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Mark Steyn comments on the president’s judgment.
The Tunisians got rid of Ben Ali in nothing flat, Mubarak took a couple of weeks longer to hit the road, and an exciting new “Islamic Emirate” has just been proclaimed in South Yemen. But, with his usual unerring instinct, Barack Obama has chosen to back the one Arab liberation movement who can’t get rid of the local strongman even when you lend them every functioning Nato air force. …
Corner Post from Steve Hayward says majority of Americans are now disabled.
Years ago the political scientist Aaron Wildavsky in a classic essay entitled “The Search for the Oppressed” concluded that 374 percent of the American people were minorities and victims. This exploration into the advanced victimology of liberalism is based on simple math, starting with the fact that according to Ralph Nader, all consumers are victims, so since we’re all consumers, we’re already at 100 percent of the population; women are victims, too, and since they are half the population, we’ve reached 150 percent of the population before we even start with the historically oppressed people of color. From there it is easy to fill out the list and get to 374 percent of the population. …
Now three million are exempt from ObamaCare.
Sure, ObamaCare is great for you. So great that the president is now offering 3 million members of his base ObamaClemency:
“The Obama Administration has rolled out another 129 waivers to one provision of the new health reform law, with almost half of those new exemptions going to various union groups.” …
Joel Kotkin finds markets alive in Vietnam.
Along the pitted elegance of Pho Ngo Quyen, a bustling street in Hanoi, Vietnam, you will, predictably, find uniformed men in Soviet-style uniforms, banners with Communist Party slogans, and grandfatherly pictures of Ho Chi Minh. Yet, capitalism thrives everywhere else in this community — in the tiny food stalls, countless mobile phone stores and clothing shops offering everything from faux European fashion to reduced-price children’s wear, sandals and sneakers.
Outside a ministry office, someone is cutting hair on the street. Nearby a woman is drying squid to sell to customers. Internet cafes proliferate, filled with young people. Virtually every nook and cranny has a small shop or workplace for making consumer goods.
In some ways, Hanoi seems very much a third-world city in terms of its infrastructure and cracking sidewalks, and it shares some characteristics with the slums featured in this Megacities project, such as underground economies and a growing population migrating from rural areas. But its poverty pales compared to places like Mumbai or Rio. The poor sections are rundown and crowded, but you don’t see people sleeping on the streets. This is a city clearly on the way up — in a country with nearly 95% literacy and a countryside that not only feeds itself but remains the largest source of export earnings. …
Some more Southeast Asia focus comes from Der Spiegel which has a story from Nepal on young girls sold into slavery.
Like many Nepalese girls from poor families, Urmila Chaudhary was sold into bonded labor until she liberated herself. Now 20, she works with a team of former victims, traveling throughout Nepal to free other girls from the clutches of their unrepentant masters.
The man who once bought Urmila squats on the threshold between her past and her new life, picking a piece of chewing tobacco from his teeth. He spits a black stream of saliva into a bucket next to him on the living-room floor. Urmila Chaudhary, who hasn’t been his property for the last four years, kneels on the carpet at his feet and hands him a tray holding a cup of sweetened tea.
She ought to hate, curse and berate this man. But, instead, she bows to him and calls him “father.”
Urmila was taken from her family and enslaved as a young child. Now 20, she has long, black hair and a gentle, melodious laugh. She wears blue smiley-face earrings and a colorful skirt with a red stripe along the hem, the traditional attire of women from Nepal’s Tharu people. Her clothing says a lot about the story of Urmila and this man — and about the thousands of other young girls who are sold every year as soon as they are big enough to look over the edge of a table and yet still young enough to grow into their new roles as servants.
Her former owner wears his black hair carefully parted, a bomber jacket and tracksuit pants. He was astonished when he saw Urmila on television and in a newspaper photo that depicted her standing next to the country’s president.
“I thought you would have forgotten us,” he says.
“No,” Urmila replies. …