Month: June 2010

The tragedy … in Lego.

Bab Az-Zahra, East Jerusalem, 12 pm

Andrew Exum sizes up Daniel Byman and Christine Fair's argument:

I think the ineptitude is just one side of a wider trend. Keeping the argument to Britain for now; before 9/11, to become an extremist, you had to be fairly committed. There was none of the reflected glamour of being associated with people capable of scaring polite society. In those days, extremists were overzealous, a bit nerdy, waay too into religion and generally uncool. As Chris and Daniel's example of 9/11 lead attacker Mohammed Atta suggests, in such an environment, a potential recruit is more likely to possess a certain awareness, commitment and focus. Of course, there are examples of pre 9/11 Jihadiots, but in general terms, the cause was as cool as chess club and membership reflected that. 

Now that the cause is much more glamorous, many more people want some of the action. So the fact that there are numerous instances of idiocy means that extremists have been able to lots of idiots. And, just one idiot who manages to press the right button at the right time is a huge problem.

But more than that, if you are going to get lots of recruits, most will be idiots but you are also going to get a larger proportion of useful people.

This is how terrorism becomes self-sustaining. With the help of the West.

"Health should be a right for everyone.  […T]he health care reform bill was highly debated by a lot of people. And I guess I’m glad that a bill was passed," – Barbara Bush, W's daughter, on Fox News.

CNN asks Karroubi about the status of the reform movement:

The Green Movement today is stronger and more mature than last year. Despite a heavy climate of repression, this movement has been able to unite and spread to different layers of society. Incidentally, the (Iranian) leadership understands this important development very well. The fact that funeral processions take place with the presence of anti-riot police and the fact that they never grant permission for any gatherings, even to honor Imam Khomeini, shows the strength of this movement and their fear of this movement.

A photo caption from Mousavi's Facebook page explains the latest act of violence:

Following the trip of Mehdi Karroubi to the city of Qom and his visit to the house of Grand Ayatollah Saanei, pro-reform senior religious figure, a group of organized plain clothes thugs surrounded the house of Grand Ayatollah Saanei and damaged Karroubi’s car. This group of organized thugs also attacked the office of Grand Ayatollah’s Saanei and Montazeri and destroyed the property and it items while the police and security forces not only did not act but were in full cooperation with them!

Many more photos of the damage here.

Yglesias:

As Spencer Ackerman notes, this $1 trillion in deposits seems likely to set the stage for a lot of bad arguments about forward-looking military policy. He focuses on the fact that war for cell phone batteries makes a better conspiracy theory than more outlandish tales about oil pipelines. The reverse, however, is also the case and Risen’s piece already features evidence of military officials floating the theory that we need to stay in Afghanistan indefinitely lest China get its hands on vast quantities of copper. In general, though, waging war for control of natural resources makes a lot of sense for third world bandits & militias or would-be coup leaders, but doesn’t cost out for citizens of a developed market oriented democracy.

You think a president Palin would examine the “cost-out”? Thoreau:

For my part, I would be content to leave Afghanistan alone and say that if somebody there somehow finds himself in control of  minerals and manages to dig them out of the ground, we are willing to pay cash on delivery.  We are NOT, however, willing to do our own pick-up or provide armed escorts for those who do the pick-up or the mining.  The terms are cash on delivery.

Ambinder:

The way in which the story was presented — with on-the-record quotations from the Commander in Chief of CENTCOM, no less — and the weird promotion of a Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense to Undersecretary of Defense suggest a broad and deliberate information operation designed to influence public opinion on the course of the war. Indeed, as every reader of Jared Diamond’s popular works of geographic determinism knows well, a country rich in mineral resources will tend toward stability over time, assuming it has a strong, central, and stable government.

Katie Drummond asks everyone to calm down:

The military (and observers of the military) have known about Afghanistan’s mineral riches for years. In a 2007 report, the Geological Survey and the Navy concluded that “Afghanistan has significant amounts of undiscovered non-fuel mineral resources,” including ”large quantities of accessible iron and copper [and] abundant deposits of colored stones and gemstones, including emerald, ruby [and] sapphire.”

Not to mention that the $1 trillion figure is — at best — a guesstimate. None of the earlier U.S military reports on Afghan’s mineral riches cite that amount. And it might be prudent to be wary of any data coming out of Afghanistan’s own Mines Minestry, which “has long been considered one of the country’s most corrupt government departments,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

Adam Ozimek:

One mechanism by which resource wealth translates to negative economic outcomes is the so-called “spending effect”…An example of this would be a huge growth in the diamond industry driving up the prices of haircuts and homes because they are non-resource tradeables whose prices are determined locally. These higher consumer prices then increases the reservation wage high enough that the costs in the local clothing industry, a non-resource tradeable whose prices are determined on the world market, go above world prices and thus the industry suffers.

Why couldn't Carly Fiorina simply apologize for her open-mic cattiness about Barbara Boxer's hair? The cult of the inerrant leader persists.

Yes, I nearly fell off the elliptical when I saw that ball go in the net, and to answer Boris's question:

"What was the thought that followed the yelp?"

I can respond with four words: "Oh no! Not again!" Alex Massie seeks some kind of solace and ends up with Camus:

"All that I know most surely about morality and obligations, I owe to football."

He was a goalie. But Gideon captures the basic idea:

One of the masochistic pleasures of watching England, however, is the sheer familiarity of the narrative. We build the team up, we convince ourselves that this time we’ve got a real chance, the team get off to a decent start and then it all falls apart. It’s like having a recurring nightmare. And I think the players are as spooked as the fans – you can see their self-belief collapsing, as soon as things start to go wrong.

Even the headlines in this morning’s papers contained references to past disasters that did not need to be spelled out. One tabloid screamed, “Oh No, Not Again.” But my favourite was the News of the World’s front page – above a picture of the hapless England goalie, Robert Green, was the headline “Hand of Clod”. All fans will instantly get the reference to the infamous “Hand of God” goal with which Diego Maradona eliminated England in 1986. Seems like yesterday.

My dad's verdict? The Americans were an impressive bunch of players.

(Photo: Robert Green of England, as he walks off the pitch at full time in the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa Group C match between England and USA at the Royal Bafokeng Stadium on June 12, 2010 in Rustenburg, South Africa. By Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images)