Today is a round-up of various odds and ends that have gotten my fragmented attention throughout the week. For anyone who is interested, the Swiss referendum that called for a prosecutor to be appointed for animals failed quite badly. Switzerland would have been the first country in the world to introduce mandatory animal lawyers, had the referendum passed. Among other items that failed was a no-brainer, i.e., a cut in pension benefits. Now who in his right mind would vote for that? One initiative that passed, however, was for a constitutional amendment that would preserve human dignity in biomedical experiments while at the same time ensuring freedom of research. Still to follow at a later stage will be more detailed cantonal legislation on transplantations, gene technology and stem cell research. This is clearly heartening and demonstrates common sense.
Two Swiss champions are demonstrating with panache and grace that that their gold medals in the Olympics were not flukes. Simi (Simon Ammann) has done it yet again and won the overall World Cup title in ski jumping, while Carlo Janka won the World Cup downhill. I mentioned before that I have a very soft spot for Simi who is not at all shy about expressing his exuberant joy. Olympic teammate Didier Cuche, a brilliant Swiss skier who did not shine at the Olympics, has in part redeemed himself by winning a recent downhill World title as well. Simi is beaming from the middle of this photo.
Switzerland is now taking some flack from the US, of all countries, for the result of its November referendum to ban the building of minarets. Most Swiss that I know are extremely embarrassed about the result and no one wants to leave things as they are ... except, of course, for a small but rabid minority. Libya's al Gaddafi, who has his own problems with Switzerland because his son and daughter-in-law were arrested in Geneva last summer for allegedly abusing their servants, has called for a "jihad" and the Arab League has also condemned the result of the vote. At the same time, the majority of Muslims here, as well as those outside the country, do not personally feel discriminated against, although most, Muslim or not, recognize that the voting outcome was the predictable result of right-wing fear-mongering. Their answer is to try to educate their neighbors a bit more. It is interesting that the US, whose house walls are very glassy in this respect when right-wing pundits dominate the airwaves whipping up sentiment against anyone who even resembles an Arab, Muslim or not, among a long list of other items ... and I will not even begin to list them because I may not be able to stop ... is the one pointing this out. The irony is lost on no one here.
There are reports that several boats were badly damaged and that around 50 were sunk during our recent bise noire. I am happy to report that, apart from one neighbor's damaged window blind, our development seems to have escaped unscathed. There have been several photos of the ice posted in the Tribune de Genève's online photo gallery. Many are quite familiar because they were taken near where I used to live.
Now, it's time to send the information on to HWMBO so that the IRS can get its due.
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