Great Quotes
I have always had more dread of a pen, a bottle of ink, and a sheet of paper than of a sword or pistol. - Alexandre Dumas
Peter Zeihan: how to be ignorant and stupid about Africa

Peter Zeihan talks about Nigeria  in a talk titled ‘Nigeria, After America’1.  This is an astounding exercise in complete ignorance.  It seems that  many in the Western geo-political talkspace  have no time to study Africa or learn about Nigeria. We have David Oulaalou who knew nothing about Africa displaying this : ‘The rise of Sahel Alliance’ 2 where he thinks the recent revolts in West Africa are something new,  having no knowledge of the liberation struggles of 60- 80’s….

Read More

Kingsley Moghalu:    a shill for neo-cons seeking to ruin the Nigerian economy

https://images.app.goo.gl/umnFdah9yNF7qPCx7 Kingsley Moghalu:    a deep shill for neo-cons and the ruining of the Nigerian economy Moghalu first of all shows himself to be a shallow thinker. He talks of US as based on freedom and liberty when as an African he ought to know it was based on slavery. He talks about replacing political appointees with technical specialists. This of course raises a question: technical people are also prisoners of political agendas. What we are looking for is…

Read More

Carl Zha: lazy thinking
Carl Zha Journalist

Carl Zha was interviewed by David Oualaalou on 17 Feb 20241.  He repeats a fundamental error of many Asian leftist in their analysis of US policy. They posit that the fundamental difference between Chinese policy and US policy is that China looks long-term and US policy is dominated by short-term policies. At one point Carl Zha suggests that quarterly earnings dominate US thinking. This is lazy thinking and close to absurd. If we look at US historical policy we…

Read More

 Kait Borsay: Murderous illusions

see: Interview with Peter Hitchens1 At 48.49 of the interview Kait Borsay says of Putin ‘Should he just be taken out?’ Peter Hitchens wisely responds:     ‘For what reason and by whom?’ and she responds: ‘Because he is a threat …’ To Hitchens demurrement she asks: ’where do we go with Vladimir Putin?’ This is quite appalling and quite worrying. Lets start with discussing murder  and whether that is  legitimate.  Would it be legitimate to ask ‘should we…

Read More

Nigerian political elite : Catastrophic failure

There is a description of Nigeria by a famous economist who has been unjustly ignored by the Nigerian political elite. According to him Nigeria is a world where it was not the Nigerian elite that ruled under Buhari and Tinubu, but one faction of it: bankers, stock-exchange kings, ….. a part of the landed proprietors associated with them – the so-called financial aristocracy. It sat on the throne, it dictated laws in the National Assembly, it distributed public offices,…

Read More

Henry Louis Gates : kicking sand in my face
Professor skip gates

We can start with intellectual property. There are two aspects to this idea a) respect and b) money. To acknowledge an author was historically to show respect. “This idea came from X”. There are complexities in this such as the assertion of lineage and authority. ‘Confucius , he say…’ is an appeal to authority just as ‘it is said in the Bible’. In the world of poetry and the arts acknowledgement is a deep form of respect. As to…

Read More

Benny Morris ascendant: why ethnic cleansing is justified
Prof Benny Morris

Reviewing the views1 of Benny Morris as expressed in his writings is illuminating. Paraphrasing his words is likely to lead to disbelief so he must be allowed to speak for himself. In 2004 Benny Morris wrote: ‘There are circumstances in history that justify ethnic cleansing. I know that this term is completely negative in the discourse of the 21st century, but when the choice is between ethnic cleansing and genocide—the annihilation of your people—I prefer ethnic cleansing.’ Of course,…

Read More

Seymour Hersh: Concealing genocide, praising war-crimes
Seymour Hersh

Seymour Hersh  has  curious view of the Israeli invasion and bombing of Gaza.1 According Hersh: ‘The Israelis had mapped the system and thus were able to assassinate many Hamas brigade commanders and their families, in their beds ….’ It seems indisputable that their families were not combattants but were nevertheless deliberately targetted  without any need from an operational point of view. This was merely an act of terror. ‘Israeli intelligence, which has mapped the tunnel system, understood early on…

Read More

Andrew Roberts: Might makes Right.

Roberts1 suggests in a recent article that one should consider the post war large -scale population transfers. I presume that  he does not consider the population transfers of Jews to Israel or to concentration camps as an acceptable model. He asks the Palestinians to accept their displacement as ‘an irreversible historical fact’ .  This is an astonishing statement for a historian.  The juxtaposition of ‘irreversible’ and ‘fact’ reveals the deep deceit. Whether the change is ‘irreversible’ is an opinion not…

Read More

Afton Titus and the shaming of African Tax Professionals

Afton Titus  has written an article on Chinese investments in Africa  implying more costs than benefits.1 What is more important is how she puts her article together. She violates almost all the rules either of academia or of international tax. She is aware of the many arguments that China is involved in debt trap diplomacy but she is also aware that most of those arguments have been discredited. She has arrived with a new argument. What is this new…

Read More