Derek Thompson, in The Atlantic, 13 January 2021 …. where the title reads “The Meaning of Trump’s Mass Cancellation” ….
This is how the president’s term ends—with the GOP dithering and CEOs swashbuckling, spared by the “deep state” but impeached in the free market.
Six days after the Capitol riot, it seems unlikely that President Donald Trump will be removed from office before the end of his term, either by the invocation of the Twenty-Fifth Amendment or by conviction in the Senate.
Filed under accountability, democratic measures, disparagement, economic processes, electoral structures, governance, historical interpretation, legal issues, life stories, politIcal discourse, power politics, Presidential elections, self-reflexivity, trauma, unusual people, world events & processes
Jeevan Thiagarajah in Daily News, 25 March 2019, with this title“Slaves built Galle Fort” … …. with highlighting emphasis imposed by The Editor, Thuppahi
The topic of the piece today was triggered by a conversation with the current High Commissioner in Colombo from South Africa, Ruby Marks, who has also posted on her Facebook page this passage, “Calvin Gilfillan, Head of Die Kasteel, affirmed what we suspected-the Dutch conceptualized and supervised, but it was the labour of an estimated 15,000 Africans brought from Portuguese and Dutch colonies, that did the back-breaking work of actually building the Fort and the other ones scattered across Sri Lanka. I was shocked by how little was known in Sri Lanka about this. I visited the cramped quarters where the slaves were kept, the dungeons where they were imprisoned, and the cemetery-now a car park where they were buried. And my heart wept.
Filed under accountability, architects & architecture, authoritarian regimes, British imperialism, caste issues, centre-periphery relations, commoditification, discrimination, economic processes, governance, heritage, historical interpretation, human rights, Indian Ocean politics, island economy, landscape wondrous, legal issues, life stories, military strategy, politIcal discourse, population, Portuguese in Indian Ocean, power politics, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, transport and communications, trauma, travelogue, unusual people, working class conditions, world events & processes
An Item in ba-bamail edited by Natalia J.
Bronwyn Hickmott took a beautiful garden paver from her late parents’ home and installed it at her own home in Devon, England. In an interview with BBC, Bronwyn said she had been fascinated with the beautiful detailing and the curious shapes of the stone ever since she was a child, which is exactly why she decided to keep it. Little did she know, the curious stone was one of the only seven existing Sri Lankan Sandakada Pahana, which are temple moonstones that date all the way back to the late Anuradhapura Period (10-11th century).
The Moon-stone found at the entrance of Uda Viharaya of Ridhi Vihara Sri Lanka Image Source: Reddit
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Jeremy Liyanage
Mannar is a sand island perched on a limestone base. The hydraulic pressure of the groundwater in the kulams keeps the sea water from intruding. As significant areas of Mannar Island are targeted for mineral sand mining, working to a depth of 12 metres, the result will be widespread sea water intrusion which will then contaminate the groundwater supplies –promoting the destruction of agricultural livelihoods.
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Christopher Knaus and Josh Taylor, in an essay in 2019 which gains relevance in the light of the recent events in Capital Hill in Washington …. This essay was entitled “Revealed: the QAnon conspiracy theorist who is friends with Australian PM Scott Morrison”
A significant Australian proponent of the QAnon conspiracy theory is a family friend of Scott Morrison, and his wife is on the prime minister’s staff. The sprawling, disjointed and incoherent QAnon conspiracy variously claims that Donald Trump is leading a behind-the-scenes fight against a shadowy deep state, that powerful forces are hiding and protecting satanic paedophile rings, and that a secretive individual named Q leaves clues for his followers to decipher on internet forums.
Filed under american imperialism, Australian culture, australian media, authoritarian regimes, centre-periphery relations, conspiracies, disparagement, economic processes, fundamentalism, historical interpretation, life stories, modernity & modernization, news fabrication, politIcal discourse, power politics, security, self-reflexivity, taking the piss, truth as casualty of war, unusual people, world affairs, world events & processes
Ahimsa Wickrematunge, courtesy of Groundviews, 8 January 2021, where the title reads “The MIG Deal: Why My Father had to Die”
Twelve years ago today The Sunday Leader Editor, Lasantha Wickrematunge, was brutally murdered in broad daylight within a high security zone. His killers have never been punished. Here is why.
When I first heard the phrase “MiG deal” as a kid in 2007, I never expected that less than two years later, the printing of those two words in my father’s newspaper would lead to my standing over his open grave on the darkest day of my life. It has long been clear to me, and to all those familiar with the evidence, that had my father not exposed the MiG deal in The Sunday Leader, he would still be alive today, still writing, still exposing wrongdoing, still standing tall against the powers that be. He knew the risks of exposing a man who cherished his holier than thou public persona, but the risk did not stop him from doing his job.
Tony Kevin, in ConsortiumNews, 8 December 2020, where the title reads “Australia Sabotaged Its Own Interests in China Relations”
The destruction over the past five years of Australia’s mutually beneficial diplomatic and trade relationship with China was probably a successful “Five Eyes” information warfare operation, writes Tony Kevin.
Hong Kong protester throws egg at President Xi Jinping’s portrait on China’s National Day, Oct. 1, 2019. (Studio Incendo, CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons)
The address to Federal Parliament by Chinese President Xi Jinping on Nov. 17, 2014, marked a highwater mark in bilateral relations. Xi was in Australia for the G-20 summit in Brisbane hosted by Prime Minister Tony Abbott. His theme was that China was committed to peace but ready to protect its interests.
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THUPPAHI darkens our entry into The YEAR 2021 and its Cumulus Cloud of COVID with two pictorial memories of two horrendous acts of political assassination by Pirapaharan and the Tamil Tigers ….. that of Rajiv Gandhi in 1991 and Neelan Tiruchelvam in 1999 …. with the roadside memorial painting at the junction of Rosmead Place and Kynsey Terrace where the LTTE’s female suicide killer ended Neelan’s life on earth (as he headed for his office) marking the moment …. albeit in temporary modality …. WHILE conveying an everlasting message.
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thuppahi
