The Economist has this article summarizing for the rest of the world what is going on with ANC and COPE. Specifically what kicked off the article was the ass-kicking handed to the ANC by COPE and DA in the Western Cape.

One of my point-form summaries:

• 27 Western Cape seats were recently contested in the Western Cape
  • The ANC had held all of them, but lost all but 3
  • The ANC didn’t contest 12 of the seats (through incompetence) so they outright lost 12 of the 15 that they did contest
  • COPE won 10 of the seats and the DA won 9

• The formation of COPE has much to do with “personal interests and ambitions”
  • It is observed that COPE was formed by those who were squeezed out of power when Zuma came in
  • These are the same people who thought the ANC was fine until they lost power

• Either way, COPE should benefit South Africa by:
  1. Offering black voters more choice
  2. Weakening the hapless ANC

The Economist has this short article on what a circus Swaziland is. The tiny country (population 1m) that we hardly ever even notice is badly run by King Mswati III who wields absolute power.

Here are some facts from the article:

• All political parties are banned in Swaziland
• The leader of the opposition (People’s United Democratic Movement) is behind bars
• Most of the country is dirt poor and ravaged by AIDS but the King and his family live a fabulously lavish lifestyle

The place is an absolute dog show, but you won’t hear a peep of criticism from our leaders.

Stones in glass houses perhaps?

Wired has this interesting article showing word clouds of the different speeches at the recent Democratic and Republican conventions. Basically words used most often are largest in word clouds - they make an interesting way of seeing what was spoken about. For instance this is a word cloud for Michelle Obama’s speech about her husband. Predictably the word ‘Barack’ is most common but the words ‘work’, ‘people’ and ‘like’ are common too.

Michelle Obama’s speech at the Democratic convention

Check out the article for the other word clouds, below I have listed the speakers and their most common words. Pretty interesting.

• Hillary Clinton: America, going, Obama
• Joe Biden: Barack, Obama, change, John
• Barack Obama: promise, America, McCain
• John McCain: country, Americans, fight
• George W. Bush: John
• Sarah Palin: America, country, McCain