Military
Counterinsurgency Theory
Ann Marlowe's short essay on the birth of counterinsurgency theory is worth a read. Note the emphasis on altering the perception of the population; the creation of reality, as it were, and why this should be relatively easy for Americans.
Categories > Military
2:07 PM / October 31, 2009
Elections
Scozzafava Out in NY 23rd
Dede Scozzafava, the Republican and Independence parties
candidate, announced that she is suspending her campaign for
the 23rd Congressional District and releasing all her supporters. The latest Siena Poll shows Bill Owens, the Democrats' candidate and Doug Hoffman, the Conservative Party candidate, in a statistical dead heat. Owens has support from 36 percent of likely
voters, with Hoffman garnering 35 percent support. Scozzafava
has support from 20 percent of those polled.
Categories > Elections
12:05 PM / October 31, 2009
Politics
French Incivilities
The Velib was meant to civilize city travel in Paris. But these bicycles, each costing circa $3,500, are being stolen, destroyed, etc. It is estimated that about 20,000 of them (about 80%) have been damaged or destroyed. A sociologist says that there "was social revolt behind Vélib' vandalism, especially for suburban
residents, many of them poor immigrants who feel excluded from the
glamorous side of Paris."
"It's a very clever initiative to improve people's lives, but it's not a complete success," a user of the bikes said. "For a regular user like me, it generates a lot of frustration," she said. "It's a reflection of the violence of our society and it's outrageous: the Vélib' is a public good but there is no civic feeling related to it."
Categories > Politics
10:51 AM / October 31, 2009
Foreign Affairs
Raw Determination Needed
This David Brooks op-ed has it about right: "The experts I spoke with describe a vacuum at the heart of the war
effort -- a determination vacuum. And if these experts do not know the
state of President Obama's resolve, neither do the Afghan villagers.
They are now hedging their bets, refusing to inform on Taliban force
movements because they are aware that these Taliban fighters would be
their masters if the U.S. withdraws. Nor does President Hamid Karzai
know. He's cutting deals with the Afghan warlords he would need if NATO
leaves his country." Read the whole sensible thing.
Categories > Foreign Affairs
2:29 PM / October 30, 2009
Political Parties
Old-Fashioned Democrats Hopelessly Out of Style
Daniel Henninger writes a biting and inspired column today in the WSJ. Oh, the irony! Democrats caught hopelessly in the out-moded and tired ways of the past? In an age of iPhone apps and de-centralizing trends, Dems are pushing a miserable model of government that should have been left in the 1930s where it originated. Obama rides on a false reputation as a hipster. He's actually a crusty throw-back. As Henninger puts it, it appears irrefutable.
Categories > Political Parties
2:49 PM / October 29, 2009
Politics
California: Object Lesson in What Happens When Wish Becomes Father of Thought
It's not for nothing that most Ohioans (and much of the rest of the country) are prone to joke that California is the land of "fruits and nuts." Yes, we do grow 'em out here; both literally and figuratively. The typical Californian response to such insults, however, has been to brush them off as a kind of jealousy. (Call me when you're snowed in this winter and I'm out picking oranges in my backyard paradise or surfing at the beach . . .) There's been a kind of amazing will--not to power, exactly, but more to seek out golden dreams--and that has always pushed this state to the forefront of the American imagination. It's also not for nothing that California is called the "golden state" . . . and it's not only because of our beautiful sunsets or the 1849 gold rush. The optimism that has driven us is characteristically American. Inspiring. Energizing. Youthful. Oh . . . and, sometimes, terribly naive.
Our own Bill Voegeli (like me, a California transplant . . . though that hardly distinguishes us out here) gives this buoyant approach to California's current prospects a sober and thoughtful assessment in the most recent edition of The City Journal. He, like many other observers of our troubles, does not see many reasons for optimism. Time magazine, however, clings to the hopes and wishes of a former era without, apparently, grasping that hope has to be backed by effort. A wish is not a thought. Hope is not a plan. In ignoring the facts before us, California may be more than an object lesson in what happens when a state allows hope to engulf it in the place of effort. It may be--as it always has been--an early indicator of where we are heading as a nation.
Let us do more than hope not. As Winston Churchill famously said at the close of his masterful work The Gathering Storm, "Facts are better than dreams."
Our own Bill Voegeli (like me, a California transplant . . . though that hardly distinguishes us out here) gives this buoyant approach to California's current prospects a sober and thoughtful assessment in the most recent edition of The City Journal. He, like many other observers of our troubles, does not see many reasons for optimism. Time magazine, however, clings to the hopes and wishes of a former era without, apparently, grasping that hope has to be backed by effort. A wish is not a thought. Hope is not a plan. In ignoring the facts before us, California may be more than an object lesson in what happens when a state allows hope to engulf it in the place of effort. It may be--as it always has been--an early indicator of where we are heading as a nation.
Let us do more than hope not. As Winston Churchill famously said at the close of his masterful work The Gathering Storm, "Facts are better than dreams."
Categories > Politics
1:25 PM / October 29, 2009
Categories > Conservatism
6:03 PM / October 28, 2009
Foreign Affairs
Another Podcast with Tucker
I did another podcast with David Tucker about all the complications of the Northwest Frontier (i.e. Afghanistan, Pakistan). Needless to say, the situation is getting worse and our choices aren't getting any better. If this keeps up, my next conversation with Tucker will be even less optimistic.
Categories > Foreign Affairs
5:23 PM / October 28, 2009
Men and Women
The Eternal Questions: Laundry, Basketball, Yawns and Lawns
Two amusing articles today, this one by Kathleen Parker and this one by Ruth Marcus, take on the big questions surrounding the eternal inequalities faced by women with respect to basketball and laundry. Feminists, of course, would argue that basketball (particularly when it's an all-male game with the President) represents "access" to power and laundry is but a metaphor for the continuing oppression of women within their own domiciles.
Marcus is right to note that women will "smile" when they read that the winner of the Nobel Laureate for Medicine was folding laundry when she discovered that she had won the prize for medicine at 5 a.m. one morning. And they will smile more when they hear that this now famous doctor noted that she did not expect the same could be said about what our President was doing when he got notice of his award. I did smile, broadly, and with knowing recognition of the sentiment.
But Marcus is probably right about another thing: women are reluctant to share these domestic burdens with their spouses for a variety of reasons. I think she gives too much credence to the power of generational habit, but she rightly notes the issue of control: female confidence in the fact that men will screw things up if they take charge of things that, traditionally, have been our domain. There is, certainly, some of that. And, with notable exceptions, it is entirely rational. I might mention a couple more. One is that shared burdens usually go two ways in a marriage. If I expect hubby to do laundry, then maybe he'll expect me to mow the lawn or, worse, change the oil. (Fill in your own blanks for these jobs . . . I understand that these things vary from marriage to marriage and this is the variety that we used to call the "spice" of life.) The point is, we all get comfortable with our own forms of drudgery and we also get comfortable about the right to complain about them. They amount, in a sense, to a kind of guilt power. It's not a very noble kind of power, I'll admit, but it has its uses. And, no doubt, it flows two ways. It is the kind of thing that people used to develop a sense of humor about and, today, people instead have to write long-winded editorials about in order to explain it to a denatured population.
Parker rightly notes this last phenomenon with a pronounced, "Yawn." It is boring to have to explain the obvious. And yet, here we are. One wonders how the likes of Maria Shriver and the Center for American Progress will continue to find interested audiences for reports like the hackneyed, warmed-over, feminist pablum she served up in her report, ""A Woman's Nation Changes Everything" when people wake up to fact that we've been talking with relentless obtuseness about the same alleged "problems" for decades. Perhaps there is no feminist end of the rainbow . . . perhaps this is just, well, life. And the smart money is with our grandmothers and great-grandmothers who, when faced with life, learned how to laugh instead of whine. There's an awful lot of power in laughter too.
Marcus is right to note that women will "smile" when they read that the winner of the Nobel Laureate for Medicine was folding laundry when she discovered that she had won the prize for medicine at 5 a.m. one morning. And they will smile more when they hear that this now famous doctor noted that she did not expect the same could be said about what our President was doing when he got notice of his award. I did smile, broadly, and with knowing recognition of the sentiment.
But Marcus is probably right about another thing: women are reluctant to share these domestic burdens with their spouses for a variety of reasons. I think she gives too much credence to the power of generational habit, but she rightly notes the issue of control: female confidence in the fact that men will screw things up if they take charge of things that, traditionally, have been our domain. There is, certainly, some of that. And, with notable exceptions, it is entirely rational. I might mention a couple more. One is that shared burdens usually go two ways in a marriage. If I expect hubby to do laundry, then maybe he'll expect me to mow the lawn or, worse, change the oil. (Fill in your own blanks for these jobs . . . I understand that these things vary from marriage to marriage and this is the variety that we used to call the "spice" of life.) The point is, we all get comfortable with our own forms of drudgery and we also get comfortable about the right to complain about them. They amount, in a sense, to a kind of guilt power. It's not a very noble kind of power, I'll admit, but it has its uses. And, no doubt, it flows two ways. It is the kind of thing that people used to develop a sense of humor about and, today, people instead have to write long-winded editorials about in order to explain it to a denatured population.
Parker rightly notes this last phenomenon with a pronounced, "Yawn." It is boring to have to explain the obvious. And yet, here we are. One wonders how the likes of Maria Shriver and the Center for American Progress will continue to find interested audiences for reports like the hackneyed, warmed-over, feminist pablum she served up in her report, ""A Woman's Nation Changes Everything" when people wake up to fact that we've been talking with relentless obtuseness about the same alleged "problems" for decades. Perhaps there is no feminist end of the rainbow . . . perhaps this is just, well, life. And the smart money is with our grandmothers and great-grandmothers who, when faced with life, learned how to laugh instead of whine. There's an awful lot of power in laughter too.
Categories > Men and Women
2:14 PM / October 28, 2009
Presidency
Bill McGurn on Obama's Uninspiring Blame Game
Even supposing--for a fanciful moment--that everything the Obama Administration says about George W. Bush and his share of the blame for the problems Obama faces were the 100% absolute truth, Bill McGurn wisely cautions that the track the President's rhetorical cart is headed down leads to a cliff. The unmistakable conclusion to be drawn from so much of what Obama and his various spokesmen in the Administration are saying is, "We are not up to the job." A "master rhetorician" ought, it seems to me, to know better.
Categories > Presidency
2:02 PM / October 28, 2009
Health Care
Too Much Fat in the Pork May Explain Swine Flu Shot Shortage
This doctor and former deputy commissioner to the FDA argues in today's Wall Street Journal that much of the delay surrounding the supplying to states with sufficient numbers of swine flu vaccines has to do with antiquated and and overbearing regulation at the FDA. Thus, even as President Obama has rightly approached the flu emergency with as much prudent executive action as he could, the limitations on the effectiveness of this approach are pronounced as big government bureaucracy, the rampant litigious nature of American culture, and obsequious bowing to special interest groups make it very difficult for private manufacturers to do their jobs. Dr. Gottlieb notes that in their more scientific and rational approach to regulation of this industry, this is one area where European nations have outpaced America.
I have mixed feelings about all of this. On the one hand, while I appreciate President Obama's efforts to encourage the distribution of the H1N1 vaccine and his commonsensical approach to it, I also appreciate the fact that he cannot summarily order it. Even if his is a rational mind, I don't want it governing mine, yours and everyone's in between. I wouldn't want to see that kind of power in the Presidency. It is good to know that he is not the law and that he is not above it. But on the other hand, who or what is the law in this situation? Is it the unelected bureaucracy within the FDA? Is it Congress? Is it the trial lawyers? Is it some maddening combination of all of these factors? That last is, certainly, what appears to be the case and it explains some of the mind-boggling inefficiencies that abound within the health industry.
If this episode is anything like a dry run for what an expanded role for government in health care might look like, we should take a pause. Adding more layers to the icing on this mess of a cake is not likely to make it look any less lopsided. In fact, too much icing can sometimes destroy an otherwise tasty cake. Perhaps we would be better served by an effort to begin fresh--with better ingredients and better cookware? Or, perhaps, we'd be even better served by a commonsensical approach that recognizes even lopsided cakes can taste pretty darn good.
I have mixed feelings about all of this. On the one hand, while I appreciate President Obama's efforts to encourage the distribution of the H1N1 vaccine and his commonsensical approach to it, I also appreciate the fact that he cannot summarily order it. Even if his is a rational mind, I don't want it governing mine, yours and everyone's in between. I wouldn't want to see that kind of power in the Presidency. It is good to know that he is not the law and that he is not above it. But on the other hand, who or what is the law in this situation? Is it the unelected bureaucracy within the FDA? Is it Congress? Is it the trial lawyers? Is it some maddening combination of all of these factors? That last is, certainly, what appears to be the case and it explains some of the mind-boggling inefficiencies that abound within the health industry.
If this episode is anything like a dry run for what an expanded role for government in health care might look like, we should take a pause. Adding more layers to the icing on this mess of a cake is not likely to make it look any less lopsided. In fact, too much icing can sometimes destroy an otherwise tasty cake. Perhaps we would be better served by an effort to begin fresh--with better ingredients and better cookware? Or, perhaps, we'd be even better served by a commonsensical approach that recognizes even lopsided cakes can taste pretty darn good.
Categories > Health Care
1:02 PM / October 28, 2009
Elections
New Jersey
According to the latest Quinnipiac University poll Corzine pulled ahead of Republican challenger Christie for the first time: 43-38% (with Daggett at 13%). Corzine has spent $23.6 on the race so far.
Categories > Elections
10:25 AM / October 28, 2009
Political Parties
Democratic Defections
Less than 24hrs after Senator Reid rolled the dice for public option and appealed for party unity, the defections begin: Liberman, Carper, Lincoln, Nelson....that's enough. A certain level of clarity about what some Democrats want, will help move even more moderate Dems is this from Barney Frank: "We are trying on every front to increase the role of government."
Categories > Political Parties
10:14 AM / October 28, 2009
Presidency
Hail, Caesar/Obama!
No, such praise is not sarcasm from a birther, Teapartier, or other such anti-intellectual dregs--it comes from the Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, Rocco Landesman. (See my earlier post on Mr. Broadway Bombast.) Scott at Powerline quotes his boast:
This is the first president that actually writes his own books since Teddy Roosevelt and arguably the first to write them really well since Lincoln. If you accept the premise, and I do, that the United States is the most powerful country in the world, then Barack Obama is the most powerful writer since Julius Caesar. That has to be good for American artists.
Scott deftly dispatches this error-plagued nonsense. I would add: In praising Bacon, Locke, and Newton as his greatest heroes, Thomas Jefferson claimed that his rival Alexander Hamilton had named Julius Caesar as his. This attribution was intended to underline Hamilton's reputation as a "monocrat"--no friend of the principles of 1776. Praises of Caesar and of Mao, obeisance to dictators, despots, and Nobel committees, assaults on an aggressive press-- what more does this Administration need to do to separate itself from the principles of 1776?
Categories > Presidency
11:40 AM / October 27, 2009
Political Parties
McConnell Lead Grows in Virginia
The WaPo reports that McConnell's lead over Deeds has grown to 55-44% among likely voters. Of course, this is not a referendum on Obama, the article hastens to point out. It also looks as if the GOP will pick up a number of seats in the House of Delegates, perhaps even enough for a majority. President Obama is in Norfolk today, by the way, campaigning for Deeds.
Categories > Political Parties
10:06 AM / October 27, 2009
Politics
Reid's Re-election Insurance
Dana Milbank has it about right. Reid announces yesterday (and I happened to see the press conference) that there will be a public option in the Senate bill (which the states could decline) and yet refuses to respond to questions (not from Fox News) about whether or not he has the votes. Well, he doesn't have the Democratic votes necessary (and has no GOP ones), so what is he up to? Milbank: "For Reid, it was an admission of the formidable power of liberal
interest groups. He had been the target of a petition drive and other
forms of pressure to bring the public option to the floor, and Monday's
move made him an instant hero on the left. Americans United for Change
hailed him for refusing 'to buckle in the face of withering pressure
from the big insurance companies.' MoveOn.org admired his 'leadership
in standing up to the special interests.'"
"Reid, facing a difficult reelection contest next year at home in Nevada, will need such groups to bring Democrats to the polls if he is to survive. But there were a few problems with the leader's solo move. He shifted the public pressure from himself to half a dozen moderates in his caucus." Milbank has it right. And this will not work; the bill will not be passed with a public option (do you think the four or so moderate Senate Dems are amused by this tactic?) and Reid will continue to have re-election problems.
"Reid, facing a difficult reelection contest next year at home in Nevada, will need such groups to bring Democrats to the polls if he is to survive. But there were a few problems with the leader's solo move. He shifted the public pressure from himself to half a dozen moderates in his caucus." Milbank has it right. And this will not work; the bill will not be passed with a public option (do you think the four or so moderate Senate Dems are amused by this tactic?) and Reid will continue to have re-election problems.
Categories > Politics
9:47 AM / October 27, 2009
Politics
Self-Parody From the Luv Guv
This is just too good: Gov. Mark Sanford (Is he still governor? -Ed. I guess so--he does seem to have disappeared from the pages of the National Enquirer, though), writing in the current issue of Newsweek, on why he likes Ayn Rand. I've always found her books too heavy to lug in my pack while hiking the Appalachian Trail.
Categories > Politics
3:45 PM / October 26, 2009
Politics
Worth a Couple Grins
- A growing 40 percent of all Americans self-identify as conservatives, about 36 percent as moderates, about 20 as liberal, according to Gallup. I wonder whether they factored in the reluctance of Republicans/conservatives to speak to pollsters.
- All politics is local: Local Chinese officials make school kids salute all cars on the road (as a safety measure). (I can imagine the compelled salutes American kids might give.) But the other examples of Chinese local tyranny are far less petty--killing dogs, compulsory liquor and cigarette purchases, licenses for harvesting one's own corn, and prohibiting women from being secretaries.
- Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is #15 on the NY Times trade paperback bestseller list and rising. I'm not sure what this Zombie business means--it's all over comics strips, and kids talk about it. Something to do with the "end of history," but there may be other meanings of brain-eating.
Categories > Politics
2:37 PM / October 26, 2009
Religion
The Strategy behind Pope Benedict's Blitzkrieg
Ross Douthat sees that the Pope understands the world stakes in his opening to the Anglicans: It's about standing up to Islam.
Where the European encounter is concerned, Pope Benedict has opted for public confrontation. In a controversial 2006 address in Regensburg, Germany, he explicitly challenged Islam's compatibility with the Western way of reason -- and sparked, as if in vindication of his point, a wave of Muslim riots around the world.By contrast, the Church of England's leadership has opted for conciliation (some would say appeasement), with the Archbishop of Canterbury going so far as to speculate about the inevitability of some kind of sharia law in Britain.
There are an awful lot of Anglicans, in England and Africa alike, who would prefer a leader who takes Benedict's approach to the Islamic challenge. Now they can have one, if they want him.
Categories > Religion
12:15 PM / October 26, 2009
Elections
Obama Hangover
The Los Angeles Times considers how "Obama Hangover" (or Fatigue). It is not possible to get Dems very excited this year, after the loud party last year. It will be a low Dem turnout in state and local elections, and this almost certainly means they will lose Virginia, and possibly even New Jersey. And Obama can't help here, even though, as CNN admits, that this is a referendum on him; he is not wildly popular. Yet, he is gamely going back to Virginia on Tuesday to campaign for Deeds, but note that Romney is there the next day to campaign for McConnell. Perhaps a foreshadow of 2012.
Categories > Elections
5:07 PM / October 25, 2009
