Aug 10
Aug 10
Bring the power of Skype’s 256-bit encryption into your home with the
iSensor HD home security camera. Currently in the fundraising stage at
Kickstarter, Amaryllo is showing a lot of promise with its iSensor HD
and corresponding mobile app. Remotely control the camera, view live
feeds, and upload footage to Google Cloud Storage.
Aug 10
Like Samsung, Nokia’s smartphone strategy has always been focused around choice. Sometimes this results in products that are so very similar that it’s impossible to tell the difference. That’s not an issue with Nokia’s Lumia 520, the ultra-budget…
Aug 10
At Guild Hall, when Florence Fabricant asked CNN’s Anthony Bourdain at a recent Q&A, which country was most surprising, he quickly answered Iran. Most Americans have not been there, and I seized a moment of opportunity. Now, he said ruefully, would not be the time. This celebrity food maven sniffs out are countries of smelly dysfunction over orderly functionality. And Iran surprised him with a people that had the attitude, Are you American? We don’t care what the government is doing; welcome, we want to know you. In a Teheran restaurant where they put flags on diners’ tables, they apologized, Sorry, all our American flags were burnt. Congo, he said was perhaps the most dangerous, run amok with warlords and militias. You don’t want to mess around. One minute you are fine, and the next everyone is glaring at you for being CIA. Known for his culinary adventures to these exotic locales, when he’s back in the states, Bourdain says he loves best a bite at the deli; the flipping of burgers in his Hamptons backyard fills him with bliss.
The literary crowd was not sure the tents for Author’s Night, to benefit the East Hampton library, were big enough to accommodate both Bill O’Reilly and Alec Baldwin. With over a hundred writers seated with piles of books in front of them, the event’s co-founder Baldwin chatted with best selling author Nelson DeMille. Lee Grant’s book about her blacklisted years, and eventual Oscar, I Said Yes to Everything, was one of the event’s big hits. Barbara Goldsmith marveled that when she founded the yearly book extravaganza, maybe a few locals attended. Now stretched out in a big field, the event attracts so many, the cars are backed up for parking. Although the authors are seated alphabetically–so that Martha Rogers did not sit with husband Dick Cavett–Ina Caro did not sit alongside her husband Robert Caro. How does it work to live with another writer? “When we work, we leave,” she quipped.
Dr. Bonnie Jacobson had piles of her useful self-help guides through loneliness and connection. Joe Pintauro encouraged a fan to buy a copy of his play Men’s Lives based on the book by Peter Matthiessen, “It’s only $10.” Another book, of his photography, goes for $3000. Needless to say, the publishers did not send that one. Suzanne Corso, author of The Suite Life posed for a photo with Jennifer Esposito, one writer, along with Giada De Laurentiis and Thomas Maier who were feted at the Hamptons Magazine dinner at Michael Braverman’s. Maier, the author of the book Masters of Sex, on which the current hot Showtime series was based, originally hoped for a two hour movie, and had to be convinced to sign on to the series for television. Maier revealed that the original actor to play Masters had no chemistry with Lizzy Kaplan’s Virginia Johnson, and John Madden flew to London to give the script to Michael Sheen, who was then performing in Hamlet. From the cerebral to the sublime.
A version of this post also appears on Gossip Central.
Aug 10
The Obama Paradox
Posted in: Today's ChiliNew York Times columnist Tom Friedman’s extended interview with President Obama shed some light on how Obama can be well-informed, thoughtful, prudent — yet still be seen as faltering as a foreign policy president.
If you compare Obama with George W. Bush (okay — a low bar), Obama wins, hands down. Unlike Bush, Obama inhabits the reality-based foreign policy space, with no apologies. Unlike Bush, he has no messianic zealots among his advisers. He gives the kind of well-considered responses that suggest a president who carefully engages with truly difficult policy conundrums.
Yet at the end of the day, he often comes across as vacillating and indecisive — an impression that can be fatal in his dealings with allies, adversaries, and of course electorates.
In the case of Iraq and ISIL, American air power got drawn in to the conflict despite Obama’s wishes and against the wishes of most Americans, who are quite weary of our decade-long Iraq misadventure. Though some on the left and the right may oppose these air strikes, the president really had little choice.
But as Obama’s Republican critics have demanded, what’s the policy going forward? It’s fine for Obama to declare that he doesn’t want to “get into the business of being the Kurdish air force,” but ISIL will not be stopped with a few waves of air bombardments. Both the Bush and Obama administrations made a huge mistake tolerating the Nuri al-Maliki regime, with its opportunistic all-Shiite complexion.
Here’s the practical dilemma: Either Obama re-inserts American power, both in forcing a more representative regime in Baghdad and in repelling the ISIL invading force, or a power vacuum persists, inviting more Islamist radicalism and more Sunni disaffection from the Iraqi government.
It’s not a pretty situation for any U.S. president. But ISIL was on the move weeks ago. It was clear to U.S. intelligence that this force was not going to be stopped by Iraqi’s ragtag military, much less by 500 U.S. advisers. Had Obama moved earlier, both against Maliki’s arrogance and against the ISIL invasion, he would have at least appeared more decisive and maybe made more of a difference on the ground.
Friedman wrote “Obama made clear that he is only going to involve America more deeply in places like the Middle East to the extent that the different communities there agree to an inclusive politics of no victor/no vanquished.” That sounds both cautious and idealist, almost Wilsonian. But is this principle a practical guide for urgent action when ISIL is at the gates of Mosul and Baghdad? Sunnis and Shiites are not going to embrace each other any time soon.
Freedman also quoted Obama to the effect that “in Iraq a residual U.S. troop presence would never have been needed had the Shiite majority there not ‘squandered an opportunity’ to share power with Sunnis and Kurds.” Well, of course. But was the U.S. without leverage over Maliki?
Obama, oddly, told Friedman that:
“[W]e did not just start taking a bunch of airstrikes all across Iraq as soon as ISIL came in was because that would have taken the pressure off of [Prime Minister Nuri Kamal] al-Maliki.” That only would have encouraged, he said, Maliki and other Shiites to think: ‘We don’t actually have to make compromises. We don’t have to make any decisions. We don’t have to go through the difficult process of figuring out what we’ve done wrong in the past. All we have to do is let the Americans bail us out again. And we can go about business as usual.'”
In effect, Obama is saying, we will let ISIL do the dirty work that America is unwilling to do in forcing out Maliki, while keeping enough military pressure on ISIL to prevent them from overrunning Iraq altogether. That tactic might work, but it is risky as hell, and it hardly adds up a policy of “no victors/no vanquished.”
America faces a similar conundrum with respect to Israel and Palestine. The Israelis are existentially dependent on the alliance with the United States, but at the end of the day no American president has been willing to apply necessary leverage over inflammatory Israeli actions on settlements on the West Bank or normalization of civilian life in Gaza.
Obama used the Friedman interview to bemoan his lack of leverage. He praised “the ingenuity, energy and vision of the Jewish people,” and quipped that Prime Minister Netanyahu’s “poll numbers are a lot higher than mine” and “were greatly boosted by the war in Gaza,” Obama added, “And so if he doesn’t feel some internal pressure, then it’s hard to see him being able to make some very difficult compromises, including taking on the settler movement.”
All true, but the U.S. has been reluctant to use the leverage it has. In fairness to Obama, no American president has been willing to push the Israel alliance to its breaking point. But once again, this president appears disengaged and weak.
It is Obama’s bad luck to be chief executive at a moment when the consequences of several bad policies of the past century are blowing up, on his watch. His answers to particular questions are thoughtful, prudent, and mindful of the limits of American power. But taken together, missteps like taking a little too long to move on Iraq, stumbling in his effort to define bright lines in Syria, and failing to dissuade the Israelis from brutal air strikes on civilian neighborhoods in Gaza, turn salutary prudence into the perception of weakness.
In his conversation with Friedman, Obama tried to connect the theme of partisan dysfunction at home to tribalism in the Mid-East. We Americans, he told Friedman, “will never realize our full potential unless our two parties adopt the same outlook that we’re asking of Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds or Israelis and Palestinians: No victor, no vanquished and work together.”
Something is wrong with that analogy. It begins to sound like an alibi for Obama’s inability to win bipartisan cooperation at home and it seems an impossible objective in the Middle East. As nasty as Republicans can be, our politics are not at the level of Sunnis versus Shiites, Israelis versus Palestinians, much less ISIL versus the Enlightenment.
Thus the Obama paradox. He is one of the best-informed and most thoughtful foreign policy presidents we have had in a long time, but his very appreciation of complexity often comes across as indecision.
No president ever wins points for being Hamlet. In today’s foreign policy crises, there are few good choices. Somehow, this president needs to hold on to his prudence while finding more decisiveness.
Robert Kuttner’s latest book is Debtors’ Prison: The Politics of Austerity Versus Possibility. He is co-editor of The American Prospect and a senior Fellow at Demos, and is a professor at Brandeis University’s Heller School.
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Aug 10
Trying to keep first-person video steady involves skill and the right equipment, but a new Microsoft Research project aims to help the everyday adventurer create hyperlapse creations that won’t induce unintentional nausea.
Aug 10
Why Russia could Invade Ukraine
Posted in: Today's ChiliThe crisis in Ukraine continues to get worse against a backdrop of conflicting signals.
Pro-Russian separatists have called for a ceasefire but Ukrainian forces continue to pound them in Donetsk. At the same time, the Ukrainian government says it is willing to accept an international aid mission to prevent humanitarian catastrophe as long as Russia stays out. Russia, meanwhile, seems to be playing cat and mouse with everyone involved.
To understand what might happen here, we need to take a step back and analyze the complicated long game that Russian President Vladimir Putin is really playing.
Sanctions
Last week, in response to economic sanctions by the West, Russia hit back with trade sanctions of its own. The Russian government banned the import of many food and agricultural products from Europe and the U.S., a move that could cost Western food suppliers more than $17 billion in lost revenue annually.
But given that Russia imports 75 percent of its food from Europe and the U.S., this move could also hurt the Russians since the underdeveloped farming sector in the country will not be able to fill the shortfall, and food prices for Russian consumers will rise.
Ukraine
In Ukraine, Russia basically has three stark choices.
If there is a ceasefire, Russia can enter the territory under the Trojan Horse pretext of a peacekeeping mission, but the Ukrainian government is unlikely to ever allow that. If the fighting continues, Russia has to find a way to supply the rebels with enough arms and ammunition to battle the intensified efforts of Ukrainian forces, which will be extremely difficult. The third choice is to simply invade. But even if any of these actions actually worked, they would widen the rift between Russia and the West and at best prolong the painful economic sanctions, at worst bring Russia to a state of war with NATO.
So the big question is how far will Putin go?
Probably much further than we think. The overarching reason is that the Ukraine situation isn’t really about conquest but about using the military as a political and economic tool. Hardline governments like Putin’s derive their power from conflict, both internally and abroad. That doesn’t mean that the Russian President wants outright war with NATO but the threat of one is enough to keep the West on edge, and Russia in a position of influence in world affairs. Brinksmanship is simply part of that game.
The other reason for Putin’s intransigence on Ukraine is economic. While trade sanctions could be devastating for Russia in the long term, Putin is betting that Europe and the U.S. will be forced to negotiate with his country once the impact of those sanctions start being felt on both sides of the divide. As the food sanctions imposed by Russia clearly indicate, economic punishment can run both ways and Putin is playing that card expertly right now.
From a public relations standpoint, lingering sanctions which deprive ordinary Russian people of necessary resources will turn the Russian public even further against the West and enable Putin to pursue a new Cold War. The only difference is that this Cold War will be fought more on the economic battlefield than a military one, with occasional proxy wars (like the one in Ukraine) being used to provoke and escalate hostilities.
Timing
Contrary to what some analysts think, Putin is not in a corner but exactly where he wants to be, and as such will continue to push the envelope. It is likely that Russia will intervene directly in the region sooner rather than later in order to exercise more control – and to prod the West.
With the U.S. embroiled in a potentially long battle with ISIS militants in Iraq, and because of wider security concerns in the Middle East, Putin knows it would be strategically difficult for America to take on yet another major conflict. Moreover, with midterm elections coming up soon, President Obama may be reluctant to take military action in multiple theaters and risk angering voters already suffering from anti-war fatigue due to Iraq and Afghanistan. This creates a window of opportunity for Russia to flex some muscle with fewer consequences to worry about.
Endgame
Putin also knows that once Russian forces go in, the U.S. will have no choice but to act militarily through NATO. However, given America’s constraints mentioned above and given the astronomical risks of a direct conflict between Russia and the West, any escalation will inevitably force both sides to the negotiating table on Ukraine and the sanctions as well.
More importantly, and this is the real kicker, the price that Putin will charge for backing down in Ukraine will be higher than simply the lifting of sanctions. In order to avoid giving Putin a massive symbolic victory through the annexation of Ukraine, the West will have to offer economic concessions to Russia above and beyond the resumption of trade, which will make the Russian Premier a hero in his country and reestablish Russia as a formidable player in international politics.
What could such concessions be? One of the most strategic (from Russia’s perspective) would be cutting edge military and commercial technology from the U.S. that Russia needs for its modernization and to boost its sluggish economy, which grew at an extremely anemic 1.3 percent in 2013. The Russians, like the Chinese, know that real national growth will not come from military power alone but from economic development and cooperation with the West – which, of course, is the great irony here.
The important thing to recognize is that on Russia’s part, the conflict over Ukraine is clever theater designed to consolidate Putin’s power within, to show off Russia’s still-potent military prowess to the world, and to coerce the West into a more pliable stance on trade, especially new technology.
This is, quite simply, the modern Cold War – complex, paradoxical, but in some ways not that different from the previous one.
Sanjay Sanghoee is a political and business commentator. He is also the author of two thriller novels. Please visit his website at www.sanghoee.com and follow him on Twitter @sanghoee.
Aug 10
HONOLULU (AP) — Hawaii’s Democratic Unity Breakfast the morning after the primary election is traditionally a time for candidates to set aside their differences and coalesce against the Republican candidates they will face in November.
But the Sunday’s festivities were awkward this year after the primary left the top-ticket U.S. Senate race undecided and the sitting governor was trounced by his Democratic opponent.
Incumbent U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz and U.S. Rep. Colleen Hanabusa, the Senate candidates who are separated by only a slim vote margin, largely ignored one another as they sat at neighboring tables until they were finally forced to acknowledge each other with a hug in between their speeches to about 200 party faithful.
“This really is an extraordinary moment in Democratic Party politics for so many reasons,” Schatz said. “Colleen and I, in a very particular way, are not ‘pau,'” he said, using the Hawaiian word for done.
Hanabusa asked, “Where else would you have a situation like this? I mean, look at this election. Two hurricanes, we were down to the wire.”
The other election drama was resolved Saturday night, when Gov. Neil Abercrombie was resoundingly defeated by a fellow Democrat and onetime underdog who took on the 40-year politician. Abercrombie pledged his full support to Democratic gubernatorial nominee David Ige and linked arms with him onstage on election night.
The 76-year-old governor on Sunday reiterated his intention to help Democrats and reminisced about his political career. Choking up, he vowed: “My every breath until the last I take will be for Hawaii.”
As Democrats shifted their focus to defeating Republicans in November, the focus of the U.S. Senate race shifts to a remote region on the Big Island known as Puna, where up to 8,255 registered voters will be mailed ballots in the next few days.
In an unprecedented move, elections officials postponed voting in two precincts after Tropical Storm Iselle hit the state this week, damaging roads and downing trees on the Big Island. Exactly how the election will proceed was unclear to candidates Sunday morning. The state faces a 21-day legal deadline.
“As long as civil defense deems the roads passable, they can start campaigning today,” said Stephanie Ohigashi, chairwoman of Hawaii’s Democratic Party. It will be a challenge to campaign in the rugged volcanic region, where many homesteaders are without water and power, she said.
“People are going to learn a lot about that part of the state,” said former Gov. John Waihee. “It’s made up of a lot of people who are very independent … they like being country. They like where they live.”
The two Senate candidates were praising Big Island voters Sunday, with both candidates planning to fly there to continue their campaigns. Hanabusa’s team planned to head to the island later Sunday, said her spokesman, Peter Boylan.
Schatz also planned to go.
“I’m a grassroots guy,” he said in an interview. “I started my career walking house to house, wearing out several pairs of shoes, so I’m comfortable communicating to voters directly.”
Abercrombie, who led the state’s tropical storm response, said officials “will get this election completed in record time.”
“People deserve to have the elections handled in an expeditious manner that they can have confidence in,” he said.
After Saturday’s unprecedented ouster of the incumbent governor, fellow Democrats lavished praise on Abercrombie Sunday, prompting the governor to joke that he “hadn’t realized what incredible virtues I still possess” after the divisive race.
Abercrombie has occupied just about every political office since he was first elected to the state House of Representatives in 1975, later moving to the state Senate, serving on the Honolulu City Council and then holding nine consecutive terms as a congressman, from 1993 to 2010, when he returned to Hawaii full-time to seek the governorship.
But the governor’s confrontational approach was a sour note for many voters, and he drew the ire of fellow Democrats last year with a proposal to raise taxes on retiree pensions, hotel rooms and plastic bags, among other things. He also lost favor with the politically influential teachers union, which supported his candidacy in 2010 but turned against him in 2011 when he imposed a final contract that cut their pay.
Abercrombie is the first Hawaii governor to lose to a primary challenger and only the second not to win re-election. His defeat comes despite the endorsement of President Barack Obama in his native state. Obama also endorsed Schatz.
Now Ige, 57, a mild-mannered state lawmaker of 28 years who took on the powerful incumbent, has to step into a much higher-profile role. He acknowledged some of his campaigning skills need work.
After making an issue of the governor’s sometimes aggressive style during the campaign and promising he would be more collegial, Ige on Sunday praised the governor’s passion.
Ige, whose speech followed Abercrombie’s, said he had been advised to “have more passion and emotion, and that’s certainly something that I look to you and have always gotten from your speeches.”
Aug 10
LONDON (AP) — Former boxing promoter Frank Maloney announced in a newspaper interview Sunday that he is undergoing a sex change.
The 61-year-old Maloney, who guided Lennox Lewis to the world heavyweight title in the 1990s, told Britain’s Sunday Mirror newspaper that he is now living as a woman under the name Kellie.
The twice-married Maloney ended his illustrious career last October and told the paper he has been undergoing hormone treatment for two years in preparation for a sex change operation.
“I was born in the wrong body and I have always known I was a woman,” Maloney was quoted as saying by the Mirror. “I can’t keep living in the shadows. That is why I am doing what I am today. Living with the burden any longer would have killed me.
“What was wrong at birth is now being medically corrected. I have a female brain. I knew I was different from the minute I could compare myself to other children. I wasn’t in the right body. I was jealous of girls.”
Maloney said his boxing career helped bring in enough money to walk away from the sport and live a new life as a woman.
“It was something that I was determined to suppress and keep wrapped up because I didn’t want to be seen different,” Maloney said in a video interview published on the Mirror website.
“(Boxing) took up all of my time. It gave me a complete focus. It was something I thought I had to be successful in because I thought if I failed in that, where do I go?”
Aug 10
The “Islamic State” push on the capital in concert with other Sunni Arabs is an attempt to recover what was taken from them by the Bush administration.
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