Persons for the week: Ban Ki - Moon and Robert Gates.

The eyes of the world rests on the two men that I have chosen as the Persons for this week. The two men are the new Secretary-General of the United Nations, Ban ki-Moon of South Korea and Robert Gates, the new U. S. secretary of Defense. Both men (pictured above, with the men they will be replacing - Ban Ki with Kofi and Bob with "Rummy"), who will take their offices about a month apart from each other (Ban Ki-Moon on January 1st and Bob Gates on Monday the 18th of December), are expected by nearly everyone to shoulder, and attempt to find solutions to, much of the world's burdens and problems, ranging from the dire situations in the Middle East (Iraq in particular) and Africa (Dafur in particular). That is what sets these two apart, in my view, and uniquely qualified them as this blog's persons for the week.

On another note, if there was an insect of the week category, the little female Anopheles mosquito will definitely win the recognition. The mosquito, which spreads the parasite that causes malaria and spreads untold misery in Africa and elsewhere, including the enabling of the aids virus, is the subject of a White House summit that started yesterday. And you thought size equates to might.