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/ 10 December 2007
Rick Wilkie, one of hundreds of volunteers canvassing for Barack Obama, recalls JFK’s inauguration speech with reverence. Wilkie, now 67, tramped kilometres through the thick snow in January 1961 to hear Kennedy. "On the way home, I was walking three feet off the ground," Wilkie said. Since that day, he has had no involvement in politics — until now.
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/ 10 December 2007
Think about climate change long enough and you soon realise that it is more than our lightbulbs that we are going to have to change. Colleagues have argued, as delegates gather in Bali to hammer out a global accord to avert this catastrophe, that a more fundamental overhaul will be required. Madeleine Bunting suggested a return to wartime rationing, in order to curb a hyper-consumerism that is unsustainable.
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/ 10 December 2007
It takes one bad leader, or leader turned bad, to destroy a country. It takes generations to rebuild. To add to Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s words of wisdom, it is not just about choosing a leader who we will not be ashamed of, it is about us choosing a leader who will not roll back the fragile gains that we have made, including gender equality, writes Colleen Lowe Morna.
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/ 10 December 2007
Iraq’s main Sunni-led resistance groups have scaled back their attacks on United States forces in Baghdad and parts of Anbar province in a deliberate strategy aimed at regrouping, retraining, and waiting out George W Bush’s “surge”, a key insurgent leader has said. US officials recently reported a 55% drop in attacks across Iraq. One explanation they give is the presence of 30 000 extra US troops deployed earlier this year.
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/ 10 December 2007
As interest rate hikes tighten consumer purse strings, retailers are bracing themselves for a disappointing festive season. Large merchandisers, such as the JD Group and Woolworths, are reconciling themselves to a slowdown in festive season activity as volatile fuel prices and consumer indebtedness compounds the effects of interest rate increases on their customers.
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/ 10 December 2007
One small corner of the retail market is seeing business as usual at this time of year. Wholesale markets providing goods to informal traders, spaza shops and small businesses across South Africa are booming. Trade unions would blow a gasket if they went shopping on the outskirts of the Johannesburg CBD where developments such as China Mart and Dragon City provide goods ”off the boat” from China.
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/ 10 December 2007
Growing up in New York City, I took the subway to school like most of my peers. I remember not quite understanding, as a 13-year-old, the looks I received from men my father’s age — or why they kept ”accidentally” brushing up against me. What was all that about?
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/ 10 December 2007
Yet another of my pens has just disappeared from where I swear I just left it and is probably already with my smug doppelganger in a parallel universe. We all have our favourite take on the existence of parallel worlds; it’s a subject that has been fodder for science-fiction writers for quite a while now. The question is whether the idea has a place in serious scientific discourse.
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/ 10 December 2007
In a class action suit that recalls the Treatment Action Campaign’s battle to access free antiretrovirals, the residents of Phiri in Soweto have instituted legal proceedings against the City of Johannesburg. They are challenging the installation of prepaid meters in March 2004 and the decision of the city on the amount of water allocated free to the city’s poor residents.
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/ 10 December 2007
The ANC and its alliance partners have often been described as a family. Families can evoke the deepest love from which courage can emerge against great danger. They can also cause bitter feuds and vengeful hatred. This month, when Polokwane is on our minds, it is also the time of Christmas holidays, family gatherings and the worst period of domestic violence and suicides.