URL: Latest posts
Greece, corruption and recovery
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Greece has passed "successfully" the test of the elections, if you look at it from the point of view of European institutions and, more generally, of North-West European governments. A center right government has been elected, joining the fledgeling...
Elections in Sun land
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Unless you have lived under a stone for the last five years, you would know that there were elections in Greece to vote a new Parliament in. And you might know that it was the second time in a month, due to the inability of the politicians to work to...
Politics in Greece
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It is very difficult to understand Greece with North-West Europe references. Not that Greece is particularly "exotic" or "alien", but mostly because it has a rather troubled recent History that most foreigners or visiting tourists don't know well (an...
Greece at last or new beginning
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After nine months of letting this blog pretty much slowly die, I have decided that my personal circumstances were justifying a relaunch. Due to private reasons, I just relocated to Greece, in Nea Ionia (Attika). Many friends and relative have been a...
Happy 2012
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Happy New Year! OK, it is horribly late... But I wish you all a pleasant new year 2012. I especially wish it to be better than 2011, which was an execrable year in so many ways. New year means new good resolutions. This apple is there as a symbol of...
Two Party System
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Democracy (as understood in the Western concept of the word) has existed in all kinds of ways and institutional constructions. All of these constructions have included the idea that one of the fundamental rights of the citizens was to organize themse...
European solidarity?
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Greece, the land where democracy was invented, entered the European Union in 1981. While we Europeans are all confronted to the worst existential crisis since the Rome treaty, Greece has taken the brunt of it. I am using the word "existential" on pur...
Security Council
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So yesterday, Russia and China vetoed a very mild United Nations resolution including sanctions threats on Syria. The resolution was a typical concoction by Western countries, aimed at the Syrian military regime. Nothing too harsh, mind you, not just...
Graphic changes
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This week, i have decided to work on my blog again. I am happy to see that Blogger added all kinds of new features. One of the most important for me is the possibility to add fixed pages to it (like with WordPress). This way, I don't need to maintain...
Google+
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Dear readers, I discovered Google+ a couple of days ago, thanks to my good friend Draz. I have to say that I am quite impressed by Page's team work on this. I know, one should not compare it to Facebook, because it was not intended to compete with i...
Dutch Army plans revisited
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Tweet Dear readers, My girlfriend had a funny remark this morning about the Dutch armed forces. Apparently, the new defence budget of the Netherlands includes no replacement for its tanks or transport helicopters. She said: "what is the point of a m...
Revolution extended
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Tweet Dear readers, It is a weakness of traditional media and particularly TV stations to select and filter information in a way which will hold in a traditional 25 minutes news bulletin. Unfortunately, this means that most channels and even newspap...
Europe and the Middle-East revolution
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Dear readers, After this very long pause in writing, I have been motivated by the Middle-East revolutions to put out this new piece. The main reason was my total disgust feeling when watching the reaction of European institutions and European countr...
Denuclearization
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Dear readers, The BBC reports that Anders Fogh Rasmussen, NATO's chief, declared that NATO should retain nuclear capacities as long as there would be rogue regimes and terrorists threatening the Alliance. He added that such threats also made a serio...
Blacksmiths of Lebanon offline?
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Dear readers,Looks like the website Blacksmiths of Lebanon has gone into hiding. Strangely, it is now an invitation only site. That sounds bizarre for te rather outspoken collective of Lebanese bloggers behind the site. If anyone has news about these...
2009 Review before 2010 wishes
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Dear readers, I have been a very bad blogger in 2009, inflicting only a couple of blog posts on you. I am very ashamed of this, so I decided to finish this year with something useful. So for all of you living in Rotterdam, Dutchies of Alochtones, he...
Will we pluck the chicken or kill it?
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Dear readers,I have listened with disgust to many of the comments made in the UK and in the Netherlands about the so-called Icesave deal. This is a nasty piece of chauvinistic bullshit if there is one. Let's go back to the facts. In 2007 and 2008, ma...
Android Review
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Dear readers,As some of you might now, I got myself a new mobile phone while renewing my phone subscription. After long and careful consideration about which phone was on offer by my provider, as well as my own budget (which is as usual on the tight...
There Is Honor Amongst Thieves
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Dear readers,I read this morning that Mikhail Khodorovski has refused to request the pardon of Dimitri Medvedev, as hinted by the current Russian President. Khodorovski is doing an 8 year jail term in Russia for alleged tax evasion and he is being cu...
Sarkozy Speech in Le Havre
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Dear readers,As you are probably aware of, if you have followed this blog from the beginning (poor you), I am interested in maritime transport, from a professional point of view. I have worked in various positions for maritime companies or suppliers...
