in der EU zu fördern.
Ich persönlich könnte damit leben, wenn eine Frau (oder sogar mehr als 

eine) eine Spitzenposition bei der EU bekleiden würde.

Meine Bereitschaft habe ich sogar durch die Abgabe meiner Stimme 

gezeigt. Ich weiß, ich weiß ... ich bin wahnsinnig fortgeschritten mit 

meiner Ansicht :D

---

Here is a project to support the participation of women in top positions in 

the EU.

Personally I could live with it if a woman (or even more than one) were to 

occupy a top position in the EU.

I have even showed my willingness by casting my vote. I know, I know ... 

I am just so progressive with my outlook :D 

--- 

Aquí hay un proyecto para promocionar la participación de mujeres en 

puestos de mando en la Unión Europea.

Yo por mi parte podría sobrevivirlo si una mujer (o incluso más que 

una) ocupase una posición de mando en la Unión Europea.

Además ya demostré mi voluntad por emitir mi voto. Ya lo sé, no hay 

que decirlo ... soy increíblemente progresivo con mi perspectiva .. je 

je

"Was sagst Du zu Haider????" fragte mich meine Professorin.

 ... und ich habe auch wahrscheinlich wenig neues zu dem Thema zu sagen.
 
 Ich persönlich weiß nicht, ob der Tod Haiders so signifikant ist.
 Natürlich war er ein sehr begabter Redner und möglicherweise werden die
 SPÖ (und die ÖVP) bei der nächsten Wahl mehr Stimmen bekommen.
 Allerdings wird Haiders Abwesenheit, glaube ich, nichts daran ändern,
 dass so viele Wähler "an Rassismus glauben". ... Vielleicht muss mehr
 Sozialarbeit geleistet werden, Rassismus mehr in Schulen debattiert werden,
 Austauschprogramme für ALLE Generationen ausgeführt werden!? Ich weiß
 es nicht genau, aber jedenfalls bin ich der Überzeugung, dass politische
 Reden nur die Oberfläche von Hass gegen Fremde sind.
 
 Du meintest in einem deiner Mails an die LIP Gruppe bezüglich des
 Wahlergebnisses, dass eine sehr hoher Prozentsatz der (neuen) Wähler von
 16 bis 18 die FPÖ wählten. Die Größe der Menge vor der Bühne bei
 einer Rede von Haider in einem BBC-Bericht, den ich letztens anschaute,
 fand ich skurril.
 
 Ich glaube alles, was ich bisher über die Situation in Österreich
 gedacht habe, wird in diesem Lied von Texta zusammengefasst:

 The following is taken from an analysis of the rhetoric in this speech given by EU Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid Luis Michel on 21 November 2007, six weeks before the EU and African, Caribbean and Pacific countries (ACPs) were scheduled to complete  negotiations and sign Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs)

Arguments in rhetoric, according to Toulmin (2003:92), consist of three parts in their fundamental structure[1]: a “claim” which is based on “data” and a “warrant” which provides a link for the claim to the data. However, as Toulmin says the warrant often remains unsaid in the specific argumentation in the text, and this may be because the warrant is dubious or by no means an unequivocal truth. In the speech by Michel at the WTO in November 2007, the claim is:

“Aid for trade must be based on countries' own assessments of their strengths and weaknesses in the global competition and on their own trade and development strategies.”

The data are:

“I am glad that we have reached a global consensus on this key parameter to address the root causes of economic marginalisation.”

The implicit warrant here is that countries making “assessments of their strengths and weaknesses in the global competition ...”, i.e. ACPs, are members of the same “we” group (in the data) which “have reached a global consensus”, yet this would be in contradiction to the rest of the text and the first line of this paragraph. The superficial involving of developing countries in global economic policy by western governments and the WTO noted in “global consensus” underlines the arguments of those that claim that these organisations barely involve poorer countries in (economic) decision making (Ghafele, 2004; Holborow, 2006).

Abstract

This dissertation studies speeches by the EU Commissioners for Trade and for Humanitarian Aid and Development on Economic Partnership Agreeements (EPAs) between the EU and African, Caribbean and Pacific countries (ACPs) from a Critical Discourse Analysis perspective. Its line of inquiry focuses firstly on the discursive representation of (future) economic consequences of EPAs, then on who is discursively included in decision making and thirdly on forms of address to recipients of the speeches, including intertextual references.

With this study spanning much history and ideally requiring familiarity of texts produced by economists, NGOs and media with opinions on EPAs, I choose to use the “discourse historical approach” and the consequent “triangulation” (Reisgl and Wodak, 2001; Wodak et al, 1999; Wodak 2001).

Thus, the argumentation of these densely rhetorical speeches is compared to the arguments of the other aforementioned text producers. Debates around trade liberalisation and globalization are key. This paper particularly ponders the position of Ha-Joon Chang (2003) who argues that industrial countries, including EU countries first reached high development and then liberalised, of the United Nations Development Programme (2003) which maintains that trade liberalization is a result of development, not a prerequisite.

The analysis considers rhetoric, including argumentation and fallacies; at sentence level, pragmatics, including presuppositions, implicature and speech acts. These analytical tools find unity in considering context to go beyond the semantics of the texts and deem language to be a verbal activity. Furthermore, metaphors are analysed from cognitive linguistic and argumentative perspectives.

Analysis of the speeches indicates several contentious standpoints in the Commissioners’ rhetoric on the benefits of trade liberalisation and the usefulness of aid (at least in comparison to economists’ analysis). It analyses deixis (“us” / “them” groups), metaphors and modality in how pressure is seemingly applied on ACPs to sign EPAs and, thirdly, investigates how the speakers react to critique from other politicians and media sources using ‘path’ metaphors.

The comment at the bottom says about all I have to say on the Times article:

It seems ironic that the internet, which started life as ARPANET - a tool developed so that US academic institutions could assist US military and intelligence services - is now being monitored by these agenices to punish academic institutions for trying to research threats to society.

Sun Tzu once wrote "...if you know your enemy and know yourself, you will fight without danger in battles." So what hope is there for students and researchers on courses such as Nottingham's MA in Security & Terrorism; Coventry's MA in Terrorism, International Crime & Global Security or UCL's MSc in Countering Terrorism & Organised Crime?

How are these researchers to know the enemy in order to understand their strengths and weaknesses and inform society, as a business student would analyse a company? Are to assume that all research is illegal or should we instead think of researchers as cyber-scouts / spooks in the hope that the military / intelligence communities would see their worth?

---

Ironically, one of the reasons I am a little busy is because I received a translation to do from the Stasi Museum this morning. Stasi = Ministerium für Staatssicherheit (der ehemaligen Deutschen Demokatrischen Republik) = Ministry for State Security (of the former German Democratic Republic). Paranoid states? ... maybe we really would learn something from history if we did not just focus so narrowly on the geographic region we were born into? ... Still, I am sure that the British Minister for Education and his or her counterpart for Homeland Security have far more important things to do than read the opinions of others.

Abstract

This paper studies two tabloids and two broadsheets in their reporting of post-election Kenya in January 2008 – thereby, their presentation of Kenyan and other actors, the newspapers’ interregional comparisons between Kenya and other African nations and their discussions of colonialism, independence and tribes are investigated from a Critical Discourse Analysis perspective.

With this study spanning so much history and a desire to read these texts with knowledge of intertextual and interdiscursive references, I choose to use the “discourse historical approach” and the consequent “triangulation” (Reisgl and Wodak, 2001; Wodak et al, 1999; Wodak 2001). Thus, the analysis of four British newspapers’ articles is cross-referenced with Kenyan and various European media as well as with historical and political contextual knowledge. This paper adopts the position of historians, including Berman and Lonsdale (1992), Mudimbe (1988) and Odhiambo et al (1977) as well as anthropologist Haugerud (1995), that colonialism plays a crucial role in modern political issues in Kenya and other former colonies – especially relevant here to the controversy over the division of land amongst tribes at the handover of power in 1963.  

The approach of Wodak et al is though also supplemented by consideration of transitivity and syntactic transformation, (Fowler, 1991; van Leeuwen, 1996), lexis (Fowler, 1991), deixis as well as modality, implicature, presuppositions and speech acts (Chilton, 2004). Therefore, the emphasis of this study at sentence level is less on rhetorical devices and more on the pragmatic, syntactic and lexical levels (Fowler, 1991:80-5, 92-3). Overall, there is overt interest in the presentation of actors and how they are predicated (in relation to other actors).

This paper demonstrates how four British newspapers prominently feature western actors in their reporting of the Kenyan elections and all four report the opinions and advice from the EU and most frequently from British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. On the other hand, Kenyan political actors are frequently foregrounded in sentences from the Daily Mail, Daily Mirror and The Times where they are predicated with negative connotations, including low assessments of their political credentials, e.g. “not statesmanlike” or the repeated reporting of counter-accusations from Kibaki and Odinga of “genocide” and “ethnic cleansing”.

In studying (African) inter-regional comparisons made by the papers, analysis of implicature and attribution yielded some interesting points. All the British newspapers were keen to give a ‘before and after’ account of Kenya, such as “previously seen as one of Africa’s strongest democracies” or “economic powerhouse”.

A discussion of post-election Kenya opens into an analysis of the newspapers’ reporting of aggression where attribution of “violence” was repeatedly presented as “tribal” in the Daily Mail, Daily Mirror and The Times. The Guardian more often used the less aggressively connotated “ethnic tensions”. More interesting in itself, however, was the observation that the papers dedicated very little or no space to a discussion of political organisation being a cause of the violence. Indeed, we noticed how references that could have potentially have signalled historical problems involving British governments did not do so, e.g. choices such as “since independence” and not ‘after colonialism’, no discussion of the “Commonwealth” and umpteen references to “tribe” without a single mention of ‘divide and rule’.

(520 words not including title) Keywords: “Them” group, Kenyan elections, Critical Discourse Analysis, colonialism, discourse historical approach

Sehr geehrter Herr Sarazin,

es freut mich, ihnen mitteilen zu dürfen, dass ihr Beitrag akzeptiert wurde. Ich

hänge ihnen jetzt die registration form an. ... /                                       

Dear me,

I am happy to be able to inform you that your contribution has been accepted. 

Attached is the registration form ...

Das nenn ich einfach fett Alda / That's what I call phat geeza

Könnte es wohl passender sein, dass ich meinen allerersten Vortrag auf 

einer Konferenz in der Stadt geben werde,wo mein akademischer 

Mentor der Doktor jetzt arbeitet? /

Could it be more fitting that my very first presentation at a conference 

will be in the city where my academic mentor Der Doktor now works? 

Vielen Dank geht an den Johannes, der mein Englisch für dieses Abstract 

verständlicher machte. Jetzt seit acht 

Monaten verlasse ich mich auf deutsche Muttersprachler, um mein 

schrottiges Englisch zu verbessern :D  /

Many thanks go to Johannes who made my English more comprehensible 

for this abstract. For eight months now, I have been relying on German 

native speakers, in order to correct my rubbisch English .. ha ha ..  

Jueves 3 de julio de 2008

20:00 horas

Universität der Künste- Konzertsaal Bundesallee
Bundesallee 1-12
10719 Berlin

Cuarteto Manolov en conjunto con el trío alemán

de jazz contemporáneo: “Out of Print”

... Así tocan los compays:

Recently, I received this sculpture as a present. The way in which the head glances upwards fills me with much joy. The form of the long nose and its curve at the end are of course exaggerated, but they give me the impression that the distance between the ears and snout is intentional, so that it all functions better aesthetically.

It brought me to thinking about how incomprehensible art is. I do not mean that in the sense of the pure aesthetic interpretation of a work, but in the sense of how its charm effects us. This piece from Kenya is one whereby it is easy to imagine the recreation of that which is observable in our surroundings. In other cases, this process of how a re-realisation of the observed object became a piece of art is more difficult (and when Kandinsky says that he was inspired by music, then one just has to believe him, because those various triangles could just as well have found their inspiration in an oddly lying pack of Ritter Sport). Some paintings, sculptures etc. are seemingly very far removed from their source, but, nevertheless, I am convinced that all forms and structures represent a re-interpretation of other visual impressions.

Where this artwork found its inspiration does not, however, really come to answer my question of how art can bring us joy per se, and so I would like to return to this animal. It looks similar to a hippopotamus, but what leads a person to the idea of producing this visual form one more time in stone and then to use it as decoration of our home? Why is the form not always recreated with exactitude? Does the reason lie in the fact that we are not capable of such? Or preferable to me seems the possibility that we do not actually want it like that (i.e. exact)? Why do we often want to have a reproduction of that which we view every day anyhow? Does it lie purely in the fact that this sculpture does not have any obvious function for me that I classify it as art, but not my saucepan or frying pan? (which, of course, can be art, too)

No doubt, Barthes has already answered these questions and also asked them more skilfully than me, but he did not have a blog, and I am not familiar with all the photos which he refers to in his publications. Be it, because I want to keep a distance from academia, or be it, because I am lazy or lack the time, neither can I look at all all of his sources to see if I agree. You, however, can tell me straight away what a load of nonsense I have written here.

The animal was made by a family in Kenya from Kisii-soapstone. Dimensions: ca. 470mm(l) x 180 mm(w) x 300 mm(h)

Kandinsky Chops:

Es hat mich zum Denken gebracht wie unverständlich Kunst ist. Das meine ich nicht im Sinne von der puren ästhetischen Interpretierung eines Werks, sondern im Sinne davon, wie sein Charme auf uns wirkt. Dieses Stück aus Kenia ist eins, wo die Nachmachung jenes, was in unserer Umgebung zu beobachten ist, leicht nachvollziehbar ist. In anderen Fällen ist dieser Prozess der Neurealisierung des beobachteten Objekts zum Kunststück schwerer vorstellbar (und wenn Kandinsky sagt, dass er von Musik inspiriert worden ist, dann muss man das ihm einfach glauben, weil diese verschiedene Dreiecken ihre Inspiration genau so gut in einer querliegenden Packung Ritter Sport hätten finden können). Manche Gemälde, Skulpturen usw. sind angeblich ganz weit von ihrer Quelle entfernt, aber ich bin dennoch überzeugt, dass alle Formen und Strukturen eine Neuinterpretierung anderer visuellen Eindrücke vertreten.

Wo das Kunstwerk seine Inspiration gefunden hat, geht allerdings nicht direkt auf meine Frage wie Kunst uns überhaupt Freude machen kann und so möchte ich auch zurück zu diesem Tier kommen. Es ähnelt einem Nilpferd, aber was bringt eine Person auf die Idee, diese visuelle Form aus Stein noch ein Mal herzustellen und sie nachher als Dekoration unseres zu Hauses zu verwenden? Warum ist die Form nicht immer exakt nachgemacht? Liegt der Grund darin, dass wir in der Lage dazu sind? Oder besser kommt mir die Möglichkeit vor, dass wir das doch nicht so haben wollen? Warum wollen wir oft eine Reproduktion davon haben, was wir sowieso schon jeden Tag betrachten? Liegt es allein darin, dass die Skulptur für mich keine offensichtliche Funktion hat, dass ich sie als Kunst klassifiziere und meinen Topf oder meine Pfanne nicht?

Bestimmt hat Barthes diese Fragen schon geantwortet und sie auch geschickter gestellt als ich, aber der hatte kein Blog und die ganzen Fotos, worauf er sich in seinen Veröffentlichungen bezieht, kenne ich nicht und, sei es, weil ich Distanz zur Akademie halten will, oder sei es, weil ich faul bin bzw. nicht genug Zeit habe, kann ich mir nicht alle seiner Quellen anschauen und damit überlegen, ob er Recht hatte. Ihr könnt mir aber gerne gleich mitteilen, was für einen Unsinn ich hier geschrieben habe.

Das Tier wurde von einer Familie in Kenia aus Kisii-Speckstein gefertigt. Dimensionen: ca. 470mm(L) x 180 mm(B) x 300 mm(H)

Kandinsky Chops:

Aún así pienso que Aragonés es un autentico personaje y por él quiero que España sea campeona.

Hace seis años en el Mundial en Japón, llegando al aeropuerto y como parte de la recepción, le dieron un ramo de flores que no cogío y dijo "Me van a dar un ramo de flores a mí que no me cabe un pelo de gamba en el culo...". Claro, en general, no es el tío más diplomático. También frente a acusaciones en el mismo Mundial de que era racista, dijo "No soy racista, tengo tres amigos japoneses". je je.. ¡Qué pavo! ... Es cierto que tampoco creo que pertenezca a ninguna institución antiracista.

Está claro que por un lado este comentario de Aragonés se puede interpretar así, como si Aragonés fuera un racista por lo muy consciente que parece que es de las diferencias entre gente de países distintos. Es decir, si alguien se concentra en distinguir entre personas de raíces diferentes en vez de enfatizar aspectos comunes, se llega directamente a una situación en la que es mucho más fácil tener grupos distintos y darles caracteristicas positivas y negativas. En ciertos casos la gente sólo quiere incluir cierta otra gente en "su grupo" según criterios como "nacido en el mismo país", "hablar el mismo idioma" etc. Así luego excluimos cierta otra gente etc..

Por otro lado escuchar a Aragonés es como hablar con mi papá. Dice cosas que suenan terribles, pero la intención de la frase suele ser muy diferente. Por eso, estaba de acuerdo con un chaval con el que hablé en Viena el jueves, que me comentó que habría que tener en cuenta la edad de Aragonés. Es de otra generación, no sabe expresarse según "las normas de hoy". Interpretar palabras sin pensar en el contexto del texto, en la historia del hablante, en el (papel social del) destinario, en el lugar de la conversación, es una forma de análisis lingüística que tiene muy poco sentido. Nuestras actitudes tratan de mucho más que la pura semántica de nuestro vocabulario.

Es complicado este asunto y tampoco quiero dar la impresión que sea absolutamente aceptable hablar como Aragonés ...

Volviendo al tema principal, hay que mirar las expresiones faciales de Aragonés durante los partidos porque tiene mucha gracia ver lo muy cabronizado que siempre parece. A mí me hace reír mucho y no viene todo el rato con comentarios arrogantes como "Vamos a ganar seguro" como el entrenador alemán, el Löw. Durante el partido de Austria contra Alemania un pavo gritó "Löw verspricht jeden Tag was neues" ("Löw promete algo nuevo todos los días"). Puede ser que sepa mucho más de fútbol que todo el mundo y que sea un profeta, pero para mí este tipo de comentario tiene pinta de popularismo (y sí, admito cierto prejuicio, no me gusta el estilo de fútbol que juega este equipo de Löw).

Sería muy bueno si hoy alguien le diese un regalo a Papá Noel (así llamo yo el Aragonés).

As I started with the translation of the text about architecture below just a second ago, it was clear to me that I had to listen to Blues at the same time. The internationally renowned architect David Greeenwood (holy is the earth he walks on) introduced me to the music of Muddy Waters a long time ago. I have just typed his name into Last.Fm.

Das Grundstück für den Neubau
des Central Clinical Hospital verfügt
über einen herrlichen Blick
über das Kaspische Meer. Gegenüber
der Straße soll dagegen
eine Abschirmung erreicht ...

For the uniniated in matters of extreme importance

En este caso sin embargo el artista no trata de dar la impresión que los animales estén vivos. No los pone de tal forma como si un pájaro estuviera volando por una habitación. Quedan sin pretensiones de moverse o animarse de cualquier forma. Yacen en el suelo y pareciera que duermen, así que la imagen posee cierta tranquilidad que se transmite al observador. No conozco este concurso ni los otros concursantes de este año y así tampoco quiero evaluar si la decisión de darle el premio a Manuel Vilariño fue correcta o no. No obstante me gusta su arte.

Actually, I like this whole area near Treptower Park, because it's so green, but I find the end of the peninsular pictured at the top in the centre the very best:

Jetzt haben wir gegen meinen Willen eine Deutschlandfahne in unserem Garten. Am Samstag Abend vorletzter Woche nach dem Spiel zwischen Portugal und der Türkei führte ich folgendes Gespräch mit dem Typ unten in meinem Haus:

Typ "Neukölln hat verloren"

Icke "Uhuh"

Typ "Freust Du dich nicht?"

Icke "Mir ist es egal wer gewinnt"

Typ "Magst Du nicht Portugal?"

Icke "Ich habe weder was dagegen noch was dafür"

Am wichtigsten in diesem Gespräch scheint mir die Benutzung von "Neukölln" zu sein, wo erstens die soziale und geografische Bedeutung erklärt werden muss, um nachher die linguistische Relevanz verstehen zu können.

Neukölln ist ein Bezirk in Berlin, der geografisch neben Kreuzberg liegt, wo ich und natürlich auch dieser Typ wohnen. Genau wie Kreuzberg hat Neukölln einen hohen Prozentsatz an "Ausländern", viele arabischer Abstammung, aber überwiegend türkischer Abstammung und das ist der Schlüsselpunkt, um die obige Konversation zu verstehen.

Metonymy ("umbenennen" aus dem Griechischen) bietet dem Textverfasser auf verschiedene Art und Weise die Möglichkeit, von einer Person bzw. Gruppe zu sprechen, ohne dass man den Namen dieser Person bzw. Gruppe direkt erwähnen muss (Reisigl u Wodak, 2001:57-8). Hier ersetzt der Ort "Neukölln" die Gruppe, also Menschen türkischer Ethnizität und so ermöglicht sich dieser Typ, schlecht über eine andere Gruppe zu reden, ohne explizit ihren Namen zu verwenden.

Dass er so auf die Art und Weise macht, ist aus manchen Perspektiven (einschließlich aus meiner) auch interessant. Vielleicht macht er so, weil es ihm persönlich peinlich ist. Wahrscheinlicher kommt mir die Hypothese vor, dass er die explizite Bezeichnung wegen Sozialdrucks vermeidet. Diese Frage und vor allem die Frage, warum Leute überhaupt solche Kommentare abgeben, sind teilweise neurologische Fragen, mit denen sich die kognitive Linguistik (zusammen natürlich mit der Soziologie) intensiv beschäftigen.

Neonazismus ist schon lange nicht tot:

http://www.rp-online.de/public/article/panorama/ausland/576844/140-Neonazis-festgenommen.html

Ich habe mir eine Fahne von den VN zugelegt. Sie hängt jetzt in meinem Fenster im dritten Stock hoch über dem Garten wo der Bus M29 jede fünf Minuten vorbeifährt. OK, mit gewissen Sachen, die die VN durchführt bin ich natürlich nicht einverstanden, aber eine Verarschung schadet nicht. Wen will ich verarschen? Na, ja, ihr könnt selber entscheiden.

---

Against my will, we now have a Germany flag in our garden. On Saturday evening of the week before last after the game between Portugal and Turkey, I had the following conversation with the guy who lives in the ground floor of my house:

guy "Neukölln has lost"

me "Uhuh"

guy "Are you not happy?"

me "I don't care who wins"

guy "Don't you like Portugal?"

me "I have neither anything for nor anything against it"

The most important thing in this conversation seems to be his use of "Neukölln", whereby one should first explain the social and geographical significance, in order to be able to understand the linguistic relevance thereafter.

Neukölln is a district of Berlin which geografically lies next to Kreuzberg where I and, of course, this guy live. Just like Kreuzberg, Neukölln has a high percentage of "foreigners", many of Arabic descent, but predominantly of Turkish descent, and that is the key point, in order to understand this conversation.

Metonymy (from the Greek "to rename") offers the text producer different ways to speak of a person or a group without needing to explicitly mention the name of this person or group (Reisigl u Wodak, 2001:57-8). In this case the place "Neukölln" replaces the group, i.e. people of Turkish ethnicity, and so the guy allows himself to speak badly about another group without explicitly using their name.

That he does it in such a manner is from some perspectives (including my own) also interesting. Perhaps he expresses it like that, because it is embarassing for him personally. The hypothesis that he avoids the direct description due to social pressure appears more probable to me. This question and, above all, the question, why people make such comments whatsoever, are partly neurological questions, which are intensively preoccupying certain cognitive linguists (together, of course, with sociologists).

... I have bought myself a United Nations Flag, and it's now hanging high above the garden in my window on the third floor, where every mofo bus can see it. OK, so naturally I do not agree with certain operations carried out by the UN, but it's a piss-take of ... (you decide)

Reisigl u Wodak (2001) Discourse and Discrimination: Rhetorics of Racism and Antisemitism Routledge

Seun Kuti highlights the arguably most important social problems of our times, e.g. government corruption, ignoring poverty and selfish interpretations of economic ideologies which exclude certain social groups.

He sketches his solutions to these problems musically. These solutions are honest, often simply operable and, for me, convincing.

He presents them in a non-dogmatic fashion which does not explicitly unite itself to any one specific ideology, e.g. socialism, capitalism etc. and in a manner which appears to provide options for discussion; that is to say, Seun Kuti does not give the impression of being a person closed to the exploration of his arguments for caveats (or indeed similar of others' arguments).

For me, Seun Kuti is one of the very few people, where I think that were more people to listen to him, humanity would progress at a rate rapidly faster than today - with regard, above all, to human rights.

A strong indication for his inspiration is documented in the following 50 minute documentary. A forewarning: from the opening moments, this documentary contains footage of musicians of the absolute sickest calibre tearing it up - if you are not familiar with extra-planetary mental experiences, this tunage will probably leave you incapable of motion for a minute or two due to the shock at just how funkingly magnificently these melodies pulsate.

Pivotal to the following man's oratory is, I believe, his selflessness in his acceptance and application of his own musical talent (c.f. part 3 on 4mins 50).

Parts 1-6:

Ich bedanke mich ganz herzlich bei dem Qs für die Empfehlung von diesem Video.

Seppy: the time has come for you to look at cows, go walking more, learn to yodel and whatever else old people in Switzerland do ...

FIFA's new idea to have a minimum of 6 people domestic nationals in each club team, however right or wrong it might be ethically* (and I personally could not be more against it - see below), falls down regardless at the most important hurdle: being practicable and legally viable.

It goes against EU laws, so it does not matter what Sepp Blatter or FIFA thinks. That is a reality - football associations write rules not laws. Personally, I think that is wonderful (at least in all the cases I can think of), because football associations are irrelevant. Football is / should be / was fun. Please do not take yourselves too seriously football officionados.

The following quote explains why I am ideologically so in opposition to the idea:

"Football is touched by political dimension. We are going to discuss tomorrow (measures) to protect our game, to protect our national teams, to protect the national identity of the clubs and to give motivation to young players" (Blatter, 30.05.2008)

from: http://www.tiscali.co.uk/news/newswire.php/news/reuters/2008/05/29/sport/blatter-opens-fifa-congress.html

If anyone can convince me away from my position that national identity is an attempt to maintain dynamic generationally changing cultures into a turgid stasis and, although probably unintentionally, is the basis of racism, then I would be interested to hear the argument(s).

I think Michel Platini's suggestion to revert the Champions League to a one country-one club participation, so that every European country automatically has one representative and no (rich) country has four appears on the face of it to make a lot of sense and could provide new vigour to poorer European economies. Still, I do not know enough about that.

For the time being, it is time to retire Blatter.

*these discussions have consequences outside the passion many have for the game itself.