Whaling, torture, beer

Updates, developments, and tactical nuclear beer. Read on...
 
Whaling

A development on a previous post on whaling and the dolphin drives: an article from the BBC's Richard Black on the International Whaling Commission and its most recent proposals. The new plans aim to regulate whaling "in a way that countries still engaged in the hunt and those opposed to it could both live with."   

Politics, of course, is central. From the article:

If the proposals were adopted, then, anti-whaling governments would find themselves partaking in the setting of quotas for hunts that according to their own beliefs ought not to exist at all, and in the knowledge that they will be probably be excoriated by environment groups on an issue where public opinion in their countries is pretty firmly on the environment groups' side.

Meanwhile, governments of hunting nations would have to be prepared to accept quotas that are below levels urged by companies operating the hunts. This could be a particularly thorny problem in Iceland where the whaling industry is urging the public to see it as a creator of wealth and employment in a time of economic hardship.

The biggest issue of principle, meanwhile, is that this plan would not remove or even phase out whaling in the Southern Ocean, where Japanese harpoons are busiest.

 Torture

In an update to this post, an article in Slate does a post-mortem on the Bush years, honing in on the lawyers behind the throne. As the writer puts it, we've erased the legal lines surrounding torture and replaced them with nothing. From the article:

The rule of law requires that there be a floor. For decades most of us believed that Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions was such a floor. Its bar against "[o]utrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment," was clearly meant to apply not just to POWs or battlefield soldiers in uniform but to all captives. Common Article 3 was intended to be the lowest we went, as Aziz Huq has written: "the point beyond which no nation can go without losing its claim to dignity and honor." But then along came the Bush lawyers, and they managed to saw into the floorboards. A sub-basement for prisoners at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo opened beneath us, and our dignity and honor disappeared into it.

Beer

Finally, a propos of nothing, exciting developments in beermaking!

A controversial Scottish brewery has launched what it described as the world's strongest beer - with a 32% alcohol content.

Tactical Nuclear Penguin has been unveiled by BrewDog of Fraserburgh.

BrewDog was previously branded irresponsible for an 18.2% beer called Tokyo, which it then followed with a low alcohol beer called Nanny State.

I want some. Also, 10 points for calling it "Nanny State".