Thousands of Iraqi Kurds gathered in Kirkuk on Monday to demand inclusion of the northern oil centre in a future autonomous Kurdish region.

"Kirkuk, Kirkuk, heart of Kurdistan," they chanted in the city centre. "We demand federalism for Kurdistan".

Well, as Dan Drezner pointed out recently, you shouldn't always take Al Jazeera at face value. Sometimes they report something you don't see elsewhere though.

If true this is a problem for both Turkey and Iraq. Sigh.

Could Lt. Col. Alan King help turn Iraq around and make Iraq a pillar of freedom for the middle east despite everything? I wish I could bet on it, but after reading this I can hope for it.

The sheik lost hope about working with the Americans until he met Lt. Col. Alan King, an Army civil affairs commander who has made it his personal mission to understand Iraq's labyrinthine tribal system. King impressed al-Shaalan right away by recounting a lengthy parable about the origin of the sheik's tribe. "I realized that he knew the history of some tribes," the sheik said. "So this shows that he is doing his duty."

In the American campaign to win over a skeptical Iraqi public, King is an unlikely ambassador: a Lutheran from Arlington, Va., with a blond crew cut and a wry smile. Unlike T.E. Lawrence, the British adventurer who helped Arab tribes expel their Ottoman rulers in the early 20th century, King does not try to dress like the tribal chiefs or live among them. But King has done more to engage Iraq's tribal leaders than anyone else in the U.S. military or the civilian-led occupation authority.

In fact, what I think we're seeing is fear, panic and desperation.

I think those commentators have made the mistake of taking the leftists at their word. For example, Tacitus comments acidly on leftist claims that Saddam's trial would lack "legitimacy" unless it was handled by some sort of international tribunal. But that's only what they say. What they're thinking is that if this is not handled by an international tribunal, then the concepts of "international justice" and "international law" will themselves lose legitimacy.

For a long time now, transnationalists have been working to establish a world government. Their goal is nothing less than world conquest, but since they do not intend violent conquest, their means has been persuasion.

If this 'fear panic and desperation' are to explain the bulk of the 'leftist' response to plans for Saddam's trial, Steven Den Beste can't consider the transnationalists to be a small or medium sized portion of the left. Does he actually think many people on the left or the right have heard the word transnationlism, let alone visited enough dull overly abstact websites to become converted? Or does he consider many who never heard the word to be transnationalist in their hearts despite never having heard of the concept explicitly? The latter is a bit of a stretch given the coordinated and immediate response to Saddam's upcoming trial.

Even those who don't think any of the objections to Saddams trial in Iraq make sense should consider the possibility of reflexive opposition to Bush.

Being Jewish, I'm happy to find a Muslim blog by someone concerned about the dangers of Muslim anti-semitism.

'Uzair is Ezra, and although Ezra is a very important figure in Judaism, reestablishing the Law and the practice of Jewish festivals in Palestine after the Babylonian Exile, I have never in my life heard of Ezra being worshipped by Jews, or seen as the Son of God to them. Some Qur'anic commentators claim that "some sects" of Judaism saw him that way, but there are never any details about these alleged sects, and it's obvious that they're grasping at straws to try not to look like utter ignoramuses of Judaism in (what is usually) a Judeo-Christian environment like the USA, where even ignorant Christians (and Jews!) will know that it isn't true. In Muslim countries, the ignorance of Judaism (as opposed to what the Qur'an says, and such crap as the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion say) is so complete, it is simply reported as fact that the Jews worship Ezra/'Uzair. I remember an imam telling me, when I brought up this point, that "we don't know" what they really believe and say and do in their synagogues, so they may very well worship Ezra!

The author of Secular Islam.net : The Natterings of an Unhappy American Muslim, shows scholarship of the Koran, Judaism, and Christianity. The blogosphere needs more like this.

In this decision, though, I am alarmed – because few of these Muslim supporters address those issues on which these candidates not only stand contrary to Islamic interests, but to the most essential values of sincere humanity: Namely, these candidates, and practically every Democratic candidate, are in favor of many types of abortion and promote some form of gay marriage or recognized homosexual union. In this post, I will focus on the issue of Islam, America and homosexuality, for two reasons:

...

Gay rights are now being promoted as part of human rights. An intentional obfuscation, to confuse the public, to make the average Joe think: “African-Americans deserved equal rights. So why not gays?” But the problem is, a distinction is passed over. African-Americans, women, children, Jews, atheists, and homosexuals, all of them, deserve human rights, because they are human. However, any healthy social system understands that human rights also deal with duties and behaviors. Further, a lifestyle does not necessarily convey rights in and of itself. The campaign on behalf of gay rights in America is trying to make people believe that gays and blacks, lesbians and whites, these are all equivalent (essentially, that is) categories.

Let me clarify: If a person is gay, they still deserve human rights. But they do not deserve gay rights. Homosexuality is, from the Muslim point of view, a great sin. One does not promote or condone rights for sins and transgressions, especially not creating identities based on sins and transgressions. That is to say, an alcoholic has rights, but there are no alcoholics’ rights in Islam. This confusion of the person and his actions, of behavior transmuted into identity and then elevated and incorporated into personality and essentiality, is absolutely wrong-headed.

I wonder if this would give any social conservatives pause for thought if they read it. Nah.

Is there a war going on more important to us than Iraq which we haven't even noticed? I don't mean North Korea.

The things I discussed here are still bothering me. I googled the web to see who would know what was happening. Maybe none of these are anything to worry about, maybe Al Qaeda has antagonized everyone with their bombings in Saudi Arabia, and driven them into the Monarchy's arms. In Iraq though, it seems that even if people don't like bombs they still make the powers that be look bad. In the name of preparing for the worst we have to consider that Al Qaeda knows what they're doing. Sometimes if the enemy is trying very hard to do something that doesn't seem to make sense you worry about it anyway.

Now, whether it's a third generation prince who's going to come along and reform the royal family, reorient its foreign policy, I can't tell you. Or will it be revolution? I mean that's just unknowable right now.

ELEANOR HALL: Either way, it would be a seismic event for the Middle East and indeed for the US, wouldn't it, if the Saudi royal family was to collapse?

ROBERT BAER: It would. You know, I take the worst case possibility and that is that Saudi Arabia takes its oil off the market, either just closes off the taps or sabotages its own facilities. And we're talking, you know, upwards of 11 million barrels a day, which would cause a recession, you know, a deep recession.

ELEANOR HALL: But is it really likely that the Saudis would sabotage their own oil?

ROBERT BAER: Well who would have thought that 15 Saudis would have got onto airplanes and run into US buildings?

ELEANOR HALL: So you're saying it's terrorists inside Saudi Arabia who could actually attack the Saudi oil industry?

ROBERT BAER: They could. I mean, the attitude of a lot of Saudis, they're disenfranchised politically and economically, they're saying, listen, we don't get anything out of the oil, we sell it underpriced to the West, it's only caused corruption and an impure society. If we were to take this oil off the market or a lot of it, we could back to living like the Bedouins, under a pure Islamic utopian society. And if you took all of Saudi Arabia's capacity off for two years, again this is the worst case scenario, you're going to have a serious economic shot, a shock as bad as we saw in 1973.

A good sign. A real worst case scenario would include Saudi involvement in building a nuclear bomb for Al Qaeda, so maybe he's just crazy.

Is there an easy answer? Were you thinking this?

Opposition groups in Saudi - and many of the émigré organisations which operate abroad - are not pursuing a vision of Western democracy, but an even more rigid interpretation of Sunni Sharia and the ousting of those sections of the royal family which they regard as having been corrupted by association with the West. These are not the sort of people with whom Washington - or Western human rights campaigners - will be comfortable doing business.

The real danger is that the latest proposals will be interpreted as yet more evidence that the dynasty founded by Ibn Saud is showing signs of weakness. Rather than strengthening the present royal government, local elections may well prove to be the beginning of the end.

The fundamental dilemma facing the West is the risk that reform of the Saudi political system may eventually produce a much more hardline, anti-Western regime. For many US policy-makers, the ongoing legacy of militant political Islam in Iran - and more recently the rise of Shi'a militancy in Iraq - is causing concern that Saudi Arabia may be on the brink of its own Islamic revolution.

Here's a more recent (Novermber 12) conservative view from the OpinionJournal.

"Is it a revolt?" Louis XVI asked in 1789. "No, sire, it is a revolution," answered one of his courtiers. In Saudi Arabia the ruling family has long been presiding over a denial of reality to match that of the Bourbon monarchy. The bombing this weekend in Riyadh, which killed 17 people and wounded over 100, suggests that the thousands of princes who control the wealth of that country have trouble in store.

This piece from the Asia Times is only slightly more optimistic. If you read the whole thing you'll find nobody there loves us too much.

Prince Abdullah keeps fighting hard for the political survival of the discredited Saud dynasty - which is now regarded as practically a pariah in Washington. His dearest wish would be to witness an American departure from the peninsula, slowly but surely. A few sound minds in Washington may have considered that such a departure would instantly melt away any appeal of bin Laden's Islamic revolution. There is intense speculation in Middle East diplomatic circles that the prince will now try to convince the Americans to fold their bases in exchange for a prominent Saudi role as the guardian of a comprehensive peace treaty with Israel, and as an economic powerhouse benefiting all of the Arab world.

This dream scenario would mean the triumph of Arab nationalism - a la Abdullah - a sort of embryonic democracy that could have its public expression in what Qatar's Al Jazeera television network embodies today. European diplomatic sources believe this semi-democratic Arab world certainly would not be allied to the US - it would rather strike a closer relationship with Japan and Korea, and with the enlarged European Union.

I've found articles about reform in Saudi Arabia. I haven't found one that examines the danger of revolution and concludes it probably won't happen.

Here's some historical perspective from the Asia Times.

Iran and Saudi Arabia are edging closer to political instability and even cataclysmic change. In the case of Iran, the United States prefers a change of regime, but not for Saudi Arabia. However, regime change might be the eventual outcome in both countries for reasons that are essentially similar: the enemies of regimes are inside the borders. But there are also certain important aspects of dissimilarity in both Iran and Saudi Arabia.

The Islamic revolution occurred in Iran in 1979 as a powerful protest against a highly corrupt and equally ruthless regime of Mohammad Reza Pahlevi. At the risk of oversimplification, it should be stated that the vanguards of that revolution at the very outset made two significant mistakes whose ramifications might bring about its end.

One more link, older than the rest.

Why have Saudi and other Gulf charities sent money to support Islamic fundamentalist schools that are encouraging jihad? And are the Saudis dragging their feet when it comes to assisting U.S. law enforcement agencies that are tracking down terrorists? Whose side are the Saudis on? "The Saudi Time Bomb," airing on PBS Tuesday, Nov. 15 at 9 p.m. EST, explores the fragile alliance with this ultra conservative fundamentalist kingdom upon which the U.S. depends for fifteen percent of the country’s oil needs. The program is a "Frontline" co-production with the New York Times.

CAIRO, December 11 (IslamOnline.net) - The two main Palestinian resistance groups - Hamas and Islamic Jihad - are operating through a joint political leadership that looks into political positions related to the Palestinian cause and coordinates joint operations against the Israeli occupation.

Moussa Abu Marzouk, deputy chairman of Hamas' politburo, told IslamOnline.net the two groups "have been coordinating operations and joint statements for more than five months through a joint leadership in and outside the occupied Palestinian territories."

This can't be good. I haven't seen it in any American papers.

He said he did not want to fight the Americans when they first arrived in April.
"I had always looked at the American government as respectable, until now," he said. "They are educated. They know how to build things, how to think and how to work hard.
"They promised to liberate us from occupation. They promised us rights and liberty, and my colleagues and I waited to make our decision on whether to fight until we saw how they would act."
But, he said, the crime and chaos in the early days after Saddam's fall convinced him and his colleagues — all Ba'ath Party members — that the Americans had come "as occupiers and not as liberators."
"And my colleagues and I then voted to fight. So we began to meet and plan. We met with others and have tried to buy weapons. None of us are afraid to die, but it is hard. We are just men, workers, not soldiers."

Just as the New York Times sometimes fails us, sometimes the Washington Times surprises and delights us. Today they're definitely more than a propaganda vehicle.

The 7500+ people in this group, and the untold others that didn't
make it to Cloudmakers or Spherewatch or the other groups that wanted
to go it alone...we are all one.

We have made manifest, the idea of an unbelievably intricate
intelligence. We are one mind, one voice...made of 7500+ neurons.
Our thoughts, our actions formed one, guiding the path before us...as
much as it guided us.

Via Jane McGonigal's paper on Collective Detective. Jane McGonigal is an instructor and PhD student at Berkley.

Something about Collective Detective has caught the imaginations of many in the blogosphere. I have several pages bookmarked, including this and these two posts from Seb's Open Research. Like Sebastien Paquet, I'm very interested in asking if this amazing phenomenon can be turned to more lasting purpose. I think there are definitely clues to creating a collective supermind here, but a precautionary note is in order.

The Cloudmakers were a "collective detective" for a *game*. Remember that.
It was scripted. There were clues hidden that were gauged for us. It was
*narrative*. There may well be seven thousand of us. Only a percentage of
those seven thousand were directly involved in the "collective detective".

I have said it before, and I'll say it again:

This is not a game.

The answers to this are not straightforward, nor will they be easy to find.
The members of this group are in NO WAY in possession of the full facts or
even a portion thereof. It is highly unlikely that members of this group
will *ever* be in possession of even half of all the facts.
No one here has access to forensics materials. On the off chance that there
are those who do, there are reasons for not sharing details of those.

Irwin pointed out that the FBI has over 11,000 agents. *EVERY* US Federal
Agency and Body that can be called into service has been. Do not go getting
delusions of grandeur.

Cloudmakers solved a story. This is real life.

Members of the CM community live in Manhattan, in areas being evacuated
_now_. I had friends who were in the WTC the day before Tuesday and as
_soon_ as I heard the news, I was on the phone.

Use the CM community for messages of support. Talk about what's happened.
But I will *NOT* tolerate conspiracy theories or rumour mongering here. Let
the properly appointed people do their jobs and do some *real* help.

Regards,

Dan Hon (co-moderator)
Andrhia Phillips (co-moderator)
Adrian Hon (co-moderator)
Bronwen Liggitt (co-moderator)
Brian Seitz (co-moderator)

It's worthwhile thinking about what real life situations this group might well be suited for - and which are least likely. Anything requiring secrecy is at the bottom of the list - Cloudmaker and Collective Detective would be very different if extensive security checks were required to join! Criminals and terrorists cannot be tipped off about being under investigation. In general, anything where a single mistake might cause disaster is problematic - many discoveries are by trial and error.

This brings us to political discussion. So far many of the projects they are engaged in seem worthy but idiosyncratic, as in this Collective Detective Think Tank effort. While wishing these twins the best, I believe preventing the spread of HIV should be a higher priority - and I didn't actually see that in the discussion list.

Great leaps are necessary to stretch the limits of global thought. People often seem more emotionally involved with their political opinions than the pieces of a puzzle - and usually some of the most knowledgeble people in any political question have strong vested interests. It would be interesting to see a puzzle requiring members to deal with these two problems, though I don't see how at the moment. Also, perhaps a puzzle with many parts, some of which cannot be solved, and which must be abandoned in favor of other priorities to avoid utter failure.

The typophile experiment of Kevin Davis of Kevan.org has been going on for a couple of years now, and the animations provide a great way to get a quick overview. The link takes you a random letter, which will help me think big rather than getting bogged down in detail.

When you push the start button for the animations for most letters, it's a little eerie at first. Out of random chaos a letter emerges. Unfortunately there seems to be a certain equilibrium point of, for instance, a-ness. We don't get closer and closer to an ideal, we get to a point where random static keeps us in the same place, or randomly progressing and regressing in small degrees.

You have to wonder about those little black squares that appear in what is obviously 'supposed' to be white space. Was somebody so click happy that they didn't read the superlatively simple directions? Did they have an entirely different letter in mind than the one present, and decide to singlehandedly redirect the group effort? Did someone want to make a visible impact at any price? Of course sometimes they get corrected, but a few errors seem to be part of the steady state.

It's a wonderful portait of a certain kind of group effort. Perhaps the biggest difference between this and Collective Detective is that the system doesn't permit moderators to emerge. Nobody is elected or appointed to filter out the noise - and the noise generators.

The competetive spirit may play a role too. Collective Detective isn't exactly playing 'against' anyone necessarily, but there is a sense of individual and collective accomplishment when a puzzle is cracked, and the efforts of contributors are probably known to most of the active participants. Contrast the anonymity and lack of an endstate of typophile - plus the mere fact of having helped a large group make something look vaguely like a letter is too easy to make people work at it once the novelty has worn off.

As somebody who wants to participate in evolving a hive mind, this experiment definitely gives me a lot to think about. I'm not quite sure what the next step is, but I suspect there are several before we try to form ourselves into a prototype of a godmind. I've been thinking about what sort of game I would write if I was a good programmer, based on what I've learned looking at this experiment.

I Low entry barrier, so many people would play. That is, the rules are easy to learn and don't feel intimidating. Maybe some kind of bonus for beginners.

II Individual games or rounds would be comparatively short, so the results of different organizing strategies would become apparent and evolve.

III There would be some kind of scoring system for individuals, allowing scores to vary as teams shifted and reformed.

IV It would be impossible to appoint the most experienced player team captain and have everyone give them all available information and let them make all the decisions. This wouldn't really be self organizing behaviour, except so far as the organization was absolute dictatorship. Maybe the pace of play would be too fast, maybe there would be advanatges to keeping certain things secret. Maybe many different skills would be required.