Decide what to worship

A tweet from my friend Antonia reminded me of the brilliance of this David Foster Wallace essay, which I first read just after he died. I'm a big fan of DFW, although his writing can be fairly patchy, because when he gets it right he really blows your socks off, in a 'deconstructing-the-little-things-that-you've-only-ever-noticed-subconsciously-and-rendering-them-profound-and-funny-at-the-same-time' kind of way.

I had a tedious, frustrating day yesterday (including very nearly getting squashed by a truck on my cycle journey home) but it was alleviated somewhat by reminding myself constantly "This is water, this is water..."

Fistula Foundation

Have a listen to this feature from Radio 4, about the Fistula Foundation hospital in Ethiopa; an excellent, rather moving report.

And by the way, The Fistula Foundation is one of the most worthwhile causes you could donate to - the treatment they give really does rebuild broken lives, so please think about helping them out.

The crazy tree blooms in America

This article in the Washington Post is excellent in putting all this absurd hyperbolic nonsense about healthcare reform, the 'Stalinist' NHS and 'death panels', into context. (My favourite right-wing gold so far: the claim that "if" Stephen Hawking was British he would have been left to die.)

It reminds me a bit of this classic essay, 'The Paranoid Style in American Politics' by Richard Hofstadter, which I have come back to time and time again since my A Level history teacher told me to read it (thanks JDM!).

Votes are not enough

The Times leader on Afghanistan yesterday was pretty spot-on I think, in labelling the heinous law on conjugal rights (see post below) "a defiance of what a democratic culture must mean", and this:

Democracy is a living process, measured in the culture of daily life, not counted periodically in votes cast in elections and the appearance of a representative government.

Paul Collier talks about this in his book Wars, Guns and Votes: Democracy in Dangerous Places: elections on their own are not enough without security, accountability and strong institutions.

Sometimes I despair

Nothing I can say will do justice to how deeply depressing this is...

Trousers in Sudan

Alright, I know I'm being very female-centric (Harriet Harman must have inspired me) but this woman is my new hero...

Maternal mortality

It's a sad and infuriating fact that pregnancy and childbirth remain hugely risky, life-threatening activities for many women in the developing world. These are largely preventable deaths, allowed to happen because of a chronic lack of resources, a result of systematic gender discrimination when it comes to reproductive healthcare. William Kristof's column highlights the issue; the White Ribbon Alliance do excellent work in terms of raising funds and awareness for this cause.