Survival of the fittest language

POST:
The Ugly American Programmer, By Jeff Atwood, Coding Horror, March 29, 2009

I, for one, believe fervently in the death of minor languages and in a Darwinian struggle for those that remain.

In language, I don't want diversity; I want effective communication.

I will speak whatever the winner speaks, but I suspect English wins. Why? You need only a small vocabulary to proceed. KISS wins, as usual.

And for the Orwellian toss-backs, I need only point out how easily English absorbs foreign influences.

So no, we won't all be reduced to doubleplusgoods.

(Thanks: Neotraditional Librarian)

Going on Larry Kudlow's WABC radio show this Sat

It runs 10-1pm. I'll be in there somewhere.

Sean will link.

Obama: pre-approved for terrorist strikes by Cheney

NATIONAL: "Cheney Says Obama Has Increased Risks," by A. G. Sulzberger, New York Times, 16 March 2009.

This will be the cry from the Right throughout the Obama administration: Bush kept us safe and Obama fails completely the minute something--really, anything--happens.

Of course, this is a silly view.

It's always a matter of balancing. If you want a zero-deductible, be prepared to pay plenty more day-in and day-out.

Bush-Cheney was willing to pay that outrageous sum in a wide variety of ways. Obama is not. He sees it as too costly and too deterministically self-destructive to America's long-term power and influence, and I agree. Having a terror-centric grand strategy is supremely inappropriate for this time in American and world history.

Do we submit ourselves to more tactical dangers? Sure. That's the philosophy of the new COIN (counterinsurgency). But the more you myopically focus on reducing tactical exposure, the more you shut yourself off from downstream strategic gains.

My goal is to win, not merely to avoid taking any direct hits.

Now, that's Rich!

SUNDAY OPINION: "Has a 'Katrina Moment' Arrived? Obama still lags behind America's populist rage," by Frank Rich, New York Times, 22 March 2009.

Sean and I knew we would have a transition on the readership to go along with Obama's transition. A lot of readers/commentators only knew me through a GOP White House, and we knew a good chunk wouldn't be able to stay around for a Dem one--it just wouldn't work.

So we made a conscious decision to process them as they signaled their discomfort. In the end, the numbers were far smaller than we expected (there is always some come-and-go on the site and especially with a new book), and we were sad to see some go, but the needs of the site rule.

Unfortunately, we can't do the same time with the opinion pages of the NYT, WSJ, WAPO, etc. Some columns were okay when it was Bush, but then they just seem out of touch with Obama, like the line-ups desperately need to change.

Frank Rich, to me, is a prime example of this. Interesting enough at first with Bush, but now you just realize he's like that with everyone all the time, and it gets boring ("Really, we've already reached the 'Katrina' moment X weeks in?").

I don't mind criticism of Obama. I just think the major papers should actively rejigger with a changed political landscape, because the lag is noticeable and bad.

Point is, the conversation always changes, and you want the right mix, whether it's your paper or the blog. Some churn is always healthy and needed, as is some consistency, but some people really lose their utility and you have to judge that without emotion and move them along.

Blessed republic

ARTICLE: Obama Portrays Another Side of U.S., By Michael D. Shear and Kevin Sullivan, Washington Post, April 8, 2009; Page A01

Hard to imagine Bush getting a fawning audience in Turkey--ever. People need to realize how distrusted we are in Turkey and what a difference this political change represents.

God bless republics with solid leadership rotations.

Budget breakdown

ARTICLE: Budget Recommendations Provide 'Home' for Warfighters, Gates Says, By Jim Garamone, American Forces Press Service, April 7, 2009

The percentage breakdown envisioned by Gates in DoD resource: 50% for the Leviathan, 10% for the SysAdmin, and 40% dual-use.

Sounds about right to me.

So our Leviathan still gets more than 5X what the PLA gets.

China opens a little more

POST: China: Government Officials' Property Declarations Published, by Larisa Smirnova, Crisis Talk (World Bank), March 30, 2009

Good sign of how this financial crisis prompts China to move forward on transparency.

(Thanks: LChang)

China-Argentina bilat

ARTICLE:
China and Argentina in $10bn deal, BBC, 31 March 2009

Interesting deal. Bit crude, but gets the job done and sends a signal at the same time. Also very bilateral in a way that China likes.

(Thanks: jarrod myrick)

Processing pirates

ARTICLE: Latest Ship Seizures Broaden Counter-Piracy Challenge, By Donna Miles, American Forces Press Service, 3/27/2009

What I like is the web page that 151 already has up. Building up its SysAdmin street cred and associated rule sets. No reason why we shouldn't see an A-to-Z rule set develop on "processing" pirates.

(Thanks: Andrew Stewart)

Sea change

NEWS RELEASE: Flag Officer Assignments, U.S. Department of Defense, Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public Affairs), March 27, 2009

The selection of Buzby to head Military Sealift Command is a real feather in the cap of the US Merchant Marine Academy (he is a graduate). It also signals a desire in the Navy to improve the ship handling and maritime skills of the Surface Community in general. Lotsa mistakes lately, leading to articles in naval journals. So this appointment viewed by many as a confidence-building measure.

How to dull the strategic brain

OP-ED: "Schott's Vocab: Pessimism Porn," by Ben Schott, New York Times, 26 March 2009.

Great definition:

Titillating bleak media reports on the state of the economic collapse.

Hugo Lindgen mused on the illicit thrills of bad news in New York magazine: "My wife busted me again the other day. I had slipped away from her and the kids and into the fantasy world of the Web. But not the kind of fantasy you're probably thinking of. This was pessimism porn. A friend had turned me on to a futurist named Gerald Celente, who anticipated the Asian financial crisis and other calamities. Now, Celente says, the U.S. is heading for a middle-class tax revolt, food riots and a Central Park engulfed by shantytowns.

Sound like any sites you frequent?

I made a decision a long time ago not to make my career a bet on bad things happening. I think that approach simply corrodes your strategic thought capacity. Human history is progress, so if you're constantly having to screen out the good to spot the bad, your vision will unduly narrow. If you bet on progress, you can easily contextualize the bad, because progress is never linear. But if you bet on retreat, you must consistently discount advances as "illusions" and "buying time" and so on, and after a while, you're just this broken clock who's dead-on twice a day.

As I've said earlier, porn desensitizes. If you want to dull your senses along with the pain, it's a great way to go, but it narrows the intake capacity. After a while, you're simply blind from all that self-pleasuring.

Welch on populist rage

THE WELCHWAY: "Put Your Rage on the Back Burner: Folks are fuming. But rage-busters--reasons to let go of anger--are everywhere," by Jack & Suzy Welch, BusinessWeek, 6 April 2009.

Good, sensible piece:

Rage begets only rage: It often makes people do stupid, short-sighted things that invariably spawn unintended consequences.

Rage isn't healing. It's polarizing.

Most of the long list of good things to watch out for in this article suggest a shift from populism to progressivism--a consistent theme of mine in Great Powers.

But you have to go through the anger to get to the answers. Skipping ahead would be nice, but it's not how things work in our country nor this world.

Obama's Turkey sea change

ARTICLE: In Turkey, Obama Reaches Out to Muslim World, By Michael D. Shear and Kevin Sullivan, Washington Post, April 7, 2009; Page A01

People will say, Bush said the same thing. But the difference is he and Cheney did many other things and openly associated with, and encouraged those who said such things--with great vehemence.

And yeah, that's a sea change all right.

Gates' direct attack

ARTICLE: Contracting Boom Could Fizzle Out, By Dana Hedgpeth, Washington Post, April 7, 2009; Page A01

What happened here was that Gates was personally confronted by his own sense of impotence in overcoming an amazingly unresponsive acquisition system, and his having to resort to going around it convinced him that a more frontal effort was required. "Today's warfighter," as he put it Monday, needs a bureaucratic home--and constituency.

Kurds will probably have to give

Q & A: Kurd sees 'very bad signals' from Baghdad, By Ned Parker, Los Angeles Times, March 28, 2009

Again, I don't foresee the Kurds finding any joy on this subject.

(Thanks: Patrick O'Connor)

We need China to grow up

ARTICLE: How China sees the world, The Economist, Mar 19th 2009

I head back over to Beijing in late April to do a series of talks at Tsinghua U (their MIT), and it'll be interesting to see what difference I see in the grad students. Last time, I was prompting them hard to think more like this, so maybe now, after the economic crisis, they'll be even more tilted in this direction.

In general, it's good for China's top leadership to feel their oats. There will be some inappropriate displays and actions, but we really need China to step into a global leadership role more, and given our recent track record, we can't be too critical.

At least we'll be able to talk with them about something other than Taiwan...

(Thanks: Steve Epstein)

SysAdmin from the Gap

ARTICLE: 81st Brigade: Ugandan guards have 81st's back, Bt Scott Fontaine, (Tacoma) News Tribune, 03/19/09

Interesting sort of back-fill dynamic going on here: still private security, but not American, still moonlighting mil types, but from inside the Gap, so the money cost is low and yet the payoff for them is still high.

Seems pretty smart, and good training.

(Thanks: Peter Jansen)

Dora grows older because that zero-to-5 demographic migrates upward

LIVING: "Dora doll seems to be growing up a little too fast," by Nekesa Mumbi Moody, Democrat and Chronicle, 18 March 2009.

New, older Dora freaks out parents who want her to stay 4 years old forever. Problem is, her fans are moving into the 5-9 space, and programmers don't want to lose them.

Our post-Caucasian little girl is growing up!

When the going gets tough, the tough go informal

WEEKEND JOURNAL: "The Rise Of The Underground," by Patrick Barta, Wall Street Journal, 14-15 March 2009.

Key point: as the global economy contracts, much labor in emerging markets simply submerges back into the informal economy--here called the "underground."

It is a certain form of resilience.

Obama goes to bat for Turkey

ARTICLE: Obama urges EU to accept Turkey as member, AP, Apr 5, 2009

You wonder if Turkey looks a bit better now after Russia smacks down Georgia.

Good but easy move by Obama.