But this route is going to be costly and painful.

Kenya s pursuit of a new constitution has been long and painful.

So harpooned whales typically die slowly and painfully.

But, for the most part, the sovereign default process is slow motion Kabuki theater.

For something profound is changing in Europe, slowly, painfully, but surely.

The missing limb often feels shorter and may feel as if it is in a distorted and painful position.

When detainees are released, they carry a heavy stigma, and harsh experiences in jail hardly contribute to rehabilitation.

In large part, this reflects unregulated or missing markets that fail to capture the values that nature provides to us every day point emphasized in the G 8 5 project on the Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity, hosted by the UNEP.

The US, Europe, and Japan are all burdened by high levels of public and private debt, and are caught in long, painful, and hazardous deleveraging cycles that render recoveries feeble and vulnerable.

Certainly, a key part of the solution is to allow more banks to fail, ensuring that depositors are paid off in full, but not necessarily debt holders. But this route is going to be costly and painful.

The tales of colleagues, and even superiors, assaulting soldiers whose lives they are supposed to protect stories that reveal the license that the attackers must have felt they had are harrowing enough.

But this will require a greater European commitment, both politically and economically, than we have seen thus far. Ukraine has been misgoverned for decades, and it will have to pass through a valley of reform induced tears before it starts to reap the benefits of association and integration with the EU.

For something profound is changing in Europe, slowly, painfully, but surely. If ethnic diversity is more and more common in national sides, it is even more marked in clubs.

But there is also evidence that Havel is right to argue that the re emergence of these patterns represents a mere hangover from 15 years of sustained and often traumatic reform. Unlike before World War II, when democratization efforts were undermined by the rise of authoritarianism in Germany, the region s countries are now fully integrated into a network of highly stable Western democracies.