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Weeks go by and my Internet connection works like a dream. Then one day - like this morning - it takes ages to obtain a connection. And I never know why.
Spare a thought then for the tens of million in the Middle East and Asia who are having trouble now connecting to the Net because of a faulty undersea cable somewhere on the bottom of the Mediterranean. More information here.
As someone who was a national trade union official for 24 years and is a fan of the film "Monty Python's Life of Brian" [my review here], I really enjoyed this Ozzie video:
Just days after the Government announcement of the membership of the New National Consumer Council on which I will serve for the next four years, we had our first Board meeting today - almost five hours discussing over 100 pages of papers. A really great team of colleagues - but a lot of complicated procedural issues to bring about the merger of Postwatch, Energywatch and the current National Consumer Council in October 2008.
I'm delighted to see that our extremely able Chief Executive Ed Mayo shares my interest in all things Internet and has started a blog to report on his progress in building the new organisation.
My favoured Democratic candidate Barack Obama won a decisive victory in South Carolina and the fight now moves to Super Tuesday, when 22 states vote, in a week's time.
Meanwhile you can hear Obama's inspiring victory speech here.
I mentioned in an earlier posting that I've just returned from a two day visit to a small town called Nuenen in the south of The Netherlands which is outstanding for having wired up all its 8,000 households with optical fibre providing up to 100Mbit/s.
I've now produced a report on the Nuenen scheme which you can read here.
On 30 September 2008, three statutory consumer bodies - energywatch, Postwatch and the National Consumer Council - will cease to exist. They will be merged into a body currently called the New National Consumer Council which will come into effect on 1 October 2008.
At the end of July 2007, advertisements were placed seeking applicants to serve on the Board of the New NCC. Six months later, the appointments are announced today by Consumer Minister Gareth Thomas at the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform. You can see the details here.
I'm pleased to say that I've been appointed to the New NCC Board for a four year term. Since I am currently on the Postwatch Council until September 2008 and on the Ofcom Consumer Panel until February 2009, I should have a busy 2008 working to advance the interests of consumers.
As regular readers of NightHawk will know, I've been a big fan of Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama since even before he entered the US Senate. Today's "Guardian G2" section devotes no less than nine pages to the man - examining the theme of what African-Americans think of Obama.
The main article is by author and scriptwriter Candace Allen who puts it this way:
"For me, and for many I've worked with or spoken to, it's not so much the specifics of the man's programmes that have garnered our profound support. Obama is a very smart man who has spent much time specifically considering the challenges that afflict us: foreign policy, healthcare, education, social security. It is his willingness and proven ability to work with all parties to solve even the most intractable problems, his "naive" determination to speak with our enemies as well as our friends, with those who fervently disagree with him on domestic matters, as well as those who share his approach, that fuels our drive to make this happen."You can read the full article here.
I've just returned from a two day visit to a small town called Nuenen in the south of The Netherlands which is outstanding for having wired up all its 8,000 households with optical fibre providing up to 100 Mbit/s. The workshop was organised by Close The Gap which facilitated the building of Ons Net (Our Net).
I'll be writing a full report which I'll put on my web site in a few days time. In the meanwhile, check out here the lovely hotel where we were accommodated.
Put your speakers on and click here.
It can be hard - especially for non-Americans - following the fortunes of the various candidates in the US Democratic and Republican primaries. When all is said and done, though, it is all about delegates to the national conventions - so where do the main candidates stand on actual pledged delegates? These are the latest figures according to the Associated Press:
Democratic race:
Barack Obama 38
Hillary Clinton 36
John Edwards 18
To win the nomination, the Democratic candidate needs 2,025 delegates.
Republican race:
Mitt Romney 59
Mick Huckabee 40
John McCain 36
To win the nomination, the Republican candidate needs 1,191 delegates.
It should all be much clearer on 'Super Tuesday' on 5 February when 22 states will hold nomination contests.
I've not blogged for a few days because this week has been such a very busy time.
Is there a country in the world that has a more complicated system than the United States for choosing the leading candidates for its Presidential election? Can't be.
To start with, there's the 50 states. Some have caucuses; some have primaries. Some have closed primaries; some have open primaries; and some have systems in between.
You can find a summary of the 2008 schedule here.
It makes for incredibly complicated campaigns and one needs some sophisticated commentators to made sense of it all. The British media is barely touching the surface - but we will all be deeply affected by the result.
The "New York Times" has a good blog.
My wife is half Czech, we have many Czech friends, and we visit the Czech Republic regularly, so we have a passing interest in Czech politics - which never features in the foreign media. At the moment, we have two close Czech friends staying with us for a few days and they've drawn our attention to a different Presidential race than that in the USA but one that surprisingly also involves an American.
We're talking here about the presidency of the Czech Republic, originally held by former anti-Communist dissident and political prisoner Vaclav Havel but currently occupied by the Right-wing and Euro-sceptic former Prime Minister Vaclav Klaus. It ought to be a walkover for Klaus to win a second term, but there's a chance that he'll be opposed by a Czech American who works for the World Bank. He's called Jan Svejnar and he has the support of Vaclav Havel.
You can learn more here.
This is not a battle on a par with Hillary Clinton vs Barack Obama - but it might be fun to watch. The Czech Parliament considers the matter on 8 February.
Marvel at this set of chemical reactions:
In 1973, the spectacular demonstration was perfected by Thomas Briggs and Warren Rauscher, two amazing high school science teachers. Some thirty-five years later, chemists are still trying to fully understand how it works.
You'll find an explanation of sorts here.
I love reading books (as I have explained here), but I have so much other reading to do as part of my work and I am a slow and conscientious reader. So I aim to read a book a month. I've managed to review almost 150 on my web site here.
Do you read books? How many?
Sweden is a most unusual European country in that it has not been at war since 1814 and is noted for its policy of neutrality.
For most of the last 70 years until 2006, the country was run by the Social Democratic Party through a model involving high taxes and substantial social provision. Now the country is ruled by a four-party Centre-Right coalition that is determined to promote privatisation and market liberalisation.
The 9M Swedes still enjoy an advanced welfare system and their standard of living and life expectancy are almost second to none in the world. The country is a common destination for refugees and asylum seekers - immigrants make up more than 10% of its population.
I've only just watched a recording I made of a weekend Channel Four programme about Operation Able Archer in 1983.
It was the closest that we came to World War Three with the exception of the Cuban missile crisis in 1962 and I confess that I had never heard of it. Fundamentally the crisis came down to a total lack of understanding of NATO/US intentions by the then USSR.
The Cold War was one of the maddest periods of human history when the stakes in terms of potential loss of life were never higher. Let us hope that we never see its like again and that we are now a world that has better communication and understanding.
Quebec is one of the 10 provinces of Canada. It is the country's largest province by area and its second-largest administrative division (only the territory of Nunavut is larger). It is the second most populated province with almost 7M citizens out of the country's total of 33M.
The official language of Quebec is French; it is the sole Canadian province whose population is mainly francophone, and where English is not an official language at the provincial level except in the legislature and the courts, where it is co-equal. Quebec has a strong and active nationalist movement, and has had referendums on independence in 1980 and 1995. Although these failed to secure a majority for a break-away, nationalist sentiment is still strong.
In 2003, the National Assembly of Quebec voted unanimously to affirm "that the Quebecers form a nation". Then, in 2006, the House of Commons in Ottawa passed a motion declaring that "this House recognize[s] that the Québécois form a nation within a united Canada.", although there is considerable debate and uncertainty over what this means.
Iowa and now New Hampshire. This is certainly proving to be an utterly fascinating race with the polls consistently wrong and fluctuating fortunes of the various candidates.
On the Democratic side, most of the media attention is on Hillary Clinton and 'my' candidate Barack Obama, but my good friend Eric Lee - who is American - insists that we should not write off 'his' candidate John Edwards and explains why here.
Of course, the race to determine the Democratic and Republican candidates is far from over and the next battlegrounds are as follows:
15 Jan: Michigan primary
19 Jan: Nevada caucuses; South Carolina primary (Rep)
26 Jan: South Carolina primary (Dem)
29 Jan: Florida primary
5 Feb: some 20 states including California, New York, New Jersey
Malaysia consists of two regions separated by some 640 miles of the South China Sea (the eastern section is part of Borneo) and is a federation of 13 states and three federal territories.
It may be geographically close to countries like Indonesia, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, but it is in a totally different place economically and politically. It has enjoyed decades of rapid economic growth and is making a big effort to move into the information technology arena, with the aim of being the first developed Muslim country in the world by 2020. It has a population of 26M.
Politically Malaysia is a stable country if not wholly democratic. It is divided between three ethnic groups. The Malays remain the dominant group in politics while the Indians are among the poorest. Ethnic Chinese continue to hold economic power and are the wealthiest community.
Argentina stretches 4,000 km from its sub-tropical north to the sub-antarctic south. It is rich in resources, has a well-educated workforce and is one of South America's largest economies. But it has also fallen prey to a boom and bust cycle with a particularly dramatic economic collapse in 2002. There has been a recent economic boom but still poverty is rife and unemployment is high.
At the end of 2007, Argentina had the unusual experience of following one President Nestor Kirchner by another member of the family, his wife Cristina Fernandez. The main challenge she faces is the renewed threat of high inflation. A quarter of the Argentine population of 40M still lives in poverty and any rise in the prices of basic commodities is likely to have a devastating impact.
It's time for another week of postings in my long-running series called Forgotten World - a look at parts of the world that hardly feature in our media or thoughts. You can check the previous 115 entries here.
Angola may not figure in many western minds but, according to "The World In 2008" produced by "the Economist", this year it will experience the fastest annual growth rate (21%) of any country in the world, double that of China (10%). This growth will be desperately needed by the country's 16M citizens because Angola is one of the world's poorest countries and is striving to tackle the physical, social and political legacy of the 27-year civil war that ravaged the country after it gained its independence from Portugal in 1975.
Angola is one of Africa's major oil producers but much of the country's oil wealth lies in Cabinda province, where a decades-long separatist conflict simmers. The government has sent thousands of troops to subdue the rebellion in the enclave, which has no border with the rest of Angola. Human rights groups have alleged abuses against civilians.
Angola has been ruled for almost three decades by President Jose Eduardo dos Santos and his political party Movimento Popular de Libertacao de Angola (MPLA), but the first legislative elections in 16 years may be held this year.
In the first actual vote of voter opinion in the US presidential primaries, the people of Iowa have now spoken - or at least a few hundred thousand of them out of three million (although turnout was much higher than four years ago).
In the Republican camp, the result was:
Huckabee 34.3%
Romney 25.3%
Thomson 13.4%
McCain 13.1%
Paul 10.0%
Giuliani 3.5%
I don't think this result tells us very much about the likely winner of the Republican race. Huckabee's massive support from evangelical Christians in Iowa will not translate to New Hampshire and elsewhere
On the Democratic side, the result was:
Obama 37.6%
Edwards 29.7%
Clinton 29.5%
Richardson 2.1%
Now this is a much more interesting result. It doesn't mean than Clinton (or even Edwards) cannot win the nomination, but it is an enormously satisfying performance for my preferred candidate Barack Obama.
An American friend of mine from Illinois - where Obama is a senator - e-mailed me today: "His speech tonight was excellent, talking about bringing the country together. If he can win in New Hampshire, he is definitely on his way to being the candidate. I think it is remarkable that a mid-western state that is 95% white, has brought out the vote among so many young people, for a Black candidate. We surely do live in interesting times."
You can see how the American press carried the news on their front pages here.
A mathematician friend of mine with too much time on his hands has pointed out to me that 2008 is the first year since 1945 that is representable as the sum of three positive cubes in exactly two ways:
2008 = 10^3 + 10^3 + 2^3 = 1000 + 1000 + 8
2008 = 12^3 + 6^3 + 4^3 = 1728 + 216 + 64
1945 = 12^3 + 6^3 + 1^3 = 1728 + 216 + 1
1945 = 10^3 + 9^3 + 6^3 = 1000 + 729 + 216
You will have to wait till 2072 before this situation reoccurs.
If the concept of integer sequences really excites you (and who could fail to be thrilled by the idea?), you can find more examples here.
During this Christmas/New year break, I'm been reading a book on the space race which engulfed the United States and the then Soviet Union in the late 1950s and throughout the 1960s.You can read my review here.
I was a young man at the time and found the whole enterprise incredibly exciting. It seemed as if every few months there was a new space spectacular whereas today space travel is of very limited interest.
As we know, the Americans won the race to the moon and, in fact, the Soviet Union never did land a man there. The USA's Apollo programme involved six lunar landings, but the last was Apollo 17 as long ago as December 1972.
In the intervening 35 years, nobody has been to the moon and the next planned human lunar landing – Orion 17 – is not scheduled until 2019. So, thrilling though it was at the time, I guess one has to ask what was the purpose of the space race and do we still have any intention of journeying to other parts of the solar system?
Tomorrow, after months and months of campaigning, the the Democratic and Republican hopefuls for the US Presidency face their first vote in the primary race - except that the vote in Iowa tomorrow is not a primary but a caucus. Iowans will gather to discuss and vote in meetings in schools, churches, or public libraries in each of the 1784 precincts.
Virtually nobody outside the United States - and not that many in the USA - understand the complex procedures of the Iowa caucus. A summary from one site is as follows:
"On caucus night, Iowans gather by party preference to elect delegates to the 99 county conventions.Presidential preference on the Republican side is done with a straw vote of those attending the caucus. This vote is sometimes done by a show of hands or by dividing themselves into groups according to candidate. In precincts that elect only 1 delegate they choose the delegate by majority vote and it must be a paper ballot.
Democratic candidates must receive at least 15 percent of the votes in that precinct to move on to the county convention. If a candidate receives less than 15 percent of the votes, supporters of non-viable candidates have the option to join a viable candidate group, join another non-viable candidate group to become viable, join other groups to form an uncommitted group or chose to go nowhere and not be counted. Non-viable groups have up to 30 minutes to realign, if they fail to do so in that time, they can ask the for more time, which is voted on by the caucus as a whole. If the caucus refuses, re-alignment is done and delegates are awarded. "
A fuller explanation is to be found on the Wikipedia site here.
The vote in Iowa could have a decisive impact on the fate of many of the candidates. There are eight Democratic runners and seven Republican contenders. After Iowa, there will be fewer and, even those who survive, could have their future prospects powerfully shaped by the result.
Although superficially democratic, the Iowa caucus puts considerable electoral power in hands of comparatively few voters in a very unrepresentative state. It is overwhelmingly white in a country where ethnic minorities are growing. It is a rural place whereas most Americans live in cities. It is a state where Republican religious conservatives make up some 40 per cent of the vote.
For a decade now, I've always carried two electronic devices with me wherever I go: my mobile and my personal digital assistant (PDA). From today, no more ...
For my 49th birthday (June 1997) I bought myself a present. My first palm top computer – a Psion 3c with 2 megabytes of memory. Some years later, I up-graded this to a Psion 5mx with 16 megabytes of memory. Four years ago, I switched to a Palm Tungsten T3 with 64 MB of memory.
Having had an iPhone (8 GB of memory) for some weeks, I have now transfered all my diary appointments and other data to my mobile and, from today, I am going to use the one device. The size of the IPhone screen and the ease of use of the device will make this a pleasure as well as a convenience.
One of the reasons why blogging comes quite naturally to me is that I've kept a daily diary for decades. In fact, I have an entry for every day for the last 46 years - that's some 16,800 entries. Of course, today I start my 47th diary.
Now my diary and this blog are very different. Essentially my diary is a comprehensive record of my life and full of personal details. This blog picks out certain subjects or events of wider interest and I don't reveal really personal information about me, my family, or my friends.
Hopefully though, you'll find the blog interesting enough to keep visiting. I aim for an entry a day and the intention is to present a global look at the world in a liberal and positive frame of mind.