All Iowa, all the time

Yep, it's that time of the year again. Today being the Iowa primary, the news is chalk full of analysis and reports about what will happen when Iowa residents caucus tonight. If I've learned one thing through this whole experience, it's that caucus can be used as a verb as well as a noun. With a statistical dead-heat between four candidates and notoriously unreliable polls because of the strange way in which the Iowa caucuses function and the fact that 46% of Iowans polled said that they could change their minds once they got to their caucus, tonight should make for an interesting time if you're a political junkie like me and going to watch the coverage.

Despite losing some ground in the polls in the past two weeks, Slate has a great article on why Howard Dean's campaign isn't too worried about the polling data. They also feature how the campaign is using computers to optimize the job of pulling the vote. Another article in Slate arguing that low turnout is actually what Dean needs to win. The idea is that high turnout will yield more voters to those candidates who are seen as having momentum now -- Kerry and Edwards, whereas lower turnout will benefit the Gephardt and Dean campaign who are seen as much better organized and therefore better able to get their vote to the primary.

In Iraqi news, a suicide bomb exploded on Sunday at the US headquarters, killing 20 and injuring more than 100, illustrating further how the capture of Saddam Hussein hasn't really made things safer for the United States. As with most incidents in this war, it was the Iraqi citizens that paid the highest price in the number of lives lost. At the same time, about 100 000 protesters demonstrated in Baghdad in support of responsible government and prompt elections.

Finally the Atkins diet spokespersons come out with something I've thought for a while, that being, gorging on fatty foods like steak and cheese will not help you loose weight, and even if it does, it sets you up for some serious heart problems later on down the road.

In Canadian news, the entirety of the center and left establishment is having a collective moment of schadenfreude with the announcement that not only has Conrad Black been fired from Hollinger International, but is now being sued by his own company for $21 million dollars. It couldn't have happened to a better person.

There seems to be some slightly good developments in Israel lately, starting with the order to remove three more Jewish outposts from the West Bank and Gaza Strip. At the same time Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has made a rather bold statement acknowledging that Israel will have to withdraw from the Golan Heights in order to secure peace with Syria. However I personally believe that Sharon does not have the political support from his own party to accomplish this task, so therefore it was interested to note a possible scandal involving the use of intelligence data by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon against the Labor Party. If this drags down Sharon enough, we might see an election where Labor takes control of the Knesset again and the peace process can begin anew. On the other side of the fence (almost literally), Hamas has managed to show their misogynist tendencies by stating that female suicide bombers like the one last week can only be used if the woman has 'transgressed moral norms.' The suicide bombing is then seen as a sacrifice to atone for the sin of shaming their family.

The winner of the most interesting policy proposal of the moment comes from Germany, where the idea of having youth spend a mandatory year of public service is being floated by several premiers to combat some problems with the ending of the draft. Although an interesting proposal, and one that I would be more interested in delving into, there are immediate problems with the German constitution that forbids replacing the draft with some other type of mandatory service. This project would give some exposure to young people on not only the needs of society, but might give them some addition direction for what they want to do with their lives.

This problem is also being talked about on the other side of the world in Australia. The government has come out saying that young people shouldn't be 'culturally drilled' into attending university when there are other alternatives that might be more suitable. I've always believed that, at least in my experience, high schools tend to push too many people towards university both through direct advise by guidance councilors and perhaps unconsciously portraying that anything other than university is seen as less than desirable. This is also the case with the course of studies -- science is always seen as the route for 'smart kids,' whereas arts are viewed as the place for people not good enough to get into science programs.

In following up with a story that I previously posted, it looks like the political party of current Iranian Prime Minister Muhammad Khatami is threatening to boycott the upcoming elections on February 20th if reformist candidates aren't allowed back on the ballot. This follows the suggestion of Iran's Supreme Leader Ayat Allah Ali Khamenei for the Guardian Council to review the cases of those who have been disqualified from running.

Finally, a small expose in the New York Times on some of Walmart's employment practices. It appears that night workers are locked into the stores without any way of getting out. The story details the plight of one employee who crushed his ankle in an accident but couldn't receive medical help for well over an hour while a manager was called to unlock the doors. Apparently other workers have suffered heart attacks and had hurricane's hit the store without being able to escape. All in the name of lower costs for consumers...