Latest on Fri, 06:13 am
Smoke 2
Indonesia can be found this month in one of the articles of PNAS (“Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences”). It deals with the large scale fires in Kalimantan, West Papua and Sumatra.
It takes the authorities off the hook- to a limited degree that is. Their responsibility is relative, because in it’s summary the authors from the University of Amsterdam en the University of Wageningen a.o., conclude that alternating periods of relative drought and relative high precipitation have a most important impact on the amount of carbon emissions and by consequence on climate change. El Nino years (dry) are 15 to 30 times worse than El Nina years (wet).
The worrying part is that as a consequence of global warming the number of dry years in the archipelego probably will grow significantly. This may equal more drought and a rapid acceleration of deforestation. Which is a gloomy prospect for the remaining Indonesian jungles.
Does Indonesia escape the Plunder Bankers?
The US, Europe, Japan, Russia, Brazil – all of them are facing an economic depression as the follow up of the financial crises. And all of us will suffer. Severely.
Maybe not really all of us though. Maybe Indonesia will escape the economical catastrophe ahead. “President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said Indonesia would not see a repeat of the financial crisis of 1997, as all the fundamentals looked solid and there was clear potential for domestic market expansion” (Jakarta Post, 06.10.08).
‘Our woman in Jakarta‘ more or less agrees with him. She reports that the Indonesian banks are not poisoned by bad derivatives, there is no serious threat for a credit crunch, Indonesia is not largely dependent on export to the US or Europe and the losses on the stock market don’t matter that much in a country where the overwhelming majority has other problems than shares, bank accounts and pensions.
But on the same day in the same paper this news could also be read: “the benchmark JSX index shed 183.77 points, or 10.03 percent, to close at 1,648.7 points.” Which, I agree, are moderate losses in comparison to the New York, European and Russian stock markets but it indicates the archipelago does not consist of islands in the financial and economical world. Which, I have to grant him, governor Boediono of BI confirmed: “The shortage of global liquidity will be felt as a result of this crisis.” And he added: “We must be prepared to face this over the next six months to one year“.
On sex, religion and politics
Thoughts on a early, chilly and misty Sunday morning:
1. The problem with finding a partner fit to mate is that they only come ready made.
2. Nuns are women of genius who long ago got the felicitous idea that they could avoid the trouble of unruly men by marrying God.
3. A successful politician is an entrepreneur who knows how to sell dreams to you which you take for real.
Promotion of the Open Mind.
Usually I try to keep clear of the construction workers of the castles in the air. Good doers and softies. But there is nothing wrong with people who practice their ideals. Courageous guys and dolls who persistently work towards reducing conflicts, helping mutual understanding and enhancing harmony in society and between societies. Especially in times when dogmatic loudmouth extremists – politically, economically and theologically- seem to have got hold of the stage.
It’s high time to promote the voice of moderation. Jennie Bev is one of those voices. I think she is right. It’s about time to contradict and, if necessary drown out, the too harsh, threatening, aggressive sounds of the Bushes, the Osama’s, the Wilders’ and the Abu Bakar Ba’ashirs. I think Jennie Bev’s article, which was in the Jakarta Post also, is about this common sense people trying to strengthen common sense on both sides of the gaps which divide them.