Tehreema Mitha, "The Dance of Life".

Perspectives on International Politics and Culture.

[cartoonpolitics]

(story here) .. (cartoon by Rob Rogers)

[cartoonpolitics]

(cartoon by Paul Fell)

[montereybayaquarium]

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Why did the syngnathid go to the doctor? Because it was a little seahorse! 😂😑

Pacific seahorses are members of the Syngnathidae—or “fused jaw"—fish family. With a tilt of the head, their straw-like mouth vacuums up prey, leaving only a plume of oily leftovers to escape from their gill flaps.

[newyorker]

According to scholars, one in four cowboys in Texas during the golden age of westward expansion was black; many others were Mexican, mestizo, or Native American—a far more diverse group than Hollywood stereotypes would suggest.

The photos in an exciting new exhibit, “Black Cowboy,” at the Studio Museum in Harlem, suggest that that many common conceptions of what an iconic American looks like are wrong. Read more about the exhibit, and see more photos here. 

[discoverynews]

Ancient Stonehenge-Like 'Calendar Rock' Aligns With Winter Solstice

A Neolithic rock with a precisely-carved hole was found in Sicily.

[cartoonpolitics]

(cartoon by David Horsey)

[cartoonpolitics]

(cartoon by Dave Granlund)

[cartoonpolitics]

(cartoon by Nick Anderson)

[fotojournalismus]

This aerial photo shows boats in the Chabaish marsh in the Maysan province of southern Iraq,on January 7, 2017. (Nabil al-Jurani/AP)

[fotojournalismus]

Blackened sheep graze as oil wells set ablaze by retreating IS jihadists, burn in the background, in the town of Qayyarah, Iraq on November 20, 2016. (Odd Andersen/AFP/Getty Images)

[fotojournalismus]

An Afghan child shepherd walks under the trees on the outskirts of Jalalabad on November 22, 2016. (Noorullah Shirzada/AFP/Getty Images)

[tehreemamitha]

Now possible

The big change that Bernie Sander’s campaign has made for the future is this: having mobilized not just young people but many middle class working and really educated people who voted for President Obama earlier but seen most promises broken and no real change; and have now contributed to Bernie Sander’s and are dissatisfied with the way the Primaries are being run…there is a real possibility for a third party like the Green Party OR an Independent candidate to start building support for a real election bid. The Democratic Party has fielded the lesser evil" candidate for too long and while it's been rubbing it's hands in glee at a possible falling apart and civil war in the Republican party that never emerged, it's ignored the growing ran our and frustration within it's own likely supporters. Come election time many Bernie supports may clench their teeth and vote for Hillary this time but the rage and anger at being cheated is not, I feel, going to result in inaction and sullen behavior. It's going to be poured into the next candidate who refuses to take shit from the establishment and the mobilization of an alternative media and fund raising will get better. It didn't work for Jill Stein the Green Party candidate this time, who most people haven't even heard of. Shut out of almost all media, she was refused place on stage even in the first debates and in fact, when she wanted to attend as an audience member she was stopped and hand-cuffed to a bench outside the event despite having made no protest or acted in any confrontational manner. And this is U.S. democracy!!! It won’t happen overnight and it may take another ten election cycles, but the wheel has been set rolling and it isn’t going to go back uphill.

[tehreemamitha]

Now we know

What Bernie Sander's has shown us is that the youth of the United Sates are not disengaged from the political process: they are disgusted with it. And so they are overwhelming supporting the non- establishment candidate who has taken no money from corporations and super packs. While their parents and elders vote for Hillary Clinton, the youth in most households is voting for a new future away from the typical politician. However, the amazing thing that Bernie Sander's campaign has really taught us is that not only can you raise an extra ordinary amount of money from simple folk, (completely unheard of before), but you can actually now launch a viable third party because a lot of citizens are fed up of always being between a rock and hard place when it comes to choosing between candidates of the same party. So if the Green Party wants, it can really make inroads not just pushing for a real presidential candidate but by concentrating on local elections at community level and also the congress and senate. Perhaps starting at the bottom will really make sense now.

[tehreemamitha]

Crises?

I’m tired of hearing about Europe’s Refugee Crises.

I want to hear about Pakistan’s refugee crises. I want to hear about Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey’s refugee crises. I want to hear about Chad, South Africa and Kenya’s refugee crises.

There are a lot of refugees out there, millions of devastated families, housed in poor host countries, and most of them are not anywhere near Europe, (the real Europe, the one they call the White Europe).

So, let’s shift our geographical focus and think about sending funds where they are needed: to the camps and ruined cities that the desperate refugees are fleeing.

And just quit complaining, Europe; cause you sure are making plenty from your arms sales to those same trouble spots.

[tehreemamitha]

The vice of Vice

There was a lot of hype about Vice episode, the documentary series), on ISIS spreading in Iraq, Syria and Libya. Generally it was a good documentary. It also highlighted the fact that the illegal attack on Iraq by the USA and the badly planned following occupation were the main reasons for the emergence of ISIS. Yet there was a glaring hole in the investigative work done by Vice. I sat listening and watching in disbelief as the show progressed and then ended without in any way mentioning where ISIS got and gets its main funding from. There was a total absence of any worthwhile investigation into the Influence and relationship of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States with ISIS and the extreme Wahabi Culture that they have been exporting for years. Watching Vice made me think again why you rarely read criticism of Saudi Arabia in Western papers. We declare, often, that North Korea is a secret country and it is hard to get news from inside the nation. But then we say the same thing about Saudi Arabia , even though this is blatantly untrue. It's just that the stories coming out of Saudia from Human Rights groups and ordinary people are not the ones we want to hear or support. So perhaps ISIS is what happens when we are unwilling to look down the other side of the barrel and see who it is who is really pulling the trigger. And therefore others must suffer.

[tehreemamitha]

Oh, we just can't help ourselves!

Recently, during a long plane journey, I ended up watching a new age Bollywood film called, “English Binglish”. It is several years since it was made but I had heard good things about it and I really did enjoy it. Sridevi, (once the rage of the town due to her thumka abilities), is a good actress and the story was well done. No vulgar scenes either.

Yet I had this niggling sense of shame by the end of the movie, for the racist tone in the movie that many in the Desi community who had seen it never mentioned to me.

While trying to show the irresistibility of the “gorgeous traditional Indian women” by having a Frenchman fall for her, the movie shows diversity by bringing people from other cultures into the English for Adults Classroom (shades of, Mind Your Language, series) in NYC.

Yet the person who is dumb and shown from the beginning as incapable of learning properly is the Hispanic lady who is a nanny; and the character who never even develops a personality is the young Black man from Brooklyn.

Familiar with the still current rhetoric in the Desi community on Hispanics and Blacks, I was sad to see it so blatantly played out in the script and direction of this movie. Yes, we are now at the stage, (especially in the Indian community), where marrying a white man or women is not seen as dreadful as even a decade ago, especially if he/she has a good degree and pedigree. However, a Hispanic person or Black…that is still a different matter.

New age, haan !?

[tehreemamitha]

Beating ISIS? Simpler than you thought.

If all the countries indulging in various bombing sprees in Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Yemen etc were to take all the money they are spending on arms, armaments, various weaponry that they are trying out in the real field, and maintaining, feeding, housing, clothing and medical for the soldiers involved…

…If all that money was used instead to feed, clothe, give shelter to refugees, give education to the children and those fleeing ISIS, the Taliban, Boko Haram etc, can you imagine how that would just turn the whole situation around!?

Who the hell would want to live under the extremist groups that lay down terrible laws and destroy people’s lives? Why wouldn’t people be drawn towards those who care and try to make their lot better the best they can, help feed and protect their families giving the lie to all the terrible things that ISIS, Boko Haram and the Taliban say about the West?

And imagine how happy our soldiers would be, protecting the refugees and helping not bombing those fleeing terrible deprecation and atrocities?

Not to mention an end to all the hysteria from countries crying about taking in a few thousand refugees compared to the millions the poor neighboring countries have been dealing with for years.

And we could actually say we still have the Geneva Convention laws in place.

It’s a no brainer.

But then who said “world leaders” had brains?