Outtaluck Jonathan's impossible Nigerian quagmire

Nigeria watchers everywhere are wondering what the next six weeks will bring.

That's the timeline Jonathan has established for not only crushing Boko Haram but also holding an election!

I'm not the only one who finds this fanciful beyond belief. Sonala Olumhense has been writing about Nigerian politics for thirty years, and it's very hard to find even a hint of optimism in his most recent ruminations.

The think tank here at Falling Downs is betting military coup.

17 dead in Paris, millions march; 2200 dead in Nigeria, who cares?

The crimes in France this week resulted in a massive show of support from Parisians and at least 40 world leaders who arrived to march in symbolic solidarity with France.

The crimes in Nigeria this week have resulted in... nothing?

Why?

Is not every life precious?

Well, perhaps, but as we all know, white European lives are exponentially more precious than black African lives.

What we're not watching while we're watching Ferguson in flames

There are no stats on how often white cops have shot down Black Americans.

Nobody knows...

Suffice to say, this is not the first time.

But it should make you wonder why this time, whether it's more or less than 1,756,342, it's getting this massive media attention.

To the think tank here at Falling Downs, it looks like a "public spectacle" that's been cooked up by various levels of government, with the full connivance of the usual social justice entrepreneurs like Reverend Al, et al.

And of course, the main stream media are all aboard, as they inevitably are in every government initiative designed to take your eye off the ball.

Here are just a few stories we're not seeing while we're focussed on this completely routine cop-killing that has mysteriously hogged the spotlight for months:

• looks like that Afghanistan war is not over after all!
• Israel just made apartheid official state policy
• the Iranian "enemy" is almost in from the cold
• Africa's biggest oil producer, biggest economy, most populous country, and biggest US ally, moves closer to being a failed state every day

Those are but four stories we're ignoring, and there are many more from Ukraine to Libya to the farthest reaches of the American Empire, that Americans ignore at their peril.

Nigerian funnyman pulls Ebola prank, goes to jail

There's nothing funny about Ebola.

So when Nigerian actor Chris Bassey pranked one of the local airlines with a hoax Ebola alert, pretty much nobody other than Chris found it funny.

The authorities were so unimpressed that they slapped the punster in the slammer poste haste.

Which is kinda funny...

Some humans more deserving of "humanitarian assistance" than others

The Nations of Virtue are in a righteous tizzy over the plight of some Iraqi folks trapped on Mount Sinjar without food or water, being threatened by Islamic militants. Western media are inundated with reports of the horrors visited on these poor souls. The leader of the free world has responded by raining humanitarian bombs on the militants and airlifting "non-combat" US troops into the region.

Meanwhile, on another mountain 7,000 kilometers away, a virtually identical scenario is playing out. Nigerian survivors of a Boko Haram raid on their village are trapped, with no way out and no food or water.

They are getting no headlines in Western media and no help from the Nations of Virtue. There are no bombs being dropped on their tormentors and no soldiers coming to help them.

They will most likely die there.

Why?

Post-colonialism; black people are too stupid to manage their own affairs

What else can one conclude from the announcement that France, under a supposed socialist no less, has signed off on a neo-colonial protection agreement with Mali.

And look at Hardluck Jonathan a couple of doors down; he has at last count got American, British, Chinese, Canadian, and Israeli forces on the ground helping to "bring back our girls".

In fairness, the Israelis may have been called home by now because they've got bigger fish to fry, but still, that's an impressive load of help from a lot of really smart white folks, and a few yellow ones, who are even smarter.

Are "our girls" back yet?

No, but that does not mean that their usefulness to the state has diminished. Goodluck came out today with a request to borrow a billion dollars to fight Boko Haram and bring back our girls.

Does anyone imagine that American, British, Chinese, Canadian, and Israeli forces would be giving all this "help" if Nigeria were not the oil capital of Africa?

And how is it that the leader of the oil capital of Africa needs to go cap-in-hand to the IMF to beg another billion to bring back our girls? Bear in mind that this is the same leader squandering $100,000/month on a top Washington PR firm to polish his image ahead of the elections.

The Nations of Virtue have been "helping" Africans for about 400 years now.

Are things getting better?

Nigerian dictator slaughtering his own people

Sort of a democratically elected dictator like that fellow in Iran.

It's not really democracy if they elect some asshole we don't like.

Big Oil and the USA figured that Goodluck Jonathan stood for business as usual in Nigeria.

But now he is slaughtering his own people. Just like that ophthalmologist in the ME.

That makes for negative publicity.

But all the people he is slaughtering are terrorists...

Black Spring is just around the corner

From the Atlantic Ocean to the Arabian Sea black Africa is in turmoil. Radical Islamic movements are a growing force in Kenya, Ethiopia, South Sudan and Nigeria. Will 2012 be the year that these diverse resistance movements coalesce into a unified regional uprising, a "Black Awakening"?

In Nigeria, Africa's most populous country and biggest oil exporter, the aptly named President Goodluck Jonathan celebrated the new year by declaring a state of emergency, purportedly in response to a wave of violence by the Boko Haram fundamentalist group.

Having declared a state of emergency, his next move was to announce the elimination of the subsidies that keep gasoline and heating oil affordable for the majority of the people. Although Nigeria is Africa's biggest oil producer, it's people are amongst the poorest on the planet due to the rampant corruption of the ruling elite.

It was mass discontent with the corruption of the ruling elite, more than some imagined thirst for western-style democracy, that motivated the Arab Wakening from Tunisia to Yemen.

This year Arab Spring will move south.

Black Spring will be the biggest news story of 2012.