Photo, above: Representation of a polio victim, Egypt, 18th Dynasty; from The Ny Carlsberg Glyptothek, Denmark.  The Islamist Egyptian president, Mohammed Morsi, has chosen to save public money by withholding polio vaccine from the country's poorest children.

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December 18, 2012   Pakistan — Gunmen shot dead five female health workers who were immunizing children against polio on Tuesday, causing the Pakistani government to suspend vaccinations in two cities and dealing a fresh setback to an eradication campaign dogged by Taliban resistance in a country that is one of the disease’s last global strongholds.  

JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW

Thursday 24 Jan 2013 / Hour 1, Block A: Bill Whalen, Hoover Institution, in re:  Gov Jerry Brown; California's economy.

Thursday 24 Jan 2013 / Hour 1, Block B:  Satyajit Das, highly independent writer and economist in Australia, in re: autarky anent the large economies of the planet (recent FT article).  Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Soviet Union, ju-cheh (DPRK state ideology; in this instance, also called "bribe –seeking"), and many others historically.  Today, growth is much more constrained in the world; also, realized that capital trades require giving up some measure of independence.

UK created high taxes for their rich, who moved to Switzerland; France did something similar [75% of highest incomes] – and England now offers safe tax haven to rich French. In the US, when GM had problems, US bailed 'em out right away.  Income distribution issues in US.  If you read Ricardo carefully, he implies infinite growth – not true.  All countries now paying beggar-thy-neighbor.  Policies in place are pushing us down this path. IMF recently in a report embraced capital controls – a sea change. In 1930s: economic and political are deeply intertwined; see: Italy & Spain, where poverty is commingled w political landscapes.  Dictatorships favor closed economies?  Maybe somewhat. In good times everyone's and internationalist; in bad times, a xenophobe.

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In good times everyone's an internationalist; in bad times, a xenophobe.

--Satyajit Das

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Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 1, Block C: . David M Drucker, Roll Call, & Salena Zito, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, in re:  Senate, filibuster, motion on a motion, 60-vote threshold on bills; young kids want to turn the Senate into the House with majority rule – that didn’t work. Thirty new members of this committee for this cycle. New marching orders to reach out into communities: more Blacks, Hispanics, young people. Diane Feinstein's assault-weapons bill is controversial.

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 1, Block D:  Jeff Bliss, The Bliss Index, in re: In view of all the disasters, who still formally has a domicile in California? IN Manhattan Beach in southern California: Maria Sharapova, Blake Griffin - lots of L.A.-based players like Kobe Bryant and soccer's David Beckham and Landon Donovan live in and around LA. Tiger Woods and Shaq also had homes there at one point (but they both moved to Florida); Magic Johnson still does (vast real estate, commercial, sports and entertainment holdings). Lots of guys playing for California-based NBA, NHL, NFL and MBL teams live in California out of necessity -- they spend at least half of their playing seasons "at home. " Further, last week, the boxing promoter Bob Arum said a planned (HUGE!) fifth fight between Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez in September would not be staged in the United States because of the tax hit the fighters would take. Losing this fight would be a blow to the already-struggling Las Vegas economy.  Also: Oakland has grown extremely dangerous; bringing in Kelly for advice.

Hour Two

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 2, Block A:  Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents, in re:  Polio has spread en masse from Pakistan to Egypt. Pakistanis assassinated people who gave vaccines; Egypt under Mursi simply refuses to give vaccinations.   Israeli elections: polls closed Tues night; 31 of 120 seats to Netanyahu, who today met w Yair Lapid  (got 19 seats, which  is huge). New party emerged on the right; 36 parties ran, the great majority didn’t qualify to cross the threshold.  Yair Lapid: opposes  division of Jerusalem but primarily on the obligation of all citizens to share social responsibilities, incl Orthodox & Arabs to serve in IDF.  Now is two years after beginning of "Arab spring."  Is Mursi a religiously-oriented manager of his own party?   Too elegant, is moving toward dictatorship. More than 200 cases vs journalists who insulted the president, closing media who criticize, cut imports, forex in the last 24 hrs, Central Banks says forex has gone below critical minimum; will not cut subsides as demanded by IMF; currency down 10% in t last month Fifteen power stations closed. Economy in ruins, changing textbooks to Moslem Brotherhood doctrine, cancelled women in electoral slates, closed the lower House; empowers Salafists; every new appt to Muslim Brotherhood members. Controlling all aspects of govt, incl mil and courts.

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 2, Block B:  Ido Aharoni, Consul General of Israel in New York, in re: Israeli elections. Nature of this is a never-ending coalition-bldg process. We vote not for a person but for a list; the heard of the winning list forms the coalition.   Now we have a right-of- and a left-of-center bloc who need to try to coalesce. The old division between hawks and doves, right and left, is no longer really relevant. Since the summer of 2000, more Israelis came to realize that at the core of the Israeli-Pl conflict is not territory, which Palestinians repeatedly reject and when Sharon gave them Gaza our reward was a rain of terrorism. The reason for the conflict is the ongoing reluctance of our neighbors to accept our right to exist, so it’s time for us to get our own house in order.

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 2, Block C:  Robert Satloff, Washington Institute exec dir, in re: Jordanian election Left to themselves, the Jordanian MB is not able to overthrow the king. It'll emerge when external actors – Islamists in Egypt, Syria, and Hamas – turn their sights on Jordan. Key will be if king retains support of traditional supporters US provide a lot of assistance to the US; problem is widespread perception across the Arab world that the US is he enablers for the Muslin Brotherhood in Egypt. Also, livid that the US leading Arab partner, Saudis, hve failed to fulfilled financial commitments for the pas year. US inability to step in is seen strongly as a weakness. Qatar is now the leading supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood; Iran supplies Hamas with money and weapons, but opposes Sunni Islamist movement in Syria.  Iran is less active in Jordan.

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 2, Block D:  Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, in re: Mali; Algeria - ali fractured this past year; jihadists take over the vast desert of northeast Mali, take over Gao, Timbuktu.  Does Washington think it's also a US problem? Split betweeen Pentagon and WH, where Pentagon is more worried.  AQIM operates with impunity.  Big flow of refugees – Algeria, Morocco, Mauritania.   Second-order consequences to terrorism. Now:  potential for retaliatory attacks (v al Amenas). Also, any country w a French presence. recently, a cell picked up in Tunisia. Adam Nossiter's report from Algeria.  Amenas attackers came from Libya?  Transnational impact of spreads of chaos. Senegal, Togo, multiple countries have committed troops – goal was 3,500, may have 5,000.  France undertook this intervention at least a month earlier than it wished.   JB: Is France the first colonial country to lose an empire twice?

The War’s in Mali, but the Danger Is International   Daveed Gartenstein-Ross
16th January 2013 - The Globe and Mail

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Polio has spread en masse from Pakistan to Egypt. Pakistanis assassinated people who gave vaccines; Egypt under Mursi has cut back and simply refuses to give vaccinations.

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Hour Three

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 3, Block A:  Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents, in re: Sergei Lavrov says the problem in Syria is. "The opposition's obsession in overthrowing the Assad regime." Also that attempts to isolate Iran "are futile."  Today Russia began the largest sea exercise in decades – in the Eastern Med.  Blasting the idea of regime change. Afraid of the idea of an Ikhwan takeover; sell weapons and provide pol cover for Assad.  Turks press the case that there's mass murder going on in Syria and the West ignores it. Paramil groups in Syria, shortages of bread and fuel; Assad holds out because of air from Iran. People no longer look long-term at he situation.  Iran: no indication whatsoever of change of behavior. Islamist count on US and West to turn ablind eye to most of the depredation. Missile exchanges between North Korea and Iran. Iranians look only to delay nuclear discussions – delay, change time, change place. Larijani on the case.  Sen Kerry looks to jaw-jaw; Iran looks to war-war.

Hamas: 3,00 y9ung graduates of a terrorist school, sent out to train others. Indoctrinating in hatred. Tunisian president and Indonesian PM will soon visit. Want to send Palestinians to Sinai to create a state.   Mursi was pressed by US Senators on his anti-Jewish comments; he defended and grew rude.  The Berlin dictator in Germany explained that the problems in Germany in 1933 weere the plot by the international Jewish newspapers.

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 3, Block B:  . Khaled Abu Toameh, award-winning Arab Muslim journalist covering Palestinian affairs for three decades; in re: his Facebook articles were abt corruption in Jordan and in the Palestinian Authority; had his Facebook account shut down for 24 hours.  Islamists turn to Facebook to get their msg out; they have intell officers monitoring Arabs who put controversial material on FB.  FB certainly needs to review its terms of use.  This is a serious violation of freedom of speech.   Gatestone Inst website; PA meddles in Israeli internal affairs, intervenes to affect outcome. Before the vote, PA issued msgs warning Israelis against voting for Netanyahu; Abbas rcd left-wing and Arab party representatives just before voting.  A thinking of inviting Lapid to Ramallah as though he were the PM.  Abbas, note, is in the ninth year of his four-year term. Palestinians have two opposed mini-states. PA trying to distract from the fact that they don't have free elections, don’t pay their employees; here’s Hama paying full salaries from Iran-donated funds.

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 3, Block C:  . Michael Auslin, AEI, in re:

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 3, Block D:   Reza Kahlili, author, A Time to Betray, in re:

Hour Four

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 4, Block A:  Richard Epstein, Hoover, in re: the NYC school bus strike and the 1926 Railroad Act (1 of 2)

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 4, Block B:  Richard Epstein, Hoover, in re: the NYC school bus strike and the 1926 Railroad Act (2 of 2)

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 4, Block C:  Robert Zimmerman, behindtheblack.com, in re: Science: 1. A research plane has crashed in Antarctica, three missing; balloon; Balto 1925   2. The polio virus has spread from Pakistan to Egypt.

Thursday 24 Jan 2013/ Hour 4, Block D:   Robert Zimmerman, behindtheblack.com, in re: manned space:  Opportunity celebrates its 9th anniversary.  1. Structural braces are being added to the first Orion capsule because of the cracks found.  2. Chinese space program gets speeded up?  3. Russia is threatening to abandon Baikonur because of demands made by Kazakhstan.

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Music

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