Low Earth Orbit

EuroPark 2

In response to another European Directive, the supine government of Her Majesty, will later today impose Workers Councils upon all companies employing 150 workers, or more. In 2008, the same regulations will apply to all companies with 50 workers, or more. […] Employers will be obliged to consult these councils on any change of company ownership, or on any change in the numbers of staff employed by the company

The devil is in the details of course, but it certainly sounds like another attempt to regulate away the looming pension crash in Europe. But he who will not risk cannot win and the effort to preserve a status quo that's failed is unlikely to be a long term success. It's more likely that hope has been lost among the EUlite and they're just partying until the ship goes down.[source, source]

A little help from our friends

The United States on Sunday released 11 Turkish special forces detained in northern Iraq […] In Friday's raid, troops from the 173rd Airborne took the Turkish special forces and others into custody over an alleged plot to harm Iraqi civilian officials in the north, an official in U.S. President George W. Bush's administration said Sunday. The daily Hurriyet said the raid aimed to foil a Turkish plot to kill an unnamed senior Iraqi Kurdish official in Kirkuk, but Gul has denied any Turkish plot.

There seems to be a lot of resentment over this in Turkey, but I suspect that the American street might resent assassinations of Kurdish officials in Iraq, as the Kurds have been of far more aid to us than Turkey. It almost makes one think that Turkey _wants_ an independent Kurdistan, because the best way to guarantee that is to continue to mess with the US occupation of Iraq. [source, source]