Webdiary - Founded and Inspired by Margo Kingston

"Many international assistance programs fail because they are badly designed and/or too complicated. The result is that the poor don’t get the help they need, and taxpayers in rich countries lose confidence in the use of their aid funds. A case in point has been malaria control. If rich countries adopt simpler and more practical strategies to help Africa fight malaria, they can save millions of Africans while building enthusiastic support among their citizens.": Jeffrey Sachs

"For a few hundred years, when science and mathematics were enjoying a period of great invention, one region of the world stood out. Masters of these disciplines were revered there, medicine advanced quickly, and the average person was curious about how nature worked. Not surprisingly, this region was globally respected. In the other half of the known planet, scientists were punished, even killed. Mathematics was outlawed as irreligious and alien, and was later made subservient to religion.": H T Goranson

Since everyone else seems to be compiling lists, here's a space to write your own personal top ten list for 2006.

Season's greetings from the Audit team. This is the last Update of 2006. To see the current team click here.

"Looking back, it is ironic that the Chinese government’s draconian "one-child" policy, imposed in 1979, was implemented at the same time as the "open door" policy, aimed at capturing labor-intensive foreign manufacturing investment. While both policies must be regarded as successes, over the years the family planning program has contributed to an aging population that may diminish China’s attractiveness as a low-cost, labor-intensive manufacturing hub.": Friedrich Wu

A pre-Christmas finale to this long-running saga ...

Dr Hayes spent the second 'coup week' of December 11 - 15, 2006, continuing to produce special daily editions of his Pacific News Wrap - 'Mo oe mai i le Pasifika (For you, from the Pacific)'

"To explain the gap between Europe and the US on farm animal welfare, we should look to the political system. In Europe, the concerns of voters about animal welfare have been effective in influencing members of national parliaments, as well as members of the European Parliament, resulting in national legislation and EU directives that respond to those concerns. In the US, by contrast, similar concerns have had no discernible effect on members of Congress. There is no federal legislation at all on the welfare of farm animals – and very little state legislation, either.": Peter Singer

We won't be publishing any new articles from 22 Dec through to the first week in January. Most editors are away / out of net contact, so comment publishing will also be intermittent. Have a good time doing other things (as we intend to) !

Shining brilliantly in Rolls-Royce's online media room is the two-week-old press kit for a great story that didn't even make it to Google News, let alone into Australian print. It's how Cheney's Men and Rolls Royce have signed a A$50 million deal with the Australian Navy to service and maintain the amphibious ships HMAS Success, Tobruk, Manoora and Kanimbla (links courtesy of RR)

"From climate change to volatile oil prices, all signs point to a looming global energy crisis. Confronting the growing challenge means that humanity can no longer afford to ignore the inexhaustible resource found in the organic material that the sun provides each day through photosynthesis.": Jean-Michel Severino

Dr Hayes spent the 'coup week' of December 4 - 8, 2006, producing special daily editions of his Pacific News Wrap - 'Mo oe mai i le Pasifika (For you, from the Pacific)' - for the subscriber-only alert and digest service, The Daily Briefing. Webdiary publishes those daily Fiji Coup/Crisis Special Editions with kind permission from Dr Hayes and The Daily Briefing, as a unique account of the first week of the year's major story from the Pacific.

"What will G-8 summit meetings be like when American President Hillary Clinton and French President Ségolène Royal join German Chancellor Angela Merkel in a formidable triangle of women’s power?": Ralf Dahrendorf

"When the Soviet Union collapsed, many predicted the end of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Yet a few weeks ago, NATO held its summit meeting in the Latvian capital of Riga, formerly part of the USSR.": Joseph S Nye

Get the full report here. Commentary from BBC, Washington Post, The Australian, The Guardian.
Typically, the SMH doesn't think this is important enough to be a lead news story ...

"Compassion is not a dirty word. Compassion is not a sign of weakness. In my view, compassion in politics and in public policy is in fact a hallmark of great strength. It is a hallmark of a society which has about it a decency which speaks for itself.": Kevin Rudd

"When is the United States going to wake up to what is happening in Latin America? The growing influence of Venezuela’s leftist president, Hugo Chávez, is casting a dark shadow over the region.": Kenneth Rogoff

"The Bainimarama Screw is relentlessly tightening on the Fijian government of 'Smiling' Laisenia Qarase. And if you listen carefully, you'll hear a very clever lawyer whispering in Commodore Frank's ear, guiding his calculated steps through the constitutional minefield his strategy, and now overtly displayed tactics, have mapped out.": Mark Hayes

"For more than three decades, Phelps has shown that there is an alternative approach. He has tried to understand what we can do to lower unemployment and increase the well-being of those at the bottom. But he has also striven to understand what makes capitalist economies dynamic, what lies behind the entrepreneurial spirit, and what we can do to promote it further. Phelps’ economics remains one of action, not resignation." Joseph Stiglitz

"Although local Muslim leaders have since criticized Hilaly’s attitude, the incident again raises the question of attitudes regarding sex in "orthodox" communities, and how they can be reconciled with prevailing norms in the West. Meanwhile, in the United States, the controversy over government spying on its citizens seems to have died down, mostly because people are now convinced that their government will only look at the really bad guys. What do these two issues have in common?" H T Goranson

"Sheikh Yamani, Saudi Arabia’s former oil minister and a founding architect of OPEC, once said, 'The stone age came to an end not for a lack of stones, and the oil age will end, but not for a lack of oil.' Humans stopped using stone because bronze and iron were superior materials. But will we really stop using oil when other energy technologies similarly provide superior benefits?": Karuna Raman

"Studies showed that there are hundreds of regions of the genome that could have more or less than the expected two copies. This alerted scientists to the existence of a larger source of genetic variation than was previously understood, and forced us to speculate on the implications of this discovery.": Jennifer L. Freeman and Charles Lee

November statistics, financials, and technicals.

"China is dangerously near a crisis point. The country’s enormous environmental debt will have to be paid, one way or another. China must exercise the foresight needed to begin paying this debt now, when it is manageable, rather than allowing it to accumulate and, ultimately, threaten to bankrupt us all.": Pan Yue, China State Environmental Protection Administration

 

"It is now possible that the outcome of Scott Parkin's Federal Court case will become a Federal election issue. Spook-squad ASIO have been granted leave to appeal the verdict. Should their appeal fail the Howard Government's only option will be to censor the issue on grounds of national security. Given the timespans involved this would probably occur just before the next Australian elections.": Richard Tonkin

Margo founded Webdiary for the Sydney Morning Herald in July 2000 and took it independent on August 22, 2005. She related her view of the saga in a lecture to the South Australian Governor's Leadership Forum in February 2006.

"The amoral practices of AWB in effect armed the enemy as the price of doing business in Iraq. This cost came out of funds set aside for humanitarian needs; and added to the humiliation of the Iraqi people. They will not find justice unless someone lifts the lid on the full, wider extent of the AWB web of deceit. Senior officials should not be allowed to hide behind the paper-thin walls of Cole’s terms of reference.": Stephen Smith

"I do not know whether Keynes or Friedman was more right in their deep orientation. But I do think that the tension between their two views has been a very valuable driving force for human progress over the past hundred years.": J Bradford DeLong