An eye for an eye

We all heared about the talion principle, or the way we named it today, the retaliation rule:

"An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth"

This way of justice comes from the oldest written "code of law" in the world, the Code of Hamurabi, the king of Balylon.

What was a simple and pragmatic approach of justice in the middle-age, for illiterate sheperds in the desert, is still in a self proclaimed modern country, the way conflicts are solved. To make it worst, where the old talion rule was directed to either the culprit or at worst his close family, it's now extended to what may be defined as a foreign tribe, based on thousands years of genealogic tree.

Getting old, it's harder to adapt to modernity. Hopefully, dark ages are back....

Champagne !

Independance Day

Today, The biggest self-proclaimed democracy in the world, celebrates their independence".

There is indeed a lot to celebrate:

- 1961: Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba

- 1964: War against independance of Vietnam

- 1965: Invasion of the Dominican Republic

- 1983: Invasion of Granada

- 1989: Invasion of Granada

- 2001: Invasion of Afghanistan

- 2003: Invasion of Irak

How many people died for their independence during these demonstrations of tolerance, respect and humanity ? No one knows, because they may have choosen the wrong side.

As history shows, all of these wars against political freedom were big sucesses for the human kind. Indeed, firing a nuclear bomb may be the only way to properly celebrate this day.

One country/Two systems/One Police Force

Hong Kong Police Arrests Protesters

The fear that led thousands of Hong-Kong citizens to get the benefit of a second passport before the transfer of sovereignty to Mainland China in 1997, now becomes tangible.

Due to changes in the world balance of powers & economies, the necessity for the PRC government of keeping a separate system in hong-kong slowly disappears. It is very interesting to notice 2 major points: - More and more people in Hong Kong are protesting publicly, independently of their origin or their resources. - Western medias don't cover the uprising at all. China has become an unavoidable and irritable economical partner for most major western economies.