Iranian neoliberal economic reform

Naomi Klein's book, The Shock Doctrine, argues that unpopular neoliberal reforms have been pushed through in countries while citizens were in shock, reacting to disaster and upheavals.

It is implied that some man-made crises, such as the Falklands war, may have been created with the intention of being able to push through these unpopular reforms in their wake.

Iran recently introduced an austerity budget, slashing subsidies for fuel and bread.

Iran's government has slashed subsidies on food, doubling the cost of bread in order to ease pressure on an economy straining under international sanctions... Prices for subsidized fuel quadrupled on Sunday as part of a new economic plan ...

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad vowed to end all subsidies by 2013. The pattern fits the thesis of Klein's book, as last year Iran cracked down on dissent, created an environment hostile to protests:

The cuts in subsidies are far more severe [than in 2007] but the response has been muted. Iran observers attribute it to a climate of fear following a government crackdown in the aftermath of the 2009 presidential election controversy.

If Klein's thesis applies, then Ahmadinejad deliberately has been stoking a crisis over Iranian nuclear capability in order to justify suppression of dissent, paving the way for neoliberal elimination of government subsidies.

Limits to the utility of fingerprinting

According to Kyodo News, a Chinese woman had her fingerprints surgically altered in order to bypass biometric airport security.

Lin Xiuai, 33, a resident of Yokohama, has told investigators she underwent surgery to change her fingerprints at a clinic in China's Fujian Province for about ¥30,000, the sources said.

That's only on the order of U$330. That makes it very cost-effective to defeat biometric fingerprint infrastructure.

Two accounts

An Israeli media report:

Tens of thousands gathered in Istanbul Thursday for prayers for activists killed in Israel's raid on aid ships bound for Gaza, condemning the Jewish state and shouting support for Hamas.
"Damn Israel! Israel is the angel of death!" chanted the crowd which overflowed the sprawling courtyard of the Fatih Mosque, waving Turkish and Palestinian flags...
"We are all soldiers of Hamas," the crowd shouted.
Nine people - eight Turks and a US national of Turkish origin - were killed in Monday's pre-dawn raid by Israeli forces on the Turkish ferry, Mavi Marmara, the lead ship in the aid flotilla aiming to break the Gaza blockade.
"May your martyrdom be blessed," read a huge banner in the colors of the Palestinian flag, hung on the wall surrounding the mosque courtyard...

In contrast, a Turkish media report:

Thousands of people came to the historic Fatih Mosque in İstanbul yesterday to pay their final respects to the victims, whose bodies were brought to the mosque for a funeral prayer following an autopsy at the Council of Forensic Medicine (ATK).
The bodies were brought into the mosque courtyard while verses of the Quran were recited. The crowd then shouted slogans, including “Damn Israel” and “Murderer Israel-Accomplice US,” following which the funeral prayer was said.
The funeral was also attended by Energy Minister Taner Yıldız, İstanbul Governor Hüseyin Avni Mutlu, İstanbul Mayor Kadir Topbaş, Felicity Party (SP) leader Numan Kurtulmuş and Bülent Yıldırım, chairman of the Humanitarian Aid Foundation (İHH), the aid agency that organized the Turkey arm of the international campaign to send the aid ships to the impoverished Gaza Strip.

The first report makes it sound like yet another angry mob demonstration, easily dismissed. The second report notes the presence of Turkish officials, which I find significant, as well as anti-American sentiments being expressed. I also have to wonder how many of those chanting slogans were mobilized by the marginal Felicity Party and the IHH.

Profiling defeated via jihadi information war

A middle-aged and suburban would-be terrorist termed "Jihad Jane" in the media was both female and white, as well as born in the USA. Far from being lone wolf operatives, however, the jihadi strategy of recruiting online has an inherent weakness tempering its effectiveness: sites can also be monitored by security agencies.

Radical, English-language Islamist websites that promote a violent jihad, or holy war, against the West have become more effective at recruiting Americans and providing a place for armchair terrorists to meet and plan attacks in the U.S. or abroad, experts say.

The war on terrorism is also an information war.

Gender profiling no longer viable

According to recent reports, militants allied with al Qaida have trained women with a Western appearance as suicide bombers.

The women, who may have a "non Arab" appearance and be travelling on Western passports, have been prepared for their missions by the Yemeni group responsible for the operation to blow up an airliner over the United States on Christmas Day.

At this point, I have to wonder if a goal of militants is to provoke the West into instituting regular body cavity searches at airports.