of the UN’s Nigeria headquarters in August moved Boko Haram to the front page of security briefs in the West and rumors of US military advisers being deployed to the region to help the government gained credence. With last week’s bombings, this is unlikely to change.

It would be easy to couch the existence of Boko Haram and their appeal in Northern Nigeria in terms of Muslim versus Christian, especially given Nigeria’s history of religious strife. But while Boko Haram is an Islamist group with an extreme Islamic ideology, their supporters are drawn mainly from the unemployed youth in the more impoverished northern states who are frustrated by government corruption and limited opportunities despite Nigeria’s oil wealth. In some ways the increasing prominence of Boko Haram over the past year tracks with the growth of protest movements around the world. Most of these movements, whether in the Global North or the Global South, focus on public corruption, the lack of accountability, and a quest for personal dignity. However the frustration behind these movements has been channeled in a variety of ways, from protests in Tunisia and Egypt, to riots in the UK and war in Libya. Without addressing these larger issues as well as the religious desires underpinning the movement, the world will be hearing a lot more about the chaos of Boko Haram.

This much is clear. What is unclear is what this all means for the future of Nigeria. Do these attacks mean Boko Haram has officially declared war on Nigeria? If so, will a war on these terms spark a civil war between the predominately Muslim north and the predominately Christian south? Can the country find a compromise that works for all of its diverse population? Expect these question to be repeatedly asked in the media over the next few weeks, but for now, don’t expect any easy answers.

Last week, as I was scanning the news media, I landed on tragic news coming out of Ethiopia, a country I am deeply indebted. In Afar region, gunmen have killed five foreign tourists for unknown reason. Indeed that is so sad. What puzzled me though is the prompt response from the Ethiopian government. Like many in the occupy movement, I believe in a government that works for the people. What I am hoping to do here is to argue for that. To question the statement Addis Ababa is making. To do so I don’t have to be affiliated with any group. I am the one percent, sharing what I see so others can see. Just buckle up on my ride.

It is of course, bad news for Afar’s fledgling tourist industry though it is not the first time that armed groups in the region have targeted foreigners. As in previous cases, the Ethiopian government was quick enough to blame the attack on militant groups from Eritrea. When that claim was made, there was no clear and convincing evidence to support it. As far as I see it, Addis Ababa is continually playing the Eritrea card to build its case against global terrorism, disregarding the genuine demand of its people. As the old saying goes, “The complete lack of evidence is the surest sign that the conspiracy is working.”

In a press release this afternoon, The Afar Revolutionary Democratic Unity Front (ARDUF), a rebel group fighting for greater autonomy for their region, claimed responsibility for the attack. ARDUF said 16 Ethiopian soldiers were killed, about a dozen others wounded and an unspecified number taken captive. ARDUF also said the German nationals as well as Ethiopian soldiers, whom it said were in safe hands, would be released once peaceful mediation is conducted by Afar elders. Though Ethiopia accuses Eritrea of the attacks, ARDUF categorically denied of Eritrean government involvement. “The fighting occurred between ARDUF and TPLF led Ethiopian forces. Both European Nationals and Ethiopian soldiers were killed in battle with ARDUF. The press release makes Ethiopia’s accusation of Eritrea baseless and unfounded.

Since the 1998 Ethiopia-Eritrea border war, ARDUF took Ethiopia’s side and declared a cease-fire in operations against Ethiopian forces. In 2002, one faction of the ARDUF went even further in its reconciliation with Addis Ababa and declared that it would permanently abandon armed struggle in favor of peaceful involvement in Ethiopian politics. In March 2011, the armed ARDUF faction claimed to have killed 49 government soldiers in the area. Recent reports indicate that ARDUF still dominate life in the desert region.

Whatever the roots and ideological aims of ARDUF’s attack, one clear priority should be clear. The Afar problem needed to be addressed in broad and comprehensive manner. Such initiatives must encompass issue of human insecurity, economic and political development and participation in decision making in Addis Ababa. It is equally clear that under all of these manifestations lie the same root cause – a persistent trajectory of underdevelopment and misgovernance in that part of the country.

There is an old proverb that explains my whole argument here “The trouble with political jokes is that they get elected “. Following the attack, the Ethiopian Foreign Ministry was busy in campaigning in political joke to provoke Asmara. The Ministry noted “The government cannot and should not sit idly by while the regime in Asmara continues to sponsor acts of terror within Ethiopia’s territory with impunity,” As I see it, such provocation is not well thought and overlooks two important facts. Mr. Zenawi is consistently using the blame game to averting attention from the mounting internal problem. By doing so, he wanted to send a clear message to the international community that he is the one and only partner to relay in the fight against terrorism. In his latest actions: convicting two Swedish Journalists of terrorism, cracking down the media, the opposition and human right groups in and outside the country, charging them with heinous crimes, he proved that he is indeed unstoppable. This in turn, sparks more opposition to his regime and open door to question his genuine intension as a partner to work with.

(Politico and AP)

So, the environmental movement drew the proverbial line in the sand:  no Keystone XL pipeline.  We’ve been fighting the tar sands for years, and will continue, but the Keystone XL has been the first clear solid rallying point and the first time in years that we greens have taken it to the street.  Bill McKibben, the author and activist who has been driving the Keystone XL opposition, won the man-of-the-year award in my annual review.

Well, McKibben and the rest of the movement got the attention of the White House and in the Fall, Obama and Co. postponed the decision.  The Republican ideologues in Congress are focused first and foremost in all things, the health of the government and nation a secondary consideration, on stopping President Obama’s reelection.  These folks, along with a phalanx of Democrats beholden to Big Oil, upped the ante on the pipeline by legislating that the President had to decide by February 21.

He did.  He said no.  The State Department, in whose bailiwick the permit decision was being processed, had offered that conclusion to the President and he accepted it.  The White House at the same time proffered that the Administration had been increasing energy security during its watch.

One of the arguments that the pipeline’s supporters have been making, and will continue to make in the wake of this extraordinary moment, is that the project meant jobs.  Well, the supporters have likely inflated the numbers.  Not surprising.  The supporters say that the unions will abandon the President on this.  Maybe some will, but I guess a lot of the lunch pail construction union folks weren’t ever all that supportive of Obama.  I took part in a “dialogue” sponsored by the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers last year.  Pretty interesting day.  Two top officials of the Building and Construction Trades Department, AFL-CIO, were as dug in on this as the oilmen were.  Again, not surprising.

What might be surprising to you, however, is that union support for these sorts of projects is not monolithic.   Two powerful groups, for instance, the Transport Workers Union and the Amalgamated Transit Union, are dead set against.  One of their conclusions is that “Keystone XL may kill more jobs than it creates, through its contribution to the climate crisis…”  Beyond this, the BlueGreen Alliance has been a powerful voice for the economic engine of clean tech.  It’s a simple but powerful message:  “Transforming our economy through renewable energy, energy efficiency, mass transit and rail, a new smart grid and other solutions to global warming, has the potential to create millions of jobs, while reducing global warming emissions and moving America toward energy independence.”

The Keystone XL just doesn’t fit in that picture.  Neither do the tar sands that the Keystone XL would further enable.  As I wrote at DeSmogBlog a while back, there is a glaring paradox in the pursuit of tar sands oil and America’s drive to decarbonize energy.  The NY Times had an editorial in the wake of the President’s decision that applauded it.  Instead of this boondoggle, it needs to be noted:  “Far more important to the nation’s energy and environmental future is the development of renewable and alternative energy sources.”

David Roberts at Grist had this analysis:  Keystone surprise: Greens stronger & GOP dumber than predicted .  It’s good politics for the President too.  How about that?  The environmental movement will now work hard for this guy.  Bill McKibben lauded the President’s courage:  “Make no mistake—this is a brave decision.”  But as McKibben says, this is not the end of the fight.  The environmental movement in general and his group, 350.org, will, in the coming months and years, “…be fighting to shut off the flow of handouts to the oil, gas, and coal industries, and to take away their right to use the atmosphere as an open sewer into which to dump their carbon for free.”

That’s the job too of everyone who believes that the time is long past, for scores of reasons, to transition to a newer world in which energy is smart, clean and cheap.

For those who have not yet read Andrew Sullivan’s Newsweek piece on Obama, published this past week, take note: it should be required reading for all U.S. voters as the country continues its journey toward the 2012 presidential election. Self-identified as a conservative-minded independent, Sullivan takes on the liberal, conservative, and moderate critiques of Obama’s term in office with dexterity — slashing some of the most pervasive arguments from both parties and all sides as fallacious, overblown, and often even factually or internally inconsistent — and maintains that the President’s character, record, and promise remain “grossly underappreciated.” But his main point is this: Obama has been pragmatic from the start, never focused on making short-term gains for which he can immediately and loudly take credit, but instead taking a long view strategy that entails slow, deliberate, unprovocative persistence and makes the changes he achieves more durable.

The point of Sullivan’s piece is not to deify Barack Obama. It is to ground an assessment of the President’s work in reality, which he does quite well. And it can remind Cuba watchers (myself included) of the character and nature of the man we’re considering when we discuss Cuba policy and Executive capabilities and actions.

First, it can help us to remember and recognize the sheer number of challenges the President faced when he took office. The economy was swirling lower into recession, with employment tumbling and our financial system threatening to pull the country into a true depression without swift and decisive action by the Executive and Congress. The U.S. global image was tarnished by our record on torture and by our bloated military presence and arrogant rhetoric. Yet still, not long into his time in office and even as he focused largely on addressing these and other pressing issues, President Obama fulfilled the only concrete campaign promise he made with respect to Cuba policy: he granted Americans unrestricted rights to send money to and visit family in Cuba. Even this small step was met with criticism, and attempts have been made in Congress to roll this policy back. But Obama has held his ground — quietly but firmly — threatening executive veto in order to make sure that his policy remains.

Second, we can recall the number of actors involved in affecting policy, which include, of course, not only the President and his administration but also the legislative branch and nongovernmental actors like lobbying groups, Cuban-American constituencies, think tanks, and others. The Executive seldom acts alone to change policy except, as we have seen, in situations deemed (correctly or not) particularly urgent and crucial to national security. Whatever the merits of changing U.S. policy toward Cuba, it simply does not fall into this category. And he does not yet have Congressional consensus on Cuba.

Third, we are reminded that Obama was not elected as a liberal crusader, but as a pragmatic, unifying reformist. Cuba policy may be ripe for change, but should the President unilaterally decree a set of changes called for by Cuba watchers, think tanks and other nongovernmental actors, he would have to willfully ignore a Congress that has been determined to avoid such changes. This is not his style. Ultimately, the repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell” came from the President working with top military and defense leaders, and they (including Admiral Mike Mullen) came forward and made the case for doing away with the policy. Had Obama acted unilaterally, the repeal would no doubt have taken more heat than it did, would have met with more resistance, and might not have been durable in the long run. We can expect to see the same with further change to U.S. policy toward Cuba, or any changes put in place will be at risk of immediate opposition, counter-attack, and retaliation or repeal. Remember: pragmatic, unifying reformist, not crusader.

And finally, we are reminded that for Washington, Cuba has always been a long game. The basic tenets of our current policy toward the island have been around for half a century without yielding any measurable “success”. Any movement in broad perception, understanding and opinions has been glacial, but we are, however slowly, moving as a population toward a different consensus than that under which current policy was designed. And as more Americans learn about and visit Cuba under the current people-to-people travel regulations, the consensus can be expected to grow.

All of this does not have to make us more patient about seeing additional changes in long-standing U.S. policy toward Cuba. But it could help us see the long view. And perhaps the President is on track.