Cole Jensen > Recent Status Updates

“He lived in the rich city as alien as a rat in a rich man's house that is fed on scraps thrown away, and hides here and there and is never a part of the real life of the house.” pg. 110

“And what happens in America matters. These days, even in Australia, if someone asks if you're an evangelical, they don't mean: Are you mild mannered, intellectually incisive, Bible expounding, pastorally warm?
No, they mean: Are you right-wing?”

Pg. 138

"Sometimes, friends, losses turn out to be wins in disguise," Dickson said in a soft voice. He paused. "After all, we're the death and resurrection people." pg. 129

“You can't separate politics from the people in it, as if they were somehow its victims and not its enablers. Its not going to change until somebody in politics- the people who quietly tell reporters of their frustrations, but go along in the end-stands up and says it's wrong of my party to behave this way…There may be good people in politics. But the problem in politics is't the bad guys. I's the good guys.”

“The gratitude … toward the [Canada] was unprecedented. I remember … a copy of the New York Post, which had a massive three-inch headline on the front page that read: "Thanks, Canada!" In diners and bars, Canadians were treated to backslaps and free drinks. Just about everywhere you looked there were maple leaf flags, signs, even billboards expressing America's gratitude toward our neighbor to the north.”

“No one is exempt. On the last Saturday of the month, everyone-government officials, judges, the prime minister, the president, teachers, students, shop owners, day labourers-is expected to show up at their local umuganda project to help out. You will be fined for not taking part, and if you want to receive certain government services, you may be asked to submit a card, signed and stamped, showing you did.” P.289

“Another word, umuganda, focuses this idea at the local level. Translated as "communal work," umuganda might involve planting res, repairing school playgrounds, building terraces to stop erosion.” P.289

“Rwanda … has been calling on all African states to eliminate barriers to trade, study, and travel in order to encourage the open exchange of goods, people, and ideas. Randa has led by example, with an open-door visa policy for all Africans, not just members of the EAC. Rwanda today is one of the only countries in the world that issues automatic visas to all African nationals at point of entry.” P.166

“[The Catholic Church in Rwanda] supported ethnic ID cards and racial quotas and actively encouraged the insidious Hamitic myth that had entrenched these divisions. High-ranking bishops were often outspoken in their support of the genocidal regime, arguing that Tutsis were irredeemably "bad" by nature, a form of original sin, a mark of Cain.” P. 103

Rwanda has modelled its recovery on the Asian example. Geographically, Rwanda—a small, landlocked, mountainous country-is the "Switzerland of Africa," which is exactly how early European travellers described it. But socially and economically, it is rebranding itself as "Africa's Singapore": a tightly controlled, politically stable, economically innovative, autocratic democracy dominated by a single party.

A panel of military experts later concluded that Dallaire had been correct in his assessment: 5,000 troops early on, with minimal air cover and a more robust mandate, was all it would have taken to prevent at least half of the deaths that occurred; 500,000 people might have been saved. Dallaire laid the blame squarely on three members of the Security Council: the U.S., the U.K., and France.

Found out I’m older than Dantes. Day ruined.

Dr. Mudhil’s life story has been one of the best parts of the book for me

"The Jews have asked for mercy a million times in a hundred lands. How can we now deny mercy to others who ask it from us?”

"Because this is not a land of mercy. Magnanimity has no part in our world. Sooner or later you will have to play politics, make alliances, secret agreements, arm one tribe against another. You will start thinking more and more like us.”

“I'll never forget my very first afternoon out of brave and decent Hong Kong, hanging over the prow of Britannia, watching the dolphins leaping alongside us through the waves, flying fish behind them by the dozen, skimming the water for a hundred yards or more. Dolphins and sunsets, that's the real world now. Isn't it?”

“I doubt whether a Governor and his wife have ever left before in such style: a pardonable way to bring down the curtain on Britain's old Empire.”

“The MoD have planned an exercise, Operation Winged Dragon', about how they could reinforce the garrison in case of trouble with China. There is of course an obvious point about this. Since the People's Liberation Army is rather large, and the only bunkers in Hong Kong are on golf courses, any military confrontation would be rather one-sided.”

“The US is utopia achieved.
We should not judge their crisis as we would judge our own, the crisis of the old European countries. Ours is a crisis of historical ideals facing up to the impossibility of their realization. Theirs is the crisis of an achieved utopia, confronted with the problem of its duration and permanence.”

“It is a world completely rotten with wealth, power, senility, indifference, puritanism and mental hygiene, poverty and waste, technological futility and aimless violence, and yet I cannot help but feel it has about it something of the dawning of the universe. Perhaps because the entire world continues to dream of New York, even as New York dominates and exploits it.”

“Driving is a spectacular form of amnesia. Everything is to be discovered, everything to be obliterated. Admittedly, there is the primal shock of the deserts and the dazzle of California, but when this is gone, the secondary brilliance of the journey begins..”

“When Mossadegh and his followers cried like women and indulged in hysterical tirades against the British, many sincerely thought at first that this was nationalism.” P.126

This has to be one of the funniest things I’ve read

“Gradually I began to realize that discipline without democracy is authoritarianism, and that democracy without discipline is anarchy.” - p. 61

Interesting comparison between Japanese and British styles of management.

- Japanese managers often started at the lowest levels and worked their way up leading to a better understanding of all company roles.

- British managers lived luxurious lives and stayed holed up in their offices often leading to very out of touch management styles.

"I like to think that once you learnt it from Britain. And now we are relearning it from you. . .. Talent, initiative, adventure, endeavour, risk, confidence, vigour have made Singapore an example to other nations of success- an example whose clear message is that you can't enjoy the fruits of effort without first making the effort." -Thatcher (to Lee)

Healthcare:

- British healthcare system is a failure

- American healthcare system is far too expensive

- Can Singapore strike a good balance that allows all citizens access while eliminating waste?

By including Singapore into the world’s financial markets we would achieve 24-hour banking and financial services for the first time ever.

British navy planning to change from coal to gas power sparking their interest in finding large oil supplies - greater interest in Middle East

By the time of the British pullout, unemployment was no longer an issue because of jobs created by American electronics companies

Entrepreneurs from HK & Taiwan brought low-tech & labour intensive manufacturing but American corporations brought large scale high-tech ventures to Singapore

Determined for Singapore to not be so reliant on British aid like Malta was