Eleanor Arnason's Blog, page 81

From Common Dreams:Egypt's military rulers called for an ...

From Common Dreams:

Egypt's military rulers called for an end to strikes and protests Monday as thousands of state employees, from ambulance drivers to police and transport workers, demonstrated to demand better pay in a growing wave of labor unrest unleashed by the democracy uprising that ousted Hosni Mubarak's regime.

Military police and soldiers surround remaining protestors as they try to clear Tahir square in Cairo, Egypt, Monday Feb. 14, 2011. Egypt's military rulers dissolved parliament Sunday, suspending the constitution and promising elections in moves cautiously welcomed by pro-democracy protesters.(AP Photo/Hussein Malla) The statement by the ruling military council that took power from Mubarak appeared to be a final warning to protest organizers in labor and professional unions before the army intervenes and imposes an outright ban on gatherings, strikes and sit-ins.

As the US demonstrates, a country that has free elections, but does not have strong unions, is not a working democracy.

Mubarak is Gone

Mubarak has resigned, and the army has taken over. Now we see what happens next. The problem is not simply Mubarak, but an oppressive system, that benefits a tiny part of the population, while the rest have far too little.

This is from a 2009 article in The Guardian:

"The proportion of Egyptians living in absolute poverty has risen despite relatively rapid economic growth this decade," Reuters reported in 2007.

Thus the neoliberal economic reforms led by Gamal (Mubarak) and his aides have harmed ordinary Egyptians and benefited well-connected entrepreneurs – 20% of Egyptians own 80% of the country's wealth, according to the United Nations human development report.

The opposition attributes poverty to the corruption of some of Gamal's aides. And they warn that the gap is widening between the two worlds of Gamal and elitists allied to him, and the millions of marginalised Egyptians.

The isolation of Gamal's circle was signified by a recent controversial statement by (steel tycoon Ahmed) Ezz – that the increasing numbers of cars and cell phones in the country indicate that Egyptians are living in luxury. He failed to mention the 43% of Egyptians are living on under $2 a day.

This figure was revealed in the 2009 Arab Human Development Report, along with other shocking facts – such as a 28.6% illiteracy rate. This discredits Gamal's economic vision and undermines the assumption that his succession to Hosni Mubarak can improve Egyptians' quality of life...

Egyptians' dismay is growing: 73% view the economic situation as bad, and 41% think it will worsen, according to a 2009 Pew report. The past few years have witnessed clear signs of popular anger, such as the labour strikes now frequently held. And the regime's crackdown on opposition continues unabated...

This was Egypt prior to January 27, 2011. So what happens next? Free elections? Free labor unions? Jobs? Education? A better distribution of the nation's wealth?

Back from a Trip

I went east to visit relatives last week. The first part of the week was sitting around my brother and sister-in-law's house in Upper New York State, talking, reading, writing and playing with the five cats.

The second part of the week involved a trek to Washington by train to see an art exhibit. I hadn't been in Washington for decades. We were in Georgetown, which is very clean and prosperous, full of government office buildings and foreign embassies. It didn't look like an American city -- too clean and well maintained, with too much official architecture.

My brother pointed out that much of Washington was not prosperous.

I don't travel especially well, though I find the experiences I have while traveling give me a lot to think about. More than anything else, I get a sense of who I am and what my life is like. Being away from home gives me a perspective. And I get images and ideas I can use in my writing.

I took a computer with me, a small netbook. It's the first time I've taken a computer through airport security. No problems there. I went through one of the new scanners that takes pictures of your undies, since I thought it would be simpler than asking for a pat down. However, a security person felt my breasts after the photo was taken, and I got my hands wiped with some kind of damp tissue. No explanation was given. I don't know if it was a random check, or if I need to buy a new kind of bra.

So what did I learn on this trip? Our capitol doesn't look like an American city, and traveling in America is kind of humiliating.

NASA...

Six worlds orbit Kepler-11, a sunlike star 2,000 light-years distant in the constellation Cygnus. The new discovery, based on data from NASA's planet hunting Kepler spacecraft, makes the Kepler-11 system the fullest exoplanetary system known. Compared to our Solar System in this illustration, five of Kepler-11's planets orbit closer to their parent star than the Mercury-Sun distance, with orbital periods ranging from 10 to 47 days. All six are larger than Earth and are likely composed of mixtures of rocky material and gas. Their presence, sizes, and masses have been determined by carefully watching the planets dim the light of Kepler-11 while transiting or crossing in front of the star itself. In fact, in August 2010, Kepler's telescope and camera recorded a simultaneous transit of three of the planets in the system. As announced yesterday, using the transit technique the Kepler mission has now identified over 1200 exoplanet candidates in a field of view that covers only about 1/400th of the sky. The tantalizing result suggests there are many undiscovered planets orbiting the stars in our galaxy.

NASA Photo

The care package from Earth had arrived. Last week, Japan launched the robotic Kounotori2 spacecraft to bring needed supplies, including food, to the International Space Station (ISS). Kountori2 launched from Japan's Tanegashima Space Center a little over a week ago reached the ISS in low Earth late last week. Pictured above, Kountori2 approached the ISS and was about to be grabbed by astronauts with the Canadarm2 and attached to the Harmony Module. In the above picture as seen through a window on the ISS, the limb of the Earth is visible, including white clouds, blue water, and various tan colored landforms. In addition to launches including humans, as many as ten robotic spacecraft may be launched to the space station this year, potentially including spacecraft from Russia, Europe, Japan, and a private company in the USA.

New Unions in Egypt

From Firedoglake:

Barely reported in the West, among the crowds at Tahrir Square last Sunday, a new trade union confederation was announced, the Federation of Egyptian Trade Unions (FETU), which immediately issued a call for a general-strike. The call has been widely taken up, and many reports now link the uprising to unity with the workers, particularly in Suez, where the battle has been fought most intensely with state police. The new confederation has the support of the International Trades Union Confederation and the AFL-CIO.

The Sydney Morning Herald is reporting that the general strike call initiated from workers in Suez. Whoever initiated it, the new trade union organizations are jumping on board...

Meanwhile, layoffs of Egyptian workers in the Suez industrial zone have been increasing of late, with international companies replacing these workers with foreign imported workers from India and Thailand, causing much resentment, and even supposed notice from the Egyptian government. Now, companies are starting to pull foreign workers out of the area, as the uprising and protest in Egypt does not appear to be dying down and thousands of foreign workers and other foreign nationals, including from the U.S., are crowding Cairo airport trying to get out of the country before a feared explosion.

The contradictions of Egyptian society are most intense in the port city of Suez, home to the Suez Canal, and a major industrial center.

The Middle East

Another great image from the Middle East. This one is Reuters, via Al Jazeera. I'm fascinated by the iconography of demonstrations. Here the symbols are traditional: the Hitler moustache and swastika on Mubarak, the child's hammer and sickle face mask. If you look two pictures down, you will find someone using V for Vendetta (the comic or the movie) and the Domino Theory, which comes (as far as I know) from the US and the Vietnam Era. In between is the guy with a sign in English saying Egypt equals freedom. What we have here is an international language and iconography. Demonstrators are signaling to the world.

Me

I suppose I ought to update what I'm doing, though I've been putting most of my daily trivia posts on facebook.

We're having a snowy winter, though nothing like the East Coast. Apparently the snow in the East and in Great Britain is due to global warming. The lack of arctic ice cover is changing weather patterns.

I am writing a fair amount: two new hwarhath stories and a new Lydia Duluth story. My agent has Lydia Duluth story # 6. # 7 and 8 are awaiting final revision, and I am maybe a third of the way through # 9.

Because I like lists, here is a list of Lydia Duluth stories:

"Stellar Harvest"
"The Cloud Man"
"Lifeline"
"Moby Quilt"
All novelettes, published in Asimov's.

Tomb of the Fathers
Novel, published by Aqueduct Press.

"Iridium"
"Checkerboard Planet"
"Tunnels"
All novelettes, finished but not published.

"Planet of the White People"
In progress.

My writing group likes "Tunnels" best of the unpublished stories. It's about homelessness and has a wonderful Goxhat accountant in it. I try not to praise my own work too much, but the Goxhat are amazing. They have appeared in two published stories, "The Glutton" and "Knapsack Poems." They are also in "Iridium" and "Planet of the White People." They are aliens, and they are very sweet and cute.

Egyptian Photo of the Day

Anothe copyrighted photo. This one is from the Foreign Policy website and is credited to Louisa Gouliamaki/AFP/Getty Images.

NASA Photo of the Day

Celebrating 7 years on the surface of the Red Planet, Mars exploration rover Opportunity now stands near the rim of 90 meter wide Santa Maria crater. Remarkably, Opportunity and its fellow rover Spirit were initially intended for a 3 month long primary mission. Still exploring, the golf cart-sized robot and shadow (far right) appear in the foreground of this panoramic view of its current location. The mosaic was constructed using images from the rover's navigation camera. On its 7 year anniversary, Opportunity can boast traversing a total of 26.7 kilometers along the martian surface. After investigating Santa Maria crater, controllers plan to have Opportunity resume a long-term trek toward Endurance crater, a large, 22 kilometer diameter crater about 6 kilometers from Santa Maria. During coming days, communication with the rover will be more difficult as Mars moves close to alignment with the Sun as seen from planet Earth's perspective.