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This is somewhat of a cheap shot, but I can't help myself. Harper's magazine has the gem of the week. If you want to leave the office today and laugh all the way home, have a look at this.
Short version: Bush’s favorite painting, from which he draws great religious inspiration, is actually a painting of a horse thief about to be re-captured by a lynch mob. Irony is not dead.
here.
Seems the Armageddon Lobby was in DC again in mid July. The intrepid Max Blumenthal covered the event and the video is posted here. Despite being very explicit about the need for right-wing religious types and American Jews to band together on a pre-emptive strike on Iran, they obfuscate and wobble when asked about how end time scenarios fit into their lobbying scheme. Looks like their press people- at least-- have gone through the Leadership Institute i.e. spin camp for the Righteous. Why, oh Why Joe Lieberman do you show up at these events? Do you realize you're sharing the dais with felons? Advice for Jews and Christians alike...um. RUN!
All with a nine month old in the backseat....
To those of you tuning in here at DA, you're early adapters! Apparently, online newsis going to overtake TV news within 5 years. Sorry I've been so absent. I just drove up and down the East Coast going to two separate conferences, the first at West Point in New York. The Social Science Department's Senior Conference this year was about American civil-military relations....It was a terrific event. To summarize: both the civilians and military at the event--on the dais and in conversation-- were at varying levels of worry and frustration about this relationship from the general public up to the White House.
The second thing I attended was a three day training by the Public Conversations Project a group in Boston that is well known for its innovative work on public discourse. Each of these events are bookends of a civil-military dialogue project I'm working on...more on that later.
Here's a fantastic site full of political brain candy....ever wonder who is working behind the scenes on the presidential campaigns? This site has the most comprehensive information I've yet seen. Go to the candidate's page and link to "organization" for the inside scoop.
It's not just dangerous nuclear, chemical or biological materials that can devastate. What about the guy with a dangerous drug-resistant form of tuberculosis...who just left and re-entered the USA and is only now under quarantine? Buzzflash has a good analysis up about it.
I'm not suggesting anything about this man in particular-- who was just trying to carry on with his wedding and was not stopped by authorities--but I don't even want to see the stats on how unprepared we are to deal with this kind of threat.
The filmmakers who brought us Gunner Palace (American and East German, which should resonate all by itself) have put together something which sounds extraordinary (please note, I haven't seen the film and this is NOT an endorsement of it or its contents):
The Prisoner or: How I Planned to Kill Tony Blair
Baghdad, September 2003: In a middle class house on a quiet street, a family is fast asleep. Without warning, the front door is crashed and American soldiers storm the house looking for weapons and bomb-making material. Cameraman Michael Tucker documents the event as the men in the house are cuffed and forced to kneel in the garden. A search of the house uncovers no incriminating evidence, however Yunis Khatayer Abbas and three of his brothers are taken and detained.
If you haven't yet read Jane Mayer's piece in this week's New Yorker, you should. She describes the politics behind Fox's hit show "24," in which all-American hero Kieffer Sutherland successfully uses torture to stop impending terror attacks in virtually every episode. Surprise: the genius behind the show, Joel Surnow, is a big fan of Dick Cheney.
Mayer describes a confrontation between West Point Commandant Brig. Gen. Patrick Finnegan and some of the show's producers. Finnegan took the producers to task for glamorizing torture and making it hard for him to help cadets understand why America should respect the rule of law.
So now there's good news and bad news, as usual. The good news? The makers of 24 now say they plan to cut back on the torture scenes. The bad news? It's not because they care one jot what the military or the human rights community thinks. It's just that, well, all those torture scenes are "starting to feel a little trite," says executive producer Howard Gordon. "The idea of physical coercion or torture is no longer a novelty or surprise."
I'm not a big Michael Moore fan, but when I read things like this I do start to wonder, "Dude, Where's My Country?"
I never thought I'd say this, but Thank You, Victor Davis Hanson--who weighs in to criticize fellow conservative Dinesh D'Souza's new piece of penmanship "The Enemy at Home," which, you guessed it, is a laundry list of attacks on the Left (a book that uses one-off occasions of liberal criticism that become conservative mythology)
---say---like the myth about how anti-war activists in the 70's persistently spit at veterans returning from the war. Which the New York Times repeated for all our benefit in their coverage of last month's anti-war march in DC....
You either laugh or you cry, and via Steve Clemons, Andy Borowitz proclaims that "like many other TV series entering their seventh seasons, Bush has jumped the shark."
Steve's addition of the Fonzie-waterskiing-in-a-leather-jacket photo is worth a click-thru all by itself. And Borowitz comparing Bush to cousin Oliver on the Brady Bunch... c'mon, if you were watching tv in the 1970s, this is the happiest you will be all day.
Well, sorta. This, anyway, is the claim put forth by Radar Online. Unscientific... but as the White House has often suggested, science is over-rated. Right?
In Regarding the Pain of Others, the last book she published before her death, Susan Sontag quotes Virginia Woolf in Three Guineas: "War is an abomination; a barbarity; war must be stopped." Commenting on Woolf's remark, Sontag asks: "Who believes today that war can be abolished? No one, not even pacifists."
Is that true? I think it is. When I was a child, I genuinely believed that war could be abolished-- that humans could find better ways to resolve disputes-- that the US government could and should work towards the abolition of war. I've never been a pacifist: it has always seemed to me that some things are worth fighting for. But I used to think that a world without war was not an impossible dream.
True, I haven't believed that since I was ten or so-- but at various points in recent history, many adults, including many serious, hard-headed thinkers, have believed in and sought a world in which there is no such thing as war. After World War One, for instance; and again in the immediate wake of World War Two. But today, in this world of proliferating conflicts and proliferating complexities, can any serious people maintain that war can be utterly abolished?
And if the answer is no, have we lost something by losing that hope? Or gained something?
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Edward Luttwak of CSIS has a piece in this month's Harper's called "Counterinsurgency warfare as military malpractice." Luttwak begins with a critical analysis of the Army's new counterinsurgency field manual, FM 3-24 DRAFT, written by David Petraeus, among others, then moves on apply this to Iraq. He concludes that the new counterinsrgency manual's "prescriptions are in the end of little or no use and amount to a kind of malpractice. All its best methods, all its clever tactics, all the treasure and blood that the United States has been willing to expend, cannot overcome the crippling ambivalence of occupiers who refuse to govern, and their principles and inevitable refusal to out-terrorize the insurgents...."
Read it (it's not available online-- you'll have to buy the magazine! Sorry).
Speaking of grim reports that the Administration probably won't listen to, I urge everyone to curl up for a few minutes with the report of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Remember all those horrifying sci-fi movies about the end of the world as we know it? Or maybe you once read The Drowned World, a 1962 novel by J.G. Ballard? If you can get through the scientific bureaucratese, this report will send similar chills down your spine (and you might as well cherish those chills, because chills are going to be few and far between in the warmer global future coming inexorably our way). But the Bush Administration is still resisting mandatory emissions caps, and proposing instead that we combat global warming by putting giant mirrors into outer space.
In addition to the environmental and economic imoact of global warming, we should all be getting nervous about the national security implications of climate change. For one take on that, this 2004 Pentagon-commissioned report is worth a look.
Finally! Someone (in Switzerland!) created a blog for civil military issues. Its got some good article links, too. Switzerland is also the home of D-CAF (I know what you’re thinking, but it is not something to drink with marzipan) it is the Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces.
Okay, I digressed. Really what I wanted to talk about was last week’s shoot down of an old weather satellite by China. It’s a big problem—but not so much for the alarming “they’re comin; for us!” reasons that were in the news. No, its actually not that exciting: It is one of those pernicious global public sector problems that will get us in the end if we don't figure out a way to regulate it cooperatively. Remember that homeless garbage barge from Long Island? The one that floated around for months and thousands of miles in 1987…trying to get rid of its refuse that nobody wanted? The satellite explosion is a bit like that.
According to this article , the satellite was a nasty oozing old thing. And now that is has been blown up, our planet has a toxic-space necklace of orbiting garbage made up of a barge worth of lethal shards. This nasty junk will now circle Earth—each piece a zillion times heavier in space than it would be in your Hazmat glove--and could possible wreak all sorts of havoc. Suppose it hit a super expensive new satellite, one that provides early warning, research data or even couch potato fare? China’s space ambitions are nothing compared to a bunch of angry Direct TV addicts who don’t get to watch CSI.
When the Little Prince visits a planet inhabited by a geographer, he asks him “What place would you advise me to visit now?” The geographer says “The planet Earth. It has a good reputation” Well, not anymore, apparently.
Two people I knew and admired died this week: Father Bob Drinan, the first Roman Catholic priest to be elected to Congress and a dedicated human rights activist, and Molly Ivins, syndicated columnist and dedicated Texan progressive. Both were outspoken, brave, and funny, their toughness exceeded only by their kindness and their deep commitment to justice. We need more people like them.
Sometimes my progressive intellectual friends wonder why "the heartland" doesn't get it about the wonders of globalization. Sometimes you even hear them doubt the intellects of folks who live out here, or down there, or wherever it is.
Well, this January has been one hell of a month for globalization here in linked-in, tuned-in, high-tech and higher-ed Southeastern Michigan. My neighbors, the ones without college degrees and the ones with PhDs, understand perfectly well that events far away have direct and unpredictable impact on our quiet lives here. And aside from some of the great immigrants now playing baseball in Detroit, it's not really doing much for us. Globalization giveth, and this month it's been taking away with a vengeance.
The quick summary: "globalization" has pushed the ill-managed Big Three to the wall, along with many smaller firms that supply them with parts and services. Now it's taking PhD. research and white-collar banking jobs, too. And somehow, the remedies from Washington involve taxing our health insurance.
Jamal Simmons of DC and Detroit calls Michigan a "canary in the coalmine" for the country, and I think he is right. It's no good being complacent about how all Michigan's woes were brought on by SUVs and auto company mismanagement, etc. If we can't figure out how to even out some of globalization's ups and downs, and offer citizens a hopeful outlook on the job market here, where Henry Ford's assembly line practically invented the industrial middle class, we may need to kiss the post-industrial middle class good-bye. And that means a lot more trouble for folks who want to see the US engaged in trade and economic openness, whether for profit motives or to help open our markets to countries and producers who are much worse off, I know well, than what we face here in the land of the wolverine.
Gory details below.
My friend and fellow ex-White House speechwriter Vinca LaFleur has written a thoughtful and elegant piece about the damp squib that was this year's State of the Union:
As someone who has labored to meet tough deadlines and satisfy tough audiences myself, I sympathize with the task the White House speechwriters faced with this year's State of the Union. Drafting this annual address to Congress is rarely an enjoyable exercise; my former Clinton administration colleague Michael Waldman once described it as boiling down gallons of advice into a few tablespoons of intense sauce, while former Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson reportedly dubbed the process the seven-day death march.
Those of you who spent too much time enjoying the New York Times' State of the Union word frequency calculator may understand the compulsion that led to this:
The whole Obama madrasa story turns out to be nothing more than an empty right-wing smear-attack. But even if it was true - so what if Obama went to a madrasa? Maybe that's actually a plus. Madrasa reform is (or should be) on the US foreign policy agenda. Maybe someone who actually knows what a madrasa is - or, even better, has attended one - might be able to suggest some useful policy prescriptions for this very serious problem.
Problem #2: Apparently, some people are worried that Obama's father was Muslim. Why is this a bad thing? Wouldn't you think that a president who actually knew something about Muslims (or had one as a father) would do a better job convincing the world's 1.4 billion Muslims that we're not out to get them? George W. Bush probably hadn't met one Muslim before he ran for governor and look where that's got us. One of the prerequisites for becoming "leader of free world" should be knowing the difference between Sunni, Shia, and Kurd. I hate to state the obvious (or is it?) but knowing about other religions and cultures is not a bad thing. Moreover, it's especially not a bad thing when we're trying to fight Islamic radicalism, understand Muslim grievances, and win the hearts and minds of what happens to be 1/5 of the world's population.
If you claim you care about democracy, why not show you really mean it? How, you ask? Well, by taking your clothes off of course! It appears that Egypt's "democratization process" may have just reached its turning point/incipient moment, also known in Condoleezza Rice-speak as "Wei-Ji":
In a debate on the amendments, details of which have not been released, member of parliament Mohamed Hussein objected to the article which gives the president the right to dissolve parliament.
“Enough of that, enough. Should I take my clothes off?” he added, using a sarcastic popular expression used in response to someone’s excessive expectations. When Hussein unbuttoned the waistcoat of his suit, speaker Fathi Sorour threatened to have him thrown out of the chamber.
Have you ever agreed with Michael Ledeen before? I bet you haven't. That's why I was just as surprised as anyone that I actually agreed with one of his Corner posts:
I see that Chris Hedges, the long-time NY Times journalist, has come out with a book entitled American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America, in which he in essence says that the likes of Falwell and Robertson are Christian fascists...I wonder if all those people who hammered Bush and Santorum for talking about Islamic fascism will similarly excoriate Hedges for unfairly branding an entire religion (that would be Christianity in this case) with a scarlet "f".
I was someone who did "hammer" Bush and Santorum for their incredibly inane usage of the term "Islamic fascist," and so yes, I think Hedges is similarly wrong to use the term "Christian fascists." In fact, I think the we should declare a moratorium on using the word "fascist," which has become just another way of saying "I don't like you." In a perhaps amusing aside on the topic of Chris Hedges, I was in Granada two weeks ago (Granada, if you recall, was once the heart of Muslim Spain. Apparently, Bin Laden wants it back). I visited the city's only operating mosque and was sifting through their book collection right by the entrance. There were a bunch of books and pamphlets about the usual topics - the Prophet Muhammad, Zakat, heaven, God, how to become a better Muslim, etc. And then there was Chris Hedges' War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning 
(click on photo). It was one of the most bizarre things I've seen, heard, or read, since, well, Michael Ledeen declared Rumseld "the best Defense Secretary the U.S. has ever
had."
Just checking in....I have been travelling for weeks--it seems--two weeks in New Orleans, then New Mexico and now upstate New York. I am at West Point--the US Military Academy--until Friday and will have lots to write about when I'm back in DC.
Between now and 08, I'll be working with others on a project that aims to help restore what I call the civil military "safety net". After working on Capitol Hill after 9/11 and seeing the failure of Congress to put the brakes on the President in matters of war and peace--our aim is to educate ourselves and the American public so that can"t happen again.
I travel with a five month old---who is deprogramming as i type---and i'm borrowing the concierge's computer here at the Thayer hotel on campus...so until later....
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In the Palestinian territories, civil wars are fought with guns. In Iraq, civil wars are fought with bombs. In Lebanon, civil wars are fought with...graphic design?
Soon after Hizballah began its recent altercation with the governing March 14 coalition in Lebanon, bright red billboards appeared across the country with the words "I Love Life" (in English, Arabic, and French). On streets. At the airport. In malls. At protests. On bumpers. The slick red signs were everywhere. The "I Love Life" campaign, which is sponsored by March 14 supporters, is attempting to capture the frustration of average Lebanese people that are sick of their country being racked by war -- both externally, as in the war with Israel, and internally, as in the sectarian fighting that has lasted for decades. They just want to live normal lives -- such as not have their favorite shopping arcade in downtown Beirut shut down by endless Hizballah sit-ins. And perhaps more pointedly, the implication of the campaign is that opponents to March 14 (cough, cough, Hizballah) do not love life (which, to be fair, may be true for groups that glorify martyrdom and drag innocent civilians into unnecessary wars with Israel).
But remember, this is war, so the opposition can't just let March 14 rub their love of life in Hizballah's face. So this week has brought the appearance of a counter ad campaign, parodying the "I Love Life" billboards by adding the words "In Multicolor," "In Dignity," or "For Everyone" scribbled on the bottom. The implication is that the ruling March 14 coalition, while having led the campaign to kick Syria out in 2005 and restore Lebanese independence, is also a sectarian movement that excludes the Shi'a. I have to say that it's a pretty creative way to counter the simplistic message of the "I Love Life" campaign with a message that really makes you think. Yes, Hizballah has created a state-within-a-state in southern Lebanon. Yes, it is the only militia in Lebanon that remains armed. Yes, it is a proxy for Iranian and Syrian interests in Lebanon. But it also has some pretty legitimate complaints. Beneath all the bombastic labels of "terrorists" and "Islamo-fascists," it's important to remember that Hizballah represents a disenfranchised Shi'a majority in Lebanon that has been historically dominated by a Christian presidency and then a Sunni premiership. The only durable solution to the current political deadlock in Lebanon will have to address this underlying power imbalance between Lebanon's sects.
So kudos to "the opposition" for such a creative comeback and kudos to both sides for reminding us that not every civil war in the Middle East has to be fought with guns and bombs.
(Photos after the jump)
I´d like to belatedly welcome Zvika Krieger to Democracy Arsenal. As you may have already gathered, he's guest blogging with us from his fascinating perch in Sri Lanka and Beirut. By way of introduction, Zvika is a writer based in the Middle East who has written for Newsweek, The New Republic, and other publications and has appeared on CNN, Fox News, and NBC News. He has received research fellowships to study the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan, the Kifaya reform movement in Egypt, public health in Bombay slums, religious identity in Kashmir, historical memory in Palestinian refugee camps, and the role of religion in Lebanese politics. In other words, this guy has a thing for hot spots. Make sure to check out some of his recent articles, here and here.
Whenever a new baby joins us on this floating sphere, we hope the world he or she comes to know is a peaceful one. Many here take a professional interest in world peace, so maybe we can give the vision a little more definite shape.
Things aren't looking so great these days, but we're all familiar with international problems and situations that somehow worked out better instead of worse. So without quibbling over odds, causal factors, or dissimilarities, these are some precedents for which we hope, for the sake of Suzanne and David's new little girl, history repeats itself. Of course history doesn't repeat itself, but it's good to remember that its downward spirals sometimes turn around. So for little Liza Juliet, we hope some of today's problems come out like some of yesterday's...
First, I want to thank Jordan Tama for doing such a crackerjack job guest-blogging while I was gone.
I just returned from a 3-week trip to India and have some thoughts on this fascinating nation that, while they're not on the Iraq surge or Nancy Pelosi, might interest some of you. And I offer these thoughts healthily aware that you flirt with cliche anytime you try and offer insights about a country that thousands of travel-writers, editorialists, and general India-philes.
I found two things about the country most interesting, especially when thinking about India from the economic-powerhouse, largest-secular-democracy-in-the-world perspective.
I wanted to belatedly wish everyone a happy new year. See if you can muster any optimism for the world that we have lost and the world that the Bush administration seems intent on losing for yet another year. In the immortal words of Coldplay, we live in a beautiful world, yea we do, yea we do.
I know this is a cliche, but it really is music that keeps us alive, that allows us to relate to a world which sometimes makes little, if any sense. The private is not necessarily separate from the political, as the misunderstandings, malice, loss, and longing which define the shattered hopes of a world losing its way, are the same kind of loss and longing that animate our own imperfect relationships with those whom we love - friends, family, wives, husbands, lovers. There is an inevitable gap between what is, what could be, and what shall never be. Jumping off that admittedly vague pseudo-philosophical point (perhaps inspired by my recent viewing of Babel), I now turn to nominate the 9 best songs of 2006, the songs which captured the zeitgeist of not only my own life, but of a world that seemed to me to crumble before my very eyes, defying the hopes and possibilities which 2005, however gingerly, seemed to offer:
1. Muse, "Starlight"
2. Editors, "Bullets"
3. Keane, "Atlantic"
4. The Kooks, "Seaside"
5. Thom Yorke, "Harrowdown Hill"
6. Keane, "A Bad Dream"
7. Band of Horses, "The Funeral"
8. The Vines, "Spaceship"
9. Kasabian, "Empire"
And then for # 10, I guess I could include Radiohead's "Optimistic," which deserves to be on a top 10 list no matter what year (it was originally released in 2000).
As Congress wrapped up its work this month, it passed important measures to normalize trade ties with Vietnam and renew low tariffs for Andean and African countries. Additional trade pacts with Peru, Colombia, and Panama will be voted on by the Democratic-led Congress next year. These votes are likely to be contentious. Many new members of Congress argue that trade agreements spur the loss of American jobs, and some new members call for renegotiating existing pacts, such as NAFTA.
The public debate on trade usually centers on its economic costs and benefits. I happen to believe the benefits outweigh the costs, but that the costs are real and should be mitigated by expanded assistance programs for Americans who lose their jobs when companies move overseas.
Here I want to focus on a different aspect of trade policy: its impact on other U.S. foreign policy interests. While reasonable people can disagree about the relative weight of the economic gains and losses induced by trade, I think the political and security benefits of reducing trade barriers are undeniable (though often underestimated). If we take them into account, the case for opening markets becomes much stronger. Consider the following:
1) Trade can provide an economic engine for foreign policy leadership. Trade accelerates U.S. economic growth, producing positive foreign policy spillover effects. Growth increases our tax base, making it easier to fund foreign affairs and defense programs. It also helps us maintain our technological edge, which is central to our military strength. A stagnant or shrinking economy would likely lead to a smaller U.S. presence abroad and diminished American influence internationally.
2) Trade can foster political and security cooperation. We need help from other countries in the Iraq war, in the broader struggle against violent jihadism, and on other security priorities. But nations that don't have direct interests at stake in those issues will only help us if we help them on issues they consider important, like greater access to our huge market. If we reduce our import barriers, they'll be more likely to back us on security matters.
Why should we care whether poor countries support our policies on Iraq, Iran, or counterterrorism? Because they have votes in international bodies like the UN and their backing can make our policies more legitimate internationally.
Adding to Heather's excellent suggestions, another way to do good during the holidays is to make a green investment that offsets your annual energy use. Carbonfund.org provides a good overview of the benefits of going "carbon neutral," and a New York Times article explains some of the ways to do it. One option is to invest in planting trees through The Conservation Fund. Another way is to invest in renewable energy projects, as TerraPass does. You'll be surprised at how inexpensively you can compensate for your greenhouse gas pollution.
Since it can take many years for investments in trees or clean energy projects to bear fruit, reducing energy use is still essential to prevent climate change in the near future. So we should all follow Heather's lead and buy a hybrid next time we're in the market for a car.
Just for a second, forget the President's end-of-the-year news conference and all the other awfulness, and let me suggest a few foreign policy-related things do can do to bring a holiday smile to your face, after you've followed Shadi's suggestion for watching The Devil Wears Prada and pondering the seductions of power:
1. Go drive a (US-built) hybrid car. We acquired a hybrid Saturn VUE last week, and I have to confess that I'm getting a lot more psychic benefit from driving it than I ever expected (which almost makes up for my preference for a zippy little standard transmission sedan). "Up yours, Ahmedinajad," I mutter whenever the little green "ECO" light comes on. "Take that, Ted Stevens. Who needs your drilling in ANWAR?" And I'm also sending a message to my Big Three auto-exec neighbors here in southeast Michigan. Build some more of these things, darn it -- how about a sedan, or even a station wagon? Give my other neighbors the autoworkers some work, compete with the Japanese hybrids AND help us climb out of the oil mess.
2. Give some money to a cause that works. If you need more encouragement, read Peter Singer's article about how little each of the top 10 percent of US income-earners would need to give to meet the Millennium Development Goals, for example. If you have kids, or remember the Del Fuegos fondly, or want to see Walter Cronkite hug a sheep, check out the Heifer Project's holiday site. Feel good about your fellow human beings, and lessen the pain of what your tax dollars are being wasted on.
My promised update:
A kid named Akash Mehta is raising money to help open a girls' school in Herat, Afghanistan. You can read about him and help him out here. Akash has already gotten his first challenge grant, from the Unemployed Philosphers Guild, the entrepreneurs who brought you Bush National Security Team puppets, "Freudian Slip" message pads and other novelties you may not be able to do without. Why is Akash doing this?
The first time I thought of this was when I was sitting in the kitchen trying to help my mom wash dishes. But I found that I wasn't good at dishwashing. So I sat down and asked my mom what use kids were to the world. She told me that we were learning how to be good, and we can help the world when we grow up. Plus, when we are kids we make joy for grownups. But I said I want to do something now that makes the world a better place, and I am too young to do that.
Even if I am only 8 years old, I am thinking about how lucky I am to be rich compared to these kids. You might think that these are disturbing thoughts for a young child and I sort of agree, but the only way that disturbing thoughts can go away from children's minds is if you help. Once a few people do this, children's disturbing thoughts can be replaced by thoughts of how the world is slowly becoming a better place and how one day is better than the last.
Shoot, send this kid some money.
Also, one thing NOT to do is to give your old clothes to one of those places (including the oh-so convenient drop boxes) that promise to send them to Africa. Why? Most end up re-sold by entrepreneurs for profit, and drive the local fabric and garment industries out of business, because who can compete when the raw material is free? ABC News has a report on this, but don't let it drive you to frustrated despair. Sell or give your old clothes to a thrift shop or find someplace that recycles them, then take the tax break and send that to a group working to empower folks in poor countries.
Spencer Ackerman's blog redesign will no doubt put a smile upon your faces.
For a brief 90-minute stint on Saturday, I had this huge smile on my face. Well, yes, I was watching The Devil Wears Prada. Those who know me know I read too much into things and that I tend to “project.” Well, as it turns out, I connected with the movie in a very personal, political way.
Okay, the Truman stuff is getting boring. This site is already way too wonky. It needs to stop. I'm copying here a letter I received from an individual who, I believe, represents a good way to restore balance. I'm hoping that sharing it here can serve as a truce.
BTW, I'm just going to have a tiny rant: We really have no "Left" in the USA. Although we should. I have worked with an actual revolutionary Left. They were not scary nor interested in making pipe bombs in the basement. They were decent people being shafted by their government. This was East Germany. I've worked with the left of the Left here in the USA also, in the House of Representatives. Never have I heard one of them say something anti-military, disloyal, or even "weak" on defending the USA. They may let their rhetoric get blurred by idealism occasionally--but that's the worst of it. And you know what? THEY HAVE BEEN RIGHT. On the war, on our budget priorities, on climate change, on economic inequality, on long-term thinking, on individual freedom and citizen responsibility, on taking care of veterans, on taking care of our roads, bridges, ports (otherwise known as critical infrastructure). I could go on and on....
Here's the letter...
Here are the new Democratic Members of the Armed Services Committee in the House of
Representatives.
Congresswoman-elect Nancy Boyda of Kansas Congressman-elect Joe Courtney of Connecticut Congressman-elect Brad Ellsworth of Indiana Congresswoman-elect Gabby Giffords of Arizona Congresswoman-elect Kirsten Gillibrand of New York Congressman-elect Hank Johnson of Georgia Congressman-elect Patrick Murphy of Pennsylvania Congressman-elect Joe Sestak of Pennsylvania
I am working with a couple of techie friends to set up a wiki for me and readers to collaboratively work on individual national security profiles of new Members of Congress, particularly the progressives. Having detailed background information on Members' interests may well help create a more effective political constituency for those of us seeking changed priorities and a better strategic concept (It can't be too hard to beat pre-emptive war, after all).
Speaking of change, I received a nice list of websites from the Army War College this week. They've started an email notice list to create a better network for those who care about about Stability, Security, Transformation, Reconstruction and Peace Operations (hold your breath for the acronym) SSTR&PO. Write me off site if you'd like more info on how to get on this list.
A few days ago, Suzanne postulated a number of possible outcomes for Iraq. I’ve been thinking about the other events – outside Iraq and its immediate neighbors – that could and probably will come along to challenge our hamstrung foreign policy capacity in the next two years. I think the chances of one or more of these happening are excellent – and readers will no doubt have their own candidates. As my mother likes to say, “life is what happens while you’re making other plans.” Progressives need to think about how we'd deal -- and how we'd want to help the country deal -- with any and all of the following:
1. Castro dies. Wheeeee. Miami goes nuts. Presidential candidates from both parties face ugly dilemmas with respect to Florida and New Jersey votes. One wing of the Administration wants to “offer assistance” with lessons learned from Iraq. It isn’t pretty.
2. Lebanon blows up. More than a year ago, someone wrote that Lebanon was a dozen assassinations away from civil war. Umm, are we there yet?
3. Nigeria blows up. If you like something more esoteric, Chavez takes Venezuela’s oil off the market – or, a really scary one, the Saudi government goes under. We’re talking a development that is bad in its own right, bad for stability in the region concerned, challenging for perceptions of the US and traumatic to the oil market. Oil heads toward that magic $100 a barrel, and world markets and polities alike freak out.
A couple weeks ago, I heard a prominent journalist say that Lyndon Johnson was the greatest president the US has ever had (this journalist, for his own sake, will remain unnamed). When I heard this, it struck me as a rather comical thing to say. I tried hard not to interrupt the talk by chuckling uncontrollably. And then I realized he was totally serious. In this spirit, I thought that after their drubbing last week, conservatives would resort to similarly absurd superlatives. And they certainly have. But, as far as I can tell, nothing can still top what Michael Novak said a week before the midterms:
I call Donald Rumsfeld the best Defense Secretary the U.S. has ever had. Close behind him, in my book, is Secretary Richard Cheney, and we have been lucky to have a number of other very good Secretaries of Defense during the past century.
I hereby declare this the reigning champion. But I propose a challenge: can anyone find a more absurd superlative then this?
At the risk of forever marking myself as a dour, humorless scold (see my critique of Talladega Nights, to which one reader, "Mikedbot," crisply responded, "I don't think you fully understood the movie, but then I don't think I fully understood your post.") I want to say here that I thought Borat was a problematic movie -- and even risky.
I was heartened to read a story yesterday on CNN where Sacha Baron Cohen found himself on the defensive about the film's obsessive anti-Semitism. His argument:
He said he always had faith in the audience to realize this was a fictitious country and the mere purpose of it was to allow people to expose their own prejudices.
"I think part of the movie shows the absurdity of holding any form of racial prejudice, whether it's hatred of African-Americans or of Jews," said Baron Cohen, a devout Jew who keeps Kosher and observes the Sabbath when he can.
There is a fine line between entertainment and satire; there is another fine line between satire and education. I don't believe the movie even crosses to satire, much less education. And this is because of its strangely obsessive, almost totally raw, depiction of anti-Semitism.
1. The Guardian turns pro-American? Simon Jenkins tell us that "Americans Should be Proud."
2. Natonal Review self-parody alert....ummm...where to begin? Why is Kathryn Jean Lopez so obsessed with Rick Santorum?
3. David Tell of The Weekly Standard gets award for best election prediction in a conservative mag.
4. Most impressive piece of day after spin. From Hugh Hewitt:
And it is a wonderful day for new media, especially talk radio. For two years we have had to defend the Congressional gang that couldn't shoot straight. Now we get to play offense.
5. Democratic troops liberate planet Rush.
6. Ennis wins Montana for Tester?
7. Gracious in defeat? Tally one for Rep. Mike Pence. Self-criticism is cool again in conservative circles. In a statement released earlier today, Pence says:
Election day 2006 will be remembered as a turning point in American political history. Twenty-five years after the Reagan Administration came to Washington with a conservative agenda of limited government, the American people chose a different course.
It is the duty of the losing party in a free election to humbly accept defeat and to acknowledge that the people are sovereign in the People's House.
As we examine the results of this election, it is imperative that we listen to the American people and learn the right lessons.
Some will argue that we lost our majority because of scandals at home and challenges abroad. I say, we did not just lose our majority, we lost our way.
Among many, here's one key thing this election is about: the American people's gradual decision, after five years of reflecting on the Bush Administration's particular foreign policy of fear and fear alone, that fear alone won't work as a response to 9/11.
For its power to sustain, a unilateral power must attract admiration as well as awe. Neocons have never understood this. People Michael Ledeen have wrongly cited Machiavelli's supposed adage "it is better to be feared than loved" for stuff like the following:
"We can lead by the force of high moral example, [but] fear is much more reliable, and lasts longer. Once we show that we are capable of dealing out terrible punishment to our enemies, our power will be far greater."
Machiavelli actually said something much different. Machiavelli never it's better to be feared than to be loved. He says instead that it's safer to be feared, "if one of them has to be wanting."
It seemed like no one inside the Administration really ever recognized this, which is why it's seemed like such a harsh, almost willfully unreflective pocket of groupthink.
But we can read today about a fascinating shaft of light today from Richard Armitage, the leading member of Colin Powell's what-might-have-been team. In a speech in Australia, he said:
I'd like to welcome Marc Grinberg of the Truman Project and blogger Ali Eteraz to Democracy Arsenal, where they'll be guest blogging for the next two weeks or so. If you haven't already, make sure to check out the important work the Truman Project is doing on national security. Also, schedule a visit to Eteraz's always provocative "Muslim reformist" blog Unwilling Self-Negation, recently nominated for an International Best of Blogs Award.
To our readers, don't cut these guys any slack.
Still on the road with baby in tow...On Sunday, I watched the Chinese boat swamp at the famed Head of the Charles regatta in Boston. Right beneath the Elliot Bridge it went down with the entire crew...valiantly trying to keep it going forward. Maybe our fears of a rising Chinese navy are premature? The launch boat was really slow to the rescue, and Notre Dame lost a chunk of time, but everyone got out okay.
Two noteable items from this past week:
The world public opinion poll that found seven in ten Americans favor Congressional candidates who will pursue major changes in US foreign policy, want less emphasis on use of military force to solve problems and want to work more cooperatively with the United Nations. Most favor direct talks with North Korea and Iran to boot!
And this article by Kevin Tillman--the brother of Pat Tillman (pro football player turned Army Ranger) who was killed in Afghanistan in 2004. It is a concise and raw summary of where we've been these past five years.
It appears that Chris Shays is pulling a Lieberman and declaring his independence from all recognized forms of reasoned debate, sanity, and rationality. I didn't think that the beleaguered congressman from Connecticut could do any worse than last week's apology for torture. It appears that I have been proven wrong. I suppose that we may yet be closer to a diagnosis: Chris Shays is slightly deranged. I suspect it might be worse.
Let me also say that I feel bad picking on Shays two weeks in a row, but there comes a point where politicians become so separated from reality, that you really begin to wonder what went wrong and how it went wrong.
I'm travelling this week, so this will be short and eclectic. We're taking our first trip with our nine week old baby to see his New England cousins. (This explains also why I've been so flakey posting lately, my apologies) I was so entranced by 3 a.m. Senate hearings on CSPAN that I couldn't do much else.
First, kudos to Keith Olbermann. He blisters the administration and their "talk to the hand" treatment of the constitution, the founding fathers, and millions of Americans with the signing of the Military Commissions Act. I've been so upset by this bill that I've started a netflix anarchy list. So far I've re-watched Fight Club, Brazil and V for Vendetta. Suggestions welcome.
I had a good discussion with a sailor last weekend and he told me about a new organization for members of the active duty military who want to protest the Iraq war. Military professionals have rigid restrictions on their ability to talk publicly about policy, and don't have the same constitutional right to express themselves as civilians do. Yet there are specific ways to speak out. Rights under the U.S. Constitution, laws passed by Congress, and the military's own regulations provide direction for those who want to voice an opinion about what's going on in Iraq. Here is the website of this movement. Here's a link to "Sir! No Sir!" -- a film that documents similar actions during VietNam.
Finally, a network for security progressives-- the National Security Network -- is up and running. It seeks to bridge the divide between the foreign policy experts and politicians in Washington aka "wonks" and local community leaders and the general public.
An affiliated organization provides a communications hub where you can sign up and discuss ideas.
And in recognition of how wacky politics have become, I'm going to end with an entire article on the U.S.-North Korea policy impasse by Pat Buchanan. I can't believe I'm saying this. But it's is pretty sound advice.
Continue reading "Olbermann and Buchanan: Left, Right and Sound Advice" »
If you don't already, put Media Matters on your bookmark list and RSS feed. It was started with the help of former right-wing hit-man David Brock and apparently has some Democracy Alliance money. It's a fascinating and energetic new effort at doing to the right what the right has done to the left for a couple of decades now -- put them on the defensive for media bias.
A couple of highlights from today's posts:
(1) They note that both ABC and CNN reported on President Bush saying during his press conference yesterday that Bill Clinton's North Korea policy "didn't work" -- but that the reporters failed to report the fact that plutonium production stopped during the Clinton presidency. Here's their summary:
The AP's Terence Hunt and NBC News' David Gregory both reported President Bush's "veiled swipe" at the Clinton administration's North Korea policy, in which Bush said, "I appreciate the efforts of previous administrations. It just didn't work." But neither noted that, following the Clinton administration's signing of the 1994 Agreed Framework with North Korea, that country did not produce any plutonium until 2002, when the Bush administration abandoned the agreement.
(2) They observe that network news faithfully carried President Bush's new talking points that he was "open" to change in Iraq -- but failed to note that he has maintained his inflexibility on troop withdrawal, perhaps the most important actual policy to most Americans today. Here's their summary:
ABC, NBC, and CBS reported that, during a recent press conference, President Bush stated that he is "open" to changing the administration's Iraq war policy, but did not note that, during that same press conference, Bush reiterated his claim that the United States will not "leave before the job is done."
This is a powerfully helpful addition to the media landscape. We should all pay attention to what they have to say -- particularly in the closing weeks of the current campaign.
I’ve decided to finally get through all of
The passion of the Founding Fathers for the divison of power, for setting ambition against ambition, for creating a constitution with a complicated system of balances exceeding that of any other is, of course, well known. Everything is bought at a price, however, and as many Englishmen have pointed out, one apparent price of the divison of power is governmental inefficiency. "The English consitution, in a word," [Walter] Bagehot argued, "is framed on the principle of choosing a single sovereign authority, and making it good: the American, upon the principle of having many sovereign authorities, and hoping that their multitude may atone for their inferiority." (p. 111)
God bless America.
I've been sitting here for an un-blog-like amount of time (well over 20 minutes) trying to figure out what to write on foreign affairs and having no luck -- not because there isn't a lot going on, whether in Iraq or with the revelations that Dr. Strangelove is again running American foreign policy. But, rather, my writer's block is coming from the strange, dizzying, Foley feeling a lot of political watchers are experiencing right now. The oxygen has literally been sucked out of the blogosphere. Man, this story has legs.
As any PS 101 student knows, it's extremely hard to unseat incumbents. The only thing that will do it, en masse, is a scandal that emotionally crystallizes for voters, in a very generic and immediate way, a sense of outrage that can be applied to any old incumbent, with electoral effects.
I've been trying to do some research on the most analogous event in recent history, which was the check-bouncing scandal that engulfed Congress from 1990 to 1992.
Can we stop comparing Islamic extremism/radical Islamism/or whatever else we might wish to call it to Western ideologies. I understand the temptation to make the unfamiliar seem familiar but, in the wrong hands, such comparisons obscure much more than they clarify. In a recent interview, Niall Ferguson, scoffs at “Islamism is the new fascism,” but then tells us that Islamism is the new Marxism. Fine, I can understand where he’s going with this, but what, ultimately, does it really mean to say that radical Islamism = Lenin plus the Koran? It’s sort of like saying spaghetti is like pizza. Yes, they both have sauce and I personally like to sprinkle as much parmesan cheese as possible on both. But then what? Sometimes, comparisons, even if they make some degree of sense, are quite pointless. As Daniel Drezner suggests, why can’t we just understand political Islam and its various derivatives for what they actually are and not for what we would like to think they resemble?
Is it just me or is the Andrew Sullivan the most intellectually honest blogger/writer out there today? In a recent post, he flirts with the possibility of switching sides:
Well, we've had Reagan Democrats. And we've had Goldwater Republicans. Why not a new version: Goldwater Democrats? By Goldwater Democrats, I mean old-style libertarian conservatives who actually believe in fiscal responsibility, small government, prudent foreign policy and live-and-let-live social policy. After being told we are completely unwelcome among Republicans, should we shift to the Dems?
I have never thought of myself as a Democrat or left-liberal in any way. And there are plenty of people among Democrats I do not agree with at all. But it's getting to the point that the illiberal, authoritarian big government Christianism of the GOP makes me completely supportive of backing the Democrats this time around. My one reservation is, of course, spending. But at this point, could they be worse than the GOP? No Congress has been worse on spending than the current crew since FDR! The war? Again, at this point, we desperately need some check on an administration utterly without prudence or a capacity for self-correction.
If Andrew Sullivan and others like him would like to join the Democratic Party, then I say welcome. Not only that, I think the Democrats will be stronger for it. Apparently, Markos Moulitsas - another former Republican - is doing some outreach, taking names, and looking for converts in an article for Cato Unbound, titled "The Case for the Libertarian Democrat." So, Sullivan continues, taking his post to an interesting and perhaps inevitable conclusion:
And so I find myself in a very uneasy alliance with Markos Moulitsas, who writes the lead essay in the libertarian magazine Cato Unbound. Strange bedfellows. But these are strange times.