Category Archives: blurb

Links (& blurbs about them)

Map of Kenya

The situation in Kenya has apparently deteriorated into low-level ethnic warfare. This map from FP raises more questions than it answers:

kenya-ethnic-divisions.png

The Kikyu (the group to which President Mwai Kibaki belongs), and the Luo (the group to which the opposition leader Raila Odinga belongs) and the Kalenjin (who support Odinga as well) don’t live near each other. So where is the fighting going on? So often, these conflicts are fueled by the desire to control natural resources or territory, as well as ethnic or religious differences. Are those factors at play here? What about the seven other ethnic groups, and “other,” which make up 55% of the population, and appear to reside in the vast majority of the country? Are they siding with one group or the other?

Plastic seas

There’s a huge trash field floating in the North Pacific gyre (E on the map):

trashing-oceans-plastic4nov02.GIF

A segment on NPR about the same trash field noted that it does not show up on satellite photos because most plastic floats just under the surface of the water, where it is invisible unless you are close to the surface.