From Ghana, rapper Blakk Rasta on Obama performs the following rendition in support of Obama:

For the Japanese, Obama is Beautiful World, as ampontan explains:

HERE’S A YouTube video lasting just under four minutes with a catchy song and video performance based on the idea that Obama (the man, not the city in Japan) is Beautiful World. (Though the city is probably where the shoe store in the video got its name.)

It’s a lot of fun and is worth watching regardless of your political preferences, because it’s a great demonstration of how positive and unselfconsciously playful the Japanese can be. It’s one of the reasons I like Japan so much. There’s not a lick of cynical irony or tiresome politicizing in there at all–just a bunch of people goofing off and having a good time.

Here's the YouTube video:

German Michel Montecrossa shares this song which already celebrates Obama as president:

And finally dancing to the tunes of a popular Indian song, Anantha from Uber Desi, posts this video not in support of the John McCain/Sarah Palin ticket:

AmiraalHussaini, from Bahrain, balked at Sarah Palin's use of the familiar:

She then questioned how Palin managed to bone up on her public speaking skills so quickly:

She also wondered about Palin's promises regarding Wall Street:

Much of the Twitter commentary was in reference to Palin's gaffes and mispronunciations. Israeli gilgul remarked upon her pronunciation of “nuclear”:

He also remarked upon Palin's “O'Biden” gaffe:

lrakoto, from Madagascar, enjoyed Palin's “O'Biden” remark:

He also eschewed Palin's use of “doggone”:

AmiraalHussaini chose to comment on Palin's repeated mispronunciation of Iraq and Iran:

Many viewers were also appalled at Palin's response to the question on oil and energy. Danish-Puerto Rican Solanasaurus didn't quite agree with Palin:

By the end of the debate, it was clear that this segment of the Twittersphere favored Biden. lrakoto made his preference clear:

On the humorous side of things, eunice007 (Philippines) remarks upon the bipartisan US:

Australian rachelhills is a bit torn on the winner of the debate:

As the speech begins, African Twitter users are having fun translating Obama's trademark phrase, “Yes We Can” into different African languages. From Kenya, afromusing starts the trend with Swahili:

dnashong, originally from Ghana, shares more ways to say we can:

kaysha remarks upon Africa's need for a figure like Obama:

dnashong responds:

He then corrects himself to say “you know I should've said Africa's new leaders. I mean US!”

Malagasy lrakoto admits his excitement for Obama's reactions:

Although it goes without saying that non-U.S. citizens have a number of reasons for their interest in the U.S. elections, Trinidadian nplaughlin puts it best when he says:

Bahraini amiraalhussaini quips:

Finally, Nigerian kuikihoro seems disappointed that Obama's speech ended so quickly:

Kucinich is not the first to suggest Bush be impeached.  Georgia Rep. Cynthia McKinney did so in 2006.  Anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, whose son was killed in Iraq, called to impeach Bush in 2007.

Bloggers jumped on the story, sharing their views on Kucinich's accusations. The Haitian Blogger tells the story:

“The house is not in order” said the gentleman from Ohio and former Presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich yesterday before for a dramatic five hours he read 35 articles of impeachment against President George W. Bush for “High Crimes and Misdemeanors.

Kucinich also named some of President Bush's accomplices; Dick Cheney and the White House Iraq Group or WHIG — Condoleezza Rice, Carl Rove, Karen Hughes, Mary Matalin, James R. Wilkinson, Steven Hadley, I. Lewis Libby and Nicholas E. Calleo.

From India, Pickled Politics writes:

I’m a bit annoyed that the Democrats haven’t supported this a bit more strongly, given that the Republicans wanted to impeach Bill Clinton for a lot less. Liberals still continue to lack balls, I’d say. What’s also interesting is how much interest the story generated online. Kucinich’s website went down after a reported 100,000 people per hour were visiting it. The American media almost universally ignored it. Also on Huffington Post.
It’s time the Democrats grew some hairs on their chest and stopped worrying that trying to impeach Bush would damage their re-election chances. Though, admittedly, there is a chance it would rally the small, hardcore Bush base and make them come out during the election.

From Ghana, blogging for the Telegraph.co.uk, What Must Africa Do says the evidence is there:

The true fact is, all of the articles above is true, none can be disputed.

Article XXI [Misleading Congress and the American People About Threats from Iran, and Supporting Terrorist Organizations Within Iran, With the Goal of Overthrowing the Iranian Government] promulgate the false perception among the american politicians on Iran. Yet there Bush is blurting his european analogs in surmising Iran is a threat.

Puerto Rican blogger Gil the Jenius is surprised it took this long:

Here's a thought: The murderous moron has thus been accused with more Articles of Impeachement than all other past Presidents combined. He lasted eight years too long.

Window into Palestine expounds on the fact that the story was mostly ignored by major media:

  Everyone knows he's a crook, a liar and a thief.

Not to mention a traitor and an undicted felon, yet somehow George W. Bush skates on leading the
US to financial, economic, diplomatic, moral and even military ruin.

Last week, a US Congressman submitted articles of impeachment for the most obvious of Bush's crimes.

Was it reported? Did you see the footage on TV?

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries agreed to a law that aims to stop the flow of electronic waste from being dumped in Africa and Asia. But Consumer International’s Luke Upchurch says this has not stopped the dumping of end-of-life electronics in what he described as large swathes of the developing world.

Consumers International carried out investigations in Nigeria and Ghana.

“We could have looked at other areas of the world but I think for us West Africa is an area which often falls foul of such unscrupulous behavior and its something which we wanted to highlight,” Upchurch said.

The report says of the hundreds of tons of obsolete computers, televisions and other household consumer electronics that arrive at ports in Ghana and Nigeria every month, as few as one in four of the imports are working. The rest, it says, are electronic waste, also known as e-waste, which often ends up on dumpsites.

Upchurch says the appliances are sent legally as working second-hand-use units even when the exporters are aware they are not working.

The arrival of flat-screen televisions and Thin Film Transistor monitors on consumer markets in the America and in Europe has set off a flood of old cathode-ray tube television sets spilling into Africa. In Accra and in Lagos, the report says, the change in European consumer habits is clearly visible as old-fashioned CRT television sets are lined up along the streets by their thousands.

In West Africa, refuse is often disposed of in fires. Waste collectors, mostly children, destroy the cathode ray tubes, and burn the wires and circuit boards inside, to get to metals such as copper, zinc, gold and other toxic materials, which they then sell.

Upchurch says this practice has a negative impact on the health of the waste collectors. He says respiratory illnesses are common in the areas and the toxins also find their way into water supplies.

“There are a lot of poisonous heavy toxic metals within the componentries of computers,” he said. “The health repercussions of burning the plastics and the toxics are having quite an effect on the health of the children in the area.”

The report urges tougher monitoring in exporting countries to ensure donated electronic goods are in working order when sent to developing countries.

Consumers International says obsolete electrical equipment should be disposed of or recycled in the country of origin, using environmentally sustainable methods as laid down by laws the countries have agreed to. Upchurch says 6.6 million tons of e-waste disappear to developing countries each year.

Written by Tendai Maphosa / VOA.
Image: Basel Action Network.

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The network would also be available to physicians in New York who were treating West African patients. But when Levine arrived in Ghana, he found that the necessary technological infrastructure did not exist and he could not set up such a site. He says the biggest problem was a lack of access “to computers and the Internet…..” During his initial visits to local clinics, Levine realized that most doctors did not have a computer.

He set out to seek a more widely used technology and his next option made more sense — cell phones. He says statistics show that more than 80 million Africans use cell phones and their proliferation even in rural areas makes them the most accessible technology available. So he sought out a cell phone provider in Ghana to create a cell phone network. ”I realized that for it to be successful, it had to be either cheap or free,” he says.

He approached the management of Ghana Telecom, which owns One-Touch Mobile. “We [agreed] that the only way to achieve this was to remove the barrier of cost,” Levine says. All registered doctors would be given access to the new network, known as “Medicare Line,” on which they would make free phone calls to each other.

He also worked with the Ghana Medical Association to coordinate with the more than 2000 doctors who are members. They all received the “one touch chip,” which they can use in their cell phone handsets each time they call another doctor.

Levine says the project has been very successful, with over a million phone calls made on the free network so far. Doctors are using it for referrals and consultations among themselves. Also, doctors in working in rural areas are able to keep up with their colleagues in cities. Levine says if there is a level of satisfaction among medical practitioners, fewer doctors will leave their profession “and there will be less brain drain in Africa.”

The network also supports text messaging, and the Ghana medical association can send out announcements to its members. “If a disaster like an epidemic strikes, the association can communicate for a quick response,” Levine says – and adds that this feature is the first of its kind anywhere in the world.

He says the idea can be replicated in other parts of Africa where there is a cell phone company “that has a social agenda as part of its corporate goals.”

Levine hopes to expand the project to include neighboring countries. He says it will lead to an improved health care system in a country with only 2000 doctors for a population of 22 million.

In a few months he begins his residency in the United States, where he will use the same network to monitor HIV compliance.

Written by Jackson Muneza Mvunganyi / VOA

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