UN high-level politics and how to simplify things....

This must be the picture of the month, if not of the year.

Addressing the UN General Assembly this week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu illustrated his concerns over Iran's nuclear ambitions, with a complex drawing.

I thought the US hit the UN's intellectual bottom when they came up with their fabricated evidence of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, back in 2002. But Netanyahu showed one could go lower. (Full story)

Story filed under #KinderGardens and #HowToAddressWorldLeaders


Picture courtesy AP/Richard Drew

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Picture of the day: Libya - The last glimpses of a dictatorship?

This deserves a "Picture of the Day" nomination: Saif Gaddafi, son of the infamous Libyan ruler (still is, at the moment of writing), raises a warning finger against his "fellow citizens".. "Bad people, bad bad bad people. You have been naughty. Do you think you can raise against my daddy and me? And daddy has soooo done his best to take of you"...

I wonder what that green stuff is, coming out of his head? Is that the steaming realization that maybe, many many years ago, the interest of the people, a nation and an individual got de-prioritized, and maybe, many many years ago, things started to go?

When would the point be, the point where a ruler mixes up his own interests and those of a nation? When is the corner turned and a ruler starts walking into an endless tunnel of self-preservation, where any measure is justified "for the good of the nation", even if one has to shoot his own citizens, or starve them,...


Picture courtesy Al Jazeera's live blog on Libya

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Picture of the day: Twitter from Space

This picture from the Aurora Australis, or the "Southern Lights" above Antarctica was taken by an astronaut. While aboard the International Space Station, @Astro_Wheels posted it via Twitter on TwitPic.

I guess he was using wireless. :-)

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Picture of the day: People

I walked around in Fiumicino, near Rome today. And started to take random pictures of people. I always wanted to do that. "Just pictures" of "just people"....

Is it really "just", though...? If you look at the faces, their expression,.. if you really look well, you will see how each has a story to tell.

With just one picture, capturing one particular moment, you can imagine the story or at least the context behind each.



In thoughts...




The tired...




The lady walks...
For those of you who have the bandwidth, here is the Flickr slide show with all of them. Best viewed in full screen (once you run the slideshow, click on the arrows icon in the bottom right corner):

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Picture of the day: And this is how your animals will look like

A Brown Pelican sits in heavy oil on the beach at East Grand Terre Island along the Louisiana coast.


Picture courtesy Periodismo Humano, AP Photo/Charlie Riedel. Discovered via The Horizon

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Picture of the day: And this is how your oceans will look like

"Delicate patterns in the sea breaking on Orange Beach, Alabama".
More than 90 miles from the BP oil spill. (Hires)

Check the latest articles on the Gulf Oil Spill (or read the latest via RSS)

Picture courtesy Guardian UK, Dave Martin/AP. Discovered via @mparent77772 and The Horizon.

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Picture of the day: Be advised that...

Discovered via MoreCoolPictures

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Are you?

Picture courtesy TypCut, discovered via The Horizon.

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Computers will always be... computers - Brussels Airport version

One of the attractions of Brussels airport is a long series of computer screens showing a real time temperature scan of the people passing by on the rolling carpet. Publicity for one of the electricity companies of our united state.

Unfortunately, computers will always remain... computers:

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Picture of the day: Ash anyone?

Another link sent in by Juan, one or our readers in Guatemala, testifying of the past two weeks and how rough it has been: first they had to deal with a volcanic eruption and the subsequent ash fall. Then Tropical Storm Agatha, the first of the season, washed away bridges and filled some villages with mud. (More foto's)

Picture courtesy Reuters/Daniel LeClair

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Picture of the Day: Shot and Charred

A charred bulletproof vest lays in the burnt-out UN Kabul guesthouse, which was attacked last week. (Full)

More Pictures of the Day on The Road.

Picture courtesy Peter Nicholls/The Times

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Picture of the Day: Malaysia floods

Cows and abandoned vehicles stranded on a tiny strip of land surrounded by flood water in Jeram Perdas northeast of the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur. (Full)

Have a close look at that picture. Surreal...

More Pictures of the Day on The Road.

Picture courtesy Reuters/The New Straits Times Press/Fathil Asri

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Picture of the day: Suicide bomb in Peshawar

A huge and lethal blast rocked a crowded market in the northwestern city of Peshawar on Friday, in what appeared to be a warning about the government’s plans to launch a military offensive against militants in the frontier region of South Waziristan.

The blast, which police and security officials suspected was caused by a suicide car bomb containing more than 100 pounds of explosives, was the biggest in Pakistan in months, killing at least 48 people, including seven children and one woman, and wounding 148 others. (Full)

A car bomb, in a public market place, on a Friday... Clearly aimed to kill as many innocent people as possible. Civilians. People like you and me, who have nothing to do with the so-called war.
Killing children has nothing to do with religion anymore. This has nothing to do with faith anymore. Not even with politics. This is about power, and money, and control. At any cost, in any way possible.

I can not imagine how vicious a mind can be to plan and execute something like this. It is a spiral that seems to be impossible control, leave alone to be stopped. Anyone can strap explosives around his waste or stuff it in the trunk of his car and blow himself up in the most crowded places, trying to kill as many innocent people as possible.

More Pictures of the Day on The Road.

Picture courtesy European Pressphoto Agency

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Picture of the day: Manila flooding

Children look out from a window of a partially submerged house in floodwaters brought on by Typhoon Ketsana, in San Pedro Laguna, south of Manila September 30, 2009.

This picture is part of an excellent picture series on the Boston Globe.

More Pictures of the Day on The Road.

Picture courtesy REUTERS/Erik de Castro. Discovered via Heads Down, Eyes Open.

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Picture of the Day: Green versus Desert

China is creating a 4,500 km (2,800 mi) long forest belt to control sandstorms pushing forward the sands of the Gobi desert. (More)

More Pictures of the Day on The Road.

Picture courtesy Biopact

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Picture of the Day: MSF in a message

I previously posted how a UNICEF ad gave a clear, simple and hard message. This -almost blank- ad for Medecins Sans Frontieres or Doctors Without borders beats anything on simplicity.


More Pictures of the Day on The Road

Picture courtesy La Cocina Creativa and Agencia McCann-Erickson.

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Picture of the Day: Unicef in a message

"Los sueños de los niños no pueden morir" means "Children's dreams can not die"
This UNICEF ad is so simple and powerful, it hurts.


More Pictures of the Day on The Road

Picture courtesy Ads of the World and advertising agency OUT (Santiago Chile)

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Picture of the day: On the move

Found on Oddee, who has loads of them.

More Pictures of the Day on The Road

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Picture of the day: Hope in Iran

Thousands of Iranians took to the streets of Tehran, fighting running battles with riot police, after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the conservative incumbent, was declared the winner of the polls. (Full)

Look at the strong symbolic values in this picture: The individual in a turbulent society. The green representing Islam. The victory but also peace symbol expressed by the fingers. And it is a hand of a woman, with soft yet powerful ribbons on the wrist as symbols of opposition.


More Pictures of the Day on The Road.

Picture courtesy The Daily Dish

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Picture of the day: Somalia on the run again

Hundreds of families are still fleeing the Somali capital, Mogadishu, despite relative calm in the past week following intense fighting between insurgents and government troops.

They are joining hundreds of thousands of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in camps on the outskirts of the city and in safer neighbourhoods inside Mogadishu. (Full)

More Pictures of the Day on The Road

Picture courtesy Hassan Mahamud Ahmed/IRIN

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