Category: Africa

New Africa, Same As Old Africa

Africa, Third World

Now it’s the Sudan which has exploded:

Fighting has erupted across Khartoum and at other sites in Sudan in a battle between two powerful rival military factions, engulfing the capital Khartoum in warfare for the first time and raising the risk of a nationwide civil conflict.  The fighting between forces loyal to two top generals has put the nation at risk of collapse and could have consequences far beyond its borders.  Both sides have tens of thousands of fighters, foreign backers, mineral riches and other resources that could insulate them from sanctions.  It’s a recipe for the kind of prolonged conflict that has devastated other countries in the Middle East and Africa, from Lebanon and Syria to Libya and Ethiopia. The fighting, which began as Sudan attempted to transition to democracy, already has killed hundreds of people and left millions trapped in urban areas, sheltering from gunfire, explosions and looters.  

Even better:

Sudan borders five additional countries: Libya, Chad, the Central African Republic, Eritrea and South Sudan, which seceded in 2011 and took 75% of Khartoum’s oil resources with it. Nearly all are mired in their own internal conflicts, with various rebel groups operating along the porous borders.

In other words, same ol’ Africa.  Here’s a map, for a little perspective:

Most notably, every single African country on this map can most charitably described as a “shithole”.

Anyway…

Forgive me if I don’t give a shit, about any of them.

Gooder And Harder

Elections, Third World

…to quote Insty.  I see that Chicago has replaced Abject Failure Lori Lightweight with her male counterpart Brandon Johnson in the mayoral elections just held.

Of course, things are going to go from worse to worser:

Johnson is a paid agitator for the teachers union and a ‘defund the police’ type.

…and Chicago slithers ever closer to the abyss within the abyss into which it’s already fallen.  Just watch as the exodus flow of businesses and their executives changes into a flood, and the city moves closer to Detroit-style bankruptcy and failure.

Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of socialist assholes.

I note that the vote total was just over half a million people out of a voting population of over two million, so clearly 75% of Chicago residents just don’t give a fuck.  And there ya go.

Failed States

Africa, Marxists, Politics, Third World

From Reader Tony H. comes this little bit of realism, South Africa’s Brave New World.  It’s a long but very clear-headed look at what has happened in post-apartheid South Africa since the sainted Nelson Mandela came to power, and his political descendants’ activities.  Here’s a brief taste:

That whole “sophisticated economy and infrastructure” that got “handed over intact” now by and large no longer exists. Consider something as basic as running water: in 1994, South Africa had some of the most sophisticated water infrastructure on earth, with a whole system of dams, reservoirs, and long-distance inter-basin conduits working together to conquer the geographical challenges of having several major cities and mining centers located on an arid plateau. All of this water was safe, drinkable, and actually came out of the tap when you turned the handle. This picture was marred of course by poor delivery to black rural communities and squatter camps, but in the early 90s the government was making rapid progress towards serving more of those people too.

That water system is now basically non-functional. It’s estimated that something like 10 million people no longer have reliable access to running water. When the water does run, it’s frequently filthy and contaminated with human sewage. South Africa had its first urban cholera outbreak in the year 2000, and they are now a regular occurrence. Again, this isn’t for lack of money or effort. The state has spent billions on trying to fix the water problems, and the government’s water bureaucracy has tripled in size since 1994. Something else has gone wrong.

And that’s just part of the story.  I urge you to read the whole review.

And now, part 2.  With the above reading in mind, please read Victor Davis Hanson’s Life Among The Ruins.  Again, a taste:

How did all of this so quickly erode our great country? Our crisis was not the next generation of foreign Hitlers and Stalins. It was not earthquakes, floods, or even pandemics. It was not endemic poverty and want. It was not a meager inheritance from past generations of incompetents. Nor was it a dearth of natural resources or bounty.

Instead our catastrophe arose from our most highly educated, the wealthiest and most privileged in American history with the greatest sense of self-esteem and sanctimoniousness. Sometime around the millennium, they felt their genius could change human nature and bring an end to history—if only they had enough power to force hoi polloi to follow their abstract and bankrupt theories that they had no intention of abiding by themselves.

Feel free to draw the many parallels between South Africa and the United States, as the two nations have become similarly degraded.  The methodologies may have been somewhat different, but the outcomes are eerily similar.

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to the range.

One More Thing

Crime, Eco-Crap, Marxists, Third World

When I mentioned above that I’m sick of writing about politics, I should have mentioned that chief among these are articles describing how California has fucked up and how terrible things are going to be.

Yawn.

Even articles by brilliant writers (Jennifer Hernandez, Victor Davis Hanson, Heather Mac Donald etc.) get short shrift from me when the topic is Fucked-Up California.

We all know how the Golden Shower State is in thrall to Lefties, race hustlers, criminal apologists and other such filth.  We all know that California’s heading down the tubes to such a degree that The Big One is more likely to be a blessed relief than a catastrophe.  And we all know that Californian cities have become dystopian pits, drowning in shit, needles, crime and rampant homelessness, almost all of which can be ascribed to their insane laws and regulations.  It’s all going to crash and burn, and California will end up worse off than New Mexico, and become America’s Greatest African Paradise.

And I, for one, no longer care enough to write about it.

What If?

Elections, Third World

Apparently, there’s a mayoral election in Chicago today.  In any other city (peopled by sane voters), an incumbent and incompetent mayor like Lori Lightweight would be not only tossed out of office, but out of her tenth-floor office window.

But this is Chicago, so she may well be reelected, simply because she’s running against the seven nine dwarfs. and the vote will be so splintered that a runoff is a distinct possibility.

Frankly, I’m looking at the thing the same way I look at two lions fighting on Animal Planet:  morbid curiosity, indifference, detachment, no favorites, and so on.  Where this differs from a lion fight is that if Mayor Betelgeuse is reelected, the Chicago voters are going to get what they deserve, good and hard (to quote Mencken).

And I’ll still be morbidly curious, indifferent and detached, because stupid people need to have the consequences of their stupidity shoved in their stupid faces.