Somewhat apropos of my frenetic jog through the jumble of Sinophobia below, I just had the unfortunate luck to witness a commercial concerning animal rights advocacy wherein those who adopt abandoned animals are referred to as parents - pet parents, as the voice over, without a hint of shame, happily repeated several times. It's really hard to defend the interests of the West when our lauded freedoms lend themselves to being enslaved by such idiocy. Sure, gotta take the good with the bad, that's the whole point etc etc - but c'mon, pet parents? Embarrassment for our sad lot near drives one to tears.

Interesting - China putting new restrictions on exports of rare earth minerals - heard explanation for this that I hadn't heard before and is the one that seems to make the most sense - they want to force companies who depend on these metals to locate their production facilities in China - suggestion made that this motivation behind recent mega deal GE just made with China - it's a startling and disturbing dynamic - since all companies who deal in rare earth metals are high tech not only does China manage to add to its soaring industrial base but it also, probably more importantly, gains access to coveted technology. I know people like to think or imagine or fool themselves into believing that these shifting currents may rock a few boats but need not send anyone hurdling overboard into dark and deadly waters - but I just don't see it - not that I can put this foreboding into any concrete terms at the moment - it's really just a feeling in the bones - but this massive and, in relative terms, precipitous transfer of wealth and technology and jobs from the democratic West to the autocratic East, that at best is simply a function of neo-mercantilism and greed operating beyond the purview of the voting public and potentially against their best interests or at worst a devious plot to undermine US power - tell me, how on earth does this possibly not lead eventually to either confrontation or appeasement or outright surrender?

Related - China has rolled out prototype of fifth generation fighter. Just in the last month it has been revealed that China has developed a new ballistic missile with much improved guidance system, have started work on a second aircraft carrier, and now have a fifth generation fighter [or, given its size, possibly a bomber] in the pipeline. None of these developments were mentioned in recent Pentagon analysis of current state of China's military. Reminds me of an argument I had recently with a liberal trying to make case that since relative to US China's defense expenditures are quite modest ours should accordingly be significantly trimmed - I countered that: one, the particulars and fundamentals of our long term strategic goals are different from theirs and therefore you can't measure capabilities strictly in terms of dollars and cents; two, how does one quantify what 50 billion buys you in China versus what it gets you in the US when it comes to military capacities; and, three, regardless of that we have absolutely no idea what China actually spends on the military - all  we know for sure is that what they say they spend is a lie. On that last point at least seems I was right.

Watch to see if Russia ends up supplying the engine for this J-20 stealth fighter - if so would mean they have given up trying to compete with China as the go to source for America's enemies of military technology and are just going to get what cash they can out of the mugging - since they know what ever engine they supply is simply going to be reverse engineered and then replaced - or it could mean they've entered into an interesting partnership with China that will almost certainly complicated American interests down the road.

update: WSJ has article up about the huge GE deal - no mention of role played by access to rare earth metals - but skinny is that GE has essentially handed all of its civilian aviation technology and manufacturing expertise over to the Chinese in a joint venture with China's new commercial jet company in the hopes that this will give them access to the Chinese market and all the other markets China has influence over [all those places that hate America]. Essentially, GE has sold its soul to China Inc for a boat load of cash, access to vast amounts of easy credit and the hope that China Inc will not completely screw them over a few years down the road once they've mastered the technology and manufacturing techniques. Boeing must be just thrilled by this because you know sure as shit once China has a reputable commercial jet, subsidized by the gov't, that can be manufactured at a fraction of Boeing's costs, that not only will Boeing never have equal access to the Chinese market but they will also start to be squeezed out of markets across the globe.

Look, I don't know nearly enough about business on this massive scale to pass judgement on how sound or unsound the deal is - but, c'mon, does anyone really believe that this is about anything other than GE, no doubt worried about a competitor making this deal if they don't, taking the short term benefit of the upfront cash and then embracing the long term delusion that China Inc can be trusted not to screw them over? Haven't they just sold China a pretty new knife and now get to wake up every morning hoping it won't be turned on them or every other American business that stands to lose from deals like this? Do we now see Boeing and Airbus make similar deals thinking, we don't trust them but if they develop a viable commercial jet company we're screwed no matter what so might as well take a chance and hope it pays off? Worst case scenario, what happens to the advantage America has and is completely dependent on in defense technology if cheap Chinese jetliners do to Boeing and related high tech industries what cheap Japanese cars did to GM and Ford? And take the military factor a step further: why should America continue to spend billions on a powerful military stretched across the globe to ostensibly serve and defend its interests if the chief beneficiary of this largesse and sacrifice turns out to be China? And if they conclude that indeed it makes no sense, what happens then? Can anyone actually see China stepping up and filling the role America holds now on the international stage? And even if they do, to what end and for the benefit of whom? America? Or petty dictatorships in Africa, the Middle East, South America, Eurasia? The bargain the world made or was asked to make with America was: embrace freedom, democracy, open markets and as we prosper, you'll prosper too [yes, the actual arrangement was a wee bit messier than that, but the underlying principle still promised far more positives than negatives over all]. What message is China sending to the rest of the world that is in any way comparable to that? The message China is sending is: if you're an autocracy and have a large pool of poor to draw cheap labour from, here's a way you can get rich - but wait, on second thought, we still have one hell of a lot of poor here in China that need something to do... and the decadent West can only buy so much crap... so why don't all you autocratic pricks out there just sit tight and in exchange for the buckets of cash we'll send your way you'll give us your natural resources and promise to keep your mouths shut.

Naw, I'm not liking any of this.

From a STRATFOR brief about START:

In the end, the issue boiled down to this. START was marginal at best. But if President Barack Obama couldn’t deliver on START his credibility with the Russians would collapse. It wasn’t so much that a New START would build confidence as it was that a failure to pass a New START would destroy confidence. It was on that basis that the U.S. Senate approved the treaty. Its opponents argued that it left out discussions of BMD and tactical nuclear weapons. Their more powerful argument was that the United States just negotiated a slightly modified version of a treaty that Ronald Reagan proposed a quarter century ago and it had nothing to do with contemporary geopolitical reality.

Passage allowed Obama to dodge a bullet, but it leaves open a question that he does not want to answer: What is American strategy toward Russia? He has mimicked American strategy from a quarter century ago, not defined what it will be.

That roughly approximates my feelings, no? Close enough.

"... it's the tendency of democracies, broadly speaking, to under estimate security needs and marginalize looming threats; paradoxically, as far as America is concerned, it's the tendency of great powers to constantly be fretting about enemies. Accordingly, no opinion expressed by either camp that wants to claim we're spending too little or too much on defense is perfectly right or perfectly wrong. I would contend, though, that given the great responsibility that has fallen to America as defender of the Western tradition and, as Europe fades, its increasing isolation in that regard, that we're probably better served by an over estimation of needs and an eternal vigilance against complacency.

Certainly, given America's commitments within its global strategy, it's much cheaper to stop wars before they start than to try and win them once the bullets are flying - which is why we have two carrier groups in the vicinity of North Korea right now and will soon likely have three. That's expensive - but given our goals much better to have the capacity than to be found wanting come crisis time..."

Could be I'm just whining about the 'liberal press' - I used to think all complaints about the liberal press amounted to dyspeptic whines but since my own POV has shifted increasingly rightwards I can see that we dyspeptic whiners have a point - but how is it Obama is being lauded for the passage of START as if it represented some wholesale victory for him over the forces of evil? Even those who supported the treaty agreed that it was essentially an innocuous document that could only do real harm if were rejected and caused us to lose the Russians [a dubious claim since as far as I'm concerned we don't really have them] - so it's patently absurd that the press covers this thing as if Obama has saved American foreign policy from certain ruin. Not to mention that republicans got what they wanted - it's just as much a victory for them! The right wanted money put on the table for modernization of the US nuclear arsenal and wording to the preamble of the treaty changed so as the ambiguity of it couldn't be manipulated by Russians in opposition to missile defense - and that's what they got. Yes, many on the right are still not thrilled by the treaty because they see it as a sell out to the Russians for the spurious if not delusional goal of gaining their cooperation viz Iran - but as Robert Kagan shrewdly points out in the Washington Post this morning had the republicans aborted this treaty democrats could have blamed them for the eventual failure of the Iran engagement policy - now, when negotiations with Iran inevitably collapse and Russia is revealed to have been less than helpful in that regard republicans can point to Obama and say "you see, your whole approach to foreign policy was naive".  

Sure, if Obama, given his new circumstances, is sincere in trying to play the Clintonesque moderate [something that will be hard to do since Clinton actually was a moderate and unlike Obama owed no great favours to the uber lefties] then yes this amounts to a modest victory for him in that context - but that's not how the liberal press is characterizing it - to them this is a reborn, remade Obama rising gloriously in decisive victory over the dark side.

Jennifer Rubin, who was a favourite blogger of mine when she was with Commentary and now is the token right wing blogger for the Washington Post [remember their last 'right wing' blogger turned out to be a lefty ideologue], seems to share my bewilderment at press treatment of Obama's recent successes.


addendum: apparently I was wrong, the preamble language wasn't changed, Obama merely sent a letter to congress  promising to defend missile defense, as it were - since the document is virtually useless anyway I don't know if this matters - if Obama doesn't follow through on defense of missile tech he'll be toast - and if Russians threaten to pull out of the treaty because of missile defense, do we really care? The diplomatic dance with Iran will be over by then and since that's the only real justification for the treaty [and a shallow one at that] it won't really matter if the Russians object to our missile defense plans. So it comes down to was there more to gain or lose by letting Obama have his treaty? If so I think I still agree with Kagan's assessment.

Krauthammer has an article in the Post today basically saying that Obama has resurrected his presidency with these legislative successes, that a mere two months removed from electoral slaughter that Obama is back from the dead because of the Bush tax cuts extension, DADT and START. I don't see that. DADT, sure, liberals love shit like this so his base is mollified, but this was a fait accompli, democrats could have lost every contested seat in the midterms and this was still gonna pass - the writing was on the wall, Gates was behind it, Mullen was behind it, Petraeus was behind it, polls suggest Americans don't mind it - this was gonna happen so I'm not really sure it's such a big win for Obama there, e3specially since the tax cuts, which the left absolutely despise, were anything but a fait accompli. START? Sure, a win, but modest and short term - and it's such a bad treaty that if there's no progress on Iran come 2012, or if worse they have actually tested a bomb, well, whoever is the GOP candidate in 2012 will be able to beat Obama over the head with this treaty nonstop - this treaty will become an albatross for him if the Russians don't play nice and Iran gets the bomb: I just don't see how you get any long term benefit from a treaty that even its supporters believe is of limited value and of absolutely no value, in fact negative value should Iran continue merrily on towards nuclear glory, which I fully expect them to do [although Stuxnet has changed the math on those calculations][and let's not forget we'll know by then if Medvedev is running for reelection or whether we'll be seeing the return of Putin - if it's Putin this treaty is absolutely worthless]. As for the tax cuts, Krauthammer asserts they represent a huge win for Obama viz independent voters - but does he forget the language Obama used during the press conference when he announced the extension of the cuts? He was disgusted that he felt he had no choice but to agree with the extension, he summoned the language of class warfare and he promised without reservation that first chance he got he'd be raising taxes on 'the rich'. I don't see how a performance like that lifts your reputation as a moderate - sure, there's short term benefit for him - but during the 2012 campaign I would guess its a virtual certainty that that press conference will come back to haunt him - or is he thinking: the economy will be improving by then, I can always fool independents into thinking I'm a moderate, after all I've done it before, and if I can get the lefties believing that if they just support me again I can deliver on all their 'make the rich pay' dreams, then I'm golden - if he manages to do that I'll almost have to start admiring him - still disagree with him for sure - but if he's that cunning [or cutthroat] an operator you'd really have no choice but to admire it in some way. On the other hand, it'd really just be the incarnation incarnation of Chicago styled political machinations at the national level, so not that revelatory actually - I mean his whole campaign for the presidency was marked by these kind of cynical calculations - Afghanistan, the post-racial uniter, the economic moderate, the restorer of America's reputation to the wide world, the florid speeches to lure people into the comforting fantasy world of him as the anti-Bush - all just a lot of nonsense to gain power - still not clear if it was simply power for power's sake, in his case the celebration of ego, or if he/they truly are motivated by a leftist agenda and all these calculations a manifestation of Alinsky in the Oval Office. After all, his seeming post election embrace of Clintonian triangulation could suggest either scenario is true, ie they're playing for time in hopes of a dramatic turn around in 2012 at which point they will start the revolution all over again; or they're desperate to avoid the scourge of history wherein the first black president would also be tagged an abysmal failure.

Apparently now I'm a homophobe or worse because I don't share the mindless enthusiasm of those who imagine the repeal of DADT is a landmark moment in the nation's history. Look, I essentially support the repeal of the law, the timing could have been better but all in all the fact remains we seem to have arrived at the point where one's sexual orientation is probably of little importance as far as military service goes, if only because gays are hardly the target demographic when it comes to recruiting state sanctioned killers of 'bad guys'. But I view the repeal with a somewhat jaundiced eye for two reasons: one, the way advocates dismiss possibilities of negative fallout from this decision is troubling - these people are either idiots or in the delusional grip of an ideology - as in a professional sports culture, but much more so in a military culture, homosexuality will remain a stigma and aside from re-engineering the species there's not much you can do about that - but if activists within the gay rights movement, who essentially seek an absurd reality wherein no existential differences are noted between gays and non gays, if these ideologues are not happy with the mere repeal of the law and wish to do away with the stigma as well, then you're gonna have problems, possibly big problems; and secondly, the huge disconnect between the insignificance of the cause of gay rights to the overwhelming majority of the population and the amount of attention the agenda garners from the press is both frustrating and galling - and this disconnect is multiplied tenfold when you're talking about the military where maybe 1% of the enlisted population is gay and of that 1% possibly 50% could care less about DADT and will probably remain 'closeted' because coming out just ain't worth the bother - and yet listening to the press you'd think the repeal of DADT has saved the military from an inevitable and ignominious decline.

It's an absurd state of affairs when doing the right thing legitimately seems to be so wrong - I mean, I support the repeal but at the same time I'm shaking my head and thinking what a ridiculous lot of creatures we are.

"... to say McCain is on the wrong side of history is not the same thing as saying he is wrong in the absolute, as Mr Ricks seems naively to assume - those who opposed the hyper liberal agenda of Johnson's great society were in a sense on the wrong side of history but many of their warnings of problems ahead still managed to be quite accurate. There's a reasonable chance that the same will prove true for those who oppose the repeal of DADT.

It will all depend on how politicized the LGBT agenda becomes or attempts to become within the military itself - the inclusion of women never became a huge problem because extremist feminist ideology was waning and therefore the military was allowed to deal with the cultural shift on its own terms - you never had women picketing outside army bases demanding that the girls get to serve on the front lines etc etc - but the extremism of the LGBT community is cresting - this is a highly politicized left wing ideology which is as a matter of course at odds with the governing ethos of the military mind - sure, Americans are increasingly ok with gay marriage etc  but that's because they are blandly ignorant of the extreme 'scholarship' emanating from the supporting activist community - if this agenda seeks out a confrontation with the conventions of a military mindset - in other words, if the issue becomes politicized within the military - you will have a problem.

I only talk with Marines so I don't have much of an idea as to how the other branches of the service feel about the repeal of DADT - but what I hear from Marines is they have no real problems with this, just so long as 'an agenda' isn't shoved in their faces - if you start forcing these boys to sign up for 'sensitivity' training etc or start punishing them for letting a 'faggot' drop in reference to a washout recruit etc or if the leftist sensibilities of LGBT community attempt to gain a proselytizing foothold within the ranks or impose an exogenous liberal agenda on the military so as to make it conform to the new found rights and needs of gay service members - well, then you're gonna have some unhappy grunts, regardless of the anodyne blandishments of advocates like Mr Ricks..."

So congress pushes through repeal of DADT - I won't necessarily call this a mistake - more frustrating annoyance, since the issue is so marginal as to verge on meaningless - 32,000 Marines were discharged last year for various reasons, most having to do with 'weight' problems - of those discharges a mere 78 were from violations of DADT - of those 78 half were amongst new recruits most of whom were probably looking to get the hell out of the corps after the grind of basic - the overwhelming majority of the 40 or so remaining DADT discharges involved junior personnel possessing modest skill sets - in other words, contrary to impression the MSM would like to sell, the US military was not bleeding valuable talent because of DADT - the entrenched socialization norms of heterosexual male bonding within context of military service was it seems after all not posing a grave threat to the defense of the nation - turns out that the fact that some god fearing jarhead farm boy from Idaho maybe had a little trouble dealing with thought of Billy over there liking his conjugations irregular did not actually represent a gross ignorance undermining viability of the entire service.

But, of course, that's to be facetious and ignore that we're dealing with a larger civil rights issue - or not. The small numbers involved, much smaller than appear in a sampling of the general population, pretty clearly indicate what's really at play here is an agenda - this has nothing to do with an egregious abuse of civil rights or of the inherent ignorance of stereotypical hyper male-dominant heterosexual socialization sapping the military of the vital resource of highly skilled homos - whoops, that's offensive. This was all about a political agenda that has nothing to do with the abuse of rights nor the efficient management of the military - and that's why it annoys people not gullible enough to be swept up in the simplistic politics of it all - it's a marginal issue being inflated way beyond the significance of it's impact in order to appease an agenda that has nothing at all to do with the proper functioning of the military - a reality made evident by a prominent liberal blog that today asked: will the 14,000 gays released since the inception of DADT now be eligible for reinstatement? Not once do they seem to wonder: how many of that 14,000 actually wanted out of the military and used DADT as their excuse; why would the military want people back who broke codes of conduct? who have already demonstrated that they are willing to put a marginal agenda ahead of their obligations as a soldier? Point being, the liberal blogger is only interested in the politics of it, the agenda - the needs of the military itself are merely a side issue.

The silliness is that I don't much object to the repeal of DADT - I agree with Max Boot who writes in Commentary that a year from now it will be a non issue, the US military will simply carry on business as usual. Still, you open the door to this liberal sentimentality and you really can't be sure what nonsense crawls in with it.

Did we just win a stare down with North Korea? They said they'd make a lethal response to any South Korean artillery test and then backed off and did nothing - so, we win, right? No. The dynamics of escalation are now set and nothing that has happened here changes those parameters - therefore, barring a fundamental change, something bad will happen - whether it's a week from now or a year from now no one knows - but the dynamics of escalation are now set and so barring a fundamental change, which will almost certainly have to be precipitated by China [which I don't see happening] shit will eventually hit fan.

Looks like new START treaty will now pass - I'm not a big fan of it but as both opponents and supporters have pronounced it is ostensibly in essence such an innocuous treaty [from our point of view] that putting up a fuss about its passage could easily do more harm than just giving it a pass, flaws and all - but that's what troubles me - there seems to be an assumption here that we need Russia viz Iranian nukes and that aborting the treaty would jeopardize that arrangement - but that argument only makes sense if: one, you believe Iran can be negotiated out of its nuke plans [I don't]; two, you can trust Russia as a good faith champion of our positions in negotiations with Iran [I don't]; and three, you believe bargaining with Russia from a position of weakness, no matter how innocuous the traded article of faith, can actually work to your advantage at some point [I don't - I think Putin sees things always in terms of superficial projections of strength and weakness - this is true of dictatorships in general, but especially of ones lacking in any real, concrete power - we think we're horse trading whereas Putin is not interested in horses at all]. My point is, that arguing that passage of this treaty does no real harm but rejection of it could lose us Russia as an ally against Iran only makes sense if we agree with Putin about what's being traded here - otherwise you're just giving away something for nothing and encouraging those already given to seeing Obama as weak.

That being said, there could be intelligence out there that suggests that although Putin is indeed a scoundrel rat, Medvedev in fact isn't and, more so, that his power is not merely illusory and entirely dependent on Putin and therefore the man is worth being courted - in which case, I could probably find myself reluctantly in support of the treaty - or rather, the treaty's passage - the treaty in and of itself will never amount to much.

In an Economist review of a book called 'Red Capitalism' wherein the book's authors, two American bankers who have worked extensively in China, claim that the Chinese economic miracle is in many ways a facade behind which hides a great deal of dysfunction and inefficiency - a point I have often made [although I merely guess at this reality rather than state it authoritatively, having not the expertise etc] - anyway, in the review there's this paraphrase of another point the authors make:

As the book details, the whole business of providing, receiving and regulating money involves one state entity or another. It may be in China’s overall interest for the system to open itself up, but doing so would pit the government against itself. That will not happen without commitment from those on top.

This is a looming dynamic that I've referenced before: it's naive to imagine there are not problems lurking beneath the surface of Chinese styled capitalism; but to solve and reform these problems before the advent of a crisis will require the massive Chinese bureaucracy and its leaders to take significant risks which will probably imperil their privileged place in the community - therefore it's naive to believe they will willingly take on these risks; consequently, when the crisis comes, whether it's 5, 10, 20 years from now, the most likely response will not be reform or self reflection but rather an embrace of avoidance and the casting of blame somewhere else - America, no doubt. Certainly, a lack of reform will imply that America and China will be engaged in an increasingly tense competition for influence, not only in Asia, but across the globe - and therefore blaming America will hardly seem a desperate leap to the Chinese people, especially since a chauvinistic stoking of Chinese nationalism will no doubt accompany the emerging crisis.

This is why I tend to be a China sceptic.

A curious correspondence discovered, that is probably somewhat over wrought and unfair to Obama and his acolytes - but reading about Hayek and the evolution of his thoughts in the run up to and during the course of WWII, you find this quote from Beveridge, Hayek's socialist nemesis: "A revolutionary moment in the world's history is a time for revolutions, not for patching" - in other words, let's not waste this opportunity the devastation of war has given us by simply rebuilding the old capitalist system - time to summon forth our socialist utopia! Sadly Beveridges thinking largely carried the post war day and England would have to wait for the arrival of Thatcher 30 years later to undo the damage caused - but one is struck, a bit unfairly I admit as a measure of the hubris involved, at how Obama and his utopian crew, coming into power on the heels of a devastating crisis of their own, thought in similar naively idealized terms: here's our opportunity to remake America into something our socialist brethren in the academy will recognize as enlightened - the awful compost of capitalism has made ripe the field - Hope and change! - or as Rahm Emanuel would later repackage it, never let a good crisis go to waste. 

This interesting and a wee bit funny in that 'ain't life a bitch' way - thievery is prevalent in China - from corporate piracy all the way down to your average street hustler - there's a culture of stealing and the Chinese actually have a word for it that I've read but in no way can remember - but it's a recognized existential reality of 'the Chinese way' and those who write about China's inevitable rise as an economic power often cite this cultural attribute as a potential loose rung waiting to upend this inevitable climb to the top - certainly Western business interests, eager to reap a China windfall, are increasingly aware of and troubled by this Middle Kingdom tendency to greet you with one hand while stealing your wallet with the other - the WSJ just ran a fascinating article on how Russian military trade is in serious decline because the Chinese have taken advanced Russian military tech they've purchased over the years, reverse engineered it, and are now selling it as 'original' Chinese hardware at greatly reduced prices. Not surprisingly I guess, intellectual property rights are not much valued in the land that Mao built [but still a bit amusing that the former Marxists are being screwed this way by the not so former Maoists].

All disturbing enough if one counts themselves a China sceptic - which I do - but here's where it gets a bit funny: 70% of all software, including operating systems, in use in China, whether by private individuals or government employees, is pirated and China's officialdom has either openly or by their silence condoned this illegal activity - but now the potentates of erstwhile Peiking have decided that's a bad thing - not because they've had an epiphany that maybe it's good policy to frown upon the stealing of the copyrighted and patent protected products of others - that they don't seem to give a fuck about [no doubt thinking it justifiable payback for years of colonial abuse - but that's comparing apples to oranges when comsidering long term implications of each culture's approach to banditry - think, paradoxically, 'rule of law' and 'rights of the individual' before that law]  - but rather because pirated software is highly vulnerable to being compromised by viruses etc. In the age of Stuxnet [Iran used pirated software and hardware in nuclear components Stuxnet targeted] and WikiLeaks this gapping vulnerability has got the boys in Beijing just a little bit on edge - and so they've started up a campaign to try and pry all this pirated digital booty away from the parsimonious purloiners - good luck with that - as one analyst said it would be like trying to turn America into a country of commie loving atheists - ain't gonna happen.

Still, all joking aside, the consequences of this cultural clash, which points to a fundamental divide between the US and China concerning perceptions of how a modern society, that seeks to wield great power, should and needs to function, could prove quite problematic.

"... not to defend Friedman who is among the shallowest of the 'deep' thinkers out there - but he's a macro guy, likes the broad, attention getting stroke - and therefore misses a lot - as in a business revolution grafted onto a retrograde political culture can mutate into something ugly, which is exactly what happened in Ireland - but that does not therefore mean the free market ideals motivating the Celtic tiger were in and of themselves 'bad' or 'wrong' - of course Mr Ricks as a socialist thinks they were and that explains this post - but Friedman makes the same mistake when he rhapsodizes about China: the 'capitalist' miracle there suits his book selling talking points and so he tends to go vague or 'hyper macro' when discussing the attending retrograde political and social cultures that, as in Ireland, are like to cause the 'miracle' to morph eventually into something grotesque if not reformed as well.

The telling quote about Ireland came from an Irish business man who said: it's an indication of how horrible things were before 'the revolution' that as bad as things look now we're still better off for the change. I remember visiting Dublin as a student in the 80's and being shocked by the dozens of dirty faced kids lining O'Connell bridge begging money from 'rich' foreigners - so I'm willing to bet that somewhat counter intuitive declaration is in many ways true..."

So little of value to say... but feel obligated to point out, viz the current reiteration of unending North Korea crisis, that I guess it was three or four years ago, when Lil' Kim test fired a multi-stage ballistic missile provocatively out over the Sea of Japan and there was much discussion concerning whether or not the US should shoot it down - believe it was I who said that although it may seem like a damned if you do, damned if you don't scenario, it probably really isn't, and for two very good, palpable reasons: one, it's imperative, when it's in our power to stop them from testing nuclear components and thereby perfecting those components and thereby moving closer to the feared end state, that we do so - otherwise you will end up leaving yourself ultimately with only two rather unpleasant options - military intervention or capitulation [although capitulation likely eventually leads to military intervention so the choice is in a way a false one]; and two, failure to call Lil' Kim's bluff will lead to escalating provocations which in turn will lead to increased chances of a serious miscalculation on someone's part which will in turn lead to perception that military intervention is necessary - and that is exactly what has happened - the North miscalculated [China too I guess we can say] and the South now feels compelled to openly talk of 'war'. Both sides are now perched in positions that make backing down hard to contemplate [this danger reflected in China's rhetoric now hardening rather than softening - realization that their credibility as a regional power is between rock and hard place - give in to US pressure and they look weak and diminished - maintain a hard line and they look unreliable and threatening]

Not that if we had shot down that missile all this could have without a doubt been avoided - but it reminds me that we often choose the riskier option thinking it the less risky only because the negative consequences of not choosing it are more easily imagined. It's the same mistake we're making with Iran - it's easy to imagine the serious fallout of a military intervention and therefore people assume that the military option must be the worst choice - whereas in reality an effort made in imagining alternate scenarios reveals that the military option, although quite obviously fraught with significant dangers, could easily prove the least bad of the few credible options out there.

Of course one wants and needs to be circumspect - rushing to war is truly a hazardous game - but by the same token I think it's important to acknowledge or at least remind ourselves of the unappealing reality the world tends to throw at us and admit that rushing away from war also carries with it the threat of significant and terrible consequences.

Turns out that Turkey's foreign minister's Phd thesis was on how the political cultures of the West and Islam are incompatible, in that Islam's institutions are inextricably informed by the stultifying homogeneity of religious considerations while the West's are inextricably rooted in the liberating dynamics of secularism - which certainly validates and further explains my cynicism viz Turkey's recent actions and gestures towards Israel and Iran - but also I think in large part, as regards my views concerning the problems of Islamic culture and Sharia, relieves me of the charge of racism leveled at me by naive liberals who in the cloistered darkness of their political correctness can see no motive for culture based criticism other than that of racial prejudice inspired by fear and hatred. It reminds one that liberals tend to feel first, then think - their 'ideas' must first pass through this emotional filter that has more to do with delusional notions of identity than it has to do with reality. [likewise, it was this abject foolishness of liberal sentiment that caused them to characterize as racist me and others like me who early on predicted that an Obama presidency would bring more bad than good and could very well end up a disaster - liberals simply could not even conceive of the idea that someone might reject the great man for reasons not vitiated by gross ignorance and racism - they couldn't conceive of it because in their ever narrowing minds it amounted to a revealed truth that electing a black man who so eloquently espoused their philosophy to the presidency of the United States was a glorious affirmation of their world view and therefore a glorious affirmation of the enlightened creatures they imagined themselves to be].

addendum: related, also turns out EU has recently passed 'anti-hate' legislation that now makes it illegal to say anything negative about Islam - so if you were to quote something from the Koran or something an Islamic leader had said and in the course of a critical analysis of this something were to extrapolate an opinion deemed negative you would potentially be breaking the law - although apparently if you were to quote something from Exodus or from a Papal cyclical and after critical analysis were to extrapolate something negative that would be just fine. And needless to say what I wrote in the above paragraph would classify me as an irredeemably hateful person in the EU. What Gertrude Stein once said of the dissolute Parisian arts scene of the 20's I now say of Europe as a whole: you are all a lost generation.

"... here we go again - there was no 'real' reason to go to war with Iraq - except since the end of hostilities in 91 everyone approached the Iraq problem as if another war would eventually be necessary - it was a war of choice, we all understand that - why is that being treated here as an astounding insight?

Bush et al 'lied', or rather, were not entirely transparent, or rather massaged the truth in service of an agenda - again, this not unusual - Lincoln did it, FDR did, Churchill did it, hell your boy Obama just did it re Afghanistan if Woodward is to be believed, committing troops to a war he quite obviously no longer believes is 'good'  and 'necessary' - taking liberties with the truth and war always have and always will go hand in hand. I'm not saying this is a good or bad thing - I'm just saying acting, as liberals do, as if Bush invented the idea of being less than honest in the promotion of a war strategy indicates either a disingenuous or hysterical point of view.

The question is was America specifically lied into a war by Bush and the boys that it had no business being involved in, a much more serious charge and one that Shelton seems to be making - but that charge would only be valid if America had no vital strategic interests in Iraq and had outright lied about WMDs merely to, for instance, steal oil - none of which is the case. What it comes down to rather is an interpretation of events and how one interprets events very much depends on one's ideological predisposition - to a liberal like Ricks the answer is obvious and thus his promotion of Shelton's book - but for a realist based conservative it's not so clear - we were already at war with Iraq and a quite rational although by no means unimpeachable case could be made that to put an end to it now while the opportunity presented itself would serve well our long term interests - that Rumsfeld screwed up the war plan has very little to do with whether the war itself made sense, a distinction liberals constantly fail to make.

But whether they lied about WMDs to sell the war - that case is closed, it's clear they [and many others] actually believed they were there - where the 'truth' starts to slip away is when they claim that WMDs were what the war was about - they weren't, they were merely the pretext - the war was always about dramatically changing the strategic map of the Middle East - but again liberals always conveniently ignore that distinction because because 'lying about WMDs' is a much juicier story.

Again, did Lincoln ever tell the country or the soldiers fighting the Civil War that they were making the great sacrifice in order to secure the commercial interests of the North? Or that after so many had died to free the slaves that he hoped, right up until his assassination, to eventually ship them all off to Panama because they really weren't worth the immense trouble of keeping them around? How one interprets these things is all about ideological prejudices - what Shelton's are, I don't know - Mr Ricks' are not in doubt though..."

"... absent from the general's analysis is fact that Obama chose the war in Afghanistan as part of a cynical, short range political calculation - he did not embrace the conflict because he had a clear sense of how to fight it or why to fight it or what the strategic consequences of fighting or not fighting it might prove to be be - he chose 'the good war' because in order to beat Hillary and then Bush he needed to conjure up a militaryesque, commander in chief persona for himself that he could sell to both liberals and independents. Is it any wonder then that Obama doesn't know what he's doing, is at a loss when it comes to making real world military decisions? Or that maybe he's vulnerable to being pushed around by his generals because they know exactly what he is - a naive political opportunist who on a purely rhetorical level leveraged his facile opposition to the war in Iraq and support for the war in Afghanistan to promote his grandiose ambitions?

But regardless of that why exactly is it we want to assume that Biden's plan wasn't rejected for reasons of political expediency? I mean anyone who has followed the intense debate within the military about COIN knows why Petraeus et al would have had little time for Biden's plan - but why do we then assume that Obama was boxed in by the Petraeus vision of COIN? Seems to me rather that Obama was boxed in by his own naive embrace of the war in Afghanistan and that made Biden's small, contra Petraeus, endless CT engagements without clear victory version of the war politically untenable.

The left wing media has consistently misread and misrepresented Obama on war - he's been unduly lauded for his opposition to the war in Iraq as if his stance there was logical and nuanced and full of strategic brilliance [which it wasn't] and had nothing at all to do with savvy political calculation [which it absolutely did] - and likewise with his embrace of the war in Afghanistan during the primaries which the left has never either acknowledged or understood was all about political considerations. Take the long gestation period for the current Afghanistan policy: the distended process is always presented as a reflection of a studious Obama being so engaged on the problem and so wanting to get it right - but to me the drawn out process is more a reflection of Obama either being way in over his head and therefore unable to make a decision or, once again, the manifestation of political calculation ie he knew the policy would not sit well with his base so he had to give the impression it was the result of deep and profound soul searching and the application of an academy approved intellectual rigor - in other words, the long gestation period was a charade.

It's high time people accept the fact that Obama is a con artist - which happens to make him a very good politician and certainly I've never denied that in a very limited way he's a damn good politician - but the presidency demands leadership and Obama's no leader, and I didn't need Woodward's book to teach me that - it's been obvious since that celebrated keynote address in 2004 what the man's about and only the ideologically deluded should be surprised that the dream has been seriously roughed up by the unforgiving hand of reality..."

Hillary as Obama running mate in 2012? I don't think so - yet someone's floating the story. Trial balloon? Why on earth does someone think she'd entertain an assignment like that? To be set up as the successor in 2016? No way any party these days wins three presidencies in a row so that ain't it. She is herself an Obamaphile and will do whatever's necessary to preserve the cause? That would shock me - what wouldn't surprise is idea of her going to bed every night reveling in the sweet revenge of watching Obama disappoint all and sundry. Naw, this is either some rogue story or maybe something Obama's people have floated to test response [possibly from Hillary herself] since they're no doubt fretting about Dear Leader's chances in 2012.

update: Hillary has come out and firmly denied it.

History has given China this moment to do what Japan could not. The Japanese did not seriously attempt to rebalance until their economy was well-developed, ossified, and allergic to change. So when the jig was up on their longstanding economic model, rather than rebalance, Japan unraveled. In this sense, the global financial crisis was serendipitous for China. By reminding China's leadership that relying on exports means depending on unreliable foreigners, the crisis put the pain of rebalancing in perspective. It is not out of altruism that we have seen renminbi appreciation accompanying Chinese wage hikes and other rebalancing measures. A slight loosening of controls over media and finance could be in the offing. Deregulating the service sector might be a frightening political proposition, but perhaps less so than not having one when the exports dry up.

A good article comparing the economic malaise Japan has become to the economic malaise that possibly awaits China if they cannot put into place lessons to be learned from the Japanese collapse - the point being China largely borrowed their current thriving economic model from Japan's once thriving economic model and therefore is liable to make the same mistakes or become vulnerable to the same miscalculations and endemic inefficiencies. It's that notion of inefficiency considered along with the prescription of increased freedom in the last two sentences above that interests me. no one's gonna deny the exponential growth in China - likewise, though, I imagine few would suggest that this particular 'great leap forward' is or will prove any more efficient then the great leaps of Mao and company that preceded it. China's economy, like Japan's before it, is at the moment served well by it's authoritarian, top down, heavily bureaucratized command approach to capitalism not because of the efficient, innovative, dynamic attributes of this approach but rather because once an autocracy decides to wrangle its vast resource of cheap labour and turn it loose to feed off the bloated carcass of consumerism, well, the prospects for growth are immense because the amount of untapped potential is immense - but nothing about that suggests that the resulting marketplace and the allocation of capital within that marketplace will be dynamic and efficient - in fact command economies always end up inefficient, wasteful, corrupt because the marketplace the bureaucracy is responding to is artificial - is in fact a creation of the bureaucracy itself - like 'the bridge to nowhere' times a billion. And this is what interests me - the economics is complicated and what the hell do I know about economics anyway - but this is what interests me: in order for the Chinese economy to continue to prosper and eventually stabilize in an efficient and rational way the bureaucracy that now commands it will have to relinquish its power so that freedom can work its magic - but tell me, why would anyone believe this bureaucracy will willingly do that? Isn't it much more likely that this bureaucracy will resist change and assiduously try and rationalize that resistance? And isn't likely that the communist party will gladly assist in the manufacturing of this illusion? Once the inefficiencies are revealed the causes will have to be addressed or covered up - but addressing the causes will lead to great disruption, possibly even social upheaval, and the loss of power by many who now have it - for them won't the only option be then to cover it up? I've always said that the greatest achievement of democracy based on individual liberties is that it upends claims to absolute power and therefore not only makes dynamic change palatable but even desirable - thus the miracle of America. The Chinese miracle on the other hand is a creation of the state, not a product of the people - it will not embrace change easily.

If the Stuxnet worm is of Israeli origin [which seems increasingly likely] and America knew of the plan and possibly even collaborated on the execution [one strongly suspects part of that at least true] then does this change my opinion of Obama's Iran appeasement policy? Possibly, not sure - given the extreme sophistication of the virus [when well seasoned cyber war wonks are referring to it as 'incredible' and an 'absolute game changer' you know it's serious shit] but given the sophistication of the project it must have been a long time in the works and therefore any American collusion or participation would have been inherited by Obama from Bush - and so one could see the appeasement initiative as a ruse possibly, which would be interesting - or Obama feeling the impending sabotage of Natanz afforded him the time to play at diplomacy, which would be less interesting and remain vulnerable to skepticism - but I don't know. Remember Bush was criticized on the right for his somewhat soft Iran policy - but I guess we can assume that he too was guided by a wait and see approach since I take it no one could really be sure how damaging the cyber attack would be - Iranian HEU production is down about 25%.

Curious though that the virus showed up first in China and Russia which seems a bit odd since the virus apparently was coded to specifically attack Natanz  - now, this probably just a reflection of the enabling role they play in Iran's nuclear ambitions and therefore the vulnerability to infection that goes with that - still, one wonders - the targeted industrial hardware almost certainly came to Iran through China since the company that produces the hardware never sold it to Iran [in fact I believe the selling of it to Iran may be prohibited] - if Israel created the worm they would have to know which hardware was being used - obviously their intelligence services could find this stuff out - still, knowing how much China is investing in cyber warfare, what if this is them running an experiment in large scale industrial sabotage that they can conveniently blame on Israel? Seems rather far fetched - I ain't ruling it out though.

I'm amazed, well, struck by how many [liberals] want to make the argument, as they do with the GZ mosque, that the average in this case Muslim is no threat to America, means us no harm, as if this is a compelling argument - since when it comes to autocracies, tyrannies, it doesn't matter what the average person thinks or says or does - that's what makes these things autocratic. We all know that most Iraqis did not like Saddam, a great many Iranians are not fond of the theocracy and sure as shit almost all North Koreans aren't thrilled by Dear Leader and etc etc. Therefore, sticking with the mosque example, one must see that the problem is not Muslims per se, but rather Islam because Islam needs to be theocratic, it depends on an autocratic imposition in order to function in true accordance with its tenets - the average person, to be put it coldly, just doesn't much matter. Now, sure, no doubt many Muslims, especially in western societies, don't really pay attention to the theocratic imperative of Islam just as many Christians ignore a great deal of the agenda their Christ was selling - but that doesn't matter - the mullahs and attendant reactionaries and revolutionaries believe in it, it's important to them, and in a culture that has known nothing but theocracy and dictatorship or some bastard child thereof like phony democracies that are mere fronts for endemic corruption, what the mullahs et al believe is all that matters. So, again, a little amazed that so many make this argument as if it's cogent - or rather, struck by how many supposed 'experts' do not point out the flaws in the argument, do not seem to understand or fail to make the distinction that we're talking about systems, not people - and that makes all the difference.

This why I tend to, if not entirely support, at least strongly sympathize with the French ban on burqas - at some point one must ask the quite logical question: if an outsider enters a culture and says they accept and adopt the fundamental principles of that culture and yet insists on behaviors that are both at odds with those fundamental principles and lend credence or legitimacy to an opposing system of fundamental principles, at what point does this political aberration become a problem? Again, France is 10% Muslim, America .5% - certain elements in America may want to pontificate about intolerance in France etc etc but if America woke up tomorrow and was suddenly 10% Muslim attitudes would change dramatically - and that's because although the constitution is a progressive document advancing and protecting many rights and freedoms and America is consequently a very open and tolerant society that does not therefore imply that anything goes - it does mean you get a lot of latitude just so long as you willingly embrace certain fundamental principles but it is not a license to arbitrarily create new laws and conventions [or in the case of Islam regress to antiquated ones] - and there's a subtlety here that people either don't get or choose not to see - because in a way in America virtually anything does in fact go up to a certain point - there's a lot of crazy or annoying or dysfunctional shit that just gets ignored because it's too small or insignificant or non-threatening to be noticed or cared about or be judged capable of threatening the greater whole - but that does not imply there's nothing fundamentally wrong with these 'aberrant' things - we may tolerate one Ashton Kutcher - if suddenly tomorrow there were a million of him, well... something would have to be done, right? Just because I may be obliged to tolerate the one Kutcher and the social contract that enables this tolerance may require such a loathed sacrifice from me in order that my own rights and freedoms be respected and held inviolable that does not therefore imply that Kutcherism in and of itself is a good or tolerable thing.

Interesting - Russia decides not to send promised game changing S-300 air defense system to Iran in compliance with present sanctions regime, or so they say. Seems odd if not questionable that after several years of playing chicken with this issue, keeping pretty much everybody wondering what their real intentions were and if there was a hidden strategy at work - seems dubious to me they just suddenly wake up convinced of what the right thing to do is. But what then? They trying to encourage a strike by Israel to drive up oil prices? Or is it really just a practical matter of them deciding that they'd have more to lose than gain by completing the sale?

Of further interest now will be waiting to see if China steps in to fill the void - their missile defense batteries are based on [stolen from] the Russian system so would probably prove an able replacement - but how would China view the long term strategic implications of such a move? They already are the most important enabler of Iran viz the nuke standoff - but the machinations of that game are fairly easily covered, buried behind rhetorical obscurantism - delivering a missile system would be a much more overt inserting of themselves into the political fun-house of the Middle East and could potentially be interpreted as an open challenge to America's dominance in the region.

Little starling to learn China controls a virtual monopoly over rare earth minerals, the elements required for the manufacturing of a lot of high tech stuff - including military technology - and has increasingly been limiting how much of it they make available for export - and that's making some people nervous - Japan's economy is dependent on rare minerals as is the US military.

So, let's see - China, America's chief rival for the next 50 years on several fronts, is by far the largest holder of the burgeoning US debt, which means they could basically shut down the American economy any time they wanted to - and they utterly control access to rare earth minerals, so they could conceivably shut down the American military anytime they wanted to - there are obviously mitigating conditions tagged to each of these threats, but still, the threats are hardly reduced to mere fantasy because of that.

This does not strike one as an optimal state of affairs for the US. Now, the US used to be the main source of rare earth minerals and so one imagines can address this strategic dilemma if they choose to [although there are apparently significant complications involved with mining this stuff, which is why they got out of the business in the first place] - and Japan and the US could start hoarding the minerals so as to build up a strategic reserve - but that begs the question: is China putting quotas on exports because their expansive manufacturing sector is increasingly hungry for rare minerals - or because by limiting supplies they make it harder for Japan and the US to steer excess into strategic reserves? The latter scenario would suggest to me a rather aggressive foreign policy lying in the weeds - and would seem to amount to a rather clumsy provocation since these minerals do exist elsewhere - so does that mean the intent here likely not strategic? or that China, when it comes to wielding it's new found powers, is indeed clumsy - autocracies layered with opaque bureaucratic structures do tend towards aberrant behaviour.

No one's commenting on how the midterm election will be big for me - as in if the republicans clean up as predicted and Obama doesn't pull a Clinton and embrace practical moderation like a long lost lover then that will mean or strongly indicate that my prediction of Obama not wanting to serve a second term is possibly correct since the only way Obama could possibly be re-elected in 2012 while continuing to govern from the left is if the economy stages a miracle recovery - but I don't even think that could save him if he's still perceived as a left wing ideologue. So big election for me - my reputation [imagined] as the most perspicacious [consistently apocryphal] pundit out there hangs in the balance.

I see Krauthammer took a shot a Palin today - essentially saying that she's responsible for that wackadoo getting the nomination in Delaware so she should go to Delaware and make sure the wackadoo gets elected otherwise she will have cost the GOP its chance at taking over the senate. I agree - everything I've read about O'Donnell [the wackadoo] makes it fairly clear that she's a carpetbagger, she runs for office repeatedly as a way of making a living - she's nuts - she obviously recognized the Tea Party's fondness for supporting 'unusual' candidates and exploited this compulsion to make one more unwarranted run at a senate seat so that I guess she can pay her rent for the next year - that's what I see - con artist.

What's curious is that only Rove and now Krauthammer have had the guts to step forward and state this obvious fact - everybody's afraid of pissing off the Tea Party - which means Palin really can't back track now, she's painted into a corner. If O'Donnell pulls off a miracle and wins, Palin looks like genius and she's on her way to the White House - on the other hand if O'Donnell turns into the electoral embarrassment that seems inevitable and thereby turns independents off of the GOP and improves Obama's fortunes - is Palin then toast? A very curious situation developing here.

update: right on cue Sarah takes to the teleprompter yesterday and grabs the challenge by the throat, sending out a rallying cry to all elements of the GOP to embrace the Tea Party so the party as a whole can be reborn and the country with it etc etc - again showing why only a fool would dismiss her - yes, she could be a not so bright, not so stable self promoter - or she could be in possession of political skills and instincts that put her on par with masters like Clinton and Reagan - it's not clear. So I see one of three things happening: O'Donnell turns into an embarrassment that spills over onto all Tea Party candidates and alienates independents and costs the GOP significant gains in November - this would be a disaster for Palin and probably bring her run to an end; O'Donnell doesn't win but does ok and more importantly does nothing to damage the reputation of other 'insurgent' candidates - that's a win for Palin because Tea Partiers will respect her willingness to take a risky stand for the cause; O'Donnell wins - huge win for Palin, will be impossible not to take seriously after that.

Don't pay attention to Ackerman anymore since his JournoList affiliation and activities were revealed.

The pursuit of COIN only makes sense if America plans on remaining the dominant economic and military power in the world - COIN only matters because of America's global significance and the foundation of that significance is conventional military power, not COIN - COIN exists because of conventional power - if that status quo cannot be maintained then COIN is ultimately a waste of time. Given present circumstances is conventional dominance coupled with unending COIN-like engagements really possible while China rushes forward with a valid plan to undermine the former without having to entangle itself in the latter? That's the real question to be answered, because if the answer is no then the ultimate winner in Afghanistan will be China, not us.

"... a truth commission is a public shaming designed to serve a partisan political interest and would have little to do with either the 'truth' or the clearing of the nation's conscience - in fact would probably righteously abuse the former and greatly aggravate and unsettle the latter - would certainly be an open invitation for partisans from each side to hurl rhetorical bombs at each other so why on earth you think that'd be good for the country - or more importantly the military - is beyond me.


Regardless, it's obvious you have a lot of military connections - but do you actually talk to soldiers? Cause the soldiers I talk to do not share your point of view at all Mr Ricks - granted they're all Marines and possibly therein lies the difference - but you sit down for a beer with these boys and start talking about a truth commission and they'll get up and leave - these guys have seen and done a lot of bad shit, the echoes of which still haunt them, I've seen it in their eyes as they tell me the stories - are you then suggesting it would be a good idea to call a truth commission to look into those 'facts' as well? So all consciences can be cleared and all hearts unburdened?


What exactly has to happen for you liberals to finally understand that the world has absolutely no interest in limiting itself to actions you deem appropriate?..." 

"... why do you speak of tolerance in absolute terms? Tolerance is always conditional - any idealistic expression of freedom and liberty etc is always constrained by practical considerations - any country no matter how tolerant it imagines itself to be will embrace 'intolerance' if the predominant culture begins to feel threatened. I've lived extensively in Paris - 20 years ago there was no arrondissement I would have considered a no go zone - that's not true today - and 20 years from now? Would you call France foolishly intolerant for, as any open society does, placing specific limitations on immigration to protect the integrity of a status quo? Conversely, would you consider France a shining example of enlightened tolerance if it just threw open its doors and said come one, come all and once you're here do what ever you want?

Conditions always apply to any expression of freedom and tolerance - America is so diverse and sprawling and fungible that it possibly can pretend that's not true, but it's always true - the people who settled this country certainly understood that, but with so much opportunity and space to exploit and with the threat of available cultural permutations so limited it was easy to pretend tolerance was in a sense absolute - that is of course until the predominant culture bumped up against a truly alien one in the form of aboriginals and proceeded to exterminate them - conditions always apply.

France and America may share an historical attachment to certain ideals - and we're all thankful for those ideals - but France ain't America and it's ridiculous to expect it to be - it's much smaller, it's cultural traditions much less diverse, and its shared sense of history much older and much more set in its ways. I've lived there and I know how proud the predominant culture is and I know for a fact they view Islam as a growing threat - the French may be particularly sensitive to this perceived threat but the fear of Islamification exists throughout western Europe, and it's not because of racism [although it'd be naive to think racism doesn't play a part - then again racism is just a fear of cultural dislocation] or a distrust of Muslims per se but because of a distrust of the inherent political demands of Islam  - European history is scarred by religious strife and that's because religion in Europe used to be highly politicized - the almost draconian secularism of the French constitution is an apt reflection of that - well, shariah by its very nature necessarily makes Islam highly political and therefore highly resistant to the adoption of Western norms [I mean if your faith is dependent upon the enactments and oversight of a political entity how can you accept a political entity that doesn't promote your faith?]   - and thus you get the fear -  awash in delusion in America you may view this fear as hysterical and unsubstantiated - but for Europeans it's real [although the fact that their poorly thought out post colonial immigration protocols created the problem does complicate ones sympathy]... you could put it this way - engage in a thought experiment - imagine that suddenly tomorrow every black in America or every Hispanic suddenly converted to Islam - do you really think the remaining 80% of the non-Muslim population would welcome the change and sing the praises of unending tolerance and comity between divergent cultures? You're living in a dream world if you say yes. Well, in about 30 years it's estimated France will be about 20% Muslim..."

I take a lot of heat for my praising of Sarah Palin - but that's the point, it's amusing how annoyed, almost insulted liberals become if you say you like her - I find that revealing - and the fact is she embodies certain characteristics, some bad, some good, that lie at the center of a realistic understanding of politics and power - so she does tend to fascinate me.

But I still think I'd be shocked and not a little alarmed by her actually running for and winning the presidency - I mean aside from making me look a bit soothsayerish since I did float such a possibility back when most were dismissing her as little more than an ignorant, bumpkin clown - but that brief sense of having one up on the supposedly much wiser punditry would soon recede behind some real concern.

For instance, apparently it was an endorsement from Sarah that pushed Christine O'Donnell to a surprise win in the Delaware republican primary for Biden's senate seat - apparently the GOP had a real shot of taking over this traditionally liberal seat - as long as they didn't nominate Tea Party favourite O'Donnell who, from what I've read, is either an absolute wacko in the far right fundamentalist religious zeal mode or an absolute con artist who sings whatever song she needs to sing in order to advance her 'interests', in this case feeding the Tea Party frenzy to it seems back anyone who doesn't sound, look or smell anything like politics as usual. And now it's thanks to Sarah that we got this girl, a person so vile that apparently even Karl Rove can't stand her.

And so the concern - but on second thought concern only if Sarah made this plunder out of ideological blindness or astounding ignorance or an impoverished sense of judgement - what if she made this 'blunder' as part of some cunning calculation to make herself even more of a hero to the Tea Partiers [but to what practical end if candidates like O'Donnell scare away independents]? Look, they might say, how our Sarah sacrificed her good name and put it all on the line to support the cause and send a clear message to the GOP establishment! What if she's that cunning? You see, that's why the girl fascinates me. [but, c'mon, you don't really think she's that clever - it's just more fun imagining that she might be, no? Could be I've invented a scenario for my own purposes that has very little to do with reality - I still insist that reading from the teleprompter there's few out there better and, like it or not, that's a significant talent to have - but removed from the security of a rehearsed performance she does come across as 90% ambition and self promotion and 10% substance - but then again I could say the same more or less about Obama - sure he has law school smarts in the sense he can remember a lot of details and weave them into circumlocutions that vaguely resemble something a truly eloquent person might say - but have I heard or read anything from him that suggests a profound understanding of the world and the people crawling across it? No - just sounds like another salesman to me, except that the product he's moving just happens to be himself and the self he is selling is the phony promise of a liberal transcendence neatly manifested in his post racial, transnational persona]

Mustn't confuse difference between speculation and theory - I can speculate on what Shakespeare was trying to say in Hamlet but it's impossible to know for sure - I can demonstrate why I think the fat Dane was meant to mean a certain thing, but I can't prove it - and because I can't prove it the interpretation is open to rebuke, often intense rebuke if the interpretation seems extreme - but of course the rebuke itself can also not be proved.

I had no problem with D'Souza's speculative essay - I took it with a large grain of salt, as all speculation should be taken with some seasoning - but that doesn't mean there was nothing there worth chewing on. After all, the Obama presidency invites speculation - I doubt any president in our history was elected on such whimsical, fantastical terms - one could read ostensibly intelligent writers pontificating on how the simple act of America electing a black man as president was not only going to forever change this country for the better, but change the world - that's pure, unadulterated fantasy and yet supposedly serious people were treating this wild speculation as if it were indisputable reality.

So take D'Souza's essay for what it is - not veiled racism [although I can't prove that] but rather as a somewhat distorted reflection of the times and therefore not without its merits. After all, Obama did write a rather emotionally drawn book about an absent father, so... Hamlet, I am thy father's ghost...

The Imam behind the GZ mosque has finally come forward to address the controversy but his views actually lend credence to the opposition - he says if he'd known the mosque would cause such unease he'd never have chosen the contentious location [this seems unlikely cause how could one not have imagined there might be problems with this] but he can't back out of the project now because that would provoke outrage in the Middle East. Sorry, but doesn't that amount to an admission that the concerns motivating opposition to this mosque are based on a reality ie that there's a problem with Islam, at least as concerns the political, consitutional, civil and cultural norms of the West? Appease our sense of historical humiliation and the absolutist needs of our faith or we'll start burning things to the ground - that's not a winning argument. I mean I'm sure progressives might buy into it cause they're afraid of confronting any problem that refuses to conform to solutions amenable to their sympathies - but the average American ain't gonna look too kindly on an offer to submit or die.

"... yes, I say Obama is anti-business... I mean, forget the fact that everything in his past suggests that is so or likely to be so... but ever since he took office the populist line from the administration has been the financial crisis is Wall Street's fault, bankers are evil, big business is all about greed feeding on the backs of poor workers... populist drivel... the fact is the crisis is a dog with three heads... banks took on way too much risk, gov't and the Fed actively encouraged this behavior and consumers - again, with Washington's blessing - excited by a mindless enthusiasm gladly lemminged forward and leapt to their credit engorged deaths... in short, we all jumped into this bed together and consequently we all got fucked... now, it would be nice if the president could distance himself from ideological pandering for a time and talk about what has happened in honest terms and thereby possibly restore some confidence to the marketplace... but of course these people are all about ideology, they don't believe in the marketplace, they believe in government and the enlightened guidance of an intellectual elite leading the oppressed towards the reformed beauty of an ideal future and the effulgence of a self serving glory that they can forever bask in, breathlessly congratulating themselves on their shared wonderfulness, like pretty girls all giddy in the court of the King..."

"... who's comparing Obama to Hitler and Stalin et al? The point was ideology tends towards delusion - and you people are delusional if you think America can remain a military giant while embracing soft, EU style socialism. The political contexts within which a powerful military can exist and thrive are very limited - and Obama's anti-big business, anti-Wall Street, redsitributive, trans-national, 'I'm here to redeem the evils of America nee the West's imperial/colonialist past' guilt mongering fantasy world ain't one of them. So people like you and Mr Ricks need to make up your minds: you wanna be the EU or do you wanna be America? History is pretty clear on the fact that you can't be both..."

It was always my impression that when the BP oil spill first happened that the Obama administration's initial reaction was to use the disaster as a prop for the continued bashing of big business and big money - saw it as an excuse to practice the crass anti-capitalist populism that was in keeping with the unsympathetic view of business in general that had marked their approach to the financial crisis since the inauguration - and only after it became apparent just how serious the problem brewing there in the gulf was did they start to tone down the populist politicking and ramp up the disaster response - but I never read anyone else characterizing the Obama response in that way so I wondered if maybe my impression was tainted by bias and forgot about it.

Thankfully though [well, it's really a small deal not quite in need of the giving of thanks] but thankful anyways for the concerns of my delicate ego Dinesh D'souza at Forbes has written a rather scathing review of Obama's antiquated anti-colonialist agenda and the delusional psychology behind it [in short, Obama has daddy issues] where he sees Obama's response to the BP disaster in much the same terms as I saw it. So... there ya go... a victory for me... small victory, true, but ya take what you can get.

Have I misunderstood what the establishment clause et al say about religion in America? It's clear Americans in general see their liberties and attributes thereof as representative of something bequeathed to them by a great and loving God and not as a victory for secularism - in fact a certain element in America would probably see secularism itself as a gift from God - and certainly there's an element that would judge secularism as evil, sinful and against the interests of the republic. So, yes, in a sense I've misinterpreted the meaning of secularism when it comes to America in general - it's possible the founding fathers would have understood the republic qua God in more enlightened philosophical terms, but America as a whole remains a fairly pious nation, or rather, tends to want to see itself in a context that blurs the line between secularism and religion when it comes to the founding principles of the nation.

Still, regardless, the evolution of secularism is fundamental to the Western tradition - it's virtually impossible to understand our sense of democracy, capitalism, individual rights and just laws without it - and that sets the West off very distinctly from Islam where Sharia is the defining context - and my whole point was that it's up to liberals to make that argument because conservatives are hindered by a base that puts everything in terms of a loving God - and what has disturbed me is the revelation that liberals are just as boxed in by their progressive ideology as conservatives are by their moralistic one - not that I was unaware of how left the left has swung - but to not be able to make the secularist argument here because you're afraid it runs against the progressive idealism espoused by Obama and his ilk? That has shocked me a bit - and it will lead to bad things - one extreme just provokes the animus of an opposing one as both fight for what the see as their survival - and so you get a church in Florida that plans to burn the Koran on the 9/11 anniversary - and the point is do I think this act is aimed at Muslims or liberals? I think the enemy here for this church is liberalism - this is the kind of insanity that ensues - the left failed to take up the realist, secularist argument when it came to the mosque, instead deciding to preach an extreme idealist left wing view that's at odds with the way a majority of Americans tend to see this issue, in fact seems disdainful of anyone expressing skepticism towards the Cordoba initiative -  and thusly the god wackos on the right are emboldened.

The crazy thing is that skepticism is an intellectual attribute one could associate quite naturally with a classically liberal point of view - I would consider a great skeptic like Hume as a perfect example of a liberal in the classical sense - and the mosque problem opens itself up to a classical skeptical secularist critique - and instead liberals can't run away from the problem fast enough. Quite revealing - in fact I would go so far as to say that the mosque issue has revealed in a most glaring way just how empty and detached from reality modern liberalism is.

History seems to suggest that for great powers [which America still is, much to the chagrin of progressives apparently] domestic policy and foreign policy are inextricably, unrelentingly joined - in fact America's rise to great affluence and power came on the heels of dramatic foreign policy initiatives - consequently, to aspire to the leadership of a great power and either not understand this dynamic or simply to be in denial of it causes one to conclude that such a person is a fool, dangerously naive... or has a hidden agenda.

So I take it Tom your brief parsing of Obama's speech to find a president unwilling to bear or uncomfortable with the burdens and frustrations of foreign policy concerns is your way of finally admitting that he is naive or a fool... or harbours a radical agenda hidden away from the public. Well done.

"... Avigdor is out to sabotage the peace talks? So in other words, if current peace efforts fail it will be Israel's fault. Have you not read Abbas' remarks made this morning to Palestinian press saying he doesn't feel any need on his part to compromise on refugee question, settlements, 67 borders, recognizing Israel as a Jewish state, division of Jerusalem etc etc? But of course if talks fail it will be Israel's fault.

As shrewd analysts in Israel always try to point out to the West which the West seems inclined to always ignore: it doesn't matter what Palestinian negotiators say to the western or world press - listen to what they say in their own language to the Palestinian and Arab press if you want a true picture of things.

Now, as to why the West insists on ignoring this rather obvious impediment when discussing the state of negotiations... well, I think we can take a few good guesses as to what that's about..."

Yes, seems that those who want to defend the GZ mosque insist on doing so in terms of the builders having a constitutional right to do so, which is entirely evasive - as if a bishop on hearing complaints that one of his priests is reciting pornography from the pulpit were to answer "well, you know, he has a constitutional right to do so" - or, since that tack ends in a doldrum, by extolling the lofty piety of the chief sponsor of the mosque, in other words, boiling all issues raised by this mosque down opaque rhetoric about religious principles as if the establishment and free exercise clauses were a victory for religion, were all about heralding the glory of God - but of course those clauses were a victory for secularism - our government and civic institutions and laws are secular and this secularism is the culmination of a western tradition that since the days of Athens had a view of personal identity and individual rights and the role and nature of absolutes and of abstract concepts and critical thought and governance and laws that was, although hardly an unbroken cloth stretching from Socrates to Jefferson - the weave was often uncertain and never far from troubles - but still, a tradition that signified at the very least a civilization and culture decidedly different from others that have come and gone and may still linger - especially the culture of Islam, which of course has no interest at all in keeping church and state separate or of allowing citizens the right to keep their beliefs or lack thereof private and free from censure by an absolutist authority.

Now certainly an elemental virtue of the Western tradition is the idea of tolerance - but of course tolerance has a limit - anything secular must be limited, must have boundaries in order to make any practical sense - there have to be lines you cannot cross, or rather, you can cross but things increasingly become unmanageable once you do - and building a mosque at a site that represents a great victory for Islam over the unclean West for those inclined to see the world in those terms is to have very definitely crossed a rather significant line.

And I don't buy this argument that to be against the mosque is to punish a whole culture for the radicalism of a few - extremism is always carried forward by a small influential group that manages to co-opt the sympathies of a larger group by exploiting favourable conditions within a specific population or culture - how many Germans followed Hitler to the bitter end despite not especially seeing themselves as true Nazis or sharing in the mad extremes of his racialism? When Philip sent the Armada against heretical England would it have mattered much if the average Spanish peasant saw little of themselves in his self aggrandizing religious zeal? When Lenin emerged victorious from the civil war not all Russians were suddenly Leninists, not even a majority would have called or seen themselves as such or actually have know what it meant if they did - nor would they have found themselves caring much what some obscure Jewish philosopher living a poor life in London a generation before had to say about capitalism and the historicism of Hegel.

I repeat, the inability for liberals to understand this very simple reality is astounding to me - and more astounding still I'm literally shocked that I have yet to read one liberal commentary on this insidious mosque that takes or seeks to make or even acknowledge the secularist argument - all you get from the left is obscurantist constitutional posturing and near puerile effusing over the inclusive, new agey ecumenism of the Imam at the heart of the controversy - oh, and of course their go to accusation, that anyone opposing the mosque must be a bigot. It's nothing short of an affront to the classical liberal secular scepticism of Hume et al.

A perfect example of this failing of liberalism in its modern incarnation - for I see it as nothing less than a failing - is that insufferable gadfly who founded the highly influential Daily Kos blog who has written a book called American Taliban where I take it he compares extremists on the religious right in America with the religious fanaticism of the Islamists - this is both obvious and meaningless to the point of being silly and will achieve nothing aside from causing many an earnest young liberal to nod head fervently in agreement as if they've been given the keys to everything that's wrong with America - as I've already said extremists, whether hatched on the left or right, tend to share commonalities when it comes to personality disorders, social traits, historical tunnel vision, cultural distortions and ideological intemperance - but my point is if you're a liberal and you're troubled by this aspect of American culture then why on earth would you not use the mosque controversy to extol and celebrate the secular nature of our civic life? Instead liberals try and sell an argument that may sound good in the staff lounge at the academy but does nothing but alienate a majority of Americans and entirely fails to address the fears most Americans feel, to some degree at least, when it comes to the nation's enemies in general and Islam in particular - not to mention does nothing to assuage fears middle America has when it comes liberals and foreign policy concerns - or to put it in more colloquial terms: completely missing the point on why the mosque disturbs causes many to wonder if liberals have what it takes to keep the nation strong - hell, makes many wonder if they even want the nation kept strong

Sadly, disturbingly, by failing to make the savvy non-idealogical argument liberals end up empowering disgusting populist charlatans like Glenn Beck who at his large Lincoln Memorial rally yesterday announced that the only way to solve America's ills, the only way mind you, is through appeal to the grace of God - and with the right wing base awash in this kind of messianic end of days bilge how does a moderate possibly win the nomination in 2012? Mitch Daniels looks like a very attractive option right now but how can a moderate like him possibly hold out if the base has decided only god can save the country now? This was always my worst fear concerning the nasty consequences of an Obama presidency [well, I had a lot of worst fears when it came to that - but this was certainly one of them] that his liberal agenda and the extreme liberal agenda embraced by the Daily Kos ilk that he drags in his wake would so piss off middle America that the country in over reaction lurches violently to the right. There are even some suggestions wafting from the sewers of that fringe that wonder if a Palin/Beck ticket in 2012 would be a good idea - I mean, how bad are things that one even has to worry about such a thing as being possible? I begin to despair that the only hope becomes that my outlandish [but there's a logic to it] prediction that Obama won't run in 2012 actually comes true and Hillary wins the nomination and then becomes the competent, reasonable, moderate leader I tend to imagine her being [although there's scant evidence to suggest her being that - but for some reason I just get that vibe from her - hardly a sophisticated endorsement, but what the fuck - we're living in a time where someone actually thinks Glenn Beck as VP is a good idea - the line between absolutely nuts and not as crazy as you think is entirely blurred].

"... seems to me most of you have missed the point of this essay - the point was not to compare Sri Lanka to Afghanistan - the point was to say that if your goal is to win a war than do what you feel is necessary to win it - I think what the author seems to want to say here is that he sees America is trying to hedge on winning the war in Afghanistan, thinking rather to manage some kind of resolution that sort of looks like victory but not at the expense of having to kill or piss off too many people... I think what the author is saying is that that is a phony compromise - either do what you have to do to win, which after all is the point of war, or go small ie stop trying to turn Afghanistan into a functioning democracy [an insane notion] and instead form tactical alliances with anti-Taliban tribes in the north, hold the Taliban to a stalemate in the south and then try and separate the malleable Islamists [the author's point was that you can indeed fracture an extremist movement if you apply force effectively] from the hardcore ones - and then once you've isolated the extremists, kill them all... if you can of course..."

If one's military as concerns traditional warfare is not the most powerful in the world, there's no reason to fret much over non-traditional, asymmetrical conflicts, is there? In other words. America is threatened by the latter because of its power which means it has a lot of interests to protect, a lot of allies to protect, a lot of influence that is felt pretty much everywhere and therefore a lot of enemies - small wars are the consequence of big power. My point being that there's much talk going on - entirely in military circles of course - the public is by and large unaware of these issues, nor do many it seems in gov't, the press and the liberal intelligentsia care or listen in much on the conversation - but there's much talk about how America's current obsession with COIN and its affiliate small scale entanglements is drawing too much energy and resources from the 'big' war services, specifically the navy, but also the air force [is the F-35 a small wars platform only?], which increases the likelihood that China eventually catches up - and China doesn't actually even need to be caught up, just caught up enough so as to make opposing them in the western pacific either unthinkable or undoable.

So the logic is obvious, yes? There's no point in concentrating on COIN et al if it's at the expense of the broader strategic picture since it's the broader picture that creates a need for COIN in the first place - in other words, winning in Afghanistan is possibly worth it if we plan on remaining the preeminent global power - which means diverting and promoting the necessary strategic, technological and financial resources - if we're not going to do that, or find ourselves unable to do that [let's say Obama and his liberal catamites bankrupt the country] then all we're doing in Afghanistan [win or lose, sadly enough] is setting the table for China - it may be 10, 20, 30 years before they sit down at that table but regardless that's what all this effort will amount to.