More than 100,000 tourists, including at least 5000 Britons, are trapped in the country. Many have been heading for provincial airports in Phuket, Chiang Mai and Had Yai near the Malaysian border in the hope of catching regional flights. Others are catching buses and trains to Kuala Lumpur and Singapore.

Thai Airlines opened up U-Tapao airbase in Chonburi province 120 miles east of Bangkok last week and have said they are operating 18 flights out daily. The only European destinations on offer were Copenhagen and Frankfurt. But the airline said it was also flying to Beijing, Hong Kong, Seoul and Sydney.

Both sides in the conflict in Thailand depend on revenues from tourists.  It’s a big part of the economy in the country, and this certainly isn’t helping their image as a travel destination.  Rather than being stuck in the middle like helpless kittens, stranded tourists should themselves organize, and demand that they be allowed to leave.  This is not like a hurricane or a terrorist attack - it’s been purposely created by thousands of rabblerousers hanging around in airports, who could leave if they wanted to.

An organized boycott on travel to Thailand may be an effective measure to get assurances from the government and the PAD that the future travel of commercialized tourists will not be obstructed.  Nothing can be accomplished by the effective false imprisonment of over 100,000 non-Thais who are waiting to leave.  Nations like the UK, which has been derelict in evacuating its own people out of the middle of an armed political conflict, should also be held accountable by returning travelers.

“Secretary Gates is extremely pleased that, after two days of thoughtful discussion, NATO has decided to allow ISAF forces to take on the drug traffickers who are fueling the insurgency, destabilizing Afghanistan, and killing our troops,” said a Pentagon press secretary, Geoff Morrell.

Throughout the two days of talks, Gates and Craddock had argued that the trafficking networks and drug trade had helped fund the Taliban insurgency, providing them with manpower and weapons. The amount that the Taliban is earning from the drug trade is up to $100 million a year, according to Craddock. Over 90 percent of the heroin that reaches Europe comes from Afghanistan, according to the UN.

This may actually be somewhat more successful than the hopelessly pitched domestic “war on drugs” as it is being done with purely economic and political goals in mind, rather than attempting to wipe out all substances of a particular type.  On the other hand, most of the poppy crop obviously isn’t going to just supply the muffin and bagel industries.  This type of move increases the degree to which the central Afghan government will essentially be supported by the illicit drug trade - which makes a great deal of money from customers in the United States.

This whole thing seems like yet another paradox where we’re working against our own interests.  We’re operating in a country where the enemy is supported by narcotics manufacturers, so we’re trying to turn those people to our own side and support a friendly government.  In the meantime, we’re trying to prevent those same people from shipping their product to our country.  What’s up with this?

The prevailing view among many in India seems to be that that there is a double-standard at work, left over from the days of British colonialism. Incidents of persecution by one side has been used to justify additional persecution against the other side, whether the victims were actually involved in the original crimes or not.  Typically, the victims attacked in anti-Christian attacks are no more related to colonialists than are the attackers themselves.  The “serves them right” attitude, from a columnist in India:

So what if Mahatma Gandhi and Vivekananda had opposed vehemently the proselytization campaigns of the Christian aggressive ‘harvesters’, we will support them.

So what if the RSS guys were amongst the first to rush to help Bihar flood victims; we shall continue to paint them as barbaric goons busy burning down faith places, who had no time to help the poor, deluged fellow citizens.

So what if a Hindu monk and three others, including a woman monk, were killed brutally by Christian assailants using AK47, we shall put the victims in the category of unmentionables and keep on repeating, ‘Hindus attack churches.’

The fact is that any religious persecution is simply the wrong way to treat people - whether in India or anywhere else.  It really does nothing but encourage an endless cycle of violence between aggressors who will never be convinced, and perpetrated on victims who are caught in the middle.  Recent attacks on Indian Muslims are similarly bad, as are attacks on Hindus.

Above: Hindus attack Muslims protesting the destruction of a mosque by Hindus.

A group of immigrants who arrive in a particular place and begin converting the locals does not justify violence against either the new people or their converts.  If some people no longer feel compelled to be adherents of their original religion, they are generally recognized to have the freedom to believe something else.  The universality of religious freedom is self-evident by the fact that people’s thoughts are their own private ideas unless they actively make them known.  Credible enforcement of a theocracy necessarily requires mind control.

The Indian government should take action to make the perpetrators of these crimes accountable for their actions, and dispel the growing wave of violence.  This is a critical ingredient to the integrity of the electoral process, and to India’s credibility as a modern state as it gains more prominence on the world stage.  If internal instability continues to plague the region, foreign companies will be resistant to send more business and neighboring countries like China and Russia may seize on the internal factioning to upset an important ally of the United States.  We can also ill afford to have India exploding into violence while Pakistan itself is already in serious political turmoil.

Indians of every religious stripe should put their country ahead of their own petty differences and avoid causing more strife in an already unstable area.  Why can’t we all just get along?

Although the North Korean government refuses to admit anything, there seems to be a significant amount of stonewalling about what is going on.  Kim Jong’s advisors have refused to speak to the press.  Calls to the NK Mission to the United Nations in New York have gone unanswered or lines are busy.  Generally speaking, no information is forthcoming and the regime seems content with making everyone think that Kim Jong Il is either dead or seriously ill and unable to govern.  In fact, rumors have swirled for years that North Korea’s iconic dictator was long dead and replaced by imitators - theories made possible by the fact that the subject of the controversy so often cuts such a mannequinesque, inhuman figure in public.

Whether Kim Jong is dead or not, this incident brings up the issue of succession.  There is no clear leader who might take the helm - most of the possible candidates are sons from various marriages.  Kim Jong Nam (pictured below), flagrant playboy and 37-year old son of Song Hye Rim has generally been regarded as the most likely to take over.  The much younger Kim Jong Chul, at only 23 years old, is another possibility.

There is little known about the leadership or political views of any of Jong-Il’s descendants.  It’s possible they could be equally unbalanced and insane, or they might moderate out somewhat.  Any changes in Pyongyang will make for interesting political theater and possibly precipitate changes in North Korea’s nuclear weapons policy.

Stock markets plunged, and more than $7 billion was pulled out of the country in just three days, exposing the fragility of Russia’s nine-year economic boom.

“If there is a perception of Russia as a risky place or as an undesirable place to invest, then the damage will be more long term,” said Chris Weafer, chief strategist at UralSib. “It will restrict the development of the economy and hurt the government’s plans to create a more diversified the economy.”

It’s unclear if this carrot-and-stick approach will work.  This conflict began with Russia attempting to show that it is staging a return to the world stage and is at least somewhat equal to the West.  Being disciplined may not play well to this sentiment and may cause the attitude to become even more rebellious.  Sustained economic woes may cause some Russians to start talking about the gorilla in the room that no one cares to acknowledge - communism.

If Russians embrace a sentiment of wanting to continue to assert themselves against the West and become independent, old ideas will certainly be considered as options.  Communism already has an undeniable foothold in the area.  Old style Soviets still hold some power in the former USSR, and would likely use a long-term economic depression as a springboard for a system about which many present-day Russians have something of a misplaced longing.  We need to be cautious of how hard we push this issue, lest we end up with more than we had anticipated.

This widespread acceptance mostly serves to validate the government’s unsavory attitudes towards public administration - a model of tyranny that it apparently intends to export around the world, in light of recent abusive governments in Myanmar, Zimbabwe and Sudan.

From the Chicago Tribune:

If the Chinese government had any doubt about whether its mix of authoritarian politics and free-market economics could gain acceptance in the 21st Century, more than 80 visiting heads of state provided a stamp of approval.

Curiously, many defenders of Beijing have accused the West of racism - ignoring the fact that most who are urging recognition of problems in China are expatriate Chinese or Tibetans.  Certain freedoms - speech, religion, and an expectation of relative freedom - are biological mandates, based upon the existence of our faculties for constructively exercising them.  They are also required as the basis for an effective and healthy, non-tyrannical government.  The false accusation of racial prejudice is a nonsense attempt to reposit the needs of humans into a vague suspicion about lowest common denominator motives that is only superficially convincing.

China may grow in wealth and power using the “everyone shut up and play along” model - but it has little chance of becoming a civilization that others can look to for guidance, unless substantial reform is implemented.  Real change will have to come from the people; the government is too in love with itself to possibly contemplate giving up much power.  Unfortunately, the latest wave of nationalism has rendered the populace totally ineffective for meaningful participation in their own political system.  Until they get some more substantial “disruptions”, things will pretty much stay the same.

Though his resignation had been expected for days, a move to flee the country is a surprise since Musharraf and his chief allies have said he would fight impeachment and remain in Pakistan. At a gathering at the presidential palace in Islamabad on Wednesday, the eve of Pakistan’s Independence Day, the president may have foreshadowed his decision in a speech to his guests. He tried to put the best face on his worsening predicament, calling for reconciliation among the country’s political forces as the only way that Pakistan could face its many challenges. But according to NEWSWEEK sources, in private conversations that night Musharraf agreed with several close friends that his resignation was his only viable option, and that fighting impeachment proceedings in parliament would only deepen and prolong the country’s political agony.

The world must now watch Pakistan very closely this week. The nuclear-armed nation cannot be allowed to fall into the hands of Islamic extremists, many of whom have fled to Pakistan from Afghanistan in recent years. If any Al-Queda allied groups wanted to make a move, this seems like their ideal time to strike.

Any crisis in Pakistan would surely impact the U.S. Presidential election as well. Consider Hillary Clinton’s now famous “3 A.M.” ad — who do you trust in times of uncertainty? A proven leader and bonfide war hero or a freshman Senator who’s never accomplished anything substantative?

However, the difference is striking - NATO moved military assets into Kosovo during the conflict in Yugoslavia after a 1998 massacre perpetrated by Serbs.  Various Yugoslav war criminals were arrested, some by force, and taken to trial.  However, that was pretty much all there was to it.  NATO’s recognition of Kosovo as an independent nation in 2008 was not a violent military action, but a diplomatic and political one.

Moscow’s attempt at seizing South Ossetia with a fierce ground and air assault has been a vast overreaction.  It would be a stretch to think that a diplomatic gesture by NATO - backed up with little threat of actual military force - could have provoked such an assymetrical response.

Now, some US officials are saying that serious diplomatic repurcussions may be coming for Russia as a result of the incident.

Washington and its allies also are discussing whether to drop Moscow from the Group of Eight industrialized economic powers, the official said.

Russian President Dimitry Medvedev had pledged to strengthen Russia’s role in the international community and world economy. But the U.S. official said that Russia, in its current situation, has “much more to lose” than the Soviet Union did when it invaded Czechoslovakia in 1968.

Russia raising the stakes in this way seems to show that they have forgotten a lot of the diplomatic progress that Washington and Moscow have made over the years.  Putin may be attempting to rebuild Russia’s imploded sphere of influence enjoyed during the former Soviet years, capitalizing on newfound oil wealth and taking the opportunity to assert itself militarily while the United States is overextended in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Worse, however, is the fact that many US leaders have overemphasized the importance of non-state actors on the world stage and have repolarized our military strength around that.  This sounds a lot like the “New Economy” mantra that was being preached less than a decade ago, right before reality struck and it all came crashing down.  As Russia’s latest foray into Georgia demonstrates, the Cold War has not ended and we would be foolish to think that the truly important “wars of the future” will involve terrorists or third-world nations.  The United States needs to remember what worked for us in the past, rather than trying to reinvent the wheel when the road has not changed.

The Chinese Embassy insists that their procedure for granting visas is omniscient:

Wang Baodong, spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, said China’s visa system is “above reproach and deserves respect.”

“Above reproach” is rather strong language.  The root cause of all this trouble is that the delusional government in Beijing apparently believes that it is also “above reproach”.  This leads to a cult of blind loyalty, while the government insists that everyone is reasonably free - so long as they don’t do anything inconveniently annoying.

China has made a big deal out of the 2008 Olympic Games being a sporting event and that they should not be “politicized”.  In fact, the Chinese government has done most of the politicization already.  Charges of racism have also been levelled against protestors, many from the West, who point to Chinese atrocities against their own people.  These points are largely moot; even assuming race is a quantifiable characteristic, Japan has hosted the Olympics three times and South Korea once, never resulting in significant outcry or boycotts.

China’s visa system is clearly being manipulated by bureaucrats who have their best interests in mind, not those of their own people, the atheletes, or least of all, individuals dying in Darfur.  Cheek’s visa should be immediately reinstated, or else the government should at least admit that their real motive is to save themselves some well-earned embarrassment.

Click here to visit Save Darfur and help put a stop to the destructive civil war in Sudan.

“I am stepping down from the volunteer role I recently agreed to take on with the Obama campaign as Arab-American and Muslim American coordinator in order to avoid distracting from Barack Obama’s message of change,” Ashabi wrote.

Seems like Senator Obama ought to be a little more careful about who he associates with.