Roundup: The Good

ìMaking the Wheels of Justice Turn in a Chaotic Iraq,î by Jeffrey Gettelman, New York Times, 1 August, p. A1.

ìBrazil Is Leading a Largely South American Mission to Haiti,î by Larry Rohter, NYT, 1 Aug, p. A4.

ìThe Triumph of the Quiet Tycoon,î by Peter Maass, The New York Times Magazine, 1 Aug, p. 24.

ìTrade Group to Cut Farm Subsidies for Rich Nations: Victory is seen for developing and wealthy countries,î by Elizabeth Becker, NYT, 1 Aug, p. A8.

ìAsian Nations To Cooperate On Avian Flu,î by Lawrence K. Altman, NYT, 31 July, p. A5.

Sunday Times full of everything today. Letís start with the good.

First, you gotta love the story of a court system working its hardest to deal fairly with every Iraqi who comes under accusation of waging war against the coalition forcesócomplete with their own busting-at-the-seams Johnny-Cochrane-like defender. A real imperial power would simply line suspects up and shoot them in large numbers. But when America occupies you, hell, weíll even supply your lawyer!

Then thereís Brazil standing up and leading the Latin-heavy peacekeeping force thatís streaming into Haiti as our Marines bail out. Whenever Brazil acts like a pillar, weíre all better off, because itís a big and important country and a huge counterweight to the U.S. in all inter-American affairs. Our military cooperation with them goes way back to WWII and joint ops in the Southern Atlantic (see the ìSouthern Crossî episode of ìVictory at Seaî), so itís great to see them stepping up to the challenge and relieving our troops there. Plus, theyíre showing a smooth hand already by bringing in its famous national soccer team for exhibition games. Good stuff.

The Sunday magazine story on the success that is Lukoil shows that not every tycoon is coming under pressure from Putin. As the article makes clear: there was a new rule set with Putin that simply replaced the chaos that was Yeltsin. Some adapted to this tougher rule set, like Lukoil, but others did notólike Yukos and its CEO Khodorkovsky.

As for the WTO meeting, it looks like the ag deal is finally in the works. Again we see a Brazil in the lead, as their Foreign Minister Celso Amorim has emerged as a key spokesman for the developing world. According to him, ìThis is the beginning of the end of subsidies. It is a rare combination of social justice and trade coming together.î This is the key building block of the Doha Development Round, which many experts are now predicting could add as much as $3 trillion dollars of growth to the global economy.

Finally, an unprecedented level of networking is emerging in Asia over the avian flu, as ten states there agreed to form a new veterinary collective. This first network is centered in SE Asia, but the Food and Agricultural Organization is promising to build two more networks for NE and South Asia.

Good stuff all around.