Rich Germans: Tax me to save the country!

[the_future_modernes]

Rich Germans demand higher taxes

A group of rich Germans has launched a petition calling for the government to make wealthy people pay higher taxes.

The group say they have more money than they need, and the extra revenue could fund economic and social programmes to aid Germany's economic recovery.

Germany could raise 100bn euros (£91bn) if the richest people paid a 5% wealth tax for two years, they say.

The petition has 44 signatories so far, and will be presented to newly re-elected Chancellor Angela Merkel.

The group say the financial crisis is leading to an increase in unemployment, poverty and social inequality.

Simply donating money to deal with the problems is not enough, they want a change in the whole approach.

"The path out of the crisis must be paved with massive investment in ecology, education and social justice," they say in the petition. MORE

What is killing our frogs?

[the_future_modernes]

Secrets of frog killer laid bare

Scientists have unravelled the mechanism by which the fungal disease chytridiomycosis kills its victims.

The fungus is steadily spreading through populations of frogs and other amphibians worldwide, and has sent some species extinct in just a few years.

Researchers now report in the journal Science that the fungus kills by changing the animals' electrolyte balance, resulting in cardiac arrest.

The finding is described as a "key step" in understanding the epidemic.

Karen Lips, one of the world authorities on the spread of chytridiomycosis, said the research was "compelling".MORE

What we lose when a language dies

[the_future_modernes]

Death of languages

An estimated 7,000 languages are being spoken around the world. But that number is expected to shrink rapidly in the coming decades. What is lost when a language dies?
In 1992 a prominent US linguist stunned the academic world by predicting that by the year 2100, 90% of the world's languages would have ceased to exist.

Far from inspiring the world to act, the issue is still on the margins, according to prominent French linguist Claude Hagege.

"Most people are not at all interested in the death of languages," he says. "If we are not cautious about the way English is progressing it may eventually kill most other languages."

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This  article happily glosses over the historical and continuing elefant in the room, the Western imperative that forced and is still forcing people to give up their languages and culture to fit into a globalized world. Take for instance American Indians.  Between devastating disease epidemics, stealing of children and raising them in schools that were specifically for the purpose of destroying their cultures and making of them caricatures of  the whites in charge, and outright policies of extermination, is anyone really surprised that  some of their languages are threatened with extinction?


For example:Having their Say

UNESCO lists almost 2,500 languages worldwide as “endangered,” meaning they are at risk of falling out of use and even disappearing as fluent native speakers die and younger generations fail to take up the language. A bulk of endangered languages are the tongues of indigenous groups who have been colonized or encroached upon by a dominant culture and forced or coerced to give up their native language. In the past, students were beaten for speaking their language in strict boarding schools in the United States and Australia. More recently in parts of the U.S. and countless other regions worldwide, people feel cultural and economic pressure to switch to the dominant language, seeing it as a means of opportunity and feeling a sense of shame in their indigenous identity.

But recent years have also seen a resurgence in the interest to preserve indigenous languages among academics, nongovernmental organizations and indigenous communities. In many cases, young people, who did not grow up speaking their native language, are now studying and embracing it as a way to understand and celebrate their heritage and connect with their elders.

Benjamin Young is a perfect example. Young heard some of his community’s native Haida language while growing up in a small town on Alaska’s panhandle. But the program to teach the Alaska Native language at his elementary school was discontinued when funding was cut. Although Young’s grandfather and other elders in the village were fluent speakers—it was his grandfather’s first language—they would usually switch to English whenever a youth was listening. When Young, now 22, began to really learn about his family’s native language while at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks, it was like new worlds were opened to him. “They were talking about endangered languages, and Haida was one of them,” he said. “I didn’t realize it. You don’t think about that when you’re a teenager.”


Young studied with linguistics professor Kathy Sikorski, who had developed a program to help students learn and preserve their native languages. She helped Young develop an independent study course that he pursued in his hometown in 2006. He began to memorize key phrases. He recorded his grandfather with a digital recorder and DVD camera and played the tapes over and over. Now, Young speaks in Haida all the time, whether people understand him or not. It is partly an effort to normalize the language and to counter the painful reality his elders experienced when they learned to silence themselves around non-Native speakers.MORE

In which Niger's Pres overreached, and was firmly slapped down.

[the_future_modernes]

Niger court annuls constitutional referendum plan

Niger’s top court on Friday annulled President Mamadou Tandja’s plans to hold a constitutional referendum aimed at extending his rule in the uranium-producing West African country, saying it was illegal.

Tandja is due to step down when his second term in office ends later this year but had called for an August 4 referendum which could hand him another three years running the nation that soon hopes to become the world’s No. 2 uranium exporter.

"The constitutional court annuls the presidential decree of June 5 ... relating to a referendum on the constitution," the constitutional court said in a ruling.

The ruling, seen by Reuters, said Tandja’s decree calling the referendum violated several articles of Niger’s constitution.

The court had previously given an opinion on the president’s plans, saying they were unlawful, but Friday’s decision is legally binding.

There was no immediate reaction from the government to the court’s decision.

His plans have sparked protests that turned violent and drawn criticism from foreign donors and regional political bodies, which said they were a step backwards and threatened sanctions against Niger.

Opposition leaders had called for demonstrations this weekend against the planned referendum. Some of the president’s allies have also criticised Tandja’s bid. MORE

Cuba is broke, so....

[the_future_modernes]

Cuba Ends Food Guarantees, Steps Back from Socialist Ideal

MERIDA, Mexico – Cuba, in an abrupt about face, is set to abandon the food rationing program that has been the cornerstone of its Socialist revolution since 1962, when the United States imposed an economic embargo against the island nation.

In a rare signed editorial, Lazaro Barreda, the editor of Granma, the Communist Party’s official newspaper, announced the end of the ration booklet, or Libreta, that has guaranteed an egalitarian distribution of food to the Cuban people.

“The ration booklet was a necessity at one time, but it has become an impediment to the collective decisions the nation must take,” Lazaro Barreda wrote, preparing the Cuban people for Raul Castro’s most radical departure from the Socialist ideals championed by his brother, Fidel.

The ration booklets constituted the fundamental social contract between the Communist government and the people: No matter what happened, the state would provide food for everyone.

As Cuba encountered economic setbacks, the gravest of which occurred in the 1990s when, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Cuba entered into a prolonged recession – a “lost” decade – the Cuban population became cynical of the program.

Throughout Latin America, where poverty and hunger remain challenges for governments of all ideological persuasions, Cuba’s government has been viewed as admirable for providing a minimum number of calories to each of its citizens.
MORE

Photo essays from Global Post

[the_future_modernes]

Nigeria's Oil Curse:The story in photos behind the fight for Nigeria's oil wealth.


Full Frame: Born Behind Bars


Piles of sponges:A photographic journey through one of the few places in the world where sponges still thrive


Amid Beauty, A Hard Life: Stone Crushers in Bangladesh


Left Behind in Tajikistan

Africa's new Narco-State Guinea-Bissau

Women standing tall

[the_future_modernes]

DEVELOPMENT-SOUTH ASIA: Women’s Peace Offensive

A collective aspiration for peace brings together women from India, Pakistan and Afghanistan. Credit:Roshan Sirran

KABUL, Oct 18 (IPS) - ‘Give peace a chance’ may just be another cliché for many, but for women who have suffered the ravages of war, endless strife and other forms of conflict, joining hands to find meaningful solutions to their collective aspiration lends it a whole new meaning.

Within the South Asian region, Pakistan, India and Afghanistan have for decades been torn by internal and external conflicts that have cried out for, but have not quite found, a lasting resolution.

"We waited for a long time to see what the men would do for peace," Zahira Khattak, a member the think-tank formed by Pakistan’s Awami National Party (ANP), told IPS.

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