On his crusade to privatize the TSA, Ron Paul appeared on Faux News to make the incredible assertion that banning guns on planes was partly to blame for 9/11.  Gee Ron…can’t you think of any reason why allowing non-law enforcement plane passengers to pack heat or why a shootout at 35,000 feet may not be a good idea.

Not so surprisingly, the Faux News bobble head does not challenge the absurdity of Paul’s position but moves right on to their pet cause of profiling brown people by race or religion.  Of course it may not have not have flagged the Nigerian born underpants bomber or the half white-half Jamaican shoe bomber Richard Reid.  Right-wing conservatives and Faux News keep on parroting how stupid it is to search 95 year old grandmas or young kids.  Unfortunately, this tragic story from Afghanistan demonstrates how the sadistic bastards we are fighting will work around racist profiling of the sort advocated by Paul.  The Taliban thugs in the article linked above tricked an 8 year old girl into becoming a suicide bomber.

Paul also willfully misstates current policy.  Nothing at present prevents the TSA from searching a “suspicious person.”  Also, as brown-skinned passengers will be happy to inform you racial profiling is still alive and going strong, in violation of current rules.   Personally, I am not surprised that a congressman who stated he would have voted against the Civil Rights Act has a cavalier attitude to discrimination against people who don’t look like him.

I will reluctantly give Paul credit for one item in his diatribe.  The pre-9/11 policy of passengers not resisting was in retrospect a mistake.  It was based on the assumption of sane hijackers who would negotiate.  This mistake was first rectified by the brave passengers of UA Flight 93 and helped stop the shoe bomber and the underpants bomber.  It still does not justify the idiocy of guns on planes.

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Otto von Habsburg the last heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne has died at the age of 98.  The son of the unfortunate Karl I (Karoly IV in Hungary), Otto became crown prince in 1916 when his father became the last Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, King of Bohemia, King of Croatia and King of Galicia and Lodomeria after the long 68 year (tragedy and clamity riven) reign of Franz Josef I came to a close (video of the funeral with a young Otto in the procession below).

Otto with Kaiser Franz Josef

Franz Josef witnessed the loss of his dynastic holdings in Italy during Italian unification and the loss of Austrian paramountcy in Germany to Prussia.  His private life was even more calamitous.His brother Maximilian chasing the ephemeral Mexican imperial crown was executed in 1867, his only son Rudolph committed suicide in a bizarre murder-suicide pact in 1889, his beautiful temperamental and estranged wife Elizabeth was assassinated in 1898 by an Italian anarchist who just “wanted to kill a royal” and in 1914 his nephew and heir Franz Ferdinand was assassinated ushering in the First World War.

King Charles IV of Hungary, with Zita and Crown Prince Otto. Coronation portrait Budapest, 1916

Emperor Karl was ill-equipped to sustain the creaky Hapsburg state which splintered in 1918.  Failing in two attempts to return to the Hungarian throne, Karl died in exile on the island of Madiera in 1922 leaving the 9 year old Otto at the head of his family.  Prohibited from returning to his native Austria, the young Otto still played a role in the interwar years.  Unlike most of the similarly dispossessed German princelings (Bavaria being an exception), Otto was always an opponent of his fellow Austrian Hitler (the Nazi plan for the invasion of Austria was code named “Otto”).  World War II forced the large Habsburg clan into even remoter exile to avoid closer acquaintance with Gestapo prisons.

It is somewhat fitting that the man once the heir to a creaky pan-European dynastic edifice would morph into a European statesman, serving in the European parliament and working to bring former eastern-bloc countries into the European union.  It is also a reminder how different the political map of Europe looked a century ago.  In 1914 France, Switzerland and Portugal (since 1910) were the only Republics in Europe.  The monarchies of Russia, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Turkey collapsed in World War I.  The monarchies of Italy, Yugoslavia, Albania, Romania & Bulgaria (the last monarchs of the last two are still alive and Symeon II of Bulgaria managed to get elected prime minister a few years ago) were swept away in World War II.  After spending large portions of the previous decades on “vacation” the King of the Hellenes was packed off to his London exile in the 1970s.  Spain is the only oddity to have actually restored its monarchy in the post world-war period.

Royalty survives only on the fringes – Scandinavia, the UK, Spain and the Low Countries – and in memory through the hordes of tourists who flock to Versailles, Neuschwanstein and the Hofburg each year.  So here is a nod to the heir of a bygone Europe who spent his life helping create the new Europe and boldly opposed the Nazis and the Communists.

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In honor of Alaska’s half term quitter enjoy the video below:

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The American economic hostage crisis continues as the Republicans continue to balk at letting the government pay its bills, consequences to global economic stability be damned.  Commentators like Matt Yglesias have previously commented how absurd it its to de-link the budget apportionment process from the debt ceiling.  If Congress does not apportion sufficient funds to pay for the expenses it authorizes, the government has only two options: risk hyperinflation by printing money or borrow the difference.  The irony is that even though the rising US debt is a long-term concern, there is little interest rate pressure at present to pay down the debt right now, i.e. the United States could defer this until revenues recover from the drop in tax receipts due to the great recession and the disastrous fiscal effect of the soon to expire Bush tax cuts.

Yet the Republicans are refusing to budge unless medicare and medicaid are slashed (insulating them from the negative effects of the Ryan plan to privatize medicare) and tax loopholes for big-oil and other profitable corporate fat cats are retained.  With some Republicans departing from reality that a default would not be so bad (congrats Chamber of Commerce you helped elect these guys), some commentators like Bruce Bartlett have opined that President Obama can simply ignore the debt limit – because it is unconstitutional.

The argument stems from two sources.  First, is the text of Section 4 of the Constitutional Amendment most hated and ignored by Republicans – the 14th Amendment:

The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

On its face, the text refers to the suppression of insurrection.  Which brings up the second leg of the argument – the 1935 Supreme Court case (before the “activist liberal court” derided by conservatives) of Perry v. United States, 294 U.S. 330 at 350, 351, 354 interpreting the clause above as follows:

The government’s contention thus raises a question of far greater importance than the particular claim of the plaintiff. On that reasoning, if the terms of the government’s bond as to the standard of payment can be repudiated, it inevitably follows that the obligation as to the amount to be paid may also be repudiated. The contention necessarily imports that the Congress can disregard the obligations of the government at its discretion, and that, when the government borrows money, the credit of the United States is an illusory pledge.

We do not so read the Constitution. There is a clear distinction between the power of the Congress to control or interdict the contracts of private parties when they interfere with the exercise of its constitutional authority and the power of the Congress to alter or repudiate the substance of its own engagements when it has borrowed money under the authority which the Constitution confers. In authorizing the Congress to borrow money, the Constitution empowers the Congress to fix the amount to be borrowed and the terms of payment. By virtue of the power to borrow money ‘on the credit of the United States,’ the Congress is authorized to pledge that credit as an assurance of payment as stipulated, as the highest assurance the government can give, its plighted faith. To say that the Congress may withdraw or ignore that pledge is to assume that the Constitution contemplates a vain promise; a pledge having no other sanction than the pleasure and convenience of the pledgor. This Court has given no sanction to such a conception of the obligations of our government…

…The Fourteenth Amendment, in its fourth section, explicitly declares: ‘The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law , … shall not be questioned.’ While this provision was undoubtedly inspired by the desire to put beyond question the obligations of the government issued during the Civil War, its language indicates a broader connotation. We regard it as confirmatory of a fundamental principle which applies as well to the government bonds in question, and to others duly authorized by the Congress, as to those issued before the amendment was adopted. Nor can we perceive any reason for not considering the expression ‘the validity of the public debt’ as embracing whatever concerns the integrity of the public obligations.

The decision is old enough (and unrelated to gun rights or election funding restrictions on corporations) to possibly draw stare decisis protection from the current conservatives on the Supreme Court.  However, even such an assertion followed by the predictable Republican and tea party hyperventilation could still spook the markets.  However, in addition to holding the Democrats and the economy hostage the Republicans are caught between their own Scylla and Charybdis.  On one side are the tea partiers and a bunch of their presidential candidates adamantly opposed to raising the debt ceiling, though it is hard to envision a legitimate scenario where the government can cut enough expenditure to avoid raising the ceiling.  On the other side is the Chamber of Commerce which is sweating bullets at the Russian roulette played on with economy.

The fragile economic recovery (already buffeted by a series of global weather disasters, the European debt crises, the global food price hike, etc.) hangs in the balance.  Please, please, please let sanity win the day.

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These are difficult times for Pakistan and its citizens. Since the 1980′s Pakistan’s military rulers have ridden the tiger of Islamic radicalism to bleed arch-rival India and install pliant regimes in Afghanistan.  However, Pakistan is now discovering how hard it is get off the tiger.  In recent years jihadists have slaughtered innocents in Pakistan’s cities, countryside, mosques, schools and even military bases.  Then came the national humiliation of the American military attack that killed Osama Bin Laden in the Pakistani cantonment town of Abbotabad, a stone’s throw from its national military academy.

The raid that eliminated Bin Laden was a double humiliation: First, because the most wanted man in the world was found ensconced comfortably in the heart of Pakistan (leading to suspicions he was protected by Pakistan’s secret service agency the ISI).  Second, because the Americans launched a military raid deep into Pakistan without the Pakistani army’s knowledge or without them being able to do anything about it.

Not given to deep introspection, the military establishment has focused on the latter and has made ham handed to warn the Americans about future Pakistani cooperation against the Taliban by playing the China card.  Unfortunately for the generals, more humiliation was to come.  The Bin Laden raid was followed by a daring terrorist attack on a naval base, possibly with inside involvement.

All of this has severely dented the credibility of the Pakistani military establishment, previously immune from domestic criticism.  Yet criticism of the military can be fatal.  Shortly after writing about Al-Qaeda infiltration of the Pakistani navy, journalist Saleem Shahzad was found beaten to death - allegedly in ISI custody.  Which brings us to the indomitable Asma Jahangir.

Along with her sister Hina Jalani, Jahangir has been one of Pakistan’s foremost human rights advocates who bravely stands up for women’s right in the face of fundamentalist neanderthals.  In the clip below she boldly eviscerates the Pakistani military for sheer incompetence, impotence and venality.

For those of you who do n0t understand Urdu a rough translation from the blogger Beena Sarwar is provided below:

I don’t need to get a medal for patriotism especially from those who belong to the establishment. We must talk harshly and realistically. I remember during the Bangladesh war, we heard the same discourse. People said that those who criticised the army action in Bangladesh were not patriots. My father was imprisoned; many people we know called me the child of a traitor. But I know that the army’s policy – they are duffers, political duffers (idiots). If you go along with their policy the way we have been doing, Pakistan will not progress. I don’t care what people in America or Africa think. I want our people to be saved from the army. They have put us in a situation where terrorism is cropping up at every corner and neighbourhood. They encourage and support it, detract from debate. They’ve got a whole propaganda machinery going. I am not saying that this goes for all soldiers, but for these generals who play golf and laugh, and keep an eye out for plots. What happened in Karachi – there was a wedding hall at that sensitive place. They’ve made us their slaves. It is time to say please, with folded hands, go back to your barracks, let our children live here. We don’t want bloodshed. If you want acclaim, go and fight – and win — a war. You fought Kargil, killed the Light Infantry soldiers. You’ve become used to making young boys into human shields. You can’t fight, or run the country, or make policy. You are the ‘qabza group’ (land grabbers) of this country. Politicians and everyone should say this clearly. If you ask me, I can give several examples of their stupidity. We need to take out a procession on Mall Road, with folded hands, to say please go home, you ‘eating drinking’ party.”

Brave words against a military establishment whose raison d’être has been anti-India hostility, towards which end it leeches off a quarter of impoverished Pakistan’s budget in a unwinnable military race with its far larger and stronger neighbor.  In the process the army lost Pakistan its eastern wing in 1971.  And 3 out of its remaining 4 provinces (not counting the so-called Azad Kashmir) are seething with discontent at domination by the Punjabi majority.  It is a pity that Pakistan’s venal civilian politicians are incapable of fulfilling the promise of its brave human rights activists like Asma Jahangir.  Until a competent civilian leadership emerges, Pakistan will continue to be dominated by its incompetent uniformed thugs.

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The weather-vane of the Republican party has a problem.  His record.  Even if some of his policies were pragmatic and defensible, he faces a party that rejects former conservative ideas when they are embraced by the Democrats, particularly Barack Obama.  Mitt Romney has shown an impressive ability to change positions like a chameleon changes colors (and then to attack opponents for holding positions he held a short while back).  Needless to say his opponents in 2008 pounced on this trait during the debates, particularly in the two videos below:

Now a democratic operative in South Carolina has added to Romney’s misery by preparing the attack ad below composed almost entirely of Romney statements.

Note to the rest of the Democrats – there is a treasure trove out there on YouTube that is begging for attention.  Much of it does not even need to be “quoted out of context.”

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For all those who have wasted hours on one of the most addictive games in recent history:

Somehow seems appropriate that an Israeli comedy show came up with this.

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As expected, the birthers will not go away quietly into the night.  At least not until Roger Ailes cracks his whip to force his in-house nitwits to move on to new alternate realities about the Democrats.  The latest comes from Eric Bolling on Fox Business who gave a platform to Islamophobe Pamela Geller and regular Fox paranoid conservative Monica Crowley (she has a PhD from Columbia University?!?!?!) to question the authenticity of the President’s birth certificate.  Video below:

As MediaMatters notes, the end of the video highlights the sheer stupidity of birthers.   According to Bolling and Geller the fact that the family of the doctor (who died in 2003 before Barack Obama entered the national spotlight after his speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention) was unaware he delivered a future President more than 40 years before his death casts doubt on the authenticity of the certificate.  Nice to know that Fox Business lives down to the low standards of its parent “news” network.

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The New York Times is the latest paper to point out the free speech crushing scope of English libel law.  The balance between the right of individuals to be let alone and the freedom of the press to do its job is inherently fraught with tension.  American law has reduced the privacy expectations of celebrities and generally prevents defamation and libel actions for expressing opinions (as opposed to the statement of fact).  The freedom to express opinions in England is far weaker and worse the default rule to inflict legal fees on the loser allows larger corporations to crush individuals (in contrast American law does not require a payment of legal fees unless expressly mandated by statute or contractual provisions).

The chilling implications on free speech are obvious (and this is in addition to the recent trend in England and Europe to introduce blasphemy prosecutions).  South Park mocked the libel tourism generated by English libel law a few years ago in its episode “Trapped in the Closet”.  For full episode click here.  Clip below:

In response Congress unanimously passed the SPEECH Act making foreign libel judgments that do not comply with the First Amendment unenforceable in the United States.  California, New York, Illinois and Florida have also enacted such statutes.  While American residents can breathe easier, other less fortunate mortals will have to hope they do not offend deep pocketed plaintiffs who can sue in England.  One wonders what will be the tipping point for the country that first gave individuals the freedom of habeus corpus to clean up this assault on free speech.  Unfortunately with the paparazzi out in full force for the royal wedding, it may take some time.

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In recent weeks a publicity seeking Donald Trump has latched on to the nutty birther fringe to leap to the top of the polls of Republicans running for President (it must be noted that these early polls are fairly meaningless).  Arizona’s governor Jan Brewer showed a willingness to stand up to her state’s Republican birther fringe by vetoing a bill that allowed Arizona to ignore the full faith and credit clause of the constitution and establish its own requirements for eligibility to run for President.  Louisiana’s Bobby Jindal indicated a typical craven propensity to roll over in face of the birther fringe. Even though the President has long since released documents that confirm his citizenship and these have been confirmed repeatedly by Hawaii officials, this controversy would not go away.  The Republican leadership’s refusal to call out these conspiracy kooks and Faux News repeatedly giving these kooks a platform also kept the controversy simmering (you can bet the Republicans would not have responded to the 9/11 truthers by “taking President [Bush] at his word” or saying that it was “not my job to tell the American people what to think”).   Alaska’s half-term quitter tacitly endorsed Trump’s crusade.

The tipping point for the President may have been a recent interview with George Stephanopoulos on fiscal matters that veered off to the world of birthers.  So the President went to the trouble of asking the State of Hawaii for special permission to access his long-form birth certificate (a standard no other politician in recent memory has been held to), and the long suffering State complied.  This was followed up by the presidential statement below:

Even though he claimed credit for the release of the certificate, Donald Trump did not respond to being lumped by the President with “sideshows and carnival barkers.”

Of course this will not end the story.  The birther fringe will not go away.  Donald Trump, whose own son-in-law bought his way into Harvard, has now started the racially charged drumbeat questioning how Barack Obama was admitted to two ivy league schools.  Since he is black and did not have the blessings of legacy admissions like Messrs Gore and Bush, there is supposedly no way he was “smart” enough to go there (an assertion that drives James Fallows bonkers).

The funny part of this sorry episode is that Barack Obama was not the 2008 Presidential candidate born outside the United States (though that candidate satisfies the naturally-born citizen requirement).  Also even if Barack Obama had been born in Kenya, as the child of a United States citizen (his mother) he would probably still be a naturally born citizen.  So lets sit back and see the birthers make bigger fools of themselves and hope that the media starts ignoring Donald Trump like they are ignoring Sarah Palin.

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It must be dispiriting for the Republican Party elites to watch Donald Trump soar in the polls based largely on babbling birther nonsense.  It underscores a deep satisfaction with a field where the “authentic” candidates are bonkers and the credentialed candidates are chameleons (not just Mitt Romney).  So for now I will spare my keyboard and rely on the parody video mocking them below.  Enjoy:

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A plug for my favorite fantasy series that is shortly coming to the small screen on HBO.  People compare George R.R. Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” to Tolkien’s classic Lord of the Rings trilogy.  To me there is no comparison.  Martin is a far superior writer in his ability to maintain a coherent storyline.  His world of Westeros may not have the obsessive detail of Tolkein’s Middle-Earth but still has impressive depth.

The series is loosely inspired by the War of the Roses – the fratricidal civil war between the Houses of Lancaster and York (two of the dynastic protagonists here are the houses of Lannister and Stark).  The series also draws from other events like the destruction of Atlantis and the Black Bull Dinner (readers of the series should recognize what scene this alludes to).

Now the first book of the series – A Game of Thrones has been adapted for the small screen.  HBO has helpfully offered up a 14 minute preview of episode 1.  So far it looks very faithful to the book and very good.  Now only if I had HBO to watch it before it gets to Netflix

Though as consolation I can curl up this summer with the long overdue book 5 of the series – A Dance with Dragons.

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A week after Pakistan lost to India in the world cup yet again (having never beaten their arch rivals in the cup), Pakistan captain Shahid Afridi mouthed off about the superior “large and clean hearts” of Pakistan and Muslims (never mind than the Indian team currently has and has always had many Muslim players and India has one of the largest Muslim populations in the world).  Pity the superiority bestowed by Allah could not help Pakistan prevail on the field.  Added in for good measure was the typical conspiracy rant against the United States.  Always so much easier to blame outsiders rather than to take a cold hard look at the pitiful condition of your home country.  Afridi has learned the two faced approach of his nation’s diplomats – say one thing in India under the full blaze of the Indian and world media.  Mouth off your true feelings back home in Urdu.  Video in Urdu below:

This blog does agree with Afridi on one point, though not for his reasons.  As we have discussed previously, the charade of talks currently being conducted between India and Pakistan to keep the United States and Europe happy are pointless.  There is nothing really to discuss, particularly when Pakistan will not forswear terrorism as a tool of state policy.  The defensiveness was evident in Afridi slamming Indian player Gautam Gambhir for the temerity to dedicate victory in a final played in Mumbai to the victims of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks (note: Gambhir never named Pakistan, but Afridi knows who was responsible by his defensive lash out).   Even the Pakistani government has conceded the origin of the attackers (though not the identity of their trainers).  So Shahid Afridi get your own house in order…and up yours!

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The cricketing gods have smiled on India.  Twenty-eight years after a huge upset won them their first world cup, India regained the trophy on Saturday after a thrilling and competitive win over Sri Lanka.   It has been many years since I watched a complete one-day international cricket match, but the adrenaline rush from watching the Indian victory eased my bleary eyed exhaustion from watching the game through the night.

India’s world cup victory in 1983 is my earliest memory of watching cricket on television.  Unfortunately at the age of eight I was unable to stay awake through the late hours to watch Kapil’s Devils shock the cricketing world by upsetting favorites and defending champions West Indies.  In 2003 (the last time I managed to watch a complete game), an Indian team that was probably the second best team in the world came up short against defending champions Australia.

This world cup was different.  India entered as one of the favorites and after a forgettable first round brushed aside Australia (which won the last 3 world cups) and national rival Pakistan to make the finals.  Sri Lanka was a legitimate contender and I had every intention sitting through this game.  Yet when Sachin Tendulkar was dismissed early in India’s run chase leaving India dangling at 31-2, a familiar sense of despair that every Indian cricket fan has experienced through the years reappeared.

Yet this is a different Indian cricket team that does not fold at the first sign of adversity.  The fielding had been phenomenal during Sri Lanka’s batting (normally not an Indian strength), and now the Indian batsmen kept their cool gathering steady runs in singles and doubles (eschewing the riskier crowd-pleasing boundaries).  They gradually sucked the oxygen out of the Sri Lankan team which desperately varied permutations of bowlers to get a breakthrough.  In the end Indian captain M. S. Dhoni emphatically sealed the win (see video below) by knocking Sri Lankan bowler Nuwan Kulasekara for a six, igniting raucous celebrations around India and the Indian diaspora.

The beaming smile on the face of legend Sachin Tendulkar (video below from the 3:00 mark) who played in his sixth world cup (1992, 1996, 1999, 2003, 2007 & 2011) showed what the win meant to him.   The Indian players celebrated by carrying him around the stadium on their shoulders and lavished praise on him afterwards (video below from the 6:50 mark). Teammate Virat Kohli summed up India’s feelings towards its icon the most succinctly (at the end of the clip below):

“He has carried the burden of the nation for 21 years. It is time we carried him on our shoulders.”

;

A friend commented today on the coincidence of rising nations obtaining validation of their rise by success in the sporting arena.   After years of futility in the emotional heart of the cricketing world, a billion people in an increasingly confident nation are celebrating the culmination of their recent cricket resurgence.  And the greatest batsman of our time finishes (probably) his last world cup as a champion.  

Congratulations India, congratulations Dhoni, congratulations Tendulkar. Chak de India!!!

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Taking a break from the usual litany of war. economic ruin, natural disasters, and politicians is the video below that an uncle shared on Facebook.  After you are done watching the adorable tyke click here for the background and a second video.  Enjoy….

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Saw the video below when it was posted by a cousin on Facebook.  It showcases a “Green Pizza Box” made of recycled cardboard that converts into plates for eating and a smaller storage container for leftovers.

People grumble all the time that environmental regulations kill jobs.  Yes, some energy inefficient jobs will be lost.  But “green” jobs will be also created by innovations like the one above that will be spurred by the need to preserve the environment and conserve natural resources.

Global Warming sucks up a lot of oxygen in environmental debate, but a probably more pressing issue in the coming decades will be the need to conserve water resources which are not keeping up with rising global population.  As water shortages increase from the Southwestern United States to Yemen to India, look for more conflicts on that issue to flare up.  The makers of the James Bond franchise were one of the few prescient celebrities to draw attention to this issue in the most recent adventure of 007.  The innovation above can do its part by reducing water usage for dishwashing.

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John Solomon at the Daily Beast has a column discussing the nostalgia for George Herbert Walker Bush in certain circles.  This Blog shares that nostalgia and posted similar emotions about a year and a half ago.

I particularly miss the George H. W. Bush wing of the Republican party when it comes to foreign policy, given the (sometimes scary) blather that emanates from most Republican presidential hopefuls on the subject these days.  When Bob Gates steps down as Defense Secretary, he will probably be the last senior Bush ’41 foreign policy official to hold public office (though who knew Dick Cheney would morph into the Prince of Darkness).  Even though Gates’ performance as CIA Director at the time was forgettable, his second act as Defense Secretary to the 43rd and 44th Presidents has displayed the pragmatism of Bush ’41 and a refusal to be trapped by rigid and unrealistic ideologies.  Unfortunately the George H.W. Bushes and the Dick Lugars of the Republican Party have increasingly given way to the Jim DeMints, Sarah Palins and the Michele Bachmanns.  Of the younger Senators only Lindsey Graham (from time to time) hearkens back to the Bush ’41 tradition on foreign policy.  Mark Kirk could do so as well if his spine was not made of jelly.

As a result this Blog is willing to renew its nostalgia for the 41st President as he proceeds in his twilight years and is proud that his Presidential Library graces the campus of the author’s alma mater.

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After weeks of refusing to get involved in Libya with the war-mongerers Stateside accusing him of dithering, Barack Obama turned on a dime and endorsed military action in Libya.   The push for war was largely driven by the French and the British and cloaked with legitimacy by the Arab League’s call for a no-fly zone over Libya.  The French intervention appears driven by a desire to restore their tarnished prestige following a series of diplomatic blunders with respect to the Arab uprisings.  In my opinion Obama’s shift can be explained by the following:

• Nobody likes Muammar Gaddafi (other than Hugo Chavez) and everybody was excited at the thought of his imminent departure.
• But Gaddafi has proved surprisingly resilient and his opposition hopelessly disorganized.
• Last week as Gaddafi’s armor reached Benghazi there was the sudden unpalatable realization that Gaddafi was about to win.
• Gaddafi went on television once again promising wholesale slaughter, conjuring up memories of the failure to prevent the massacres at Srebrenica in 1995 and of the Iraqi Shiites in 1991.
• Even though he stood at the brink of victory, Gaddafi’s armed forces are weak and his advance was easily stopped.

It is interesting to speculate whether the UN would have acted if Gaddafi had not broadcast his genocidal intentions to the world.  The broadcasts may have been enough to prevent Russia and China from vetoing intervention in Libya (ironic given the willingness of both those regimes to slaughter their people in Chechnya and at Tiananmen respectively).  Yet the old fault lines are obvious.  The BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) and Germany all abstained at the vote.  The Arab League whose support lent legitimacy to the operation promptly flip-flopped when the bombs started to fall.

It is hard to avoid the impression that the war was a half-baked attempt to stop a Gaddafi victory.  To his credit Barack Obama is aware (unlike many of his domestic critics) that the United States no longer has the credibility to initiate an armed intervention in the Arab or Muslim world.  Unlike the coalition of the billing that accompanied the United States into Iraq, this is a true (if disorganized) coalition with NATO allies doing heavy lifting and a few Gulf monarchies sending their fighter jets to enforce the no-fly zone.  Gaddafi’s unpopularity on the Arab street has muted some of the reflexive anti-American voices.  People still carp that this is “about oil.”  That makes no sense since Gaddafi’s legitimization in the last decade was followed by the entry of western oil companies into Libya.  Getting rid of Gaddafi was no longer a prerequisite to get Libyan oil.

The problem is that nobody has explained the end-objective of what is likely to be an open-ended military commitment.  Nobody has any idea what the disorganized Libyan opposition stands for.  Various parts of the coalition differ on the wisdom or legality of killing Gaddafi with a military strike.  Other NATO allies are showing marked reluctance to being involved in the operation and the United States is on record wanting to hand off the baton to someone else.  With the rest of the world used to freeloading on US leadership and the casting stones at the United States for “causing civilian deaths,” it is difficult to see who that would be.  There has been no debate within the United States about what American strategic goals are and how this war will be paid for.

Basically the allies are gambling that elimination of Gaddafi’s air and armor advantage will allow the opposition to sweep into Tripoli.  The precedents for this exist in the success of the Bosnian Muslims and Croats after NATO’s bombing of Serb positions.  Aerial bombardment and limited special forces involvement enabled the Northern Alliance to sweep the Taliban out of Kabul in 2001.  Yet key differences exist.  The Bosnian and Northern Alliance forces had been tempered by years of war and had an organized command structure.  The Libyan opposition is hopelessly out-gunned by even Gaddafi’s ramshackle army and mercenaries.  On the flip side the ramshackle nature of Gaddafi’s military and regime makes it unlikely that his generals will want to go down shooting for him.  There is a rumor that a kamikaze attack by a Libyan pilot may have killed one of Gaddafi’s sons.  Combined with rumors of members of the regime seeking exit strategies, Gaddafi’s rule may be cracking.

The quickest solution to this military dilemma would be for the Egyptian army to march west.  Even if it is bloated and inefficient, the Egyptian army would probably sweep aside Gaddafi’s forces.  Such an intervention would probably play well with the Egyptian street that is suspicious of the Generals’ commitment to democracy.  But the Egyptians are playing coy and their aid to the rebels has been under the table.  Their Generals have some cause for worry that an invasion of Libya could trap their army in an unwinnable occupation of a failed tribal entity with a national flag (See: Ethiopian intervention in Somalia – 2006-2009).

This is a war where the ends will unfortunately justify the means.  The quick fall of Gaddafi (even though regime change is not a declared purpose of the war) with minimal bloodshed will vindicate Messrs. Obama, Sarkozy and Cameron.  If Gaddafi holds on and the result is a long drawn civil war and military stalemate the intervention will ultimately be seen as a failure.  The fall of Gaddafi followed by chaos will probably be seen as a failure as well.

For now we cross our fingers and wait….and hope.

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“C’est pire qu’un crime, c’est une faute”

(It was worse than a crime; it was a blunder) – Comment by a Napoleonic official on the judicial murder of the Duc d’Enghien.

“What’s being done to Bradley Manning by my colleagues at the Department of Defense is ridiculous and counterproductive and stupid.” – Soon to be sacked State Department spokesman P. J. Crowley.

By sacking P. J. Crowley shortly after he committed the gaffe above (i.e. spoke the truth), Barack Obama has endorsed the sadistic jollies that Bradley Manning’s jailers receive from torturing him.  Previous winks at torture could somewhat be justified by the need to obtain information.  There is no such excuse here.  Bradley Manning is being subjected to a regimen that appears intended to drive him insane, allegedly because he is a suicide risk.  Then there is the ritualized humiliation of forced nudity and sleep deprivation he is being subjected to.   The media outrage at the treatment of a man not yet convicted of passing classified information to WikiLeaks is growing – see here, here, here, here, here, and here – but will probably have no effect on our ruling class.  At some point this should not be surprising.  On human rights, after the decree to close Guantanamo (which is still open), Obama has been a colossal disappointment and has been unwilling to stand up to the excesses of the national security apparatus.  His administration seems to pursue whistle-blowers more aggressively than the abuses they uncover.

Unlike some of my friends I do not condone Bradley Manning’s alleged leaking.  But he has not yet been convicted of his crime.  And even if he were, his treatment would still be unjustified.  The last decade has seen the Executive and Judicial branches wink at the abuse of prisoners.  Congress, which is particularly prone to jingoistic populism, is also useless.  Large sections of the Fourth Estate have also condoned torture because of the unsympathetic nature of people being tortured and the fears of terrorism.  This is a disgrace, as is Obama’s reaction to the news of Manning’s treatment:

“With respect to Private Manning, you know, I have actually asked the Pentagon whether or not the procedures that have been taken in terms of his confinement are appropriate and are meeting our basic standards. They assured me that they are.”

Gee..the alleged abusers have assured him that the treatment is appropriate.  End of inquiry.  How heartwarming.

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Via Joshua Green of the Atlantic: so spoke the only President of the United States to ever lead a union. The reference is to the Solidarity Trade Union that challenged the communist regime in Poland.

This is yet another piece of evidence that the mythology created by the Bircher, Birther and Know-Nothing rump of the Republican Party today does not comport to the reality of their hallowed President.  (Note: In the interest of being fair and balanced one must note that Reagan broke the air-traffic controllers union when they went on strike on the obvious public safety grounds, but as a man who drew his support from blue-collar Democrats did not actively attack the Unions).  The man was no bleeding heart liberal but had the pragmatism to raise taxes when needed, bailed out GM and Chrysler (sound familiar), refused to demonize gays, was willing to cut his losses and withdraw from Lebanon without trying to avenge the dead Marines, was willing to deal with the evil Empire and even Iran, and was willing to genuinely compromise with the Democrats instead of taking a position of “my way or the highway.”  Frankly none of the Republican Presidents since World War II would satisfy the purity test imposed on today’s Republican candidates.

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(Via Andrew Sullivan) Jimmy Kimmel flags the early Oscar front runner for 2012. Video below:

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As Muammar Gaddafi digs in for his final stand, mockery of the brutal dictator is spreading across the web.  A couple of samples are below:

• The clip below “Zenga Zenga” by Israeli musician Noy Alooshe mocks the dictator’s speech last week.  The video has garnered over 1.6 million views and is a hit in the Arab world.  Using Autotune to turn an excerpt of his speech to song the dictator promises that he will clean Libya “inch by inch, house by house, room by room, alley by alley.”  At the edges bikini clad women gyrate to the music.  The Israeli origins of the video have not prevented it from becoming a hit in the Arab world.

• Vanity Fair which previously cataloged Gaddafi the fashionista now gives you the opportunity to craft your own hard line speech with Gaddafi as your muse.

Enjoy…

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Pervez Hoodbhoy has this pessimistic take on the perils of a nuclear-armed failing Pakistani state.  For all the opprobrium it received for the Mumbai attacks, Pakistan has still not brought the attack planners to justice or commenced dismantling its terror infrastructure.  Incredibly the bankrupt Pakistani state appears to be betting all its chips on the nuclear shield.  So a state which survives on financial aid is risking an arms race with its larger and stronger neighbor that will make its fragile condition even worse.

Hoodbhoy is probably right in that another attack on India is only a matter of time.  How will India then react to the rogue state on its western border?  Indians have noted that the Bush doctrine allowed the United States to invade Afghanistan, but the United States limits the Indian response to its terrorism sponsoring neighbor.  This perpetuates the Pakistani faith in its nuclear deterrent as a shield for any foreign misadventures.

It must be noted that the second and less appreciated part of Pakistan’s shield will eventually disappear.  The US will get out of Afghanistan and will no longer need Pakistan as a supply route for its troops.  Similar to 1989, it will be far easier for Washington to cut Pakistan loose after it withdraws from Afghanistan.  With China already sponsoring North Korea and Burma, will it want the Pakistani basket case in its lap?  Given its size, location and the size of its nuclear arsenal, the collapse of Pakistan will be a far greater geopolitical nightmare than the fall of the rickety regime in Pyongyang.

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I posted earlier in the week that Gaddafi’s Latin American friends other than Daniel Ortega were not sticking their necks out for him.  The silence of the garrulous Chavez was particularly unusual.  The Caudillo finally broke his silence a few hours ago on twitter by embracing Fidel Castro’s theory that this was an American plot to invade Libya.  Tweet below:

The tweet translates as follows: “Minister Nicolás [Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro]: Teach the far right yankee lovers” a lesson! Long live Libya and its Independence! Gaddafi is facing a civil war!”

Some context:  ”pitiyanqui” literally translates to little Yankee.  It is an insult Chavez created to mock opponents he deemed to be Yankee lovers.  The tweet followed a statement by Maduro echoing Castro’s theory that the United States was creating a movement to topple Gaddafi.

Even a blowhard like Chavez cannot bring himself to openly support Gaddafi like Nicaragua’s Ortega did.  So he wraps himself in his reflexive anti-Americanism to try to mask his support for Gaddafi. Kinda pathetic.

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I have little respect for the intelligence of many legislators, but some of the legislation that has been introduced in the last couple of months is truly breathtaking.

It started with anti-abortion Republicans in Congress trying to limit the Federal funding of abortions by attempting to redefine rape.  Then, a legislator in South Dakota introduced a fetus protection bill so loosely drafted that it could have allowed a pregnant woman’s immediate family to kill anyone (including doctors) who tried to provide that woman an abortion with her permission.  Thankfully the legislator saw the dangers of legalizing homicide of doctors performing still legal acts and withdrew the bill.  Undaunted a Nebraska legislator has introduced a similar bill that will grant such justifiable homicide rights to any third party vigilante.

Then you have Republican legislators in states like Montana discovering their inner John C. Calhoun and trying to pass nullification statues.

But this one takes the cake and is truly beyond belief.  Georgia State Rep. Bobby Franklin has introduced a bill that would make women who miscarry felons unless they can prove that there was “no human involvement whatsoever in the causation” of their miscarriage.  Such a felony could be punishable by death.  So much for innocent until proven guilty.  Even the infamously misogynistic Taliban never dreamed up such an obscenity.

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