Putting on the squeeze

BERLIN: Russia has further reduced its oil deliveries to the Czech Republic, bringing total July cutbacks to 50 percent, senior Czech officials said Wednesday, a disruption that is again calling into question Russia’s reliability as an energy supplier to Central and Eastern Europe.
Supplies were reduced about 40 percent early in the month. A further cut in [...]

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Ankle deep in African Islam

Talk about patronizing. And let’s mention, based on the article’s conclusion, a lack of serious knowledge of the practice of Islam in sub-Saharan Africa.

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UFOs and national security

Nick Pope pens perhaps the most interesting op-ed of the summer:

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Which matters more, if at all?

TEHRAN, Iran – More than 100 nonaligned nations backed Iran’s right to peaceful uses of nuclear power on Wednesday, an endorsement sought by Tehran in its standoff with the U.N. Security Council over its refusal to freeze uranium enrichment.
[ . . . ]
Senior Iranian officials depicted the support from a high-level conference of the Nonaligned [...]

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Arma mundumque cano

The Economist has a graphic showing the top five arms exporters. Naturally, the United States and Russia dominate, with only 6 percentage points of difference between them (31% and 25% of world sales, respectively). Notice that Algeria purchases 4% of Russia’s arms sales. This is the result of increased revenues from rising oil and gas [...]

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The Germans are jealous

American Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s speech had ended an hour before and the skies over Berlin were taking on an ethereal reddish hue as the sun set. But Julian Metz was still glowing with enthusiasm. He spoke with nervous excitement, his words tumbling happily out of his mouth as if he had just lost [...]

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Oh so tough

This is rather poorly conceived advice on Pakistan. I really wish those Democrats so enthusiastic about chasing bin Laden and the prospect of bombing or capturing him in Pakistan were skylarking when they ignore the potential consequences of doing so without regard to that country’s sovereignty and stability.

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New NATO?

Too soon. Not to mention rather disingenuous. NATO needs to be updated, but its members’ attitudes and relations with Russia are not friendly enough for this kind of grouping. NATO needs institutional reform, but it likely will not involve Russia directly.

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On liberal Kurdistan

Michael Rubin writes, after news of Kurdish journalists being arrested and harassed by the KDP: “Success in Iraqi Kurdistan could have been one of Bush’s greatest legacies. Unfortunately, it appears just one instance of how his administration has squandered its chances.” This has been one of the major myths of the Iraq War. The [...]

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On the Hamid book

Via Martin Kramer, I am reminded of Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist last winter. Firstly, I will say that TRF, on the whole, left me wanting. While Hamid’s writing is elegant and for the most part lucid, the book’s construction is frustrating. The first two thirds or so of the book are fine (in places [...]

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The power of words

Yawza.

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1067

I am fully aware that David Brooks is not a “blogger,” and that someone who wanted to could write a post or a long form article explaining how he in many ways represents the opposite of the blogger, but I am going to list his NYT page under the “Blogs” category in the sidebar, because [...]

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Why the veto?

The Economist writes, as I have:

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Ich bin Barack der kosmopolitischen

Obama’s Berlin speech was excellent. My primary quibble with it was the awkward phrasing that can make certain aspects of his speeches anticlimactic. He should add an extra layer of editing on his disquisitions. I was also struck by the delicious disingenuousness of his “the walls must come down” motif, which he mixed with talk [...]

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Call me Kal

So, I’m changing my posting name to my latest, and what will probably end up being most durable, nickname. “Kal” is becoming quite popular in my work and social life. Normally I reject or avoid nicknames because they can lead to unnecessary informality. I never found “Kikou,” “Ninou,” or “Kha” (some nicknames for Khalid and [...]

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Who cares?

Dan Nexon offers a good reason not to get all riled up over John McCain’s tendency to misemploy “Czechoslovakia.” I tend to agree with him. However, I disagree that calling the Czech Republic “Czechoslovakia” is justifiable because it hasn’t got an English shorthand like other countries do. I’m only concerned with gaffes insofar as they [...]

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Mending fences

The two African stories dominating North American media this last week or so have been Nelson Mandela’s birthday and the commencement of power sharing talks between Mugabe and the Zimbabwean opposition. Another important story (though many on this side of the Atlantic would be at a loss as to how this could be) is that [...]

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Before we get ahead of ourselves. . .

Brzezinski is an expert on bad foreign policy, having dabbled in it quite a lot, so when he says that a given strategy will commence  a via dolorosa, I’m not always sure whether to embrace or discard his advise. He is clearly a brilliant geo-strategist and thinker, and on Afghanistan he’s probably right. Pouring troops [...]

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Chávez in Moscow

Russia sees North Africa, Algeria and Libya especially, as a market for arms and a place into which Gazprom can potentially “expand” its influence over the European gas market. The Russians have been speaking openly about their desire to expand their reach into North American energy markets. Simultaneously, tensions with the United States over the [...]

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$#!&

Apparently, the “Netroots” crowd has some kind of historical problem managing its authors’ collective predilection for profanity. Heavy hitters in that community held a panel on the topic recently. Many of them have found that they had to drop excessive obscenity usage as they gain respect and visibility. I was interested to see how many [...]

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