MORE ABOUT POLITICS

Right now, on behalf of the present financial crisis, I am reading that Alan Greenspan said this one to be the worst crisis of the century.

About a fortnight ago, I heard on the telly that the Mayor of New Orleans called the approaching hurricane the worst of the century and thus he invited his fellow citizens to leave town.

Well, being a born Berliner, we would say to this kind of braggadocio "one size smaller would be welcome".

I take the liberty to remind everybody the century barely started, we have still 92 years to go before we are able to make an evaluation. So let's be patient and leave the subject to our children or even better to our grand-children.

Another well-known fact, the stock exchange goes up and down, some get burnt and other get rich and probably next year we'll have other "events of the century" to consider. As to the king-size hurricane over New Orleans, the Mayor mishandled the evaluation of this one as he did on behalf of the previous one thus I suppose he will be reelected triumphantly by his thankful citizens.

Another thing I am quite fed up with is the "War on Terror". Every one of us has a bigger chance to win a Billion Dollar or Euro at the Sweep Stakes or the Lottery and afterwards get struck by lightning rather than being killed in a terrorist action. An efficient police force and a Secret Service that is doing his job on the ground are amply sufficient to neutralize these buggers.

And let's stop talking endlessly about September 11 when its main aim seems to be using it merely as an excuse to embark on actions that shy the light, a kind of smoke screen with an exceeding long shelf life.

Because there are problems and there are dangers facing us. Climate change is one. During the last Ice Age the average temperature fell 2°C. Not very much one might say but now we are in danger to live through increases of 4° to 6°C!! That means lots of more deserts everywhere as well as flooded and definitely disappearing coastline everywhere around the globe.

Another one is overpopulation. If we go on like this the horror movie "Soylent Green" depicting life in 2022 will become a reality well before the end of the century. I have seen recently a documentary about Dhaka the capital of Bangla Desh: that was hell on earth, just to look at it. Those unhappy people have already achieved this kind of concentration..............


Have a look at overpopulation at home. Fortunately, it lasted only one evening and half of the night. We were celebrating our ten years' living here.





All this to let off some steam and to entertain my friends worldwide who want to read something about politics.

SOME POLITICS - JUST FOR A CHANGE

That's me, taking off for another subject. Rejoice.


These days the little war between Russia and Georgia and its aftermath are very much in the headlines. And as nearly always nowadays I hear all the time the same tune: the Russians are very bad, bloodthirsty and imperial and the Georgians: poor innocent lambs in danger of being slaughtered by Mister Big.

Well, I don't agree.

First, just as a reminder, Georgia's biggest contribution to mankind was Mr. STALIN, the Russian dictator. When he finally died they did not celebrate and still now he is to them what Napoleon is to the French.

There are many different peoples living in the Caucasus area and all of them have one thing in common: they hate each other's guts. Their grievances go back to centuries, unforgiving, ready to jump at each other's throat when there is a possibility to get away with it.

Georgia's independence was such an occasion. There were accounts to settle with the Abkhasians and the Ossetians who lived as a minority within Georgia but don't belong to this people. So Georgia embarked on a nasty little war against everybody else who had the misfortune not to be Georgian.

In a nutshell: if these Abkhasians and Ossetians don't want to be Georgians, let them go. To independence or to Russia, whatever. Just let them have a kind of referendum so that they can decide for themselves democratically where they want to be.

By the way, in the case of Kosovo, once a Serbian province, this independence was granted. So why not here?

I think we should stop meddling into other people's affairs in far away countries. What about minding our own business, improve our own way of doing things, stop talking about democracy and human rights when in reality we only try to lay our hands on oil and gas they have and we don't.

Coming back to Georgia: they make real good wine there, it seems and I would very much like to taste it but can't find it here in France. What a pity.