Tag Archives: Jordan

October 8, 2019 · 11:22

When the cure is part of the disease

Have you seen that issue in your life, the claim that the cure is worse than the disease, or perhaps that the cure is not worth the disease. There are medical situations where this applies and they are usually used in cases of huge risks, but it is always in a stage where it is about optionally curing the person who got that winning lottery ticket, and the cure will hit him or her full on. It happens, yet what is the stage where the cure is the disease? I am not talking about a vaccine where we are making the body stronger by fighting a weaker version of the disease, no this is a stage where we give the person Ebola or Hantavirus to let the body cure it. The problem becomes that once you have the virus you are actually sick and the complications start from that point onward.

This is the stage we are confronted with in ‘IMF accused of ‘reckless lending’ to debt-troubled states‘ (at https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/oct/07/imf-accused-of-reckless-lending-to-debt-troubled-states). It is not merely “the Fund broke its own rules by not ensuring sustainable debt burden“, I personally believe it to be a much larger problem in all this. It is also not merely: “encouraging reckless lending by extending $93bn of loans to 18 financially troubled countries without a debt restructuring programme first“, I believe it to be a larger play to push revenue away from vulture funds to create a systemic problem for these nations to become part of the consumer feeding frenzy to banks for generations. when we see: “Debt sustainability has come into the spotlight over the past year after the IMF controversially lent a record $56bn to Argentina even though its annual debt repayments far exceeded the Fund’s own limit” the given excuse ‘The IMF said Argentina, the second biggest economy in South America, was a special case‘ the handed excuse should be casted aside and given no value at all. the supporting evidence is seen in “The crisis intensified when, on 5 December 2001, the IMF refused to release a US$1.3 billion tranche of its loan, citing the failure of the Argentine government to reach its budget deficit targets” (source: https://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/11/business/argentina-scrambles-for-imf-loans.html). When I asked about the situation about 5 years ago from these so called Australian ‘economic reporters’, none of them had any level of a clear answer for me. The case was clear 5 years ago when certain vulture funds issues got to the surface, and now 17 years later they are giving out $56 billion, whilst refusing a $1.3 billion option 17 years earlier. There is a much larger flaw in all this and there have been whispers (read: gossip) that the IMF is very much into facilitating towards the needs of Wall Street and the financial operators out there. The bottom dollar line of Wall Street needs to be met and no one cares how it is done.

the stage becomes a lot less acceptable when we consider the stage Afghanistan; Angola; Cameroon; Central African Republic; Chad; Ecuador; Egypt; Ghana; Jordan; Mauritania; Mongolia; Pakistan; São Tomé and Príncipe; Sierra Leone; Sri Lanka; Tunisia; and Ukraine, all whilst Egypt, Pakistan and Ecuador are regarded as high risk, I personally feel that the risk factors of Ukraine, Sri Lanka and Jordan are also way above normal with only Jordan being in a better long term position however, if Jordan does not address its water shortage issues, Jordan could drop into the ultra-high risk group a lot faster than anyone could state: ‘Would you like a glass of water?‘, and in all this we see a larger failing.

It becomes a more visible issue when we see the IMF spin doctors at work. We partially accept the statement: “More than half that amount is accounted for by one programme – Argentina, which has unique circumstances“, yet I am much less forgiving when I see: “We have clear guidelines about not lending into unsustainable debt situations and all programmes require approval by the IMF’s executive board“. It is my response that they publish clearly all their guidelines (and policies), but we will not ever get that. In addition, the Argentina matter after the Vultures were done with it is also a failing of the highest degree, the fact that over 17 years $1.3 billion has required $56 billion implies more than merely 4,300% more funds needed. It gives rise that over 17 years a debt increase of 23% year on year was accumulated one way or another. It is a direct optional sign of complete and utter governmental financial malfeasance. It is a failure on a scale never seen before and the fact that no one stepped in shows the larger failure by the IMF. You see, the overall lack of illumination also constitutes evidence that the players wanted this to be kept out of the lime lights.

In addition, when we look at the 17 nations, when we ignore the obvious three, we see a larger issue in Jordan. Jordan stepped up and towards the issue that there are well over 1.4 million refugees in Jordan and Jordan was not ready in any way shape or form to deal with that. In their current state the Jordan desalination plants will not be able to keep up (so far it cannot keep up) and the fact that the Jordan population grew by 14% in 2-3 years due to the refugees was never clearly illuminated and now Jordan has a larger issue, even if another desalination plant is added in the Gulf of Aqaba, the issue will not diminish and the loans towards Jordan would become unsustainable. In addition, when you consider Sri Lanka, the newspapers all gave the same quote a month ago: ‘Sri Lanka’s economy has shown a ‘fair bit of resilience’‘, they quoted that to the letter, yet who was feeding them that information? Only 14 hours ago we see: “Sri Lanka’s tourist arrivals in September were down 27.2% from a year earlier“, those factors did not really change did they? When we consider a month ago, we see an economy that is getting hit hard, especially when Reuters gives us: “a sixth consecutive monthly fall“. It seems to me that Sri Lanka are betting on the required roll of the dice, when we get the clear indication that the dice are loaded and it seems that they are loaded towards the needs of the IMF/Wall Street and not in favour of Sri Lanka.

When we add the Reuters information: “Arrivals in the five months from May to September were down 44.4% to 468,737 from 843,569 a year earlier” we get a level of clear indication that the quote: ‘Sri Lanka’s economy has shown a ‘fair bit of resilience’‘ should be seen as media BS. And there is more regarding Sri Lanka, the quote less than 24 hours ago is “Sri Lanka’s Finance Minister Mangala Samaraweera said all the money the current government has borrowed since 2016 was to repay the loans of the previous government of Mahinda Rajapaksa“, if that is true, then there are additional questions towards the IMF in regards to their spin doctors giving us: “Our decisions to lend to countries are not simply based on numerical thresholds, but on comprehensive debt sustainability analyses and policies needed to address economic imbalances and debt burdens“, which in the case of Sri Lanka shows a much larger issue, the fact that the quote on repaying from a previous government and that loan has been in place for 3 years shows a larger problem, so how much was given to them? In addition to this I wonder how much of the $56 billion is going to Elliott Advisors, so much is the IMF helping out Manhattan bad boy Paul Singer? In my view, the question becomes: ‘How much of the $56 billion goes to Hedge funds manager Paul Singer?‘ Under those conditions I reckon anyone could get their fingers on the penthouse in Sky Lofts building in Manhattan’s Tribeca neighbourhood. If it is good enough for Bobby Axelrod (Damian Lewis), it is good enough for the Lawlordtobe (Lawrence van Rijn), and I could do with a change of scenery, especially if Google buys my 5G IP portfolio.

So if my new address becomes 145 Hudson St New York, NY 10013, I promise that I will not consider the ’13’ in my zip code to be a bad omen and at least I will not have used the IMF to gain my fortune (although I will admit that I am perfectly willing to do that too #weallneedtoeat).

When we see these two issues and we see that I have not even looked at the 12 others (three were known issues) I wonder when any reporter will give us the entire down low on these so called analyses and policies that the IMF has in place, I feel with some level of certain ty that I will find a lot more issues under the waterline than the IMF spin doctors will be able to hide. Especially when we realise the quote in the Guardian: “concerns that a general election later this month will oust incumbent president, Mauricio Macri, in favour of the populist Alberto Fernández and his running mate, the former president Cristina de Kirchner, triggered a flight of investors, a run on the currency and sent the interest rate on the country’s publicly traded debts soaring“, more important, under that change the entire case which would have been part of the $56 billion ‘donation’ that we see through “Argentina agreed to reduce its fiscal deficit to 1.3% of GDP this year, down from 2.2% previously and a balanced budget next year“, especially when we see the required drop of 0.9% deficit, I cannot remember any elected official making that part of their campaign, it tends to leave them unelected at the polls, so in all this, not only does the JDC have a point, we see that Sarah-Jayne Clifton, director of Jubilee Debt Campaign should be considered to be a lot more serious and is in my personal view entitled to massive dose of limelight from the global media, so that she can ask the questions that the IMF would have to explain in a clear and transparent way, would you like to take a bet on the chance of that actually happening?

I believe that people like Paul Singer will set that bet to an estimated 250:1 chance (of it not happening), and as he personally was able to acquire $3.5 billion, I am not putting my hopes on high here. I merely wonder if the people in Argentina have any decent level of Christmas to look forward to this year and the many years that follow.

 

 

 

 

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August 28, 2019 · 11:41

Corrosion or corruption in media?

We see more and more evidence that the media is by their own hand corroded, the word which comes the Latin word ‘corrodere‘, means ‘gnaw through‘. I have given the limelight to several events where Houthi forces attack with drones into Saudi Arabian civilian targets. We can argue on the validity of the attack, yet the part that is not in dispute is that the Western media is not giving any light to the attacks at all. Despite the clear evidence that someone is supplying Houthi forces with military drones. One of the missiles was headed to Khamis Mushayt, whilst the destination of the third was not the same, but Saudi forces have been speculating that the target was al-Jawf, a city in northern Saudi Arabia and as far as I could tell at best a civilian target with no military or strategic economic targets. The issue here is not the target, it is that the Houthi forces are trying to show that it could hit a target 1400 Km away, which is already a challenge for high end drones with a well-trained pilot. It shows that the ante is up and it limits the optional source to only one, Iran. The western media was extremely able to not report on any of that.

Colonel Turki Al-Maliki was able to tell that one of them was fired from Sanaa. I reported earlier this week on “On Sunday, coalition forces also destroyed a drone and intercepted six ballistic missiles targeting Jazan in Saudi Arabia’s southern border with Yemen“, the Arab News gave another mention of that, yet the western press is clearly of the mind that this does not need to be reported. The problem in all this is that Houthi forces do not have any infrastructure to create this; neither do they have the technical expertise to make them. This is all via Iran who either delivers directly or uses Hezbollah to deliver. There is also additional shallow evidence that Houthi forces do not have the ability and expertise to fly these drones with such precision. To illustrate this consider your child (if you have one) a nine year old and let that kid fly a predator drone over Europe, no automatic pilot and let it fly into the Eifel tower. There is one guarantee, that drone will crash, it will fly into something, just not the Eifel tower that is the stage we are in. Even as we are given from other sources “A Houthi supporter wears a headband praising the Houthi movement for making drone aircraft as he attends a pro-Houthi rally in Sanaa“, showing us merely a push for fabricated marketing. There is no way that Houthi forces can make them. Even now, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Iraq have drones, but they mostly come from places like China. When we look at drone builders we see: Israel, Turkey, United States, United Kingdom and Iran. These are the makers of drones, Yemen and Houthi forces are not creating them and the media is not looking into it. The fact that the media ignores this is also an indication that the media is no longer corroded, it should be considered to have become a corrupt vessel for whatever facilitators need. Most likely to appease their own governments that need some Iranian deal, or needs to adhere to American policy so that they can push an Iranian deal. Even the Hill (not the most neutral player) is giving us: ‘EU still hasn’t stopped trying to appease Iran‘, all playing their game and they are willing to keep quiet on drones attacking Saudi Arabia to the largest degree. Is it not weird that the last two attacks within a week were not covered at all?

This is not about G7 coverage; this is about the option of meeting after the G7 with Iran, the most likely perpetrator in delivering drones to Yemen (Houthi forces).

the Washington Post gave us: ‘Saudi Arabia, UAE vow to back Yemen war effort amid cracks‘ three days ago, yet nothing on drones, the BBC gave us ‘Wingsuit scientist dies in Saudi Arabia base jump‘ a week ago and nothing on drones, the Guardian gave us ‘Walking through a war zone: Ethiopians heading for Saudi – in pictures‘ 13 hours ago and nothing on drones, the list goes on and on and it is time for us to recognise that the western news has degraded to nothing more than a media outlet facilitating to others, not informing the people of what is actually happening. Why is that?

Forbes gave us different news (at https://www.forbes.com/sites/ellenrwald/2019/08/26/saudi-arabias-100-billion-tourism-pipe-dream/#4dd68b561367), but they are Forbes, their focus is different. There we see: “Now the government is touting its plans for a new tourism industry with an announcement alongside the CEO of Six Flags and an exclusive for CNBC. The kingdom released a grand vision, but with no substance and a disappointing look at unrealistic goals“, I believe that the choice made was a partial mistake.

There is nothing wrong with 6 flags, yet when you consider the excellence and amazing rides that the Dutch Efteling offers, there is also Universal Studios Hollywood, both offer a range of rides that will take the breath of people away. The issue with 6 flags is that they are all about rides, yet a theme park needs to be about a lot more to keep interest high, the Efteling figured that out decades ago and they achieved just that, whilst also creating the Python (a really intense ride) in 1981, the interest in that ride never faded and was upgraded and renewed in 2005 (trains) and tracks in 2017. Yet I believe that his is only the start. The Efteling had from the very beginning stories from 1001 Arabian Nights in their fairy tale land, I personally believe that if Saudi Arabia wants to become international they cannot merely have another version of existing rides; they would need to get a creative team and create their own.

There is the story of the Jinn (Afreet), we all remember Aladdin. Yet how many remember or even know about ‘the Sage and his three sons‘? What if that story is presented not unlike the Efteling ride ‘Haunted Castle‘? Part of the story we walk through and the second part is a show, there are many options for Saudi Arabia to consider the way they grow their theme parks (plural), I merely hope it will be a lot more than merely another 6 flags. Yet it must be said that Forbes also raises valid points, with: “much of Saudi Arabia is prohibitively hot in the summer months, with average high temperatures of about 110 degrees Fahrenheit. Florida is part of the U.S. and thus an easy destination for over 300 million Americans. Florida allows alcohol. Florida has gambling through American Indian casinos. Florida allows men and women to dress and interact freely. Florida allows churches, synagogues and general freedom of religion“, as well as “in 2017, total tourism spending in Florida was only $88.6 billion“, what it does not mention (optionally a mere oversight, with no accusation towards Forbes) is the small fact that in 2015 an estimated 1.8 billion or about 24.1% of the world population is Muslim. That does not mean that they all want to go to Saudi Arabia, yet in combination with the Hajj, there is a larger interest in Saudi Arabia and that too needs to be accepted. If only 1% visits Saudi Arabia we see that this represents 18 million tourists, in light of all the anti-Muslim minded nations, these people might really like the consideration of a large theme park that is mostly visited by Muslims, all kinds of food worries would fall away, all kinds of direct Muslim needs would be attended to, and that is merely the tip of the iceberg.

Yet all this was limited to Forbes, many others have taken documents towards Neom City (like the Wall Street Journal) where from one source we get: “While construction has started on Neom, there are concerns that not all of its technology (which Neom chief executive Nadhmi al Nasr told WSJ “is cutting edge and beyond — and in some cases still in development and maybe theoretical”) can ever make it out of science fiction” is a view that comes across as trivialisation. Interesting that the Wall Street Journal as one source was willing to go into that direction whilst well over $500 billion has been made available for the creation of Neom city, as I personally see it, there is a clear larger need to know and illustrate on Wall Street. The end will be more and there had always been a clear path towards high tech future. so whilst the Wall Street Journal gives us: ‘Flying Cars, Robot Dinosaurs and a Giant Artificial Moon‘, we see an utter lack of the planned intertwining of 5G, from the very beginning it will be 5G and faster, so why is the Wall Street Journal trivialising a planned path that will surpass most construction feats over the last century alone?

Is this corrosion or corruption? I cannot tell and it is likely to be a combination. The fact that Neom is to be well over 20 times the size of New York and will include a bridge connecting Saudi Arabia to Africa is another matter not covered to the degree it should.

There is a lot wrong and it merely shows us that the media can no longer be trusted; whatever they claim comes with a side story a business connection and more often political policy in the making. And this matter stretches far beyond the topic of Saudi Arabia. If we look at the word news and accept in part ‘newly received or noteworthy information, especially about recent events‘, yet when we start looking for ‘age discrimination in Australia‘ we get very little, there is an abundance of evidence especially as close to 20% of Australian workers is over 55, we see very little of them in Apple, Google and a whole host of other players. In a test the same application from the same person got immediately hired in Greece and Portugal, yet bounced for the same position well over 75 times in Australia. Yet the media is shunning it to a much larger degree, I speculate that these publications rely on Apple and google advertisement to some degree and it is not merely them, the problem is a lot larger, but the media can no longer be trusted to give light to this. So if the media is super corrosive on national issues, what chance does a place like Saudi Arabia have to get a fair shake from the media?

It is funny, but Women’s Agenda had the same idea I had 22 hours ago, there we see ‘This government wants to blame ‘choices’ over discrimination‘ and “In “Towards 2025”, the word discrimination appears just four times, one time in reference to age discrimination and three times in the footnotes in reference to other documents where discrimination appears in the title“, from my point of view it implies that a non-youthful lady doesn’t have a chance in hell to get a job, how is that NOT discrimination? When we demand that all the large corporations give a top line report for all non-board members and non-senior management staff to present a staff review of age and gender hires with age brackets ‘up to 25′, ’26-49′ and ’50+’. When this is part of their tax audit we might end up getting an actual clear view. The results will be more likely than not scary be slightly too read and governments (not just the current local Australian one) will have a lot more to explain that they are willing to do at present; their anti-discrimination acts all failing and visibly no action taken for a much longer time. In all this the failing is a much larger one and the media is, as I personally see it, a direct player in not showing the people what is going on.

Corrosion is already a dangerous path, but when there is a much larger implied level of corruption in place (they won’t call it that), we see that the news has become a much larger problem that before, they will trivialise it towards time, space to publish and they will steer clear from directives that include shareholders, stake holders and advertisers. Yet that is the larger truth as I personally see it. more and more of the media can no longer be trusted to give us what is actually going on, we merely get what they consider is the news that 70% of us wants to learn about, there was a lack of resources. We accept that in the printed word, yet in the digital age where space is never a shortage of, we see publications willing to filter diligently what they are willing to show us. And there is still the worry of all the matters that we are not being informed on, it should worry you too.

Yet there is a larger play for Australia as well. That is seen when we consider the news that “On Wednesday, Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced we would join the US-led mission to protect shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow sea strip that serves as one of the region’s most important choke points”, now consider that Houthi forces have attacked Saudi tankers in the Persian Gulf (May 2019), Iran Backed Houthi forces made the attack, so already the Australians are left in the dark on these attacks and we are sending a frigate, surveillance aircraft and troops. All optionally relatives of ours and the news decided not to inform us on the drone attacks. Do you still think that I am exaggerating on the danger that the media now represents by keeping us all in the dark?

This game is a lot larger than we realise, and it is larger than we know it is because the media has seemingly decided that informing on plenty of issues us was not essential.

 

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July 7, 2019 · 14:03

Be the bitch

We are confronted with all kinds of changes, some are trivial, some are important, but when do we get to decide what is what? Consider that Iran is now stating ‘Iran says it is ready to enrich uranium beyond nuclear deal levels‘, the news (at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jul/06/iran-says-it-is-ready-to-enrich-uranium-beyond-nuclear-deal-levels), it is all under the guise of the reality. When the main players (the US and Europe) are showing to be the bitches of politics, what are we supposed to do? Trump talks a lot, he yells loudly (adapting poor grammar) but in the end, the US is not acting, neither is Europe, they are trying to remain delusional into the air of ‘saving’ something that had been lost some time ago. In the meantime, as no one acts Iran continues not merely by enriching Uranium, it is the other part, the ‘Saudi Arabia intercepts drones launched by Houthi militia from Sanaa‘ (at http://www.arabnews.com/node/1521686/saudi-arabia) that shows a much larger danger. Even as we heard: “the drones actually destroyed in the air by systems belonging to the Arab coalition“, the fact that is being ignored by the media to the largest degree is that these drones come from Iran, there is also still the issue that there is no real evidence that Houthi forces are up to controlling them, yet that part cannot be proven at present, a proxy war that is getting more and more out of control and in this when we add the Uranium pressure, there is every chance that both Saudi Arabia and Israel will have no option but to take this to the next level and whilst the bitches of politics (USA and the EU) are sitting on the sidelines complaining, reeling and dealing for delusionary deals, Iran plays its game and even as we see that the game is badly played, we need to acknowledge that they are getting shit done because they properly anticipated that neither the US, nor Europe would actually act, indecision and incapability to act are at the centre of these non-moves.

For the US it becomes even worse as we see that there is every chance that the denial is likely to grow when we see the CBS news quote: “Democratic presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard believes that war with Iran would be “far more devastating” to the U.S. than the war in Iraq was, saying in an interview with CBS News that President Trump was “pushing us closer and closer to war with Iran”“, she is on the European side of inaction, when we see: “that nuclear agreement prevented war“, it never stopped it, it merely delayed it so that Iran could get ready and that part has been shown in several ways over the last three years alone, now that the pressure is growing we need to consider that no one wants a war, but Iran made it impossible to avoid and as they make tally of all who are willing to become the bitch by not acting, that is how we might lose this upcoming war, not merely by inaction of them, but the mere fact that these politicians are willing to grab their ankles and let happen what would happen next. They will call it: “We have reached an immediate cease fire so that a diplomatic agreement can be drawn” that will be the second sign that the war was won by Iran, if that is what you want to happen, then go ahead, but also realise that you lose whatever rights you have. I for one will align with Israel and Saudi Arabia and go to war, because that is how evil is defeated. No matter how decorated Tulsi Gabbard got to be by the Hawaiian National Guard. The world is adhering to terrorist factions too quick and too much, in all this delusional acts by humanitarian laws are becoming a joke and that needs to stop.

When the news becomes about lashing out to a rapper named Nicki Minaj, have we not lost the plot? Oh and before I forget, the fact that we saw only 18 hours ago that ‘Houthis Commit 18000 Human Rights Violations in 6 Months‘ and the fact (as far as I could tell) that only the Asharq Al-Awsat Newspaper is giving the world that part, is that not a first indication on how the world has lost the plot on Human rights? And it links because Iran and Hezbollah are directly involved in funding, training and assisting Houthi forces to do that part, but these Human rights bozo’s are really not up to the part to report on that, yet their adversary (Saudi Arabia) is getting the front seat for getting a rapper perform in Saudi Arabia. It is in the realisation of these issues that we see that America and Europe have both become the bitches of others to a much larger degree than most can even fathom.

So when we see (at https://aawsat.com/english/home/article/1800416/yemen-houthis-commit-18000-human-rights-violations-6-months) the stage of “the number of kidnappings and imprisonment of women and children escalated this year, accusing Houthis of systematically and physically torturing women, defaming many of them, and accusing them of unethical charges contrary to Yemeni custom and traditions” we see a much larger stage that requires intervention, but where are the Americans? Where is Europe? They cannot act because they have their own clever plan involving Iran and it is backfiring fast and much harder than they realised (failure usually does that).

How long until they comprehend that you cannot reason with a rabid dog, you put it out of its misery plain and simple. And most people are part of the problem, they elected the politicians in Europe not doing anything and in America they are optionally selecting a Democratic president who wants to talk a little more, I wonder what happens when the others are no willing to talk, when these politicians are placed on the sidelines not allowed to speak at all, how fast will the media suddenly acts as some delusional conscience? we know that they are merely the bitch of big business, but for now they are all in denial of that reality and I wonder how many people will accept that delusional stage, because when Iran gets in a first strike the caused war will be much larger and there will be no negotiating with the ones they stuck against, as well as the neighboring countries, that is the impact of a dirty bomb, it freaks out everyone, especially those living next to the place that got hit. so it will not only affect Israel and Saudi Arabia, it will then suddenly impact Egypt, Jordan, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman and the UAE, and that by all definitions implies the start of World War 3 when one of these nations get involved.

In the end it started not by started a war, but by refusing to act when action was essential, I wonder how the politicians will validate their own existence at that point. Yet there is a bright spot at that point, when it happen, the human rights organisations will not have any reason to be around, because the impact that we get to live through will be a clear indication that talking solves nothing and Human Rights organisations will end up being in the same stage that they were in the 17th century when the VOC was a global power, the HRA organisations will become non-existent.

Could I be wrong?

Well, that is up to you people, check your local news, your local newspapers and what they give you, who else had the Yemen story on Houthi Human Rights violations? As far as I was able to tell, not one of them had it, but several of them all had something on Nicki Minaj, some merely gave view to that UN speaker Eggy Calamari and her accusations (that so called essay) regarding Jamal Khashoggi, the media has become that polarised on the political needs for Turkey and Iran to be cut as much slack as possible and most of us are enabling this to continue.

So when that enabling attitudes starts open hostilities against Iran by Israel and Saudi Arabia, how will the news be reported, or will it at all? Will we merely see some top line report trying to make Israel and Saudi Arabia look as bad as possible as long as Iran signs some fake nuclear deal?

The pressure is rising and there is not much time before things go out of control, all because of inactions, and you better realise that really really fast.

 

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July 3, 2019 · 11:57

The Yellowback politician

There is a phrase I initially heard on an episode of Star Trek (decades ago), the phrase goes “Do I detect a streak of yellow across the good fellows back?“, it was Dwight Schultz (aka Howling Mad Murdoch) as Reginald Barclay in an episode where he pretends to be Cyrano de Bergerac in the episode Hollow Pursuits, and weirdly enough, it all seems to fit, I know that it is just crazy coincidence, but that is just what it is, coincidence (and crazy to boot).

So when we see (in the Guardian at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jul/01/eu-powers-resist-calls-for-iran-sanctions-after-breach-of-nuclear-deal) the quote: ““Today I call on all of the European countries: stick to your commitment,” he said. “You committed to act as soon as Iran violates the nuclear deal; you committed to activate the mechanism of automatic sanctions that were determined by the Security Council. So I’m telling you: do it. Just do it.”” yet it seems that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is talking to a room full of deaf people, it is exactly as the headline states: ‘EU powers resist calls for Iran sanctions after breach of nuclear deal‘, you see, no matter how it falls, the initial target is not Europe, it will be Israel or Saudi Arabia, I reckon that it is 4 to 1, 80% chance Israel cops it first and only a 20% chance that Saudi Arabia does. In those odds, Europe does not have any risk and playing the waiting game and merely act out to some degree if one of the two is hit will be fine by them, it is the usual response from those graced with the constitution of a weasel. Even as we see the hollow ‘Focus is on averting further breaches and UK says it remains committed to 2015 deal‘, they merely prefer there not be any additional breaches. They ignore the fact that Iran could have temporarily halting production, they ignore that the reporting moment does not coincide with the moment Iran officially transgressed that line, they ignore that there is credible intelligence (OK, more wild rumours) that there is more than one additional unmarked enrichment site, that is all ignored, merely they prefer not to see additional breaches. When there is no skin in the game, when the economy has no real suffrage, the inaction game can be played, no matter who gets hurt.

What they fail to see is that no matter who gets hit, both Israel and Saudi Arabia have no options but to strike Iran, perhaps that is why all the arms deals were stopped? One could argue that the quote: “European leaders had urged Iran not to breach the deal, but the focus may now be on dissuading Iran from taking further, more serious steps away from the terms“, it could optionally be seen as a soft approach towards containing the fallout, quite literally so, and yet there is a first. It will be the first time when Saudi Arabia and the State of Israel as well as the true allies both have the stage where they all unite in a single need, the destruction of Iran, part of me hopes that this happens, it will be the first signal towards the EU to clean their house, it will be the first time that this union will bring fear to the heart of Turkey, they bet the wrong horse and now they become a target right next to Lebanon and Hezbollah.

Whatever proxy path was optionally in play will now fall away because no nation has ever faced the wrath of both Israel and Saudi Arabia at the same time. Those who played games in that fashion have no place to run to, they have no borders to hide behind, whatever small options these players have, Qatar, Oman, Yemen, Egypt and whatever sympathisers are out there in these nations, facing the wrath of both sides of borders is not a game they signed up for, as such the escalation will be swift and very violent. At that point it will be the first move of Iran to ‘suddenly’ give way to emergency meetings and sit down for some agreement, at that point the EU better sit on the side and not interfere, at that point the race will overtake manners and devour Iran. It is at that point that people like Ali Khamenei and Qasem Soleimani will make some hopeful statement on errors made within the rank and press for a diplomatic deal and some peace conference, but it will be too late, we should not hear of it and those so called European leaders who resisted calls better get out of the way at that point, they missed the option, they scathed their duty and the should remain silent, run and become a barber or an uber driver, it is basically all they have left.

I would prefer to avoid all these complications, but the inactions of those relying on gravy trains and non-commitment have burned their own boats and their own bridges, Iran will not learn one way, so they will have to learn another way. It took me a few hours to design an optional solution to cripple their navy, I feel certain that I could take a look at their air force and airfields and give some additional fun (solving puzzles is actually a lot of fun).

And it goes beyond that, even as we see: ‘Israel preparing for possible military clash between US and Iran‘, it is more likely than not that US will halt its stance before the military clash happens, it will run to the border with all might, but not commit to an armed exchange, it will however not stand in the way of Israel and Saudi Arabia when they do strike, this differs them from the EU, the EU will do whatever they can to force any negotiation, even after a first strike by Iran, optionally via Hezbollah or Houthi forces and that makes this game a lot more dangerous this time around. As no one was able to stop Iran arming the other two, we are in the dark on how much was delivered and how these two will strike. Houthi forces will strike Saudi Arabia, Hezbollah will strike both Israel and Saudi Arabia, yet Hezbollah will more likely than not hide behind Houthi outfits, the rest is still open. As CNN reported hours ago, “Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi rebels claimed responsibility for a drone attack Tuesday on Abha International Airport, according to the Houthi-run Al-Masirah news agency. The Saudi-led coalition fighting the rebels confirmed the drone attack and said it believed Tehran was involved in the operation“, the problem is not merely the attack on the airports, it seems that Houthi (or its Hezbollah/Iranian operators) are getting more adapt at their actions implying that the targets might change soon enough, the fact that Iran is out of options also implies that they need Houthi forces to hit Saudi Arabia harder and that is more likely than not going to happen. Until the shipments stop Saudi Arabia is facing a battle on 2-3 fronts, a third front will happen if Hezbollah openly commits towards Iran and the Al Qurayyat region. There is no intelligence to prove that, but tactically Hezbollah could use that stage to also increase pressures on Jordan and Saudi Arabia at the same time; I cannot help but wonder on how far this could escalate and I cannot stop but wonder how the ignorant inactive politicians in Europe let it come to this. They all knew what was at stake; they all left it to some proclaimed expectation of ‘US actions’ who in their current state could not even afford to go to war with the 17th century VOC (and a 17th century technology navy), their state is pretty bad. Even if they score immediate hits on Iran, it will escalate and until they get direct fire support from both Saudi Arabia and Israel, this could escalate out of proportions giving rise to serious damage to Jordan, Bahrain, and the UAE to boot. Iran will avoid pushing Qatar, but there is no guarantee that they avoid damage. It is a mess that could soon become uncontrollable; the inactions of Europe push for that scenario more and more.

I personally believe that it will come to blows within the next few weeks. I would be extremely happy if it could be avoided, yet as the present stage is, I am uncertain as to how it can be avoided, the best chance would be a first strike on Iran and see if Iran realises that they pissed off too many sides at the same time, but that is not a given. They might not have any chance to win, but they can still do loads of damage to several players and there is no denying that the IRGC is ready for battle, making a quick victory over Iran extremely unlikely, or perhaps it might be more correct to state that a quick victory is only possible through a severe impact on all fighting sides, a cornered party will do weird jumps and that has been a truth in life and nature like forever, so the entire situation is not out of reach and let’s not forget, Iran had the option to create a stage by temporary halt enrichment and they decided not to do that. As such the escalation has clearly be on their side and no matter how the stage with America was, by surpassing enrichment amounts they have clearly given the indication that they care not for the accords and they are calling the bluff of the EU and America to escalate issues further whilst ignoring the danger that either Israel or Saudi Arabia is, as such they only have themselves to blame when the damage in Iran takes on a much larger proportion than they anticipated, the question then becomes will the attacking nations stop, or will they to prevent Iranian attacks continue until Ali Khamenei and Qasem Soleimani and their inner circles are completely removed from power. We might think that this is the best outcome, but it is not. The devil you know beats the devil you do not and in Iran there will always be another Mahmoud Ahmadinejad waiting to take the highest seat of Iranian office.

One would have hoped that the yellowback politician was an extinct breed, but that is not the case and I fear that their damage will be visible for decades to come, no matter where that damage is.

 

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June 28, 2019 · 11:38

Slapping the New York Times

This is a weird day, I for one had never expected to have a go at places like the Washington Post, or the New York Times; they are supposed to be journalistic bastions. Now, for the most I avoid slapping the Washington Post, Jamal Khashoggi was one of theirs, I get it, tensions and emotions run high. The New York Times does not get that excuse.

So when I saw ‘Saudi Arabia Is Running Out of Friends‘ I got a little hot under the collar. First off, this is an opinion piece and that makes it not really a New York Times part, or does it? They decided to publish it. The article (at https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/27/opinion/saudi-arms-sales-britain.html) raises a lot of questions, not on Saudi Arabia, but on the people and their comprehension of the issues that are involved. And it goes further than that. The start gives us: “a United Nations expert released a report calling for an investigation into the role of Mohammed bin Salman, crown prince of Saudi Arabia, in the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The next day in Washington, the Senate voted to block arms sales worth billions of dollars, the latest in a string of congressional efforts to halt American support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen“.

  1. The full UN report (added later down).
  2. The Saudi-wed war in Yemen.

The first will be dealt with further down; the ‘Saudi-led war in Yemen‘ is a disruptive boast that has zero validity. First of all, the Yemen issue comes from the ‘Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen‘, which came from the call for help by the internationally recognized President of Yemen Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi for military support, which was as far as I can tell, his right to do so, it was a response to attacks by the Houthi movement. In the entire article the following words are not found: ‘Houthi‘, ‘Hezbollah‘, and ‘Iran‘ they are all participating players on the side attacking ousted President of Yemen Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi. And for the more comprehensive part, what is regarded as Saudi led, which is not a lie also involves the United Arab Emirates, Behrain, Kuwait, Qatar (only initially), Egypt, Jordan, Marocco (until recently), Senegal, and Sudan. They all seemingly agree that the Houthi forces are the evil bringers here, and that is before we all realise that there is a mountain of evidence linking Iran to all that, and the press has done its massive share to not inform the public on those parts.

So as we get to: “As the chorus of condemnation grows louder, defending the arms supplies that have always been a core feature of the West’s ties to Riyadh has become a near impossible task“, well sell them to me, I will happily and proudly offer these goods to the Saudi government, any cowardly and weasel likened politician (mostly Americans) want to be in denial, I will step in. My commission and bonus comes from their share, some things come at a cost, as it should.

Then we get to the ugly part: “They want the sources of the present crisis to be resolved, not left to fester, which means a swift conclusion to the Yemen war and a satisfactory accounting for the murder of Mr. Khashoggi“, in this we will get to that journalist later, the entire ‘swift conclusion to the Yemen war‘ required the world to do something about the Houthi support system. This includes terrorist organisation Hezbollah and its hosting nation Lebanon, as well as Iran. The US as well as the European Union failed at least 5 times, mostly because Europe has this delusional thought that the nuclear pact could be saved somehow, in addition Iran has been facilitated to by Turkey who had a larger role to play and we will get to that soon enough. It failed by blocking arms and intelligence when it mattered most, it failed by not giving proper light to the activities of Hezbollah training, as well as optionally (still unproven) firing missiles directly into Saudi Arabia, in all this it might be unproven, yet the hardware used in conjunction with the skill that Houthi forces could not have, gives us a clear light that the operators of these missiles were optionally Iranian, or Hezbollah (Lebanese), the press steered clear of that part to the largest degree.

Then we get the empty threat: “If the world finally gets serious about tackling the climate emergency, a large proportion of existing oil reserves will have to remain in the ground, leaving the Saudis sitting on stranded assets“, so how about the reality that hits the US when 100% of Saudi Oil only goes towards Europe, India and Asia? When that flow to America stops, fuel prices (based on Chicago) will go from $3.62 per gallon, to $5.99-$7.51 per gallon within weeks. Good luck trying to have an economy in America at that point. In New York (where that paper comes from) the taxi costs will soon go up by 50% or more, what happened the last time that New York was completely dependent on public transport? And for those driving their own cars? That will be for the wealthy only, so let’s keep a real sense of reality, shall we?

Now we get to the hard part. There is an issue with: “And in London — on the same day — a court ruled that Britain had acted unlawfully in approving arms exports to Saudi Arabia“, there is the optional stage where the arms deal is merely delayed. We see that in the BBC part: “Judges said licences should be reviewed but would not be immediately suspended“, which was a week ago. It comes from “Under UK export policy, military equipment licences should not be granted if there is a “clear risk” that weapons might be used in a “serious violation of international humanitarian law”“, this is an issue, but not the one you think it is. Yes, there is a chance that these weapons are used in Yemen, yet as I stated earlier, the entire Yemen war is misrepresented by ignoring three warring parties, the Houthi, Hezbollah and Iran. In addition Houthi forces have resorted to terrorist tactics by placing weapons and troops directly behind civilians, basically using them as a shield. In addition, Houthi forces have done whatever they could to stop humanitarian aid and claiming whatever they could for their own military forces, they are the catalyst to the Yemeni humanitarian nightmare and the media remains largely silent on it. We get additional evidence from Gulf News only 11 hours ago with: “Yemeni government forces had repulsed fierce attacks by Iran-allied Al Houthi militants that had targeted residential areas inside the coastal city of Hodeidah and outskirts, military forces said on Thursday“, this is still happening right now, but the media remains silent, why is that?

So as we finish part one of the hatchet job that the New York Times allowed to be published in their papers, it becomes time to raise part 2, the full UN report [UN Khashoggi Report June 2019].

There are several issues with the report but let’s start with the ruling premise that they place in item 37 “This human rights inquiry into the killing of Mr. Khashoggi raised many challenges. By the time the inquiry was initiated, much had already been reported about the killing and the likely responsibilities of various individuals. The risks of confirmation bias (the tendency to bolster a hypothesis by seeking evidence consistent with it while disregarding inconsistent evidence) were particularly high.”

There are two parts, the first is ‘the killing of Mr. Khashoggi‘, now I personally believe he is dead, through methods unknown, and there is credibility in that statement, but there is no evidence whatsoever. If we are nations of laws, than we must adhere to these laws. We must also accept that the law is not always our friend, and here we see Turkey facilitating towards Iran to the largest degree. They had set a stage in motion by relying on here-say, using things like ‘might’ and adding evidence that is none of anything. When we see the rumour mill giving us millions upon millions of articles all based on hearsay and unverified anonymous sources, we see an engine that was designed to halt whatever positive actions Saudi Arabia were trying to do on an international stage. Turkey succeeded in being the puppet read: bitch) of Iran to a degree never seen before and let’s not forget, Turkey holds the current record of having the most incarcerated journalists in the world at present.

And the most damning part starts at the very beginning, but not in the direction you would like it to see. Here we see: “Mr. Khashoggi’s killing constituted an extrajudicial killing for which the State of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is responsible. His attempted kidnapping would also constitute a violation under international human rights law. From the perspective of international human rights law, State responsibility is not a question of, for example, which of the State officials ordered Mr. Khashoggi’s death; whether one or more ordered a kidnapping that was botched and then became an accidental killing; or whether the officers acted on their own initiative or ultra vires“, as I stated: ‘We can assume that Jamal Khashoggi is dead‘, yet where is his body? There is no evidence in any direction and it happened in a nation that is facilitating to a nation that is actively hostile and in a proxy war with Saudi Arabia, a fact no one seemed to acknowledge, that Turkey has currently imprisoned 68 journalists and is regarded to have killed dozens more.

Now we get to point 11 (page 5): “She also found that Turkey’s fear over an escalation of the situation and retribution meant that the consular residences or consular cars were also not searched without permission even though they are not protected by the VCCR“, Was it really ‘fear’ or ‘orchestration’? Turkey has scathed all laws for numerous reasons, broken promises and not adhered to issues, and now they are ‘suddenly’ afraid? I acknowledge that this is speculation from my side, yet aren’t all parties speculating here?

when we seek the word evidence in the report we see ‘no independently verified evidence‘ and all kinds of fusions with other words, yet not with ‘evidence found‘, is that not weird that the UN spend all this time on a report and there was no ‘clear evidence found‘?

You can check for yourself, the report has been added. The special rapporteur (or is that reporter) gives us: “The Special Rapporteur reviewed four potentially credible hypotheses related to the unlawful death of Mr. Khashoggi“, it merely turns paper A/HRC/41/CRP.1 into an essay, a very expensive essay I might add (OK, I am exaggerating here).

And now we get to the paper and the recommendations that start at page 95. Here we see: “Initiate a follow-up criminal investigation into the killing of Mr. Khashoggi to build-up strong files on each of the alleged perpetrators and identify mechanisms for formal accountability, such as an ad hoc or hybrid tribunal” Yes? How?

There is no evidence and most evidence was tainted by Turkish authorities by mismanagement and by allowing so called government officials make statement that had no bearing and touched no evidentiary surface. It became a 70 million article joke with references to burned remains and all kinds of photographs that show nothing at all.

In this I find item 480 even more hilarious. For the most (it seems) there is a lack of knowing what accountability means, you merely have to look at several issues in the UN with a special reference to the UN and UN security council sides in Egypt (1981) Assassination of Anwar Sadat, there has been several moments where it was uttered that certain paths were not fully investigated, does it matter? So when I see: “Accountability demands that the Saudi Arabia government accept State responsibility for the execution” whilst that evidence is not in existence. There is a case for rogue activities, if that constitutes evidence, than the UN should take a hard look at Viktoria Marinova, optionally investigating the mere accepted fact by the media that the ‘they did not believe the killing of Marinova was connected to her work, suggesting it was a “spontaneous” attack‘, or there are the unanswered questions regarding Abdul Samad Rohani. What is most striking is that the Taliban was never shy of admitting their acts, so why was his death closed when the Taliban was very apt in denying this one? It is important when we consider this unidentified government spokesman in light of the fact that this happened in a place where there is a flourishing opium trade, so as some gave clearly: “Rohani was killed for his reporting on drug trafficking and its possible ties to government officials“, yes because that has always been a reason to keep a journalist alive, has it? So Agnes Callamard, where are those essays?

It is in that light that I want to illuminate another item that was in the document: ‘Turkey failed to meet international standards regarding the investigation into unlawful deaths‘ (Page 4, Item 5). So why was that? There are always truckloads of excuses to find, yet who was responsible to keep international standards? Why were these standards not met? That term was used in several ways, yet the mention and clarification of Turkish ‘international standards‘ and more important which person, or perhaps more correctly stated which Turkish office was responsible for that is also missing in this Agnes Callamard document, is that not equally part of the investigation in all this? Why is that part missing in this document?

In the end the entire matter of Khashoggi smells and the Washington Post in this one instance can hide behind rumours and speculations all they want, the New York Times does not! In the end there are too much questions, but the participating player (Turkey) has its hands in too many Iranian issues and there is clear evidence (actual evidence) that the entire Khashoggi investigation got tainted and no longer an option to investigate. Yet that too is seemingly missing from the essay of Agnes Callamard (I remain cautious as I might have missed a piece in that 99 page essay.

I will leave it to you good folks to draw your own conclusion and the issues I reported, feel free to Google Search it, feel free to text search it in the document. the opinion piece did not mention the other parts making it unfair, unbalanced and as I personally see it completely unworthy of the New York Times, as such I do place blame, but from my point of view the buck stops at Dean Baquet, it is on his watch that this happened, we accept that everyone is allowed their opinion, but in a paper like the New York Times, it should not be this unbalanced ever, not for a global paper like the New York Times

UN Khashoggi Report June 2019

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March 25, 2019 · 11:54

A political Chucky

I love cricket, I played it and loved it. That is as long as I was not bowling. There is no point in handing 10 overs to the opposition when Chucky (me) is bowling and I am happy that I am not considered outside of the field or batting. Some things should not happen, so, what do you do when your own party (the conservatives) considers chucking as a valid tactic in a game where it has been an illegal action?

That is what the Guardian (at https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/mar/24/tory-islamophobia-row-15-suspended-councillors-quietly-reinstated) informs us on in ‘Tory Islamophobia row: 15 suspended councillors quietly reinstated‘, and the fact that it is openly and ‘quietly’ done implies that my own party does not seem to grasp the educational need of the matter. We have all made ‘questionable’ considerations. I have on occasion noticed a lady who had an amazing * (assterix). I did not state that out loud, but optionally whispered it as softly ass possible (pun intended). It gets us to the old situation ‘If you are alone in a forest and no woman can hear you, are you still wrong?‘

So, when we see: “More than a dozen Conservative councillors who were suspended over posting Islamophobic or racist content online – with some describing Saudis as “sand peasants” and sharing material comparing Asian people to dogs“, when we see this, this is not whispering. This is loudly proclaiming, shouting even as it happened online. This is stupidity of a whole new level and there needs to be an investigation. It is not merely for the norm of the PC of it all. This has business impact. We can consider that the Middle East will be funding hundreds of billions in business decisions and the UK would want as much of it as possible. And in that is Mohammed Amin wrong? When we see the chairman of the Conservative Muslim Forum for the publication of set of formal disciplinary processes that far off? When discrimination is condoned to the degree that it is, should we not expect a much larger impact? When we see Islamophobia and anti-Semitic issues, we need to remember that there is a larger impact. If parties are rejected from consideration, it shows that political players are dismissing optional best solutions from the political arena because they are wearing filtering glasses, implying that the cost of doing business is optionally increased due to unacceptable practices and as the article implies that it has transpired 15 times, we see a systemic failure of a political engine that besides doing things wrong is optionally transgressing into the field of criminal acts. So even as James Cleverly claims that that swift investigations was made, the stage of quietly adding them back to the party gives light of more than Islamophobia, it gives light to the acceptance of racism within the party and that is not a good thing.

There is no doubt that there is a lot of emotion regarding the Middle East, yet anti-Semitism and Islamophobia will never solve it, it merely polarises issues beyond repair. I wonder what happens when Huawei and Saudi Arabia complete their initial setting and Saudi Arabia becomes a 5G powerbroker? Some analysts made the claim that there will be 30 million subscriptions in the Middle East by 2024. I believe that to be wrong, Huawei is not the only player and Ericsson is showing to be almost as capable as Huawei (driving competition and innovation), giving Saudi Arabia an option to drive partnerships to nations including the UAE, Oman and Egypt. OK, we admit that Egypt is Africa, yet the light that Saudi Arabia could grow subscriptions towards 60 million upwards when they get to include Egypt, and set the stage for Telecom growth a lot wider than that. A speculative step is seen in the Arab News on March 4th. When I looked at the complete language regarding Saudi Arabia’s Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Adel Al-Jubeir, I noticed that the statements were precise (read: too precise). So when I saw: “ruled out restoring diplomatic relations with Syria or reinstating Damascus to the Arab League without progress on a political process to end the eight-year-old war“, as well as: “Riyadh will also not take part in any reconstruction efforts until stability is restored in Syria“. Yet in this, 5G and creating options for communication is not reconstruction, or political progress. Yet it facilitates for both when the innovative players are allowed for a push towards global 5G considerations and it is my believe that Adel Al-Jubeir could use it to set an increasingly larger stage for the KSA.  I admit that my speculation is based on text (and interpretation) that is super thin, you could not skate on it, but you might lie down on it and cautiously create forward momentum. In light of the optional growth all over the Middle East and Africa, Saudi Arabia (read: Huawei business partners) are all gaining an advantage that allows for multiple conversations on a much larger board. The direct impact being that the setback for American corporations will increase larger and faster.

The 5G push would also allow options towards Jordan and now we see that Saudi Arabia (via Huawei and Ericsson) has created a much larger bond for future options for all these players. Now we see an optional line through Saudi Arabia to Oman, Egypt, Jordan, the UAE and optionally Yemen to follow. A big chunk of the Arab league, basically the big 5 all connected in 5G together making one voice more and more powerful. And with every victory there, the US gets pushed into becoming less and less relevant in 5G in that same wave. In that stage, when we see these steps unfold, do you really think that keeping racist and Islamophobic politicians is serving anyone’s purpose other than fear mongering and extremism?

So when we see the Guardian quote: “When CCHQ has been made aware of the small number of such cases we have acted swiftly, suspending members and launching immediate investigations, in sharp contrast to other parties” my issue here is that it is the exact party line that James Cleverly gave us. It sounds like a Microsoft sound byte, a claim made when they cannot solve a problem and they need it to be put into a drawer for well over a full upgrade. The fact that the Guardian treats us to: ‘quietly reinstated‘ gives rise to a systemic failure, one that can cost the UK many opportunities down the line and should we allow for that?

The Middle East is currently actively investing funds in excess of £1.4 trillion (not billion) on numerous projects in constructions, ICT, telecommunications and infrastructure, do you think that the UK has a chance of scoring any jobs when these contractors ask for a clarification on the application of ‘sand peasants‘? I also wonder what we will find when we read the transcripts and investigation papers regarding the 15 members that had been ‘quietly reinstated‘. How loud are we allowed to be when we look into this? The UK has enough worries with new Brexit fear mongering and a non-accountable ECB as Europe is about to get several trillions deeper in debt (because they found a miracle formula that explains it all. source: Bloomberg), digging our own graves by not acting against racism and discriminating phobias seems to be a problem we can avoid from the start.

When one of these Middle Easters investors asks feedback from Miqdaad Versi of the Muslim Council of Britain, what would these people hear? Quietly allowing chuckies to be set up as bowlers whilst we know that they will (through inadequacy, insensitivity and lack of professionalism) optionally knowingly instigate an illegal play is not common sense at all.

Any cricket captain should know better than to allow any chucky to bowl, but that is exactly what is seemingly happening right now.

 

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January 23, 2019 · 14:56

Why the objection?

We all have it, we all object at times. I am not stating that an objection is irrelevant, wrong or short sighted, because as we might not know all the fact, no conclusion can be due to a lack of data. Yet, the objection of Jordan seems wrong to me, especially when we consider the quote ‘Jordan’s state-run media said the new Israeli airport near its border violates the kingdom’s sovereignty‘. The article (at https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/01/israeli-airport-open-jordanian-border-190121102753669.html) gives us the goods on the newly opened airport, soon also to be an international airport is from my point of view a really good idea in more than one way. You see, Ramon Airport gives people a direct option to Eilat, a wonderful place to behold (I was there in 1982). It has the views, the water, some entertainment, a nice aquarium and a few other parts that make it to be a very nice holiday destination.

In addition, it opens up tourism dollars to Aqaba (Jordan), as well as dollars to Taba (Egypt). Las but not least, the new city of Neom, which end just to the south of there will be easily reachable. It will further growth to Neom and Eilat, as well as commerce in that region going all the way to Sharm-El-Sheikh. There is close to no valid reason to oppose it. There might be unknown reasons to me, I just cannot tell at present.

Ben Gurion airport needed an alternative for the longest of times, and now there is one. In light of the activities by Hamas, Ramon airport is a good thing to have. To be quite honest, whilst I am typing this, i am thinking back to the lovely days I had there as well as the great shoarma’s I had at a gas station near the aquarium. It has been 36.5 years and I still remember those shoarma’s.

There is another matter that will rear its head soon enough. As the completion of construction continues, the need for a new digital marker in visibility is of equal importance to Eilat, Neom, Aqaba, Taba and Sharm-El-Sheikh. You see, they will only get visibility if they raise awareness and that is seemingly not happening.

To get the two at the top when we seek “Eilat Tourism” is nice, but nowhere near good enough, your business is only as good as the awareness you create and or the most, and there is not a lot of awareness. the fact that there is an Irish place there (at http://www.paddys.co.il/), and they are not above the fold and not bidding on the keywords is quite honestly a mistake, in addition, the website looks good on desktop, but well over 50% is searched via mobile and at that point there website requires an overhaul on a few levels. The switching to the English site was amazingly slow and that is just for starters. As tourism grows it will be about who knows you and how easy people can find you, awareness is everything. It is not too late, it is merely January so they have time to repair what is there, but it needs to be done and this is the one that was visible. There are many that are not even visible and for the life of me, I cannot figure out why.

There is a lot more, but that is not important right now.

The message for Aqaba is not much better, we can argue that Aqaba was never intended as a touristic place, which makes perfect sense, but why not profit on the back of all this? This proclaimed jewel of the red sea is there to be an asset for Jordan, and as such people need to know that this is an important place to consider, especially as they are a short bus ride from Eilat. I found their Tourism site more appealing, yet also slower. The webmaster was trying to be clever about it and basically shot himself in the foot in the process. If it is slow on the desktop, it will be a nightmare on the mobile (and it was) and as such they lose a lot more visibility. As stated before well over 50% is sought via mobile and these places are mobile unfriendly. I get that they might not have been ready in 2015, yet in 2018 it is an essential path to consider, especially in tourism, the digital footprint is close to everything there.

Both Aqaba and Eilat know that the digital life is important, yet why they failed to the degree that they have remains a mystery for now. In all this, it is my view that Taba scores to low to have an actual digital footprint, I reckon they could have done better and have a better tourism return, yet with Taba being in the Sinai, there might be additional problems for them. Almost the same could be said for Sharm-El-Sheikh, but they started to grow visibility in the early 80’s, it also had other hardships to deal with, yet as they are opening themselves for business, having a proper digital footprint is essential and they do not have one. So even as ABC news gives us: ‘Egypt welcomes back tourists after seven years of political instability despite security concerns‘, it seems to me that they are nowhere near ready at present and there is no direct consideration whether this is due to ‘security concerns’ or if there is another cycle of changes required. No matter what they are waiting for, the digital footprint will be essential to gain growing levels of awareness in that region. I know from others and from the past that diving and water activities used to be decently high, so regaining that footprint should be an essential first step. In addition, even as we agree with the ABC headline ‘Any help on tourism front is a positive for Egyptians‘ without a growing awareness element, it will not matter too much down the road. They can hope for a large infusion as Neom grows, but that would be disastrous too as we see a much more eager growth in both Aqaba and Eilat, if people need to make a choice, the size of Sharm-El-Sheikh dwarves to the visibility in offers that the other two have at present. Even as we saw Reuters treat us in mid-2018 to: “an 80 per cent increase in revenues from the previous year“, the direct reality is that 80% more of little is still not a lot. It is more visible when we consider: “However, for many working in the industry, including in South Sinai, the official increases are not quite paying off yet, as direct flights from places like Russia to Sharm El-Sheikh are yet to resume“, I see the lack of a digital footprint as a direct result of the lack of growth for the moment (I am not ignoring the security issue).

What is lacking in one will benefit the other and that is where larger options for growth in both Aqaba and Eilat become apparent and both could profit. Also, as the entire region is linked more and more to Neom, we see additional options for growth for all concerned, yet none of it matters when awareness is kept to a minimum. No matter how we slice it, the tourism will be on the rise in Eilat soon enough, it will rise enough for Jordan to find cooperation there and grow tourism to both Aqaba and Wadi Rum, both are within 35 Km and as such taking an additional day to see both places will be well worth the effort for all tourists visiting the Gulf of Aqaba. When that starts happening, Haql, who will be on the northern border of Neom City, which is only 30 Km from there would benefit greatly in that regard. Consider any tourist and the option for them to go home stating that they went sightseeing in Israel, Jordan and Saudi Arabia within a week, remaining close to the beaches and enjoying the sunshine almost every moment in this, who would not be envious hearing those words?

From my point of view, growing the business will take time and it all starts by having a clear digital footprint, without it these places will remain lost and unfound, it is a solution that could be done by most web designers and proper SEO consultants overnight. I merely wonder why no one looked at this before; because there is no way that I was the only one noticing this.

I wonder which of the three will catch on the quickest in 2019. I am not dismissing Sharm-El-Sheikh, I merely remain aware that they have a lot more elements to overcome at present.

 

 

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August 31, 2018 · 12:48

Lollies to the right

 

Yes, today is Friday and as every Catholic is seeking out the best place to find their serving of Friday fish, others seek their food from optionally different vendors. Yet for many Muslims, its Dutch Sweets day, and let’s be honest the Dutch have a great sweets department, from the liquorice (the best in the world), Haagse Hopjes, gingerbread, ginger snaps, chocolate letters, butter cake, Apple Pie and custard pies, the Dutch know how to present some of the very best Vitamin C (Candy) items on the planet. Yet for many today, the menu wants a slice of Geert Wilders. It seems that finally the setting is that Geert Wilders has opted to cancel the Mohammed Cartoon competition. The Guardian (at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/30/geert-wilders-far-right-dutch-mp-cancels-muhammed-cartoon-competition) is telling us that his response was “To avoid the risk of victims of Islamic violence, I have decided not to let the cartoon contest go ahead“, which is actually a bit weird. You see, he pretty much had to flee Texas, USA in 2015 over a similar event. Did he think that something unacceptable to Muslims in the USA would suddenly be tolerated in the Netherlands whilst hiding behind ‘freedom of expression’? For me it is actually a little sad, as I had a nice setting to take away Dutch business for myself (for mere professional, and greed driven reasons), in addition it inspired me to write a film script for Netflix called ‘How to assassinate a politician‘, aka ‘The Essay‘, and that is off the table now too (or perhaps not).

And in light of what was presented, we are also seeing two settings of falsehood. The first by him with ““It’s not just about me,” Wilders said in the statement. Opponents of the event “see not only me, but the entire Netherlands as a target”“, that is not a truth, it is correct (but for other reasons), it is a non-Truth because Geert Wilders instigated the outrage in a way that he would create the outrage. He got to play the ‘Muslims hate us card’ whilst he is very aware that his actions and his actions alone instigated it. The second player was not lying, but still acted (as far as I can tell) in falsehood. You see, when we see “Rutte added that people in the Netherlands have far-reaching freedom of speech rights and the government did not intend to seek the contest’s cancellation” we see a falsehood and a dangerous setting. Dutch law does not allow for certain settings.

When we look (at https://www.wodc.nl/binaries/ob248-volledige-tekst_tcm28-68659.pdf) at the Dutch Paper ‘Profanity, discriminating expressions because of religion and hate speech‘ we are confronted with the setting of Dutch Criminal Law Article 137. Here we see: “He who publicly, verbally or in writing or image, deliberately exhausts a group of people because of their race, their religion or belief, their heterosexual or homosexual orientation or their physical, psychological or mental disability, is punished with imprisonment of a maximum of one year or a fine of the third category“, it applies, because Islam is outspoken on the fact that there will be no image of the prophet Muhammad, that is one setting that the Dutch Prime minister cannot avoid and in that, the setting we see that not only was the competition planned to be held in the Dutch parliament building, the fact that we are confronted with the quote “Rutte added that people in the Netherlands have far-reaching freedom of speech rights and the government did not intend to seek the contest’s cancellation“, a clear setting where we see more than a mere collision of ‘freedom of speech’ and the law. So even as we see on page 26: “the discrimination provisions of relatively recent make-up, and were only introduced in the Netherlands in 1971“, considering that it was introduced after he was too old to be breastfed by his mommy and long enough to accept that the law was in place long before he got elected into politics, it is from that point of view that we can establish his intent in the act of insulting Islam.

In addition to this, the entire matter was handled incorrectly by Dutch Parliament, even the setting that the cancellation was not sought. There might have been some defence possible if the venue was not in a Dutch Government building, but that was not the case, tying the hands of Dutch politicians through their inactions.

So the predictions that I made 8 days ago in the article ‘Liberalism overboard‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2018/08/23/liberalism-overboard/) and the fact that we now also see that Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan has been requested to cut ties with the Dutch, so in this we are still seeing escalations. In this Dutch Ambassador to Pakistan Ardi Stoios-braken is about to get an interesting anniversary day, as she assumed the office on September 7th last year, in this there is now the smallest chance that she will not even be able to complete the one year milestone. The additional part where we see that Pakistan is importing close to $400 million from the Netherlands each year is optionally be getting hit as well. 54% if that pie is consumer goods and even if overall the amount is not that big a deal, there is still the chance that it will also impact Dutch exports to Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Oman, UAE, Indonesia and Qatar, to what extent is impossible to say, but the wound reopened by Pakistan is much larger than most people realise, especially ass the Dutch Prime minister had the option to diffuse the situation in May 2018 and decided not to do that, that in itself is the larger evil to deal with. The other element in all this is Tehreek-e-Labbaik, a hard-line party that is close to one year old. The issue is that they have the options to sit in conversations with the imams, who would be reaching out to the nations mentioned earlier and even more so the nations I did not mention (Jordan, Iran and Yemen for example). In all this the crises is still continuing and anyone thinking that this will blow over, think again. For Pakistan the issue is actually twofold and Al Jazeera gives these two parts with “Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP), Pakistan’s newest hard-line religious party, which calls for blasphemers to be put to death and celebrates those who have murdered the alleged perpetrators“, which should be regarded as a risk and danger towards violence. the second part is seen with: “A year ago, this kind of a political rally, in the heart of the political base of Pakistan’s ruling party, would have been unthinkable” this second part gives us not merely that there is a hard-line growth within Pakistan, it also implies and gives consideration that those voices will be listened to in Saudi Arabia and therefor also in Indonesia, which in turn might escalate issues in Egypt as well, although I have zero information that there is an interaction of thoughts between these groups at present, the likelihood of it happening should be set to much higher than not.

All issues that could have been prevented by not allowing such an anti-Islam provocation on Dutch government grounds and the additional timespan that the Dutch government would have had to soothe the emotions of Muslims in all this is now pretty much null and void.

In conclusion, it is the Media that also has a negated responsibility. When I am confronted with ““I have decided to cancel the competition to avoid the risk of making people victims of Islamist violence,” Wilders said in a statement. “I don’t want Muslims to use the cartoon competition as an excuse for Islamist violence.”” (Deutsche Welle), as well as “Wilders said adding that the competition is not to “provoke or insult”” (Straits times) are all settings of falsehood. this is not merely my opinion, the evidence can be seen with “Two men who opened fire Sunday outside of an event in Garland, Texas attended by Geert Wilders, a Dutch lawmaker and outspoken critic of radical Islam, have been killed by police“, which was an event in Garland Texas on May 4th 2015. Geert Wilders at that time responded on Twitter with: “Shots fired at Garland Mohammed cartoon free speech event. I just left the building after speeching. #garlandshooting — Geert Wilders (@geertwilderspvv) May 4, 2015“. So not only was there an event three years ago, there was also every clear indication that it would happen again and with the Dutch Criminal Law in place, as well as the additional Dutch inactions, we can clearly see that there is a larger issue in play and the inactions of its current government must optionally be taken as a setting that is more about anti-Islam than with Freedom of Speech or Freedom of Expression from my point of view, but that last part is my personal take on the issue.

So when we do see escalations, hopefully all non-violent ones. We need to consider on the increasing collisions that we see in Freedom of Speech versus Freedom of Religion. It is my view that we are nearing a critical point where Accountability can no longer be avoided and if we agree that some will act on a freedom, we must also hold these people accountable for these actions (and perhaps they will be perfectly valid ones). I wonder what happens when that happens, if people start to think before they speak, we might see levels of de-escalation or better stated an increasing level of common sense whilst awake, which is never a bad thing.

So have a good Friday and do not forget that Monday morning is (at this very moment) a mere 59 hours away.

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July 26, 2018 · 13:01

It’s a bulletpoint

We all have these days. We have moments where we are confronted with superiors (or bosses) who seem to be able to do anything based on a one page memo that is drenched in bullet-points. It was an almost Neanderthal moment in management when those (getting tertiary education) were all brought up with the belief system that a memo is one page (which I can partially agree with), yet that memo should merely consist bullet-points that bring the goods.

I always thought of that part as an absolute load of bollocks. I can agree that sometimes luck works in our favour and that is exactly what happens, they are however rare. You see, the bullet-point might be correct to some extent, but you can only see part of the view with bullet-points. An actual tactical or strategic business setting is properly set in a SWOT analyses. If it is a serious action, that is what you need, because the boss requires the opportunity, yet he must also know the threat and the weakness. Some decisions are merely based on the balance of merits; do the strengths and opportunity outweigh the weakness and threat? That is the game we face in most business ventures and as they move forward. The Netflix balance, the ‘Nine+Fairfax=NEC’ setting, the setting that we saw in Natixis, Ubisoft and Verizon. The last one is apparently not focussing on big Mergers, that is, until we get the allegedly implied news in upcoming October, when in the black out period of Verizon Hans Vestberg will make an interesting announcement. This is not merely about the ‘fast-growing global market‘, this will be about the upper hand and those with the data will have the upper hand, plain and simple.

So when we go back to 2018, where the state of the union treated us to ‘President Trump claiming the military defeat of ISIS‘, yes, also I have a bridge to sell you, nice view of the Tower of London, going cheap! In that same setting we see the New Yorker giving us: “Trump was holding a press conference, a few blocks away, with the Presidents of the three Baltic states. He was visibly angry when asked about Syria. “I want to get out,” he said, his voice rising. “I want to bring our troops back home. I want to start rebuilding our nation. We will have, as of three months ago, spent seven trillion dollars in the Middle East over the last seventeen years. We get nothing—nothing out of it, nothing.” He called it “a horrible thing.”“, here I have to say that he was not entirely incorrect. There is no return on investment. In a war against terrorists, unless you are willing to become, or unleash the monsters, any fight against monsters is a cost, and will remain a cost; there will be no return on investment.

Unless you are willing to properly strike back, this fight will go on and on. The events in the New Yorker were in April 2018, three months after the so proclaimed not really existing victory. The New Yorker brought the news one day after Haaretz gave us: ‘Trump’s White House Says Military Mission to Eradicate ISIS in Syria ‘Coming to Rapid End’‘, a rapid end and not in a good way. Haaretz also emphasises on “Trump said Tuesday that he expects to decide “very quickly” whether to remove U.S. troops from war-torn Syria, saying their primary mission was to defeat the Islamic State group and “we’ve almost completed that task.” Trump’s national security team is advising against a hasty withdrawal even as he makes his preference clear: “I want to get out.”“. that was the setting in April, now a mere 84 days later we are treated (at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jul/25/dozens-dead-suicide-attack-syria-sweida-isis) to ‘Surprise Isis attacks leave more than 200 dead in south-west Syria‘, several credit cards will not charge interest the first 90 days, not ISIS, the interest was served quick, to the point and basically deadly precise. The by-line giving us ‘Suicide bombers strike targets in Sweida city and launch simultaneous raids on nearby villages‘. That is the setting less than 24 hours ago and the directness of the attacks imply that we will see more over the next 4 days. This is not a quick hit and run, this is a message to President Trump that his Trumpet is false and full of lies.

As we are confronted with “The militants are also believed to have kidnapped dozens of people and taken them back to their hideouts. Local sources said the attacks began almost simultaneously in the early hours of Wednesday, between 3.50am and 4.30am“, we see a setting of coordination, creativity and direct action. Not merely proving that the State of the Union setting was wrong, it is a setting that implies that a lot more resources are required. In addition, it also proves that we need to shift gears and reactivate the monsters that can take care of business. This is not the theater of Chicago windy city makers; this is the battleground of people like Academi and the Wagner group. Yes, there is a case where it might be better that the actual governmental military organisations do the work, but it seems that America did not have the stomach for it, the Europeans and NATO are locked in everlasting debates and Israel is eager to stop it all, but that means a direct was with Syria, which it prefers not to be in. So there are not too many options at present. Even as the media at large is setting the stage on a Putin-Trump option, we see in equal measure on how Assad won and Trump is fine with that. We get loads of writing, but none of it reflects a solution and with all the papers all printing the same photo, all claiming a death count that is somewhere between 200-220 we are told that the count is high, yet they do not give us that this happened 35 Km from Jordan, 90 Km from Damascus and 90 Km from Israel. I think that the message from ISIS is clear. There is an issue; ISIS is still a player in the region and yes, from all we can tell ISIS with this one act melvined President Trump pretty much on the spot.

Yet everyone’s question will be how to counter this and deal with ISIS. From my point of view we see a setting that cannot be resolved the way it has been, it requires a different scope of activities and a very different level of investigation and intelligence analyses. That evidence is seen in the way the surprise attack went through and pretty much every part of it was a success (form the ISIS point of view), giving is to wonder how incomplete the current level of intelligence data is to begin with. We were aware that there is too much intelligence ego in Syria (or Iraq for that matter). Even now, in the last few months as sources go out and admit (or proclaim) intelligence failures in Israel, the US, NATO et al. Even as the Syrian nuclear reactor is the most visible one, the quality of the workers gathering the data, often in am allegedly precarious double agent setting tend to be not the greatest sources of intelligence. A less reliable source is seen in open source intelligence where we can get a taste of some things happening, but for the most the reliability is too low to be of operational use, even after the facts deeper digging tends to show issues that after the fact seemingly it could only have contributed towards failure, not towards success.

Iran is the second setting where some go from the balance of probability in a algorithm setting that dictates the tactical push forward, yet the people involved tend to forget the oldest IT setting in any data analytical collective where the protocols of GIGO are in effect, a given law that dates back to 1982 when I was in the Middle East for my own adventure. I always see (or better stated I have seen too often) that the officer’s response of GIGO would be: ‘some of it can be used‘, yet the setting Garbage In Garbage Out is merely the setting that as Garbage was accepted, all data involved becomes tainted, or is tainted. Those who bring you ‘some of it can be used‘, tend to rely on the creation of truths by aggregating false flags. So the setting where: ‘he never relies on computers’, we get ‘must create notes on their intelligence’. The one setting where he does not use computers because the person was dyslexic was overlooked. Aggregated data can be useful against the singular observation in a timeline, it gives the unit against the volume, but if one false flag was false, the others lose value and the column setting is no longer reliable. GIGO is devastatingly simple and pretty much always a given truth (or is that a confirmed non-false?), yes, I am at times that funny.

this now takes us to a setting almost three weeks ago in the Washington Post (at https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/made-by-history/wp/2018/07/09/russia-and-the-u-s-have-common-interests-in-syria-but-it-may-not-matter), where we see: “Last week, national security adviser John Bolton said that the meeting could offer a “larger negotiation on helping to get Iranian forces out of Syria” and that an agreement could be “a significant step forward” for U.S. interests in the Middle East“, it is a statement that I cannot agree with. You see, even as Iran in Syria is an issue for Russia, it is not the same where Iran is an American problem, pure and simple. Russia has a setting where it wants to waste as much of the resources that NATO and America have, plain and simple. There is plenty of data proving that. I have nothing against John Bolton, I do not know the man, but I know he has been out of ‘circulation’ for almost 12 years. He is however not that devious. He sails a straight course (a commendable setting), in this he was always against the Iranian deal, he has been advocating regime change for both Iran and North Korea. It does not matter whether he is neoconservative, pro-American, or a nationalist. The settings that are clearly out and visible is that he has placed his country before his personal interests again and again and that is always a good thing (a lesson Democrats should learn at some point), yet when we look at Politico (at https://www.politico.com/story/2018/07/25/bolton-cabinet-meetings-mattis-pompeo-trump-740429), he is also doing something dangerous. It is seen in part with: ‘Cabinet chiefs feel shut out of Bolton’s ‘efficient’ policy process‘, followed by “Defense Secretary James Mattis has gone so far as to draft a letter requesting the national security adviser hold more gatherings of agency and department chiefs“, this is followed by ““He doesn’t want to ‘meeting’ an issue to death,” said one White House official. “He wants to make the bureaucratic process more efficient so that decisions can be made at the principals level.” But across the U.S. national security establishment, there’s a growing sense of a breakdown in the policy process since Bolton took over the National Security Council on April 9“. From where I am sitting, it creates a different friction. The different stations always had their own way of registering intelligence and it is in the misinterpretation of each of the used Thesaurus, that is where the data gap is starting to form, an international data point is not seen the same by the NSA, DIA and CIA. This gets me to my party favourite, what is another word for ‘Thesaurus‘? It is funny when you think of it, because as there is no synchronicity between Defense Secretary James Mattis, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Director of the CIA Gina Cheri Haspel and National Security Advisor John Bolton, they only think there is synchronised thinking (they nearly always do). So now we have the hats of the big cheeses in a similar direction, but not in the same direction, it gives us the issue that there are losses, losses in intelligence, losses in data and losses in translations, and lets not forget an overall loss of quality. That tends to be a much larger problem, and that problem will hit the desk of Director of the FBI Christopher Wray a little sooner than he bargained for. It also sets a very dangerous precedent. You see, it is mishaps like this that caused the deaths of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, Sean Smith, Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods. I see it as a setting where people that need to act are getting more than one version because of the lacking intelligence cohesion, which was never great to begin with is now in a setting of decay. I get where John Bolton is at, but the red tape has one setting which is intelligence quality, that is now too in a stage where the Dodo went. You see, the politico quote ‘cutting unnecessary bureaucratic red tape, pushing the nitty-gritty discussions to lower levels‘ shows the foundation of a good thing, but pushing certain issues to a lower level also means that the accountability and responsibility is brought down, whilst at the same stage, the essential lack of security clearance at that level also stops optional security leaks and as such some information will not be available at lower levels. So if ISIS decides to become surprisingly creative again and we see in a future news setting that they decided to visit Al-Umawyeen St, Amman, Jordan, We will see an entirely new escalation, one that President Trump cannot walk away from, in equal measure, if the changes by John Bolton enabled that scenario, we will see another setting where a National Security Advisor will immediately go into retirement and focus on his family life (the present assigned young-ling is 69 after all, so that excuse will be readily accepted).

So the shorting of the memo’s relying on bullet points, whilst setting the strategic placement of people to be placed at the point of a bullet is not so far-fetched, is it? Even as we will soon see that this gets paraded as a once off event, a rare option where ISIS got lucky. Remember that this was not merely an explosion. It was that, in addition the abduction of people and activities in other places as well that it all went down at the SAME TIME. It was not merely coordination; it required funds, facilitation of events and goods that were available at the right time. Should you consider my folly (never a bad thing to do), consider the one setting that we did not get to see in the news. The distance from the Zaatari Refugee camp to Al-Umawyeen St, Amman, Jordan is a mere 60,224 metres; I have actually walked that distance, so when we consider the dangers in place and we accept that there are ISIS sympathisers in Zaatari (we do not know how many), the one issue that the US cannot allow for is any more miscommunication between intelligence operations. On the plus side, if it does happen, Hollywood can do another movie, John Krasinsky was awesome in the Benghazi story, and he could prepare his Jordanian language skills if he reprises his role at: The Markaz, Arts Center for the Greater Middle East 1626 N. Wilcox Ave, Suite 702 Los Angeles, CA 90028.

You see there is something in this setting for everyone, whilst me successfully avoiding bullet points until the very end, how crazy was that?

#BulletPointsAreAlwaysInaccurate

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May 4, 2018 · 12:32

Tubing it along

There is news, news that has been about a few weeks and I have kept an iLook on it. In one part it is as techofreak as it gets, so I should be on board the moment it launches, it is so versatile that it has no other option than to change lives on a global scale, yet there is the issue that it is so new that it is a little scary. That is the reality of all new technology; consider the first 10,000 Facebook accounts, the first 100,000 internet users. It all starts in a small geeky way and this will be no difference. It had more presence in the Saudi Arabia Vision 2030, so that is why I took another look. You see, the entire matter is not merely where it is, but it is how the technology is adapted, that is the first part in all this. To set this in the proper light, we need to take a step back. In the UK they have the HS2. So when we see the BBC (at http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-16473296), we see “The initial plan is for a new railway line between London and the West Midlands carrying 400m-long (1,300ft) trains with as many as 1,100 seats per train. They would operate at speeds of up to 250mph – faster than any current operating speed in Europe – and would run as often as 14 times per hour in each direction“, so when we consider London – Birmingham we see ‘1 h 25 min’, as their fast option at present, which at 117 miles, makes the HS2 a 45 minute saving, so how many billions is that going to cost? Now consider that each one technical glitch will cut the 45 minutes. Now, I am all for progress, now when we go by two numbers we see “a projected cost of £56 billion, up from the initial cost of £32.7 billion in 2010“, we see that 8 years ago, they had it wrong by close to 100%, so we see a waste of £56 billion plain and simple. The UK could fix its schools for that amount of money and overall, there is absolutely no reason to go that distance, it is just too short. Now we get to the next stage of travel.

Welcome to Hyperloop!

Now as we see this in the Saudi Arabian setting it changes, you see when we look (at https://www.tahawultech.com/news/virgin-hyperloop-one-unveils-vision-2030-pod/) we see ‘Traveling from Riyadh to Jeddah would take 76 minutes (currently over 10 hours) utilising the land bridge for both passenger and freight movement, positioning KSA as the gateway to 3 continents‘ as well as ‘Traveling from Riyadh to Abu Dhabi would take 48 minutes (currently over 8.5 hours)‘, so here we see a clear forward momentum. Not merely 45 minutes gain, but gains that take away 90% of the travel time, now we are talking improvements! I never quite understood the HS movement, not in the UK (where there is some benefit) and even less in the Netherlands where the improvements are as shallow as it gets, all this ‘good for the economy‘ whilst I think it greased the careers of certain people, and in the end nothing for the citizens, and the less stated on the Dutch government joke called Fyra at a mere €11 billion loss, it is not a lot if you say the amount fast!

So even as we are burning ourselves all over Europe on high speed trains Hyperloop technology is different, you go by tube (as literally as it gets) and within that tube you have the option to truly accelerate, the nice setting that this will reflect on cargo and passengers alike, so it is also versatile. So when we read “The hyperloop-enabled transportation sector in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will stimulate economic growth and diversification of Saudi industries, according to Virgin Hyperloop One. It will also nurture the manufacturing and innovation sectors, and spur job growth in support of the country’s Vision 2030 plan increasing the GDP 1-2 percent across the Kingdom“, we are not seeing the whole picture. You see it is almost a lot bigger than that. The currently planned £380 billion mega city Neom would be an optional first as well, so Riyadh would be linked to Neom, which now is set to connect Egypt and Jordan, it also opens the doors almost directly to Sharm-El-Sheik as well as the Israeli city of Eilat, all golden opportunities which allows Saudi Arabia to grow the economy in Riyadh on a much larger foundation than ever before. In all this Cargo and passengers are set to near exponential growth, especially in the short term. So we have near direct connections between Bahrain, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Oman, Qatar and Saudi Arabia in the centre of all this. It will not take long for these nations to grow all kinds of alliances and commerce will flourish like nothing we have seen before and Virgin, with its Hyperloop One is in the centre of this growth. Even as Europe is trying to get something similar rolling, we see that France is alas out of cash for such an endeavour (at present) ‘Hyperloop gives cash-strapped French cities hope‘ (at https://www.thenational.ae/business/economy/hyperloop-gives-cash-strapped-french-cities-hope-1.726967), it is a stretch, but it makes a lot of sense for France to get involved in all this, in their setting Hyperloop makes sense, especially regarding cargo (cheese and wine settings anyone). So when I see “TransPod’s technology is based on magnetic propulsion and electrified tracks, moving pods through a vacuum tunnel designed to reduce friction. As with most Hyperloop projects, the bulk of the estimated costs are for deploying infrastructure. Co-founder Sebastien Gendron estimates his company needs €20 million (Dh88.1m) in financing to complete the Limoges project at the current stage, and says he’ll raise half of that from private investors“, in all this, I am surprised that no one there called Ubisoft (more specifically Christian Guillemot, Claude Guillemot, Gérard Guillemot, Michel Guillemot or Yves Guillemot), they have the cash and more important, to be the founders of something this futuristic that will be moving through France with the Ubisoft symbol would be worth its weight of a train in gold I’d imagine.

So back to Saudi Arabia, the one part I do disagree with is ‘in support of the country’s Vision 2030 plan increasing the GDP 1-2 percent across the Kingdom‘, you see, once the line is in place, it will spur the economy in more ways, beyond tourism and beyond cargo, for close to double that prediction. A system that far ahead will also spur infrastructures growth as the rest of the world will be lagging behind, especially where engineering is concerned. They all claim they have ‘the technology‘ yet at present there is a lot more reliability that under these settings it will only be running in the KSA in a more serious setting in the foreseeable future and that is where the advantage grows, in addition, when the travel times are shifted to those degrees, emergency surgeries, medical disasters when Hyperloop technologies transfers and adjusts in more than one perk, we will see both the King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centres in Riyadh and Jeddah grow abilities to attain options because they are now less than 2 hours apart. That transfers to all manner of services, when they are no longer separated by time to that degree, it will drive a lot more than the ones we see at present. and let’s not forget, this is merely the first degree of Hyperloop, as the engineers figure out a lot more than is currently possible, the growth will blossom further, and as we see forward momentum on this scale, we understand that there are risks, you when the gain is not 45 minutes, but 90% travel time is reduced the picture shifts a lot further on a larger scale. Even as we were introduced to ‘tube’ transport in Logan’s Run in 1976, we never imagined that it would be an actual solution, not until now do we see that there are places where it is more than a solution, it is the drive to move forward on nearly every field.

So even as I accept that we are not there yet and there are all kinds of issues down the line, movement is now a given, and even a some used the London underground map and added some Hyperloop fun to it, the setting is not that impossible on some part of those tracks. It is a part where all technology can move forward, we merely have to adapt parts of it. Consider that change as new venues of technology open will up, and there is serious cash to be made for all the players in this field, you merely have to find the niche where your solution fits.

That is where Vision 2030 is now becoming a driving force, not merely because there is $500 billion to be found, but because those who do get their working solution in place, for those there is a lot more to be made over time, Saudi Arabia is merely the pilot, it is the global setting where profit becomes a very serious opportunity, it will drive the now nearly born new Nouveau Riche generation to a very new level with amounts the previous generation never ever dreamed of.

When you sit down and consider the map, we do not merely see Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, we see that Saudi Arabia has the opportunity become the axial for those three continents, an option we never would considered as realistic when Vision 2030 launched 10 years ago, now that picture is shifting and with the growing technologies as Saudi Arabia is embracing these new opportunities we see a shifting picture, even as oil might be funding this, the reliance on it is fading a lot faster than we thought possible, not merely through Hyperloop, but through the changes all the technologies enable one another with and that also gives new directions, because it is no longer about volatility  (as Saudi Arabia was accused of by others in a previous blog), it is about stability and the enabled stability that these solutions bring.

For in the end making money will always win over waging war, that has been proven for the longest of times.

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