Who are the 1 percent?

Occupy Wall Street: Who is the top 1% for income? - Oct. 20, 2011

Though Occupy Wall Street protesters have staked out workers in the nation's financial capital for weeks, a 2010 study suggests that most of the people in the "1 percent" don't actually work in the financial industry.

Financial professionals make up 14 percent of the top 1 percent of American earners as of 2005, CNN Money reports. Executives and managers in other industries made up 31 percent of the elite. But medical professionals weren't far behind, at 15.7 percent. Although doctors make up a big chunk of the 1 percent, their wages have seen slower growth than those of financial workers and executives. You can find out more stats about the top 1 percent of earners here.

Who are the 1 percent?
By Tami Luhby @CNNMoney October 20, 2011: 10:40 AM ET
occupy wall street top 1 percent top 1%

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Think it takes a million bucks to make it into the Top 1% of American taxpayers?

Think again. In 2009, it took just $343,927 to join that elite group, according to newly released statistics from the Internal Revenue Service.

Occupy Wall Street protesters have been railing against the Top 1%, trying to raise anger and awareness of the growing economic gap between the rich and everybody else in America.

But just who are these fortunate folks at the top of the income ladder?

Well, there were just under 1.4 million households that qualified for entry. They earned nearly 17% of the nation's income and paid roughly 37% of its income tax.

Collectively, their adjusted gross income was $1.3 trillion. And while $343,927 was the minimum AGI to be included, on average, Top 1-percenters made $960,000.
Meet the Occupy Wall Street protesters

But the income threshold for this exclusive group changes every year, largely with the performance of the stock market, experts said.

In 2007, when times were good on Wall Street, one needed to have an adjusted gross income of more than $424,000 to get into the highest rank. But the stock market decline in recent years has helped lower that bar back to a level not seen since 2002.

"The further up you go, the wider swings you see," said Pete Sepp, spokesman for the National Taxpayers Union. "They have a great deal of wealth sunk into the markets, which can vary quite widely."

While much of the wealthy's income comes from capital gains on investments, bonuses on the job can also give people the needed boost.

Just what jobs are those?

Many workers in the securities industry in New York likely qualify for the Top 1%.

These folks, many of whom work only blocks from where protesters are gathering in Zuccotti Park, made an average salary of just over $311,000 in 2009, according to the state Comptroller's Office. (This figure does not take into account certain income, losses and deductions that make up adjusted gross income.)

A separate study found that financial professionals made up about 14% of the top rank in 2005.

Executives, managers and supervisors working outside of finance accounted for 31%, the largest share, according to an analysis by Jon Bakija of Williams College, Adam Cole of the Treasury Department and Bradley Heim of Indiana University. Medical professionals came in at 15.7%, while lawyers made up 8.4%.

Over time, the Top 1% has claimed a bigger share of the income pie. In 2007, they earned 22.8% of the nation's income, more than double the amount in 1986, according to IRS data. The recession has since brought that slice down to just under 17% for 2009.

While those at the top have seen their incomes soar over time, middle-class incomes have stagnated.

"The higher up the income distribution you go, the more your income rose and the larger the share of total income gains went to your group," said Roberton Williams, a senior fellow at the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center.

But as corporate profits and productivity have increased, workers aren't reaping the benefits, said Edward Wolff, a New York University economics professor who specializes in income inequality. That's helping spark the movement, which has spread across the country.

"There is a lot of anger and it's for a very good reason," Wolff said. "If all of the income gain goes to the top, there's not much left to go to the rest of the people."

Correction: An earlier version of this story included an incorrect timeframe for IRS income data. The most recent figures from the IRS are for 2009.

Sharia law declaration raises concerns in new Libya

- Yahoo! News

The announcement that Islamic sharia law will be the basis of legislation in newly liberated Libya has raised concerns, especially among women, despite Islamists insisting moderation will prevail.

Interim leader Mustafa Abdel Jalil said on Sunday, during his speech to the nation in Benghazi to formally declare the country's liberation from the ousted regime of Moammer Kadhafi, that sharia would be Libya's principal law.

"Any law that violates sharia is null and void legally," he said, citing as an example the law on marriage passed during the slain dictator's 42-year tenure that imposed restrictions on polygamy, which is permitted in Islam.

"The law of divorce and marriage... This law is contrary to sharia and it is stopped," Abdel Jalil said.

His comments have provoked criticism and calls for restraint both in Libya and in Europe, amid fears that the Arab Spring may give rise to a potentially intolerant Islamist resurgence.

Many Libyans awaiting Sunday's historic speech expressed surprise at the decision by the National Transitional Council leader to mention the role of sharia law in the new country before addressing such important issues as security and education.

"It's shocking and insulting to state, after thousands of Libyans have paid for freedom with their lives, that the priority of the new leadership is to allow men to marry in secret," said Rim, 40, a Libyan feminist who requested anonymity.

"We did not slay Goliath so that we now live under the Inquisition," she told AFP.

In his speech, Abdel Jalil also announced the introduction of Islamic banking in Libya in keeping with sharia which prohibits the earning of interest, or riba in Arabic, that is considered a form of usury.

Adelrahman al-Shatr, one of the founders of the centre-right Party of National Solidarity, launched just last week, said it was premature for the NTC leader to speak about the policies of the new state.

"It is a subject that should be discussed with the different political groups and with the Libyan people," he said.

"These declarations create feelings of pain and bitterness among women who sacrificed so many martyrs," in the eight-month battle against Kadhafi loyalists, he added.

"By abolishing the marriage law, women lose the right to keep the family home if they divorce. It is a disaster for Libyan women."

Western leaders also responded swiftly to Abdel Jalil's comments, with EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton saying on Monday Libya's introduction of sharia law must respect human rights and democratic principles.

Abdel Jalil, a respected former justice minister of Kadhafi who distanced himself from the old regime, is seen as a pious man and a Sufi follower of Islam who is at odds with extremism.

He has already said that the new Libya would not adopt any extremist ideology, and sought to reassure the international community by stating on Monday that Libyans were moderate Muslims.

Nevertheless, Libya's Islamists are a rising force in the country's political arena, some of whom, such as Abdelhakim Belhaj, the founder of the Al-Qaeda linked but now-disbanded Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), are expected to hold prominent positions.

After suffering decades of persecution by Kadhafi, they are also working hard to present themselves as proponents of tolerant, democratic values and policies.

"The rules and laws (in new Libya) should take Islam as a basic reference," Islamist leader Sheikh Ali Sallabi, a supporter of Belhaj, told AFP.

He insisted that freedom, justice, equality and respect for human dignity should be enshrined in the new constitution, along with the peaceful rotation of power.

"We believe in the rights of others to show their programmes to the people, and to let the people decide," said Sallabi, who was jailed for eight years during the 1980s in Tripoli's notorious Abu Salim prison.

"We also believe in the freedom of the press and the right to self expression. We believe that our religion accommodates these rights," he added.

Hanging Rock

I've been here..awesome place
Living life on the edge: It's no picnic at Hanging Rock as couple perch inches from an 800 FEET fall | Mail Online

'I couldn't help thinking of the 1975 hit film 'Picnic At Hanging Rock', but that was actually filmed in Victoria,' said Mr Matthews.

Photographer Michael Matthews was amazed to see the duo so far out on the narrow rock formation, overlooking the Grose River Gorge in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales.

Libyans urged to unite

Libyans urged to unite after death of Gaddafi - Yahoo! News

Libya's interim prime minister said he was resigning on Saturday and urged new leaders to seize a "very limited opportunity" and resolve rivalries now surfacing after Muammar Gaddafi's death.

With regional differences emerging about what to do with Gaddafi's still unburied body, the formal end to the war and the carve-up of power, Libya's outgoing premier said the coming days posed a crucial test of resolve for the new men in power.

Mahmoud Jibril said he would step down later on Saturday, after seven months as prime minister of the Western-backed rebel government now that the legal declaration of "liberation" was expected on Sunday following Gaddafi's killing on Thursday.

But in a parting shot at an international business forum in Jordan, he warned Libyans to avoid in-fighting if Libyans were to keep to a plan to hold their first free election next year.

Leaders required "resolve," he said, "in the next few days."

In Misrata, the curious and the relieved filed for a second day through a market cold store to view the body of Gaddafi, whose surprise capture and killing in his hometown of Sirte sparked joy - and renewed jockeying for postwar influence.

Visitors wore surgical masks against the stench, an image that may trouble some Muslims, for whom swift burial is a holy duty - even if few Libyans share the unease among their Western allies over what some believe was a summary execution.

Jibril said progress for Libya would need great resolution, both by interim leaders on the National Transitional Council and by six million war-weary people: "First," he said, "What kind of resolve the NTC will show in the next few days?

"And the other thing depends mainly on the Libyan people - whether they differentiate between the past and the future."

He added: "I am counting on them to look ahead and remember the kind of agony they went through in the last 42 years.

"We need to seize this very limited opportunity."

"LIBERATION"

The formal declaration of an end to war and of "liberation" from Gaddafi's rule was expected to be made by NTC chairman Mustafa Abdel Jalil on Sunday in the eastern city of Benghazi, the seat of the revolt inspired by the fall of autocrats in neighboring Tunisia and Egypt.

There have been several delays to the announcement. It will set a clock ticking on a plan for a new government and constitutional assembly leading to full democracy in 2013.

Jibril reaffirmed the plan was for elections to the body that will draft a constitution to be held in eight months.

Gaddafi's body remained in Misrata, bearing wounds assumed to have been inflicted by fighters from the city who hauled him from a drain in his hometown Sirte. A field commander in Misrata worried that trouble was brewing:

"The fear now is what is going to happen next," he said, speaking to Reuters privately, as ordinary Libyans, some taking pictures for family albums, filed in under armed guard to see for themselves that the man they feared was truly dead.

"There is going to be regional in-fighting. You have Zintan and Misrata on one side and then Benghazi and the east," the guerrilla said. "There is in-fighting even inside the army."

DIVISIONS

Comparisons with Iraq after Saddam Hussein are tempered by the absence of the Sunni-Shi'ite divide which ravaged that country. However, as in Iraq, there are vast energy resources at stake and international powers keen to exploit them.

Regional enmities thrive, as well as differences between Islamists and secularists and among those who once served Gaddafi - like NTC head Abdel Jalil - and others. There is also ethnic tension between Arabs and Berbers.

Gaddafi's surviving family, in exile, have asked that his body and that of his son Mo'tassim be handed over to tribal kinsmen from Sirte. NTC officials said they were trying to arrange a secret resting place to avoid loyalist supporters making it a shrine.

Unlike on Friday, Gaddafi's body was covered by a blanket that left only his head exposed, hiding bruises on his torso and scratch marks on his chest that had earlier been visible.

A Reuters reporter who viewed the body said Gaddafi's head had been turned to the left. That hid a bullethole that earlier could be seen on the left side of his face.

SUMMARY EXECUTION?

Gaddafi's family and international human rights groups have urged an inquiry into how Gaddafi, 69, was killed, since gory cellphone video footage showed him alive but being beaten and taunted by his captors. Jibril said on the day that Gaddafi was killed in "crossfire" in an ambulance taking him to hospital.

But an ambulance driver in Sirte told Reuters Gaddafi was already dead by the time he picked him up, and a local military commander in Misrata said "over-enthusiastic" fighters had taken matters into their own hands:

"We wanted to keep him alive. But the young guys...," he told Reuters. "Things went out of control."

The International Criminal Court at The Hague had wanted to try Gaddafi for war crimes and may yet be able to try his son Saif al-Islam if he is found. NTC officials believe he escaped from the last redoubt in Sirte, after French jets had scattered a convoy of dozens of vehicles trying to flee with his father.

Intelligence chief Abdullah al-Senussi, the third man wanted by the ICC, managed to reach Niger, officials have said.

Libyans also want to try some of the old guard at home.

Despite the qualms of some abroad, few compatriots are troubled by Gaddafi's bloody end, captured in clips of cellphone video broadcast around the world.

"People in the West don't understand the agony and pain that the people went through during the past 42 years," said Jibril, who added he felt "reborn" when he heard the news.

Abdulatif, a pilot, who came to see the body in Misrata, asked: "What would he tell the mother whose children were killed or the girls who were raped? If he lived and was killed a thousand times that would still only be a trifle."

Nonetheless, some Libyans have expressed unease at the way Gaddafi's body has been treated - Muslim custom dictates it should have been buried by sundown on Thursday - and at other matters of religion and respect for the dead.

Gaddafi's daughter Aisha, her mother and two of her brothers fled to Algeria after the fall of Tripoli. Aisha gave birth on the day she arrived.

The government in Algiers has angered the NTC by refusing to send them back. But an Algerian newspaper on Saturday quoted official sources saying that, following the death of the head of the family, they might now reconsider.

Who's next?

Gaddafi dead: Obama warns Syrian President Bashar al-Assad | Mail Online

How things can change in a year: Four dictators are pictured together last October smiling and laughing but months later president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali from Tunisia, left, was the first to fall. To his right is Yemen's Ali Abdullah Saleh, who is clinging to power. Gaddafi, in shades and golden robes, is now dead. Egypt's former president Hosni Mubarak, right, was ousted in February

Every cloud has a... tent? The optical illusion that appears to show camping in the sky | Mail Online

This tent looks as though it has been pitched in the sky in a photograph that plays tricks on the eyes.

Student Bjarke Bitsch pitched his tent so high up Mont Blanc - the highest mountain in the French Alps - that snow and clouds blended together in this shot.

The 24-year-old from Aarhus in Denmark took the stunning photo during a three day-expedition to climb the peak in Chamonix, France.

(the late) Gadhafi on King Abdullah

He insulted Saudi King Abdullah in a 2009 meeting, dismissing him as "a British product." He said, "You are always lying, and you're facing the grave, and you were made by Britain and protected by the United States."
Moammar Gadhafi: The Name Calling Never Let Up - Yahoo! News

Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, killed Thursday in a rebel uprising in Sirte, will be remembered in the annals of name calling. Few leaders have been called more vile names than Gadhafi, and he had a few choice names of his own for foreign dignitaries.

Gadhafi also used a series of egotistical nicknames to refer to himself.

Here's a rundown on all that name-calling:

Names Others Called Gadhafi

Moammar Gadhafi was not a popular figure and many pols and pundits used derogatory nicknames to describe him. Here are some of the most common:

Former U.S. President Ronald Reagan nicknamed Gadhafi "mad dog of the Middle East."

He was called "a Barbary pirate" and the "king of international terrorism," according to UPI.

The Central Intelligence Agency dubbed him a "messianic paranoid."

Egyptian leader Anwar Sadat said Gadhafi was "an infantile nitwit."

The former president of Sudan said Gadhafi was "someone suffering from a split personality-both evil."

Vitaly Naumkin of the Russian Academy of Sciences soft-pedaled his name-calling, saying of Gadhafi in March, "probably he has lost his link with reality."

The blog Swiss matters says Gadhafi has also been called "Flakey Barbarian," "Ruthless Dictator," "Fashion King," and "Terrorist Financier."

Names Gadhafi Called Himself

Gadhafi himself preferred the nicknames "Colonel," "brother leader," "guide of the revolution," and "king of kings," "Great Leader," and "Dean of Arab rulers." The "king of kings" appellation was not one of his own creation but one bestowed on him by 200 African leaders. Another flattering moniker was "keeper of Arab Nationalism."

Names Gadhafi Called Other Leaders

Gadhafi had a particular distaste for U.S. Ronald Reagan, calling him "mad," "foolish," and "an Israeli dog."

He insulted Saudi King Abdullah in a 2009 meeting, dismissing him as "a British product." He said, "You are always lying, and you're facing the grave, and you were made by Britain and protected by the United States."

At a 1988 Arab summit, he accused other leaders of having "blood-stained hands" and wore a white glove to avoid skin contact during a handshake.

At a 2005 Arab summit, Gadhafi called the Israelis and Palestinian's "idiots."

Bangkok's Flood

few months ago when I was on that street in Bangkok, that street was so dry... hope the flood is over soon

Thailand flooding Photos | Thailand flooding Pictures - Yahoo! News

Thailand's premier warned Thursday that it was impossible to stop the kingdom's worst floods in decades gushing into Bangkok, ordering the city's sluice gates to be opened to tackle the "national crisis".

Occupy Melbourne at Flinders Street Station

I miss Melbourne. I used to go to that Melbourne's iconic station many times...love Melbourne :)
Occupy Melbourne Protesters Clash with Police Photos | Occupy Melbourne Protesters Clash with Police Pictures - Yahoo! News

MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - OCTOBER 22: Police officers on horseback stand guard outside of Flinders Street Station as 'Occupy Melbourne' protestors demonstrate on October 22, 2011 in Melbourne, Australia. Protesters and riot police clashed in Melbourne again today after police, acting on a Melbourne City Council eviction order, attempted to break up the crowd of hundreds that had been positioned in City Square for a week. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) less

Nakusa (Unwanted) gets name change

Indian girls called 'Unwanted' get name change - Yahoo! News

More than 100 Indian girls named "Unwanted" by their parents are to get new names this weekend as part of a campaign to tackle bias against women that has led to the country's huge gender imbalance.

About 150 of more than 200 girls called "Nakusa", which means "unwanted" in the local Marathi language of western Maharashtra state, will get rid of their first name for good on Saturday under an initiative in the district of Satara.

"We've identified 222 Nakusas," said district health officer Bhagwan Pawar, who has been behind a drive in the area to combat negative attitudes towards girls.

"The most probable reason for them being called 'Nakusa' is that they were the second, third or fourth child in that family and the parents wanted a boy," he told AFP.

Girls, particularly in poorer, rural areas of India, have traditionally been seen as a financial burden on their families because of the dowry that has to be paid when they marry.

In contrast, boys are viewed as heirs, future wage-earners and family heads.

"Many of these girls that we've identified don't want their name. They feel very bad about it, so there is a psychological impact," said Pawar.

"We will change their names and we will award them with certificates with the signature of the district collector (local government official) and myself. All their school documents and official records will be changed."

A preference for boys has led to a rise in the abortion of female foetuses in India as well as the neglect and even murder of baby girls, meaning millions of women are effectively "missing" from the population.

India has made the use of ultrasound scans to inform parents-to-be of the sex of their unborn child illegal, but a lack of enforcement means the practice continues.

One study published in The Lancet medical journal suggested that as many as half a million female foetuses are estimated to be aborted each year in India.

In April this year, 15 female foetuses were found on a rubbish dump in the eastern city of Patna.

In Satara, 190 kilometres (120 miles) from the state capital Mumbai, the sex ratio is 881 girls for every 1,000 boys -- well below the rural average of 919.

The national average of 914 is the worst since India became independent in 1947 and lags the global benchmark of 952.

Nature provides a biological standard for the sex ratio at birth of 943-962 females for 1,000 males. Any significant divergence from that narrow range can only be explained by abnormal factors, say population experts.

Sudha Kankaria, an activist who runs the local Save Girl Child charity and who has been involved in the renaming project, said the "Nakusas" of Satara were living examples of prejudice.

Because of their first name, many girls had poor self-esteem, were embarrassed and discriminated against, with the risk that they will pass on their insecurities to their own daughters, she added.

"It's a vicious circle and we should break it. With this project, we are benefiting two people: the Nakusas and the future Nakusas," she said.

Some girls have already changed their names in recent weeks, said Kankaria, adding that she has been working to introduce a pledge into the Hindu marriage ceremony for local couples to welcome and honour baby girls.

The first Nakusas to change their names were two young cousins, now called Aishwarya and Sunita.

"I didn't choose this name but it is nice," eight-year-old Aishwarya told the Times of India newspaper last month. "(My friends) still call me Nakusa because they have become used to it.

"But whenever anybody calls me Nakusa, I correct them," she added.

Steven Pinker's research reveal dramatic reductions in war deaths, family violence, racism, rape, murder and all sorts of mayhem

Bombings, beheadings? Stats show a peaceful world - Yahoo! News

It seems as if violence is everywhere, but it's really on the run.

Yes, thousands of people have died in bloody unrest from Africa to Pakistan, while terrorists plot bombings and kidnappings. Wars drag on in Iraq and Afghanistan. In peaceful Norway, a man massacred 69 youths in July. In Mexico, headless bodies turn up, victims of drug cartels. This month eight people died in a shooting in a California hair salon.

Yet, historically, we've never had it this peaceful.

That's the thesis of three new books, including one by prominent Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker. Statistics reveal dramatic reductions in war deaths, family violence, racism, rape, murder and all sorts of mayhem.

In his book, Pinker writes: "The decline of violence may be the most significant and least appreciated development in the history of our species."

And it runs counter to what the mass media is reporting and essentially what we feel in our guts.

Pinker and other experts say the reality is not painted in bloody anecdotes, but demonstrated in the black and white of spreadsheets and historical documents. They tell a story of a world moving away from violence.

In his new book, "The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined," Pinker makes the case that a smarter, more educated world is becoming more peaceful in several statistically significant ways. His findings are based on peer-reviewed studies published by other academics using examinations of graveyards, surveys and historical records:

— The number of people killed in battle — calculated per 100,000 population — has dropped by 1,000-fold over the centuries as civilizations evolved. Before there were organized countries, battles killed on average more than 500 out of every 100,000 people. In 19th century France, it was 70. In the 20th century with two world wars and a few genocides, it was 60. Now battlefield deaths are down to three-tenths of a person per 100,000.

— The rate of genocide deaths per world population was 1,400 times higher in 1942 than in 2008.

— There were fewer than 20 democracies in 1946. Now there are close to 100. Meanwhile, the number of authoritarian countries has dropped from a high of almost 90 in 1976 to about 25 now.

Pinker says one of the main reasons for the drop in violence is that we are smarter. IQ tests show that the average teenager is smarter with each generation. The tests are constantly adjusted to keep average at 100, and a teenager who now would score a 100 would have scored a 118 in 1950 and a 130 in 1910. So this year's average kid would have been a near-genius a century ago. And that increase in intelligence translates into a kinder, gentler world, Pinker says.

"As we get smarter, we try to think up better ways of getting everyone to turn their swords into plowshares at the same time," Pinker said in an interview. "Human life has become more precious than it used to be."

Pinker argued his case in a commentary this past week in the scientific journal Nature. He has plenty of charts and graphs to back up his claims, including evidence beyond wartime deaths — evidence that our everyday lives are also less violent:

— Murder in European countries has steadily fallen from near 100 per 100,000 people in the 14th and 15th centuries to about 1 per 100,000 people now.

— Murder within families. The U.S. rate of husbands being killed by their wives has dropped from 1.2 per 100,000 in 1976 to just 0.2. For wives killed by their husbands, the rate has slipped from 1.4 to 0.8 over the same time period.

— Rape in the United States is down 80 percent since 1973. Lynchings, which used to occur at a rate of 150 a year, have disappeared.

— Discrimination against blacks and gays is down, as is capital punishment, the spanking of children, and child abuse.

But if numbers are too inaccessible, Pinker is more than happy to provide the gory stories illustrating our past violence. "It is easy to forget how dangerous life used to be, how deeply brutality was once woven into the fabric of daily existence," Pinker writes in his book.

He examines body counts, rapes, sacrifice and slavery in the Bible, using an estimate of 1.2 million deaths detailed in the Old Testament. He describes forms of torture used in the Middle Ages and even notes the nastiness behind early day fairy tales, such as the evil queen's four gruesome methods for killing Snow White along with a desire to eat her lungs and liver.

Even when you add in terrorism, the world is still far less violent, Pinker says.

"Terrorism doesn't account for many deaths. Sept. 11 was just off the scale. There was never a terrorist attack before or after that had as many deaths. What it does is generate fear," he said.

It's hard for many people to buy the decline in violence. Even those who deal in peace for a living at first couldn't believe it when the first academics started counting up battle deaths and recognized the trends.

In 1998, Andrew Mack, then head of strategic planning for U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, said a look at the statistics showed the world was becoming less violent. The reaction from his professional peacekeeping colleagues?

"Pffft, it's not true," they told Mack, arguing that the 1990s had to be the worst decade in U.N. history. It wasn't even close.

Joshua Goldstein, a professor of international relations at American University and author of "Winning the War on War," has also been telling the same story as Pinker, but from a foreign policy point of view. At each speech he gives, people bring up America's lengthy wars in the Middle East. "It's been a hard message to get through," he acknowledged.

"We see the atrocities and they are atrocious," Goldstein said. "The blood is going to be just as red on the television screens."

Mack, who's now with Simon Fraser University in Canada, credits the messy, inefficient and heavily political peacekeeping process at the U.N., the World Bank and thousands of non-governmental organizations for helping curb violence.

The "Human Security Report 2009/2010," a project led by Mack and funded by several governments, is a worldwide examination of war and violence and has been published as a book. It cites jarringly low numbers. While the number of wars has increased by 25 percent, they've been minor ones.

The average annual battle death toll has dropped from nearly 10,000 per conflict in the 1950s to less than 1,000 in the 21st century. And the number of deadliest wars — those that kill at least 1,000 people a year — has fallen by 78 percent since 1988.

Mack and Goldstein emphasize how hard society and peacekeepers have worked to reduce wars, focusing on action taken to tamp down violence, while Pinker focuses on cultural and thought changes that make violence less likely. But all three say those elements are interconnected.

Even the academics who disagree with Pinker, Goldstein and Mack, say the declining violence numbers are real.

"The facts are not in dispute here; the question is what is going on," John Mearsheimer, a professor of political science at the University of Chicago and author of "The Tragedy of Great Power Politics."

"It's been 21 years since the Cold War ended and the United States has been at war for 14 out of those 21 years," Mearsheimer said. "If war has been burned out of the system, why do we have NATO and why has NATO been pushed eastward...? Why are we spending more money on defense than all other countries in the world put together?"

What's happening is that the U.S. is acting as a "pacifier" keeping the peace all over the world, Mearsheimer said. He said like-minded thinkers, who call themselves "realists" believe "that power matters because the best way to survive is to be really powerful." And he worries that a strengthening China is about to upset the world power picture and may make the planet bloodier again.

And Goldstein points out that even though a nuclear attack hasn't occurred in 66 years — one nuclear bomb could change this trend in an instant.

Pinker said looking at the statistics and how violent our past was and how it is less so now, "makes me appreciate things like democracy, the United Nations, like literacy."

He and Goldstein believe it's possible that an even greater drop in violence could occur in the future.

Goldstein says there's a turn on a cliché that is apt: "We're actually going from the fire to the frying pan. And that's progress. It's not as bad as the fire."

___

Researcher Julie Reed Bell contributed to this report.

___

Online:

Steven Pinker's web site: http://stevenpinker.com/

A lecture by Pinker with his statistics and graphics on a "history of violence:" http://bit.ly/rupVbk

Joshua Goldstein's book website: http://winningthewaronwar.com/

The Human Security Report Project: http://www.hsrgroup.org/

Call him the billion-dollar man. One billion for one dictator.

For $1 billion, one dictator | Exclusive - Yahoo! News

For $1 billion, one dictator

According to the Pentagon, that was the cost to U.S. taxpayers for Muammar el-Qaddafi's head: $1.1 billion through September, the latest figure just out of the Defense Department.

And that's just for the Americans.

The final totals will take some time to add up, and still do not include the State Department, CIA, and other agencies involved or other NATO and participating countries. Vice President Joe Biden said that the U.S. "spent $2 billion total and didn't lose a single life." NATO does not track the operational costs to each member country, but the funds directly taken from a common NATO account for Libya operations have totaled about $7.4 million per month for electronic warfare capabilities and $1.1 million per month for headquarters and command staff, a NATO spokesman said.

(PHOTOS: Qaddafi Through the Years)

From the beginning of Operation Unified Protector in March, critics have questioned whether the U.S. could afford to open a third front. The Congressional Research Services estimate the Afghanistan war has cost nearly $500 billion so far. With Iraq, the figure easily tops $1 trillion.

In the first week of Libya operations, bombs were dropped from B-2 stealth planes flown from Missouri and roughly 200 missiles launched from submarines in the Mediterranean, causing alarm that any extended campaign would quickly cost billions more.

But after the U.S. military ramped up the operation, other NATO countries shouldered most of the air burden. Americans took a supporting role: aerial refueling tankers, electronic jamming, and surveillance.

The behind-the-scenes role was something President Obama celebrated in remarks in the Rose Garden on Thursday.

"Without putting a single U.S. service member on the ground, we achieved our objectives and our NATO mission will soon come to an end," Obama said.

(RELATED: Why Qaddafi's Demise Has Little Political Promise)

As to when that mission would end, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said in a statement NATO issued from Brussels, "We will terminate our mission in coordination with the United Nations and the National Transitional Council."

U.S. and NATO officials steadily maintained their mission was never to hunt, capture or kill the Libyan leader. The mission, they said, was to enforce the arms embargo, establish and hold a no-fly zone, and take actions to protect civilians from attack or the threat of attack.

That last directive seemed to give plenty of reason to target Libya's top commander. But Pentagon officials said for months that if Qaddafi should happen to be at one of those locations when NATO missiles strike, so be it.

Since the operation began on March 31, getting to Qaddafi's final stand required 7,725 air sorties and 1,845 strike sorties, 397 of which dropped ordnance, and 145 Predator drone strikes.

NATO aircraft, including those supplied by the U.S., totaled 26,089 sorties and 9,618 strike sorties through Wednesday.

(RELATED: Obama to Libyans: You've Won Your Revolution)

More than 70 U.S. aircraft have supported the operation, including Predator drones.

NATO flew 67 sorties and 16 strikes sorties over Libya one day before Qaddafi was killed.

The NATO mission also employed submarines, aircraft carriers, amphibious assault ships, destroyers, frigates, and supply ships—as many as 21 vessels at one time.

Additionally, as of one week ago, the U.S. had sold participating countries in the operation roughly $250 million in ammunition, parts, fuel, technical assistance, and other support, according to the Pentagon.

Several members of Congress put out statements celebrating Qaddafi's downfall but did not comment on the cost. Several offices contacted did not provide additional reaction to the monetary figures.

But presidential candidate Ambassador Jon Huntsman did question the cost of the Libya operation. His statement on Thursday said, "I remain firm in my belief that America can best serve our interests and that transition through non-military assistance and rebuilding our own economic core here at home."

Visit National Journal for more political news.

Which Middle East Dictator Is Going Down Next?

 - Yahoo! News

Muammar Gaddafi's death-if confirmed- sends a sharp signal to the remaining Arab dictators from Algeria to Yemen that you better run; don't hang around too long. The unprecedented Arab revolutions of 2011 have not yet run their course.

Gaddafi misruled his country for longer than any of his fellow dictators. He seized power right after the June 1967 war. He ordered the bombing of PanAm 103 and he supported terror around the world. President Obama's decision to help Libya's rebels fight for their freedom looks increasingly like a smart call.

The regional implications are many. Northeast Africa from Tunis to Cairo has now been swept free of three dictators. Will the revolution now move west to Algiers? The biggest country in Africa today, Algeria, has given Gaddafi's family safe haven in exile. It quietly hoped for Gaddafi's success against the rebels and openly opposed NATO's air war. Will Algerians be inspired now to oust their generals? As a huge country with massive oil and gas reserves Algeria's future is critical to America and Europe. Senior French decision makers tell me Paris is watching the Algerian picture closely.

Syria's Assad dynasty has long been close to Gaddafi. They helped many of the same terrorists and the Iranian mullahs. The Syrian rebels will be encouraged by their Libyan brothers’ success. Bashar should get his tickets to Tehran ready. NATO is not going to help the Syrians; Libya was a one off in many ways. But the power of the Arab awakening should not be underestimated.

Yemen's Ali Abdallah Saleh has ruled his country almost as long as Gaddafi. Now the UN may demand his departure after he has taken the country to the edge of civil war. He may wonder whether he should have stayed in his Saudi hospital after all. He needs to go back to Riyadh for good.

The Bahraini ruling family has never supported terror nor been as brutal as the Libyan mad man but they should also be worried. They have rejected reform for far too long on their little island kingdom. The Bahrainis and their Saudi backers seem to believe repression will work forever. They are mistaken. The 21st century Arab world is changing like no one anticipated, least of all its dictators.

Of course the hard part of the Arab revolutions is only just beginning. Making new democracies from failed police states will be a very difficult challenge. The Arabs face daunting problems. Libya itself is a relatively recent and artificial creation of Italian imperialism and it is severely divided on regional and tribal grounds. But we should be impressed by the Arab peoples-despite terrible repression they are fighting for a new world.

Olga Onassis and Greek Tragedy

Scavenging through rubbish bins, how desperate times have pushed Olga Onassis from riches to poverty | Mail Online

She looks like any old bag lady scavenging for cast-offs in the rubbish as the world looks the other way.

But this is no ordinary woman - she is Olga Onassis, 90, a woman linked by marriage to one of the richest dynasties in the world.

She has now fallen, like her country, on desperate times. She is a regular at a church soup kitchen in the Greek capital Athens and roots around in the overflowing garbage containers of the city for clothes.

Riches to rags: Olga Onassis, 90, has become a symbol of the modern Greek tragedy that is playing out with the eurozone as she rummages through rubbish for anything of use

German newspaper Bild spoke with her this week as her debt ridden nation lurched into violence and chaos once more.

Olga Onassis' husband Georgios was the cousin of Aristotle Onassis, the fabulously wealthy Greek shipping tycoon who married President John F. Kennedy's widow Jackie in 1968.

Gadhafi's death: Vindication for Obama?

- The Week

Best Opinion:  Financial Times, Cato at Liberty, Antiwar

The foreign effort to protect Libya's pro-democracy uprising culminated Thursday in Moammar Gadhafi's death, following a NATO airstrike. In the last seven months, President Obama has endured no end of grief over that Western effort, which began in the spring with a no-fly zone preventing Gadhafi's forces from slaughtering civilians. Obama's taken heat from both the Left and the Right, with some calling the NATO-backed war an unnecessary military adventure, while others criticized Obama for taking a back seat and letting France and Britain lead. Will Gadhafi's death and the liberation of the last pockets of Libya  controlled by his loyalists finally silence Obama's critics?

Yes. This shows Obama did the right thing in Libya: Gadhafi's demise bolsters "Obama's reputation as a strong commander-in-chief," says Anna Fifield at Britain's Financial Times. The president was first pummeled for launching the humanitarian air war, and then for letting it turn into an effort to oust Gadhafi. But results speak loudly. Libya is free of Gadhafi, and Obama ought to be vindicated. Sorry, Republicans, but your 2012 candidate will have to debate national security with the guy who got both Osama bin Laden and Moammar Gadhafi.
"Gaddafi death boosts Obama's reputation"

No way. This justifies nothing: Gadhafi's death is "good news" because it means we can end our military involvement in Libya, says Christopher Preble at Cato at Liberty. But it doesn't "validate the original decision to launch military operations without authorization from Congress." Our air war "did not advance a vital national security interest." The Libyan rebels could have, and should have, done this on their own.
"Gadhafi's death does not legitimize U.S. intervention in Libya"

Obama will be judged on what happens next: Obama's "decision to oust Gadhafi" implicated the U.S. in Libya's future, says John Glaser at Antiwar. Now the president will have to shower the victorious rebels with money and weaponry, and there's still no guarantee they'll "actually secure power and operate a functioning government." If they do, Obama might have a new oil-rich ally; if they don't, or if the new leaders prove to be as brutal as Gadhafi, Obama won't be viewed quite so favorably.
"Gadhafi is dead, 'luckily' we have 'implicated' ourselves in Libya's future"

Does Obama Deserve Credit for Killing Qaddafi?

A Lot of People on Twitter are saying things like this: "I swear to god if Obama gets praised for #Gadhafi I will leave the United States."
Does Obama Deserve Credit for Killing Qaddafi? - Yahoo! News

Minutes after unconfirmed reports of Qaddafi's death broke, pundits started arguing over whether or not Obama deserves credit. If indeed the Libyan dictator is done for--and it certainly looks like is--he would be yet another on a growing list of major terrorist targets brought down this year under the president's watch. However, Qaddafi wasn't the sort of direct hit that Osama bin Laden, Anwar al-Awlaki and Atiyah Abd al-Rahman (Al Qaeda's former number two) were, so the debate over Obama's role in the former dictator's death is necessarily convoluted. But the entire Libyan conflict has been that way from the start. When he sent troops to help the rebels less than six months ago, the president caused an uproar on all sides, catching flak from some for not being more aggressive and others for entangling the United States needlessly in another war. As The Atlantic Wire's Elspeth Reeve wrote at the time, conservatives and liberals simply "agreed to disagree with Obama." Now that Qaddafi is reportedly gone for good, folks seem eager to take sides, and this time, the split is more predictable.
Related: Obama's No-Fly Zone Dilemma

Those Giving Obama Credit

Nick Kristoff at The New York Times tweeted soon after the news broke, "If Qaddafi is dead, this is (tentative) vindication of a brave Obama decision to back rebels trying to overthrow him." On MSNBC later on Thursday morning, Kristoff said, "It was an unusual decision by President Obama to engage in libya and it was very controversial … At least for now, tentatively, this strikes me as somehwat of a vindication for that decision."
Related: Qaddafi Politely Asks Obama to Stop Bombing His Country

Juan Williams at Fox News rushed up a column unabashed tipping his hat to the president under the headline "Can't Argue with American Policy Now, Qaddafi's Dead and the Results Speak for Themselves." Williams sounds a lot like Kristoff, too. "The news from the Middle East is vindication of the Obama administration's policy in Libya," he writes.
Related: Admiral Admits NATO Is Trying to Kill Qaddafi

John Kerry doesn't name Obama specifically but says that Qaddafi's death shows how "the United States demostrated clear leadership," according to MSNBC's live broadcast.
Related: France and Britain Swap Roles with U.S. on Libya Military Action

Andrew Sullivan at The Daily Beast blogged, "To rid the world of Osama bin Laden, Anwar al-Awlaki and Moammar Qaddafi within six months: if Obama were a Republican, he'd be on Mount Rushmore by now."
Related: How Qaddafi's Son Lost 1,000 Olympics Tickets in 24 Hours

Those Not Giving Obama Credit

Mitt Romney tweeted "Muammar al-Qaddafi was a tyrant who terrorized the Libyan people and shed American blood and the world is a better place without him."

John McCain conspicuously avoids mentioning the president in his remarks. The Chicago Tribute transcribed his Thursday morning remarks:

The death of Muammar Kadafi marks an end to the first phase of the Libyan revolution. While some final fighting continues, the Libyan people have liberated their country. Now the Libyan people can focus all of their immense talents on strengthening their national unity, rebuilding their country and economy, proceeding with their democratic transition, and safeguarding the dignity and human rights of all Libyans. The United States, along with our European allies and Arab partners, must now deepen our support for the Libyan people, as they work to make the next phase of their democratic revolution as successful as the fight to free their country.

Chris Cillizza at The Washington Post anticipates the credit question and argues how it won't even matter. "The reported death of deposed Libyan dictator Moammar Gaddafi will be touted by Democrats as another foreign policy success story for President Obama but seems unlikely to seriously affect his political fortunes heading into a 2012 campaign still laser-focused on the struggling U.S. economy," he writes.

Propaganda in the Global Media

Flat Earth News: An Award-winning Reporter Exposes Falsehood, Distortion and Propaganda in the Global Media: Amazon.co.uk: Nick Davies: Books

Flat Earth News: An Award-winning Reporter Exposes Falsehood, Distortion and Propaganda in the Global Media [Hardcover]\
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Occupy Wall Street? Why Not Occupy a Job?

 - Yahoo! News

COMMENTARY | Yes, I have student loans. Am I mad about that? No. Because I chose to go to college. Do I think college should be given to me? No. It's something you work for. It's something you earn. Don't want to have to pay for it? Study hard and get scholarships. It's not my (or any taxpayers') fault you decided to be an art history major and during a recession you can't "find a job."

Honestly, don't give me that "can't find a job" line. Temp agencies are always hiring. McDonald's is always hiring. How about, rather than trashing the streets, blocking traffic and using an NYPD car as a bathroom, you look for a job?

These Occupy "where ever you are" protesters are getting on my last nerve.

Here's an idea. Want to stick it to the banks? Don't take a loan. Don't borrow money. Don't spend more than you make. If you can't afford it, don't buy it. Want to change the world? Want to change policy? Don't just hang out. DO SOMETHING. Contact your representatives, your senators, the president. Write letters, tweets, emails. Make phone calls.

Do I agree with the protesters? No. Have you read some of the "demands" of the group? Wow. If that's the kind of government and regulations they want, I'm sure Cuba would love to have them. But their anger is directed at the wrong group. It's not Wall Street or bankers, it's the failed administration of Barack Obama. The protesters need to move from Wall Street to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Here's the deal. Just because you were born in America, you're only entitled to three things, Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. No one said "health care" or "college education." People who have worked for things (and yes, even those who have inherited it) owe nothing to anyone.

Yes. We need to boost the economy, but I've never known of a poor company hiring people, it's always the companies that are doing well that hire. We need to get our people back to work. We need to stop the wasteful spending (and bailouts). This is America. No one and no company is too big to fail. It is failing is how we learn. At nine months of age, we didn't start walking around without falling a few times.

Unlike this blogger, I don't consider myself a percentage. My husband and I don't own, we rent. Having worked for a mortgage company, I knew that once the "balloon loans" everyone was getting came due, it was going to burst. And it did. But I knew what we could and couldn't afford. So we didn't buy.

It's about personal responsibility. That's what it all comes down to. It's something that worked for our grandparents... why can't our generation do it? Stop blaming and start working. And be sure to vote in 2012.

Silence

Wilhelm Sasnal – review | Art and design | guardian.co.uk l Whitechapel Gallery

'A kind of visual silence' ... Wilhelm Sasnal's repainting of George Seurat's Bathers at Asnières (detail). Photograph: Wilhelm Sasnal/Sadie Coles HQ

The Occupy Wall Street image that marks the end of the global consensus

 | Jonathan Jones | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

A New York police officer leans forward and yells as if attempting, with the sheer force of his anger, to hold back time. His rage is understandable for, in this photograph, you can actually see the world turn upside down and all that was solid melt into air. This truly is a picture of a turning point in the history of the world.

It shows the moment when Occupy Wall Street campaigners reached Times Square, whose giant hoardings glow brightly in broad daylight even as furious protesters confront mounted police. When this photograph was taken, movements were simultaneously starting up around the world in emulation of Occupy Wall Street and its attempt to hold finance capitalists to account. In London and Vancouver, Brussels and – with a violent twist – in Rome, the call went out and the people came. But of all the weekend's photographs of global protest against capitalist excess, this, surely, is the image that will endure.

That is because it captures the surrealism of a moment when the stabilities and certainties of an era suddenly became yesterday's distant memory. Times Square makes a powerful setting for this picture. Shiny walls of towing glass, the citadels of corporate entertainment, dazzle among the giant screens – is that Apu from The Simpsons? – in the bright autumn air.

But no one is entertained. The faces in the crowd are genuinely angry and determined. A man in the foreground has a red star on his T-shirt. Sixty years ago they hunted reds in Times Square, metaphorically at least, as America fought the cold war. Today that red star says it all. These people have not come to protest just against a bad law or a single issue, but the system itself. They are putting capitalism in the dock. The photograph powerfully captures this moment because it so vividly shows the symbols of the order of things that inhabitants of western economies have up to now accepted.

There were "anti-capitalist" protests in the boom years but these were self-evidently marginal to a society lapping up the joys of credit. Today, the world is ready to listen to Occupy Wall Street and its claim to speak for the 99% against the profiteering 1%. Everyone knows what they are talking about and everyone can see some truth in it.

This deserves to be the remembered image of a moment when history assumed a new basic structure, but if you wanted to gauge the significance of these events a cartoon in the Times was also telling: a fat cat capitalist looks down on the marchers from a lofty skyscraper office. He comments that the people down there look small enough to crush with one finger. We've already done it, says his cigar-smoking colleague. When such a cartoon appears in the Times, hardly a Marxist publication, the world has changed.

This is a photograph of a turning point in history, not because the Occupy movement will necessarily succeed (whatever success might be) but because it has revealed the profoundly new possibilities of debate in a world that so recently seemed to agree about economic fundamentals. Occupy Wall Street and the global movement it is inspiring may yet prove to be an effective call for change, or a flash in the pan. That is not the point. Nor does it even matter if the protest is right or wrong. What matters is that unfettered capitalism, a force for economic dynamism that seemed unassailable, beyond reproach or reform, a monster we learned to be grateful for, suddenly finds its ugliness widely commented on, exposed among the lights of Times Square. The emperor of economics has no clothes.

This is an unbelievable moment. Pinch yourself. The global market economy triumphed two decades ago. In the 1980s, it was possible to dispute the Thatcherite cult of "wealth creation", but by the next decade most agreed she seemed to have been right. After the Soviet bloc disintegrated in 1989 the market ruled universally, the communist alternative turned out to have been a grotesque sham, and Bill Clinton and Tony Blair led the left to embrace free finance. This was the way the world worked. The old volumes of Das Kapital might as well go to the secondhand bookshop.

In this photograph we see the end of that consensual age, which turns out to have lasted just 20 years, when the free market was essentially beyond criticism. The very use of the word "capitalism" seemed corny a decade ago. What was the point of applying such a term to a way of life that seemed to have no outside to it? Now it is once again a word to hurl as abuse, as it was in the era of RH Tawney, or for that matter Lenin. Capitalism is in trouble because of the very fact that people are once again widely calling it "capitalism" – with the implication that we can dissent from it.

Socialist parties first got traction in the 1880s in the economic contraction that Victorians called their "Great Depression". In the capitalist crisis of the 1930s, western intellectuals admired Stalin, Welsh miners fought for the Republican cause in Spain, but many more in western Europe turned to the right. What collapsed was the liberal centre ground.

What we see collapse in this photograph is the post-1989 global consensus that unfettered market economies provide the greatest happiness for the greatest number. The slump is making people notice that another way to describe the free market is as Karl Marx's ruthless, tempestuous, darkly creative, but divisive and crisis-creating "capitalism". To say the word is to break a spell.