Catching up on what's been said about PNM

Dateline: above the garage in Portsmouth RI, 30 July 2004

The past couple of days have been the first ones I've had in a very long time just to waste a few hours surfing the web and catching up on everything that's been written about PNM. I guess I've felt the need to take stock in the same way that my wife Vonne has felt the need to reorganize every drawer and closet in our house this week: we are only 9 days away from leaving for our big adventure in China.

Being an obsessive planner myself, I've plotted out what I want to cover in my daily blogs between here and our departure date of 9 August, so I've be taking the next week or so to catch up on reviews that have been posted about PNM, some translations of the old article, a side article concerning System Perturbations that's posted in an e-book online, etc. Yes, a mishmash of stuff that in the end may only be interesting to me, but I look at the blog as a sort of "for the record" entry form for me, so I feel like getting all this stuff put down on electrons before we head out and my weblog shifts from articles to pure travelogue. Don't worry, if something really cool comes up, then I blog that and simply squeeze these tasks into a shorter number of days, but dang it! I want the decks cleared before it's wheels up and we're cleared hot for China!

Today's task concerns two Reviewing-the-Reviews entries:

R. Grant Seals' review of PNM in the Reno-Gazette Journal, posted 5 June 2004

Booklist Reviews' review of PNM, distributed last spring

Following all that I'll deal with the following articles in today's catch:

A speech I've been waiting to hear from John Kerry

"Kerry Accepts Nomination, Telling Party That He'll 'Restore Trust and Credibility': Invoking His Past, He Vows to Command 'a Nation at War,'" by Adam Nagourney, New York Times, 30 July, p. A1.

"Kerry's Next Big Challenge: Wide Split in Undecided Votes: Suburbanites, Blue-Collars Disagree on Many Issues; Senator Needs Them All; Potential Bridge: War in Iraq," by John Harwood and Jacob M. Schlesinger, Wall Street Journal, 30 July, p. A1.

"The Nominee Seems a Happy Warrior: 'I'm John Kerry,' he says with glee, 'and I'm reporting for duty,'" by Alessandra Stanley, NYT, 30 July, p. P7.

"Kerry's Plan to Reduce Mideast-Oil Dependence Meets Skepticism," by John J. Fialka, WSJ, 30 July, p. A4.

Score a big one for the insurgency in Iraq

"Iraqis Postpone Conference as Kidnappings Rise," by Ian Fisher and Somini Sengupta, NYT, 30 July, p. A1.

"Saudi Plan for Muslim Force in Iraq Gains in U.S." by Christopher Marquis, NYT, 30 July, p. A6.

A good example of U.S. exporting rules in the global economy

"New Role for SEC: Policing Companies Beyond U.S. Borders: In Wake of 9/11 and Enron. Agency Hits Hard Abroad; Cutting Messier's Parachute," by Michael Schroeder and Silvia Ascarelli, WSJ, 30 July, p. A1.

Long live the 9/11 Commission! No . . . really!

"9/11 Panel Seeks New Life With Private Donations: Its budget dwindling, the commission turns elsewhere," by Philip Shenon, NYT, 30 July, p. A8.

A speech I've been waiting to hear from John Kerry

"Kerry Accepts Nomination, Telling Party That He'll 'Restore Trust and Credibility': Invoking His Past, He Vows to Command 'a Nation at War,'" by Adam Nagourney, New York Times, 30 July, p. A1.

"Kerry's Next Big Challenge: Wide Split in Undecided Votes: Suburbanites, Blue-Collars Disagree on Many Issues; Senator Needs Them All; Potential Bridge: War in Iraq," by John Harwood and Jacob M. Schlesinger, Wall Street Journal, 30 July, p. A1.

"The Nominee Seems a Happy Warrior: 'I'm John Kerry,' he says with glee, 'and I'm reporting for duty,'" by Alessandra Stanley, NYT, 30 July, p. P7.

"Kerry's Plan to Reduce Mideast-Oil Dependence Meets Skepticism," by John J. Fialka, WSJ, 30 July, p. A4.

I had never sat through a full Kerry speech before, and probably 99% of the American public hadnít either, so this really was a hugely important ìfirst impressionî for Kerry to make. Having heard so much about how boring he was, I had very low expectations, all of which were summarily surpassed. Overall, I thought it was a very strong speech, one that tells me that Kerry is well-positioned to exploit all of his natural advantages: war record, stronger intellect, andófranklyóa far more impressive physical presence and gravitas that Bush, who still suffers from that frat-boy halo that seems to follow him everywhere he goes.

The speech was appropriately hawkish for the times and for the fears currently being captured in the polls, so Kerry is doing what makes sense: going on the offensive against what is currently perceived as Bushís strengths (handling of terrorism and foreign affairs in general). I think the Dems believe that a campaign that focuses on that alleged strength will work well to their advantage, because that reputation is worn down with each passing day in Iraq. Kerry spoke directly to that dichotomy when he said America shouldnít go to war without a clear plan for winning the peace as well. Yes, a bit of a laundry list in the middle, but some nice soaring rhetoric at the end. I gotta admit, the speech fired me up as a Democrat and made me feel nervous on Bushís behalf. I think Kerryís going to be a very strong candidate when it comes to fighting over that 1-in-5 voters who are still undecided.

Most of all, I liked how psyched Kerry himself seemed to be. The guy really did seem to be happy being up there, and if he can display that sort of ease and comfort with the challenge of being president, it goes a long way toward convincing people that heís up for the job. In contrast, Bush has throughout his time seemed alternatively ill-at-ease, too casual, or too wound up. Kerryís speech showed him to be someone with a real center of gravity; he looked quite comfortable in his own skinóBotoxíd or not.

The only part of the speech that disappointed me was the reflexive linking of new transportation technologies with not having to care/wage war in the Middle East. I think thatís a very deceptive sort of sales job that targets our worst instincts. Kerry brayed confidently about changing the world, and if he means that, it has to include a future worth creating not just for America but for the Middle East as well.

Score a big one for the insurgency in Iraq

"Iraqis Postpone Conference as Kidnappings Rise," by Ian Fisher and Somini Sengupta, New York Times, 30 July, p. A1.

"Saudi Plan for Muslim Force in Iraq Gains in U.S." by Christopher Marquis, NYT, 30 July, p. A6.

The news that the national political conference is being postponed as a result of the rash of recent kidnappings and bombings is a very bad signóalmost on par with the Philippinesí decision to abandon ship. It can only embolden the insurgency. If 1 kidnapping gets you a coalition drop-out and 20 more nixes a crucial political milestone for the interim government, how can we expect to get a handle on this new tactic?

Now the glass-half-full interpretation says the whole conference process was being rushed anyway, that too few Iraqis knew about the preliminary political meetings that were designed to generate the 1,000 national delegates, that too many groups had opted out instinctively and needed more time to be brought into the mix, and that the UN was so worried about all these things that it was pushing hard to get the conference pushed back for these concerns to be adequately addressed.

What does the U.S. do with this extra time? Try like crazy to internationalize this occupation to reduce its West-vs-Islam flavor. The country working hardest on this goal right now is the one that owes us the mostóSaudi Arabia. Naturally, no Saudi forces will be involved, but their effort at least shows how nervous the House of Saud is at the prospect of continued deterioration in Iraq. So long as America stands firm, the fact that things get worse in Iraq may be nerve-racking, but in reality, it may point to the shortest pathway for serious solutions to emerge from those most affected by the instabilityóIraqís neighbors.

A good example of U.S. exporting rules in the global economy

"New Role for SEC: Policing Companies Beyond U.S. Borders: In Wake of 9/11 and Enron. Agency Hits Hard Abroad; Cutting Messier's Parachute," by Michael Schroeder and Silvia Ascarelli, Wall Street Journal, 30 July, p. A1.

An interesting article that describes how the Securities and Exchange Commission is actually more aggressive overseas that it is at home:

As financial markets grow more global, the SEC is increasingly working with foreign regulators to track down wrongdoing at companies listed in the U.S. Sometimes, the SEC has pursued cases in countries where securities regulators have weaker powers and resolved them first, thanks to its ability to reach punitive settlements with defendants. Many countriesí legal systems donít permit settlements, forcing their regulators to prove guilt in lengthy procedures.

But hereís the kicker that proves once again the profound nature of the rule-set reset that occurred because of the System Perturbation that was 9/11:

The SECís increased global role is in part a legacy of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. As the agency sought to establish whether the terrorists profited from the turmoil they wrought on financial markets, securities regulators around the world closed ranks. The bigger budget and strengthened powers the SEC obtained after the U.S. corporate scandals are also raising its international profile.

The horizontal scenario in financial markets that came out of the vertical shock that was 9/11 has entered its mature phase: the resulting rule-set reset is now creating further, far more profound outcomes than originally anticipated. Osama bin Laden laid 9/11 on the Core in order to disrupt its rule sets and generate greater disconnectedness both between the Core and Cap and inside the Core itself. In some superficial ways, al Qaeda succeeded, but in many more profound ways, it got exactly the opposite result it was hoping for. Understanding these connections helps us understand better how to effectively wage war within the context of everything else.

Long live the 9/11 Commission! No . . . really!

"9/11 Panel Seeks New Life With Private Donations: Its budget dwindling, the commission turns elsewhere," by Philip Shenon, New York Times, 30 July, p. A8.

I am really missing the logic on this one, unless it all starts being about giving panel members (one bad-ass collection of enormous egos, if you ask me) a permanent political platform. All any of these guys are needed for now is to testify on the Hill. Keeping the panel alive, through private donations no less, is entirely unnecessary. And thatís the main reason cited for this step: ìlogistical supportî for members to keep lobbying the Hill.

That is complete bullshit. Thereís no one on this panel who would suffer any hardship in this process. Theyíre all Washington insiders who can certainly catch the Metro to the Capitol, when required. To me, this is just these guys all jockeying for whatever jobs they think they can milk out of this situation, especially Hamilton and Kean who both seem keen on becoming the first intell czar.

Give me a break!

Hereís a no-brainer solution. The panel says it needs bucks, and their book is number one on Amazonís bestseller list. How about asking the publisher that isnít paying any author royalties to donate what would be that share to the panel for its operating expenses? Or does Norton feel like it deserves a windfall profit coming out of the pain and suffering endured by the 9/11 families and this country as a whole?

Reviewing the Reviews (Reno-Gazette Journal)

The Reno-Gazette Journal Online

Found this one thanks to a Google search. My comments follow:

Author offers new paradigm for the 21st century

R. GRANT SEALS

SPECIAL TO THE RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL

6/5/2004 07:55 pm

Thomas P.M. Barnett is a senior military analyst at the Naval War College in Newport, R.I. He has a doctorate in political science from Harvard and has advised both the Pentagon planners and high-level civilians on war and peace, terrorism and security. His studies of the past decade or so have led him to formulate a theory that seems to explain the new post-Cold War world. It also seems to explain some of the Bush administrationís approach to Iraq.

His theory divides the world into two distinct areas: those affected by globalization and those not affected by globalization. The countries affected by globalization include Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Europe, Russia, India, China, Japan, Australia and, of course, the United States. Countries not affected by globalization include northern and western South America, most of Africa, the Middle East, Southern Asia (excluding India), Southeast Asia, Indonesia and Malaysia.

The countries affected by globalization are termed ìconnectedî in terms of information flow, ideas, people and trade and are called the ìFunctioning Core.î The countries not affected by globalization are termed ìdisconnectedî or ìfunctioning in disconnectedness.î They fall under the ìNon-Integrating Gap.î By and large, these countries are governed by dictators or have authoritarian governments that serve to keep the populace ignorant of world trends. For instance, after the United States toppled Saddam Hussein in Iraq, one of the very first things that happened was the spread of cell phones, which Saddam had strictly prohibited. In his new book, ìThe Pentagonís New Map: War and Peace in the 21st Century,î Barnett includes a map that shows the division between the two world areas.

The Functioning Core is stable. The countries in the Non-Integrating Gap that are disconnected from globalization are unstable and allow bad actors such as Osama bin Laden ìto flourish by keeping entire societies detached from the global community and under their control,î so says Barnett. Barnett goes on to say that eradicating disconnectedness becomes the defining security task of the 21st Century.

Barnett also sees this as an opportunity. Fighting global terrorism must be subordinated to spreading economic globalism around the planet. The new strategy of preemption must be a means to the larger goal of complete globalization. ìWhen all other reasonable measures fail, we bring war pre-emptively to entities seeking weapons of mass destruction for use against us or our allies. . .. We bring war against any entities that threaten global stability by threatening or waging war against key pillars of that (global) economy, to include the Persian Gulf economies.î He believes our warfare must be directed at despots, not at people. He proposes two types of ìarmies,î the conventional type, which wins wars, and the new type, which rebuilds countries and economies. We do not now possess the new type.

Finally, Barnett says overwhelming force is our ace in the hole and is the hallmark of the American way of war. Past experience has taught us that committing forces in a piecemeal fashion puts U.S. personnel unnecessarily at risk. This seems to be a part of Barnettís theory that the U.S. Department of Defense did not follow. He bemoans going it alone and running the risk of members of the Functioning Core permanently withdrawing their support.

His book is worth reading and may become the document that defines the West or the Functioning Core in the 21st century as the philosophy of containment did for the Cold War in the 20th Century.

R. Grant Seals is emeritus professor of agricultural biochemistry and emeritus associate dean at the University of Nevada, Reno. He is a regular contributor to the Opinion page.

COMMENTARY: A very explanatory sort of review, which is interesting to me primarily because it draws so much from the section ìThe American Way of War,î a portion of Chapter 6 thatís never really been treated before in any other review. His use of the term ìaffectedî in describing my definitions of Core and Gap troubled me a little bit, because of its imprecision: every state is affected by globalization, but not all of them can handle those effects well or even desire them to occur. But since he gives such a nice plug at the end, making the direct comparison to the containment strategy of the Cold War, it would seem petty to harp too much over that one term. Overall, he takes a complex book and gives a very straightforward rendition of the main concepts. Given the limited space and his kind words at the end, you gotta like it.

Reviewing the Reviews (Booklist Reviews)

Got this directly from Neil Nyren at Putnam. He clipped it from whatever insider pub these reviews get distributed in. The short blurbish-review follows, along with my commentary:

The Pentagon's New Map: War and Peace in the Twenty-First Century, by Thomas P.M. Barnett (G.P. Putnam's Sons, 27 April)

Review

It has been generally recognized that the end of the cold war and the emerging threat of international terrorism presented new challenges in planning American diplomatic and military strategy. What has often been lacking is a coherent, integrated vision that assesses the new threats to American interests and provides a comprehensive plan for coping with them. Barnett, a senior strategic researcher and professor at the U.S. Naval War College, presents his operating theory, which sees the principal threat to American security arising from dysfunctional or so-called failed states, which provide fertile ground for the recruitment and sustenance of terrorists. On the other hand, as such past adversaries as Russia and China are integrated into global economic and political systems, they are less threatening. To counter these threats, Barnett suggests some bold, even revolutionary, changes in our military structure and in the dispersion and utilization of our forces. Of course, both his analyses and remedies are open to debate, but Barnett's compelling assertions are worthy of strong consideration and are sure to provoke controversy. ((Reviewed April 15, 2004)) Copyright 2004 Booklist Reviews.

COMMENTARY: This sort of insider review is really about forecasting reader interest, and I think this one does a very nice job of capturing the most interesting dynamics of the book: it diagnoses the problems and provides comprehensive answers. By citing the ìgenerally recognizedî new challenges, the reviewer suggests that my ìrevolutionary changesî are appropriately bold, although he holds off on offering any critical judgment. Ending on the ìsure to provoke controversyî note is pure gold, meaning itís telling stores and libraries to expect lotsa demand. Looking back on this review, itís clear to me that a lot of the placement PNM got in bookstores came as a result of this sort of early critical appreciation of the bookís ambitious content.

Briefing the Kerry camp

Dateline: SWA flight from BWI to Providence, 29 July 2004

Struggling after a long day and two lengthy briefs yesterday.

Got up at 5:30 and headed out into the pouring rain to Providence for a SWA flight (my usual) to BWI. Then hop in a rental and off to the DC headquarters of Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), a big consulting/contracting/R&D firm that does work all over the dial, to include plenty for the Defense Department. Iím not there on official business, but as a private speaker giving a speech to a host of senior execs and analysts. SAIC likes the book and wants to hear more. Since I donít/canít really do individual corps one-on-one as part of my War College duties (although private companies are free to catch my act at conferences open to the public), this trip has to be done while on personal leave. A decent honorarium to cover costs, but nothing more.

Why bother? The trip is not so much for SAIC as it is for an opportunity to brief the Kerry camp. I mean, Iím certainty happy to brief such a distinguished firm and Iím sure Iíll sell some books in the process, but given how little personal leave I have after my Dadís long decline and passing, I wouldnít have made this trip if not for the additional request made by the Kerry campís foreign policy task force thatís focused on the Pentagon and DoD. In effect, SAIC covers my travel and gets a free brief while I donate my time to the Kerry campaign tonight.

Why brief the Kerry camp? Besides being a Democrat, I believe itís always important to reach across party lines to any potential incoming administration. These sorts of briefs are standard-issue in election years, especially in the national security community because, you know what? Weíve got to live with each other administration after administration. The guys I brief tonight will be plenty familiar from the Clinton years, just like the guys who got briefed back in 2000 on the Republican side were plenty familiar from the first Bush Administration. If Kerry wins, the Bush people will go into exile at all the think tanks and the Kerry people will come out of exile from all the think tanks. If Bush wins, then that normal switcheroo gets delayed for at least four more years. But in the end, weíre always talking aboutóand toóthe same basic pool of people, so the national security community is a lot more bipartisan than you might imagine, not to mention a lot smaller.

The brief at SAIC was the full-up version for about 40 staff. Not the strongest connection there, and certainly not a bunch that laughs easily. It felt like briefing my old crowd at the Center for Naval Analysesójust must be something about having all those INTJs in one room together.

The real fun was briefing the Kerry crowd last night in Chevy Chase, at the home of an old friend of mine. This guy is just A GUY, but he's also someone who talks to THE GATEKEEPER on this subject, who in turn talks to THE INSIDER, who advises THE MAN himself on national security (as does THE GATEKEEPER himself, naturally). Of course, THE INSIDER and THE MAN were in Boston, but still, even getting THE GATEKEEPER to show up at A GUY's house was quite a trick, simply because he's a seriously-connected gatekeeper and gatekeepers around THE MAN right now are in extremely high demand. Everyone wants to get to the gatekeepers, because these people can get you face time with the INSIDERSójust one step removed from THE MAN!

You just know I was tingly all over.

Brief went very long but very well. Felt like I was presenting to a bunch of early Christians hiding out in some catacombs; I just felt like some authorities would bust in at any moment and arrest us all.

In the free-flow discussion that goes deep into the night (leaving me with a late drive to BWI and a rousing 3-hour sleep in my hotel bed before getting up at 4:30 to catch my sunrise flight back to the college for my workday), I make my pitches here and there for what I think the Democrats' message can be on defense. Nothing you haven't heard me say here or on TV (or frankly, to the current administration over the past three years), just a bit more emphasized by the material I presented in my brief.

Bottom line: the vision I push is as much acceptable to the Kerry crowd as it is to the Bush crowd. But the Kerry crowd, while seeing so much of what they believe expressed in this vision, are a bit wary of looking like they want to engage in "nation-building" (the new "N" word in national security) any more than the neocons allegedly do. Why? It's because of all those nasty polls that say Americans want out of Iraq. But frankly, those polls only say that Americans hate to see their sons and daughters die in a situation that's badly explained and features a murky sense of both progress and outcome. If it has been a successful war followed immediately by a successful occupation/rebuild, we wouldn't be having these discussions or seeing those poll numbers today. So my line is a simple one for Kerry:

As President, I assure you that I will never send American soldiers overseas into harm's way unless we can win both the war and the peace. I believe we have the capacity within our current armed forces to succeed on both sides of that equation: not just to wage war without parallel but to wage peace without parallel. Because if we cannot secure the victory, we will find no wars worth waging in the global struggle against terrorism.

Moreover, until we strengthen our ability to win the peace that must inevitably follow wars, we will continue to fail in our attempts to attract allies to our cause. We know that smaller states around the world need to see a winning hand in any American-led military intervention overseas before they are able and willing to join. In short, they need to see our strength and commitment demonstrated before they can act with confidenceóthey need our leadership when it counts most. I will work with the U.S. military to ensure that winning hand, not just in the warfighting phase in which our troops perform so ably, but likewise in the peacekeeping phase where our armed forces need far more support from both the White House and Congress in terms of funding and manpower.

As President, I will assure that needed support will flow to our armed forces, and by doing so, America will have the military it truly needs to win this global war on terrorism, one that can not only engage in drive-by regime change but can also workówith allies, the United Nations, and the local citizens themselvesóto generate lasting security in those regions around this world that otherwise will continue to breed the terrorists who will seek to do us harm. That's how I will make America not just secure, but respected around the world as a global leader for peace and justice.

Upshot of the meeting? THE GATEKEEPER approves of the notion of taking the next step. Will it happen? I worry about that no more than I've ever worried about the next brief up the chain with the current administration. It happens when it needs to happen, and I'll be ready when I need to be ready. I'm no more interested in THE JOB with that crew than I am with the current one.

As a visionary out to change the world, I don't need no stinkin' badges! I need converts. So I'll travel to any statesóblue or red.

Hereís todayís and yesterdayís catch, put together in snippets of time here and there:

Kerryís foreign policy: topic of the day not just for me

ìKerry Must-Sell: A Tough Foreign Policy: He Seeks to Portray Party as Steadier Than G.O.P,î by Roger Cohen, New York Times, 28 July, p. A1.

ìKerryís Foreign Policy: Broad but Vague: Strategy Is to Present a Small Target for Bush, While Emphasizing Vietnam Record,î by Carla Anne Robbins, Wall Street Journal, 28 July, p. A4.

ìA Nostalgia For The Consensus Of the 1990s,î by John F. Harris, Washington Post, 29 July, p. A1.

ìThe Wrong Way to Be Right,î by Richard Cohen, WP, 29 July, p. A23.

The first seeds of a shrinking-the-Gap strategy

ìFarm Subsidies Again Take Front Seat at the W.T.O.,î by Elizabeth Becker, NYT, 28 July, p. W1.

ìFailure in Cancun Haunts WTO: Trade Leaders Meet in Effort to Patch Difference Between Rich and Poor Nations,î by Paul Blustein, Washington Post, 28 July, p. E1.

ìWTO Farm Pact Wouldnít Be Panacea,î by Scott Miller, WSJ, 29 July, p. A11.

ìPanel Sees No Unique Risk From Genetic Engineering,î by Andrew Pollack, WSJ, 28 July, p. A13.

More casualties in terroristsí anti-access, area-denial asymmetrical strategy

ìJordanian Company to Quit Iraq to Save Lives of 2 Hostages: Powell warns that those who plan to stay must ënot get weak in the knees,î by Ian Fisher, NYT, 28 July, p. A3.

ìKillings Drive Doctor Group To Leave Afghanistan,î by Carlotta Gall, NYT, 29 July, p. A6.

ì70 Are Killed By Car Bomber In an Iraqi City: Worst Attack in Month Since Power Transfer,î by Khalid Al-Ansary and Ian Fisher, NYT, 29 July, p. A1.

ìSaudis Propose Islamic Force in Iraq: Idea Pushed as War to Expedite Pullout of U.S.-Led Military Coalition,î by Robin Wright, WP, 29 July, p. A16.

The biggest rule-set changes China generates are internal

ìNew Boomtowns Change Path of Chinaís Growth,î by Howard D. French, NYT, 28 July, p. A1.

ìChinaís MIT Upgrades Itself: Tsinghua Tries to Keep Pace With Nationís Global Ambitions,î by Philip Tinari, WSJ, 28 July, p. A11.

Francis Fukuyama wants his Sys Admin force

ìThe Art of Reconstruction,î by Francis Fukuyama, WSJ, 28 July, p. A12.

Connectivity with an Islamic twist

ìTechs Awaken to the Muslim Market,î by Jeremy Wagstaff, WSJ, 29 July, p. B4.

ìImmigrants Keep IslamóItalian Style: ëModern Muslimsí Forge Hybrid Culture,î by Daniel Williams, WP, 24 July, p. A15.

Europe as the center of the go-slow ideology

ìLove of Leisure, and Europeís Reasons,î by Katrin Bennhold, NYT, 29 July, p. A8.

Would you invest in these Gap countries?<blockquote>

ìAt Colombiaís Congress, Paramilitary Chiefs Talk Peace,î by Juan Forero, NYT, 29 July, p. A3.

ìLosing Energy and Investors: After Years of Growth, Boliviaís Gas Industry Faces Hurdles,î by Juan Forero, NYT, 29 July, p. W1.

South Africa: And then there's AIDS . . .

ìAs AIDS Continues to Ravage, South Africa ëRecyclesí Graves,î by Michael Wines, NYT, 29 July, p. A1.

Making globalization global = freeing the women in the Gap

ìHer Virtual Prison: ëInside the Kingdomí by Carmen bin Laden,î by Danielle Crittenden, WSJ, 29 July, p. D8.

ìThe New Macho: Feminism,î by Barbara Ehrenreich, NYT, 29 July, p. A27.

Kerryís foreign policy: topic of the day not just for me

ìKerry Must-Sell: A Tough Foreign Policy: He Seeks to Portray Party as Steadier Than G.O.P,î by Roger Cohen, New York Times, 28 July, p. A1.

ìKerryís Foreign Policy: Broad but Vague: Strategy Is to Present a Small Target for Bush, While Emphasizing Vietnam Record,î by Carla Anne Robbins, Wall Street Journal, 28 July, p. A4.

ìA Nostalgia For The Consensus Of the 1990s,î by John F. Harris, Washington Post, 29 July, p. A1.

ìThe Wrong Way to Be Right,î by Richard Cohen, WP, 29 July, p. A23.

The flip-flop charge against Kerry on foreign affairs simply does not stick, but itís basically all the Bush camp can come up with since Kerry basically agrees with the broad outline of Bush foreign policy (fight a global war on terrorism, no pull-out in Iraq or Afghanistan, and reserving the right for preemptive war). All Kerry promises is that he will do the job better, and given the state of U.S. standing in the world, thatís a fair argument to make.

Not just the Democrats, but basically the entire American public is looking for a return to at least some of the consensus we seemed to have as a nation in the 1990s. Key to that consensus was fiscal responsibility in the federal budget, a strong commitment to free trade, and a sense that U.S. alliances around the world were not only stronger, but getting stronger and larger with time.

The rule-set reset triggered by 9/11 created some expenses that arenít easily wished away, and yet a lot of the spending weíve engaged in for domestic security purposes isóI would argueóway overboard. Itís been a real feeding frenzy and the Republicans have turned on the federal spigot in a way thatís both amazing and fairly scary. Even the plus-up on defense wasnít that warranted, because the challenge the Pentagon faces is more one of rebalancing that buying. Yes, the wars have cost, but a much better sales job on that could have been done. Remember, Bushís dad pulled offówith Jim Bakerís helpóDesert Storm at a profit in terms of international financial support. Strange to say it, but it seems like we need to return the Democrats to the White House in order to get federal spending under control.

On the commitment to free trade, there the Bush White House still looks better than anything coming out of the mouths of Kerry and Edwards. Is much of that election-year nonsense? Yup. Is most of it unnecessary given the passion of the hard left to remove Bush from power? Yup. So itís a complete waste of time and sets bad expectations.

On the alliances question, here the Bush White House has much to answer for. There is no doubt that we have fewer allies and friends than we did four years ago, so the Bush Administration needs to sell the public on how they are going to reverse that very negative trend.

Why be so demanding with the current administration? After all, we were told by the Bush camp in 2000 that the governorís lack of foreign policy experience would be balanced by all his ìwise menî and Condi Rice, but look at the diplomatic track record. Thereís nothing in this GWOT effort that mandates we scare the hell out of the rest of the world or alienate key allies. If weíre really right, and I believe we are, then we ought to be able to bring the rest of the Core with usónot just the Brits. Kerry is the diplomatís son, just like Bush, but Kerry has spent two decades in the Senate specializing in foreign affairs, and that experience is both laudable and sellable in this election. Too nuanced? Too smooth-talking? The Bush camp better come up with tougher charges than that, because many Americans are looking for exactly those sort of characteristics after four years of with-us-or-aígin-us!

Then again, I agree with Richard Cohen's op-ed: Kerry's strategy can't be one of simply saying we'll make the world love us. That's running foreign policy by international polling, and that's just Clintonism writ larger. But give Kerry this credit: even though U.S. polls show majorities wanting the U.S. out of Iraq, he's not promising to deliver that baby.

The first seeds of a shrinking-the-Gap strategy

ìFarm Subsidies Again Take Front Seat at the W.T.O.,î by Elizabeth Becker, New York Times, 28 July, p. W1.

ìFailure in Cancun Haunts WTO: Trade Leaders Meet in Effort to Patch Difference Between Rich and Poor Nations,î by Paul Blustein, Washington Post, 28 July, p. E1.

ìPanel Sees No Unique Risk From Genetic Engineering,î by Andrew Pollack, Wall Street Journal, 28 July, p. A13.

ìWTO Farm Pact Wouldnít Be Panacea,î by Scott Miller, WSJ, 29 July, p. A11.

What always drives success at WTO meetings is the overwhelming fear of failure. When thereís not enough of it, then talks collapse, but when itís overwhelming, then deals get cut. Cancun was such a collapse last year, and now the overwhelming fear of going 0 for 2 is pushing both Core and Gap states into more negotiable stances.

Everyone knows what has to give: roughly $300 billion of ag subsidies that Core nations lavish on themselves, effectively shutting out the bulk of the Gap from their markets in the one venue where theyíve consistently showed capability. How the Core expects Gap states to move up the production chain when we keep their ag sectors shackled is simply beyond me, but the myths of ìthe landî die hard.

The good news so far in these talks is that neither side is acting too bloc-ish, and splinter groups on both sides are approaching each other in a mutual search for earliest common denominators.

Along those lines, the National Academy of Sciences just came out with an authoritative report that said that ìgenetically engineered crops do not pose health risks that cannot also arise from crops created by other techniques, including conventional breeding.î

What that says is that bio-tech is different in degree but not in kind from the sort of crop cross-breeding that humans have been pursuing for millennia. For the Core to deny these advances to Gap nations desperate either to feed themselves or to boost production in areas where crops are hard to grow is simply wrong. I call it a ìno brainerî in the book and am routinely vilified for it, but now that the NAS is officially on the record regarding the safety of bio-tech, the passionate arguments about ìfrankenfoodsî canít be defended as anything but ag protectionismópure and simple.

And I agree with the Journal's appraisal of who will really win in any ag deal between Core and Gap: largely the New Core powers Brazil, China and India. Why? They "have the infrastructure and farming know-how to better take advantage of a trade deal." But guess what? Until you give them the incentives to invest in that ag infrastructure, Gap countries won't do it. May seem like chicken or egg, but the Core's got the chicken in a choke-hold right now.

More casualties in terroristsí anti-access, area-denial asymmetrical strategy

ìJordanian Company to Quit Iraq to Save Lives of 2 Hostages: Powell warns that those who plan to stay must ënot get weak in the knees,;î by Ian Fisher, New York Times, 28 July, p. A3.

ìKillings Drive Doctor Group To Leave Afghanistan,î by Carlotta Gall, NYT, 29 July, p. A6.

ì70 Are Killed By Car Bomber In an Iraqi City: Worst Attack in Month Since Transfer,î by Khalid Al-Ansary and Ian Fisher, NYT, 29 July, p. A1.

ìSaudis Propose Islamic Force in Iraq: Idea Pushed as War to Expedite Pullout of U.S.-Led Military Coalition,î by Robin Wright, Washington Post 29 July, p. A16.

Another sliver of connectivity bites the dust in Iraq. Since the Philippines gave into the terroristsí demands following their kidnapping of one Filipino truck driver, at least a dozen more foreigners have been similarly snatched and their companies or countries threatened with their deaths unless they leave Iraq.

Ditto for Doctors Without Borders in Afghanistan. They could handle having their people killed. After all, they've been there for 24 years! What they couldn't handle was the killers getting off scot free, because that just says the lives of Westerners operating there are basically worthless to the governmentómeaning no effort really required.

Meanwhile, the plans for the opening of the national political conference on 31 July continue apace, thank God. Because when the Iraqis stop showing up for their freedom, you canít expect the foreign workers to stay on the job amidst all the death threats. The targeting of those Iraqis brave enough to work in the security forces will only get worse, I fear. On the same day 70 Iraqis are killed, the U.S. military reports four more lost in various events. Expect that sort of ratio to continue, sad to say, until the West is driven out completely and then the real purges could proceed.

Would it be better to accept ideas such as what the Saudis are offering in terms of an Islamic peacekeeping force inside Iraq? The idea seems to be that no countries bordering Iraq would participate, which carries a certain logic (especially for the Saudis!). So who would they get for this? They're talking Pakistan, Malaysia, Algeria, Bangladesh and Morocco. Right now the U.S.-led coalition has no Arab countries involved, so this would clearly be better than what we have now, but is it realistic to think that crew, even blessed by the UN, would offer much in terms of putting down an insurgency? Sounds to me suspiciously like declaring "victory," leaving the mess to others, and when it all falls apart, we're long gone. I have seen that scenario unfold before in the 1990s, yes?

The biggest rule-set changes China generates are internal

ìNew Boomtowns Change Path of Chinaís Growth,î by Howard D. French, New York Times, 28 July, p. A1.

ìChinaís MIT Upgrades Itself: Tsinghua Tries to Keep Pace With Nationís Global Ambitions,î by Philip Tinari, Wall Street Journal, 28 July, p. A11.

The rapid urbanization of China is creating a slew of megacities. If, in its past, Beijing always cast a wary eye over the upstarts in a Shanghai or Hong Kong, now they are looking at over 150 cities of one million-plus citizens (compared to just nine in the U.S.) and ten cities of 4m and over. The sheer magnitude of all the urban planning going on in China constitutes a major rule-set reset, and not exactly one in slow motion. Chinaís urban population is growing at 2.5% a year, one of the fastest rates in the world. All this shows yet again that Chinaís historical integration with the outside world is dwarfed only by its amazing pace of internal integration.

All that development naturally taps the intellectual capital of the nation, which in turn forces a revolution in educational institutions, which are more pressed now than ever to crank out not just competent grads, but imaginative thinkers and leaders:

ìWe realized that the old system doesnít fit with the current society,î says provost [of Tsinghua University] Hu Heping. ìWe need to produce people who can think for themselves and one day lead a powerful China.î

Chinaís red-economy has been straining the limits of the education system. Multinational companies, scrambling to expand, complain that the dearth of talented people is their chief constraint in China. As the same time, many college graduates struggle to find suitable jobs. Efforts of universities such as Tsinghua to better match graduates to Chinaís new jobs will be key in sustaining the countryís rapid development.

So who knows? Maybe all those ìextraî males will be needed after all for something besides going to war?

Francis Fukuyama wants his Sys Admin force

ìThe Art of Reconstruction,î by Francis Fukuyama, Wall Street Journal, 28 July, p. A12.

Iíve always greatly admired Francis Fukuyama and haveóat timesóimagined myself following his same career pattern. One of the best books I used in my Ph.D. dissertation on East European-Third World security relations in the 1970s and 1980s was a collection of articles edited by Fukuyama. Thatís right. Both he and I not only started as Soviet experts, but both of us came out of the same, far more narrow field of Soviet bloc relations with the Third World. Fukuyama left that narrow specialty far behind when he wrote ìThe End of Historyî in the early post-Cold War years, and since has become a bit of a jack-of-all-trades, but a big thinker par excellence. I hope to do similar things with my career as a result of finally bringing PNM to the world.

Fukuyamaís latest book is ìState Building,î so his current ideas are naturally gravitating toward the same conclusions Iíve reached regarding the need for the Sys Admin force.

Fukuyamaís big point in this op-ed concerns the size of government and how we need to understand that asking most Gap countries to go smaller in their governments is the wrong way to go. Only when a state/economy/society reaches a certain maturity does it make sense to start asking the government to get out of the way. Until then, stronger public institutions are crucial for developing, especially in weak states. Fukuyama quotes Milton Friedman as saying he was wrong to tell all the former socialist states to privatize at all costs in the early 1990s: ìBut I was wrong. It turns out that the rule of law is probably more basic than privatization.î In other words, get the security, then the rules, and then the economics can unfold more freely.

Then, at the end of the op-ed, Fukuyamaís logic leads him to the same basic conclusion I reached in PNM: we need a new US Government entity thatís first and foremost about what I call the ìback half,î or that transition space between war (the ìfront halfî) and peace (that future worth creating that involves shrinking the Gap). Hereís how he ends the piece:

The Americans who presided over the successful reconstruction of postwar Europe and Japan were for the most part New Dealers who had just lived through a period of intense state-building in Washington. No similar cadre exists now. If there is any lesson to be drawn from our haphazard reconstruction of Iraq, it is that we need to reorganize all of our soft-power agencies (State, USAID, the civil affairs units of the military and the broadcasting agencies) to be better able to do both reconstruction and development. In the place of ad hoc planning, we need to provide a permanent institutional home for people with experience in prior efforts. Difficult and contradictory as these functions are, they will be as much a key to overall American power and influence in the coming years as the technological prowess of our armed forces.

What Fukuyama is basically calling for is a Dept. of Something that lies between the Department of Defense/War and the Department of State/Peace, and itís exactly what Iím aiming for in enunciating the need for the Sys Admin force, because unless the Department of Defense creates such capacity, talking about the other parts that may eventually migrate toward it from the other side of the Potomac River will remain just thatótalk and nothing more.

Connectivity with an Islamic twist

ìTechs Awaken to the Muslim Market,î by Jeremy Wagstaff, Wall Street Journal, 29 July, p. B4.

ìImmigrants Keep IslamóItalian Style: ëModern Muslimsí Forge Hybrid Culture,î by Daniel Williams, Washington Post, 24 July, p. A15.

Neat story. LG of South Korea (maker of my phone) wants to market cells in the Middle East. Their gimmick is an embedded compass that helps the faithful better locate Mecca for direction in their daily prayersóa total hit.

Other electronic marketing efforts: phones that recite the call to prayer, provide prayer times for more than 5,000 cities in a database, store electronic recordings of the Quran.

So long as approval is sought from the right authorities (apparently the Al-Azhar Al-Sharif Islamic Research Academy in Cairo is a biggie), it's relatively easy to market such products without offense. Some Muslims like the products because they allow for low-key worship, while others find that goal offensive in terms of seeming to deny who they are.

But defining who is a good Muslim isn't any more a set issue worldwide than defining who is a good Catholicóin fact probably far less because there is no central Islamic authority. So, in many ways, when Muslims migrate to Core states like Italy, they're a lot more on their own than adherents of other religions in terms of defining what's an acceptable mix of clinging to tradition and moving toward assimilation. So-called "modern Muslims" in Italy naturally lean toward hybrid solutions simply because their ranks stem from such varied sources around the world. As one guy put it (an American transplant from the Bronx who picked up his Islamic faith via Sudan): "There are all kinds of Muslims here, and most of them are modern. We don't have to print Islam on our T-shirts."

Europe as the center of the go-slow ideology

ìLove of Leisure, and Europeís Reasons,î by Katrin Bennhold, New York Times, 29 July, p. A8.

Europe emerges more and more as the go-slow center of the Core. If the U.S. tends to be all go-go on globalization, whereas many in the New Core can't seem to go fast enough in terms of integration, then it's Europe's growing role to be the Core pillar that emphasizes the opportunity costs in progress. They may be "poorer" in terms of goods acquired, but they seem to be trading that in for more leisure in their lifestylesóa very different social-economic rule set from either the U.S. or the workaholic Japanese.

The moderate resistance to globalization doesn't say "keep it out" like radical Islam, but simply advocates a go-slower approach. Over time, this is the great alternative political ideology that attracts many adherents throughout the Core. A cruder version of this is seen in the growing New Core focus on remembering the rural poor and making sure they get pulled up in the globalization process as well as the urban elites. Inside the U.S., it would appear to be the Democrats who will emerge more as the go-slower party and the Republicans as the go-go-globalization party, since the isolationist wing of the GOP is far less powerful (for now) than the anti-globalization ranks of the far left.

Would you invest in these Gap countries?

ìAt Colombiaís Congress, Paramilitary Chiefs Talk Peace,î by Juan Forero, New York Times, 29 July, p. A3.

ìLosing Energy and Investors: After Years of Growth, Boliviaís Gas Industry Faces Hurdles,î by Juan Forero, NYT, 29 July, p. W1.

Why does Colombia's economy run far too much on narcotics? Who wants to invest in a country where paramilitary commanders are invited into the national legislature under white flags and promises of no arrest? This trio of leaders sat in the national congress chamber and were treated like serious political players in the system instead of rebels and vigilantes who are in bed with narco-traffickers.

As one Humans Rights Watch official put it, "This is a very dangerous game and awful precedent. What this kind of circus does is raise the expectations for these individuals to strengthen their position by manipulating the public with some sort of family-values speech."

A Colombian congressman was even harsher: "What we see is the state and justice submitting themselves to narco-traffickers. This shows the great power paramilitaries and narco-traffickers have over Congress."

Colombia isn't really even a state anymore, just a collection of warlords running the countryside and a government running the capital. It's the Pakistan/Afghanistan of South America.

Meanwhile, in Bolivia, the political and economic rule sets there are so incoherent and weak that despite the huge global demand right now for new sources of natural gas, the government there can't get international investors interested in coming there. As the Times puts it: "The turmoil in this isolated, land-locked country in the center of South America has been quickly snuffing a nascent gas industry that seven years ago appeared to have no limits." Bolivia simply can't seem to come to any consensusóespecially with indigenous groupsóon how to exploit its gas resources for the benefit of all, so nothing happens to the detriment of all:

"There's total uncertainty regarding the legal, regulatory, political and social framework," Mr. Lopez [former vice minister of energy] said. "This is a sector that, having discovered the reserves, should be investing substantial amounts to develop the fields," he said. "Instead, it is an industry preparing for the worst."

And so Bolivia, in its political and social confusion, remains firmly mired deep inside the Gap.

South Africa: And then there's AIDS . . .

ìAs AIDS Continues to Ravage, South Africa ëRecyclesí Graves,î by Michael Wines, New York Times, 29 July, p. A1.

Scary story. So many bodies pile up in some parts of South Africa that graves in cemeteries are being recycled, meaning old bones are dug up and new bodies put in.

If South Africa is to fall out of the Core, it will be because of AIDS, and this should be a scary lesson to all New Core states facing rising HIV populationsómeaning Russia, India, Brazil and China.

Making globalization global = freeing the women in the Gap

ìHer Virtual Prison: ëInside the Kingdomí by Carmen bin Laden,î by Danielle Crittenden, Wall Street Journal, 29 July, p. D8.

ìThe New Macho: Feminism,î by Barbara Ehrenreich, New York Times, 29 July, p. A27.

Good review of book by Saudi ex-pat who once was the wife of Osama bin Laden's brother. The portrait painted is basically that of a women kept as a breeding pet in a totally male-defined culture:

Rarely could she leave the houseórarely, even, did she see sunlight. Courtyards had to be cleared of male servants before she could poke her head outside: she was not even permitted to cross the street alone to visit a relative. When she did venture out, she had to wear a choking abaya and thick socks to hide her ankles. "It was like carrying a jail on your back," she writes.

Interesting comparison. Reading the excerpts in this book reminded me of nothing so much as the descriptions of life inside a super-max federal prison for hardcore criminals. One is now located in my hometown of Boscobel WI and the prisoners there are completely invisible to the town just outside its walls. Prison-reform advocates say the isolating treatments are so cruel that they naturally drive the inmates down pathways of mental illness over time.

Barbara Ehrenreich hits a politically-incorrect nail on the head when she writes that "Many women have nothing to lose but their chains" inside such Gap regions as the Middle East. In her mind, the most incendiary (and Democrat-friendly) counterterrorism is feminism in our foreign policy, which frankly has been missing in action primarily because of the influence of the anti-abortion crowd in this country.

Yes, Democrats would risk the "girlie man" charge from tough-guy Republicans like Arnold, but when push comes to shove, we have to admit to ourselves that making globalization truly global will mostly be about liberating the women of the Gap and killing the hardcore males who stand in the way.

Reading the leavesóa father's remembrance

Dateline: above the garage in Portsmouth RI, 27 July 2004

Yesterday I took my first-born Emily to Hasbro Children's Hospital in Providence for her annual visit with the pediatric oncology people there. I expected nothing but good news and yetóas alwaysóI was filled with dread.

First, there is that sense of returning to the scene of the crime that's a bit unnerving. Then there's simply the discussion over "late effects" and/or secondary cancers coming from the initial treatments, a conversation that no longer occurs in Em's presence at age 12 without her catching the drift in full. Finally, there's simply being around all those kids with cancer, which was never easy then and isn't any easier now (listen to Don Imus describe his kids cancer ranch sometime if you don't believe me), especially since your kid has "aged out" in the best sense of that phrase.

But there was just a bit more this time around, and that takes a bit of explaining.

When I first discovered Em's cancer by accident in the summer of 1994, it was during a trip back to my parents in Boscobel WI for the 4th of July. I had gone back with her alone because Vonne, my wife, had wanted some time alone from this boisterous 2-year-old, and I was all hot to run in the race of my youthóthe Boscobel Firecracker 5-miler.

Well, after discovering the lump and being told by the local ER doc that it was probably just a hernia and "don't cut your trip short over it," my Mom and I looked at each other and knew immediately I was flying back East with Em first thing next morning.

As we drove up to the house back in Springfield, VA, I was somewhat stunned to see the big tree in front of our townhouse. Normally a deep green, the leaves were all brilliantly red, like they had been spray painted or something. It was really odd. I had this scary sort of feeling, like it was an evil omen or something. I couldn't stop thinking about the old Hebrew story from Exodus in which the slaves marked their front doors with sacrificial blood so that the angel of death would pass them by and kill only the first-born children of the Egyptians, except it felt like my house was being marked by some . . . thing for exactly that purpose.

Three days later we got the shocking diagnosis and entered into a two-week stay at Georgetown U Hospital in Washington DC. I don't think I walked outside for almost a week; it was that intense and real-time. Every hour was a draining decision or soul-shaking sort of judgment handed down from on high.

Finally, about seven days into the process, Vonne and I decided that one of us needed to head back home to check on things there, simply because we left the place in such a flash and had not been back since. A friend of mine drove me back, and as we pulled up the hill and our front-yard tree came into view, you could almost here the ominously growling strings of the symphonic soundtrack kick inóthe leaves on the towering tree had now all turned a deep black.

While I was at the house, I got a call from Vonne: Em had gone into a special full-body scan procedure whereby they injected her with special, radiated substances that would allow her entire skeletal structure to be x-rayed in an attempt to see if the cancer had spread into her bones. This was pretty scary, because if it had, it was game over. If not, then we had a fairly firm grip on the extent of her metastases (i.e., right kidney sac, abdominal nodes on that side, both lungs). To have the test done, Emily had to lay very still in a completely blacked out room. As a two-year-old, she was sedated for the procedure.

Vonne, calling from the hallway, asked me to get back to the hospital right away. Every test we had done up to that point had come with a negative outcome, meaning it was always what we feared (yes to cancer, yes to spreading beyond her kidney into the sac, yes to nodes, and yes to tumors in both lungs). By this time, we had already left behind all the normal odds of this-or-that happening. We felt we were on a terrible losing streak that would only end with her death sentence, and Emily was going to receive itóunwittinglyólying in a dark room with only a stranger (a nice nurse) holding her hand in the blackness.

As I walked out the front door of our house and glanced up at the tree's now funereal tapestry of leaves, I had this inescapable feeling that God's judgment had already been transmitted down to us through the frightening image. And all I could think was, "F--k you!"

I got to the hospital and stood around with Vonne in the rather dark basement corridor outside the X-ray chamber where Em was still lying, recovering from the sedation. Scoping out the location, I could see the radiologists' on-site diagnostic room where they did their quick reads. It was just around the corner. Sticking my head in ever so slightly, I saw an intense looking young doc pouring over Em's x-rays.

I pulled back immediately at the sight because it felt like peeking into the star chamber deciding my kid's fate. Slinking back to Vonne in the hallway, we both just nervously paced around the area, unable to talk much to one another.

I kept playing the scene out in my head: if the doc had good news, he'd look us straight in the eyes as he came around that corner. It would be: "This is only a preliminary read, but it looks good. No cancer appears to be anywhere in her bones." If it was bad, his eyes would never exactly meet ours and the voice would be curt: "I don't have any complete answers at this time. I'll be delivering my full report to Emily's oncologist in a couple of hours. I'm sorry I can't tell you more right now."

At that moment I knew exactly how it felt to be standing in a courtroom waiting for a verdict of guilty or innocent. I just knew we'd either turn a corner or hit rock bottom in the next several minutes.

Funny thing was, I had no idea if we had really committed any crime.

Finally, after what seemed like forever, the doc comes bounding around the corner with a big smile on his face, looking us right in the eyes. He said something but I didn't catch a word of it. His non-verbal communication told me everything I needed to hear.

A week later, after we got home from Georgetown, I got up early the next morning, took out my axe, and chopped down that f--king tree. Then I shook my fist at the sky and told the Big Man that if he planned on messing with one of mine, he better come with a bigger bag of tricks than that.

He never did.

In our yard in Portsmouth we used to have two-dozen trees, including a stand of five trees in the front yardóthe first ones you'd notice as you drove up to our house.

Well, one by one over the fall and winter we lost all five of those pines to Japanese beetles, which apparently love that type of pine. Nothing we could do about it except cut them downóeach in turn as the months passed.

That sort of sucked, but I didn't pay it much mind . . . until the special little tree that sits between our house and driveway started to show signs of stress this spring. It's a small, decorative tree that we always dress up for various holidays. The kids all love this little tree because numerous birds have nested there over the years, plus it's where we stick our bird feeders in the winter, so we can watch and identify all the types that come there to feed.

It wasóin shortóour family's favorite tree.

Well, about the time I took Em in for her annual blood work, I noticed that the leaves on the tree were slightly tinged with red, as though they had entered their fall bloom.

A couple of weeks later when Vonne took Emily in for her annual x-rays, the leaves on the tree had mostly blackened.

By the time Em and I left the house yesterday for Providence, virtually all of the tree's leaves had rotted and fallen off, clearly indicating its rapid progression toward death. Apparently, it had suffered the same sort of "fire blight" that had decimated our tree back in Virginia ten years ago.

Now, I knew that all of Em's diagnostics were good, but the angst and the old feelings of dread were hard to deny as I drove the route to Hasbro.

And yet, the news was just as positive yesterday as it had been that July afternoon in 1994: Emily has reached a real turning point in her long-term survivorship. Her oncologist at Hasbro said that as a ten-year-survivor, Em has reached the point where the possibility of reoccurrence of her original cancer is virtually nil, so we'll be dialing down the diagnostics to just blood and urinanalysis, plus a biannual tracking of her heart's development and lung performance as she grows into adulthood. In sum, he said, it was time to start treating Em as completely cured.

No, I didn't chop down the tree the minute I got home last night, and I don't plan on shaking my fist at the sky any time soon eitherónot with this China adoption trip looming.

Still, it was nice to feel like we had moved Em off of one worry list just in time to make room for another young girl to take her place. We've been extraordinarily lucky to have kept her these ten years, but we'll take as many more as we can get. Same will hold true for Vonne Mei Lingóno matter how many dead trees I may bump into on the long journey between Rhode Island and Jiangxi Province.

Here's today's catch:

Slow but steadier progress in Iraq

"Early Steps, Maybe, Toward a Democracy in Iraq," by Ian Fisher, New York Times, 27 July, p. A1.

"U.S. Seeks to Provide More Jobs and Speed Rebuilding in Iraq: A focus on large projects has been criticized as wasteful," by Erik Eckholm, NYT, 27 July, p. A7.

The knock on NOC's

"Paying the Pumper," J. Robinson West, Washington Post, 23 July, p. A29.

"Scrutinizing the Saudi Connection: Questions the 9/11 commission left unanswered," by Gerald Posner, NYT, 27 July, p. A19.

Let's see . . . plus up foreign aid or search every cargo container?

"At Nation's Ports, Cargo Backlog Raises Question of Security," by John M. Broder, NYT, 27 July, p. A12.

Good coffee is one thing, good leaders another

"Rwanda Savors the Rewards of Coffee Production," by Carter Dougherty, NYT, 27 July, p. W1.

China-Taiwan: the ties that bind often chafe as well

"China Raises Economic Heat on Taiwan," by Jason Dean, Wall Street Journal, 27 July, p. A15.

The inevitable public debate in Japan on foreigners

"Tokyo urged to open doors to foreign workers," by Mariko Sanchanta, Financial Times.com, 27 July, found on story.news.yahoo.com

Slow but steadier progress in Iraq

"Early Steps, Maybe, Toward a Democracy in Iraq," by Ian Fisher, New York Times, 27 July, p. A1.

"U.S. Seeks to Provide More Jobs and Speed Rebuilding in Iraq: A focus on large projects has been criticized as wasteful," by Erik Eckholm, New York Times, 27 July, p. A7.

As Allawi the interim prime minister continues his efforts at establishing stability across Iraq in the face of a fierce, multiheaded insurgency, quiet but widespread efforts continue toward a legislative branch. Right now there are political caucuses convening all over Iraq to pick upwards of 1,000 delegates to a national convention next week in Baghdad. That convention is designed to select a smaller, 100-seat council that will play watchdog to Allawi's government until the full national elections are held in Januaryóat least that's the plan. If the elections get delayed, this council could be a little bit more than "interim."

Of course, the caucuses are so much more than a delegate-picking scheme, they are the first real chance for organized political dialogue on a local level. Yes, many hardcore groups refuse to participate, but Allawi's government pushes ahead and it is right to do so. Waiting for everyone to get happy isn't democracy, but a recipe for political paralysis. Plus, since the process is so new for Iraqis, better to let them get through these sloppy first attempts prior to instituting a permanent constitution, slated for voting in late 2005.

Plenty of groups that refused to participate in Allawi's government are at least participating in this process, and that's a positive sign.

A long journey, no doubt, but these are positive first steps. That positive, small victories approach is how we should have approached the rebuilding process in Iraq, but typical of the Pentagon, we planned big, hugely expensive projects.

Rick Barton, an expert on such reconstructions at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in DC (and host to my talk there last month) puts it simply:

The projects have been way too large. Building large infrastructure is not usually what you do first in a post-conflict society. You need to get things going in the right direction, and the process will pick up speed later on. If you try to build pyramids in the beginning, it will suck up all the money.

Plus, going the "big contract, big contract" route means the funding goes primarily to large multinational corporations, leaving local Iraqis with little sense of ownership.

If keeping it small but beautiful makes sense politically, then it should make sense economically too.