This World Cup has me thinking about teams.  I was excited when the US beat Algeria.  But I have spent half my life outside America and don't care about or know much about spectator sports, least of all soccer.  What is our attraction to teams?  There is much written about how soccer is a good, harmless outlet for nationalism: better cheer on the stands where there are very clear rules and referees than to take it outside the stadium.

We live in an era of free trade and few governments understand this better than Georgia's.  Although there is still some way to go, the improvement to the system of importation of goods is much better than in Shevardnadze's time.  The libertarian views of the Georgian government lead it to a free trade, which is a very wise over all policy.  But food is different.  The way Georgia grows and sells food is changing and so is the way Georgians eat.  The problem is that Georgia is moving in the opposite direction of much of the developed world regarding food.

I am writing before the results of the elections are known but by the time this is being read, the results should be out.  Most of all I hope the results will be conclusive; that whoever wins does it fairly and that everybody respects the results.  The government's decision to put the threshold at thirty percent was a very disappointing move.  There could be the possibility of a candidate winning with no run off when more than twice as many people had voted against him as for him.  That would have been a disaster.  I very much hope that whoever won actually got more votes for than against a

There has been a great deal of discussion this past week about US policy to Georgia that illustrates some confusion.  In trying to get congressional approval for an agreement with Russia on nuclear weapons, Obama said that what Russia is doing in Georgia should not prevent the agreement from going through.  This was seen by some people, particularly supporters of the ruling party as selling out Georgia's interests in favor of Russia.