SWEDEN

SWEDEN

Dagens Nyheter, Stockholm, July 2: The tone against (Zimbabwe’s President Robert) Mugabe has hardened and the criticism is coming from an increasing number of directions. But that doesn’t appear to be enough. Enough African leaders still support Zimbabwe’s dictator to keep him from falling.

One of them is Omar Bongo, president in Gabon. He tells British newspaper The Telegraph that Robert Mugabe is a hero and that the West has acted clumsily.

Shrill tone

The tone from Zimbabwe is — as usual — even more shrill. The West can go hang a thousand times, Robert Mugabe’s spokesman said.

What the west can do is to stop camouflaging the shortcomings. Stop the aid. Starve the regime, the police and the military. Give the Zimbabweans the opportunity to force their tyrant off his throne, when nobody else will.

ISRAEL

Jerusalem Post, June 28: The country’s industrialists warn of an impending recession, the finance minister does a sharp about-face on key taxation policy, and the cabinet has yet to devote real attention to urgent university reforms despite the imminent danger of the new academic year not opening.

High schools were supposed to teach well into the summer, to compensate for the prolonged strike earlier in the year; but many school districts are blithely ignoring the deal to keep schools open during part of the vacation, turning a written agreement into a farce.

Israel’s social workers have been striking for two long months; and for two weeks now the mobile post office has been out of commission. A group of disabled Israelis has been protesting the erosion of their disability and mobility allowances.

‘Highlights’

These are only selected “highlights.” There is much more on the domestic agenda, from the need for community intervention to help prevent youth violence to the issue of salaries and conditions for thousands of local authority workers. And yet it has been difficult to generate sufficient interest in these issues. Even worse, our elected representatives seem unperturbed.

CANADA

The Toronto Star, July 2: In its latest report card on the state of the country, the Conference Board of Canada says many of Canada’s problems stem from a lack of innovation. If we were a more creative and forward-looking country, it says, we would not be plagued by such problems as longer hospital wait times, the affordability of social programs, and a poor record on the environment and climate change.

Economic tautology

We have no argument with the Conference Board’s view that we need to be more innovative. Nor do we disagree with its claim that innovation spurs productivity growth, which provides the wherewithal to address other problems. But the standard formula the Conference Board relies on innovation to productivity to wealth creation to problem solving is basically an economic tautology that excludes the non-economic elements that may be part of the equation.

A true index of well-being would also measure other “goods” that are not captured by our market-based GDP per capita. It is true, for example, that health-care wait times are longer in Canada than in the U.S., where an MRI can be had on demand. Is the difference just a sign that the Americans are more innovative or technologically adept than we are, or is it a reflection of the fact that only those with the money or insurance can get an immediate MRI in the U.S.? If you could measure the value to society of universal health care, then the points we would get for our social innovation would offset to a degree the points we lose for having longer wait times.