March 2011
40 posts
“For many of them, the fighting consists largely of a performance—dancing and...”
– Jon Lee Anderson
“It might be justifiable to arm the rebels if that were only way to achieve the...”
– Steve Coll
“You can see mission creep turning into mission zoom, mission flood, day by day.”
– Gary Brecher
“It’s only been two years since the Great Collapse, and finance industry...”
– Kevin Drum. Cf Felix Salmon
“They raise a fundamental question that the military is now grappling with: Who...”
– Thom Shanker and Charlie Savage
“Picture this growth-through-cutting-the-deficit argument as an elaborate version...”
– Mike Konczal
“Once wars begin, and positions harden, nothing matters less than legalities.”
– Glenn Greenwald
“But the programme also makes a strong case that the aid that resulted from the...”
– Adam Curtis
“With the entire Middle East in turmoil, does it make sense that Washington is...”
– Douthat
“The coalition hopes to repeat the success of its predecessors. It believes it...”
– Nick Cohen
“Previously, Oates rated as ‘the most exquisite of intimacies’ the...”
– Julian Barnes
“despite Obama’s declaration that he would not send ground troops into...”
– Stephen Walt
“Here more than ever what seems to matter is not detailed knowledge of the...”
– Rory Stewart supports the no-fly zone because, if we didn’t establish one, we’d seem to ‘countenance and endorse Gaddafi’s actions’. He doesn’t argue why. And does he think it will have even one of these effects? At any rate, ‘more’ is happening.
“The most predictable failure in modern American military policy has been the...”
– James Fallows
“The failure to control inflation in the 1970s served to substantially discredit...”
– MY
“Perhaps the only thing worse than intervening in a civil war in which the U.S....”
– Larison. I think this is what I think
“How often does a president announce a war at 2 pm so he can catch a flight...”
– Sullivan
“But so far, the administration seems eager to avoid drawing any contrasts with...”
– PK
“You can’t have a war that is admirable in all respects apart from falling down a...”
– Daniel Davies in a good thread
“It feels like there’s been a lot of new news recently.”
– Walter Kirn
“But the single unlikeliest episode in the history of American Hebrew writing...”
– Adam Kirsch
“But what if science were to show that religion serves needs that do not change...”
– Gray
“If you present subjects with two shapes, one rounded and one jagged, and ask...”
– Colin McGinn
“We say the word “democracy” and invoke its prestige with such careless fluency...”
– Bromwich
“What lesson should be learned from the fact that Europe’s worst atrocity...”
– Washington Post
“In 2001, the IPCC “consensus” said neither Greenland nor Antarctica would lose...”
– Joe Romm
“It should tell us everything we need to know about how unwise intervening in...”
– Larison
“The X Factor, like the National Lottery, is part of a giant con trick,...”
– Thomas Jones
Note on the syndrome
writing things up is a way to think them through. i want to try to explain here something i’ve learnt since summer but haven’t put into prose. telling my family i thought i had the syndrome, or had enough of its associated symptoms the explanatory power of the proposition was overwhelming, was an adventure in empathy, because in doing so—i came to understand—i had...
“Every decade, the British declare that they have buried class and, every decade,...”
– Laurie Penny
“The “out of touchness” of the Beltway is such a cliché that Beltway denizens...”
– Chris Hayes. As I said on Twitter: ‘Self-knowledge is no reprieve – no alibi – even when it knows it isn’t’
“Reciprocal self-promotion seems like the inherent content of social interaction.”
– Rob Horning on Facebook and ‘neoliberal subjectivity’
“The price of this financial crisis is being borne by people who absolutely did...”
– Mervyn King. Abe Sauer at The Awl refines the sentiment: ‘Fewer than three years after a Wall Street cartel treated the economy as a psychopathic teenager with a handful of fireworks would treat a cat, the national discussion for blame over our financial woes is focused on teachers, nurses,...
“On Tuesday night, a convoy of pickup trucks mounted with heavy machine guns...”
– Barnes, Coker and Levinson
“‘If he falls with no intervention, I’d be happy,’ one rebel leader...”
– Fahim and Kirkpatrick
“While American officials say the withdrawal matches the latest counterinsurgency...”
– Chivers, Rubin and Morgan
“Do they own the air?”
– Yglesias
“Sometimes it’s said that women and children bear the brunt of the brutality in...”
– Kristof
“I suppose you can call a match between Mike Tyson and a five-year-old boxing,...”
– Gideon Levy 