A Swiftly Tilting Planet

Madeline L'Engle died last week, and this piece is just a lovely, eulogistic book review. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/09/AR2007090901947.html

And in other planetary news (not as exciting as a tesseract, mind you), the reports are in! Highlights include:

1. The arrest and deportation of former Pakistani leader Sharif on his attempted return to Islamabad. If anything shows the weakness of Musharraf's hand, this is it. You don't tip the table when you're winning the game of chess. Now he's managed to lose quite a bit of credibility and fire up resistance. D'oh.

2. The reports are in! More than I'd like to admit, I really appreciate Ryan Crocker's analysis of the scenario in Iraq. He's the first person who's stood up and presented the complex, long-term sort of thinking that can keep Iraq from turning into even more of a quagmire. I look forward to hearing the rest of what he has to say, and I only hope Congress and the White House can keep their mouths shut long enough to listen.

Damn straight, Judge Marrero

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/06/AR2007090601438.html?hpid=topnews

Humpty Dumpty

My goodness, it's been a while.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/15/AR2007051501945.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

I saw this today, and I have to admit, my glee at the seeming unraveling of the Bush Administration knows no bounds. This one's particularly good, because the whole episode reads like something from a John Grisham novel. Excellent.

Also, sorry for the long hiatus. I'm back now!

2007: An Earth Odyssey

And now it's time for something completely different!

Researchers in Senegal have recently discovered a troop of chimpanzees that create hunting weapons. This is a strange development - chimps have used tools, such as blades of grass, to gather food before, but not to hunt.

Even more interesting, all ye scientists and generals of the hunt, is that fully 2/3 of the chimps developing and using the new hunting "technology" are female.

I can just see us gathering around the obelisk as I write this.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/22/AR2007022201007.html

Another Dispatch from Pakistan

This should scare everyone:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article1414137.ece

Habeas Corpus

take a look at this:

http://restore-habeas.org/index.php

I'm not going to tell you to sign on (although I think you should, regardless of who you are), but I am going to tell you that I think it's extraordinarily dangerous for our country to circumvent the Constitution to stop those who'd most like to, well, see our constitutional republic fail. The more we change the rules, the less they have to do.

I'm moving to Sweden.

Or Norway. Having spent an hour yesterday looking at proposals within the International Affairs budget, and the rather, er, ingenious ways the administration has "increased funding" (really, allocating lots of money to HIV/AIDS prevention that focuses on abstinence education...which I could complain about for hours, and but won't subject you to here), I was intrigued to read Mr. Dionne's assessment of the 2008 Budget Request. Even more interesting is the link in this article to the Urban Institute-Brookings Institution analysis of Bush's proposed tax cut plan. This is worth a read:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/08/AR2007020801677.html

with friends like these...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/04/AR2007020400653.html

Someone in the Bush administration must be smoking Opium

An interesting analysis of the US-Pakistan-Afghanistan relationship, written by a former Indian diplomat.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/IA27Df02.html

Gag me with a spoon

Really, that's all I have to say to POTUS today. The Boston Globe says the rest for me:

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/01/17/amid_bloodshed_bush_wants_a_thank_you/

Also, have I mentioned lately how much I love Garrison Keillor? Here's some more fodder for my adoration:

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2007/01/17/keillor/

It's really not about the wrappings

When my dad and I opened our Christmas presents this year, we found out that we had bought each other the same gift: Jimmy Carter's new book on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I read it - it really isn't all that controversial (seriously, I promise), and to his credit Carter tries to stay logical and balanced.

However, just as most debate in the US has suffered, at least in the past few years, from a lack of substance, the firestorm of criticism surrounding the book revolves not around Carter's ultimate argument for peace (which is to everyone's benefit - including Israel's), but around the fact that he even used the world "Palestine" in the title.

Well, I'm not even going to address that, because I think the critique is so ridiculous. However, I am going to direct you all to Carter's op-ed today in the Washpost. Enjoy!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/17/AR2007011701712.html


Also, this has little to do with the rest of the post, apart from geographical coincidence, but it's totally weird:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2552754,00.html

When I was there, I was Togo

Georgetown University's SFS-Qatar (the newest campus, in Doha), sponsored a Model UN conference this week. I have a feeling my experience at the one Harvard set up in 1997 was slightly different, but here's Al-Jazeera's coverage:

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/806D889A-9F99-48AE-87ED-69B8BDEFC32B.htm?FRAMELESS=true&NRNODEGUID=%7b806D889A-9F99-48AE-87ED-69B8BDEFC32B%7d


Also, this is not the result of bias or (much) campaigning on anyone's part (you know who you are), but here's my current pick for '08.

http://www.courant.com/news/politics/hc-dodd0116.artjan16,0,4024450,print.story?coll=hc-headlines-home

Reasons:
Coherent foreign policy stance (combined with actual CFR experience), and general willingness to engage the world
Peace Corps service
Overall liberalish politics, pretty hard-core Democrat (in the best sense of the word)
I lobbied his office once
He's bilingual
He has the same birthday as my mom
No waffling on whether he'd have voted one way or another
Has been an elected official since 1975
Not Hillary or Obama (Hillary bothers me viscerally, and made concessions to pro-lifers; Obama doesn't have enough experience to make me comfortable with the idea of him running the country)

This Is Completely Fascinating, If It's Real

Ha'aretz (a leading Israeli newspaper) reported this morning that Israel and Syria have been conducting secret peace talks for two years. Even better, it seems like they've actually developed a workable solution to the border dispute in the Golan Heights. Interesting. Looks like Condi might have missed something on her trip abroad...

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2549465,00.html

In other news, remember that interesting conversation I had with my boss about Dubya and the game of Risk? Well, our thoughts made it into the NYT this weekend...

Unfortunately, it's TimesSelect, so you can't read the article unless you're a subscriber, but...

http://select.nytimes.com/gst/tsc.html?URI=http://select.nytimes.com/2007/01/13/opinion/13dowd.html&OQ=_rQ3D1&OP=4fad2792Q2FQ20o4,Q20Q3BQ3Cp((Q3BQ20Q60zz1Q20z.Q20.Q2FQ20(_eQ5Ee(Q5EQ20.Q2FQ5B(oQ5BQ2BQ51Q3B75

he who smelt it...

this is just really, really funny:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/08/AR2007010800293.html

Global Warming is just a liberal conspiracy

See the changes in what are termed "Hardiness Zones" - areas where specific types of trees grow best, based on overall temperature trends. The link will bring you to the 2006 numbers. Then press "reset" and "play" to see how tha that has changed in the past 15 years.

http://www.arborday.org/media/mapchanges.cfm

Also, I've been catching up on news pieces I missed this year, as I tend to read the news rather than watching it. Read the transcript of this elegant piece by Keith Olbermann on NBC - you can click to watch the video, as well.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15147009/

There's something wrong with the world today

I don't think additional text will help this story:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,13509-2511686,00.html

Ramallah Burning?

I suppose, logically, it was only a matter of time before the violence in the Gaza Strip spread outwards to the West Bank, and thence to Ramallah. But it is both heartbreaking and maddening to hear that it has finally happened. The irresponsibility of the world in failing to resolve this conflict (or even to take steps in the direction of resoution) will wind up with much farther-reaching consequences than I think anyone sees today. The Times has more detail than WashPost today.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,251-2507122,00.html

I know I've said before that answering the question of Palestine is a necessary condition for so much else in the Middle East, and that answer is more needed now than ever. There is a very tightly woven political web, and the question of the Palestinian Territories and Israel is central, if not to practicality, to the hearts and minds of the entire region.

To do this, though, the question of Israel must move from a fruitless (and moot) debate about existence, and into a more productive one of coexistence. There is a seeming aversion to real debate on both sides of the aisle - with a few significant exceptions, who deserve commendation. The terrorists, the hawks and the lobbyists, by choosing to use blunt instruments instead of subtlety, have lost the ability to listen, and have let the chance for peace elude them.

If people don't stop and listen to each other, they will continue to spiral downwards, and violence benefits no one. Not the Palestinians, not the Israelis, nor Egypt or Jordan, and ultimately not even Iran or Syria. And not the US.

Git'n Into Gitmo

This is a very interesting piece from Seton Hall Law School outlining and analyzing the criteria used by the government to determine enemy combatant status for Guantanamo detainees. http://law.shu.edu/news/guantanamo_report_final_2_08_06.pdf

Their analysis, as well as the WashPost article that references it, is rather frightening. http://blog.washingtonpost.com/benchconference/2006/11/abbott_and_costello_go_to_gitm.html

On an unrelated note (as much as anything is unrelated today), I had the chance to listen to Tom Friedman come speak at our offices today. Check out his column in the NYT tomorrow, as I think it'll be interesting (not about us, but interesting nonetheless).

Eat your heart out, John Le Carre

So, I haven't had much chance to post lately, which is why I haven't written about the new twisty, turny, cold war-evoking spy drama that is unfolding in London lately. For anyone who hasn't been paying attention, Alexander Litvinenko, the one-time Russian spy, was poisoned with a rare (i.e. government-sponsored?) radioactive isotope about a month ago.

Following his death last week, all sorts of interesting new connections have developed between Litvinenko, the FSB, the Italian SISMI, and another former Russian intelligence officer. To add to the already complex mix, Yegor Gaidar, the former Russian PM, is also a suspected victim of poisoning.

I just can't wait until someone puts all this in a book...

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2481876_1,00.html

It's not like it's hard

When I was in 8th grade, our substitue math teacher, who had once fought in WWII, taught us all how to build an atomic bomb. Yup, that's right. It took about 45 minutes, and he drew it on the chalkboard.

At the time, you could find the theoretical instructions in textbooks. When I was a freshman in college, you could look it up online - and I did (for a class). By the time senior year rolled around, I again needed to write up a discussion (historical) about different types of nuclear material, what is used for weapons, what for fuel, etc. To my surprise, all the websites (generally from other universities) had been pulled off the web.

Now, I'm not arguing in favor of nuclear proliferation. But seriously? Once information is in the public domain, we do no one any favors by removing it. Being able to understand the makeup and consequences of dangerous substances allows us to make better decisions about when, how, and why to use them. These websites don't show you where to buy nuclear material, or how to finance such a project, or even the mechanics of making it work. They articulate the science and theory behind a very politically sensitive source of energy. Limiting information limits the effectiveness of democracy, and lowers the tone of political debate. And we all know how I hate that.

In the meantime, as a corollary to some interesting constitutional musings, Japan's foreign minister noted that Japan "has the technological know-how to produce a nuclear weapon but has no immediate plans to do so." Um, ya think? Who's surprised that a nation so focused on science, mechanics, etc, has the ability to make a bomb? I think it'd be a pretty fair assumption that Japan probably figured it out a while ago.

What's interesting is their choice not to build one. There is history there, and politics, and a whole host of other factors. I just hope they don't let North Korean belligerence and American incompetence change their minds.

In any event, here's the WashPost article about it: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/29/AR2006112901641.html