There was once a bank, Icesave, which was formally established in Iceland but did most of its business through websites in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. It promised savers to pay higher interests than other banks.

Then came the crash and bank broke down. The savers money was gone. The governments of Britain and the Netherlands were fast to promise their national Iceland saver a full return of their money. They expected the government of Iceland to pay that money back to them even before they bother to ask it. The UK used anti-terrorism rules to size the bank's assets.

The government of Iceland negotiated a deal with the other governments, essentially promising that Iceland's taxpayers would pay whatever they asked for, and pressed the parliament to agree to it. It did but the president of Iceland vetoed the law. It was put to a referendum and the people of Iceland rejected it.

A second round of negotiation happened but today the results were again voted down by the people:

Many Icelanders feel they should not have to pay for the mistakes of their banking elite, who made deals around the world during a decade of boom before the credit crunch struck.

Indeed. Many people elsewhere, likely high majorities, feel just the same. I hail the Icelanders for setting this example of sound thinking and peoples will. Let's hope that other people will learn from this.

The Goldstone Chronicles – Roger Cohen, NYT

Six years ago I expected calls in the U.S. to Free Baluchistan. I was a bit early on that, but now Selig S. Harrison fulfilled my prediction even under the same title: Free Baluchistan.

Howard Dean endorses the Islamic-Marxist terror cult MEK

"Ashraf is part of a government-in-exile which is headed by Madame Maryam Rajavi. We should recognise the government-in-exile headed by Madame Rajavi," said Howard Dean, the former Democratic presidential candidate. "It is an outrage that the MEK remains on the terrorist list in the US. There is no legitimacy in this."

How much did they pay him?

One more reason not to travel to the U.S.: U.S. can conduct offsite searches of computers seized at borders, court rules – Computerworld

A long drought, a tornado and land erosion causing a sandstorm which then leads to a deadly 80 cars highway pile up. One probably would not expect such news from this country: Sandstorm kills eight in pile-up – Guardian

The consigliere was send out to deliver first a threat

Gates: Iraq will face problems if U.S. troops withdraw

"They will not be able to do the kind of job in intelligence fusion. They won't be able to protect their own airspace. They will have problems with logistics and maintenance."

then an offer

Gates: Some US troops may stay if Iraq wants

and making clear that it can not be refused

Gates Presses Iraq to Decide on Extension of U.S. Presence

But the guy in charge of pizza joint says "No!"

Sadr calls for an end to 'US occupation'

Al Jazeera correspondent Jane Arraf, reporting from Baghdad, said that this time Sadr had not only warned US troops but also the contractors.

What will the mafia Don do next?

First the good news. Yesterdays 7.4 quake appears to have not created any serious damage at any other nuclear plant though some had to go to emergency power supply because of loss of external power. It is unknown if additional damage occurred at the Daiichi plant.

The Japanese regulator NISA admitted to the possibility that the molten core of reactor no 2 leaked from the reactor pressure vessel into the primary containment. Due to some earlier damage that containment has leaks to the environment.

Speaking to the NYT U.S. sources have several even more alarming suspicions of further damage at the other reactors:

[S]ome of the radiation readings at Reactors Nos. 1 and 3 over the last week were nearly as high as or higher than the 3,300 rems per hour that the commission said it was trying to explain, so it would appear that the speculation would apply to them as well. At No. 2, extremely radioactive material continues to ooze out of the reactor pressure vessel, and the leak is likely to widen with time, a western nuclear executive asserted.
[…]
Flashes of extremely intense radioactivity have become a serious problem, he said. Tokyo Electric’s difficulties in providing accurate information on radiation are not a result of software problems, as some Japanese officials have suggested, but stem from damage to measurement instruments caused by radiation, the executive said.

Broken pieces of fuel rods have been found outside of Reactor No. 2, and are now being covered with bulldozers, he said. The pieces may be from rods in the spent-fuel pools that were flung out by hydrogen explosions.

The above includes several alarming points I have not seen reported so far:

• 3,300 REM/hour are 33 Sievert/hour. Anything above 10 Sievert means immediate death for those exposed to it. It is the first time I see such a high estimate.
• Nuclear fuel being exposed in the surrounding of the plant is also new.
• While we have feared that some continued spontaneous fission might occur in pockets of the molten cores the “flashes of extremely intense radioactivity” appear to confirm such reactions.
• It seems that the Japanese have limited all their equipment to just measure up to 1 Sievert. Several readings they had were reported as “above 1,000 milliSievert” which in reality can be anything higher. The German nuclear emergency team has instruments that can measure up to 200,000 Gray (~Sievert) per hour plus the robots needed to use them. Why ain’t these things in Japan?

Cont. reading: Fukushima Update April 8

The surge in Afghanistan is coming to an end without any decisive results. The military and its allies will, as usual, fight any reduction of any military effort and will try to keep the troop numbers up. An active campaign in Afghanistan means more money and faster promotions.

That is why I am very suspicious about the timing and content of this WSJ piece about new Al Qaeda bogeyman "training camps" in eastern Afghanistan:

"The raid gave us insight that al Qaeda was trying to reestablish a base in Afghanistan and conduct some training of operatives, suicide attackers," the senior U.S. military officer said. "They found a safe haven in Afghanistan."

Well, senior U.S. military officer, what have you been doing the last ten years in Afghanistan? If 150,000 soldiers haven't done their basic task in Afghanistan, denying Al Qaida a safe haven there, maybe we should try something different?

But it is not the purpose of the article to question the ever expending and useless military strategy. The purpose of the scaremongering comes with the last graph:

"We do not have an intelligence problem. We have a capacity problem. We generally know the places they are, how they are operating," said the senior U.S. military official, speaking of al Qaeda. The problem "is our ability to get there and do something."

All together now: "We need more troops in Afghanistan."

As for the quality of the intelligence: If that is really no problem, then the only explanation for these raids on ex-Taliban and members of the High Peace Council is a purposeful sabotaging effort to any talks with the Taliban:

Cont. reading: Prolonging The Surge In Afghanistan

What is providing legitimacy to a rebel movement like the one in Libya? The Wall Street Journal explains:

The opposition in eastern Libya took further steps toward establishing its legitimacy Wednesday, meeting with a U.S. envoy and loading its first shipment of oil for export since the uprising began.

So legitimacy is the easy part. At least when one speaks English and has some cheap oil to give away. The Brits want Blackwater/Xe or some other mercenary outlet to train the rebels which I understand means to do "training on the job", i.e. to fight their fight. I am sure that will also add to the rebels legitimacy. As Britain is broke, the Saudis are supposed to cough up the money for that. Getting support from Saudi money also adds to legitimacy?

The Libyan head of security Moussa Koussa who fled to London is said to be an MI6 double agent. That might well be the reason why restrictions on his bank accounts were immediately removed. Expect more propaganda talk about such false defections.

When I wrote How The War On Libya Will Continue, predicting their defeat, the rebels controlled the oil hubs Ras Lanuf and Brega. They soon lost both and their attempts to recapture them failed.

Attempts by the rebels to send resupplies to Misurata in the west also failed. Their ships were stopped by a Turkish patrol boat. The UN resolutions says "no additional weapons" and Turkey is serious in enforcing that part.

Gaddafi forces are still "cleaning up" in Misurata. In a few days that will be done and he will start new offense efforts in the east. But his forces must now "hug the enemy" to discourage further air attacks. Thereby it is unlikely that he will try a frontal assault on Ajdabia and later Benghazi. Instead Gaddafi will likely have some forces infiltrate into those cities, from the sea, the south and the east, and then roll the rebels up from their back.

Some NATO buffoon said that Gaddafi forces are "hiding behind civilians". That is a sure sign that more attacks on those civilians are now likely to happen. It is always the same sorry excuse. Hitler had to bomb London because Winston Churchill was "hiding behind civilians" there. Then again NATO is also bombing the rebels. Maybe they make up their mind.

The situation is now in a temporary stalemate and when the scale slides further towards Gaddafi forces, as it will, the attackers are in a bind. Protect civilians or bomb the heck out of them because they happen to be on the wrong side of the front? With the UNSC resolution and the attack Britain, France and the U.S. put themselves into an idiotic position. This was foreseeable. One might want ask what is their plan B but that would be wrong question. What was their plan A in the first place?

On the recent massacres of 800 or so civilians in Ivory Coast, and the "western" humanitarian intervention support for the culprit which will have huge regional consequences, I'll defer to Craig Murray. He certainly knows more about the issue than I do.

This is a tragedy for Africa, because it devalues democracy. Ouattara, with a strong personal push from Sarkozy, secured international recognition for his election victory. In truth it was an extremely dubious election, with no freedom for Ouattara supporters in the South or for Gbagbo supporters in the North in a poisonous contest. It would have been better for everyone if Gbagbo had accepted that he lost and left quietly. But the truth is that both sides’ claims of victory are fallacious. This was nothing like a free and fair election. Somehow the UN and the international community finds itself in the position of imposing by force, fighting alongside the perpetrators of massacre, the “democratically elected” victor. This denigrates democracy.

I hope b real, who keeps a very needed eye on Africa, will let us know his impression.

To me this seems to be, after Libya, the second act of a new US, France and their UN puppets alliance. What will be the next one? My bet is another attempt on Iran. The rhetoric from both sides point to that. Rising oil priced may hinder that though.

The NYT propagandist David Sanger wrote a weekend piece about The Larger Game in the Middle East: Iran:

The Obama team holds no illusions about Colonel Qaddafi’s long-term importance. Libya is a sideshow. Containing Iran’s power remains their central goal in the Middle East. Every decision — from Libya to Yemen to Bahrain to Syria — is being examined under the prism of how it will affect what was, until mid-January, the dominating calculus in the Obama administration’s regional strategy: how to slow Iran’s nuclear progress, and speed the arrival of opportunities for a successful uprising there.

The second part of the graph is easy to understand. It is always about Israel and thereby its perceived archenemy Iran.

But if that is so why take on Gaddafi at all? The Iranians do not like him very much. They supported intervention against him:

Cont. reading: U.S. ME Revolts Response All About Iran?

My longtime political readers may excuse that this will be a quite technical post. I'll get back to Iran etc tomorrow.

Someone in Denmark diligently collected the raw pressures and temperature readings of the Fukushima reactors which were published by various sources.

Being concerned about the state of reactor 1 I pushed the number 1 readings into an graph.

Reading that graph I come up with some interpretations that may well be of general interest.

• I find it likely that there was some direct release from the reactor vessel of no 1 to the atmosphere.
• I also believe that reactor 1 had a complete core meltdown.
• Additionally there is a pressure anomaly which escapes my grasp but needs some urgent attention.

bigger

What concerns me most is the red line creeping up after diverging from the blue line. More on that below.

Cont. reading: Fukushima No 1 Data Interpretation

The New York Times does some public wanking about the capability of "western" laboratories to analyze the nuclear accident in Japan:

Thanks to the unfamiliar but sophisticated art of atomic forensics, experts around the world have been able to document the situation vividly. Over decades, they have become very good at illuminating the hidden workings of nuclear power plants from afar, turning scraps of information into detailed analysis.
[…]
Indeed, the detailed assessments of the Japanese reactors that Energy Secretary Steven Chu gave on Friday — when he told reporters that about 70 percent of the core of one reactor had been damaged, and that another reactor had undergone a 33 percent meltdown — came from forensic modeling.

Chu did not get that information from forensic knowledge. That sentence might be simply a fact checking error. But given the tone of the whole piece I'd rather call it a blatant propaganda lie: "Look how good we are!"

On March 15 the Kyoto News Agency reported:

An estimated 70 percent of the nuclear fuel rods have been damaged at the troubled No. 1 reactor of the Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant and 33 percent at the No. 2 reactor, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Wednesday.

The reactors' cores are believed to have partially melted with their cooling functions lost after Friday's magnitude 9.0 earthquake rocked Fukushima Prefecture and other areas in northeastern and eastern Japan.

There may be reasons to applaud the nuclear laboratories around the word or Secretary Chu for analyzing the incident in Japan. But Chu's simple repetition of a 18 days old official statement from the reactor owner TEPCO is not one of them. Nor is any of the other sensationalized statements about meltdown analysis in that article. Reading through the official reports from Japan and the resources below plus some basic understanding of reactor technology and science allowed anyone to come to the same conclusions.

Cont. reading: The “Sophisticated Art” Of Reading Press Releases

Is the inherent contradiction in the paragraph of a WaPo piece intended or is just a display of the stupidity of the author?

Eight years after the American invasion put Iraq on a path to a more modern, democratic society, people here are increasingly resorting to the ancient process of tribal negotiations — called fasels, and conducted by tribal leaders or sheiks — to demand compensation for alleged injustices.