Let’s talk Turkey about Turkey – that bird that must hate Thanksgiving in America and Christmas in  most of the rest of the world. And, I have to warn you, it is a pretty confusing story, but we will do our best to unpack it  in a way that will not drive you back to the booze or the smoking that you gave up cold Turkey a few months or some time ago.

New sports and recreation minister, Fikile Mbalula has worked with great intensity, energy and exuberance since taking office. Among others he has been active in demanding cooperation between rival office-bearers and in ensuring that there is harmony in certain sporting codes.

A mouth-watering prospect awaits Cape rugby fans – watching a Super Rugby semi-final contest between the DHL Stormers and the Crusaders at Newlands in Cape Town on Saturday after a volcano eruption in Chile assisted the New Zealand team in their quarter win over the Sharks by 36 points to 8 this past Saturday.

U.S. President Barack Osama announced June 22 that the long process of drawing down forces in Afghanistan would begin on schedule in July. Though the initial phase of the drawdown appears limited, minimising the tactical and operational impact on the ground in the immediate future, the United States and its allies are now beginning the inevitable process of removing their forces from Afghanistan. This will entail the risk of greater Taliban battlefield successes, writes Nathan Hughes.

Anonymous and LulzSec represent a real change in the politics of cyberspace. The networked power at the hands of the hackers may show itself to be the equal of people power on the streets, writes an anonymous contributor on the openDemcarcy website.

The charge of murder laid against respected South African professor Sean Davidson after helping his terminally ill 85-year-old mother to die in New Zealand at the end of last year has put the question of euthanasia in the spotlight. In the United Kingdom a TV documentary by Terry Pratchett on the subject caused a respected author and philosopher to pose the questions: Does public prejudice condemn many to unnecessarily prolonged and painful death; and can death be a good thing?

The fast-growing popularity of smartphones and tablet PCs is driving growth in mobile broadband services. Wireless broadband subscriptions in Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries had exceeded half a billion by the end of 2010, an increase of more than 10 percent on June 2010, according to new OECD statistics.

Julius Malema, president of the ANC Youth League (ANCYL) recently kicked off the ANC leadership succession race by calling for an open debate on the issue. This could further polarise divided sections within the ruling alliance.

The next global climate change conference will take place in Durban from 28 November to 9 December 2011. High on the agenda – also for South Africa – will be geo-engineering as well as the need for a new development path that is more inclusive and less dependent on the exploitation of non-renewable resources. Some of these plans might have unpredictable side-effects.

A recent survey conducted by CIB Insurance Administrators has revealed that over one quarter of the brokers surveyed (25.6%) have not yet made the necessary arrangements to write the compulsory Financial Services Board (FSB) regulatory exams. With the December 2011 deadline for completion of the first level of the exam fast approaching, fears are mounting that substantial numbers of people could lose their jobs in the industry due to the way the exams were introduced.

In a move reminiscent of the events in the build-up to the financial crisis of 2008, when banks refused to lend to one another, the leading British banks have radically reduced the amount of unsecured lending they are prepared to make available to eurozone banks. Meanwhile, in the European debt crisis there are uncanny similarities with May 1931 when a banking crisis in Austria triggered events that led to the Great Depression and eventually World War II.

Some distinctive victories are encapsulated in the decision by the ruling African National Congress (ANC) to revise and water-down the controversial Protection of Information Bill. However the battle is still not finally over, while the entire affair is also symptomatic of a wider problem ­– the long-standing acrimonious relationship between the ruling party and the media.

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