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I was just having a look at Fortune Magazine’s 2009 list of the 500 largest global corporations, based on annual revenue.
While a growing number of companies from the developing world are creeping into the list, the overwhelming majority are still listed from rich countries: 163 were in European Union countries, 140 in the United States, 68 in Japan, 15 in Switzerland, 14 in Canada and 14 in South Korea.
An ongoing saga that has dominated news headlines for the last fifty years is the seemingly perpetuated Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Since and prior to the 1948 Israeli Declaration of Independence the Southern Levant region has been plagued into decades of conflict, atrocity, terrorism, violence, war, an arms races, power plays and intensive diplomatic action and extensive instability across the remainder of the Middle East.
I often wonder whether in my lifetime we will see this conflict resolved, or if it will only continue to exacerbate. Many envisage an apocolytpic nightmare, in which the Arab-Israeli conflict is the casus belli for a third world war.
It’s difficult to appreciate just how deep and complicated this conflict is. For this reason I will warn anyone about to continue that this post is going to be long and separated into three parts. However I believe an understanding of this conflict is integral to anyone trying to interpret the issues of terrorism and Islamic Fundamentalism, which have dominated international politics during the last decade. For the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, is at the epicentre of the instability in the Middle East and arguably a route cause of the September 11th attacks on the United States, the Invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq, the War on Terrorism and the current Western diplomatic stand off with Iran over it’s nuclear programme. It is almost a certainty that events relating to this conflict are about to unfold. Continue reading ‘Clash of Nations Part I: Seeds of a deadly conflict’ »
Today Jamie and I decided to exploit the beautiful, calm, sunny day and travelled to Baker’s Beach at Nirawantapu National Park, about 30km East of Devonport. This is the third time I’ve been to the beach in the last week and the second time I’ve visited Baker’s Beach.
This week the Australian media is buzzing with speculation that the Australian Dollar, for the first time in history may soon reach parity with the US dollar. Currently the AUD$ is hovering under a purchase value of 92 US cents, in one year from now the dollar has recovered from a low of about 60 US cents. The predicted parity is imminent; they speculate, soon the AUD/USD will be trading at $1/1.
However excuse me for a case of déjà-vu, but I remember the predicted parity having come before. On the week of July 16th, 2008 the Australian Dollar reached a peak all time high of $0.9734 USD, this was at a high point for the Australian economy, although our stock market was already in reverse gear.
Historic ruins at Highfield in Stanley, Tasmania
Today the plan was to drive to take the 231 km drive from Launceston to Smithton, well actually 40 km Southwest of Smithton and enjoy our afternoon at the Forestry Tasmania Dismal Swamp attraction.
Dismal Swamp at Togari, features a 110 metre slide through luscious rainforest. I had been there once before with friends, but after an eternity of driving we arrived at the close of the attraction. On that occasion the staff at Tarkine Forest Adventures were willing to let us take the slide, but one of my friends baulked at the cost (A $20) of entry and so we made other plans in the North West.
For the past several weeks I have regularly paid $1.27 for each litre of petrol required to fill up my car (about 45), this amount includes $0.382 AUD paid as excise tax. Governments find slapping taxes on petrol generally unpopular, but a tempting source of easy revenue. The main argument in favour of petrol excise tax is that it can be used to compensate for the ‘external’ cost that motorists incur on society: the requirement for road maintenance, traffic management, congestion and most importantly of all carbon population. Many Australians often complain about the high cost of fuel and animosity towards the Federal Excise Tax is frequently vented in the popular media like Today Tonight. However according to this OECD report Australians should consider themselves lucky.
This weekend I was lured by a curiosity to see the flooding in the Cataract Gorge, apparently water levels haven’t been this high in over 35 years. So with my mum we went for a drive and checked out the gushing torrent of water as it breached the Trevallyn Hydroelectric dam and the epic wave of floodwater pouring through the Cataract Gorge.
This photo was taken by my friend Dan: it shows a view of the South Esk River taken from within the Gorge and looks out towards Launceston which can be seen in the distance.
One of my regular ‘Top Sites’ were you to open my Safari Browser is The Economist.com, this is the online edition of the news magazine weekly that I am a subscriber to. Today I was reading an article on Georgia and sex offenders, which I found very intriguing. You can follow the link to the article titled Sex Laws: Unjust and ineffective here, which I’d highly recommend. Below is a summary and my opinion about it.
1996: At the back of a classroom in Georgia, USA there is a young girl eagerly flirting with a young boy while the teacher dims the lights in preparation for a video. “No one will know” he says reassuringly, “are you sure?” she replies, “go on – it’ll be hot, just kneel down and swallow my cock” — okay, okay I’m being silly and have fabricated this conversation, but indeed on this day a young 17 year old teenage girl did perform oral sex on her classmate. Unfortunately for her the pair got caught and her embarrassment would prove eternal. This particular incident would be referred to Georgian state police and she would be sent to court on the charge of ‘sodomy’ (which in Georgia included consensual oral sex). The judge would hand down a sentence of five years on probation and this would require Ms. Whitalker to sign her self up to Georgia’s state sex offenders registry.
Today I went to see Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince and I did enjoy it. My only complaint is that the actor who played Tom Riddle (the younger Voldemort) didn’t really suit the part: he looked too young, too boyish and didn’t fit the handsome, beguiling, manipulative personality of the books. The sexier Christian Coulson from the second film was much more suitable, although apparently he had aged too much to play the role in this film. The other thing I noticed was that the development of romantic relationships between Ginny and Harry, Ron and Hermione seemed far more direct and less subtle than in the books.
Yes this in far from a good quality review, but I just felt the need to share my thoughts..
I give it 4.42 / 5.00 (I’m easy)
I was feeling fairly crap less than one hour ago but going to the gym has generally lifted my mood. Exercise is said to increase your levels of dopamine, endorphins, seretonin and norepinephrine. These chemical neurotransmitters are thought to elevate moods.
I generally find that going to the gym or doing some other exercise leaves me feeling better. Actually there is nothing like a hard session at the gym to soothe the sting of personal heartache.
I might benefit from the general distraction that intense or moderate physical activity provides, or simply a sense of achievement that one feels after completing a session of exercise. In general I find that intensive exercise like running, or weightlifting, provides a better “high” than lighter exercise e.g. walking.
Today at the gym I booked a personal training session, which was really fun – the guy showed me how to use most of the equipment that I had previously shied away from. He also told me that I needed to do more weights rather than just cardio based exercise, since over the longer term it helps to improve metabolic rate.