Thursday, September 24, 2009 at 12:38AM ARTICLE: U.S. Company and China Plan Solar Project, By TODD WOODY, New York Times, September 8, 2009
Premier Western alt-energy firm partnering with a Chinese firm that receives generous gov subsidies, to produce energy over there.
Thursday, September 24, 2009 at 12:36AM ARTICLE: Big U.S. Bases Are Part of Iraq, but a World Apart, By MARC SANTORA, New York Times, September 8, 2009
A good glimpse of how it will be for the long haul in terms of presence in Iraq.
The usual details: nothing to do in off-time, the third-nation workers, and living apart from the locals by and large.
But until Iraq gets strong enough and stable enough internally, this will be the barely accepted (on both sides) norm.
Thursday, September 24, 2009 at 12:35AM ARTICLE: Pentagon Keeps Wary Watch as Troops Blog, By JAMES DAO, New York Times, September 8, 2009
I think Caldwell is on the right side of history here. I expect retrenchments on a regular basis by the bureaucracy, but it will be a losing battle over the long term, despite the operational security issues.
Thursday, September 24, 2009 at 12:32AM ARTICLE: Driver Texting Now an Issue in the Back Seat, By MATT RICHTEL, New York Times, September 8, 2009
I purposely picked the BB Storm because it's impossible to text with one hand, solving this issue for me.
Thursday, September 24, 2009 at 12:29AM ARTICLE: Barack Obama and free trade: Economic vandalism, The Economist, Sep 17th 2009
Economist jumping on crowded bandwagon re: Obama's protectionist stance over Chinese tires.
Best part of argument is found at the end: does this obviously political cave-in suggest less than vigilant concern over budget deficits?
Expect the Chinese to be concerned on that score as well.
(Thanks: Michael S. Smith II)
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 5:15PM On just now with Michael Oren, who is spinning mightily as Israel's ambassador to the US (predicting Iranian nukes will soon enough threaten US cities) and a Rabbi (who was sometimes good, but quick on the Hitler analogies), and Zakaria acquits himself quite nicely with a series of reasoned arguments re: Iran.
The man certainly tries.
As much as I think CNN has declined precipitously in recent years, Zakaria is a small island of intelligence in a vast sea of blowhard mediocrity.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 2:50AM Just a call-out to my sister-in-law's site. Susan married my eldest brother Jerome, for whom my youngest son is named. Susan and Jerry are godparents to my eldest child, who's a very talented artist in her own right (her prize-winning self-portrait hangs in my office and she's got enough of web presence in terms of her anime and fiction that's she's recognized by fans at fantasy/comic conventions--in costume, mind you; but no, she won't let me link to her work just yet . . . and she's impossible to find without her handle).
Sue has been active in the art world since before I met her in the summer of 1985 upon my return from Leningrad. I detoxed with her for a week at Fire Island (too many Lucky Strikes and too much Stolichnaya in the USSR over the summer), where I held onto her arm for dear life whenever we ventured out (it was my first exposure to an openly gay community--not just individuals or clubs but an entire universe!; as the father of non-straight teenager, I now look back on the experience as downright quaint and provincial).
At that point Sue was primarily an agent, and later in the year I got to traipse around with her, visiting her various artists (imagine "Rent" without the cool numbers and everybody far less attractive) in various seedy locations around NYC. Sue located an original painting of horses done by a noted artist that we still hang in a place of pride upstairs in our youngest daughter's bedroom.
Sue later went on to do a lot of bead work herself (we possess one of her best works: a tiny shopping bag done up as the U.S. flag), often working with found objects (we used to hunt for and send her early industrial shoe lasts). Sue also paints. We have a gorgeous watercolor of a single orchid hanging in our dining room. It's as entrancing as anything you've seen from Georgia O'Keefe.
Perhaps counterintuitively, Sue became a photographer after losing the use of one eye a while back, and she does a lot of amazing shots of neon signs, often capturing neon through shooting them in reflection in large-size pane windows, thus capturing through the window and off the window (these are my favorite works of hers, and we have an especially good one handing in our master bedroom). Lately, she's been shooting a lot of T-shirts on the streets of NYC.
The T-shirt shots are cool, but definitely check out the neon. Those shots are so fascinating that you cannot believe they're not photoshopped (and my favorite ones of hers are not even on the site). Her manifesto explains her approach:
After Neon
John Szarkowski said a photograph is not what a picture is of but what it is about. My photographs are about desire, which is the fundamental motivation for all human action. It is the desire for pleasure which can be liberating and enhancing in opposition to fear. These photographs ask how do you express desire. They are a visual hunger founded in desire: illuminate enticement. They contain the signs and symbols that are desire's stock in trade, that create the atmosphere of delight where it is still safe to appreciate and like what is offered.
They juxtapose consciously and unconsciously elements of the real world with artificial light to create a new world. To delight in the images is to seek the pleasure of your own desires. They seduce you into examining and accepting your own hidden desires and agenda. They say don't be embarrassed to want, don't be ashamed to feel, don't be uncomfortable just to look. You don't have to explain: it ís all OK.
They take the demotic and public and make it private in a world dominated by financial, political and social fears. My images say lighten up and look around for what it is you want and can in fact have.
Anyway, very much worth checking out if you like such things. We'll keep Sue's link listed to the side with my wife's poetry and my beloved Packers (not so beloved after disappointing me and my kid last Sunday in Lambeau . . ..)
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 1:13AM Analysis: Lessons of Europe's history with terrorism, By Michael Goldfarb, GlobalPost, August 26, 2009
Worth reading. America's "Dirty Harry" tendencies here are counterproductive, because, in the end, you deal with everyone if you want the win.
(Via WPR Media Roundup)
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 1:11AM ARTICLE: Lord's Resistance Army terrorises Congo after Ugandan crackdown, By Xan Rice, Guardian, 14 September 2009
Broken record, this one.
(Via WPR Media Roundup)
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 1:08AM ARTICLE: U.S. Kills Top Qaeda Militant in Southern Somalia, By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN and ERIC SCHMITT, New York Times, September 14, 2009
Second crank on this one: note how all we need to police Africa in a "global war" sense is a few special ops guys, not a ton of bodies. But remember this as well, it's the effort of places like Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa (small piece, big puzzle) that build the security. Killing bad guys is always nice, but it ain't security.
So your answer is a bit o' Leviathan and a larger SysAdmin effort, understanding--as I have long argued--that the SysAdmin is ultimately more civilian than uniform, more USG than DoD (U.S. gov than Dept. of Def), more world (esp. China in Africa) than U.S., and more FDI than ODA (foreign direct investment than official developmental aid).
So this--again--isn't about a lot of military presence and spending.
(Via WPR Media Roundup)
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 1:05AM ARTICLE: China makes gains in its bid to be top dog, By Gideon Rachman, Financial Times, September 14 2009
A good argument on the fragility of rising China. Note, as it's becoming frequently argued, that China seems to be ruling in fear of citizens.
That dynamic does not a world power make.
(Via WPR Media Roundup)
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 1:01AM ARTICLE: Changing Conventional Military Balance in the Gulf, By Michael Knights, PolicyWatch #1577, September 14, 2009
Some counterbalance to the notion that rising Iran owns the Gulf militarily.
(Via WPR Media Roundup)
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 12:19AM POST: Conservatism And Afghanistan, By Andrew Sullivan, The Daily Dish, 08 Sep 2009
Disagree with Sullivan here: where America has gone and stayed, peace has come, not just to the country but to the region.
Now we're lured/forced by events to make similar efforts in parts of the world heretofore largely ignored or only temporarily/cynically addressed in the past.
Order will be applied to the region because the neighbors and the world have little choice but to address its shortcomings. That will take decades, but making it an American affair is foolish. We will simply have to accept the kindness of "strangers" more, especially those for whom this is the "front yard." The outcomes we will settle for will be sub-par by our standards, but the connectivity--also largely created and maintained by others--will come, and with the connectivity will follow the desired social change and associated political change.
But nothing can be imposed from the outside when the culture/economic/political gap is this large. We can't short-circuit history here, only speed it up. And we have to realize that while we may play bodyguard early on, globalization's advance will come through others and ultimately be defended by the same.
Again, if you can only stand for an American-style outcome, we never should have come. Both Left and Right tend to be childish in this regard--in the sense of Lenin's critique of those who wish for magical change. We have no need to match bin Laden's infantile thinking in this regard.
There are more than enough incentives to subdue this place, making it safe for women to act more like we believe they should be free to act and making it very dangerous--even deadly--for men who would have it otherwise. But we are being totally unrealistic on the incentives here--as well as the people most likely to respond to them in a manner we could eventually come to recognize as practical success.
The problem with Americans is that they hate to admit they can't do everything by themselves. And so we continue with this useless all-or-nothing debate.
We're not leaving. But we're also not going to be in charge of outcomes.
Remember those two realities and this will all go down a lot easier.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 12:17AM ARTICLE: Swiss topple U.S. as most competitive economy: WEF, By Sven Egenter, Reuters, September 8, 2009
Inevitable, given the crash, and a good prod to boot.
Switzerland needs a vote of confidence right now anyway, given that it's going to stop taking tainted money--a move I cheer.
(Thanks: Vonne Meussling Barnett)
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 12:15AM MIDDLE EAST AND AFRICA: "Iran's Revolutionary Guards: Showing who's boss; Iran's hard men purge opponents and line their pockets," The Economist, 29 August 2009.
The nastiness only grows: the Guard faction is taking over more and more of the government in the post-election fracas. The mullahs are being marginalized, a goal of Ahmadinejad's all along, I would argue.
Some see only the banishment of opposition parties, but the real putsch here is that the Guards are achieving a hegemony that will make them independently powerful. They simply won't need the illusion of mullah rule.
And please, spare me descriptions of how "nutty" and irrational these guys are. This is a mafia-as-ruling-party and little else--not a new beast and certainly not unfathomable.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009 at 1:30AM ARTICLE: Clinton Lays Out Iran Requirements, By MARK LANDLER, New York Times, September 15, 2009
I think the show-of-force requirement on our side here will be overwhelming, allowing the Iranians to act suitably enraged. That's why I think Medvedev did his recent hint on Moscow's openness on sanctions: Moscow has little sense these talks will go anywhere, so why not float it?
To me, this is a lot of time-buying, but little else. I don't think our hearts are in it and for good reasons: Israel plays its role to perfection, allowing Tehran to play us for time.
I see nothing here that tells me we're still not inevitably heading to Iran having nukes.
(Via WPR Media Roundup)
Tuesday, September 22, 2009 at 1:28AM ARTICLE: Despite Warning, Thousands Rally in Iran, By ROBERT F. WORTH, New York Times, September 18, 2009
Very nice showing two months after the election, proving to the ruling leadership that the opposition has both legs and a capacity to disrupt events normally highly advantageous to the government.
Very impressive, indeed:
Coming a day after President Obama announced a revised missile defense system that aims to check Iran's military ambitions, the rallies underscored the continuing vitality of the domestic opposition movement, which has rejected the election as fraudulent and fiercely criticized the violence that followed it.
In a striking contrast with earlier rallies, the police often stood on the sidelines as protesters faced off against huge crowds of government supporters -- many of them bused in from outside the cities -- and chain-wielding Basij militia members. There were reports of arrests in Tehran and the southern city of Shiraz, but no shootings or deaths, with the police apparently showing greater restraint than during earlier protests.
Yet another good reason to keep our missile defense responses as temporary and flexible as possible.
Especially sweet:
The protesters, ignoring stern official warnings not to use the annual pro-Palestinian rally as a pretext for demonstrations, showed up in large numbers wearing the trademark bright green color of the opposition.
When government men shouted "Death to Israel" through loudspeakers, protesters derisively chanted "Death to Russia" in response. Many opposition supporters are angry about Russia's quick acceptance of Mr. Ahmadinejad's electoral victory.
Most important, the students seem highly energized and not intimidated:
In the capital, the police and huge crowds of government supporters blocked most protesters from approaching Mr. Ahmadinejad as he arrived in a bulletproof car at Tehran University to deliver a speech before the formal Friday Prayer sermon. But as he began his remarks, chants of "Resign! Resign!" could be heard, according to witnesses cited on opposition Web sites.
All in all, this is progressing nicely.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009 at 1:24AM ARTICLE: Yemen: The world's next failed state?, The Economist, Sep 10th 2009
The driver for me mentioning Yemen in the recent Esquire column on dealing with rogue regimes. Inside the national security community, this scenario has been discussed for a while, although no one seems to have any clear ideas about how we could help.
(Via WPR Media Roundup)
Tuesday, September 22, 2009 at 1:20AM OP-ED: A 'weapons system' based on wishful thinking, By Andrew Wilder, Boston Globe, September 16, 2009
Good reminder that money alone ain't the answer, if it's perceived as being exploited by the local corrupt elite.
(Via WPR Media Roundup)
Tuesday, September 22, 2009 at 1:01AM ARTICLE: Russia's Reaction on Missile Plan Leaves Iran Issue Hanging, By CLIFFORD J. LEVY and PETER BAKER, New York Times, September 18, 2009
Key quote here comes from Mark Medish, with whom I attended the Russian Research Center's masters program at Harvard in the 1980s:
Much as in the Soviet days, Moscow's praise can be seen as a political kiss of death for Western counterparts. But the criticism misses the point that Mr. Obama has made a hardheaded calculation based on U.S. national security interests and strategic priorities.
Medish is a very smart guy who's worked Russian issues for a long time, serving high up in the Clinton administration.
We can't conduct relations with other great powers on the basis of caving in to our defense contractors' desires to sell, sell, sell. That would be the tail wagging the dog.
