CHANGING SCENES OF LIFE THROUGH 2018

Mahinda’s appointment as PM 

The latter part of the year just past, was certainly an annus horribilis with a threat to democracy, which made civil society rise in protest In  an unprecedented way. The first threat to the Prime Minister came when there were moves  in February, encouraged by the President, first to try to get him to resign, then later several forces combined to bring a vote of no confidence in him in Parliament. This was soundly defeated. 

Ranil’s re-appointment as PM

 2019-01-07

In the meantime, the President took  several public swipes at the PM breathing fire and fury, again this is simply not done, is inappropriate and probably again done on the wrong advice. One was to say publicly that the UNP was not the party it was in the Senanayake era. Times have changed, as have issues and no party including his own, the SLFP is the same as it was when it was started by the late SWRD Bandaranaike. I’m sure former President Chandrika Kumaranatunga, the daughter of the founder would agree with me. The UNP however hasn’t changed in its ideals, visions or in the fact that it has always stood as its name portrays for every citizen in this country beyond the narrow peripheries of race,  caste or creed. 

Those behind these moves, reportedly two sacked disgruntled UNPers and a media mogul who wants to be a kingmaker, boded their time waiting for an opportune moment to lay their plans in place for their next move which was to get the President to  remove the PM and appoint the former President as PM. He had betrayed the former earlier, by  doing a political high jump after enjoying a meal of hoppers with him,contesting him and  shouting himself hoarse from every conceivable platform to say that he would be killed by them if he lost. 

The nation voted against Mahinda Rajapakse at the Presidential election, so he was betraying the confidence placed in him by the people, in making this unconstitutional move with this coup. Why he listened to people who obviously didn’t care or know anything  about the constitution and where this mistake would land the President, and not take advice from those officially  there to advise him who knew the law of the land, seems to me to be like the ‘Peace of God which passeth all understanding”. 

"This is the first time in our country’s history that a judgement like this has been given by a bench of judges who will go down in history as the heroes and saviours of the nation, of democracy and of freedom"

This is the first time in our country’s history that a judgement like this has been given by a bench of judges who will go down in history as the heroes and saviours of the nation, of democracy and of freedom. By their historic judgement, they have planted their footsteps firmly in the sands of time in the annals of our history. We must thank God for men and women such as this, who had the courage and the independence to recognize  and state that what was done, was not in keeping with the constitution by the Head of State. We also have to thank lawyer Esh Kanag Eswaran whose brilliance and eloquence in this cause was unequalled. He too deserves to be known as a hero and a saviour of our time.

The  cunning protagonists behind this moves, politicians and their advisors. underestimated the Prime Minister. He never rants and raves at his foes like they do, but thinks before he talks or acts which is what they fail to do. They thought he would go quietly, because he was famed as a gentleman. They failed to see or sense the hint of steel behind that cool patrician composure. As an unwavering believer to the last word in democracy, freedom , the rule of law and the constitution, he stood firm and refused to budge unless the court  ruled otherwise or he lost the confidence of Parliament. They didn’t bargain for the thousands of UNP supporters  who stood with him, guarding him  through night and day, ready to protect him by sacrificing their lives if the need arose to do so.

• He was instilled in right principles and values from birth
• It is vital that the party stands together, leaving personal agendas aside

 I fail to comprehend how MR as a former President, wasn’t aware of the law of the land and constitution and allowed himself to be part of the disgraceful  coup, which put the country into a state of instability, stalling of aid, halt to investment and a tourist  ban, when we had just been named as the top destination for 2019 by Lonely Planet. Even the democracies of the world failed to recognize him as Prime Minister or to congratulate him. Although Ranil Wickremesinghe was born with a silver spoon, he and his siblings were never spoilt by their parents, with luxurious cars, and other such gifts.  The right principles and values were instilled in him from birth onwards which have stood him in good stead throughout his political life. He never came into politics to make money, but to serve the nation. 

I was proud of the UNPers who stood together, and woke up from their slumber to protect democracy. Also the UNF and its leaders. But I am disappointed now that some UNP MP’s are resorting to threats and fighting for Ministries. They must surely understand the situation that ministries are limited and also that the President also has a say in this. It is important that the party stands together, leaving personal agendas aside for the moment. We know what it cost the country in the last few months when a personal vendetta lost us the respect of the world and placed the country in unprecedented difficulties in varied spheres.  

"The right principles and values were instilled in him from birth onwards which have stood him in good stead throughout his political life. He never came into politics to make money, but to serve the nation"

We have a team of excellent young people,in the second line, superior to those of any other party. Our MP’s must display patience and show that they are statesmen and not mere politicians, that they are there to serve the people and not to further their political ambitions. During the  times of the late Dudley Senanayake’s, JR Jayewardene’s and President Premadasa’s leadership, no –one demanded Ministries, you took what you got and had to be content with that. I appeal to our MP’s for the sake  of the country, please don’t try to hold the Leadership and the  party to ransom.With the help of God,  each one will get there at the right time , in the right place if they all pull together,work at the grassroots and make our country great once again.  

‘Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country’—John F. Kennedy

The continuing coup

Sanjana Hattotuwa-January 5, 2019, 7:02 pm 

New Year. Old problems. Those who have taken a medium or long haul flight in recent years know the feeling. You are promised hundreds of channels of the best entertainment, more than enough to last the length of the flight. In reality, the films and shows are those you have seen before, the music isn’t to your taste and the quality of either isn’t very good. It is the illusion of choice, forcing you to watch reruns because there’s no other option, or switch off and sleep. Sri Lanka’s mainstream politics also, periodically, offers the promise of meaningful change and renewal, but in fact only ever offers dramatic re-enactments of a tired script with the same actors, made up badly to look differently. Some in fact, just play themselves. One is reminded of a quote from Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s classic novel ‘The Leopard’, where a character - an Italian aristocrat - notes that "If we want things to stay the way they are, things will have to change".

Weeks after Mr. Wickremesinghe was sworn in as Prime Minister again, despite evidence in the public domain, those responsible for the coup - from President downwards - go about their lies and lives with impunity. Individuals appointed during the coup to key positions at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Information Department and other Ministries, continue in their service. Ambassadors who supported the coup, actively and openly, continue to hold their posting. Members of Parliament responsible for unprecedented, wanton violence on the floor of the house and the destruction of public property, have not yet been held accountable. Individuals who convinced the President that his actions were constitutional, as noted by the President himself, haven’t been identified and dealt with. The President is on record requesting that those appointed to state media during the coup, including ITN, Rupavahini and Lake House, aren’t removed from their positions. The Minister has complied.

2019 starts with the constitutional coup’s enduring success, which is to place in positions of commanding authority - around both domestic policy and foreign relations - individuals who are deeply illiberal, undemocratic, and loyal to President above principle, professionalism, constitution or country. They will undermine, actively work against, stall and reverse progressive measures brought about by the government and work towards political anchors and goals partial to the former administration, including its domestic and international allies. But what does the Prime Minister have to say about all this? One doesn’t know, because he hasn’t said anything. And therein lies the rub. Many, who were spontaneously animated and agitated to strengthen democracy in October, find the ominously silent yet definite entrenchment of the coup’s dynamics disturbing. I am one of them.

There is another reason for my disquiet, after what is more widely recognized as the end of the constitutional coup mid-December. What was anecdotally shared and intuitively grasped by those on Twitter during the coup was the fact that the content sounded and looked markedly different to what it was usually, before the coup. Twitter in Sri Lanka plays a vital role in the now well-established media ecosystem through its ability to shape conversations, accentuate attention and drive traffic towards certain place, product, pole, person or party. And as with all social media, its influence extends beyond just those connected to it and engaging on it. From May to December last year, I collected around 332,000 tweets in the public domain, anchored to two of the most used hashtags in the country. Likewise, I collected just over 181,000 tweets from last week of October to the beginning of December, covering the timespan of the coup and as a historic moment.

Keeping in mind the theory of six degrees of separation, I was surprised to learn that over the months I had data for in 2018, those using Twitter captured by my research net were separated by just under four degrees. During the coup however, there is statistical evidence to prove that the use and users on Twitter grew. In the collection anchored to the coup, the average connection between users was just over five degrees. This indicates an increase of those on Twitter - numerically as well as by way of diversity - in a very short span of time. This significant growth was the result of dormant users coming back on to the platform, as well as new users using the platform to produce and distribute content, including personal frames of anxiety, resistance and hope. Research over November alone indicated clearly that Twitter, as well as Facebook, were dominated not by content supporting the coup and the President’s actions, but by pushback. In other words, those most volubly against the President and Rajapaksa, were those who were not card-carrying supporters of the UNP or Mr. Wickremesinghe.

The data-driven evidence for this over Twitter alone is significant, because the rapid expansion in those active is a proxy indicator for the support and goodwill that the UNP and Mr. Wickremesinghe organically attracted. Though users didn’t increase in much the same way, on Facebook, there was an exponential increase in the production of content and engagement with it. Given the entrenchment of the coup’s destructive and disturbing dynamics, it is unclear how as this year progresses, those who came out to the streets in November and December 2018 - many for the first time in their lives - and produced content over social media, will react to what is already evident as another lost opportunity for meaningful democratic reform and change.

This is more significant than the slow erosion of support for the January 2015 configuration. There is a constituency that is clearly anti-Rajapaksa but not pro-Wickremesinghe, that is opposed to authoritarianism as much as it is opposed to the UNP’s nepotism and corruption. This new constituency doesn’t act according to established norms of a party cadre, because they are fluid and flexible in partisan affiliation - assured in what they don’t want to see, and guided more by what they would like to bring about no matter who is in power. This is not something traditional political parties know how to deal with, much less even recognize. While not an exact science, the anger this constituency will feel toward a government they fought hard to protect because of democratic and constitutional principles, acting now against this very spirit, will invariably have an electoral consequence. The degree and depth of this initially virtual discontent and its subsequent expression through franchise runs the spectrum of non-participation (believing nothing changes) through to voting in the known evil, given that multiple chances given to hope and change went to waste.

Post-coup, the most significant difference between Sirisena and Rajapaksa is the spelling of their surnames. Everything else is interchangeable. It goes to show that democracy in Sri Lanka this year faces a challenge unseen even prior to 2015’s Presidential preference and mandate. A President who acts in concert with a former President he was once a sworn enemy of. A Prime Minister does not act to safeguard and strengthen the overwhelming democratic mandate he received just over a month ago. A constituency that clearly cares more about democracy and constitutionalism than those in government. And the prospect of elections where the greatest distinction projected by competing voices is really the smallest of difference.

It is customary to begin a new year with hope. But if holding on to hope requires the jettison of stark realities, I will choose to brace myself around what is to come, instead of being surprised later this year around dynamics evident just after the coup. The only constant in our politics, evidently, is change that changes nothing.

What the coup taught us

by Tisaranee Gunasekara-Jan 6, 2019

Jan 6, 2019

“A polis ruled by one man is no polis at all.”
– Sophocles (Antigone)

Four years ago, a majority of Lankans elected Maithripala Sirisena as the country’s executive president.

A year from now, the country will be asked to elect its next executive president.

Can the mistakes of the past be avoided in the future?

What were the mistakes of the past?

With the memory of the recent anti-constitutional coup still raw, the readiest answer would be choosing Maithripala Sirisena as the common presidential candidate.

Hindsight enlightens. It also distorts. In 2015, the choice was a simple one – do we give Mahinda Rajapaksa a third presidential term, or do we not? If we wanted to evict the Rajapaksas from power, democratically, our last chance for it was the presidential election of 2015. Six more years of Rajapaksa rule, and Lankan democracy would have been vitiated beyond repair. As Anura Kumara Dissanayake said, “If the people fail to defeat the insane dictatorship of Mahinda Rajapaksa at this point, there will be no turning back for Sri Lanka.”

That was the logic behind the selection of Maithripala Sirisena as the common presidential candidate. The outcome of the election proved the correctness of that logic.

The mistake was not the selection of Maithripala Sirisena. That was the right thing to do in 2014. The mistake was failing to hold him to his solemn public pledge to abolish the the executive presidency.

In his nine-year rule, Mahinda Rajapaksa had demonstrated the dictatorial dangers inherent in the Lankan presidential system. By 2014, that danger was clearly understood by a wide range of oppositional forces. In consequence, the demand to abolish the executive presidency gained new traction in oppositional circles.

On 21st November 2014, Maithripala Sirisena walked out of the Rajapaksa government, and publicly accepted the mantle of common presidential candidate. Addressing a media briefing, he expounded what he was offering the electorate. The first item on his list of pledges was the abolition of the executive presidency. Mr. Sirisena excoriated the executive presidency as a political and moral calamity, and a crucible of injustice. “We came to a clear decision with the UNP to abolish the executive presidency,” he stated. “I ask the people to give me power to abolish the executive presidency in 100 days.”

The mistake was to let that promise fade into the background, post-victory. The mistake was to be satisfied with the 19th Amendment. The mistake was to think that the executive presidency no longer contained a threat to democracy.

For that, the blame cannot be heaped on Mr. Sirisena alone. An equal share of the blame goes to the UNP.

Ranil Wickremesinghe dreamt of using the Rajapaksa-Sirisena divide in the SLFP to win the next presidential election, easily. His belief of a romp to victory was such that he paid scant heed to public sentiment, and violated the norms of good governance repeatedly. Sajith Premadasa (and perhaps Ravi Karunanayake) dreamt of ousting Ranil Wickremesinghe, and becoming the UNP’s next presidential candidate. The UNP ceased to champion the abolition of executive presidency.

Meanwhile, the plague bacillus of executive power was afflicting Maithripala Sirisena. He slowly abandoned all talk of abolishing the executive presidency or being a one-term president. He too had a new obsession – how to win a second term.

Had Ven. Maduluwawe Sobhita Thero been alive, the pledge to abolish the executive presidency may not have faded from both political discourse and societal memory. In his absence, there was no one of sufficient stature to advocate the idea at the national level.

Another contributing factor was the mistaken belief (which this writer too shared) that the 19thAmendment had defanged the executive presidency, and rendered it sufficiently harmless.

Thus, the ground shifted, enabling the anti-constitutional coup of October 2018.

The anti-constitutional coup as a blessing in disguise

Where was the country on October 25th, the day before the coup?

In 2015, Maithripala Sirisena won thanks to the unified effort of a truly Lankan coalition. By 2018, that coalition was in tatters.

The government, by its actions and inactions, had antagonised most of its former allies. Many of the failures were needless. A political solution to the ethnic problem might be hard to achieve, but why the failure to build houses for the war-displaced in the North and the East? The anti-Muslim riots of Kandy might have taken the government unawares, but why the failure to prosecute the suspects, and punish the guilty? It might not be possible to totally stop the slide of the rupee, but why be so blasé about its impact on the living costs of ordinary Lankans? Why turn a blind eye to one’s own corruption? Why fail to convict a single political killer? This last failure looms with obscene starkness as we mark the tenth anniversary of the murder of Lasantha Wickrematunga.

Not even the drubbing it received at the local government polls could make the UNP face reality. The disastrous fuel-price formula became a symbol of the government’s unconcern about the plight of ordinary voters. The government just didn’t seem to care, whether it was about the effects of global warming on Sri Lanka, or the rapidly increasing Chinese footprint (public notice boards in government projects in Sinhala, English and Chinese, not Tamil!), the daily killing of elephants or the disastrous consequences of Norochchoali coal-power plant, corruption or child abuse. The recent horrific incident in Negombo where a dog was burnt to death served to highlight another one of the government’s avoidable failures – the non-enactment of the Animal Welfare Act. The government was sleepwalking into disaster, taking Lankan democracy along with it.

Perhaps the most striking measure of where we were before the anti-constitutional coup was the TNA’s (erroneous) decision to nominate Chamal Rajapaksa to the vitally important Constitutional Council. Thanks to the government’s idiocies, even the minorities were forgetting the danger presented by the Rajapaksas to the notion of a pluralist Sri Lanka.

Maithripala Sirisena’s coup, despite its massive downside, was a much needed knock-on-head for the somnambulant UNP. The prospect of the return of the Rajapaksas acted as an eye-opener. Ranil Wickremesinghe displayed unaccustomed resolution, and the UNP, by and large, rallied round.

Faced with that mortal threat to democracy, the 2015 coalition recreated itself. The valiant role played by the TNA and the JVP in defence of democracy was one of the most positive outcomes of the Sirisena-induced crisis. Speeches by parliamentarians MA Sumanthiran and Anura Kumara Dissanayake, for instance, became essential reading, because they explained and interpreted the ongoing crisis from a national rather than a partisan point of view.

The spontaneous rallying around by ordinary people in defence of democracy and the rule of law was another key positive development of the last several months. The mistakes, inabilities and hypocrisies of the UNP-led administration had done much to alienate the very people who voted against the Rajapaksas twice in 2015. The anti-Rajapaksa, pro-democracy camp was so demoralised, scattered, inactive, its very existence was in doubt. That changed when the anti-constitutional coup happened, and the stakes facing the country became clear. Ordinary people did what they could to stand against the growing anti-democratic tide, be it taking part in demonstrations or signing a petition. That societal engagement is something new in Sri Lanka, and hopefully will continue to grow, post-crisis.

But the real hero of that saga was the judiciary. In the Supreme Court and the Appeal Court, all judges stood as one to face the challenge (including Justice Eva Wanasundera). As the Supreme Court judgement in the case on the dissolution of parliament stated, “…this court has time and time again stressed that our law does not permit vesting unfettered discretion upon any public authority whether it be the president or any officer of the state.”

The coup has given Lankan democracy a second chance to save itself, by reminding democrats everywhere of the impending Rajapaksa threat, and by highlighting the need to abolish the executive presidency before it falls into the hands of a leader who is more ruthlessly effective than Maithripala Sirisena.

This is no country for an executive presidency

Sri Lanka’s ancient past and its modern present render the country unsuitable for an executive presidency.

Executive presidency and democracy go in tandem generally in countries unburdened by a monarchical past, like the United States. France had a monarchical past, but she also made a republican revolution against monarchy, and beheaded a king for good measure. In ancient Lanka kings were killed by usurpers, and not by their own subjects under the banner of liberté, égalité, fraternité. In that crucial absence, the executive presidency gives rise to monarchical longings on one hand, and instincts of servility on the other.

The obvious danger facing Lankan democracy is a Rajapaksa winning the next presidential election. 19th Amendment may have placed Mahinda, Basil, Gotabhaya and Namal Rajapaksa out of the running, but no such disqualification hampers Chamal Rajapaksa. He will be a very effective candidate, both in terms of attracting supporters and disarming opponents.

Even if the Rajapaksas lose, who will win? Maithripala Sirisena fortunately cannot. That leaves Ranil Wickremesinghe – and as lesser possibilities, Sajith Premadasa and Ravi Karunanayake. Do we have any reason to believe that any one of these leaders would conduct himself more democratically than Maithripala Sirisena, once the presidency is his?

The new president (whoever he is) is likely to dissolve the parliament as soon as possible, to enable his party to benefit from the knock-on effects of the presidential win. This would mean a parliamentary election around late March/early April. The chances are that one party/formation will gain control of both the executive and the legislature. How effective will the checks and balances introduced by the 19th Amendment in such a situation, when the prime minister is merely a minion of the president?

There is a glaring flaw in Lankan political system which renders the country particularly unsuitable to an executive presidency – the absence of inner-party democracy in any of the major political parties. For instance, many democracies with executive presidencies (the US, France, Chile etc) have systems or traditions necessitating major parties to hold primaries to choose their presidential nominee. In Sri Lanka, leaders remain leaders, and there are no democratic spaces within the main parties to challenge their stranglehold or policies. This absence of internal democracy can play a role in negating the achievements of the 19thAmendment.

When the Supreme Court gave its judgement on December 13th, Maithripala Sirisena accepted it. The importance of that acceptance cannot be overemphasised. According to some Sinhala media reports (notably Irida Divaina), his new ally, Mahinda Rajapaksa, advised him to do the opposite, ignore unfavourable verdicts and plough ahead towards an unlawful election. Had Mr. Sirisena followed that advice, the repercussions would have been devastating. He didn’t. That alone, the fact that he is still a president willing to abide by extremely unfavourable judicial rulings, renders the choices of 2015 correct, even after cataclysms of the last three months.

As the prospect of electing the next president nears, the question assumes an increasing urgency – how do we ensure that the candidate we back does not do a Maithripala Sirisena or worse?

There is only one safe option – abolish the executive presidency.

If there is sufficient societal pressure to abolish the executive presidency, if parties like the JVP and the TNA can provide leadership to that demand, it might be hard for the UNP to refuse. The JVP’s draft 20th Amendment which envisages a president who is not the head of government, is elected by parliament, and cannot function as a member of a political party might be a good starting point.

The effort may succeed or it may not. But the effort must be made. Failing to do so would be a criminal folly, after what the anti-constitutional coup taught us.

The Terrifying Rajapaksa Legacy Will Destroy The Sinhalese Buddhists Of Sri Lanka!

By Sharmini Serasinghe –JANUARY 6, 2019

Sharmini Serasinghe

The leader of a nation is like a parent to one’s children. The children emulate the examples set by the parent, for better or for worse. The morally upright parent sets morally upright examples and standards and ensures the children abide by them.

What happens when the leader/parent is immoral, unethical and unprincipled? Obviously, the children/citizens, especially the young and impressionable will naturally follow the examples set by the leader/parent. And they too become immoral, unethical and unprincipled, just like their leader/parent. 

This unfortunately is what has happened to an entire generation of the Sinhalese Buddhists of this country, including the academically qualified and some amongst the senior generations, as well as the Buddhist clergy, during and after the decade Mahinda Rajapaksa was the Parent of our Nation. An entire generation and more of Sinhalese Buddhists fell victim to Mahinda Rajapaksa’s self- serving political machinations and thus, on the path to self-destruct. 

How did Mahinda Rajapaksa set about doing this? 

He did it with his endearing but questionable charm, oratorical and acting skills and his folksy appeal, to brainwash the impressionable young minds and quit a few of the unenlightened gullible seniors with, “I won the War” mantra. The brainwashing was so intense and cunning, his victims never realised and still don’t, what was done to them.

Since then, it has not yet dawned on them and may never will as to WHO exactly won the war against the LTTE in 2009. It is obvious to the rest of us that it was the Tri-Forces of our country and those amongst them who gave their life and limb for our motherland who are the true victors of the war and NOT Mahinda Rajapaksa. 

So, what exactly was Mahinda Rajapaksa’s role in this victory? He simply granted carte blanche to the Tri-Forces to end the war. Like ancient Kings of yore did he lead his armies to war? NO he did not! Was he even in the country when the war concluded? NO, he was not!

So, how exactly and what moral right has Mahinda Rajapaksa got, to claim to be the sole victor of the war against the LTTE? How must those comrades of the fallen heroes of the tri-forces who saw their own killed and wounded in battle feel, when all the glory of the war victory has been hijacked by a single individual, who never set foot on the battlefield- Mahinda Rajapaksa? Will his brainwashed victims amongst the Sinhalese Buddhists ever realise this? 

Thanks to Mahinda Rajapaksa, the moral degradation amongst an entire brainwashed generation of Sinhalese Buddhists including the Buddhist clergy has become a cancer in our society, the virulency of which is extremely evident especially on the streets and on social media today. This scourge will be immensely challenging to eradicate in a democracy, and I dread to think what extreme measures might have to be enforced to stop this virulent societal cancer from spreading.

These young victims of Rajapaksa’s racist and immoral ideology – the future generation of our country – with an all too visible lack of morality and integrity, will undoubtedly end up as utter misfits and frustrated failures in society, if not stopped in their tracks right now. This will not only be for their own good, but for the future of our country as well.  Though some are armed with academic qualifications, this alone does not make a well-rounded educated person, given the quality of our education system today. And these facts, this particular generation is not aware of, as there is no one to teach them ethics in an ethically bankrupt society.

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Universal Basic Income to solve the effects of artificial intelligence?

Not only will AI make life more comfortable for humans, we can expect faster services 

Monday, 7 January 2019 

800 million jobs are expected to be lost by 2030 due to automation according to a study by the Mckinsey Global Institute. That is a fifth of the global workforce. This is the reality the world is facing as automation is increasingly taking over many things we do. We know that technology is taking over repetitive and menial jobs and we can see that even in banks as we are encouraged to deposit our money in a machine rather than at the counter. In time, the person at the counter will lose his or her job.
Deep learning 

Usually the computers did the repetitive jobs that did not need thinking so the jobs which needed critical thinking were safe from automation. With artificial intelligence using deep learning, the computers are able to use vast amounts of data and learn for themselves and use the experience they encounter to further study and improve themselves further.

The late Cambridge Professor Stephen Hawking believed that the development of AI more powerful than the human brain could even lead to the end of the human race. This view is also supported by others like Tesla’s Elon Musk.
Machines taking over

According to the World Economic Forum, in a study on the division of labour as hours spent, in 2018, machines are doing 29% of the work. By 2022 it will be 42% and will hit 52% by 2025. Data processing jobs are to be worst hit with 62% of jobs being taken over. 47% of American jobs are likely to be lost in the next 20 years to AI, according to the Oxford University. We are seeing a push by AI into areas such as design, medicine and finance too.

AI can be the future

According to the World Economic Forum by 2022, 135 million jobs related to AI will emerge, though it says it requires major investment in developing a workforce capable of working in that field. People will need to update their skills and education has to be geared towards this to prepare our future graduates for this new reality. Though, developed countries are expected to face AI first, in this age of globalisation, it will not be long before it comes to the third world.

But in AI, there is a lot of hope. Not only will AI make life more comfortable for humans, we can expect faster services also. It is also a big area for investments. According to Gartner, business value derived from AI is $1.2 trillion in 2018 but is expected to be $3.9 trillion by 2022. There is $2.7 trillion dollars worth of business to come into existence in the next four years alone. AI will create losers but also winners as it causes change in the world. But the price for AI is loss of jobs.
Universal Basic Income

What is Universal Basic Income (UBI)? It is a fixed amount enough for subsistence given by the government to all citizens, regardless whether they are rich or poor, employed or unemployed. This is an idea that is advocated by many in Silicon Valley like Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates. They agree that as the world gets more and more automated, people will lose their jobs to machines as McKinsey Global Institute predicts, 800 million are to lose their jobs by 2030.

The supporters of UBI believe that with more robots replacing humans, company profits will soar as robots will bring overheads down and a robot works 24 hours a day compared to eight hours a day by humans. With corporate profits soaring, tax revenue will increase. Also, governments can have license fees for robots which will be a further source of income for governments. Governments can use this money to give a guaranteed income to every citizen. As automation keeps steadily taking over jobs and jobs in the AI industry cannot replace the numbers lost, Universal Basic Income being adopted maybe the only solution.

Palestine in Pictures: December 2018

Relatives of Palestinian boy Ahmad Abu Abid, 4, mourn during the child’s funeral in Khan Younis, southern Gaza, on 12 December. The child succumbed to injuries sustained days earlier after he was hit by shrapnel fired by Israeli soldiers during Great March of Return protests.

Ashraf AmraAPA images

2 January 2018

Israeli occupation forces killed 14 Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip in December.

It was the first month since the launch of the Great March of Return in March that more Palestinians were killed in the West Bank than the Gaza Strip.

Some 300 Palestinians were killed by Israeli soldiers and settlers throughout the year. Fourteen Israelis were killed by Palestinians during the same period, including two soldiers shot dead in the West Bank during December.

Palestine in Pictures Decem... by on Scribd

Hamas arrests five suspects over raid on Palestinian Authority media station in Gaza

Hamas says all five suspects are former employees of PA whose salaries were recently suspended

Employee inspects damage at PA radio and TV station in Gaza on Friday (AFP)

Saturday 5 January 2019

Hamas authorities in the Gaza Strip arrested five men on Saturday on suspicion of ransacking the offices of the Palestinian Authority's media headquarters, Hamas's interior ministry said.

Five armed men entered the offices of the Palestinian Broadcasting Corporation (PBC) in Gaza City on Friday, official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported. During the raid workers were assaulted and equipment was destroyed.

"At least five people broke into the building, broke the radio door and completely destroyed the main studio, including cameras, equipment, furniture and broadcasting equipment," a staffer at the radio station said.

The PBC is funded by the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority and its Gaza office shares a building that hosts several media outlets including Palestine TV, the mouthpiece of the PA, and the Voice of Palestine radio station.

The incident underscored tensions between President Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority (PA), based in the occupied West Bank, and Hamas, the Islamist group that rules Gaza, Reuters said. Staff and a PA official initially blamed the raid on Hamas.

Still, Hamas said on Saturday that all five suspects were former employees of the PA whose salaries were recently suspended. There was no immediate response from the Palestinian Authority.

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Masked men raid Palestinian Authority media office in Gaza Strip

There has long been antipathy between Hamas, which won the last Palestinian parliamentary elections in 2006 and is opposed to any peace negotiations with Israel, and with Abbas's more moderate and secular Fatah faction.

The two rivals have tried and failed to end the divisions. Egypt has brokered a Palestinian reconciliation pact that provides for Hamas to cede control of Gaza to Abbas, but a dispute over power-sharing has hindered implementation.

Hamas seized control of Gaza from the PA in 2007, a year after winning parliamentary elections that were rejected by much of the international community.

Despite losing power in the enclave, the PA continues to pay tens of thousands of civil servants there, although it has reduced salaries in recent years amid financial shortfalls, causing anger among its employees.

Pence and White House officials leave meeting with congressional aides with no end to shutdown

Vice President Mike Pence and other senior Trump officials were seen arriving to continue negotiations to end a partial government shutdown on Jan. 5. (Reuters)

By Seung Min Kim ,Robert Costa andAnne Gearan-January 5 at 9:30 PM

The government shutdown that has halted paychecks for hundreds of thousands of federal workers began its third week Saturday with no end in sight, as Vice President Pence, top White House officials and senior congressional aides met for more than two hours without reaching a deal to reopen the government. 

Inside the meeting at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, Pence refused to budge from the more than $5 billion President Trump has demanded from Congress to pay for a portion of his promised wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, according to two Democratic officials briefed on the negotiations.

The standoff — which has heavily affected national parks and other operations and threatens to halt payments as varied as food stamps and tax refunds — has made Trump’s unrealized border wall the linchpin of his presidency as he seeks to make good on a signature campaign promise.

Administration officials have acknowledged that they were not prepared for the potential consequences of an extended shutdown and Trump’s decision to demand wall funding. Democrats, meanwhile, are standing firm on offering no taxpayer money for the project, which Trump had long asserted would be funded by Mexico.

Pence was deputized by Trump to oversee Saturday’s talks, but he did not have the president’s blessing to float new or specific numbers as he did last month in a meeting with Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), according to two Trump aides who were not authorized to speak publicly. That meant few specifics were actually discussed Saturday, as Democratic staffers repeatedly pushed the administration to reopen the federal government and negotiate differences over the border after the shutdown ends.

But the administration — represented by Pence, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney and senior adviser Jared Kushner — refused, according to multiple officials.

Here's what you missed at President Trump's Jan. 4 news conference on the 14th day of the partial government shutdown. (Monica Akhtar /The Washington Post)

“Not much headway made today,” Trump tweeted Saturday afternoon. “Second meeting set for tomorrow. After so many decades, must finally and permanently fix the problems on the Southern Border!”

Before the meeting began Saturday morning, Trump took a combative tone in several Twitter messages and claimed that news coverage documenting cracks in Republican support for his hard-line position were inaccurate.

“Great support coming from all sides for Border Security (including Wall) on our very dangerous Southern Border,” Trump tweeted. “Teams negotiating this weekend! Washington Post and NBC reporting of events, including Fake sources, has been very inaccurate (to put it mildly)!” 

A number of Republicans, including Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.), who is up for reelection in 2020, have said in recent days that the government should be reopened and that a shutdown is not the “right answer,” worrying GOP leaders about the depth of support for Trump’s position.

Trump spent much of Saturday on the phone with allies, talking through his positioning on the shutdown and hearing their reviews of his Friday news conference in the Rose Garden, according to a person close to him. Two people regularly on his call list — Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) and Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) — have encouraged Trump to hold fast and refuse to agree to reopen the government unless wall funding is secured, the person said. 

 “I’ve never seen the president as resolved on any issue as he is on this,” Meadows said Saturday. “But he is open to new ideas about how to end the impasse.” 

Trump told reporters Friday that he wants to reopen government but is prepared to maintain the shutdown for weeks or even years. He also told congressional leaders at the White House on Friday that he preferred the term “strike” over “shutdown,” people briefed on the meeting said. 

[Tax refunds, food aid could be shutdown’s early casualties]

In conversations with top aides on Friday and Saturday, House Democratic leaders said Trump and GOP leaders seem eager to be seen as making progress even if the talks remained stalled, allowing Republican lawmakers back home over the weekend to reassure nervous constituents, according to two Democratic officials briefed on those discussions who were not authorized to speak publicly.

“There is the reality of what the White House is doing, which is very little, and the image they’re trying to send, which is, ‘Look at us, we’re busy, and the vice president is rolling up his sleeves,’ ” one Democratic official said. “They’re worried about defections.”

During Saturday’s meeting, Democratic staffers asked the White House to lay out in formal detail the administration’s funding request for the border — including its specific security requests, what the money would be used for, and what in the Homeland Security budget the administration would cut to make the numbers work, people familiar with the meeting said. 

Democrats “emphasized that it’s important for us to have an updated budget request from the White House because they have been all over the map,” said another official briefed on the discussion. The White House plans to provide those figures before the group meets again Sunday afternoon. 

Some centrist Republicans on Saturday urged Trump and congressional leaders to reopen the government, reflecting growing unease in their ranks about the prolonged shutdown and the political cost the GOP might pay.

“With Nancy Pelosi as speaker, it’s going to have to be a compromise solution,” Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), a moderate and former FBI agent who represents the Philadelphia suburbs, said in an interview. “It’s our most basic function as members of Congress to fund the government, and we need to have these battles on immigration and other issues on their own turf, separately.” 

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said in a statement Saturday that the House will begin passing separate bills to reopen the government in the coming week, starting with the funding bill that covers the Treasury Department “so that the American people can receive their tax refunds on schedule.”

“The senseless uncertainty and chaos of the Trump Shutdown must end, now,” Pelosi said.

Mulvaney said in an interview to air Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that Trump would “take a concrete wall off the table” in negotiations with Democratic leaders if that would help end the shutdown.

“If he has to give up a concrete wall, replace it with a steel fence to do that so that Democrats can say, ‘See? He’s not building a wall anymore,’ that should help us move in the right direction,” Mulvaney said.

But Trump is annoyed by news reports about the negotiations that make it seem that he is backing away from his demands and wants to avoid stories about new numbers for wall funding being discussed, Trump aides said. The president instead encouraged Pence and senior aides to focus on the $5.6 billion for border security that was the focal point of legislation passed last month by House Republicans, the aides said. 

Trump exasperated members of both parties with his comments Friday, but Trump spent that evening boasting to friends that he was in a strong negotiating position because he was able to capture attention and make a flurry of points that he feels his core voters appreciate, White House officials said.

[After years of Trump’s dire warnings, a ‘crisis’ has hit the border but generates little urgency]

On Saturday evening, Trump tweeted that he would travel to Camp David on Sunday for “meetings on Border Security and many other topics” with aides attending a White House staff retreat. He then followed up with a tweet of his “Game of Thrones”-style poster saying, “The Wall is Coming.”

Mulvaney is spearheading the Camp David gathering as a way of connecting with his new deputies and colleagues, according to officials.

The president is asking advisers about further ways to battle for wall funding in the coming days, whether it is meeting with family members of people killed by undocumented immigrants, huddling with sheriffs or visiting the border, the officials said.

As Saturday’s meeting unfolded, Trump was eyeing his own options for trying to force the Democrats’ hand, including declaring a national emergency to begin wall construction without congressional approval, a possible course he mentioned at his Friday news conference. 

According to two confidants of Trump’s, who have spoken to him in recent days but were not authorized to speak publicly, Trump is looking at how such a move would play out and has told his aides that such a drastic turn could rattle the Democrats and compel them to offer him wall funding.

 The legality of such a move is unclear, however, and Trump would almost certainly face immediate legal challenges in the courts. 

Still, there are signs within the White House that more-comprehensive deals are at least being discussed, more likely for after the shutdown concludes and the government reopens.

Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, continues to tell his allies that he thinks there could eventually be a deal for border wall funding in exchange for immigration protections for undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children, according to two people who were briefed on those discussions. Another person familiar with the discussions emphasized, however, that Kushner was not pushing for a deal on Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, at this time. 

Chatter about an agreement involving protections for young immigrant beneficiaries of the DACA program have risen a bit in recent days, although the administration has rejected previous wall-for-DACA deals and Democratic leadership is in no mood for one now.  

After his work on a bipartisan criminal justice reform bill, Kushner is as engaged as ever with Capitol Hill, the people said. Still, Kushner’s interest in brokering a possible deal on immigration has caused some anxiety among conservatives close to Trump, several of whom said Saturday they feared the president could eventually be intrigued by Kushner’s position as the shutdown drags on and Trump searches for a way out.  

California shooting: three people killed at bowling alley in Torrance

• Four injured as witnesses describe ‘huge fight’
• Resident: ‘As we were running, we heard 15 shots’

Police statement on shooting at Torrance bowling alley – video

Associated Press-Sat 5 Jan 2019

Three men were fatally shot and four injured when a brawl at a popular Los Angeles-area bowling alley and karaoke bar erupted into gunfire that had terrified patrons, some children, running for their lives.

Police in the coastal city of Torrance responded shortly after midnight on Friday to calls of shots fired at the Gable House Bowl, which offers bowling, laser tag and an arcade. They found seven people with gunshot wounds.

Three men were pronounced dead at the scene and two were taken to a hospital, Sgt Ronald Harris said. Two other men were struck by gunfire but “opted to seek their own medical attention”.

Authorities did not immediately identify the victims or suspects or release details about what led to the shooting. Witnesses said it stemmed from a fight between two large groups.

Dwayne Edwards, 60, of Los Angeles, said he received a call from his nephew that his 28-year-old son, Astin Edwards, was one of those killed. His nephew told him his son was attempting to break up a fight when a gunman “just started unloading”.

“I’m thinking this is a dream and I’ll wake up,” Edwards told the Orange County Register. “He was a good kid. I don’t understand it.”

A grieving mother told KABC-7 her 28-year-old son, Robert Meekins, was also trying to break up the fight and that Meekins and Astin Edwards were friends.

“They were friends so I know he probably jumped in and helped Astin and whoever he was with … but I don’t think my son deserves to die,” Anglean Hubbard said. “My son was a loving person. He loved life, he loved his son, and he loved his family. Nobody can imagine what I’m going through right now.”

The third victim was 20-year-old Michael Radford, his sister Latrice Dumas told the Torrance Daily Breeze.

“He was happy. He was always a protector,” Dumas said. “That’s how he got into this, he was trying to protect others.”

Wes Hamad, a 29-year-old Torrance resident, was at the bowling alley with his 13-year-old niece and cousin when he saw a “huge fight” break out. Hamad said the brawl, which lasted about five minutes, blocked the entrance and spiraled into “complete chaos”.

“I grabbed my niece and started running toward the far end of the bowling alley,” he said. “As we were running, we heard 15 shots.”

As he was leaving, Hamad said he saw a woman weeping over a man who was had gunshot wounds to his head and neck.

Police investigators work at the Gable House Bowl. Photograph: Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images
Damone Thomas was in the karaoke section of the bowling alley when people ran in saying there was a shooting. The 30-year-old Los Angeles resident said his friend flipped a table to shield them as they heard gunshots.
Thomas said he didn’t feel scared because he was “just trying to survive.” But when he was driving home, he said he realized how traumatic the situation was and said he wasn’t been able to fall asleep.
“Closing my eyes, all I can see is the women against the wall crying, not knowing what to do,” he said.
Thomas and Hamad said they had never witnessed any violence there in the past. But Hamad said he had stopped going for a while because he heard someone with a gun was recently seen there.
“I definitely won’t be going back anymore,” he said.
In a tweet, California senator Kamala Harris said her heart breaks for the victims.
“We must do more to address gun violence,” she said. “Americans should be able to go to a bowling alley and be safe.”