On why it is often rewarding to pay attention to the politics of small countries

There are just over 1,000,000 people in Bahrain, more than two-thirds of which are Shi'a (although it is 15% Sunnis who rule); Christians compose slightly less than 10% of the population and there are--at last count--forty Jewish citizens.

Bahrain has a constitutional monarchy; the Islamist parties (both Shi'a and Sunni) are growing in strength, but are peaceful and opposed by more moderate secularists.

On women's rights:

Women's political rights in Bahrain saw an important step forward when women were granted the right to vote and stand in national elections for the first time in the 2002 election. However, no women were elected to office in that year’s polls and instead Shī'a and Sunnī Islamists dominated the election, collectively winning a majority of seats. In response to the failure of women candidates, six were appointed to the Shura Council, which also includes representatives of the Kingdom’s indigenous Jewish and Christian communities. The country's first female cabinet minister was appointed in 2004 when Dr. Nada Haffadh became Minister of Health, while the quasi-governmental women's group, the Supreme Council for Women, trained female candidates to take part in the 2006 general election. When Bahrain was elected to head the United Nations General Assembly in 2006 it appointed lawyer and women's rights activist Haya bint Rashid Al Khalifa as the President of the United Nations General Assembly [50], only the third woman in history to head the world body.

Why is any of this important? Al Jazeera today reports that Bahrain has just appointed Houda Nonoo as its third female ambassador (probably to the US; the others represent their country in France and China).

Being third is not like being first, unless--like Ms. Nonoo--you're also the first Jewish ambassador appointed by an Arab country in modern history.

From Al Jazeera:

Bahrain has appointed a Jewish woman as an ambassador, believed to be the Arab world's first Jewish envoy.

The selection of Houda Nonoo was made by decree on Wednesday and reported by local media in the Gulf Arab kingdom on Friday.

The decree, published by the official Bahraini News Agency, did not state which nation Nonoo would be appointed to but media reports have said that the US is her likely destination.

Nonoo, 43, said she would undertake the role "first of all as a Bahraini" and that she was not chosen because of her religion.

Bahraini media had speculated over Nonoo's selection for the past few months.

Nonoo, a businesswoman and mother of two children, has served as a legislator in Bahrain's all-appointed 40-member Shura Council for three years.

Nonoo lives in both Bahrain and London and is the first Jewish woman to head a local rights organisation, the Bahrain Human Rights Watch....

About 40 Jews live in Bahrain, where there is one synagogue.

The authorities in Bahrain are currently planning to grant full citizenship rights to Jewish returnees, according to local reports.

The world is an interesting place.

Comment Rescue (?) and child-related gun violence in Delaware

In my post about the idiotic over-reaction to a New Jersey 10-year-old posing with his new squirrel rifle , Dana Garrett left me this response: One waits, apparently in vain, for you to post the annual rates of children who either shoot themselves or someone else with a gun. But then you Libertarians are notoriously ambivalent to and silent about data and facts and would rather talk abstract principles and fear monger (like the government will confiscate your guns). It doesn't require any degree of subtlety to see why you are data and fact adverse. The facts indicate we have a crisis with gun violence and accidents in the USA, and Libertarians offer nothing credible to address it. Lives, even the lives of children, get sacrificed to the fetishism of liberty. That's intellectual cowardice. OK, Dana, let's talk facts. According to the Children's Defense Fund , which is itself only querying the CDCP data base, fewer than 10 children/teens were killed per year in Delaw

The Obligatory Libertarian Tax Day Post

The most disturbing factoid that I learned on Tax Day was that the average American must now spend a full twenty-four hours filling out tax forms. That's three work days. Or, think of it this way: if you had to put in two hours per night after dinner to finish your taxes, that's two weeks (with Sundays off). I saw a talking head economics professor on some Philly TV channel pontificating about how Americans procrastinate. He was laughing. The IRS guy they interviewed actually said, "Tick, tick, tick." You have to wonder if Governor Ruth Ann Minner and her cohorts put in twenty-four hours pondering whether or not to give Kraft Foods $708,000 of our State taxes while demanding that school districts return $8-10 million each?

New Warfare: I started my posts with a discussion.....

.....on Unrestricted warfare . The US Air force Institute for National Security Studies have developed a reasonable systems approach to deter non-state violent actors who they label as NSVA's. It is an exceptionally important report if we want to deter violent extremism and other potential violent actors that could threaten this nation and its security. It is THE report our political officials should be listening to to shape policy so that we do not become excessive in using force against those who do not agree with policy and dispute it with reason and normal non-violent civil disobedience. This report, should be carefully read by everyone really concerned with protecting civil liberties while deterring violent terrorism and I recommend if you are a professional you send your recommendations via e-mail at the link above so that either 1.) additional safeguards to civil liberties are included, or 2.) additional viable strategies can be used. Finally, one can only hope that politici

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