World View

(The Telegraph): David Cameron, Ed Miliband and the entire British political class came together yesterday to denounce the rioters. They were of course right to say that the actions of these looters, arsonists and muggers were abhorrent and criminal, and that the police should be given more support. But there was also something very phony and hypocritical about all the shock and outrage expressed in parliament. MPs spoke about the week’s dreadful events as if they were nothing to do with them.

(Huffington Post): In the evangelical community, the year 2011 has brought a resurgence of debate over evolution. The current issue of Christianity Today asks if genetic discoveries preclude an historical Adam. While BioLogos, the brainchild of NIH director Francis Collins, is seeking to promote theistic evolution among evangelicals, the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary recently argued that true Christians should believe the Earth is only a few thousand years old.

(International Law Office): The question as to whether a freezing order (or Mareva injunction) may be awarded in a jurisdiction where there are no related substantive proceedings has been a controversial subject in the offshore world in recent years. Traditionally, such 'free-standing' injunctions were not granted. More recently, certain offshore jurisdictions, whether by the development of case law or by statute, have performed a volte face and determined that such injunctions can be awarded in aid of related foreign proceedings.

(The Jamaica Gleaner): The decision by the attorney general of the Cayman Islands, Sam Bulgin, against prosecuting the Cayman Compass newspaper and its journalist, Brent Fuller, is welcome and sensible. Mr Bulgin's decision, however, does not resolve the more fundamental question that has arisen in recent weeks about the commitment of the Cayman Islands legislative assembly, and by extension the territory's government, to freedom of the press, transparency in governance and, ultimately, democracy.

(Jamaica Observer): Today, the Parliament of Jamaica will take a decisive step forward in advancing the cause of freedom of expression, without which we might as well retreat into the Dark Ages. The Joint Select Committee reviewing the pernicious libel laws of Jamaica is scheduled to sign off on the report of the Hugh Small Committee that was mandated by Prime Minister Bruce Golding to delve into the largely outdated laws and recommend ways of removing the shackles that protect the corrupt.

(CNN): This week, I have had the opportunity to meet with ministers and country delegates from around the world who have gathered in Nagoya, Japan, to set a global conservation action plan for the next ten years. This is a critical moment in time for environmental ministers gathered here to work together to set bold, ambitious targets to protect nature and the services it provides.

(The Independent): To many people, the "war on drugs" sounds like a metaphor, like the "war on poverty". It is not. It is being fought with tanks and sub-machine guns and hand grenades, funded in part by your taxes, and it has killed 28,000 people under the current Mexican President alone. The death toll in Tijuana – one of the front lines of this war – is now higher than in Baghdad. Yesterday, another pile of 72 mutilated corpses was found near San Fernando – an event that no longer shocks the country.

(Forbes): As something like normality has settled down among hedge fund managers on both sides of the pond in recent months, the question of where to find new investors (and new money) returns to its rightful place as a top concern for many US and UK-based firms. And in the face of regulatory lemons, a number of fund managers are making lemonade.

(Christian Science Monitor): Facebook is turning my mind to mush and I don’t like it. The IQ drop is palpable, and it’s really beginning to get on my nerves. I’m no Internet critic. Nor am I some dude who’s nostalgic for the romantic bygone era of steam engines and Fatty Arbuckle ... Therefore it’s with more than a little regret that I have come to realize that Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and any number of other catchily named applications and websites are taking my mind, the ripe fruit of the Wisconsin public school system, and spoiling it like an abandoned banana.

(The New York Times): Canaries are small. Coal mines are big. Finding one in the other is never easy. There is little debate these days, though, that the implosion in the summer of 2007 of two Bear Stearns hedge funds — run by two bankers, Ralph Cioffi and Matthew Tannin — was the first sign that significant trouble was brewing in the market for subprime-mortgage-related securities and for the Wall Street firms that manufactured and sold them.

(Times Online): Jury-less criminal trials have sparked controversy in the legal profession, pitting prosecutors against defence lawyers. The Criminal Justice Act 2003, which made them possible, was introduced amid concerns over jury nobbling. David Blunkett, who was Home Secretary, said that in London alone £9 million was being spent every year on surveillance of jurors.

(Jamaica Gleaner): The unifying influence of sport cannot be overlooked nor can the overall discipline which it breathes into the life of athletes and their affiliates. This explains why the next two weekends will be glorious ones for Caribbean athletes and their adoring fans. First, the local Boys and Girls' Championship marks a century of competition at the National Stadium and next weekend, the Carifta Games will be staged in the Cayman Islands.

(Times Online): Good morning. Here is the news. Because of the budget deficit, shrinking economy and untenable level of national debt, all public service salaries will be cut by an average of 13.5 per cent, with immediate effect. The charges will appear on your payslip as “government levy”, and will apply to frontline public workers in health, education, transport and local services and also to MPs, Ministers of State and the Attorney-General.

(The Guardian): Standing at a hotel bar in Freetown, Sierra Leone, a few years ago with an unreconstructed Afrikaner and a white Briton whose racial politics I trusted even less, I was approached by a local, black hustler who put his arm around my shoulder, smiled and asked: "How's my nigger?"

(reason.com): If sea turtle tasted like chicken, I’d fess up, but it really does taste like veal. I grew up occasionally eating mud turtles pulled out of the ponds on my family’s farm. And mud turtle does taste like chicken. (Legs from freshly butchered mud turtles also writhe when you toss a bit of salt on them, as my startled mother once found out.)