Category: World Affairs

Allister Cooke is the world’s most prolific weblogger (He is also in his mid 90’s). He has been giving a weekly radio diary broadcast for the last 50 years. A recent piece ponders why Hitler’s crimes are more famous than Stalin’s even though the Kremlin recently calculated that he had put 27 million people to death. Cooke writes:

In the end, put it this way: is there a listener who has not seen a hundred sickening times the clanking skeletons of Dachau, Buchenwald, Auschwitz?

But have you ever seen a single picture of a company of colonels dead on the ground, of a whole horizon of burning villages and their smoking corpses, of the execution of a favourite general, a son-in-law, of any of the Kremlin’s listed 27 millions?

In the result we see Hitler with his mad, sincere vision of a perfect Nordic race.

By comparison with Stalin – the paranoiac of the century – Hitler was a demented boy scout.

Biographical Note: : Binkley (aka Brian Oxley) was my college roommate, and one night we had a heated argument about whether Hitler or Stalin was responsible for more deaths. I insisted that Hitler had killed more people, but Binkley insisted that Stalin’s camps and executions had resulted in 20 million people. That number seemed absurdly high, so I called my high school world politics teacher, Tom Kulick, who knows everything . We called him up at about 11:30 PM, and I was surprised to learn that Mr. Kulick had indeed sided with Brian’s estimate, saying that although the exact number will never be known, 20 million is closer to the truth. And alas, now the number is 27 million people–4.5 million of which were forcibly starved in Ukraine. I am shocked! Shocked!

Dana Blankenship wrote a compelling denunciation of Bush’s mispresentation of the Iraqi threat :

Bush lied.

Bush lied in his claim Iraq was a direct threat to the United States. Bush lied to the United Nations, lied to the U.S. Congress, and he lied to you.

Bush didn’t lie about a blowjob. Bush lied about the most important part of his real job, the decision to commit U.S. troops to risk their lives. So far, 6,000 Iraqis have lost their lives in that war. I mention that because the Administration now claims 9/11, in which 3,000 died, as its justification for the Iraq War. Since May 1, the day Bush said on national television that hostilities ended, 45 more U.S. soldiers have died. I guess if you can lie about the reason for a war, a lie about when it ends doesn’t mean much to you.

Since the war, of course, the Administration has been moving the goal posts, hoping history will still record a touchdown. It wasn’t whether Hussein had enough weaponry to threaten us, but whether he had any unconventional weapons at all. (A lie.) The war was about “liberating the people of Iraq” from a tyrant. (A lie.) We have secret intelligence proving we are telling the truth. (A lie.)

What’s more important, war and the death of thousands, or a blowjob? What is more deserving of removal from office, the death of thousands or a blowjob?

I don’t want to sound like I’m undercutting the criticism, but is there such a creature as a “political lie?” A politician plays up certain facts or plays down others in order to make his case to be as convincing as possible. Perhaps it’s not a lie but simple self-deception. Do political lies belong in a different category? Or are lies just lies? Clinton lied to protect his reputation. Bush “lied” to promote his policy. One could make the argument that Bush’s deception had honorable intentions and that his problem was not dishonesty but blindness to the bigger picture. But ultimately Bush’s deception cost us more than Clinton’s ever did.

Dinesh D’Souza wrote a compelling Why I am an Anti-Anti American . (Thanks, Binkley). It is a little too rosy-colored (look at murder rate, CO2 emissions, failure to ratify the ICC and gross military expenditures). I have usually been surprised at how many of my European friends preferred living in the Netherlands, New Zealand or Canada. D’Souza writes, “America has achieved greater social equality than any other society. True, there are large inequalities of income and wealth in America. In purely economic terms, Europe is more egalitarian. But Americans are socially more equal than any other people, and this is unaffected by economic disparities. Alexis de Tocqueville noticed this egalitarianism a century and a half ago and it is, if anything, more prevalent today. For all his riches, Bill Gates could not approach the typical American and say, “Here’s a $100 bill. I’ll give it to you if you kiss my feet.” Most likely, the person would tell Gates to go to hell! The American view is that the rich guy may have more money, but he isn’t in any fundamental sense better than anyone else. “

Peacecorpswriters.org is a literary site with great travel essays. Looking in the archives, I found this essay about anAmazing Postcard. In the early 1960’s, a PCV from Nigeria sent a postcard which jeopardized the entire Peace Corps program. One forgets how much impact that words (especially carelessly chosen ones!) can have.

For an idea about what my Peace Corps experiences look like, look at this Albania Peace Corps weblog. Unfortunately, it has not been updated recently. This is a really cool idea–overseas Americans blogging about their experiences. Sinosplice, for example, keeps a list of TOEFL Teachers in China.

I talked to a pregnant Chinese woman at my apartment complex yesterday, and she reminded me about China’s strict one child policies. One can argue about whether this policy is humane or even necessary (I for one feel that economic prosperity will do more to reduce the birth rate than any law), but she made an interesting point. She said that it reduces the number of aunts and uncles that future children will have to practically zero. Eventually, it will make the extended family a thing of the past. One only wonders what are the social and political implications of that.

Here is a fascinating in-depth account of Bush’s actions and schedule on the day of the Word Trade Center terrorist attack.

This is an amazing article. I don’t believe in the conspiracies hinted at by the articles (although they are not far-fetched). The article raises many puzzling questions. First, although the Secret Service in Florida seemed aware of the second WTC attack before Bush began his appearance at the elementary school, the information did not trickle to Bush until the reading session began. Second, according to a video available at the website, Bush sat in his chair for 5-10 minutes with the children after being told by Andrew Card that his country was under attack. Admittedly, it was an awkward and disconcerting situation for Bush and his entourage, but it still leaves unanswered why Bush wasn’t whisked away immediately after being told (especially when delays in Presidential Orders might have jeopardized response time from the US military). Fourth, apparently, Bush flew from Air Force One at 10:00 AM without any sort of military escort. This air escort didn’t arrive for at least an hour. Imagine that–the nation with the most powerful military machine in the world had sent the US president unescorted into airspace when it was clear that dozens of airplanes were flying unaccounted for (and possible suspects for hijacking). All this is less a statement of Bush’s failures than the missteps that occur at the opening moments of any crisis situation. It is also a sign that our government leaders, despite the bravado and confidence of our military might, are not invulnerable or omniscient. It is simply impossible for any organization to filter information fast enough to arrive at a coherent policy of action. It is also worrisome that the White House press spokesmen failed to correct details in previous statements it gave to the press which were later proved to be inaccurate. I realize that press spokesmen have lots of things on their mind, but this only illustrates that the White House primary mission is not factual accuracy, but the presentation of facts in a way that support the president’s positions. In an age of one or two day news cycles, it is easy for the White House to give out information that is later shown to be inaccurate without the need to make corrections when necessary. That is why we need a vigilant press now more than ever.

Finally, look at this amazing photo: .

This impromptu televised speech occurred about 10 minutes after the president had talked to his advisors about the terrorist threats. Keep in mind that he had already finished the classroom and had talked to his advisors for about 10 minutes about the situation. Then he returned to the classroom, where the students and teacher were herded behind him. This event was almost completely choreographed to maximize the poignancy of the situation. Even in times of political crisis, the presidential handlers were making sure that the delivery of the message looked pretty.

Accounts of mistreatment of Afgani prisoners at Guantanamo Bay are pretty shocking.

Freedom: For or Against?, a commencement address, by Johns Hopkins president William R. Brody.

Then she laid down some Tarot cards at his fingertips, studied them intently for several minutes, and said: “You will be poor, and miserable, until you are 45 years old.”

“And then?” said my friend rather hopefully. “What happens when I’m 45?”

She said: “By then you’ll be used to it.”

The council last year voted 15-0 to grant immunity from prosecution to peacekeepers in U.N.-backed missions from countries that had not approved the treaty for the ICC. At that time, the Bush administration threatened to veto all U.N. peacekeeping missions, one by one. From reporter Evelyn Leopold on the 1 year exemption to ICC jurisdiction granted to USA .

Ponder that for a moment. Admittedly ICC is a controversial subject about which honest people can disagree, and nations must act according to their national interests. But for the Bush Administration to say, “we are going to veto every UN peacekeeping mission until you fix this,” sounds absurd.

Followup: This sentence was deleted. Possibly incorrect?