OxBlog

Posted 7:05 AM by Patrick Belton
THE ECONOMIST has a piece on the potential of UAVs:

According to a UAV road map from America's Department of Defence, by 2012 UAVs the size of F-16 fighter aircraft are likely to exist.....By 2020, the Pentagon estimates that one-third of America's combat planes will be robotic....The world's smallest UAV is currently the 15cm-long, electrically powered, Black Widow. It can fly for 30 minutes and download live colour video to the ground via its onboard camera. Many such craft are being developed for �over the hill� work, when soldiers need scouts in dangerous areas....The biggest breakthrough in civil aviation, though, would be the invention of the aerial equivalent of the motor car.

Kudos to Bagehot's newspaper for a systematic exploration of the military, urban studies, and environmental implications of what portends to be a revolutionary new technology. And it is difficult not to end this post by quoting the piece's most memorable line: "There is a joke in the airline industry that the future crew of an airliner will consist of a pilot and a dog: The pilot's job is to watch all the computers, and the dog's job is to bite the pilot if he tries to touch anything." Can I assume from this that the days of British Airways stewardesses are therefore blissfully limited?

Posted 2:40 AM by David Adesnik
CALIFORNIA BLOGGIN': I have left behind the high-stress dog-eat-dog rat-racing money-making East Coast. I am out here where we eat organic foods, listen to new age music, lie on the beach and ride the waves.

Actually, I'm out here to do some research at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and take part in a mini-reunion with five of my close friends from college.

But tonight, to kick off the festivities, I attended a lavish dinner at Chez CalPundit. It was a sumptous Italian banquet for which I owe Kevin and Mary Ann many thanks. I also had the chance to converse with the creme de la creme of the blogosphere, including Pejman, Robert Tagorda (as well as his lovely wife Noemie) and Mark Kleiman.

The conversation was hard to match. It isn't everyday that I get to converse with so many well-read, intelligent and articulate people -- all around one table.

The only less-than-perfect thing about California is the 56k connection I'm blogging from. If I find something faster, I'll let you know. Until then, expect no more than a few judicious words from this third of OxBlog.

Posted 8:44 PM by Josh Chafetz
A CRAZY THOUGHT. If President Bush is reelected, and if Colin Powell does leave the administration, why not offer the SecState job to Joe Lieberman? Good policy move, and an amazingly good political one. Would Lieberman accept? Who knows ... but he probably won't make another run for the presidency, so I don't see why he wouldn't want to accept the most prestigious cabinet post.

Posted 7:01 PM by Patrick Belton
IN LIGHT OF THE DAY'S EVENTS, can we start wondering whether this google bomb will go away? (This one can stay, though.)

Posted 2:40 PM by Patrick Belton
FROM A FRIEND IN NASIRIYAH:

It took about 30 seconds for THE rumor to spread through our compound. THE rumor, if true, would be the biggest story in Iraq: we had Saddam.

It took about 60 seconds for the first celebratory gunfire to begin. It hasn't stopped. It is now so constant that all of our workers--who had already stopped working and forced their way into our normally off-limits kitchen (where our TV is)--came in to watch the news. Its probably better that way...the sky is raining bullets. I gladly stepped aside for them to watch--this is their day.

It took about 5 minutes for every car in Nasiriyah to grind to a halt, horns honking, people getting out and dancing in the streets. I kept thinking to myself "I hope this one turns out to be true..."

It took about 20 minutes for an official here to get through to Baghdad and confirm that the news was true."

This is the last bind to their terrible, recent history, and that bind has now been cut. The people here are ecstatic. People are dancing in the streets, honking their horns, firing weapons non-stop, smiling, hugging, and lord knows what else.

There's still a lot of work to be done here, but for the first time since I've been here I think I'm going to take a lengthy break in the middle of the day, and just kinda enjoy myself with the Iraqis that work here. I feel so very fortunate to be here, among them, as they celebrate.

Posted 1:48 PM by Josh Chafetz
LIEBERMAN ON THE CAPTURE OF SADDAM: "Hallelujah, praise the Lord."

Posted 1:26 PM by Patrick Belton
HERE are the president's remarks on the capture of Saddam Hussein. This is the statement from Downing Street, and here is the statement from Chancellor Schr&#246der. Administrator Bremer's remarks are here.

Posted 11:32 AM by Josh Chafetz
INTERESTING PIECE on Ali Ahmad Jalali, Afghanistan's Interior Minister.

Remember, today's other big news is the opening of Afghanistan's constitutional convention.

Posted 10:16 AM by Josh Chafetz
OBVIOUSLY, this is really, really good news. I said below that I think guerilla attacks will intensify before they fade away, but I think this is basically the death knell for the opposition. With Saddam gone, the locals should be less afraid of turning the guerillas in -- there was clearly fear among many that Saddam would return to power and punish those who had aided the coalition. Saddam's capture will also make it harder for the guerillas to recruit any new members, and at least some current members may well decide to give up and try to blend back into civilian life. Finally, today's pictures of Saddam looking pathetic are not likely to win his cause any converts.

I think that, in the very short run, those former regime loyalists who do decide to carry on the fight will step up their efforts. But I also think that they will increasingly be killed or captured, that they will not be replaced by new recruits, and that many will decide not to carry on the fight at all.

A hearty, hearty congratulations to the men and women of the 4th Infantry Division and the Special Forces who captured him. And an even heartier congratulations to the people of Iraq, who are one big step closer to a peaceful, civilized life in a democratic country.

Posted 9:51 AM by Josh Chafetz
PET PEEVE WATCH: Brokaw on Saddam: "He was literally a rat trapped in a hole." No, he was figuratively a rat trapped in a hole. He was literally a former dictator trapped in a hole.

(This is a long-standing pet peeve.)

Also, while I'm at it, Stupid Headline of the Day Watch, from the AP: "Death, Exile Among Hazards for Dictators." Thanks, guys.

Posted 9:27 AM by Josh Chafetz
PRESIDENT BUSH WILL APPARENTLY ADDRESS THE NATION at noon Eastern.

Posted 9:20 AM by Josh Chafetz
THE AP REPORTS on Iraqis' reactions.

On a side note, what is it with people firing guns in the air to celebrate? I know this isn't just a Middle East thing -- the LAPD has a Fourth of July gunfire reduction program. Seriously, does it not occur to people that what goes up must come down?

UPDATE: John F. Burns has more on Iraqi reaction to Saddam's capture.

Posted 8:46 AM by Josh Chafetz
IN HONOR OF TODAY'S CAPTURE OF SADDAM, I thought I'd re-post this link, which is still as funny as it was the first time.

Posted 7:22 AM by Josh Chafetz
I WAS WATCHING VIDEO OF THE COALITION PRESS CONFERENCE announcing Saddam's capture. When Gen. Sanchez showed video of Saddam in custody (undergoing a medical examination), the Iraqis in the crowd erupted into cheers which went on for some time.

UPDATE: You can see the clip with the cheering here. The Iraqi journalists are shouting "Death to Saddam" in Arabic.

Posted 7:13 AM by Josh Chafetz
PREDICTION: Guerilla attacks will intensify for about a month before they start melting away.

Posted 7:08 AM by Patrick Belton
MY GOVERNMENT SOURCES IN WASHINGTON are confirming personally to me, as well....

Posted 6:37 AM by Josh Chafetz
REPORTS THAT WE'VE GOT SADDAM. Stay tuned.

UPDATE: The British government is confirming. The US government apparently has a press conference scheduled for 7:00 AM Eastern.

UPDATE: The AP cites a US government official as saying that they're doing "scientific testing, possibly DNA" to make sure he's really Saddam.

UPDATE: IT'S CONFIRMED! DNA match.

UPDATE: Here's how Al Jazeera is reporting it.

Posted 8:32 PM by Josh Chafetz
ARCHIMEDES: Dead 2200 years, but still producing first-rate scholarship!

Posted 7:20 PM by Patrick Belton
RULE BRITANNIA: Under a UK-advanced compromise proposal just adopted by the EU, the EU will get a defence planning cell separate from Nato - which, thanks to the UK, will be based out of none other than Nato headquarters.

Posted 1:03 PM by Josh Chafetz
I HAVE TO ADMIT, I just don't understand what's wrong with this ad. Let me rephrase: the conclusions it draws might be wrong -- that is, it may be factually wrong that "Howard Dean just cannot compete with George Bush on foreign policy" (or it may not). But Kevin Drum says that the ad is "linking Howard Dean to Osama bin Laden" and that this "isn't criticism." It's "crap ... [which] has no place in the campaign. Matt Yglesias agrees. But I just don't see that. I mean, if the ad showed Bin Laden's face morphing into Dean's or something like that (full disclaimer: when I click on the link to watch video of the ad, I get only audio, not video, so maybe it actually does do something like that, in which case just ignore this post), then it would clearly be beyond the pale. But how is showing a picture of a serious problem and then talking about how a candidate isn't doing enough to address that problem beyond the pale? Would Kevin and Matt object if, say, an ad showed a factory belching smoke and then a voiceover talked about President Bush's environmental record (this notwithstanding)? Again, I just don't see what's so outrageous about bringing up Bin Laden ...

Posted 12:38 PM by Patrick Belton
MEDIA WATCH: Enjoying the weekend? Sipping on some early eggnog and looking for some good reading? Great! Here are some of our best picks from the magazine world this week...

In the pages of the Atlantic, Harvard's Samantha Power describes life in Mugabe-ville, Tobias Wolff examines his new novel on East Coast boarding-school life, and P.J. O'Rourke drinks his way through the War to Free Iraq. Over at TNR, James Wood looks at religious comedy in Erasmus and Alberti, Anne Hollander reviews Virginia Postrel's book on aesthetics in America, and on the TNR website our friend Dan Drezner writes on the unfolding future strategy of the developing world in global politics. And at the Standard, Bill Kristol, Bob Kagan, and Gary Schmitt talk China and Taiwan policy, while Dave Skinner does his bit in sticking up for Texans.

At Slate, Steve Chapman says America's elderly have gotten spoiled, Joel Simon takes aim at the Rwanda genocide tribunal, and Jeremy Khan writes from the Ivory Coast. In Policy Review, Marc Plattner points out that the EU constitutional debate is thus far fairly silent on democracy, Kevin O'Connell and Robert Tomes write on reforming intelligence for the war on terror, and Reginald Dale says we're missing the point in Europe.

In the pages of Foreign Affairs, Evan Medeiros and Taylor Fravel marvel at China's newfound diplomatic acumen, Josh Micah Marshall reviews Daalder and Lindsay's book on President Bush's foreign affairs revolution, and the editors run a contemporary piece by Allen Dulles on the Allied reconstruction of Germany.

Moving over to Britain, Sylvia Plath continues her stellar media year with an appearance in the TLS. In the Prospect, Lord Owen analyses Cabinet government and Michael Lind sticks up for Texans. Over at the Spectator, Rachel Polonsky calls on the West to stop flattering Putin, Stephen Glover criticises the dumbing down of the BBC, and Peter Jones says Epicurus would want you to be virtuous this Christmas. LRB shines as usual with pieces on terrorism and sea transport, underworlds during WWII, and a criticism of US North Korea policy. And finally, in the New York Times book review, Magdalen fellow Oliver Taplin remembers the Greek gods, and Alfred Kazin remember's America's, perceiving American literature as having embarked on a centuries-long search for an ever-receding God.

Happy reading! Caveat lector!

Posted 9:34 AM by Patrick Belton
FEEL BETTER SOON, MA'AM.

Posted 9:15 AM by Josh Chafetz
EUGENE POSTS A TRANSSEXUAL DIVORCE STORY. This actually raises a question I'd thought about briefly before: Let's say two people get married in a state that does not allow gay marriage or civil union. Let's say that one of the people then undergoes a sex change operation, but the couple has no intention of divorcing. What is the status of their relationship in the eyes of the law? Anyone?

UPDATE: Sufficiently desperate to procrastinate dissertation work, I decided to do some Lexis-ing. In In re Estate of Marshall G. Gardiner, 273 Kan. 191 (2002), the Kansas Supreme Court voided a marriage between a post-operative male-to-female transsexual and a man. In that case, the operation took place before the marriage (and the male knew about the operation before the marriage). The court there argued that, within the meaning of Kansas law, the transsexual was not a woman, and therefore the marriage was void from the get-go. A Texas court has held the same -- see Littleton v. Prange, 9 S.W.3d 223 (Tx. App. 1999).

On the other hand, a New Jersey court held that such a marriage was, in fact, a marriage between a male and a female, and therefore valid. M.T. v. J.T., 140 N.J. Super. 77 (1976).

But these cases, I think, raise a very different legal question than whether an operation after a marriage serves to dissolve the marriage. Also, these cases all deal with sex change operations which, if you accept that the operation actually changes the patient's sex, result in opposite sex marriages. Very different than one which results in a once opposite-sex marriage becoming a same-sex marriage.

In dicta, a Maryland court has noted that, "Most cases in which the gender of a transsexual is at issue have arisen in the context of marriage, and the prevailing sentiment in the United States seems to be that, absent legislation to the contrary, marriage between a transsexual and a person of the transsexual's initial assigned gender is not permitted, even when the transsexual has undergone surgery," In re Robert Wright Heilig, 372 Md. 692, 721 (2003). Again, though, it's addressing the question of a pre-marriage operation.

UPDATE: Eureka! A case that seems to be kinda, sorta, somewhat on point from New York: In re Frank Joseph Guido, Jr., 2003 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 1334. A married man petitioned to change his name as part of assuming a new identity as a woman, including a sex change operation. He had a notarized consent form from his wife approving the name change request. The court noted that, "Under the present state of the law, same-sex marriages are not recognized. It would therefore be inconsistent for this court to grant the relief requested, to permit the applicant to appear and represent himself as female, while in fact he remains in a legal relationship with his wife premised on his being male," but ultimately decided that this issue was not properly before it, as the petitioner had not yet actually had the surgery. His petition for a name change was granted, and the question of the continuing legality of his marriage after an operation -- should he have one -- was left open.

LAST UPDATE: Okay, that's all the relevant caselaw I could find (given the limited time I'm willing to put in). (There's also some British caselaw -- which is cited in some of the decisions mentioned above -- but I really do need to do some dissertation work at some point today ...) It seems to me that nothing is squarely on point. But it also seems to raise some interesting issues either way. Either, for the purposes of the law, a sex change operation truly changes a person's sex, or it doesn't.

If it does -- that is, if sex is defined by physiology and not by genetic makeup -- then a post-operative transsexual should be able to marry someone who was born the same sex. But this would suggest that a post-marriage sex change operation should serve to end the marriage (assuming, of course, that the state does not permit same-sex marriage).

If, on the other hand, sex is defined by genetics, then someone who was born male and someone who was born female should be able to get married even if both are physiologically male (or female) when they get married. And, of course, it would follow that a post-marriage sex change operation wouldn't actually change anyone's sex, and therefore wouldn't affect the status of the marriage in any way.

Posted 8:15 AM by Josh Chafetz
ALTHOUGH IT IS ONLY AVAILABLE TO SUBSCRIBERS (at least for now), the Weekly Standard turns over almost its entire "Scrapbook" page this week to Zeyad's coverage and pictures of the anti-terrorism march in Baghdad. Good for the Standard!

(This week's Parody, which, alas, is also only available to subscribers, is also one of their best in a long time.)

Posted 8:11 AM by Josh Chafetz
THINGS ARE COMING TO A HEAD IN VENEZUELA -- a WaPo editorial explains the situation.

Posted 8:02 AM by Josh Chafetz
DAVID BROOKS WILL UNDOUBTEDLY TAKE A NUMBER OF (IN SOME CASES, QUITE WELL-DESERVED) SHOTS for writing a column praising the Bush Administration for its candor. But ultimately, I do think there's something to it -- the image of him as a cowboy includes an image of a straight talker -- someone who doesn't understand that, in the words of a very wise friend of mine, hypocrisy is the lubrication of social intercourse.

Kyoto -- which Brooks mentions -- is what really brought this home for me. Clinton never had any intention of submitting it to the Senate. Had Kyoto gone to the Senate, it probably wouldn't have gotten even 50 votes, and it wouldn't have come anywhere near the 67 needed for ratification. Numerous other countries never signed the accord, and only two of the 15 EU nations -- Britain and Sweden -- are on track to meet Kyoto targets. Yet Bush is widely considered to have scuttled the Protocol, because he was the only one who actually announced and then abided by his intentions.

The Bush Administration certainly has not been honest in everything it has done -- no administration ever is. But it is frequently its candor -- at least on the international stage -- that has gotten it in trouble, not its lack of candor.

Posted 7:58 AM by Josh Chafetz
NICHOLAS KRISTOF, WHO KNOWS CHINA as well as any living journalist, has an excellent column today on censorship, leadership, and the future of the world's most populous nation.

Posted 6:23 AM by Patrick Belton
GEE, THANKS, GUYS!

Posted 12:24 AM by David Adesnik
VIP BLOGGING: Pejman can't tell you what Noam Chomsky told him, but he can tell you about it. But whatever you think of goings on at MIT, student democracy is alive and well in the West Bank.

Posted 12:21 AM by David Adesnik
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE POND: Greg Djerejian thinks the Guardian is going to have some trouble substantiating its claims that the Israeli are training US assassination squads for missions in Iraq.

Posted 12:09 AM by David Adesnik
YIPPEE! ANOTHER RECALL! In Venezuela. Is Gray Davis running?

Posted 12:06 AM by David Adesnik
POTTY MOUTH: I never thought a real newspaper would use that phrase without putting it in quotes. The rest of the article about FCC obscenity debates is pretty funny, as well. You should just send some these censors into the average junior high school, so they can learn that we are protecting television from children and not vice versa.

Posted 12:01 AM by David Adesnik
PARTIAL METAL JACKET: In a moment of truth-is-stranger than fiction, the WaPo reports that the new Iraqi army is having discipline problems because the instructors aren't rude or authoritarian enough. I guess when you're used to being bossed around by Saddam's thugs, that's what happens.

The article also talks about how low pay, shoddy equipment and ethnic tensions have led to serious problems, and that makes a lot more intuitive sense.

Posted 11:27 PM by David Adesnik
DRUM CALLS CLINTON A HYPOCRITE: In so many words.

Posted 11:20 PM by David Adesnik
JUST CLICK AND SCROLL: Glenn Reynolds has tons of posts on the media's strange aversion to reporting anti-terror protests in Iraq. CalPundit thinks that charges of media bias are absurd, since most conservative media outlets failed to cover the protests as well. But, he says, Fox and CNN picked it up because protests result in good footage. Come on Kevin, you can't have it both ways...

Posted 11:09 PM by David Adesnik
THAT IS JUST SOOOO FRENCH: In Paris, sophisticates scoff at the United States' delusional faith that armed invasions rather than cross-cultural dialogue can win over the hearts and minds of the Islamic world. In Paris, a blue ribbon panel appointed by President Chirac has just recommended that the French state ban Muslim girls from wearing headscarves in public schools. Also prohibited would be other "conspicuous" example of religious attire, such as Jewish yarmulkes and Christian cross-emblems.

There is something touchingly innocent about the French aspiration to promote tolerance by imposing conformity. Perhaps Tocqueville should have cast a glance homewards as he warned his American hosts about the dangers associated with the tyranny of the majority.

While the average American man-in-the-street could have told M. Chirac that religious repression only promotes resentful backlash, there is a more subtle point that American might not appreciate because they take religious toleration for granted. When I spent a summer in Germany a number of years ago, the papers there were filled with a similar debate about Muslim headscarves and the effort of some school or other to ban them. (Characteristically for German federalism, the headscarf debate arose out of a local ordnance, rather than a central government plan a la francaise.)

As I read more about the debate, one of the most interesting points that came out was how the woman in question who had been asked to remove her headscarf was actually a very progressive Muslim who favored both greater equality for women and greater integration of Islam and secular society. Such beliefs were not at all accidential. After all, who but a progressive Muslim woman would prefer to work in a German institution rather than a Muslim one?

I suspect that in France, a similar trend exists. The girls in public schools who wear headscarves are probably the ones most likely to learn to love and respect French civilization. If taught that French civilization is willing to respect them as well, such women would have tremendous potential to share French ideals with those members of their families and communities who are not so enlightened.

Perhaps it should not come as a surprise that France has a resentful, violent and poorly integrated Muslim immigrant community whereas Muslim immigrants in the United States seem to be thriving no less than Jews, Hindus, or Chinese -- and giving back to their host country.

In other cultural news, the Academie Francaise, the body charged with protecting the French language from Anglo-American pollution, has finally reached the letter 'R' after six decades devoted to producing the definitive French-language dictionary.

Posted 5:55 PM by Josh Chafetz
THE NYT HAS A SHORT BUT INTERESTING PIECE on Karzai and Afghanistan's upcoming constitutional convention.

Posted 4:29 PM by Josh Chafetz
YALE LOSES ONE OF ITS VERY, VERY BEST. Dean Brodhead will be sorely missed. But congratulations to Duke for such a fantastic catch.

Posted 11:46 AM by Josh Chafetz
HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN HAS A NEW PRIME MINISTER IN CANADA.

Posted 9:35 AM by Patrick Belton
DEAN GETS A BOOST out of Gore endorsement.

On other fronts - Josh, count me in! (especially if I can still get charter member privileges.....I can think of one or two yummy kosher and halal joints where I'd love to have a discount card....)

Posted 7:58 AM by Josh Chafetz
BELOW, PATRICK ASKS, "If the United States is supposedly being run by Jews and (now) Muslims, then how in the name of Hashem/Allah did we end up with a budget so full of pork?" A year and a half ago, I proposed "a grass-roots 'rainbow coalition' against pork. In the spirit of bridging divides, it could be called the 'National Movement for Kosher-Halal Legislation.'" At the time, I asked, "Anyone wanna sign on?" Patrick?

Posted 7:33 AM by Patrick Belton
THINKING AHEAD: The National Intelligence Council's triennial Global Trends projects collectively represent some of the most wide-ranging, strategic, and neat thinking being done within the U.S. government. Robert Hutchings, the Council's chair, is fond of saying that with so much of the nation's intelligence community focused on the next car bomb, it's crucially necessary to have at least someone looking at the decennial trends that will shape the world in which the U.S. will be acting, to permit policy to take into account ways to prepare to anticipate and adapt to trends, and to look for lever-points at which it can attempt to shape them.

As an analytical exercise, future-forecasting requires looking both at trends (i.e., it is 2020, and America, Europe, and Japan are struggling to maintain a decent quality of life for masses of elderly people, China is facing a choice between belligerence and joining Western nations as an economic superpower, and India, Brazil, and Indonesia are becoming emerging powers) and at wild cards (a nuclear exchange, for example, or the emergence of new technologies, or worldwide pandemics), as well as points at which U.S. policy could attempt to influence these trends. Global Trends 2015 and Global Trends 2010 have already been released, and make for provocative (and recommended) reading.

Posted 6:38 AM by Patrick Belton
JUST WONDERING.... If the United States is supposedly being run by Jews and (now) Muslims, then how in the name of Hashem/Allah did we end up with a budget so full of pork?

Posted 12:17 AM by David Adesnik
EYES ON THE PRIZE: What are Glenn Reynolds and Andrew Sullivan thinking? Playing politics with reconstruction contracts is a terrible idea.

But all of those who are against the Bush administration's wrongheaded decision also seem to be missing something. The first question that should come to mind when thinking about the contracts is not "Is this good for the United States?" but "Is this good for the people of Iraq?" If a French or German company can generate more electricity or pump more oil, then that is what the Iraqi people deserve. (Somehow I doubt that Russian corporations can contribute all that much to Iraqi well-being.)

The people of Iraq have suffered enough for the crimes of Saddam Hussein and shouldn't have to suffer at all for the pettiness of Chirac, Schroeder or Bush. The people of Iraq suffered through more than a decade of devastating sanctions for the sake of Western security. Now we owe them.

Frankly, I am appalled at the President's statement that

"Our people risked their lives. Friendly coalition folks risked their lives, and therefore the contracting is going to reflect that, and that's what the U.S. taxpayers expect."

Those are the words of a corporate mercenary. Those are the words of a man without vision. America earns it wealth from the creativity of its entrepreneurs, not the blood of its soldiers. Many European nations supported the invasion of Iraq because they share our vision of global security, not because they wanted a handout.

Moreover, why should an American corporation benefit from the sacrifices of an American soldier? The 82nd Airborne was fighting for freedom and security, not for Halliburton. Thus, the President owes it to the 82nd and to all of America's fighting men and women to what is in the interest of freedom and security.

Posted 11:52 PM by David Adesnik
FIGHTING CRIME, BLOOMBERG STYLE: It's all about the Benjamins.

Posted 11:42 PM by David Adesnik
HONEY, WHY DIDNT YOU CALL? Richard Cohen thinks Al Gore could've found a more sensitive way to break up with Joe Lieberman. David Broder thinks Lieberman is better off alone.

Posted 11:36 PM by David Adesnik
EXACTLY RIGHT: The WaPo endorses the Supreme Court decision on campaign finance reform.

Posted 11:31 PM by David Adesnik
NOT READY FOR DEMOCRACY: Tsk, tsk. Engaging in peaceful protests? Demanding elections? Uniting different interest groups? Who do these Iraqis think they are? If they had any sort of respect for the Western punditocracy, they would at least say something about how food and shelter are more important than freedom or how order has come before justice.

So now it's time for the occupation authority to wake up and recognize that local elections are the way to go, with a national poll following later. It isn't a new idea, folks.

Posted 10:15 PM by Josh Chafetz
COOL! I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO BE A TOKEN MAN!

Posted 10:11 PM by Josh Chafetz
DOW CLOSES ABOVE 10,000. Pretty cool.

Oooh, and this sounds pretty nice, too!

Posted 1:56 PM by Josh Chafetz
FASCINATING PIECE ON IRAQ -- including a mention of yesterday's anti-terrorism demonstrations -- in today's Rocky Mountain News.

Posted 12:32 PM by Josh Chafetz
I'VE WRITTEN BEFORE THAT CLINTON HATRED is one of the great and disgusting pathologies of a substantial portion of the right. And I never cease to be amazed at how it can warp people's thinking. Take, for example, this comment by Jim Robbins in The Corner today:

When Hillary Clinton was asked on "Meet the Press" if she would never accept the Democratic Presidential nomination, her response was , "I am not accepting the nomination." This was exactly the formulation Bill Clinton used to deny his affair with Monica Lewinsky under oath: "There is no relationship." Meaning, not at that precise moment. And we understand that Hillary was not accepting the nomination Sunday, because everyone now knows what the meaning of "is" is. Either this was a subtle joke she was playing, or this junior high-level wordplay is a family psychosis.

Um, yeah ... or, like any normal human being, Clinton doesn't always think over every implication of every word she uses. Yes, I watched Sen. Clinton's "Meet the Press" appearance in its entirety (hooray for CNBC Europe!), and yes the exchange about whether she's running in '04 was amusing. But, people, she's not running in '04. If you think she's honest, then consider that she has said over and over and over that she's not running. And if you think she's shrewd and devious, then consider that, while she could easily win the Democratic nomination, she'd have no chance in the general election, and she stands a much better chance for a 2008 run. Either way, she's not running in '04!

On a related note, I've been quite impressed with Sen. Clinton over the last couple of years. And I think that a lot of centrist conservatives, if they could get past their hatred of her last name, would find that she's hardly the liberal bogeywoman of their imaginings ...

Posted 12:09 PM by Josh Chafetz
'THIS DECISION IS A BLUNDER. WE TRUST IT WILL BE REVERSED.' Kristol and Kagan against the Pentagon's limiting reconstruction contracts to countries that supported the war. President Bush, however, defended the decision today.

To be honest, I'm not sure how I feel about this. It strikes me as neither more nor less devious than the EU's planned response to US steel tariffs (which was to slap tariffs on products from electorally important and closely divided states -- e.g., Florida citrus). No government always awards contracts solely on the basis of efficiency -- other national interests are frequently taken into account. And it seems to me that rewarding companies from those countries that helped us out is a legitimate way to award contracts.

That said, I think Kristol and Kagan make some good points -- it may well be that this money could better have promoted our foreign policy goals without this policy. So, like I said, I'm not sure.

Posted 11:08 AM by Josh Chafetz
SWEEEEEEEEEEEEET!

Posted 11:04 AM by Josh Chafetz
MIXED ECONOMIC NEWS today, as retail sales for November were higher than expected, but last week's new unemployment claims were also up slightly. Overall, the news seems more good than bad, although, of course, it would be nice to see employment numbers doing better.

The markets seem to agree that today's news was, on the whole, good -- the Dow is inching towards 10,000, and the NASDAQ and S&P; 500 are both showing substantial gains.

Posted 10:59 AM by Josh Chafetz
THE HUTTON INQUIRY INTO THE DEATH OF DR. DAVID KELLY will apparently release its report on January 12. You can read my take on the issues that Lord Hutton is investigating here, and I'm sure I'll have more to say on the report when it is released.

Posted 10:57 AM by Josh Chafetz
THE BBC REPORTS on Iranians posting notes on the blog of the UN Digital Summit in Geneva, complaining about their government's censorship of the web.

Posted 10:27 AM by Patrick Belton
AND I WROTE IT ALL MYSELF: A copy of a paper on the role of Congress in Sino-American relations in the post-Cold War period, which I presented here at Oxford last Friday, is online here. (Also, a paper I gave last week on the intellectual history of the concept of progress, this one at the Oxford intellectual history seminar, is here.)

Posted 7:06 AM by Josh Chafetz
POLLS CLOSE SUNDAY, SO THERE'S ONLY A LITTLE TIME LEFT TO VOTE FOR OXBLOG AS BEST GROUP BLOG! Vote early; vote often! (If you've already voted, clicking on that link will let you see how we're doing.)

And, yes, I'll stop bugging you about this now.

Posted 11:29 PM by David Adesnik
PUTTING THE "LIBERAL" BACK IN "LIBERAL HAWK": It's a reversal of the classic Nixon-in-China strategy. Hillary Clinton is using her impeccable liberal credentials to attack Bush from the right on Iraq without offending her Democratic base. I hope Hillary gets the attention of Howard Dean and the rest of her wayward co-partisans, not to mention that of the White House. Everything she says about Iraq is 100% right.

Posted 11:04 PM by David Adesnik
THE ROMANCE OF IRAQIFICATION: Lawrence Kaplan exposes the strange faith behind certain conservatives insistence that we should turn over more responsibilities to Iraqi security forces as quickly as possibly. Also worth a look is the debate between Kaplan and Jim Phillips of the Heritage Foundation, who tries to defend the administrations' policies. Phillips gets a couple of shots in, but Kaplan is the winner, hands down.

Posted 10:47 PM by David Adesnik
AN OXBLOG RARITY: How often does OxBlog criticize others for their naive insistence that democracy promotion is the answer to every political dilemma? Almost never, since we're generally pretty busy defending ourselves from those who throw similar charges at us.

Today, however, the tables are turned. In a masthead editorial, the WaPo is blasting President Bush for siding with China in opposing Taiwanese President Chen Shui-Bian's proposed referendum on independence. As the WaPo would have it,

Yesterday President Bush essentially placed the United States on the side of the dictators who promise war, rather than the democrats whose threat is a ballot box.

Admittedly, having to side with the Chinese is never pleasant. However, the proposed referendum would achieve nothing more than sticking a finger in China's eye without doing anything to enhance democracy in Taiwan.

Frankly, the referendum seems like a cynical attempt by President Chen to make China talk tough so that he can win a second term by posing as the Taiwanese David standing up to the Chinese Goliath. That's just reckless, so there's no reason the US should support the idea. It would be better for both Taiwan and the United States if Bush acts as a peacemaker so that if China starts trouble, the United States can both side with Taiwan and take the moral high ground.

Posted 10:36 PM by David Adesnik
SHI'ITE BOOMTOWN: The WaPo has an in-depth look at the situation in Najaf, where religious freedom is driving a major economic expansion by attracting thousands and thousands of pilgrims. Interestingly enough, the expansion is racing forward despite limited supplies of electricity and water.

Unfortunately, the article perpetuates the WaPo/NYT habit of providing vague but menacing indications of Shi'ite attitudes towards democracy. Still, one has to wonder whether the economic revitalization of the Shi'ite spiritual capital is one of the reasons that Shi'ite have shown no interest in joining the Ba'athist struggle against the American occupation. Insteads of hearts and minds, this may be a case of hearts and pocketbooks.

Also in Iraq: The Americans have decided to let the Iraqis prosecute their own war criminals and the Europeans aren't happy about it. While the Europeans' preference for an international tribunal has merit to it, it is somewhat ironic that they constantly warn the United States about imposing its will on Iraq but then turn around and want to do the same.

Posted 7:54 PM by Josh Chafetz
GLENN HAS A NICE ROUNDUP OF LINKS ON TODAY'S ANTI-TERRORISM DEMONSTRATIONS IN BAGHDAD. I hope this gets picked up by more mainstream media outlets. Glenn has more here.

Posted 12:20 PM by David Adesnik
PENNY WISE, POUND FOOLISH: After finally laying to rest some of the more ridiculous accusations about its handling of reconstruction contracts for Iraq, the Bush administration is now doing its best to confirm widespread suspicion of its motives.

First, I just can't figure out why DoD would do something as transparently vindictive as barring French, Russian and German firms from bidding on reconstruction contracts. Whatever financial benefit comes from this will be more than outweighed by the storm of domestic criticism it will bring down on the administration (not to mention foreign reaction.)

Besides, those who get the contracts are allowed to subcontract out to French, Russian and German firms. Thus, the financial impact of the ban will be minimal despite its massive political costs.

Moreover, awarding contracts to American firms doesn't seem so smart when there are continuing reports that Halliburton is swindling the administration by overcharging for imported fuel.

Coming from an administration that is usually so good about looking for its own self-interest, it is hard to know why no one seems to be watching out for Iraq as the election approaches and voters show more and more concern about the lack of visible progress on the ground.

The best I can figure is that the administration is so preoccupied with the military situation that it can't bother questioning the integrity of its good friends at Halliburton.

Posted 7:04 AM by Patrick Belton
THINK TANK WATCH: Bruce Hoffman and Kim Cragin coauthor an interesting RAND study on the counterterror and other implications of small arms trafficking in Colombia, in a piece commissioned by the DIA. They conclude American military assistance to Colombia under the auspices of Plan Colombia had the unintended consequence of increasing small arms trafficking, and bringing about an escalation in violence as non-state actors competed for control of trafficking routes, as well as spill-over effects in other black-market economies in the region (Foz do Iguacu, Leticia, Colon).

Also at RAND, James Dobbins testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the U.S. has been too slow in incorporating lessons learned into its doctrine, training, and planning, and in making use of the expertise of professionals with past experience in post-conflict situations. Dobbins also notes favourably proposals for revamping the way the US deals with post-conflict situations - tasks that are at present eschewed by both DOD and State - by the possible creation of a new government institution for the task, and the passage of an act on Goldwater/Nichols lines which would accomplish for post-conflict reconstruction and stabilization missions the clarification of responsibilities within an enduring arrangement that the Goldwater/Nichols act accomplished for the creation of unified warfighting commands.

Over at CFR, Dennis Kux and Mahnaz Ispahani write a piece on revamping South Asia policy, calling for the US to move toward a security partnership with India, and conditioning US aid to Pakistan on progress in fulfilling its nonproliferation responsibilities, denying its territory to militants, and pursuing a democratic-reformist agenda, while orientating the cast of that aid slightly away from security assistance and more toward education, projects in ethnic-Pakhto areas, and building of democratic and judicial institutions. They also call for a broader U.S. role in shepherding the de-escalation of the Kashmir conflict through expanded trade relations and confidence building measures on each side. Also in the Upper East Side, Pete Peterson chaired a task force on addressing America's image problem, recommending the administration do this through greater presidential support of public diplomacy efforts (through a PDD and creation of an interagency coordinating structure), doing more overseas polling, and taking overseas public opinion into account at an earlier stage in the policy process.

Elsewhere in think-tankery, both Brookings and CFR hosted meetings on the Geneva Accords, featuring Yossi Beilin, Yasser Abed Rabbo, and their own luminaries (and making the transcripts available online). Brookings also has a paper on revamping intelligence for homeland security tasks, and Michael O'Hanlon is spearheading an Iraq indices project, keeping track of trends in battlefield casualties, public opinion in Iraq and the U.S., reconstruction, and other facets of the reconstruction effort. AEI has hosted thoughtful events (with transcripts available online) on aiding democrating reform in Iran, Leo Strauss's perspectives on modern politics, and the future of Franco-American relations. And Carnegie has pieces on Arab democracy, NAFTA ten years after, and how Chechnya has affected Russian foreign, domestic, and military policy.

Posted 10:53 PM by David Adesnik
ONE-STOP SHOPPING: Dan Drezner has some good comments about the reliability of recently unveiled stats on unemployment and worker productivity in the US. He also has some very insightful comments about Al Gore's endorsement of Howard Dean, as well as a comprehensive round up of other bloggers reactions to it.

Posted 10:25 PM by David Adesnik
THE ART OF JUXTAPOSITION: Forgive me for being a week late with this one, but I think it's worth pointing out. Last Tuesday, the WaPo ran this Fareed Zakaria column, which does a good job of making the usual case against Bush's unilateral instincts. The anchor for Fareed's column is his observation that Chinese President Hu Jintao has been getting standing ovations throughout Asia while George Bush gets the cold shoulder.

Below Fareed's column, the Post ran this op-ed by Robert Bernstein, a founder of Human Rights Watch. In it, Bernstein discusses the media's tragic lack of attention to massive slave labor camps and widespread police brutality in China. Running alongside Zakaria's column, it makes a devastating point about the moral confusion of those who applaud Hu Jintao while lashing out George Bush. (Greg Djerejian made the same point quite effectively a short while back.)

While criticism of George Bush is certainly deserved, the intensity of the anger directed at the American President demonstrates that his critics abroad have internalized a dangerous double standard that judges aggression against dictators to be a far greater crime than the vicious abuse of millions of one's fellow citizens.

Posted 9:52 PM by David Adesnik
DEAN IS INEVITABLE: Matt Yglesias says so both here and here. Matt is also backing Al Gore for Vice-President, since he has so much experience on the job and performed it so well.

Also worth reading are Bill Kristol and Glenn Reynolds' thoughts on why Dean will be anything but the next McGovern.

Posted 9:16 PM by David Adesnik
FOREIGN POLICY (THE MAGAZINE): When in DC, I always make a point of stopping in at the offices of Foreign Policy, the bimonthly journal of "global politics, economics, and ideas" sponsored by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. The staff there is friendly, hard-working and creative. Thus, it should come as no surprise that "FP" took home this year's National Magazine Award for General Excellence in the under-100k circulation category. (Although it's probably worth noting that The Nation somehow picked up a "Maggie" for its commentary and opinion columns.)

A sample of FP's high-quality work includes: the best article I've read on European anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism, an in-depth look at the whether the Indian economic model is more sustainable than its Chinese counterpart, and a trenchant defense of free-trade from the myth of anti-globalization activists.

Admittedly, FP produces some duds, much like any publication. For example, its forum on post-war Iraq could've been lifted from the op-ed pages of a half-dozen newspapers. (Robert Kagan's contribution is definitely worth a look, however.)

In general, I'd say that FP does its best work when it explores in-depth those issues that newspapers can only treat anecdotally. Take the India vs. China article for example. Foreign correspondents are constantly producing spot reports that one country or the other. But they rarely compare the two. Moreover, the authors of the FP essay are well-versed in the expert literature on the subject, which journalists tend to ignore, thus reinforcing their selective perception and cultural predispositions.

In contrast, shorter essays in FP tend to provide a somewhat one-sided look at a given issue. Whereas newspaper op-eds do the same, you can generally rely on a given newspaper to run opposing opinion columns. Yet when FP runs opposing columns, it has to plan them months in advance so they aren't timely as those on the op-ed page.

On the other hand, FP needs to run short articles so that readers don't get turned off by the challenge of reading a 3,000 word article or nothing at all. Still, there are other kinds of short articles than can get readers hooked, such as FP's "Prime Numbers" and "Think Again" columns.

Finally, it's worth mentioning that FP takes a pretty firm multilateralist line on US foreign policy. This is both a product of its left-wing heritage as well as its more recent emphasis on globalization and the importance of transnational cooperation in a global era. While there's nothing wrong with taking that sort of position, it often results in FP running some less-than-insightful articles that reiterate the multilateralist conventional wisdom. (For balance, FP relies on Bob Kagan to function as the in-house neo-conservative, a responsibility he can't avoid because he's on the Carnegie payroll.)

So there you have it. FP is a damn good magazine. It isn't perfect, but it is definitely worth taking a look at everytime it hits the newsstand.

Posted 9:15 PM by David Adesnik
17 BLOGGING DAYS 'TIL CHRISTMAS: I need a vacation. My trip to DC really wore me down. But it was a very educational experience. The interviews I conducted fell into two basic categories. The first category consisted of interviews with Carter administration officials whose professional records I am already familiar with. As a result of this familiarity, I was able to ask them extremely specific questions that helped me push beyond the contents of published documents in order to get a better sense of the inner workings of American diplomacy.

Admittedly, I didn't push all that far beyond the contents of the printed material that is already out there. Often, the interviews were most useful in terms of confirming some of the working hypotheses I had already developed. From what I can tell, the limits of human memory make it very hard for interviews to supplement the extensive public record that comes into existence thanks to the relatively transparent nature of American diplomacy. Moreover, the popularity of US-Nicaraguan relations as a subject of inquiry in the 1980s ensured that all of those I spoke with have already gone on the record multiple times with their version of events.

Interviews with those on the other side of the Cold War divide are often quite illuminating, however. The example that immediately comes to mind is Robert Kagan's interview with Sandinista military commander Humberto Ortega. Conducted shortly after the Sandinistas' fall from grace in February 1990, Kagan's interview brings out a story that was simply never told because of the limits of Nicaraguan politics and American journalism. (NB: There is no published transcript of the interview, but many of the most illuminating quotes can be found throughout Kagan's excellent work on US-Sandinista relations, entitled A Twilight Struggle.)

The second set of interviews I conducted were with Reagan administration officials and lobbyists and congressional staffers. I relied on these interviews to provide me with an introduction to some of the policies that I have not studied in as much depth as I have those of the Carter administration. I also used these interviews to broaden my range of contacts so that I can conduct a more comprehensive set of interviews when I return to Washington.

Finally, I'd like to thank two individuals who were extremely helpful and generous with their time. The first is Bruce Cameron, who really want out of his way to help me get in touch with as many individuals as possible who were part of the policymaking process in the 1980s. The second is Cindy Buhl, who sat down with me for an hour and half and provided me with a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at congressional politicking despite the fact that she has a million things to do because she is still an congressional staffer.

By and large, almost everyone I talked to did their best to help me with my research. (Except for one arrogant prick who shall remain nameless because I sense that he is vindictive enough to try and screw me over if he found out I had insulted him on my website.) While Washington DC doesn't exactly have a reputation as a the most friendly place to work, I think there a lot more good-hearted people out there than the city gets credit for.

Posted 8:12 PM by Josh Chafetz
CHIEF WIGGLES NEEDS HELP -- four young girls' lives are in danger for helping US troops identify former regime loyalists. He's looking for someone or some group to sponsor bringing them to the US and helping them find a home there. If you're part of a group that might be able to help, please consider doing so.

Posted 5:45 PM by Patrick Belton
THIS IS REALLY STUPID: Namely, eliminating funding for Radio Free Europe, as this year's Omnibus Appropriations measure has done. RFE/RL boadcasting to Bulgaria, Croatia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Slovakia will end Dec. 31. The WaPo points out just how short-sighted a move this is:

THEY PROVIDE what one Lithuanian politician calls "neutral, solid, Western programming" reflecting Western values. They give an American point of view but are not generally regarded as propaganda. They have millions of listeners across the new democracies of Eastern Europe as well as a long tradition. They cost, by U.S. budgetary standards, very little: The overall funding, for 11 countries, is $11 million a year. Yet if congressional appropriators have their way, one of the cheapest, most effective and most popular tools of U.S. public diplomacy -- the foreign language services of Radio Free Europe -- will soon cease to exist. Seven languages are to be cut altogether, including the services to Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Croatia and the Baltic states. Several more, including services to Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia and Serbia, will be cut by 25 percent.

The logic behind the cuts -- which have been heavily pushed by the administration and opposed by many in Congress -- is allegedly financial: More money is now going to radio services in the Middle East, and budgets are limited. But the omnibus appropriations bill awaiting congressional approval is hardly austere. As we've said before, it is proving to be yet another example of lax congressional spending, funding everything from a rain forest museum in Iowa to Alaskan fishing communities.

Like the relatively low funding for the newer but equally effective services of Radio Free Asia, the cuts to Radio Free Europe do not, therefore, really reflect a new administration push to control spending. Instead, they are yet another example of the administration's poor choice of foreign policy priorities. With a short attention span and little understanding that allies, too, require attention and diplomacy, the administration seems to have let whole chunks of the world fall off its diplomatic radar screen altogether. No iron law says that new democracies will remain democracies or even remain American allies. In this unstable part of the world, the sober presentation of an American point of view is still necessary.

Instead of spending $11 million to present an American point of view in Eastern Europe, what are our tax dollars going to? Funny you asked:

* $1.35 million for the Clearwater Economic Development Association for implementation of the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial plan to assist small communities in North Idaho in preparing for the anticipated influx of tourism during the Bicentennial years.

* $450,000 for Trout Genome Mapping. $600,000 to a project called "Web Wise Kids." $200,000 for Renovation of the First National Bank Building, Greenfield, Massachusetts. $250,000 to Martha's Village and Kitchen, Indio, California. $6,000,000 to construct a Treasure Island Bridge. $725,000 to the Please Touch Museum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. $225,000 for "Construction of Blue-Gray Civil War Theme Park, Kentucky"

* And the Congressional Pig Book 2003 has a more complete list, identifying $22.5 billion of pork in the appropriations bills - so much, they've been heard squealing on their way across the Capitol from the House to the Senate.

Now, I'm sure all of these are worthy projects. But I'm not yet nearly convinced that building, say, a "Blue-Gray Civil War Theme Pack" in Kentucky is more deserving of the tax dollars of the nation than making the case for American policies to foreign audiences. In fact, I think it's fairly silly and short-sighted.

Posted 5:06 PM by Patrick Belton
LEBANON - IT'S GOT ISSUES: The Middle East Intelligence Bulletin has a special issue out on Lebanon, with pieces on PM Hairi's impending showdown with Damascus, on student politics as an augur of what a future Lebanese politics might look like, and on the overratedness of Lebanese powerbroker Issam Fares. Good fare, as always.

Posted 12:55 PM by Patrick Belton
BOB TAGORDA'S GOT NEW DIGS: They're at http://www.tagorda.com/ - go pay him a visit!

Posted 12:51 PM by Patrick Belton
DAN DREZNER gives an even-handed roundup of a blogosphere debate on the relationship between Islam and economic growth.

Posted 12:44 PM by Josh Chafetz
FAVORITE SENTENCE OF MY DISSERTATION (SO FAR): In discussing Nixon v. United States, 506 U.S. 224 (1993):

Chutzpah has often been said to be defined as when a man kills both his parents and begs the court for mercy because he's an orphan,[fn] but the case of a federal judge who refuses to resign his position after being convicted for lying to a federal grand jury surely gives the traditional definition a run for its money.

The footnote reads

See Alex Kozinski & Eugene Volokh, Lawsuit, Shmawsuit, 103 YALE L. J. 463, 467 (1993). It might be argued that this is, in fact, an exemplification, rather than a definition, but far be it from me to so kibitz in Kozinski and Volokh's writing. See id. at 463 n.4, 464, 464 n.6, 467.

(You can read an updated version of Kozinski and Volokh's piece here.)