A New Chapter for Africa (Peter Pham) from the National Interest
"The breakup of Sudan is part of an inevitable redrawing of Africa's boundaries. Will that process continue to be bloody?"
Unconventional Wisdom: And China Isn't Beating the US (Daniel Drezner) from Foreign Policy Magazine
"Right now, the United States is vastly more powerful than the People's Republic of China. Anyone telling you otherwise is selling you something."
FP has a whole series of articles they put out challenging "conventional wisdom" in a lot of key areas. Most of them are worth checking out. The full list with links is HERE.
US Troops Wage War with Cash in Afghanistan from Agence France Presse
"At the entrance to a military base in southern Afghanistan, US Army Staff Sergeant Andrew Cunningham hands out money to locals employed to help rebuild their villages devastated by war. … after months of fighting in which six coalition troops and three Afghans were killed, the US military says the rebels have been pushed out -- and they want to make sure that they cannot return."
I don't know what to make of this story. Throw cash, not bullets. I suppose if you pay the people whose country you're occupying ENOUGH, they very well could stop trying to kill you. Win their wallets and their hearts and minds will follow?! It's so … so American.
Cyber Victory in Iran: Derailment of Iran's nuclear program is greatest under-reported news story of 2010 from Y-Net News [of Israel in English]
"Three attacks on developing nuclear centers have occurred in the world, the most recent scant months ago. It is amazing that the year 2010, pegged universally as crunch time regarding Iran's atomic ambitions, ended with such a whimper, not a bang. It was to be a year characterized ultimately by a crippling counter-blow to Teheran's plans -with nary a peep from the media. No "top 10 stories of 2010" inclusions. Not even a Wiki-leak."
It was a top-ten story on THIS BLOG!!
Israel and the Iranian Nuclear Timetable (Paul Pillar) from the National Interest
"Why are Israeli officials suddenly so sanguine about Iran's nuclear-weapons program?"
Iraqi Cleric Embraces State in Comeback Speech from the New York Times
"Mr. Sadr’s challenge now is to reshape a powerful street movement into a political one, and to reconcile its self-image as the permanent face of opposition even as its ministers and deputies fill the government."
Ah, the future is now. This guy and his organization sponsored terrorism directed at US and UN targets from 2004 to 2008 and is openly supported by Iran. You hear it here first: he's going to be the next president of Iraq. And, no matter how much Bush, Cheney and Rove and their neo-con surrogates try to argue otherwise, the regime that will be left in place when we leave will look way more like what Iran looks like now rather than some moderate, US-supporting showcase democracy for the rest of the Middle East. Iran WILL be the big winner for all the lives and resources we will have wasted there.
Loughner Friend Explains Alleged Gunman's Grudge Against Giffords from Mother Jones Magazine
"Loughner's animus toward Giffords intensified after he attended one of her campaign events and she did not, in his view, sufficiently answer a question he had posed, Tierney says. He also describes Loughner as being obsessed with "lucid dreaming"—that is, the idea that conscious dreams are an alternative reality that a person can inhabit and control—and says Loughner became "more interested in this world than our reality.""
Whacked.
A Turning Point in the Discourse, but in Which Direction? (Matt Bai) from the New York Times
"… scrubbing them from the Internet couldn’t erase all evidence of the rhetorical recklessness that permeates our political moment. The question is whether Saturday’s shooting marks the logical end point of such a moment — or rather the beginning of a terrifying new one."
Tucson Shooting Marks Turning Point for Sarah Palin from Politico
"So far, the former Alaska governor has said little, only posting a brief message on her Facebook page Saturday offering condolences to those affected by the shooting. But the rush on the left to affix some of the blame on her for the assassination attempt on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords has suddenly turned the tragedy into a defining moment in Palin’s meteoric political career."
Her supporters wouldn't change their views of Queen Sarah even if she had been the actual shooter. But the tragedy may represent a turning point for the rest of the country. We'll see.
Climate of Hate (Paul Krugman) from the New York Times
"When you heard the terrible news from Arizona, were you completely surprised? Or were you, at some level, expecting something like this atrocity to happen? Put me in the latter category."
In the US, Where Hate Rules at the Ballot Box, This Tragedy has been Coming for a Long Time (Michael Tomasky) from the Guardian [of the UK]
"The shooting of Gabrielle Giffords may lead to the temporary hibernation of rightwing rage, but it is encoded in conservative DNA."
Let Obama's Reagan Revolution Begin (Frank Rich) from the New York Times
"…if Obama actually read Cannon, his comeback could have legs. It’s full of leadership lessons that will be particularly useful in outfoxing political adversaries who seem not to have consulted so much as a picture book about the president they claim as their patron saint."
Dems Will Turn Around Health Care Debate (E.J.Dionne) from RealClearPolitics
"Rule One of politics: When you have the advantage, don't allow your opponents to turn the tables. House Republicans violated this rule when they decided to make repeal of the health care law their first major act in the 112th Congress. The mistake will haunt them for years."
From Ugly to Just Plain American (Gregory Rodriguez) from the Los Angeles Times
"Diversity stateside, the weak dollar and the rise of other global powers have changed how U.S. visitors act overseas and how Europeans see them."
VIETNAM NUGGET!!
An Island of Economic Instability in Asia from the New York Times
"The New Year’s decorations are coming down in this frenetic city, replaced by hammer and sickle flags that flutter near luxury boutiques competing for access to the wallets of the newly rich. Ho Chi Minh City, the seemingly irrepressible bastion of Vietnamese capitalism, is dutifully marking the start on Tuesday of the Communist Party’s National Congress, an event that comes every five years and is meant to chart the future course of a country that has witnessed an economic miracle in recent decades. But this time, things are different."
ANTARCTIC NUGGET!!
Huge Observatory 1.5 Miles Deep in Antarctic Ice from National Geographic News
"Situated at the geographic South Pole, the U.S. $279 million observatory—the largest of its kind—will search for neutrinos, mysterious subatomic particles that can travel through almost any type of matter."
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