Ay, Hugo

AMERICAS NEWS - JANUARY 9, 2010

Venezuela Says Its Jets Intercepted U.S. Plane

CARACAS -- President Hugo Chávez said he ordered two F-16 jets to intercept a U.S. military plane that twice violated Venezuelan airspace on Friday in what he called the latest provocation in the South American nation's skies. Brandishing a photo of the plane, which he described as a P-3, Mr. Chávez said the overflight was the latest incursion in Venezuelan skies by the U.S. military from its bases on the Netherlands' Caribbean islands and from neighboring Colombia.

So, his foto is good, but the Colombian photos showing FARC camps in Ecuador and Venezuela are fraudulent?

* Venezuela Devalues Its Currency

There was no immediate response from the U.S. Defense Department or the White House.

What are they gonna say?

Separately, Mr. Chávez announced a currency devaluation for the first time since 2005. The president said Venezuela's currency, the bolivar, will now have two government-set rates depending on the use, either 2.60 to the dollar for transactions deemed priorities by the government or 4.30 to the dollar for other transactions. The currency's official exchange rate has been held by the government at 2.15 bolivars to the dollar.


On the plane interception, Mr. Chávez said the F-16s escorted the U.S. plane away after two incursions lasting 15 and 19 minutes each. The perceived threat of U.S. intervention has become a central element of Mr. Chávez's political discourse and a rallying cry for his supporters.

An external threat diverts attention from internal matters.

Foes say the president is hyping the idea of a foreign threat to distract Venezuelans from domestic problems such as a recession and inadequate public services. Mr. Chávez surprised the diplomatic world in December when he accused the Netherlands of abetting potential offensive action against his government by granting U.S. troops access to its islands close to Venezuela.


The Dutch government says the U.S. presence is only for counternarcotics and surveillance operations over Caribbean smuggling routes.

Belgian Haiku Master

Georges Gobet/AFP/Getty Images - Belgian Prime Minsiter Herman Van Rompuy.




BRUSSELS -- When it chooses its first permanent president this week, the European Union is expected to pass over former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and other heavy hitters in favor of a balding, bespectacled Belgian named Herman Van Rompuy.

The charismatic Mr. Blair walked the international stage long enough to wear grooves in it. Mr. Van Rompuy, Belgium's prime minister for the past 11 months, is a modest functionary known inside his country for writing haikus in his native Flemish. His lack of ostentation is reflected in his poem "Hair":

“Hair blows in the wind
After years there is still wind
Sadly no more hair.”

I know whereof he speaks.

Mr. Van Rompuy is the clear favorite of oddsmakers like Ladbrokes to be chosen president by the leaders of the EU's 27 member nations Thursday. Though the vote could still hold surprises, Mr. Van Rompuy's likely ascendance speaks to the baroque nature of EU politics -- where permanent presidents need not be permanent or presidential, and where the race tends to go not to the strong, but to the Belgians, Danes and Luxembourgers.


From left, Luxemburg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker, Belgian Prime Minister Herman Van Rompuy, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende and former Latvian President Vaira Vike-Freiberga[mdash ]hopefuls for the coming job of EU President.




Mr. Van Rompuy is known as a master of procedural minutiae who can run committee meetings in several languages. But as Belgium's budget director in the 1990s, he also helped the massively indebted country meet the criteria for joining the euro.

After becoming Belgium's prime minister in December, Mr. Van Rompuy has repaired fissures with the country's French-speaking minority and managed a bureaucracy of six parliaments and more than 50 cabinet-level ministers. "If you know how to run Belgium, you can deal with the EU," says Piotr Maciej Kaczynski, an analyst with the Brussels-based Center for European Policy Studies.

Mr. Van Rompuy's particular knack was evident in the haiku he read at a recent news conference with the prime ministers of Spain and Hungary:

“Three waves together,
Rolling into the harbor --
The trio is here.”

Before the Deluge

This is what I call long-term planning.

The Dutch are embarking on a decades-long plan to improve their flood-control system because they're afraid that rising sea levels from global warming will threaten their low-lying country. The effort, which the government says could cost €1 billion ($1.27 billion) a year through 2100, would include massive, decades-long public works, such as raising dikes and reinforcing storm barriers.

Imagine looking out a century. Hereabouts the next three months are long-term.

Existing Dutch flood defenses include the Maeslant barrier





"We have the best system of flood protection in the world today, but we have to start preparing for the future," says Cees Veerman, a former agriculture minister who headed a recent government commission that recommended the overhaul of the nation's flood defenses. "Climate change and rising sea levels will affect our coastal defenses and our rivers," Mr. Veerman says. "We must take action now to ensure that our citizens are safe in the centuries to come."

Massive gates pivot closed to protect Rotterdam and environs








There is a website (http://www.deltawerken.com), one of the biggest and most complete online resources of information about the deltaworks and water management in the Netherlands.


The Dutch campaign is still in its early stages, and lawmakers still have to make important decisions such as how to ensure its long-term financing. But the initiative is likely to have an impact far beyond the shores of this Northern European country of 16 million residents. The Dutch are leaders in water management, and its engineers, dredging companies and consultants work in flood-prone areas around the world. Dutch engineers traveled to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina to study why the levees broke, and have advised governments as far afield as Vietnam and Bangladesh.

Peace of Amiens

Beginning to read "Gladstone" by Roy Jenkins. Peace of Amiens mentioned.

Signed in 1802, the Peace of Amiens marked the end of the French Revolutionary War. For the British, it brought respite from conflict abroad. As part of the peace treaty, Britain, isolated from her allies, agreed to return recent territorial conquests to France, Spain and Holland. These terms were heavily resented and the British, worried about Napoleon’s plans, refused to withdraw from Malta.

Also mentioned is the Battle of Coruña (Corunna)