This week has not been a pleasant one for Hamid Karzai. Following an embarrassing outburst where he declared, among other things, “I might join the Taliban”, Western media outlets have kept up a steady barrage of open editorials lampooning the President. Foreign Policy, Slate, Small War Journal, The Weekly Standard, the Huffington Post, and Politico […]
If one political philosopher must be named my patron saint, it would be Alexis de Tocqueville. It is hard to read a page of that he has written without coming across a gem of wisdom relevant to today’s affairs. Take this small excerpt from the second chapter of Democracy in America: In most European nations, […]
I like ecology. It is a fascinating subject, and it deserves much more credence than many will ever allow it. Its importance is hard to contest: long before man played any part in sizeable political or economic systems, he was a node in the Earth’s many extensive ecological networks. It was upon these networks mankind […]
War and Peace and War: The Life Cycles of Imperial Nations, Peter Turchin’s sweeping application of cliodynamics to the rise and fall of great powers, has been making the rounds recently. Both the Committee of Public Safety and Sublime Oblivion have posted responses to the book. As my past posts on cultural cohesion might suggest, […]
A collection of articles, essays, and blog post of merit. THE REPUBLIC America, the Land of Limited Opportunity. We Must Open Our Eyes to the Truth. “Fabius Maximus”. Fabius Maximus. 31 March 2010. Fabius Maximus points to a painful truth: increasing inequality of income and declining social mobility is tearing our America apart at the […]
Author’s Note: A few days ago I finished reading Europe in Crisis, 1598-1648, by Geoffrey Parker. Parker is a renowned scholar of 17th century Europe, and for those unfamiliar with the period’s history I can think of no better introduction than this volume. This reading was the impetus for the following post. You can summarize […]
Wikileaks edited and presented this incident in a manner that can be called nothing but blatantly dishonest. This video presents portions of the full 40 minute video that Wikileaks left out. At this moment it has received 500 hits. The Wikileaks video has received 5 million. I ask my readers to spread this video to […]
Earlier this week Sublime Oblivion linked to a smart quantitative breakdown posted over at the Russian Strategic Forces Blog concerning the new START treaty. Included was this useful table: RUSSIA July 2009 Old START 2010Actualoperationally deployed launches (total launchers) ca. 2020New STARToperationally deployed launchers (total launchers)[estimate] ca. 2020New START warheads[estimate] ICBMs SS-25 176 171 SS-27 […]
Last month Arundhati Roy published an incredible piece of investigative journalism in The Guardian. Roy spent more than a week “embedded” with Naxal insurgents in Chhattisgarh and her piece is a rare window into the hidden world of India’s Maoist insurgency. I heavily recommend that all readers with an interest in international insurgencies or Indian […]
(Photograph: Stringer/Reuters) Long War Journal has published an excellent graphic breakdown of the results and an astute analysis of what they mean.