UN envoy: Without deal in Syria, think Somalia not Yugoslavia

• A daily summary of global reports on security issues.
After a week of attempting to craft a peace plan that both President Bashar al-Assad and the Syrian opposition would agree to, the United Nations' envoy to Syria said the situation will not stabilize on its own and that a political deal is no closer.
“People are talking about a divided Syria being split into a number of small states like Yugoslavia,” Lakhdar Brahimi said, according to The New York Times. “This is not what is going to happen. What will happen is Somalization – warlords."
“The situation is bad and it’s getting worse,” Brahimi also said, according to Bloomberg Businessweek. “I can’t see anything other than these two paths: Either there will be a political solution that will meet the ambitions and legitimate rights of the Syrian people, or Syria will turn into hell.”
He warned that the violence could claim as many as 100,000 lives in 2013.
Recommended: Sunni and Shiite Islam: Do you know the difference? Take our quiz.
According to the New York Times, Mr. Assad did not respond to Mr. Brahimi's proposals and a Syrian opposition leader declined an invitation to Moscow to meet with Russian officials. Sergei Lavrov, Russia's foreign minister, said Assad could not be convinced to leave the country, which the opposition has insisted is a precondition for talks.
Speaking about the yawning gap that has to be bridged for the two sides to sit down for talks, CNN reports that Brahimi said, "The Syrians disagree violently. On one side, the government says we are doing our duty to protect our people from ... terrorists. On the other side, they say the government is illegitimate," Brahimi said. "They are not talking about the same problem. They are talking about two different problems."
Brahimi's comments came the day after what CNN said might be the bloodiest day in the uprising – on Dec. 29, at least 399 people were killed.
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According to Reuters, Mr. Lavrov pinned the blame for continuing violence on the opposition, even though the US, European countries, and most Arab states back the opposition's demand that Assad's removal from power come first.
"When the opposition says only Assad's exit will allow it to begin a dialogue about the future of its own country, we think this is wrong, we think this is rather counterproductive," he said. "The costs of this precondition are more and more lives of Syrian citizens."
But the Syrian opposition's calculus has changed over the last couple months. A string of victories has made it optimistic abut winning the war in the end, and therefore less flexible in negotiations, according to Reuters.
REGIME STILL HAS STRENGTH
But despite their recent success, "the government still has the bigger arsenal and a potent air force. It controls most of the densely populated southwest of Syria, the Mediterranean coast, most of the main north-south highway and military bases countrywide," Reuters notes.
Russia appears to be making an effort to secure a meeting, agreeing to meet the opposition representative outside of Russia if he insists. Bloomberg reports that, according to RIA Novosti, the foreign ministry said talks could be held in Geneva or Cairo instead.
Meanwhile, Brahimi is rapidly losing ground support in Syria, Reuters reports.
The envoy's credibility with the rebels appears to have withered. In the rebel-held town of Kafranbel, demonstrators held up banners ridiculing Brahimi with English obscenities.
"We do not agree at all with Brahimi's initiative. We do not agree with anything Brahimi says," the rebel chief in Aleppo province, Colonel Abdel-Jabbar Oqaidi, said on Friday.

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Obama's pivot to Asia? Middle East will still demand attention in 2013.

Nearly four years ago, President Barack Obama addressed a packed, enthusiastic crowd at Cairo University and promised a "new beginning" between the United States and the Muslim world.
In that speech, Mr. Obama outlined a vision for a new era of economic cooperation in the Middle East, one of steadfast US support for democracy, and of reset priorities.
"I've come here to Cairo to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, one based on mutual interest and mutual respect," he said then.
While Obama ended the war in Iraq on a schedule provided to him by his predecessor, George W. Bush, many of the promises in that speech went unfulfilled. The Guantánamo Bay military prison was never closed. Progress on peace between Palestinians and Israelis was not made. The promised economic development of Afghanistan, beset by a war that Obama now looks set to end in 2014, never took root.
Recommended: Sunni and Shiite Islam: Do you know the difference? Take our quiz.
Nevertheless, four years later, he's got his new beginning – not by his own hand, and not the one he would have either imagined or wanted when he made his series of stirring promises in Cairo.
The self-immolation and death of Mohamed Bouazizi in Tunisia in December 2010 led to the sharpest change in the politics of the Middle East since the 1960s. The events of the past year in Egypt, Syria, Tunisia, and Libya have cemented a radical new reality that Obama will have to contend with in his second term.
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For all the talk of a US strategic "pivot" to Asia, a dramatically changed Middle East looks set to suck up a huge portion of American diplomatic energy and attention in the coming years. Old, comfortable patterns of dealing with regional dictators like Egypt's Hosni Mubarak and Tunisia's Zine El Abidine Ben Ali have been severely disrupted. Islamists, long feared by the US, have since won power in free elections in Egypt and Tunisia, and are among those fighting the secular regime in Syria.
SYRIA'S DENOUEMENT
In Syria, the civil war has claimed more than 40,000 lives, and there are threats to US interests in both the demise of Bashar al-Assad's regime there, if it comes, and in his survival. As this year draws to a close, the US has edged closer to full-fledged support for elements of the uprising against Mr. Assad even as it labeled one of the opposition's most effective fighting groups, the jihadi Jabhat al-Nusra, a foreign terrorist organization.
The denouement there, when it comes, could well have destabilizing ripples for neighboring Lebanon and Iraq. Syria's chemical weapons stockpiles are a reality that can't be ignored, and the prospect of those weapons falling into the hands of jihadi groups has the Obama administration drawing up contingency plans for possible intervention.
Israel, while it's had a long cold war with Assad's Syria and continues to occupy the Golan Heights, nevertheless is frightened by the prospect of yet another Sunni Islamist regime, rather than a secular nationalist one, on its doorstep.
TROUBLES AT HOME FOR ISRAEL
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is also moving into new, dangerous waters. The so-called peace process that began with the Oslo Accords in 1993 has petered out completely. In 2009, Obama called for an end to Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank and early in his presidency leaned hard on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for at least a temporary freeze. But expansion has continued unabated, and the Obama administration appears to have lost interest in pressing the issue.
In the West Bank, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has been weakened by his failure to negotiate an end to the encroaching Israeli settlements, and in Gaza the Islamist movement Hamas remains as entrenched as ever.
In November, Israel was a hairbreadth away from an invasion of Gaza that was only avoided at the last minute by a negotiated cease-fire. A key figure in heading off that crisis was Egypt's president, Mohamed Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood stalwart whom the US turned to as intermediary with Hamas.
BROTHERLY RELATIONS
The rise to power of the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt captures the peril for the US of this new beginning. Mr. Morsi was elected in a free election, but the country's new constitution, which is set to pass a referendum this month, is filled with alarming elements in terms of personal freedoms and minorities' rights.
The state of that country's economy has deteriorated sharply thanks to the political turmoil of the past two years, with clashes in Cairo between supporters of Morsi and his opponents in November being the latest reminder that the authoritarian stability of the Mubarak years has been replaced by something fluid and hard to predict.
Many of the Egyptian liberals and secularists who listened to Obama's Cairo speech so appreciatively now grumble that he's backing the Brothers as they seek to cement their power and influence over the country. In the year ahead, and beyond, Obama will have to weigh criticism of Egyptian suppression of civil liberties on the one hand against a desire for Egyptian cooperation in keeping Hamas, an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, contained in Gaza.
There are still other shoes to drop in the region. Libya is struggling to create a new order after decades of one-man rule by Muammar Qaddafi, with weapons smuggling rife along its desert borders and sharp clashes there still to be worked out over the role of Islam in the country's political life. In Bahrain, a close US ally and home to the US Navy's Fifth Fleet, a Sunni monarchy is contending with the simmering political discontent of the country's Shiite majority, which is challenging Obama's earlier assertion of a personal commitment to advocating "governments that reflect the will of the people."
EAST OF THE MIDDLE EAST
The one constant from four years ago is hardly reassuring: the slow, steady progress of Iran's nuclear program. Obama has spearheaded an effort among Western governments to financially isolate Iran, with restrictions on its oil sales and the financial transactions of its central bank, which have taken a heavy toll on Iran's economy but have done little to lessen the commitment of Ayatollah Khamenei, the country's supreme leader, to what he insists is a peaceful nuclear program.
For now, Iran continues to insist on its right to nuclear enrichment, which the US argues is producing material that could be eventually used in a nuclear bomb.
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The situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan is as fraught as ever. Yes, Osama bin Laden was killed in a daring raid in Pakistan by US troops in 2011. But, notwithstanding billions of dollars in annual US aid, that country continues to provide a home to militants, and Shakil Afridi, a Pakistani doctor who helped the US track Mr. bin Laden to his compound in Abbottabad, remains in a Pakistani jail.
In Afghanistan, the Army is completely reliant on US financing and technical support to operate, and the Taliban appear no weaker than they did when Obama took office.
As the Obama administration looks ahead to 2013 and its new challenges, it is looking over a Middle East landscape transformed from four years ago. The old ways of doing business in the region aren't going to work anymore. How Obama must miss them.

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On cusp of new year, Chavez's health keeps Venezuleans fixated on future

Dec. 31 is typically a time to recap the biggest events of the year. But in Venezuela this year, news that President Hugo Chavez has suffered “new complications” after surgery on Dec. 11 has kept Venezuelans anxiously fixated on what’s to come in 2013.
In downtown Caracas, an annual free concert in Plaza Bolivar to welcome the New Year has been canceled, government officials said. They instead called on Venezuelans to unite in prayer for the prompt recuperation of President Chavez, according to the Venezuelan daily El Universal.
President Chavez underwent surgery in Cuba on Dec. 11 for a recurrence of cancer. Since then, the nation has been faced with uncertainty about his chances for recovery, whether he’ll be able to attend his Jan. 10 inauguration – after winning a fourth presidential election in October – and if not, who will be Venezuela’s new president.
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That uncertainty increased a notch after Venezuelan Vice President Nicolas Maduro went on television to say the following (translated into English by VenezuelanAnalysis): “Nineteen days after having undergone his surgical intervention, President Chavez’s state of health continues to be delicate; he has presented complications that are being attended to with treatment that is not without risk.”
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Venezuela is, of course, not alone in looking at what lies ahead in 2013. US President Barack Obama and US Congress are scrambling to avoid the so-called “fiscal cliff,” as they try to hammer out an agreement on taxes for the wealthy and budget cuts. And across the world, as the Monitor wrote in a round-up, nations are hoping that in 2013 they can bridge such political divides, some of them deadly. Venezuela, in hoping for more unity, was included on that list. But for now it is a nation holding its breath.
David Smilde, a guest blogger for the Monitor, told the Associated Press that the fact that Nicolas Maduro, the nation’s vice president, traveled to Cuba to personally meet with the president in recent days is itself telling. “The situation does not look good. The fact that Maduro himself would go to Cuba, leaving Hector Navarro in charge, only seems understandable if Chavez’s health is precarious,” said Mr. Smilde, who runs a blog on Venezuela for the Washington Office on Latin America.
The trip likely gave Mr. Maduro a chance “to be able to talk to Chavez himself and perhaps to talk to the Castros and other Cuban advisers about how to navigate the possibility of Chavez not being able to be sworn in on Jan. 10,” Mr. Smilde said. “Mentioning twice in his nationally televised speech that Chavez has suffered new complications only reinforces the appearance that the situation is serious.”
If Chavez does not recover, there are many questions about what is next for the oil-rich, Andean nation that has been dominated by Chavez since he took office in 1999.
According to the Venezuelan constitution, translated into English by the BBC, here is what should happen:
Article 231: The president-elect shall take office on January 10 of the first year of their constitutional term, by taking an oath before the National Assembly. If for any reason, (they) cannot be sworn in before the National Assembly, they shall take the oath of office before the Supreme Court.
Article 233: (...) When an elected President becomes absolutely absent prior to inauguration, a new election...shall be held within 30 days.
Article 234: When the President is temporarily unable to serve, they shall be replaced by the Executive Vice-President for a period of up to 90 days, which may be extended by resolution of the National Assembly for an additional 90 days.
But recently, a Chavez ally and head of the national assembly, Diosdado Cabello, said that the inauguration should be delayed – a move that the opposition has declared unconstitutional and casting doubt on what will happen. In the meantime, all of the problems that face Venezuela are on hold, as another guest blogger for Caracas Chronicles describes in his own personal experience here.
Chavez and his government, however, are trying to maintain a semblance of order – with Maduro sending out New Year’s greetings and avoiding mention of the radical changes that could await the nation in the year to come.
“Commander Chavez wanted us to transmit a special end of year greeting to Venezuelan families, who are gathered together over this period throughout the country; in particular he wanted to send a warm embrace to the children of Venezuela, and remind them that they are always in his heart," he said. "The embrace was extended to all of our people, so that they see in the year 2013 with love; a year which should bring the greatest of happiness to our homeland, as well as the definitive consolidation of our independence and national unity.

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Egypt's opposition still hopeful, despite many defeats

When a controversial constitutional draft went to a vote earlier this month, the Egyptian opposition was, as usual, in disarray.
It waffled for weeks between boycotting the referendum and calling for a no vote. When it finally chose the latter only days before the first round of voting on Dec. 15, it was too late to overcome the Muslim Brotherhood and their salafist allies’ strong campaign for a "yes."
But the backlash facing President Mohamed Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood for rushing the constitution through without input from the opposition has given his opponents new hope for electoral success.
Recommended: Why is Egypt's draft constitution so controversial? (+video)
“The divisions are a thing of the past now and we have Mr. Morsi to thank for that,” says Mostafa El Guindi, who was an independent member of the now-dissolved parliament and played a role in organizing the main facets of the opposition into a new coalition, the National Salvation Front.
“The marriage between ElBaradei and Hamdeen Sabahi is now fact,” he says, referring to two politicians with often clashing policies. That the Nobel prize winner and former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohammed ElBaradei, and Hamdeen Sabahi, the leftist candidate who came in a surprising third in June’s presidential elections, have come together shows the strength of the determination to create a united front against the Brothers.
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This gives the opposition new hope heading towards parliamentary elections which, according to Egyptian law, must happen within two months of the approval of the constitution.
REJECTING POLITICAL GAMES
But there are also those who say the opposition has only itself to blame for its failure to chip away at the electoral successes of the Muslim Brotherhood.
“Many people wanted to vote no in the referendum about the constitution, but they were looking for a good reason to do so,” says Fady Ramzy, who runs the think tank Messry. “The problem is that the opposition doesn’t have a political product to sell. They should have spent their time convincing people that this constitution is [a waste] for any number of reasons, and that we should do a better job. Because what we have now is just a bunch of nice words with no mechanism to hold those in power to the promises contained in the constitution. Instead, the opposition chose to make a lot of noise about the influence of sharia in the new constitution.”
Mr. Ramzy’s assertion was echoed by voters in some of the districts in the Nile Delta last week. Most Egyptians voting "yes" cited a desire for stability as their main reason, while most "no" voters had very specific reasons to be against the constitution. Among them were the absence of a minimum wage in Egypt –wages are instead linked to productivity – or the fact that free health care is subject to a "certificate of poverty," which many see as humiliating.
Not a single voter cited the role of sharia, or Islamic law, as a reason to vote either for or against the document, despite the fact that both sides had campaigned mainly on this issue.
“The religious factor is decreasing with every election,” says Ramzy. “People realize that political games are being played with religion, and they are starting to refuse being put before the choice of voting for or against Islam.”
DISILLUSIONED BY DEMOCRACY'S SLOW PACE
There is also a growing belief that Egypt’s chaotic path since the overthrow of Mubarak in February 2011 was perhaps an inevitable one.
For all the criticism of the opposition, “it is unreasonable to expect Egypt to have a healthy political landscape just two years after the fall of a dictatorship,” political activist Alfred Raouf says.
“We need at least five years to get to that point, especially with a Muslim Brotherhood that is not really intent on having a diverse political landscape, but rather wants to take the place of the NDP,” he says, referring to Mubarak's former National Democratic Party.
Writing in the Egypt Independent this week, Mr. Raouf said that even if the revolutionaries had been the ones to assume power, they would have "quickly oppressed the people." What happened instead – military rule followed by a landslide for the Muslim Brotherhood – “seems to most people like a catastrophic outcome to a very hopeful revolution," but is actually "the best course for the revolution,” Raouf wrote.
Nevertheless, Raouf, a founding member of ElBaradei’s Dostour (Constitution) party, sees an opportunity for the opposition to make inroads in the next parliamentary elections, even if the current opposition coalition dissolves before then.
Mostafa El Guindi believes the opposition has a chance to win a majority in parliament. But Raouf is more conservative. “I think we have a good chance of getting 45 percent of the seats in parliament, up from around 30 percent, provided there is no rigging,” he says.
What worries him most is voter turnout, which is lower with every election or referendum.
“It suggests that people no longer believe in democracy because they don’t see it helping them in their daily lives.”

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Happy new year, Cairo?

I'm back in Cairo after well over a year away, and my first thought was that little has changed.
Getting out of Cairo airport is still a chaotic mess of taxi and hotel touts, though easy to navigate if you know the drill. Traffic was worse than I'd have expected for midday on Saturday, but Cairo zahma hardly has a predictable rhythm anyway. Parts of the city are always one flat tire away from being turned into a parking lot.
As I pulled into my old haunts, one thing that struck me was the apparent absence of the over-the-top commercialization of Christmas I was used to when I lived here years ago. Friends agreed, saying shops and hotels had reined in their use of the holiday, on the reasoning of "why take a chance?" Referring to bearded President Mohamed Morsi from the Muslim Brotherhood as "Morsi Claus" was apparently de rigeur, however, in certain activist and secular circles.
Recommended: Obama's pivot to Asia? Middle East will still demand attention in 2013.
But enough with first impressions. Egypt had a tumultuous 2012 that was disillusioning, to put it mildly, for many of the young revolutionaries who supported the January 2011 uprising against Hosni Mubarak. While you can't see the economic pain of the past year by walking the streets of Cairo, just a few early conversations with friends and acquaintances make it clear that it's very real. In the fashionable districts of Cairo, shopkeepers say business is down. In more working class neighborhoods, the guys selling vegetables or clothing say likewise. Men who paint houses or fix plumbing say work is less steady, with customers putting off non-essential work.
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And while in my few brief conversations with Egyptian contacts the focus has been disappointment with the new Muslim Brotherhood-backed constitution, or anger at Morsi and the Brothers' apparent accommodations to a military hierarchy that has cast a shadow over Egyptian politics for a generation, it is economic conditions that will make or break the emerging new Egyptian political order in 2013.
The two, of course, are not mutually exclusive. While Morsi has spoken of a need to restore a battered Egyptian economy, neither he nor anyone else has been better able to provide stability or bread than the military was when it was running Egypt from February 2011 until June of this year.
On one level, they can be forgiven. The past year has seen certain post-Mubarak assumptions (or hopes) seriously ruptured. A popular Egyptian view of the military as protector of the nation was eroded. In February, more than 70 people died following a soccer match in Port Said at which security, the responsibility of the army, was conspicuous by its absence.
There was an elected parliament, one packed with Islamists, the results of which were later annulled. There was a presidential election that pitted President Morsi against former Mubarak Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq that saw Morsi walk off with the spoils. Neither option was enticing to Egypt's young revolutionaries, and in Morsi's victory – which was made possible by the Brotherhood breaking a promise not to run a candidate for president – there was evidence that the Islamist movement could not be taken at its word.
And, of course, there were clashes between protesters at Tahrir and at the presidential palace in Cairo, in the industrial towns of the Nile Delta, and once again in Port Said, along the country's economically vital Suez Canal. The constitution, which Egyptians were promised would be written by a truly representative body, was rushed through by Morsi and his allies over serious opposition towards the end of the year. When it came time for Egyptians to vote on it, it passed – but with less than 40 percent of the Egyptian electorate participating, many voters having lost hope that the political process was going to deliver anything of any tangible value to them or their families.
ATTEMPTS NOT MADE
While fixing Egypt's economic problems would be the work of years under even the best of circumstances, serious attempts to address how the national budget is administered, rampant corruption that makes being either a simple wage-earner or an entrepreneur a minefield, or the heavy-hand of the military in business, were not made. The average Egyptian was financially worse off at the end of 2011, and worse off still at the end of 2012. This simple reality is how Egyptians are judging recent events, and why so many of them are so deeply worried.
Now the country is less than two months away from electing a new parliament, extending a period of political uncertainty. A new political reality will be created by that election – the fifth national vote in two years – and will lead to more political uncertainty as factions in parliament are formed, and Egyptian politicians test the new rules of the game. Local and foreign investors will stay on the sidelines for awhile yet, hoping for some clarity as to the new rules –clean ones or dirty ones, new ways of doing business or the same old rent-seeking of the past – before they put any more skin in the game.
Meanwhile, Egyptians are watching, and worried. The Egyptian pound plunged to an eight-year low against the dollar in the past month, and the Egyptian government's foreign reserves now stand at about $15 billion, less than half of what they were at the time of Mubarak's ouster. That exchange rate – and the soaring interest the Egyptian government pays on international borrowing – has a host of implications for the subsidized bread, cooking fuel, and gasoline that millions of Egyptians rely on.
A random walk through Cairo can't show how finely poised Egypt's situation is. But if you stop to talk for a few hours, you can feel it.
It's the economy, stupid, as a US political hack had it 20 years ago. And it's the economy that Egypt needs to focus on in 2013.

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The year's 9 most hilarious New York Times corrections

Egregiously, the Gray Lady mistook My Little Pony's Fluttershy for Twilight Sparkle
The internet has unquestionably made it easier for readers to interact with big media organizations — and that includes calling them out on mistakes. Still, you've really got to hand it to The New York Times. Internet or no, the paper of record has long exhibited unrivaled diligence when it comes to issuing corrections. And because the paper addresses every minute inaccuracy with the same strident gravitas, it's often quite "funny to hear pop-culture quibbles addressed in the Gray Lady's formal language," says Josh Dzieza at The Daily Beast. Without further ado, some of the year's most endearing Times corrections:
1. "Navigating Love and Autism"
Correction: "An article on Monday about Jack Robinson and Kirsten Lindsmith, two college students with Asperger syndrome who are navigating the perils of an intimate relationship, misidentified the character from the animated children's TV show My Little Pony that Ms. Lindsmith said she visualized to cheer herself up. It is Twilight Sparkle, the nerdy intellectual, not Fluttershy, the kind animal lover."
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2. "Fanfare for the Comma Man"
Correction: "An earlier version of this article misstated the length of time E.B. White wrote for The New Yorker as five centuries."
3. "Food for Hungry Fans of the Boss"
Correction: "An earlier version of this article misspelled the singer's surname in a number of places. He is Bruce Springsteen, not Springstein."
SEE ALSO: Today in business: 5 things you need to know
4. "Gore Vidal Dies at 86; Prolific, Elegant, Acerbic Writer"
Correction: "An obituary on Gore Vidal on Wednesday included several errors. Mr. Vidal called William F. Buckley Jr. a crypto-Nazi, not a crypto-fascist, in a television appearance during the 1968 Democratic National Convention. While Mr. Vidal frequently joked that Vice President Al Gore was his cousin, genealogists have been unable to confirm that they were related. And according to Mr. Vidal's memoir Palimpsest, he and his longtime live-in companion, Howard Austen, had sex the night they met, but did not sleep together after they began living together. It is not the case that they never had sex."
5. "Suspect in Libya Attack, in Plain Sight, Scoffs at U.S."
Correction: "An earlier version of this article misidentified the beverage that Ahmed Abu Khattala was drinking at the hotel. It was a strawberry frappe, not mango juice, which is what he had ordered."
SEE ALSO: 16 abbreviated company names explained
6. "Eileen Moran, Special Effects Wizard, Dies at 60"
Correction: "An obituary on Wednesday about Eileen Moran, a visual effects producer, misstated the name of a character she helped create for a series of Budweiser commercials. It was Louie the Lizard, not Larry the Lizard."
7. "S.E.C. Weighs Suit Against SAC Capital"
Correction: "An article on Thursday about efforts by the hedge fund manager Steven A. Cohen to defend his firm, SAC Capital Advisors, against a government inquiry into insider trading misstated the size of Mr. Cohen's house in Greenwich, Conn. It is 35,000 square feet, not 14,000."
SEE ALSO: The Connecticut school massacre: Are investors backing away from the gun business?
8. "In Shake-Up, Apple's Mobile Software and Retail Chiefs to Depart"
Correction: "An article on Tuesday about an executive shake-up at Apple described incorrectly an element of Apple's Game Center app that involves so-called skeuomorphic design. It is a simulation of a felt-covered table, not the thread of a leather binder."
9. "Homeless Man Is Grateful for Officer's Gift of Boots. But He Again Is Barefoot."
Correction: "An article in some editions on Monday about Jeffrey Hillman, the homeless and barefoot man for whom New York Police Officer Lawrence DePrimo bought a pair of boots — an act captured on camera and celebrated across the country — misspelled the name of the store where the officer made the purchase. It is Skechers, not Sketchers."

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The grassroots movement to get Piers Morgan deported: Could it actually work?

More than 60,000 people have signed a petition to get the CNN commentator kicked out of the country for his outspoken views on gun control
Can a foreign-born political commentator be deported for making political comments? That's the question — and the goal — of more than 60,000 Americans who have signed a petition to deport British journalist Piers Morgan for his outspoken views on gun control. On a recent episode of his CNN series Piers Morgan Tonight, Morgan called guest Larry Pratt, the executive director of Guns Owners for America, "dangerous" and "an unbelievably stupid man" for arguing that the U.S. needs more guns to fight gun violence. Pratt responded by calling Morgan "morally obtuse." (Watch a video of the heated exchange below.) The subsequent petition to get Morgan deported, which was started by "Kurt N" from Austin, Texas, argues that Morgan is "engaged in a hostile attack against the U.S. Constitution by targeting the Second Amendment" and "[demands] that Mr. Morgan be deported immediately."
The irony, of course, is that deporting Morgan for his "hostile attack" on the Constitution would be a violation of the constitutional right to free speech. Even as a British national, Morgan is "afforded various rights under national security law and due process," says immigration attorney Mark Schifanelli at ABC News. Morgan's comments are protected unless they present "immediate danger" to the United States, and his opinion on gun control isn't likely to meet that requirement.
So the government is very unlikely to take action against Morgan — but what about CNN, which airs Piers Morgan Tonight? "His bosses have every right to fire him if they want: That's not a breach of First Amendment rights," says Tim Worstall at Forbes. But there's no indication that Morgan's job is on the line, and given that he was hired as a political commentator, he's not likely to land in hot water for making political comments. In fact, the controversy may end up proving to be a ratings boost, offering a life raft to the relatively low-rated show.
Getting past the fairly ludicrous question of deportation, there's a much more serious issue at hand: Is Morgan doing damage to the gun control movement? "He's certainly given conservatives a gift by allowing them to portray gun control as the issue of choice of foreign liberals," says Tim Stanley at The Telegraph. "And, frankly, asking an interviewee 'You're an incredibly stupid idiot, aren't you?' fosters the impression that liberals are engaging not in constructive debate but an assault on the character of their opponents.

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Acer's $99 tablet: Just what the world needs?

The PC maker reportedly plans to unveil a gadget that will undercut the gadgets that undercut the iPad
Acer, the world's fourth largest PC maker, is reportedly becoming the first heavy hitter in the industry to make a tablet that — at $99 a pop — will be inexpensive enough to be within reach of a wide range of buyers in developing countries. Chinese companies making no-name budget tablets should be nervous, says Eva Dou at The Wall Street Journal. "At seven inches with a 1024 x 600 resolution screen and 1.2GHz dual-core processor, the so-called Iconia B1 tablet will have somewhat similar specs to Amazon.com Inc.'s Kindle Fire and the Barnes & Noble Inc.'s Nook Color," but it will undercut their lowest prices by $40 (although the final shelf price might vary from country to country). Dou continues:
Acer's pursuit of lower-priced tablets will cut into its margins, but will help it secure a stronger foothold in the rapidly growing China market, said Daiwa Securities analyst Christine Wang.
SEE MORE: What kind of tablet should I buy? A holiday shopping guide
"Chinese white-box tablet makers are expected to sell some 60 million tablets next year, so it is a really big market," she said. "None of the major PC brands sells a tablet right now priced to compete with them right now."
This all "sounds great, especially if you're looking for a minimal investment starter-tablet for your clumsy kid," says Brian Barrett at Gizmodo. The catch is that it's "bound for places you (likely) don't live," as the $99 gadget is destined for store shelves in emerging markets with no planned release in the U.S. (at least not yet). And it's easy to see why Acer isn't eager to unveil this tablet in the U.S., says Barrett:
Different markets have different needs, and by the time the B1's ready for showtime it'll likely feel hopelessly outdated against the current U.S. competition, low price or now.
Still, it'd be nice to at least have the option, especially given that you'd pay $100 for the adorable but horribly gimped LeapPad 2. At the very least, maybe it'll give some other hardware honcho inspiration to do the same in the US. Looking at you, HP.
Acer's tablet, rumored to be hitting the market in early 2013, might never come to the U.S, says Rik Henderson at Pocket-lint, but it could certainly open doors in developing countries where, for most people, an iPad is not an option. One thing's for sure though. If a $99 name-brand tablet does hit the U.S., "there'd certainly be demand" for it.

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Seven Things Parents Can Do Post-Newtown Without Government

These simple common-sense steps are adapted from a post I published on my blog after the horrific Newtown, Conn., massacre. Our hearts ache, but we are not completely helpless or hopeless in the face of evil and the unknown. And we are not alone. This Christmas, cherish life, keep faith and practice self-empowerment.
7. Teach our kids about the acts of heroes in times of crisis. Tell them about Newtown teacher Vicki Soto's self-sacrifice and bravery. Tell them about Clackamas mall shopper Nick Meli, a concealed-carry permit-holder whose quick action may have prevented additional deaths. Tell them about Family Research Council security guard Leo Johnson, who protected workers from a crazed gunman. Tell them about the heroic men in the Aurora movie theater who gave their lives taking bullets for their loved ones. Tell them about armed Holocaust Museum security guard Stephen Tyrone Johns, who died fighting back against the museum's nutball attacker. Tell them about armed private citizen Jeanne Assam, who gunned down the New Life Church attacker in Colorado Springs and saved untold lives.
6. Train our kids. When they see something troublesome or wrong, say something. Students, teachers and parents, if a young classmate exhibits bizarre or violent behavior toward himself or herself, report it right away. If it gets ignored, say it louder. Don't give up. Don't just shrug off the "weirdo" saying or doing dangerous things, and don't just hope someone else will act.
5. Limit our kids' time online, and control their exposure to desensitizing cultural influences. Turn off the TV. Get them off the bloody video games. Protect them from age-inappropriate Hollywood violence. Make sure they are active and engaged with us and the world, and not pent up in a room online every waking moment.
4. If you see a parent struggling with an out-of-control child, don't look the other way. If you are able to offer any kind of help (your time, resources, wisdom), do it. Don't wait.
3. We still don't know the medical condition of the Newtown shooter. But we do know that social stigmas are strong. We don't need government to take immediate, individual action to break those stigmas. There are millions of children, teens and young adults suffering from very real mental illnesses. Be silent no more about your family's experiences, your struggles, your pains and your fears. Speak up.
2. Prepare and protect your community. Joe Cascarelli of Westcliffe, Colo., wrote me about how he and other citizens took their children's safety into their own hands. "It was 10 years ago that our sheriff put an ad in the local paper to initiate the formation of the Sheriff's Posse. About 40 of us volunteered; today we have about 20 active Posse members. Eight years ago, the Posse command staff offered to provide the local school district with daily security patrols when the school was in session, at school athletic events and during school dances including the annual prom." Law enforcement conducted emergency drills, training to prepare for mass shootings and joint sessions with first responders.
"The Posse has continued its patrols at school events and during the school day. Posse patrols have become a visible, accepted part of our community," Cascarelli told me. "Anyone intent on harm would see armed uniformed personnel at the school daily. The Posse even has an Amber Alert at the local rodeo. When an atrocity like Columbine, Virginia Tech and most recently in Newtown, Conn., happens, all we hear is carefully crafted words of grief, heartrending interviews with parents, and TV's talking heads with knee-jerk 'solutions.' Well, our little community has implemented a local solution. Trained, armed volunteers daily protect our children. What is the matter with the rest of the country? Where are concerned parents and citizens willing to carve out some time to provide similar security?"
1. Teach our kids to value and respect life by valuing and respecting them always. And in loving and valuing life, teach them also not to fear death. The Catholic hymn "Be Not Afraid" offers time-tested solace and sage advice:
If you pass through raging waters, in the sea, you shall not drown.
If you walk amidst the burning flames, you shall not be harmed.
If you stand before the pow'r of hell and death is at your side, know that I am with you, through it all.
Be not afraid, I go before you always.
Come follow Me and I shall give you rest.

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State-Run Broadcasting Pushes for Taxes

A "serious" proposal is one that has a reasonable expectation of resolving a conflict. Anyone studying Speaker Boehner's Plan B proposal knows it wasn't serious. Why are so many defending it and bemoaning its defeat?
It tells you an awful lot about the dishonest nature of politics in America today.
Republicans — fiscally conservative Republicans — have argued since forever that tax increases diminish economic growth. For the past two years, they have argued that increasing taxes on the "wealthy" would wreak havoc on our fragile (at best) economy. In fact, three studies have confirmed that this "millionaires tax," now endorsed by Plan B Boehner, would cost America 700,000 jobs, an unmitigated disaster.
The problem, as has endlessly been trumpeted by this camp, is spending, not taxes, with entitlement reform as the solution. Plan B does nothing of substance here.
A "meaningless" proposal is one that has no reasonable expectation of resolving a conflict. Plan B is that in spades.
So how do Republicans, so desperate to be a party to the resolution of our fiscal crisis, square the hole? They declare that a tax is not a tax, and a lack of spending restraint is spending restraint.
Boehner and Co. have been as politically incoherent as Team Obama has been skillful. The Democrats have co-opted one hallmark GOP issue after another. The final one was taxes. Incredibly, it's the party of McGovern, Carter, Kerry and Kennedy that is now the champion of fiscal responsibility: tax cuts for everyone except the greedy rich who need to pay their fair share.
The Left smells political blood. Boehner has given them the opening to tear the GOP in two. On the one side, there are the reasonable Boehner moderates who recognize the need to increase revenue; on the other are the troglodytes who refuse to leave failed Reaganomics behind.
Take the "PBS NewsHour" on Friday night. Liberal pundit Mark Shields was typically ranting away against anti-tax Reagan Republicans. "It's really become a problem for Republicans," he said. He said the post-1990 Republicans have never voted for a tax increase.
Shields was angry they wouldn't "give up their virginity," even to offer a head-fake to Obama. "They were going to give up their virginity, their political virginity, and risk a primary challenge — that is how they saw it — by doing this. What they failed to address is the reality that, when you are the — part of the governing party in any institution, the House, the Senate, anyplace else, you have a responsibility to make sure that you can govern."
Liberals always equate "reality" and "governing" and "responsibility" with tax-hiking. Shields didn't offer a sentence on how it's "governing" for the Senate Democrats to fail to offer a budget, year after year.
Instead, Shields insisted conservatives were destroying the GOP brand: "They robbed the Republicans of that — that sense of leadership, of governability, and robbed them, I think, and reduced the brand of the Republican Party even more."
Then PBS turned for agreement to its regular "conservative," David Brooks. But he was on vacation. So they turned to "conservative" Michael Gerson, the former Bush speechwriter. He also saw the vote against a Boehner as a crisis caused by Reaganite troglodytes. "Fair and balanced" PBS really knows what to do with its Republican tax dollars.
"We now have a president and a speaker who both wanted a deal, OK? By every account, they wanted a deal. They tried it twice. And they couldn't make it happen," Gerson argued. "It's a serious kind of governing challenge right now. If you look, we have got a short-term political crisis. We have a long-term fiscal crisis. And we're providing no confidence whatsoever that we can approach those things as a government in a mature way."
This is ridiculous. Both sides wanted a deal? Obama stated repeatedly and unequivocally that he'd veto it, and Reid said the Senate would never consider it. Obama wanted, and still wants a deal that surrenders even more turf to the Democrats.
Naturally, the same sham unfolded at NPR's horribly titled "All Things Considered" on Friday. The liberal "Week in Review" commentator, E.J. Dionne, treated the Tea Party as stupid people who don't understand compromise, and "this raised profound questions about whether the Republicans in the House are serious about governing because you have seen this over and over again."
Sitting in for "conservative" David Brooks on NPR was Matthew Continetti of the so-called Washington Free Beacon. He offered his "optimistic" take that conservatives would cave to Boehner as soon as the markets react badly, like they voted for the Troubled Asset Relief Program in 2008.
"Both sides" on these networks are just waiting for conservatives to be dismissed. They've already proven they're interested only in another Obama victory, not compromise.

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