Chill and Thaw

As Arctic ice melts, disputes concerning maritime boundaries are heating up, reports Canada's Globe and Mail.

North Korea Is Gay and Has No Friends

What, it's true! I'm not just being mean (I save that for Philadelphia). Besides, North Korea just winked at me on match.com.

Ew - gonna block yo ass, lil' Kim.

And for Some Good News

...there's this.

The Never-Ending and Always Depressing Demise of Freedom in Post-Soviet Russia

At some point, someone's going to have to take this patient off life support. (Putin's just the man to do it.) Russia's parliament recently approved a bill that would grant the FSB - the successor to the KGB - greatly expanded powers. That agency may now summon people who are suspected of "causing or creating the conditions for committing a crime." (Caution now, dear reader: Minority Report comments will not be tolerated.) Oh dear. That kind of vagueness is an aneurysm-inducing invitation to abuse.

And, in another indication that democracy in Russia is anemic, Putin's party voted unanimously in favor of the measure. Yet another indication: the communist party opposed it. Wow. It can't be good when your bill is too oppressive for Russian communists.

Ah, Hugo Chavez

...or the Crackpot from Caracas. In one of his recent speeches, he improvised a ditty about how Hillary Clinton doesn't like him and he doesn't like her either. The man really does class up the joint, doesn't he? Video:

Uganda: Why Stop with the Gays? Kill Their Straight Friends Too!

As this video from wakingupnow.com reveals, the Ugandan Anti-Homosexuality Bill doesn't just seek to impose the death penalty on those who are gay. The bill's language is so broad and vague that, under a few easily met circumstances, it authorizes the death penalty even for straight people who have never had gay sex. If the bill were to pass, straight Ugandans could be executed simply for doing any of the following more than once:

• Suggesting that a gay friend should have gay sex.
• Failing to turn in someone who has had gay sex, within 24 hours of learning about it.
• Failing to turn in someone who failed to turn in someone who has had gay sex, within 24 hours of learning about it.

Granted, the video is from January. But it's important to emphasize that, despite media reports that the bill would be amended to remove the death penalty provision, the bill has not in fact been amended. The media seems to have tired of the story, to judge from the lack of reporting, but the bill is as much an outrage, disgrace, and threat as it ever was. In the link immediately above, which leads to a BBC report from May 19, James Nsaba Buturo, the Ugandan minister for ethics and integrity (stop laughing!), says:

The impression is that we are after gays, want to kill them. That's what they've been told out there. And the truth isn't that. What we are seeking to do is to make a statement for our society: homosexuality is an abomination.

Whoa there, Nelly! Whatever else the bill does or doesn't do, it certainly makes such a statement - kinda like the Nuremberg laws "made a statement." But as for whether it is the "truth" that the Ugandan government is "after gays, want[s] to kill them," that is palpably obvious. And then some: the "truth" is that the Ugandan government is also after straights who express support for the human rights of gays or who refuse to be snitches - and wants to put them to death as well.

Another point that the video makes: for gays, the supposed "two strike" rule required for the death penalty to apply is, effectively, a "one-strike" rule. Here's why. Suppose Martin and James have sex. That's strike one for Martin (and likewise for James). Let's presume, too, that Martin doesn't turn in James within 24 hours of having sex with him - nor does James turn in Martin. That's strike two. Automatically, Martin and James are each guilty of "aggravated homosexuality," and subject to death.

Watch the video.

What Is The Point of Nick Clegg?

The coalition agreement between the newly minted PM David Cameron and Deputy PM Nick Clegg does not give Clegg responsibility over particular matters (although it promises legislation on election reform, an issue near and dear to the Lib Dems). Alex Massie of The Spectator sees this as an advantage, in that it doesn't pigeonhole Clegg and, instead, makes the success of the coalition dependent on the working relationship between Cameron and Clegg.

I'm not so sanguine. If much of the policy agenda "will be agreed by the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister," as the coalition agreement puts it, it really gives Clegg little clout at all, beyond that which Cameron is willing to suffer. Frankly, I think this tends to undermine the stability of the coalition, rather than buttress it. Massie says:

Yes, he'll be like some Vice-Presidents but, since that job has grown in recent times, that's not, as the Americans say, chopped liver.

It is true that the job has grown in recent times (think Gore and Cheney). But increased vice presidential authority has always come at the pleasure of the president himself, and some presidents have preferred to keep their vice presidents on a shorter leash (think Quayle and, probably, Biden). In other words, the terms of the coalition agreement seem to give Clegg as much authority as Cameron wants him to have. Ironically, those Lib Dem members with concrete portfolios may end up with more clout than Clegg himself.