Magic Statistics

I kid you not.

A vice principal at an English school wants to coax students with poor attendance records back to school by offering them smoking breaks.

[Ian Mather] said: "Rather than let them sneak a smoke in a dangerous place, we are offering them the opportunity to do so in a controlled and safe environment. We do not condone smoking in any way. We felt we had two choices - pretend they weren't smoking or do something constructive about it."

Reality check, Mr Mather: What message would that send to the majority of students who want to go to school and are not inclined to smoke?

They will, quite naturally, conclude one of two things: Either the school does indeed “condone” smoking, or the school is hypocritically winking at under-age smoking by unmotivated slackers.  Either way, allowing the truant minority to smoke in school can only increase cynicism and alienation among the majority.  Are you sure you want to go that route?

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Military historian John Keegan says that Israel will not sit by while Hezbollah re-constructs its fortified zone in south Lebanon in preparation for re-commencing bombardment of northern Israel. Hamas is also re-building its fortifications in Gaza.  Both are amassing missiles and other armaments.

Hezbollah's network of bunkers and tunnels was crucial to its apparent success in last summer's Lebanese conflict, and that will be a primary Israeli target in renewed hostilities.

Although the IDF [Israel Defence Force] had got into south Lebanon, the casualties it had suffered in entering the fortified zone had alarmed the government and high command, since Israel's tiny population is acutely vulnerable to losses in battle. Israel's plan was to destroy Hizbollah's tunnels and bunkers, but the sending of a United Nations intervention force did not allow the destruction to be completed before the IDF was forced to withdraw.
. . .
The adoption of a tunnel strategy has allowed Hizbollah to wage asymmetric warfare against Israel's previously all-conquering armoured forces. The tunnel system is also impervious to attack by the Israeli Air Force.

Since Israel's reason for existence is to provide a secure base for the Jewish people, and that of the IDF is to act as their shield and safeguard - functions that have been carried out with high success since 1948 - it is obvious that neither can tolerate a zone of invulnerability occupied by a sworn enemy located directly on Israel's northern border.

It is therefore an easy prediction to foresee that the IDF will - at some time in the near future - reopen its offensive against Hizbollah in south Lebanon and will not cease until it has destroyed the underground system, even if, in the process, it inflicts heavy damage on the towns and villages of the region.

It is likely that it will also move against the underground system being constructed in the Gaza Strip. Hamas resupplies itself with arms and munitions brought from Egypt through those channels. Gaza is a softer target than south Lebanon, since it is an enclave that Israel easily dominates.

Mr Keegan foresees a resumption of hostilities by the end of the year—earlier if Hezbollah attacks pre-emptively.

Another war in Lebanon could bring Israel into conflict with UN forces there, but that will not deter Israel if it believes its national security is at stake.

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The Kerala High Court in India has voided the election of Roman Catholic MP P.C. Thomas and declared his Communist Party opponent the victor.  Mr Thomas, former Minister of Law and Justice, was ordered ejected because he referred to his religious background in campaign literature.

The court said Thomas had indulged in "corrupt practices under two sections of the Representation of the People Act — for circulating leaflets and calendars seeking votes of Christians and for using vehicles to transport voters to polling booths." The leaflets included a specific request "to vote for Thomas, who was described as a representative of Christians," the court said. The calendar had photographs of Thomas, Pope John Paul II and Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta.

The court granted a one-month stay on the judgment to enable Thomas to file an appeal before the Indian Supreme Court.

Mr Thomas says he was convicted for, in effect, asking fellow Christians to vote for him.  He will appeal the ruling.

h/t: Big News Network.com - Breaking Religious News

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Last month, NDP leader Jack Layton advocated negotiations with the Taliban as a means of ending the fighting in Afghanistan. Lauryn Oates, vice-president of the Calgary-based Canadian Women for Women in Afghanistan, thinks that a terrible idea because one of the first things the Taliban will insist on is abrogation of women's rights.

Misogyny is not peripheral to the Taliban's agenda. Rather, it is a central tenet of their platform. We have already had the chance to see the Taliban in power, and know that their policy of subjugating women is not mere rhetoric but bona fide practice. Their warped interpretation of Islam swiftly became the law of the land, and was brutally enforced during their horrifying rule in the late 1990s.

The evidence we have of what happened to women under the Taliban is not light stuff. Their edicts meant torture, rape, the amputation of nail-polished fingers, women whipped in the streets for an exposed ankle, and girls killed for studying secretly. The haunting stories of women stoned to death inside crowded soccer stadiums are not urban myths, but actual events in the very recent history of Afghanistan. Have Canadians so soon forgotten our shock and fury at hearing about the hell Afghan women faced for more than five years?

Ms Oates links the Taliban to the current campaign of intimidation against professional women in southern Afghanistan.

Taliban forces are also destroying schools and killing teachers for educating Afghan girls.

The Taliban, alongside their insurgency against NATO and the Afghan government, are waging another war, an assault against the education sector, and particularly against girls' education. There have been 204 schools burned down between January, 2005, and June, 2006. Thousands more girls' schools have closed due to security threats. All this suggests that it is unlikely Taliban policies toward women have changed, or that Taliban leadership has undergone any enlightenment around relying on violence and intimidation as their main tool of governance.

Why would the NDP want Canada to talk with fanatical oppressors of women?  The NDP likes to think of itself as a principled defender of women’s rights, but the suggestion to negotiate with the Taliban puts paid to that.

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Religiously motivated violence against Christians in Iraq is becoming more frequent and more gruesome.  Two particularly horrific instances in the past month: An Orthodox priest from Mosul was kidnapped, beheaded, and dismembered, and a teenager was reportedly crucified in Basra.  To avoid persecution, hundreds of thousands of Christians have become refugees.

Bishops of the US Catholic Church are appealing to Condoleezza Rice to offer asylum to beleaguered Iraqi Christians.

The American Catholic bishops have . . . asked US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to grant asylum to hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Christians who have fled their homes to escape persecution.
. . .
In a letter to Miss Rice which was made public, Thomas Wenski, the Bishop of Orlando and the chairman of the bishop’s committee on international policy, said: "We deplore the sectarian violence engulfing the Shia and Sunni communities in Iraq. We are especially and acutely aware of the deliberate violence perpetrated against Christians and other vulnerable minorities."

"The recent beheading of a Syriac Orthodox priest in Mosul, the crucifixion of a Christian teenager in Basra, the frequent kidnappings for ransom of Christians including four priests … the rape of Christian women and teenage girls, and the bombings of churches are all indicators that the situation has reached a crisis point."

The UN High Commission for Refugees reports that Christians comprise 44% of Iraqi refugees, although only 4% of the overall population is Christian.

John Pontifex, who works for a Christian charity that aids the persecuted, believes a concerted attempt is now underway in Iraq to expunge Christianity from the country.

h/t: Persecution Blog

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Who says Stephen Harper is aloof, arrogant, and humourless?  When Rick Mercer visited 24 Sussex Drive to talk politics, the PM invited Rick to stay the night.  Rick got into his PJs, played with the kids, and then our country’s leader helped Rick fall asleep by reading a position paper boosting reform of campaign financing.

Watch “Sleepover at 24 Sussex Drive” in the Mercer Report archives for Season 4, week of 31 October.  It’s a riot!

h/t: Anglican Philosopher