Israel and the Gaza Fiasco: Brinksmanship where no one blinks

I suspect this diary will not be popular, but I didn't start blogging to avoid controversy. Here in America, sentiment on the right almost exclusively supports Israel in the boarding of the Free Gaza Movement (FGM) flotilla and the violence that followed. Sentiment on the left almost exclusively supports the FGM. I have been trying to figure out the rights and wrongs and the legalities of the incident since it happened and it seems ambiguous all around (more on that below). But the incident itself is very simple: two sides (one heavily armed) engaging in brinksmanship with neither side willing to blink. The inevitable result of such brinksmanship will be the better armed side will ultimately succeed through brutal means.

The basic series of events is simple to outline, but complex. Israel unilaterally pulled out of Gaza, creating tensions within Israel as the Israeli government forced the dismantling of Jewish settlements in Gaza, the right thing to do but not popular among right wingers in Israel. In the next Palestinian election Hamas, whose charter officially denies the existence of Israel and calls for its destruction, won fair and square, becoming not just a terrorist organization, but a legitimate part of the Palestinian government.

Under such circumstances, the best outcome is that the former terrorist/guerrilla organization successfully makes the transition to effective and reasonable government. Arguably the Sandinistas and ANC made similar transitions, though the parallels aren't exact. Much as I hated Hamas, I recognized the legitimacy of their election and hoped they would make a transition to a legitimate government.

This didn't happen. Hamas made a partial offer to end attacks on Israel and recognize the legitimacy of Israel (and I think it could have been the basis of genuine discussion, though Hamas would have had be willing to compromise) but the US under Bush imposed sanctions on Palestine. At the same time, Hamas and Fatah began fighting, though reached an agreement for a coalition government. However fighting between Israel and Hamas escalated (with each side blaming the other) at the same time. This led to a renewal of civil war between Hamas and Fatah which left Gaza in Hamas hands and the West Bank in Fatah hands. Israel then imposed a blockade on Hamas controlled Gaza as Hamas sanctioned rocket attacks against Israeli civilians. One of the main justifications for the blockade was to prevent supplies for the rockets from reaching Gaza. Meanwhile, Fatah controlled West Bank has been largely calm, though Israel has failed to respond to West Bank calm with something like...oh, stopping the illegal settlements. After an outright invasion of Gaza by Israel, the rocket attacks stopped but the blockade has continued.

The Free Gaza Movement (FGM) started as an attempt to break the blockade, arguing that it was inhumane and illegal. Background on FGM (mostly sympathetic) can be found in this Nation article. In general their flotillas have been quietly allowed to do their thing, though the IDF and right wingers in Israel have always wanted Israel to use force and stop them.

The issues in question are as follows:

1.) Is the blockade legal?
2.) If the blockade is legal, is it legal for Israeli forces to board a ship in international waters>
3.) Is FGM linked indirectly to arms smugglers supplying weapons to Hamas?
4.) Did either side do its best to prevent confrontation or did they both seek confrontation?
5.) Did Israel use excessive force?

International waters are notorious for ambiguous legal issues. Two things are clear: a.) Nations ARE legally allowed to blockade other nations, though the details are HUGELY ambiguous. b.) in general one nation is NOT able to board another nation's ship in international waters UNLESS arms smuggling is suspected.

Officially Hamas does not recognize Israel, though when they won the election they unofficially mitigated that stand. Israel outright refuses to recognize the legitimacy of Hamas. Both sides have exchanged fire on the other. In essence a state of war exists between Gaza and Israel. Blockades are common tactics in war, including British blockades of Germany in both World Wars.

Is the Israeli blockade legal? Was their boarding of the ship legal? Both are in the realm of the ambiguities of the high seas. Here is an article that concludes Israel probably did not act legally in boarding the ship. But Alan Dershowitz wrote an article that argues that, though ill advised, the blockade and boarding WERE solidly legal. It seems an open question to me. On the one hand, blockading an enemy in war (and Israel claims that Gaza's rocket attacks are acts of war and that Hamas is a terrorist organization, a claim supported by the EU and US) is common and accepted. On the other hand there is always argument over how a blockade applies to neutral nations. I should point out that traditionally (with the clear exception of during the Civil War) the United States government has stood up for the rights of neutrals to trade with belligerents in a war. In fact violation of the neutrality of American ships during the Napoleonic wars and WW I were major issues that contributed to the War of 1812 and America's entry into WW I.

The legality of the boarding is PARTLY dependent on the legality of the blockade, but it also is dependent on whether the FGM is linked to arms smuggling.

In general (as described in the Nation article I link to above) it is clear that the FGM, whether I agree with them or not, is a legitimate humanitarian organization founded by peace activists. However, one organization connected to FGM, the Turkish charity IHH, has been accused by Israel, the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Danish Institute for International Studies of being linked to terrorist organizations and of arms smuggling (which in itself would be legal justification for Israel's boarding the ships). I am not sure how strong the evidence is. The basis for the claim seems to be the following (from a Washington Institute for Near East Policy article):

A French intelligence report concluded that in the mid-1990s, IHH president Bulent Yildrim was directly involved in "recruit[ing] veteran soldiers in anticipation of the coming holy war [jihad]. In particular, some men were sent into war zones in Muslim countries in order to acquire combat experience." Foreshadowing IHH's role in this weekend's aid flotilla to Gaza, the French report noted that IHH provided financial support "as well as caches of firearms, knives, and pre-fabricated explosives" in an effort to obtain "political support from these countries." IHH phone records in Istanbul reportedly included repeated telephone calls in 1996 to an al-Qaeda guesthouse in Italy and to North African terrorists active in Europe.

In addition, a 1996 CIA report on terrorist abuse of charities, declassified after the September 11 attacks, documented IHH as a charity with ties to "Iran and Algerian groups." According to the report, the director of the IHH office in Sarajevo "has been linked to Iranian operatives." The report described "the terrorist-related activities and linkages" of fifteen selected "Islamic NGOs," noting that "individuals connected to some of these NGOs have plotted to kidnap or kill U.S. personnel." And according to French court documents, IHH was the subject of a Turkish criminal investigation in late 1997 when sources revealed that leaders of the group were purchasing automatic weapons from other regional Islamist militant groups. Based on an analysis of seized IHH documents, Turkish authorities concluded that "detained members of IHH were going to fight in Afghanistan, Bosnia, and Chechnya."

IHH is a member of the "Union of Good" (Itelaf al-Khair, also known as the "Charity Coalition"). According to Palestinian intelligence, this organization "is considered -- with regard to material support -- one of the biggest Hamas supporters." Israel outlawed the Union of Good in February 2002, and the United States named it a specially designated global terrorist entity in November 2008. According to the U.S. Treasury Department, the Union of Good was created by the Hamas leadership "in order to facilitate the transfer of funds to Hamas." Intelligence underpinning the U.S. designation noted that the group "facilitates the transfer of tens of millions of dollars a year to Hamas-managed associations." It also "acts as a broker for Hamas by facilitating financial transfers between a web of charitable organizations...and Hamas-controlled organizations in the West Bank and Gaza."

I should note that the Washington Institute for Near East Policy is considered biased towards Israel by most, but it has also been criticized by Zionist organizations for ties to Fatah as early as 2003.

It sounds to me like, whether it was advisable or not, as Dershowitz argues, the boarding had at least arguable legal backing based on the arms smuggling connection, though again see the Daily Kos article for a counterpoint.

Could the confrontation be avoided? The answer is clearly yes, but it is equally clear that BOTH sides wanted confrontation, though not necessarily bloodshed.

Israel has in the past handled FGM flotillas differently. From the Nation article mentioned above:

It turns out there was a robust debate within the Israeli government. The military wanted to stop the FGM by whatever means necessary. The foreign ministry argued that doing so would only play into the hands of the activists by making them martyrs and making Israel look brutal in the eyes of the world. Further, they predicted that a peaceful end to the journey would diminish interest by the international media. This judgment was partially redeemed by the almost complete lack of coverage of the trip in the US media...

I think two things led to things being handled differently this time. A more right wing government in Israel sided with the IDF, insisting on a strict enforcement of the blockade. But also, the response to the flotilla allowed through previously was not as muted as Israel had hoped. Continued from the same Nation article:

Israel's decision not to intervene surprised and shocked the FGM, making for a wild celebration as the boats docked in Gaza's tiny harbor on Saturday, August 24. With them, they brought 200 hearing aids for Gaza children and 5,000 balloons. Most Gazans were unfazed by the token humanitarian aid and focused on the symbolic significance of breaking the siege. For them, the impact of this event was akin to Hamas's breaking the international boundary separating Gaza from Egypt several months earlier. It meant breaking through a psychological as well as a physical barrier. It meant showing that a group of unarmed peace activists could successfully disrupt the Israeli occupation.

So Israel's right wing government was going to insist on strict enforcement at the risk of brinksmanship. But the FGM also passed up a way of defusing the situation that could also have brought them some great publicity. Noam Shalit, the father of kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, made FGM an offer that could have put Netanyahu in a VERY difficult position, but they turned it down:

Noam Shalit, the father of kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, offered what sounded like a pretty good deal for the group that calls itself the “Free Gaza Movement..."

He said he would give the convoy his stamp of approval and use his considerable moral leverage to pressure Israel to allow the convoy to continue to Gaza — if the organizers of the cruise agreed to make contact with his son:

Attorney Nick Kaufman, who approached the Free Gaza Movement on behalf of the kidnapped soldier’s family, told Ynet that he offered the flotilla’s organizers the family’s full support, provided that “in addition to their demand that Israel lift its blockade they will urge Hamas to allow the soldier to receive letters and food packages from his family and allow international organizations to visit him.”

According to Kaufman, he was referred to the movement’s legal counsel, who rejected the offer. “I thought this movement supports human rights, as it claims, but according to the reaction it seems that it is only interested in provocation and expressing support for a terror group that doesn’t really care about human rights,” said the attorney.

...Almost immediately after the Israeli media announced that [the offer] had been extended, it was refused [by FGM]

To me Israel's current government is a horrible right wing regime that really wants to use brutal methods to keep Palestinians down. They may well have the "River to the Sea" mentailty favoring Israeli takeover of all Palestinian land. It is inevitable that such a government will use violence whether or not warrented. On the other hand, Hamas is, (unlike Hezbollah who I may not like but who only target military targets) a terrorist organization that has allowed and probably supported the use of rockets and mortars against Israeli citizens. Officially, and probably genuinely, Hamas also has a "river to the sea" mentality that wants to destroy Israel.

This leads to a situation where violence and possibly war is almost inevitable. It is unclear to me if the blockade is clearly legal. I lean towards yes, but even given that it is unclear to me how neutrals, such as Turkey, should be treated regarding such a blockade. Boarding the ship is also of dubious legality, though IF there is genuine evidence that one of the charities connected with the FGM IS linked to arms smuggling (and I don't know the evidence for or against) then it could well be legal as arms smuggling is the main justification for boarding a ship in international waters. It would be VERY interesting to see what would have happend if FGM took the deal that would have gotten them support from Noam Shalit...it would be hard for the Israeli government to board them but it also would mean compromising the blockade and the arms smuggling justification. I think the FGM should have taken the deal. It would have been a huge PR coup for them and put Netanyahu in a situation he really couldn't win.

Once the confrontation was definite, due to the actions of both sides, two things were clear. a.) Israel was going to have a PR nightmare (largely of their own making) and b.) resistance by the flotilla was only going to lead to injuries and death. IDF training emphasizes minimizing casualties and the IDF went in initially with non-lethal weapons. But the IDF also has the mentality of responding to force with overwhelming (many would say excessive) force and once resistance was encountered, the order came down to use their regular armaments.

Who is right and who is wrong? I can't really justify the actions of either side since it is clear to me that both sides wanted confrontation, though NOT, I believe, deaths. I don't think either side wanted the confrontation to go so far, but it is inevitable that it would once the confrontation began.

Bottom line is I see no good guys in this, just different shades of people who blundered either blindly or intentionally into a situation where bloodshed was almost inevitable. Ultimately Hamas and the Israeli right wing are to blame, but mistakes (in my mind dumb mistakes) were made by others along the way as well.

Obama and the Stimulus has helped us Economically

Among my investments is an investment in the Eaton Vance Greater India Fund. I was lucky, or smart. Back in 2004 I saw the restoration of the Congress Party in India (over the Hindu extremist BJP party), combined with Bush's horrible economic policies, as a sign I should invest in some India mutual funds. I was convinced that India would be doing well and that Bush would ruin America's economy. So I invested in the Eaton Vance Greater India Fund.

I didn't realize it at the time, though I suspected, but I invested at EXACTLY the right time. By 2007 I had MORE than doubled my investment, so I sold enough shares to make up my initial investment and kept the rest as profits. A good chunk of what I sold for profit went to investing in Sunpower which, in turn, doubled in value, so I sold enough to make up for what I invested and still have the rest (which has gone down in value) as profit.

Bottom line is I bought and sold as the India market bottomed and peaked. The part of my India investment that I kept plummeted as the Bush recession hit full force in 2008. It has now been recovering.

What strikes me, though, is the statement made by the fund manager about what is going on. It is in direct contradiction to what right wing extremists are saying about government intervention in the economy. Basically, the recovery from 2008 (when the Bush economy dominated and markets were bottoming out) to 2009 (when the Obama economy was just beginnning) there was a real recovery in investment value. To be fair, how much of this filtered down to the working and middle class is a fair question. The stimulus helped investors...how much it helped working and middle class remains an open question. But, Republicans have claimed that the kind of government intervention that the Stimulus represents is some kind of socialism that hurts business.

I have clear evidence that this is bullshit. In the Annual Report I just received from the Eaton Vance Greater India Fund investment I have, is the following statement by the fund manager:

Equity markets the world over staged a dramatic comeback during the 12 months ending December 31, 2009 [Obama's first year in office], most clawing their way back into positive territory from the depths of a global recession that began to reach historic proportions in the second half of 2008 [the end of Bush's adminstration]. Significant infusions of government monetary and fiscal stimulus helped moderate the economic downdraft early in 2009...

In other words, that government intervention called a "stimulus" that Republicans are calling "socialist" led to a "dramatic comeback" from a global recession of "historic proportions." Those so-called "socialist" infusions of government monetary and fiscal stimulus saved the day according to this mutual fund manager.

So the Republicans are against the policies that have been responsible for the current recovery. Sure, us leftists think we need MORE of this for MORE recovery. But the Republicans currently are attacking the very policies that mutual fund managers are saying saved us from the worst of the Bush recession.

So thanks to the Stimulus. I know my job is more secure thanks to the Stimulus. And this fund manager is attributing the change from the Bush recession to the Obama recovery to the government intervention in the stimulus package. So I really think it is time to stop paying any attention to the delusional Republicans and start listening to the FDR Democrat strategy of government stimulus. THAT is what has driven the recovery so far, so why aren't we going even further along this road to recovery?

Gowanus Canal Pictures, Feb. 20, 2010

As Joy, Jacob and I strolled along Union Street, we noticed that even in the middle of winter (Feb. 20, 2010) the Gowanus Canal stank. And when we neared it, this is what we saw.

Photos by Joy Romanski

View from Union St. Bridge over the Gowanus:




Closeup 1:



Closeup 2:




Disgusting and really stinky. Can't imagine living or working along the banks. But this wasn't the worst we have seen. It gets even worse in the summer in terms of both stink and slime. On July 26, 2008 my wife took the following pictures of the 9th St. bridge over the Gowanus Canal:



See the lovely phase change between the solid slick and the water? Here's what it looked like on the opposite bank:



Yes...that is a glass bottle embedded and suspended by the muck. Want to see a close up?



More debris enshrined in the amber-like "water":



Though for sheer "man that is gross" impact, nothing can beat a used latex glove embedded in the crap:



It is no wonder why the EPA wants to designate it a Superfund site and clean it up. I can't believe ANYONE would be so greedy and callous as to want to develop the canal without a thorough cleanup. My wife calls it a Love Canal waiting to happen. I should note that among those who support the Superfund cleanup of the Gowanus are:

# United States Environmental Protection Agency
# New York State Department of Environmental Conservation
# The Army Corps of Engineers
# Columbia University’s Urban Design Lab

That's not counting the environmental groups, local neighborhood organizations and local politicians. I am only mentioning the groups with both expertise on the issue and no bias or stake in the matter.

I also want to highlight another expert opinion: that of Tom Angotti, Ph.D., Director of the Center for Community Planning & Development at Hunter College. Another voice I would hesitate to ignore! Here is part of his statement from an excellent piece for Pardon Me For Asking on May 22, 2009:

I am deeply concerned about the future of the Gowanus area. It is one of the most contaminated in New York City and I find it troubling that after so many years of concern by residents and workers in the area, city government has yet to carry out a thorough study that looks at the long-term effects of the contamination on the health of people who live and work in the area. Nor does the city have an adequate strategy to clean it up the Canal. Designation of a Superfund Site would bring to bear the missing attention and resources and while it will not resolve all environmental and health problems it will bring us much closer than New York City’s limited efforts.

The proposal to rezone the area advanced by New York City Department of City Planning (DCP) can derail efforts to improve the environment. It is not based on any careful scientific study of contamination, the long-term effects of climate change and sea-level rise, or existing and future impacts on human health and local ecosystems. The rezoning responds to proposals for new residential development and would limit existing and potential industrial uses. DCP claims that as sites get redeveloped property owners will be required to clean them up. However, environmental impact statements (EIS) for individual sites, even large sites, will not produce the kind of remediation needed to make the Gowanus safe for residents and workers. First of all the EIS is a disclosure document. Applicants are required to disclose potential impacts; they are not required to remediate pre-existing conditions, nor are they even required to mitigate unhealthy conditions that are created by their own projects. And site-specific mitigation may very well lead to the migration of toxic waste to other sites and increase public exposures to unhealthy conditions. The EIS is so inadequate as a tool for environmental improvement that specialists at both the conservative Manhattan Institute’s Center for Rethinking Development and my Center, on the opposite end of the philosophical spectrum, agree that it needs a major overhaul...

City government also wants us to believe that the current plan by its Department of Environmental Protection to flush out the Canal, once it is fully implemented, will constitute an adequate cleanup. However, flushing out the canal will not remove the toxic sediment in the canal or prevent leeching into surrounding properties. It will not resolve the long-term problem of contaminated Combined Sewer Overflows. It will not make further development around the Gowanus Canal safe for people who live and work there.

We hear the argument that even if Superfund cleanup might be better if will take too long and in the meantime prevent new development, which is supposed to mean more jobs and housing units. This is a reckless way of treating public health hazards. It can also result in a net loss of jobs as residential uses replace industry. New residential development within breathing distance of the Gowanus Canal will place many more people at risk of chronic diseases such as cancer and respiratory illnesses. Government has not adequately studied existing levels of exposure or projected future levels of exposure. This is needed so that the public can make informed judgments about whether or not to develop, where to develop, and the precautionary measures that need to be taken.

There is more of his excellent, expert analysis. Please read his whole statement on Pardon Me for Asking.

The Gowanus Canal neighborhood has so much potential. Even now there are some real gems, including a pottery shop and an art gallery (Proteus Gowanus) in a former box factory on the corner of Union St and Third Ave:



The pottery is Claireware, and has some beautiful stuff. From her website:



Proteus Gowanus includes the following ongoing projects all in one building near the canal:

Proteotypes
The publishing arm of Proteus Gowanus, an interdisciplinary gallery and reading room in Brooklyn, New York. Proteus Gowanus develops exhibits of art, artifacts, objects and books around a yearlong theme. Related programs are held at the gallery throughout that year.

Fixer’s Collective
The Fixers Collective is a social experiment in improvisational fixing and mending that grew out of a yearlong exhibition at Proteus Gowanus entitled MEND.

Anonima
An archive of visual art, books, documents and ephemera from a 1960’s artist collaborative including Ernst Benkert, Frank Hewitt and Ed Mieczkowski.

Blue Fire
This archival installation by Wendy Walker centers on a young British woman named Constance Kent, who in 1865 confessed to the brutal murder of her three year old half-brother. Kent’s detailed narrative, which inspired the first examples in two literary genres, true crime and sensation fiction, does not tally with the facts established by forensic evidence.

Reanimation Library
Developed by artist/librarian Andrew Beccone, the independent library serves artists, writers and other cultural archeologists.

Hall of the Gowanus
A mini-museum and store of art, artifacts and books related to the Gowanus Canal acknowledges our post-industrial neighbor and namesake as the site of the Revolutionary Battle of Brooklyn; a vital 19th century industrial canal; and the post-industrial polluted waterway and inspiration for artists and writers that it is today. We invite you to help us expand our collection by emailing us ideas for Gowanus-related art, artifacts, books and weblinks. We are interested in an interdisciplinary array of material relating to Gowanus history, art, ecology (past and present) and urban exploration. We are compiling a list for possible inclusion in an expanded Hall of the Gowanus in the future.

Museum of Matches
Developed by artist Sasha Chavchavadze, the Museum of Matches project explores the Cold War through an evolving array of visual art, narrative prose, documents, photographs, memorabilia and publications.
Morbid Anatomy

Morbid Anatomy Library
Developed by Joanna Ebenstein, Morbid Anatomy is a project begun in 2007 to survey the interstices of art and medicine, death and culture. The library is usually open by appointment only.

Oulipo
A library and bookstore of books related to the French literary movement, Oulipo, founded in 1960. Oulipian writing involves composing text according to constraints (rules) that are invented and arbitrary. Writers are compelled to say what they had never thought to say in ways they never would have chosen to say it. It is a method for making sense differently; for escaping old or ready-made ideas, subjects, and formulations; for creating many and various alternative realities and discovering what is true in them.

Observatory
A new exhibition/classroom/event space run by a group of seven artists and bloggers. The space seeks to present programming inspired by the 18th century notion of “rational amusement” and is especially interested in topics residing at the interstices of learning and amusement, art and science, and history and curiosity. The space hosts screenings, lectures, classes and exhibitions.

Bet most people in central Brooklyn don't know we have a great resource like this right in the neighborhood. But overall the neighborhood can be even better...but only if the stink and slime of the canal are cleaned up. If we just let the EPA clean it up we could have a great neighborhood along the canal.

Billboard in New Zealand Pisses off Christians

Seems a church in New Zealand (yes...this isn't an anti-church thing) has put up a billboard "challenging stereotypes" of the Christ conception story, that I (admittedly as a non-Christian) find hilarious, however some Christians are finding offensive. Here's the billboard:



And you can read more about the controversy at BBC News. Meanwhile, the whole thing reminds me of a friend I had in college who told me about his very devout Catholic grandmother who once expressed that though she believes in the absolute word of the bible, she has some SERIOUS doubts about this whole virgin birth thing.

The Science of Violence

An amazing study just came out in the journal Nature where people studied violent conflicts statistically and found that such conflicts all follow very similar patterns. And those patterns are very similar to how financial markets (also based on human behavior) function. Here is the abstract of the article:

Many collective human activities, including violence, have been shown to exhibit universal patterns. The size distributions of casualties both in whole wars from 1816 to 1980 and terrorist attacks have separately been shown to follow approximate power-law distributions. However, the possibility of universal patterns ranging across wars in the size distribution or timing of within-conflict events has barely been explored. Here we show that the sizes and timing of violent events within different insurgent conflicts exhibit remarkable similarities. We propose a unified model of human insurgency that reproduces these commonalities, and explains conflict-specific variations quantitatively in terms of underlying rules of engagement. Our model treats each insurgent population as an ecology of dynamically evolving, self-organized groups following common decision-making processes. Our model is consistent with several recent hypotheses about modern insurgency18, 19, 20, is robust to many generalizations, and establishes a quantitative connection between human insurgency, global terrorism and ecology. Its similarity to financial market models provides a surprising link between violent and non-violent forms of human behaviour

What is most striking is just how similar the patterns are whether you look at Afghanistan, Iraq, Peru or Colombia. They analyze both the size and timing of events and show that they fall on a very well-defined straight line on a log-log graph. Thus small scale attacks of violence occur more frequently and large-scale events far more rarely, though such large scale attacks are NOT isolated, unique events but rather simply one extreme of the normal dynamics of a conflict. The authors use these similarities across conflicts to formulate a model of insurgency by "treating the insurgent population as an ecology of dynamically evolving, decision-making groups..."

This model cannot be used to predict specific attacks any more than financial modeling can predict specific ups and downs of the markets or climate models can predict specific hurricanes or El Nino years. But, as with these other fields, this study can be used to analyze the overall dynamics of conflicts and could be used for emergency planning as well as for the timing and nature of interventions and diplomacy. Cool stuff and it shows that violent conflicts are far more orderly than I would have predicted.

You can see an article about this study on BBC News.

Earth-like, Watery World Discovered

In the recent issue of Nature is an article reporting the most earth-like planet yet discovered outside our solar system and, importantly, one that is very likely to be watery...perhaps as much as 50% water.

From the News and Views in this week's Nature:

The hunt for Earth-like worlds has taken a major step forward with the discovery of a planet only 2.7 times larger than Earth. Its mass and size are just as theorists would expect for a water-rich super-Earth...

Charbonneau's team1 has found that the small, faint star GJ 1214 undergoes repeated dimming of 1.3% for 52 minutes every 1.6 days. The only plausible interpretation is that a planet orbits the star with an orbital period of 1.6 days and that it has a radius that is 12% that of the star. Good estimates of the star's radius (21% that of the Sun) put the planet's radius at only 2.7 Earth radii. Such a small planet orbiting a star other than the Sun is an extraordinary find. With the tools currently available, only one other extrasolar planet has been reported that is thought to be close in size to Earth, namely CoRoT-7b, at 1.7 Earth radii. The new planet, which is only about 13 parsecs away, is named GJ 1214b. Importantly, it pulls gravitationally on its host star, causing the star to move with a speed of 12 m s−1, which the team has detected through measurements of wavelength shifts in the star's light (the Doppler effect). The planet's inferred mass is a mere 6.6 Earth masses, which, when combined with its radius, leads to a density of 1.9 g cm−3. By contrast, Earth's average density is much higher, at 5.5 g cm−3. Because water has a low density of about 1 g cm−3, the chemical composition of the new planet is probably some admixture of rock and water, with perhaps a small atmosphere of hydrogen and helium...

That solid material forms the building blocks of large planets such as Saturn and Neptune, and perhaps smaller planets as well, such as the new one1. But the density of 1.9 g cm−3 for this new planet imposes a constraint on the relative amounts of each constituent. To keep the planet's density that low requires that it contains large amounts of water. If the planet were pure Fe and silicates, its density would be similar to Earth's. It must contain a huge amount of water, roughly 50% by mass.

The actual article can be found here.

This planet would NOT be just like earth. The atmosphere is likely to be very different and it is not clear whether there could be solid continents to support terrestrial life. However, I am of the opinion that anywhere you find liquid water, there is a good shot of at least simple (bacteria-like) life if not more complex life.

GJ 1214b as it is now called is quite a landmark discovery. It is hard to see it that way now, since it is unlikely that any kind of exploratory mission can be launched any time soon, so we have to rely on indirect methods of studying it. But I suspect a lot of smart people are thinking right now of how we can get a good look at what seems like a big, very watery, possibly (probably?) life-bearing world in our general galactic neighborhood.

New York Focus: The Ongoing Working Families Party Scandal

I got a fair amount of crap from people about my coverage of the Working Families Party scandal, wherein WFP was caught red handed violating campaign finance laws. Several people told me to lay off them because they are progressives. To me, though, corruption by people I agree with on policy is worse than corruption by Republicans, who I expect it from. So I covered the WFP scandal despite attacks from fellow progressives.

Well, now WFP and one of their star candidates, Developer Shill Bill de Blasio, have been subpoenaed by the U.S. Attorney's Office. So folks, it isn't just me who thinks WFP, Developer Money, and Bill de Blasio are rotten to the core despite their progressive rhetoric. From the New York Observer:

The Working Families Party has received a subpoena from the US Attorney's Office for the Southern District seeking information in connection with its efforts in the 2009 elections, a spokesman for the labor-backed party confirmed...

The party is being sued for its work on Staten Island Councilwoman-elect Debi Rose's campaign. A judge ruled last week that the trial can go forward.

It was also the subject of at least one complaint filed with the CFB.

Three days after the Nov. 3 elections, the party announced it had hired Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom to conduct a thorough review of the structure and relationship between the WFP and its for-profit arm, Data & Field Services. The review is being led by former Chief Judge Judith Kaye...

It's hard to overstate how bad this could be for the WFP.

I personally think that WFP skirted the edge of legality close enough that in the end there will be little actual punishment for their actions. But in my mind they have finally abandoned all pretense of being a reform organization. They have shown a complete willingness to bend and break laws and cooperate with corrupt political machines like the Vito Lopez machine in Brooklyn. WFP may well survive this scandal, but it is a real scandal nonetheless and one that finally shows their true colors: they are nothing more than another corrupt machine interested in their own power more than in actual governance. In this sense they are the same as the Vito Lopez or Clarence Norman machine which had perfectly respectable policy stands in most cases, but were corrupt as can be. I have high expectations of my fellow progressives. I don't accept corruption just because they have good rhetoric on policy. I find the corruption of Brooklyn's Democratic machine embarrassing as hell, and the corruption of the WFP is just as bad if not worse.

For a LOT more on the WFP scandal (I haven't covered it much recently due to taking some time off from blogging) please see the excellent coverage by the City Hall News here, here, here and here. And that's just the stuff published since I took a break from blogging.

(P.S. I know some of you out there are going to complain about this article, but how the hell can I speak out against Republican corruption if I don't speak out against this crap?)32