July 02, 2008
I had no idea Nelson Mandela was on the terror watch list until just now, when I spotted this report that he was being removed by a bill today. South Africa's apartheid government had designated the ANC a terrorist organization...
June 27, 2008
Gotta agree with Hilzoy here. Kicking Russia out would be dumb. Trying to kick Russia out when you can't even make good on your word adds a whole new layer of dumbness. When it would anger someone were you to...
June 23, 2008
Yes, there does seem to be something missing from the logic of our former ambassador to the UN: So let me see if I have this straight: A country that is supposedly so irrational, reckless and religiously fanatical that its...
June 17, 2008
The American right's favorite Frenchie is slashing the size of his country's military, closing 50 bases, increasing spending on intelligence, and rejoining NATO's military command....
June 16, 2008
Is it just me, or was this story oddly under-reported? Big, multi-part operation, several guards killed, hundreds of Taliban prisoners escape ... and in yesterday's edition of the local paper it was reported on page 7D....
June 14, 2008
Mark Hosenball notes that the 3 top Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, all former presidential candidates, are "running" for Secretary of State - John Kerry, Joe Biden, and Chris Dodd. While Bill Richardson and others should certainly be...
June 12, 2008
Wow. Can you imagine something like this happening in the US? The Shadow Home Secretary, who generally ran to David Cameron's right in the 2005 race for the leadership of the Conservative Party, is resigning his seat in parliament in...
June 10, 2008
There's a lot of work suggesting that oil wealth hurts the cause of democratization, so perhaps it's not too surprising that apparently it also has a negative effect on women's rights....
June 06, 2008
"Unavoidable?" That's troubling, to put it mildly. Also troubling, this comment was made at the same time as meetings between Olmert and Bush in which Iran was the "dominant subject". I'd say we should fasten our seatbelts. And it's...
May 28, 2008
Huh. I missed this in last week's news, but it's a reminder of just how tense things are in Israel right now. Tony Blair came within moments of being killed when two Israeli fighter aircraft threatened to shoot down a...
May 23, 2008
Interesting - so Pakistan is better for them than Iraq, like Kenya is better than Somalia....
May 21, 2008
The keys according to the New York Times: Lebanon will finally get a president, but Hezbollah will have veto power over the new government.One wonders if Israel's peace talks with Syria are tied to this. And will John McCain denounce...
May 09, 2008
Awful news from Beirut. The battles spread within moments of a rare news conference by the leader of the Shiite Hezbollah movement, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, who effectively endorsed the use of violence by his supporters against fellow Lebanese. This is...
May 02, 2008
And Labour takes a beating all over....
60 judges, including the chief justice, are to return to their jobs. That would seem to be bad news for Musharraf - but good news for a freer Pakistan....
I assumed Labour would do poorly, but I didn't think they'd do this poorly: Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Labour Party was headed toward its worst local election defeat in four decades on Friday, fueling doubts about Brown's ability to lead...
April 28, 2008
That's the message Ben Smith sees in these pieces by the Boston Globe (on Hillary Clinton and Iran) and Fareed Zakaria (on John McCain's call for "war" against Russia and China)....
April 18, 2008
Larry Bartels had a column in yesterday's New York Times noting that it's not working-class people who vote at unusual levels on social issues - it's wealthier people. This holds internationally too right? The green revolution in Europe, or the...
April 09, 2008
April 06, 2008
Yeah, this really does cut to the chase, doesn't it: So, just so that we're clear on this. We are building an army full of people who are still getting pension payments from an organization that the U.S. has designated...
March 25, 2008
Yesterday Galrahn posted on the big increase in naval activity in the Middle East - "we find it noteworthy we are in the midst of the largest European naval surge to the Middle East in the 21st century and nobody...
March 21, 2008
Now this makes me happy, mostly at the thought that Richardson could be considered for a VP or other major foreign policy spot in an Obama administration. As you know, I have been less willing than Armand to commit in...
March 17, 2008
Yep. That's what you call it: The account that emerges from those interviews, and from access to previously unpublished documents, makes clear that Mr. Bremer’s decree reversed an earlier plan - one that would have relied on the Iraqi military...
March 13, 2008
Errrr, what are the courts in the UK smoking - they don't think there is systematic persecution of gays in Iran? That would come as a shock to the gays of Iran. Seems pretty clear to me if this teenager's...
February 19, 2008
China Hand does a masterful job of concisely analyzing the outcome of the election, and the different roads the near future might take. He's also got a nice map of the results. If you are interested in the topic this...
February 18, 2008
Sick, and yet sadly so predictable....
February 08, 2008
This will be somewhat obscure, 'cause I don't want this to be public (this will make sense; just read on).I've been invited to have dinner with a gentleman being inducted to this august University's Alumni Hall of Fame (or whatever...
February 07, 2008
From the people that President Bush prances around hand-in-hand with ...An American businesswoman was carted off to jail by religious police in Saudi Arabia for sitting with a male colleague at a Starbucks in Riyadh, the Times of London reported....
January 26, 2008
Charli Carpenter discusses the unique position of the Vatican here, and raises an interesting hypothetical. It's true the Holy See has the ostensible status of a state for the purposes of multilateral treaty negotiations. It sits on deliberations over UN...
January 18, 2008
They are building a French military base in their country, and constructing copies of Lyon and the Louvre....
January 17, 2008
No. Not even close.In the wake of the president's visit to the region Abu Aardvark has a post up that includes lots of links that point to increasing and improving ties between Iran and the GCC monarchies. And about the...
December 21, 2007
And apparently US criticism played a part in their decision. Japan dropped the planned taking of 50 humpbacks - which have been off-limits to commercial hunting since 1966 - at the behest of the United States, the chair of the...
December 13, 2007
Actually, that's not a bad idea. Hey, if nothing else it's a bit of insurance against the killing blow to our image abroad that electing another Republican in November would be. And it's not like Vice President Cheney hasn't presented...
December 10, 2007
That's Robert Farley's advice, and it's good advice. Just about any nuclear program can be negotiated away. Iraq gave up its nuclear program (as well as its other WMD programs) years before the U.S. invasion of 2003. Libya began steps...
December 07, 2007
That's what Gerald Posner is raising. And while I'm not often given to thinking there's much to "conspiracy theories" the deaths of those princes have always looked really peculiar....
December 03, 2007
It appears that the intelligence community still hates the Bush administration. Oh, and that Iran's nuclear weapons program was halted 4 years ago. A new assessment by American intelligence agencies concludes that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003...
The leaders of March 14 are extremely annoyed, and Hariri wasn't even informed, but pressure from the French, the Egyptians and the Saudis was enough to get a new president elected in Lebanon. Joshua Landis has the story and a...
While there could be more going on here than meets the eye given the intricacies of Iranian politics, the New York Times sure doesn't show us that. In fact, it's just the opposite. They paint this turn as bleak and...
November 30, 2007
Bring us your poor, your tired, your huddled masses, afraid of being tortured in the United States: The United States is not a safe country for refugees, the Federal Court said Thursday as it ruled that Canada will no longer...
November 25, 2007
It's a sign of how far the US has moved in the last decade that the current and former heads of Israel's highest court are noting that Israel is much better at protecting human rights than the United States. Of...
November 24, 2007
On handshaking: Some politicians (I won't name names, but you know who I mean) won't shake Hugo's hand. It's not that Sarkozy thinks Chavez is a great guy or an example of good governance, but that he appreciates that Chavez...
November 14, 2007
This detailed post is almost a week old, but well worth reviewing if you are interested in Israel/Palestinian issues. Long story short, the Israeli government is actually in a surprisingly good position to approve further deals with the Palestinians when...
November 12, 2007
Via Majikthise, we find nuclear security lacking in South Africa: A brazen attack by four gunmen on the Pelindaba nuclear facility has left a senior emergency officer seriously injured. ... He was shot in the chest when the gunmen stormed...
November 01, 2007
Apparently men can't be raped there - which may come as a surprise to the men who are raped there. Ah, the power of language and identity ......
October 26, 2007
Sure we've been annoying them no end of late - but maybe giving them two Perry-class frigates and two minesweepers (3 for free, one at a greatly reduced price) will take the edge off that a tiny bit. Looks like...
October 20, 2007
If an unchecked presidency and human rights violations are okay for the US, Russia wonders why it can't engage in similar practices.And yes, perhaps Secretary Rice should have thought twice before going there....
October 18, 2007
Or "How Osama Bin Laden Beat George W. Bush".Yes on occasion good articles can be found inside The New Republic, and this one is insightful. The general tale is familiar, but the details are enlightening and deeply depressing....
October 15, 2007
That's what John Cole seems to think the Democrats are up to. I think that's flat-out wrong. If the Democratic leadership in the Congress really wanted to end war in Iraq there are several other things they could do that...
October 07, 2007
The rule of law (or what looks more like it to American eyes) is coming to Saudi Arabia....
September 26, 2007
Josh Marshall thinks that more or less what happened yesterday. Among those voting "yea" on Kyl-Lieberman were Hillary Clinton, and 3 of our 4 regional senators (Rockefeller, Casey and Specter).UPDATE: Apparently most of the worst language in the amendment was...
September 19, 2007
And yet again an anti-Syrian lawmaker appears to have been the target. He was killed, as were several others....
September 16, 2007
I'm no expert on the leaders of the LDP, but it's interesting how quickly the press and analysis has turned regarding Prime Minister Abe's successor. In a few days it's gone from Aso being a sure thing, to it likely...
September 12, 2007
Posted without comment, from the Economist (p. 14): A recent glance at the Low Countries revealed that, nearly three months after its latest general election, Belgium was still without a new government. It may have acquired one by now. But,...
September 07, 2007
So any thoughts on why this is coming out now? My first thought is to influence the debate over the "Petraeus Report". Agree? Disagree? As far as the effect he has on US policy debates this is sort of interesting,...
September 06, 2007
Joe Klein notes something (in the midst of a very depressed column about the latest Republican presidential debate) that I pretty much never hear in discussions of the possibility that Iran would launch a nuclear attack against Israel:... the fact...
September 02, 2007
In terms of who I read on occasion, I seem to disagree with Matt Stoller more often than any other lefty blogger. And I think this would be another one of those cases. What exactly is so terrible about divesting...
August 28, 2007
This is one of those mornings when I hate Connecticut Republicans. Why oh why couldn't we have had Sen. Ned Lamont instead? Instead we get the frothing at the mouth, unglued from reality war-war-war rhetoric of Sen. Joe Lieberman. Ugh....
August 27, 2007
Greek authorities are discussing whether the fires ravaging the country could be considered to be terrorism: Dimitris Papangelopoulos, who is responsible for prosecuting terrorism and organized crime, ordered an investigation to determine "whether the crimes of arsonists and of arson...
August 21, 2007
I imagine this is going to be Obama labeled as 'inexperienced" right? (Yes, by the same people's whose "experience" has led to the wildly successful US foreign policies we have seen in Iraq and ... Cuba) Accordingly, I will use...
August 16, 2007
It's hot (back into the high 80s, with approximately the same humidity); I'm tired (I start teaching three classes on Monday). Thus, I'm cranky. Consider this a wrap-up of the things I have muttered to myself this past week. If...
August 15, 2007
Victor Davis Hanson is famously stupid (as has been pointed out again and again by the folks at Lawyers, Guns and Money), so maybe he really did mean "paper tiger". That would fit with his general habit of making assertions...
August 12, 2007
Feeling safer yet? Al Qaeda is the strongest it has been since the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, a new U.S. government analysis concludes, according to a senior government official who has seen it. Despite a campaign...
August 11, 2007
Literally. For the life of me I'll never understand why this doesn't get discussed more in the media's discussion of what victory entails, or whether the US can "win"....
August 10, 2007
In a surprise to no one, any domestic political party the US tries to help in the Middle East loses in democratic elections. Thus, the US is bringing democracy to a region that is systematically voting against us. Gee, wonder...
In all the back and forth over the supposed Obama/Clinton brouhaha over Pakistan I'm really surprised that I never saw this brought up. As to the case in Lebanon, it's highly troubling though also completely predictable....
August 07, 2007
President Karzai believes Iran is helping his country. To that President Bush responds ... well, I'm not sure. Can you make this out? "The president knows best about what's taking place in his country, and of course, I'm willing to...
August 01, 2007
Marc Ambinder discusses the foreign policy agenda that Sen. Obama is laying out this morning.,/p> As President, Barack Obama would order attacks on terrorist camps in Pakistan even if its president, Gen. Pervais Musharraf, refused to give permission and would...
July 30, 2007
Don't you know that Condi Rice and Bob Gates are just thrilled that our UN Ambassador made these comments just before they visit Saudi Arabia? I presume the administration planned this, but talk about a way to make some difficult...
July 28, 2007
$50 billion. Massive increases in arms sales to both Israel and the Persian Gulf monarchies - that's what we need to bring about peace in the Middle East, right?...
July 27, 2007
In today's New York Times: WASHINGTON, July 26 - Three years after President Bush urged global rules to stop additional nations from making nuclear fuel, the White House will announce on Friday that it is carving out an exception for...
July 04, 2007
This is the kind of story that has huge international implications, but which I imagine the US media won't cover at all. I mean it's much more important that we see pics of high school bands and great big flags...
July 03, 2007
Has anyone noticed that Britain's response to the round/wave of bombings is to use the law, arrest people according to the law (technically, they can "hold" them for 28 days before arresting them or letting them go, but the law...
July 02, 2007
George Packer (who wrote a great book on Iraq last year) also has a blog over at the New Yorker. He muses about Phil Carter (who runs Intel-Dump, a great military blog), who has served in Iraq and now feels...