"How can we negotiate with a state that wants to kill us?"

While the US is having its current drama about events that may or may not have happened at a high school party 30+ years ago, an actual important drama is brewing and being ignored.

“We’re accumulating risk in the Middle East by not getting at Iran’s proliferation,” [Brian Hook, the State Department's special representative for Iran] said. “There is something brazen about this missile behaviour, they’re not even hiding it. This sort of escalation is deeply concerning..."

"The Iranians have to decide are they a nation state or a revolution,” [The Saudi foreign minister] said, underlining that Iran had diverted virtually all its additional revenues from the removal of sanctions into its regional agenda, including support for the Houthi rebellion.

“If a missile is launched at Saudi Arabia and UAE what will be reaction be and how will we be defended?” said UAE Ambassador to the US Yousef Al Otaiba.

Maybe we could ask if the government can spend a few minutes considering this when they get done with their he-said, she-said partisan argument?

UAE ambassador asks how allies will defend country from Iran's missiles

Fake Brakes

The National has a report about a conference about counterfeit goods being sold, including dangerous auto parts: Brake pads 'made of grass' among the counterfeit car parts putting UAE drivers at risk.

The story is suitably informing and scary, but I wanted to see a picture of these brake pads, which unfortunately isn't provided in the story. In trying to find a photo elsewhere, I discovered what might be an even more interesting fact: There is a website dedicated to the automotive brake industry, The Brake Report. And, what might be the best part, according to their about page, they are the "leading digital platform dedicated to the global automotive and commercial vehicle brake segments", which seems to imply that there are multiple digital platforms dedicated to the global automotive and commercial vehicle brake segments.

Truly, we live in an age of wonders.

UAE Media vs. US Media

I thought that it is interesting how The National and Gulf News are covering President Trump's speech to the UN as compared to what I saw my friends in the US had posted about it. So I looked at some of the major US new sources pages. The American media is downplaying the importance of the speech as compared to the media here, and the Americans are playing up the laughter of some of the delegates.

Draw what conclusions you want from these:

Those Pacific Fans

Shot:

My own theory is that the US has never quite grasped the give-and-take character of world sport. Countries devoted to soccer, cricket and rugby play regular international fixtures; they win some and lose some, and learn to live with that.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0df0d4b8-7057-11dd-b514-0000779fd18c.html

Chaser:

Violence erupts in the streets as fans brawl at Euro 2016

http://www.thenational.ae/world/europe/violence-erupts-in-the-streets-as-fans-brawl-at-euro-2016---in-pictures

Schadenfreude

Over Eid in Al Ain, a Toyota Landcruiser that was parked on the sidewalk was nearly swallowed by a sinkhole.

A person who saw this story and felt that it was somehow fitting that someone who was parked illegally had this happen to them would be experiencing schadenfreude. Many people think that if you experience schadenfreude, then you should feel shame for feeling that way.

I don't think that there is a word to describe the feeling that it is unfortunate that this happened to one such person and not to all sidewalk parkers.

How Unique?

So, on the 7th, the Gulf News published an article about four players under contract to Al Ain FC but on loan to Al Dhafrah who could not play for Al Dhafrah against AAFC.

The article states that this is a "unique practice" to UAE Pro-League clubs. But, I know that the Premier League has this rule too, Rule V.7.2: "during the period of the Temporary Transfer of his contract registration a Player shall not play against the Transferor Club;".

So, obviously this is not unique. But is it limited or widespread? Any experts on {football/soccer} transfer rules?

Tastefully Done

So I was reading an article in a UAE media, and at the bottom, in the related article section, was this:

I especially love the last photo. Quite tasteful.

Really?

On Wednesday I was looking at the BBC web site and noticed that this story was the most read that day: US school road marking spelled wrongly. Really? I do not understand this at all.

I mean, first, how is this even news? A word is misspelled in North Carolina and it is suddenly world news? Isn't there anything more important happening in the world? Was it that slow a news day?

Second, why is this so popular? It isn't as if the word school spelled "shcool" is hard to find. It isn't even hard to find pictures of it misspelled on the road. Is the BBC going to start reporting on cute pictures of cats next?

Third, why exactly would it be surprising that a road crew would misspell a word? Are road workers known for their great erudition? If so, I missed that. This isn't even a good effort on that front. Check this one out if you want to see dedication to the craft.

I just do not get it. The only possible explanation that I can come up with is that somehow BBC readers believe that this says something about America, but that belief would be even stupider than misspelling school. So it must be something else.

The Totalitarian Impulse

First, let me be clear, I'm not calling either Tom Toles, the Washington Post cartoonist, or Robert Wright totalitarians. I'm sure that if a conservative had suggested that the government find some way to jail someone for doing something that wasn't illegal, both would be horrified. I'm merely pointing out that this impulse to abuse power is deep within all of us.

Unfortunate Ad Placement

I'll say it again, I love interesting juxtapositions. But this story/ad combination from the Wall Street Journal is quite unfortunate, what with Steve Jobs recent health difficulties and nearly skeletal physique:

Breaking the Irony Meter

Just a few posts apart at Boing Boing:

Abusive "coal-thugs" try to break up anti-mountaintop-removal festival

"At one point the most vile of the thugs threatens a man and his child verbally and with a throat slitting gesture. Simply appalling."

Absolutely true. Wishing death on those you disagree with is simply appalling. Which makes this post just 12 hours later... Well, decide for yourself.

Strange Creature found in Doha

Looking for something else, I came across this:

The report is based on the statement of an Arab expatriate lady who said she had seen the strange figure near the Oryx statue while walking in the area.
Quoting the woman, the daily said she took a picture of it in spite of being terribly frightened.
“She was very soon surrounded by a large number of people who also attested to the fact of what she had seen . But it suddenly disappeared out of their sight when they tried to go near it,” the report added.

I'm not sure how the Weekly World News missed out on this. The photography is even evocative of it. You can imagine how "surprised" I was to discover that it seems to be a hoax.

You say that, but what do you really mean?

Words all too often stop us from communicating. The same words can vastly different things (just ask my sister who told her English in-laws that she fell on her fanny [see here for what she meant and what they thought]).

In a similar vein, I thought that this article in the CSM is very interesting:
10 terms not to use with Muslims :

• The Clash of Civilizations.
• Secular.
• Assimilation.
• Reformation.
• Jihadi.
• Moderate.
• Interfaith.
• Freedom.
• Religious Freedom.
• Tolerance.

I'm a little surprised that "crusade" wasn't on the list. I guess that the author assumes that we know that one already. Read the whole thing.

Wow. Just ... Wow

What is wrong with the world today?

Fire kills child, 3, and parents as police prevent neighbours from trying to rescue them

A pregnant woman, her husband and their three-year-old son were killed in a house fire early yesterday as police who arrived before the fire brigade prevented neighbours from trying to save them. The woman screamed: “Please save my kids” from a bedroom window and neighbours tried to help but were beaten back by flames and were told by police not to attempt a rescue...

“I thought the police were there to protect lives. At one time they would have have gone inside themselves to try and rescue them.

“When a family is burning to death in front of your eyes, rules should go out of the window – especially with kids. Everybody wanted to try and help.”

Doesn't this infantilization of society have to stop at some point? I'm sure that it was dangerous to try to help. But shouldn't adults be aloud allowed [D'oh! Thanks for pointing this out FR] to choose to risk their life?

h/t Ann Althouse

---

Another example, from the US this time:

A Queens [New York] judge ruled yesterday that subway employees do not have to do anything but pick up their phones if they see a crime — as he threw out a suit against the MTA and two workers who did nothing more to stop a rape.

A conductor saw the rape from the window on his train, and a station agent in the booth witnessed a screaming woman being dragged down a staircase inside the desolate 21st Street station of the G line. But neither one left the safety of their assigned posts to help her.

The blogfather nails it:

In a previous day, in a different culture, such men would have been afraid of being called cowards for failing to help a woman under such circumstances. Nowadays, they’re probably proud of acting “sensibly.” (For the record, the story says their names are Harmodio Cruz and John Koort.) And in a different world, Judge Kevin Kerrigan would have been ashamed to describe picking up a phone as “prompt and decisive action.” But he probably thinks it is.

Well, we all seek our consolation where we can

Matthew Engel really, really, really dislikes America: Fool’s gold consoles unloved America (free registration required)

...a Scandinavian [journalist] sat opposite me in the press room [after the US lost the Olympic softball final to Japan]. We exchanged conspiratorial smiles: the Americans had lost and that always goes down well with everyone else at the Olympics...

American unpopularity at the Olympics is hardly new. It is a natural response to a great and sometimes overweening power. But it has grown: many sports journalists remember the we-know-bestism that pervaded the badly run Atlanta games in 1996; and the effect of George W. Bush’s presidency on America’s global standing is well-attested.

Of course, you remember that it was these same members of the US softball team that a) ran the Atlanta Olympics and b) single-handedly elected George Bush, so who wouldn't be happy that these evil young women lost. I'm surprised that Mr. Engel, a journalist of 35+ years experience and his no doubt just-as-sophisticated-unlike-us-hick-redneck-Americans colleague only smiled and didn't cackle with glee.

My own theory is that the US has never quite grasped the give-and-take character of world sport. Countries devoted to soccer, cricket and rugby play regular international fixtures; they win some and lose some, and learn to live with that.

Yep, countries devoted to soccer are world renowned for their gentle dispositions. I suppose that there is hope, as some of the European fans seem to be trying to teach our more boorish fans how to properly conduct themselves. Let's keep our fingers crossed.

Others stand aghast as they try to follow the logic of NBC, the television network that is the Olympics’ chief paymaster. It is basking in a ratings triumph for these games, so I suppose they are not interested in bleats from me. The fact remains that they declined to show live both the opening ceremony and the 100 metres, the two seminal moments of the games. The desperate had to turn to the internet. Meanwhile, the remotest reaches of the world were sharing the experience.

I'll admit, I'm just a simple redneck from eastern North Carolina, not a brilliant, sophisticated European journalist with more than 30 years experience, but what the heck, I'll try to explain NBC's logic, at least regarding the opening ceremony: The US East Coast is 12 hours behind Beijing. The West Coast is even further, 15 hours behind. So, if NBC showed the Opening Ceremony live, it would have been shown at 8:00 am Eastern time on a Friday. You know, the sort of time when many people are either already at work, traveling to work, or getting ready for work. Instead, they decided to show the Opening Ceremony at a time when most Americans would actually get to share the experience. I somehow was able to enjoy the event despite that fact that it was not live. (I wonder, does Mr. Engel refuse to listen to recorded music because he isn't sharing the experience with those who were there when it was recorded?)

The consolation for Americans is that they believe they are triumphant. The medals table is unofficial and, indeed, frowned on by the Olympic Charter, which insists the games are "between athletes . . . and not between countries". Nonetheless, its format is well established: the number of golds decides the placings, with minor medals used to settle ties. At least, it is well established outside the US.

The American media add up the golds, silvers and bronzes, giving them equal weighting, which is ludicrous. By an amazing coincidence, this puts the Americans on top, well ahead of China. The normal method has the US far behind. But guess which way plays better in Peoria?

Finally, some straight talk that we can all get behind! It is about time that someone in the media told all those silver medalists the truth: You are just the first losers! And you bronze "winners"? You suck. Only the winners in this world count. Devil take the hindmost! To hell with the Olympic Charter! The country that won the most gold is the best!

I could be wrong, but I'm fairly certain that the US press has a) honestly reported that China won more golds this year and b) always listed the countries by total medals.

I'm also a little uncertain as to why it is "ludicrous" to list them that way, but then apparently I'm just not smart enough to see this self-evident truth. Presumably, by Mr. Engel's reasoning, if country A won five gold medals, no silver or bronze and country B won four gold, 10 silver and 10 bronze, then country B should be shamed at its feeble effort - to suggest otherwise is "ludicrous".

If Mr. Engel can find that we have reversed our usual method, to console those poor devils in Peoria, bereft with grief over the opprobrium of the rest of the world, I'd be willing to accept his point.

This attitude reminds me of the ugly and small-mindedness of those Americans who wanted to rename french fries. It is petty and small for a man of his age to not only take glee in the tears of a group of young women who did nothing but be born in the wrong country, but to proudly boast of it. Mr. Engel, you say that we are "fools" - I say that I revel in the your hatred; we must be doing something right if jerks like you hate us.

I Sure Hope So or That was Awful Fast

I'm not sure that four days is really enough to draw conclusions, but:

Traffic offences and accidents have dropped in [Al Ain] - with police saying drivers are being more cautious following the implementation of new unified traffic laws.

The police have not recorded a fatal accident in the city and its surrounding areas since Saturday when the law came into effect.

The cynic in me says that this is just more of the same old, same old, but then my taxi driver this morning remarked how he didn't run through a yellow/red light because of the new fines, and two of my co-workers noted (without my asking) how the new laws are making them take extra care.

Of course, my inner cynic also wonders how many thousands have died needlessly, if these sorts of rules would have made traffic safer over the years.

A Dark Day in Al Ain

Blaze claims two children in Al Ain [Warning: there are some gut-wrenching details at that link, so you may not want to read the whole story. I suspect I may have trouble sleeping tonight after reading it myself.]:

Two Emirati children - Hamad, 4, and his brother Mansour, 2, - died in a fire that broke out in their house in Zakhir area in Al Ain on Friday...

The source said the fire might have been started due to a short circuit in one of the air-conditioners.

The aunt of the victims said the children were playing inside a room. Suddenly, the other family members heard the children’s cries and rushed to the room. But the fire had already engulfed the room.

"Our neighbour who rushed to the house and we tried to rescue the children but could not see them due to the fire and heavy smoke," she added.

The family are blaming the deaths on "the delay in the arrival of the rescue team" but the police head says otherwise. I only know that when we had our fire, it took the fire department a very long time to find the house.

Crash: Car overturns killing girl [second story on page]:

A teenage girl died and her mother sustained severe injuries when their car overturned yesterday in Al Kharis [sic - should be Al Khrais] district.

A traffic police official said the car was driven by a Syrian woman, identified as N.M., who was accompanied by her two teenage daughters. The woman lost control of the vehicle while she was negotiating a roundabout.

Since the other daughter was unhurt, it seems possible that she was the only one wearing a seatbelt. Of course, she could also have just been very, very lucky too.

(Speaking of which, it is good to see that the Dubai police are launching a two-week campaign to encourage seatbelt use for children. I agree with the experts in the story, it is not enough, but a start is better than nothing.)

Then, to top everything else off, we are also apparently facing a stray dog infestation:

Residents in Al Ain have been complaining about the rise in the number of stray dogs in the city that is famous for its quiet and clean environment.

The stray dogs, they feel, are a traffic hazard as they can cause accidents by running across the streets unexpectedly.

Mohammed Al Mahdi, a resident, said the stray dogs disturb his family as well as the neighbours, especially at night. "Sometimes, the dogs attack the passersby," he added.

Ashraf Sharif, another resident, said the stray dogs seem to be diseased and urged the local authorities to initiate measures to protect the health of the public, especially children.

It isn't clear if the disease that these dogs have is rabies, which would be a big concern. It would also explain why these dogs seem to have turned aggressive suddenly. Everytime I have seen a stray, it avoids everyone like its life depends on it.

No One Likes the New Taxis

It seems like the residents of Abu Dhabi have the same reaction to the new taxis that I did:

Residents in the Capital are dissatisfied with the new taxi services that were launched a few months ago.

While speaking to several commuters, Khaleej Times found out the reasons for their disappointment. Most of those spoken to were unanimous in their views that the taxis’ fares had doubled, registering an increase of 100 per cent compared to the old taxis.

I agree wholeheartedly. It is interesting to note that some of the people interviewed said that they are now walking as much as 4 kilometers because they cannot afford the new fares. So you have to think that this decision could quite easily increase the pedestrian accident rate, especially as the roads here a very unfriendly for pedestrians, not to mention the potential for heatstroke when the temperatures increase.

In response to these complaints and demands, Lieutenant-Colonel Mohammed Maiouf Al Kotbi, manager of drivers’ licensing and vehicles in the General Headquarters of Abu Dhabi Police, said the decision of the new taxi services came as a result of the demands and requests of the Abu Dhabi residents, as they frequently complained about the behaviour of many of the old taxi drivers. "We received so many complaints from people that the drivers of the old taxis refused to stop for passengers or that they refused to drive outside the city centre or in crowded areas," said Lt-Col. Al Kotbi.

"For these reasons people demanded a new taxi system and the Abu Dhabi Police responded by launching the new taxi service, which aims to solve the problems," he added.

Lt-Col. Al Kotbi also pointed out that the new taxi project allows for more confidence between passengers and drivers, who are trained to be cooperative and friendly. "The problem of doubling the taxi fare is unacceptable and the passengers are entitled to get a receipt for the payment and, in case of increasing the fairs, they should come to the police," he said.

As I pointed out before, the new taxis are also charging by the hour, which seems, in my limited experience, when combined with the increased milage rate, to be the cause the doubling.

I'm not sure exactly why the two systems cannot run together either; if one wants to pay extra for a cleaner car with a more courteous driver, great. But for those who cannot, why get rid of the older system? For that matter, why make us change in Al Ain for problems that we were not having? I have never had or heard of a driver refusing a fare to anywhere in Al Ain. Has anyone ever that this experience?

Hawk at Your Own Peril

Dh100 fine imposed for spitting in public places:

The local municipalities in Abu Dhabi, Al Ain and the Western Region are now imposing a Dh100 fine on those caught spitting in the streets and public places.

Engineer Omar Al Hashimi, Director of the Department of Municipal Service Affairs, told Khaleej Times that move is aimed at protecting the community from unhygienic practices.

One small problem with the article is that it is wrong that "spitting in the streets and floors of public places ... have [sic] become a problem", it is that spitting has been a problem for some time. Why else would there be signs like this posted?

One good thing

There has been a lot of complaining about the traffic problems that President Bush's visit has caused, but the Gulf News reports one good thing:

...motorists reported seeing a complete lack of disregard for road rules... (emphasis added)

A complete lack of disregard for the traffic rules sure sounds like a good thing, since the usual order around here is a complete lack of regard for the rules of the road.