[BLOG] Some Thursday links

[rfmcdonald]

• Daniel Drezner wonders if, at a time when Europe is weakening, the United States can find partners and allies to take Europe's place in emerging countries like India and Brazil.


• Extraordinary Observation's speculates that social engineering might change the ways American cities and city-dwellers operate, becoming more pro-bike for instance.


• Geocurrents writes about Paraguay, suggesting that its apparent tolerance for corruption may have a lot to do with its participation in two deadly, very draining wars.


• Global Sociology really doesn't like the IMF, particularly what it sees as economic strategies which disproportionately hurt the poor and the middle classes.


• Law 21's Jordan Furlong warns that China may end up becoming hugely important as the outsourcing of legal work goes, with obvious implications for lawyers in North America and elsewhere.


• Lawyers, Guns and Money's communication of the reality that the Israeli-South African alliance under apartheid was so close that Israel was apparently willing to sell South Africa nuclear weapons doesn't surprise me. The fact that Israel got away with such potentially catastrophic proliferation will threaten non-proliferation efforts, in the Middle East and elsewhere.


• Noel Maurer is not impressed by German public opinion's hostility to IMF bailouts of southern European Euro-using countries, since Germany will benefit.


• Slap Upside the Head reports on the sad news that Canada is about to deport an asylum seeker, hoping that Canada wwill save him from persecution on the grounds of his sexual orientation.


• Spacing Toronto's Shawn Micallef mourns the recent death of Will Munro, a queer artist and community organizer who helped transform Toronto's artistic community.


• Zero Geography maps Internet usage by country. Romania and Ukraine turn out to have surprisingly low rates of Internet usage.