Monday, July 24, 2006

Can Democrats Compete in the South?

Rethinking Red States
Can Democrats Compete in the South?

Monday, July 24, 2006; Page A08

If you want to understand why Democrats are the minority party in Congress, look at four states: Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina and Kentucky. Before the 1994 elections, when Democrats still controlled both chambers, these Southern states had 24 Democratic House members and 14 Republicans. Among senators, there were five Republicans and three Democrats.

Look today. There are 24 GOP House members and 15 Democrats, and all eight senators are Republicans.

Wp

Friday, July 21, 2006

Disney paga la rivoluzione digitale

La WD ha preso ieri una decisione rara a Hollywood, quella di produrre meno film per concentrarsi su una manciata di pellicole, destinate ai minori di 13 anni, che possono essere sfruttate al massimo nei mercati ancillari, leggi dvd, videogiochi, libretti, figurine, pupazzi e mercanzie di ogni genere. Lennesima onferma, questa di un trend che si sta ormai consolidando nell'industria cinematografica: la rivoluzione digitale. Disney, come le altre major di Hollywood, sembre puntare sempre di più sui film ad animazione computerizzata, tagliando le produzioni con attori in carne ossa: costano meno, rendono di più e soprattutto richiedono meno personale di produzione.
Non a caso, insieme al taglio delle produzioni tradizionali la Disney ha annunciato il licenziamento di 650 dipendenti della divisione cinematografica, pari al 20% del totale. La divisione di animazione computerizzata sarà esonerata dalla ristrutturazione.
Daniela Roveda, il Sole24ore di giovedì 20 luglio

L’estremista mobbizzato

French Socialist Using Web to Win Over Voters

PARIS -- Among her Socialist Party allies, Segolene Royal was well liked but considered a bit of a political lightweight -- mother of four, minister of "soft" cabinet posts for the environment and the family, domestic partner of the party's leader, Francois Hollande.
Washington Post

a doctor and his brother

The legitimate basis for the IDF's operation was stripped away the
moment it began. It's no accident that nobody mentions the day before
the attack on the Kerem Shalom fort, when the IDF kidnapped two
Palestinian civilians, a doctor and his brother, from their home in
Gaza. The difference between us and them? We kidnapped civilians and
they captured a soldier, "we are a state and they are a terror
organization." How ridiculously pathetic Amos Gilad sounds when he says
that the capture of Shalit was "illegitimate and illegal," unlike when
the IDF grabs civilians from their homes. How can a senior official in
the defense ministry claim that "the head of the snake" is in Damascus,
when the IDF uses the exact same methods?

philadelphia.craigslist.org

UK Street Crime Rise Blamed on iPods

UK Street Crime Rise Blamed on iPods
Shlashdot

Blogging From the Belly of Beirut

Blogging From the Belly of Beirut
Wired

steveryan

Storytelling, not journalism, spurs most blogs

Storytelling, not journalism, spurs most blogs

By Robert MacMillan
Reuters
Wednesday, July 19, 2006; 1:41 AM

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Many people see Web journals or "blogs" as alternatives to the mainstream media, but most Americans who run them do so as a hobby rather than a vocation, according to a report released on Wednesday.
About 77 percent of blog authors, or "bloggers," said they post to express themselves creatively rather to get noticed or paid, according to the report, released by the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

The Rise and Fall of the Hit

The Rise and Fall of the Hit
The era of the blockbuster is so over. The niche is now king, and the entertainment industry – from music to movies to TV – will never be the same.
July 2006
Wired

Internet e l’era dei mercati di nicchia
Vince la “coda più lunga”
di FILIPPO SENSI
EuropaQ
L’anno scorso è toccata al “mondo piatto” di Thomas Friedman fare da talismano e bussola delle vertiginose trasformazioni in corso in giro per il globo. Oggi la palma del libro da non mancare per guardare al futuro che cambia spetta alla “coda lunga” di Chris Anderson, guru della rivista Wired, la bibbia dei tecnomaniaci.
Si intitola The long tail. How endless choice is creating unlimited demand il volume più recensito in pochi giorni sui giornali che contano, dal Financial Times al Wall Street Journal. La sua tesi di fondo – che l’autore tratteggiò in un articolo che risale al 2004 – è che sono definitivamente finite economia e marketing ossessionati dalla quantità, dal best-selling, dal successo kolossal che fa una fiammata per poi spegnersi ineluttabilmente fino alla prossima trovata usa-e-getta. Benvenuti invece nell’era dei mercati di nicchia, dei piccoli numeri che sommati fanno cifre assai più consistenti di quelle degli hits.
La causa? Internet. Anzi, il Web 2.0, come viene chiamata l’ultima (o già penultima) generazione della rete, quella dei “social networks” come MySpace o dei servizi come Netflix, dove puoi trovare con un semplice clic i dvd più incredibili e remoti.
Anderson si prodiga in esempi virtuosi, come quello del libro dello scalatore, scomparso da tutti i cataloghi, e divenuto alcuni anni dopo un testo di culto, grazie ai consigli dei lettori di Amazon. A dimostrazione, spiega The Long Tail, che «un nuovo modello economico per i media e le imprese di entertainment sta cominciando appena adesso a mostrare la propria potenza». Meno Wal-Mart, più iTunes, l’avvenire della distribuzione e della vendita risiede nelle chicche, nelle occasioni mancate che vengono recuperate dalla pazienza maniacale degli utenti della rete, nei prodotti che il consumatore finale si è abituato sempre più ormai a ritagliare sulle proprie esigenze, sempre più individualizzate, flessibili, affinate, virali, partecipate e scambiate passaparola con altri aficionados.
È la rivincita del fiasco, grazie al passaggio dall’epoca della scarsità, in cui ci si doveva accontentare di ciò che il mercato metteva su scaffali limitati dalla tridimensionalità, all’epoca dell’abbondanza, veicolata dalla banda larga, dalla connessione veloce, dalla multidimensionalità impalpabile della rete. Non è più il picco che conta, la cresta dell’onda mediatica, ma la risacca dei milioni di titoli che vendono poco poco, ma che sommati fanno una forza paurosa, come lo tsunami che tutti si aspettavano in altezza, e invece spazza e travolge in lunghezza, in profondità.
Nel mercato del futuro, profetizza Anderson, non vince la popolarità, ma l’accessibilità; e per vincere è necessario seguire alcune semplici, ma auree regolette.
Come quella, numero uno, di rendere disponibile tutto e subito (ora si può fare); di renderlo disponibile, regola numero due, a metà della metà del prezzo di prima (meno costa, anzi più è gratis, più la gente ci punta); di aiutare, regola numero tre, i consumatori a trovare o incontrare il loro prodotto, facilitare il loro percorso di ricerca, come fa Google, metterli in condizione di trovarsi da soli nel più breve tempo possibile e in maniera agevole le cose che interessano, piacciono, incuriosiscono di più.
Così l’amateur la spunta sul fan, la nicchia sulla massa, il pull sul push, l’essai sul blockbuster, la chicca sul bestseller. Una rivoluzione commerciale ed economica che ha molto da insegnare anche alla politica di oggi, e alla sua comunicazione, sempre più online.
Anche qui, c’è da scommetterci, vincerà chi avrà la coda più lunga.

Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Tiny wireless memory chip debuts

Tiny wireless memory chip debuts
Monday, 17 July 2006
A chip the size of a grain of rice that can store 100 pages of text and swaps data via wireless has been developed by Hewlett-Packard.
Bbc

Criminals exploit net phone calls

Criminals exploit net phone calls
By Mark Ward
Technology correspondent, BBC News website

Malicious hackers are turning to net phone systems in a bid to trick people into handing over personal details.
BBc

Swimming pool use link to asthma

Swimming pool use link to asthma
Children who use an indoor swimming pool may be at increased risk of developing asthma, research suggests
Bbc

Griffes, internet e made in China

I risultati di uno studio effettuato su 21mila persone in 20 paesi
Griffes, internet e made in China
ecco come spendono gli europei
Italiani vanitosi, tedeschi impulsivi, turchi i più autarchici
E tutti sono diffidenti verso il commercio online
RICCARDO STAGLIANO'
La repubblica

Monday, July 17, 2006

La vita delle notizie su internet

Una ricerca pubblicata dal NYT dimostra che le informazioni su web
"durano" 36 ore, molto più di quanto si potrebbe immaginare
La vita delle notizie su internet
è molto più lunga che sulla carta
La rep

U.S. Border Town, 1,200 Miles From The Border

Early Days of Dalton's Carpet Manufacturing
U.S. Border Town, 1,200 Miles From The Border
Georgia's 'Carpet Capital' Relies on Immigrants Nytimes

DALTON, Ga. -- Jerry Nelson steered his grocery cart out of the Wal-Mart on a recent night, fuming about globalization, Southern style. "Another great night at the Mexican Wal-Mart," he groused to no one in particular.

The mass migration of Latinos to this corner of northwest Georgia known as the carpet capital of the world has changed the character of everything from factory floors to schools to superstores. On this night, Wal-Mart's ubiquitous TV monitors alternately promoted arroz and rice, aparatos and electronics.

Like many working-class natives of this once lily-white area, Nelson blames the changes on the carpet industry, which he insists lured the Mexicans -- and more recently, other Latinos -- to keep down wages and workers' leverage in this nonunion region. "We all know who the culprit is: Big Business. That's who's running our country," he said.

But the immigration-driven transformation of work in the United States is not simple, and Nelson played a role in the story, too. For decades, displaced farmers were the backbone of carpet mills. Nelson's mother left a farm in Appalachia to work in one until age 82. But Nelson didn't follow her. Neither did his wife, Georgia, also a mill worker's daughter. "We wanted more than our parents," said Jerry Nelson, who spent most of his career as a heating and ventilation contractor.

Another indispensable force was a federal immigration system that went limp in the face of urgent demands for labor, whether in the Vidalia onion fields 270 miles to the southeast or the Atlanta Olympic Village 90 miles to the south. Both drew thousands of illegal workers, many of whom ultimately found their way to Dalton through another important force: the amazing Mexican jobs grapevine.

And then there was the longest economic expansion in American history. As buildings rose and homes kept getting bigger, Americans carpeted almost a billion more square yards of floor in 2004 than in 1994, a 50 percent increase. With more than three-quarters of America's carpets made in and around Dalton, a shrinking workforce and 10,000 jobs to fill in a decade, the region was in the grip of a labor vacuum.

And immigration adores a vacuum. Today 40 percent of Dalton, 61 percent of its public school students and half of this region's carpet factory workers are Latino.

"A lot of people used to come here from Tennessee when there were no jobs there," said Shirley Silvers, who has worked 30 years for Dalton carpetmaker J&J Industries. "I guess it's the same now for Mexicans."
Reaching Past Dalton

Dalton may be 1,200 miles from Mexico, but it is in many ways a border town, whipsawed by every twist in the immigration debate. Its business and civic leaders call Latinos saviors of their one-industry economy, while its state and federal lawmakers are in the forefront of efforts to seal the border and block a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants.

And U.S.-born workers at Mohawk Industries Inc., the nation's No. 2 carpet manufacturer and a major Dalton employer, have filed one of several class-action lawsuits around the country alleging that the hiring of illegal workers constitutes federal racketeering -- a legal strategy that, if successful, could subject Mohawk to huge fines. Mohawk says it obeyed all applicable laws and is trying to have the suit dismissed. But the forces that changed Dalton are not easily reversed. The carpet industry always has relied on migrants. It took off in the 1950s, drawing people throughout Appalachia to the steadiest paycheck in the hardscrabble region.

"Men left farms, stayed in boarding houses for $7 to $10 a week and worked in the mills until they saved enough money to bring their families," said Shaheen Shaheen, an industry pioneer who in 1954 started World Carpets, now part of Mohawk.

So began a cycle of carpet companies depending on workers from well beyond Dalton, and Dalton staking its future on carpet companies. Whitfield County Commission Chairman Brian Anderson said that the area's 150 carpet factories pay 70 percent of county taxes and that nine out of 10 jobs depend on them. And as in the 1950s, industry executives praise the new arrivals' work ethic and appetite for overtime -- only now they cross national instead of state borders.

Norberto Reyes arrived here in 1981 with visions of opening an authentic Mexican restaurant for an Anglo clientele, and he remembers finding only a handful of Latino families. "I wanted to hire Mexicans to work in my restaurant, and it was hard to find them," Reyes recalled from the stucco hacienda that houses Los Reyes, now a Dalton institution.

The shift began soon after the 1986 immigration law granted amnesty to millions of illegal U.S. immigrants. At about the same time, carpet factories began hiring after a deep recession. Frank Shaheen, a cousin of Shaheen Shaheen and owner of a small carpet mill in nearby Calhoun, said he first noticed the transition at a sweltering factory where his company's yarn was dyed.

"It was like there were two completely separate workforces there," he said. "One was these older [white] guys who'd been there since the business opened in 1951. And the other was all young Hispanics. There was nobody in between."

According to Ruben Hernández-León, a sociologist at the University of California at Los Angeles, almost 2,000 Mexicans had moved to Whitfield County by 1990 -- still less than 3 percent of the population but the foundation for what followed.
Word of Mouth

The national housing boom of the 1990s sent demand for carpet soaring, prompting alarm about a labor shortage in Dalton. First-generation workers were retiring and many young people had left for New South metropolises like Atlanta. The county's non-Hispanic workforce dropped by more than 4,000 in the 1990s, according to the U.S. Census. And many who remained turned away from factory work. Industry executives talked of moving some major facilities from the area, possibly to Mexico. Meanwhile, word of the jobs bounty -- advertised on billboards and banners -- spread to Mexican enclaves around the country.

Carmen Campos, who became a citizen after the 1986 amnesty, was working in a foul-smelling meat-packing plant in Dodge City, Kan., for less than $10 an hour when his sister-in-law called with news of better work and better schools in Dalton. (He now makes $14.64 an hour as an operator for Shaw Industries Inc.) A woman named Elizabeth, who would not give her last name because she is here illegally, said she and her husband were working on cleaning crews in Los Angeles when an old friend called to say they could make more money in carpet factories and pay half as much in rent. Mario Figueroa, 18, said his father was working on a dairy farm in California when a relative called with a message that beckoned many a farmworker: " Allá se trabaja adentro ." (There you work indoors.)

The Pew Hispanic Center has found that Mexicans who have been in the United States for a year on average have relatives in a dozen U.S. cities. "The labor market knowledge of your typical Mexican worker is astounding," said Roberto Suro, the center's director.

The buzz didn't stop at the border. Kitty Kelley, an anthropologist who researched immigration here in the 1990s, said she interviewed carpet workers who would go home to Mexico to help their families during planting seasons, then return with eight cousins. A men's soccer team here is named Jalisco because all the players came from that Mexican state; most now work at Mohawk, which sponsors the team. By 2000, the Census counted 18,419 Hispanics in Whitfield County, a ninefold increase in a decade and still a severe undercounting, according to researchers.

Asked what they knew about Dalton before arriving, seventh-grade Latino children at a Dalton State College summer program had many versions of the same answer. "There was work here and there were no jobs at home," said a girl named Candelaria from Guatemala. "There was a good future," said a boy named Jesús from Ecuador. "My father said of all the states in the U.S., this was the best place to live and make money," said a girl named Julia from Brazil.

Carpet factory wages start at $8.50 to $10 an hour for unskilled workers, compared with a state minimum wage of $5.15. But the grapevine also touted Dalton's safe schools and neighborhoods, far from the gangs and crime of border towns and big cities.

Campos, the former meat packer from Dodge City, and his wife, Armida, who both work for Shaw Industries, said they came with hopes that their sons would get good educations. On the living room wall in their immaculate trailer home are two framed certificates from the President's Education Awards Program, each for their oldest son, Jorge -- one signed by Bill Clinton; one by George W. Bush. Jorge, 18, graduated in May as valedictorian of Southeast Whitfield County High School, the first Mexican-born student to do so, and plans to attend Dalton State College in the fall.

"He is like our hero, we are all so proud," said Nancy Fraire, a classmate and also a child of Mexican carpet workers.
Georgia's Immigrants

While Nancy and Jorge's parents are here legally, industry officials say they know that some workers are probably using fraudulent papers, which are widely available for a price. But the law does not require employers to verify whether official-looking documents are valid.

"If there's no reason to question the validity, we don't. If there is, we do," said Louis Fordham, vice president of human resources at J&J Industries.

The Mohawk workers' lawsuit invokes a 1996 law that made knowingly hiring illegal immigrants a potential racketeering offense. It alleges that the company recruited illegal workers and paid bonuses to employees who transported and housed them and supplied them with fake papers. It also alleges that the company effectively winked at obviously fake documents. The alleged scheme suppressed the wages of U.S.-born workers, according to the lawsuit.

Mohawk denied the allegations and has challenged the racketeering theory all the way to the Supreme Court, which last month sent the case back without a ruling to the federal appeals court in Atlanta for reconsideration.

"Mohawk is proud of the fact that it has a diverse workforce," said its lead attorney, Juan Morillo of Sidley Austin LLP. "It didn't do anything intentionally to generate that."

Several researchers say the 1996 Olympics are the reason Georgia has more illegal immigrants than any Southern state except Florida -- 350,000 to 450,000 in 2005, according to the Pew Hispanic Center. Atlanta's former Mexican consul general, Teodoro Maus, said thousands of illegal workers from Mexico suddenly appeared on construction crews when preparations for the Olympics fell behind schedule, and federal immigration officials assured him they would not interfere -- and they didn't.

"You'd see 40-foot-high girders, and up top, all these brown faces, right in the middle of Atlanta," Maus said. "Everyone agreed the Olympics never would have been finished on time without them."

Another turning point came in 1998, when immigration agents raided the Vidalia onion fields, putting the valuable harvest in jeopardy, only to be called off after Georgia congressmen protested to the Clinton administration. One protest came from then-Rep. Saxby Chambliss (R), now a senator and an advocate of deporting illegal immigrants.

Soon afterward, periodic immigration raids came to a halt in Georgia and nationally. The Government Accountability Office found that the federal government filed notices of intent to fine only three companies in 2004, compared with 417 in 1999. The Pew center and UCLA's Hernández-León estimate that more than half the Latinos who arrived in Dalton after 1995 were illegal.

The government recently conducted several highly publicized raids of companies with illegal workers and has promised more.

Even when the raids were going on, Dalton's civic leaders were sending a different message. When Latino parishioners overflowed Dalton's 130-seat St. Joseph's Catholic Church -- even after pews were extended and aisles narrowed -- industry executives helped pay for a new, 600-seat church whose bilingual priest now leads both masses and misas. Parishioner Carl Burkhardt, president of Dalton's No. 3 carpetmaker, Beaulieu of America Inc., gave $1 million while Shaw Industries chief executive Bob Shaw "godfathered" the project, according to Father Daniel Stack, the priest at the time. "He said we were taking care of his workers, so he wanted to help take care of us," Stack said.

And as Latinos increased from 4 percent of Dalton public school students in 1990 to 44 percent in 2000 and 61 percent in 2005, help came from the industry, the city government and a $500,000 federal grant, all at the behest of a prominent local attorney and former congressman. The Georgia Project, founded by attorney Erwin Mitchell in 1996, brought bilingual educators from Mexico to teach Latino children and to instruct local teachers in the Spanish language and Mexican culture. It also sends Dalton teachers to a summer institute in Mexico and provides after-school tutoring for Latino children whose parents don't speak English.

"We're not about immigration; we're about education," Mitchell said. Commission Chairman Anderson said the county would have to raise property taxes to cover rising costs for schools and indigent health care, but he argued that paying for immigration is cheaper than not paying for it.

"People will say if it wasn't for these darned Mexicans, we wouldn't have a tax increase," Anderson said. "But would you rather have a little increase in property taxes because our industry thrives and we all benefit, or would you rather the industry left and we had no jobs here?"
Our United States

To Betty Motley, who retired last year after 21 years with six carpet companies, the choice is not that simple. Standing on her porch in a mill workers' neighborhood, she pointed out a green, two-bedroom house across the street where she said five Mexican men live.

"They don't spend anything, they're just saving," she said. Around the corner is Morales Market and a branch of Sigue Corp., the leading transmitter of money from the United States to Mexico.

Down the street, a woman named Diane, who would speak only on condition that her last name not be used for fear of retaliation from her supervisor, has worked 15 years for Mohawk said most of her white co-workers have retired, quit or been laid off.

She said that her new Latino co-workers work faster than she does and that she can't meet the new production quota, meaning she now makes less money.

"They're taking our United States and making it their United States," Motley said. "Mohawk and Shaw used to be our companies."

Rep. Nathan Deal (R), whose district includes Dalton, said he hears constantly from constituents upset about the Spanish-speaking majority in their children's schools, about hospitals where disproportionately uninsured Latinos increase the cost of care.

Deal is considered a hard-liner on immigration. He has introduced legislation to deny citizenship to U.S.-born children whose parents are illegal immigrants, and he wants to deport illegal immigrants, secure the border and establish a fraud-proof guest-worker program.

But when asked where this would leave Dalton and the carpet industry, he sounded more open to negotiation.

"To say we'll seal the border and enforce the law is not something we can do by snapping our fingers," he said. "That's no more realistic than those who say we should just have open borders."

Staff researchers Richard Drezen and Magda Jean-Louis contributed to this report.

crowdsourcing

La rivista Wired lo ha chiamato crowdsourcing: si offre lavoro su internet e si risparmia. Anche le multinazionali cavalcano il fenomeno
Le aziende e i creativi low cost
migliaia di collaboratori via web
Niente stipendi fissi. Ma i più bravi diventano ricchi
La Lego ha chiesto agli appassionati idee per nuovi giochi

DI RICCARDO STAGLIANÒ la repubblica 17 luglio 2006

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Tre miliardi sotto i 25. Il loro futuro?

UNITED NATIONS POPULATION FUND «La generazione di giovani più grande della storia
Tre miliardi sotto i 25. Il loro futuro?
di STEFANO BALDOLINI
su Europa Quotidiano, di oggi 12 luglio 2006

«Difficile essere giovani». Questo lo slogan lanciato dall’United Nations Population Fund (Unfpa), in occasione della “Giornata mondiale della popolazione” celebrata ieri, e dedicata alla condizione dei tre miliardi di abitanti sotto i 25 anni, «la generazione di giovani più grande della storia» e, in parte, a rischio.
Stiamo parlando di quella larga fetta della popolazione mondiale minacciata da povertà, analfabetismo, malattie connesse alla gravidanza, Hiv/Aids. Dell’85 per cento di under 25 che vivono nei paesi in via di sviluppo, dei 500 milioni che vanno avanti con meno di due dollari al giorno (o dei 238 milioni con meno di un dollaro al giorno). Ma anche delle cento milioni di ragazze tra i 10 e i 19 anni destinate ad essere prese in moglie nei prossimi dieci anni contro la propria volontà, o dei circa 300 mila bambini-soldato impiegati nei vari conflitti in corso.
Lo scenario negativo è stato confermato recentemente dall’Organizzazione internazionale del lavoro (Oil) che denuncia una disoccupazione giovanile globale ai massimi storici, dall’11,7 per cento del 1993 al record del 14,4 per cento nel 2003.
Per dirla con Zygmunt Bauman, lo studioso di origine polacca autore del fortunato “Vita liquida”, il mondo deve decidere in fretta se metà della sua popolazione sia destinata o meno a diventare «scarto umano», ossia classe globale esclusa dai processi di educazione, produzione, consumo, dall’accesso alle risorse, e privata di condizioni igienico-sanitarie dignitose.
Da New York, dal quartier generale delle Nazioni Unite arriva un invito a non mollare. Sono i dati a disposizione, per primo, a fornire le ragioni di tale impegno.
Così secondo Rogelio Fernandez Castilla, dell’Un Population Fund, è in aumento «il numero dei giovani che stanno entrando nell’età produttiva, nel mercato del lavoro», ed è in calo «il numero dei giovani a carico di qualcuno», ossia dei bambini sotto i 15 anni. Dunque, per i policy-makers incaricati di elaborare strategie nei Paesi in via di sviluppo, «il momento è critico». E provvedere ai giovani «non è solo un obbligo morale, ma è anche una necessità economica », ribadisce il segretario generale KofiAnnan.
Sullo sfondo, il raggiungimento dei cosiddetti Obiettivi del millennio, gli otto target individuati nel 2000 con lo scopo di dimezzare la povertà entro il 2015. A tal fine secondo il rapporto “The Promise of Equality: Gender Equity, Reproductive Health and the Millennium Development Goals”, sono «indispensabili» due fattori: «uguaglianza di genere e salute riproduttiva».
In particolare appare fondamentale l’educazione delle donne.
«Oggi 600 milioni di donne sono analfabete» (contro i 320 milioni di uomini), si legge nel rapporto. Con dati contraddittori.
L’accesso alla scuola primaria, per esempio, è in aumento, ma è completata solo dal 69 per cento delle ragazze del sub continente indiano e nell’Africa sub-sahariana. Per la secondaria, ancor più decisiva secondo gli studiosi Onu, il gender gap s’allarga, con un accesso ridotto al 47 e al 30 per cento rispettivamente nelle due regioni considerate.
D’altra parte investire nei giovani non è solo una priorità in linea con il rispetto dei diritti umani e per la riduzione della povertà, ma «potrebbe anche produrre un “bonus demografico”». Questo, considerato che la popolazione dei cinquanta paesi più poveri è proiettata a più che raddoppiare nel 2050: dagli 800 milioni nel 2005 a 1,7 miliardi. Così attraverso «maggiori investimenti nell’educazione, nella salute riproduttiva, nel lavoro, i giovani potranno essere una fonte di aumenti di produttività.» E permettere alle giovani coppie di scegliere quando sposarsi e quanti fi- gli fare, con conseguenti famiglie più piccole e minor crescita della popolazione, «darà loro maggiore controllo sulle proprie vite».
Dal punto di vista demografico, un dato interessante emerge guardando a oriente.
Secondo le stime dell’Onu infatti, molti paesi asiatici saranno alle prese con società sempre più vecchie. E le generazioni giovani dovranno prendersi cura di fasce di anziani sempre più vaste: il numero di asiatici di 65 anni e oltre salirà del 300 per cento tra il 2000 e il 2050. Passando da 207 a 857 milioni.
Tutto questo mentre, a dispetto delle previsioni pessimistiche dei demografi degli anni ‘60, dei cultori di Malthus e del suo “Saggio sul principio della popolazione” che invitava al controllo delle nascite per evitare l’impoverimento dell'umanità, o degli scienziati catastrofisti come il Pulitzer Jared Diamond (“Armi, acciaio e malattie”) recentemente alle stampe con “Collasso”, la crescita della popolazione mondiale sembra rallentare.
Superando nel 2006 i sei miliardi e mezzo di abitanti, ma scendendo decisamente di ritmo. Con una media mondiale di 2,7 figli per donna (contro i 4-5 paventati nei ’60). Naturalmente a far la parte del leone sono i Paesi in via di sviluppo, dove ogni donna mette al mondo 5,1 figli, contro un tasso di crescita di 1,4 nei paesi industrializzati, in primis l’Europa.º

Tuesday, July 11, 2006

Bush, addio alla diplomazia cow-boy

Bush, addio alla diplomazia cow-boy (La rep)

Wednesday, July 05, 2006

New drug useful for smoking cessation

New drug useful for smoking cessation
Tue Jul 4, 2006 4:50 PM ET

By Anthony J. Brown, MD

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Treatment with a new drug called varenicline (Chantix) may be more effective than bupropion (Zyban) in helping smokers kick the habit, and it may also promote longer-lasting abstinence, suggest results of three studies in the Journal of the American Medical Association this week.

However, according to a related editorial, the drug is no panacea for people wishing to quit smoking. "There are some important gastrointestinal side effects and, in the current studies, most people given the drug actually did not quit smoking," co-author Dr. Robert C. Klesges, from the University of Tennessee in Memphis, told Reuters Health.

Chantix, the first prescription anti-smoking drug in over a decade, belongs to a different drug class than other agents currently used for smoking cessation. It stimulates sufficient dopamine release to curb cravings while blocking the reinforcing effects of smoked nicotine.

The drug, which is marketed by Pfizer Inc., received FDA approval in May.

In two of the Pfizer-sponsored studies, Dr. Karen R. Reeves, from Pfizer Global Research and Development in Groton, Connecticut, and colleagues compared the effects of Chantix against those of Zyban and placebo. In the third study, Chantix was tested against placebo in maintaining abstinence from smoking.

In the first study, which involved 1025 people who smoked at least 10 cigarettes per day, 12 weeks of Chantix was associated with an immediate abstinence rate of 44 percent, significantly higher than the 29.5 percent and 17.7 percent rates achieved with Zyban and placebo, respectively.

However, at 1 year, the abstinence rate for Chantix was not significantly different from that of Zyban: 21.9 percent vs. 16.1 percent. Still, these rates were significantly higher than that seen with placebo -- 8.4 percent.

Nausea was a common finding with Chantix, noted in 28.1 percent of patients. Zyban, by comparison, was tied to a high rate of insomnia -- 21.9 percent.

The second study was similar to the first except this time, the abstinence rate at 1 year was significantly higher with Chantix compared with Zyban: 23 percent vs. 14.6 percent. Once again, Chantix was often linked to nausea with a rate of nearly 30 percent.

The third study involved 1210 smokers who remained abstinent for at least 7 days after completing a 12-week course of Chantix. The subjects were randomized to continue the drug for an additional 12 weeks or switch to placebo.

Subjects who remained on Chantix had a continuous abstinence rate from weeks 13 to 52 of 43.6 percent, significantly higher than the 36.9 percent rate seen in the placebo group.

While the results are encouraging, Klesges noted, smokers should not get caught up in the media hype likely to surround this new drug and think that it represents any easy cure for their problem. "There is no such thing as a magic bullet for any condition, let alone one that involves complex human behavior."

Still, "this drug may be as good as we're going to get in terms of a medical therapy for smoking cessation," Klesges noted. "There clearly is an addictive component to smoking and the best results are achieved when a medical therapy is combined with a behavioral intervention."

SOURCE: Journal of the American Medical Association July 5, 2006.

Latin American Melodramas That Are Made in the U.S.A.

Latin American Melodramas That Are Made in the U.S.A.
New Telenovelas Draw on American Culture

By Peter Whoriskey
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, July 5, 2006; A01

MIAMI -- Heaving bosoms. Breathless dialogue. Betrayal. Telenovelas , the passionate melodramas of Spanish-language television, may look complicated. But the secret to writing them is simple.

Take two people who want to kiss.

Prevent them from doing so for 120 episodes.

"A telenovela is the story of an impossible love," instructor Roberto Stopello, a chief writer at the Telemundo network, told students during a recent class here on escenas de amor (love scenes). "That is the formula."

This city at the crossroads of Latin America is in the midst of a telenovela production boom -- some see it emerging as a kind of Latin Hollywood -- and Telemundo created the class last year to round out its stable of writers.

While the overheated dramas have long appealed to Hispanic audiences in the United States, telenovelas were almost always written and produced somewhere else, most often in Mexico, Venezuela, Colombia or Brazil.

But in a sign of the swelling number of Spanish speakers in the United States and their growing influence on Latin American culture, television executives have brought their productions here to create dramas with closer connections to the lives of Hispanics in this country.

Over the past three years, Telemundo, the second-place Spanish network after Univision in the United States, and Venevisi?n, a major Venezuelan production company, have aimed to hook more U.S. Hispanics by writing and producing more shows here, and by depicting the realities of U.S. life, where dating and class distinctions -- the staples of many a melodrama -- adhere to different rules than in other countries, executives say. American-bred telenovelas then appear not only on TVs in the United States but also in markets across Latin America.

So far this year, seven telenovelas have been taped in Miami, according to the Miami-Dade County film office, and the city now bustles with casting calls. Actors, writers, directors and cameramen from all over the Latin world arrive in a steady stream. Classes for telenovela acting and writing -- such as the one created by Telemundo President Don Browne and led by Stopello -- hone local and international talents.

"A lot of our audience came from Mexico, they're Mexican, but their life experiences are much different" than people who haven't emigrated, Browne said. "The humor is different. The pacing is different. It was critical for us to be more relevant."

One recent telenovela , " Anita No Te Rajes " (Anita Don't Give Up), revolved around the adventures of an illegal immigrant. Characters in another were depicted commenting on President Bush's recently televised speech on immigration.

"Everyone reduces their appeal down to language -- and it's not just language," Browne said. "It's cultural relevance."

About a third of Telemundo's prime-time lineup now is taped in Miami. Venevisi?n started producing telenovelas in Miami two years ago, and is now working on its fourth, said Peter Tinoco, president of Venevisi?n Productions.

For years, many Spanish-speaking immigrants watched telenovelas out of a sense of nostalgia -- and the episodes' being made and set in Mexico or elsewhere were a source of their appeal. Many figured that would fade with time and viewers' assimilation. But now, TV executives say, a younger generation of Spanish-speaking viewers, some of them second-generation Americans, may be open to telenovelas if they take aim at U.S. life.

"It's a very simple thing," Tinoco said. "We wanted to make telenovelas that appeal to all of the Hispanics in the U.S."

The telenovela boom here has also inspired countless dreams of individual expression and stardom.

Three years ago, the CIFALC School for the Performing Arts, an offshoot of an acting school in Caracas, opened here. Now a steady stream of students gets direction in the genre well-known for its tearful face slaps.

One recent night in a class of about a dozen people, some of them with telenovela experience, students took turns enacting a tension-fraught scene in which a man and a woman see each other for the first time in 12 years. The man is a study in nonchalance; the woman trembles with remorse.

"I feel like I have something in me," said Gabriel Abdala, 35, originally from Argentina, now a plumber in the Miami area. "But it's a little harder to break in for a man than for a woman. If they have the big booboos and they can talk, they have a chance."

When Telemundo held a casting call in Miami three years ago, about 30 people showed up for a typical 25 available slots; now hundreds do.

Few people embody the new possibilities here more than Erick Hernandez, 33, whose life story has taken twists worthy of telenovela writing.

Hernandez arrived 12 years ago from Guanabo, Cuba, in a boat with his wife and 18 others, he said. After being rescued by a container ship, Hernandez found work in the gruff environs of a Miami concrete plant, where he worked for years.

Then, last year, Telemundo offered a class in telenovela writing. More than 4,000 people locally and from around the world applied. Thirty or so were accepted based on writing samples, and among them was Hernandez.

The class, now in its second run, draws people of all ages and occupations. Among this year's class are a psychologist born in Peru who had been living in Vancouver, British Columbia; a television copywriter from Argentina; a journalist from Caracas; a lawyer from Spain; and a linguist from Switzerland.

Most, however, are immigrants who had been living in the United States: a car service manager, an airport worker, a Spanish teacher.

Eight of last year's class were hired as writers by Telemundo, and at least some of this year's class hope to follow.

Hernandez has dropped the concrete work and now writes out of his home, crafting Spanish-language dialogues, occasionally tearing up when he watches the melodramas.

"It's a matter of culture," he explained when asked about the genre's emotional hooks, which sank into him just the other day as he was watching an actress. "At the end, I started crying. She got me."

Unlike productions in other countries, the cast and crew of telenovelas here often consist of a remarkably international group.

Of the crew putting together " La Viuda de Blanco " (Blanco's Widow), which is in production, the director is from Venezuela, the director of photography is from Bogota and the script supervisor is from Peru. The leading man is played by a Cuban, and the leading lady is Mexican.

The melting pot here does pose one problem: accents.

"You can't have a believable show if the mother speaks like a Cuban, the father like an Argentine and their child like a Mexican," said Elizabeth Sanjenis, a Telemundo spokeswoman.

Telemundo and other telenovela makers hire speech coaches who aim at what they call a "neutral" accent. With about two-thirds of the audience claiming Mexican heritage, however, neutral is actually something close to Mexican.

Whatever the nationalist loyalties, to the delight of producers here, the experiment in telenovela production has shown that the United States, which has long exported mainstream culture, might now be able to export this staple of Latin culture, as well.

At least some of the U.S.-produced shows have fared well in other countries. " El Cuerpo del Deseo " (Body of Desire) was produced in Miami but won high ratings in Spain and Argentina, Telemundo representatives said.

Soon, even English-speaking U.S. audiences may get a taste of telenovelas. ABC has scheduled for the fall an adaptation of " Yo Soy Betty, La Fea " (I Am Betty, the Ugly), a Colombian hit, and other networks are reportedly exploring the genre.

The question looming over the telenovela industry here, however, is whether the U.S. demand for Spanish-language dramas could wane with assimilation and English proficiency.

Citing the Spanish proficiency of third-generation Latinos, however, a Pew Hispanic Center report says, "the loss of speaking competence in Spanish in favor of English may not happen as comprehensively, rapidly and readily as some scholars suggest."

Browne said Telemundo is preparing for either possibility. From his Miami office, he notes that Cubans began arriving here en masse during the '60s. Yet the Spanish-language stations in Miami frequently beat the ratings of their English-speaking competitors.

That "should give everyone a bit of pause if they think they've figured it out," he said.

Monday, July 03, 2006

Contro il pericolo di una ’“Iraq-ification”

AFGHANISTAN  LO SCENARIO DELLE OPERAZIONI INIZIATE NEL DICEMBRE 2001
Contro il pericolo di una ’“Iraq-ification”. Affinché Kabul non finisca come Bagdad
di STEFANO BALDOLINI
Europa Quotidiano, sabato 1 luglio 2006

Quella che si sta delineando come la più vasta operazione Nato mai vista ha per principale avversario un neologismo anglosassone: “Iraq-ification”.
Per dirla con il ministro della difesa tedesco, Franz Josef Jung, che spera che i soldati dell’Isaf possano «evitare che l’Afghanistan diventi un altro Iraq.» Un altro paio di maniche rispetto alla mission originaria stabilita nel dicembre del 2001 dalla conferenza di Bonn, all’indomani della caduta del regime talebano: il compito di «garantire un ambiente sicuro» a tutela dell’allora neonata Autorità afghana.
Un obiettivo tutt’altro che agevole, alla luce delle violenze del 2006, per l’”International Security Assistance Force”, la prima missione nella storia della Nato fuori dall’area euro-atlantica.
Che si configura come una missione in progress dove i contorni e le mutazioni sfumano. Tecnicamente non una forza dell’Onu, ma dislocata sotto il mandato del Consiglio di sicurezza, (risoluzione 1386 del 20 dicembre 2001). Iniziata come missione multinazionale, con comando a rotazione ogni sei mesi, dall’agosto 2003 il contingente passa alle dipendenze della Nato.
In principio limitata a Kabul e dintorni, in seguito alla risoluzione 1510 del 13 ottobre 2003 estende il raggio d’azione.
Oggi (fonti Nato) «copre circa il 50 per cento» del territorio del paese, tra Kabul, il nord e l’ovest del paese.
Sempre secondo Bruxelles, all’inizio di giugno impiega circa 9.700 unità da 37 paesi (Nato e non). Il numero di soldati inviati cambia secondo criteri di rotazione delle truppe.
I quattro paesi con il maggior numero di uomini impiegati sono la Germania (più di 2.400), l’Italia, che partecipa alla missione sin dalla sua costituzione (più di 1.100 tra Kabul ed Herat), il Regno unito (più di 900), e la Francia (più di 800).
Ma i dati sono in evoluzione.
L’annuncio della Nato di inviare in primavera seimila militari addizionali nel sud del paese controllato dai talebani risale infatti all’8 dicembre scorso.
Contestualmente Washington annuncia per lo stesso periodo un ritiro di circa 4 mila uomini dalla regione.
La duplice decisione arriva dopo l’escalation drammatica del 2005 (oltre duemila morti) e alla vigilia della cosiddetta “fase 3” di espansione nel turbolento sud del paese (sempre più instabile a causa di un “risveglio” dei talebani) programmata per la primavera del 2006.
Come reazione i talebani stessi iniziano a colpire gli obiettivi Nato. Attacchi suicidi a Kabul e a Kandahar prendono di mira le forze di peace-keepingcon la deliberata intenzione di spaventare e dividere la comunità internazionale, europei in primis.
Sull’opportunità di annunciare pubblicamente la strategia, sul timing e sull’esigenza di “irrobustire” le regole di ingaggio dei militari impegnati nella missione, s’interrogano in dibattiti pubblici tra la fine del 2005 e l’inizio del 2006 i governi coinvolti.
Non l’Italia, che se la cava con un maxiemendamento per il rifinanziamento inserito nella Finanziaria del 2005 (passata imponendo la fiducia). Forse solo il Canada ha fatto peggio. Dopo settimane di pressioni da parte d’opinione pubblica e opposizione, il presidente del consiglio Stephen Harper solo in aprile concede l’agognato dibattito per poi ammantarlo di retorica.
Poi lo scorso 8 giugno a Bruxelles, i ministri della difesa dei paesi Nato confermano congiuntamente l’aumento delle truppe, che dovrebbero pressochè raddoppiare passando a 17 mila unità.
Questo permetterebbe agli Stati Uniti un parziale rientro del proprio contingente schierato nell’operazione “Enduring Freedom” e la copertura da parte della Nato del sud del paese.
Proprio il coordinamento e la sovrapposizione con la campagna lanciata dagli Stati Uniti all’indomani degli attacchi terroristici dell’11 settembre 2001, è uno dei nodi da sbrogliare per risolvere la sempre più complicata matassa afghana.
Il passaggio di consegne tra le due operazioni, previsto per questo luglio, dovrebbe rendere la missione Isaf pienamente operativa, sino alla sua scadenza, tra tre anni.