Category: Uncategorized

Why Do Red-Staters Despise the East Coast Media? Perhaps it has something to do with stories like this one, with their sophisticate condescension crudely disguised as compassion, help to explain: Stuart, named for the Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart, has always sent its sons off to war. On the courthouse lawn, the World War II memorial bears 64 names. The Vietnam War memorial lists seven men who did not come home. High unemployment has caused many of Stuart’s young to seek...

The White House has added its say to the Washington Post’s sensational–and almost certainly false–claim that it “misled” U.S. allies about North Korean proliferation of uranium by “concealing” the fact that Pakistan acted as middleman in that transfer. “U.S. Misled Allies About Nuclear Export,” the March 20 front-page story about nuclear material exported to Libya, was flat wrong. Our allies were not “misled” by the United States about North Korea’s proliferation activities. We provided an accurate account of the intelligence...

The White House has added its say to the Washington Post’s sensational–and almost certainly false–claim that it “misled” U.S. allies about North Korean proliferation of uranium by “concealing” the fact that Pakistan acted as middleman in that transfer. “U.S. Misled Allies About Nuclear Export,” the March 20 front-page story about nuclear material exported to Libya, was flat wrong. Our allies were not “misled” by the United States about North Korea’s proliferation activities. We provided an accurate account of the intelligence...

Well, well . . . and what did I happen to see in today’s Letters to the Editor? A map included with the March 17 news story “Islands Come Between South Korea and Japan” used the terms “East Sea” and “Dokdo.” Regarding the term “East Sea”: Japan believes it is essential to refer to this body of water as the “Sea of Japan,” a name used widely by the global community since the early 19th century. Although South Korea asserts...

Why Do Red-Staters Despise the East Coast Media? Perhaps it has something to do with stories like this one, with their sophisticate condescension crudely disguised as compassion, help to explain: Stuart, named for the Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart, has always sent its sons off to war. On the courthouse lawn, the World War II memorial bears 64 names. The Vietnam War memorial lists seven men who did not come home. High unemployment has caused many of Stuart’s young to seek...

Although I’ve been deeply interested in Central Asia for many years, it’s been difficult to get inordinately excited about events in Kyrgyzstan, given that I don’t yet know just who composes the opposition. There’s not much to be gained from replacing one dictator with another, and there’s certainly always room for things to get worse. It seems that the previous president was a Soviet holdover, but a less ruthless one than his neighbors in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. I’m always ready...

Add Stratfor to the list of pundits veering sharply from bearish to bullish on Iraq. Success, as they say, has a thousand fathers. Failure grovels, disowned and bitter, for a dollop of gruel (more fun here). The best news of all is the role being played by the Iraqi people in turning against the terrorists, via this fascinating AP report: The raid at Lake Tharthar in central Iraq turned up booby-trapped cars, suicide-bomber vests, weapons and training documents, Iraqi Maj....

. . . lest anyone get too carried away with optimism about the Middle East. According to the AP, these boys are Fatah. That would be the ruling faction of Mahmoud Abbas. I realize that mentalities can only change so much overnight, but . . . .

Although I’ve been deeply interested in Central Asia for many years, it’s been difficult to get inordinately excited about events in Kyrgyzstan, given that I don’t yet know just who composes the opposition. There’s not much to be gained from replacing one dictator with another, and there’s certainly always room for things to get worse. It seems that the previous president was a Soviet holdover, but a less ruthless one than his neighbors in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. I’m always ready...

A must-read in today’s New York Times. My wife’s mother died of kidney cancer five years ago yesterday, so this passage plunged me into a dark gloom: “We have no friends, and no future, nothing at all, really,” said the soft-spoken older sister, Hae Jon, 17. “But if we stay here, at least we have enough to eat. In our country, we could go for days without eating.” Within months, according to an underground network of people who help support...

Add Stratfor to the list of pundits veering sharply from bearish to bullish on Iraq. Success, as they say, has a thousand fathers. Failure grovels, disowned and bitter, for a dollop of gruel (more fun here). The best news of all is the role being played by the Iraqi people in turning against the terrorists, via this fascinating AP report: The raid at Lake Tharthar in central Iraq turned up booby-trapped cars, suicide-bomber vests, weapons and training documents, Iraqi Maj....

Add Stratfor to the list of pundits veering sharply from bearish to bullish on Iraq. Success, as they say, has a thousand fathers. Failure grovels, disowned and bitter, for a dollop of gruel (more fun here). The best news of all is the role being played by the Iraqi people in turning against the terrorists, via this fascinating AP report: The raid at Lake Tharthar in central Iraq turned up booby-trapped cars, suicide-bomber vests, weapons and training documents, Iraqi Maj....

. . . lest anyone get too carried away with optimism about the Middle East. According to the AP, these boys are Fatah. That would be the ruling faction of Mahmoud Abbas. I realize that mentalities can only change so much overnight, but . . . .

A must-read in today’s New York Times. My wife’s mother died of kidney cancer five years ago yesterday, so this passage plunged me into a dark gloom: “We have no friends, and no future, nothing at all, really,” said the soft-spoken older sister, Hae Jon, 17. “But if we stay here, at least we have enough to eat. In our country, we could go for days without eating.” Within months, according to an underground network of people who help support...

On her return from an eight-day trip to the United States, Park Geun-hye, chairwoman of Grand National Party, told reporters yesterday that relations between South Korea and the United States are far worse than Koreans imagine they are. “I met various politicians,” said Ms. Park. “If the mistrust that prevails among the politicians spreads to the general public of the United States, bilateral ties between the two countries will face greater problems.”Ms. Park had a meeting with U.S. Secretary of...

Other than the odd exceptional case of an outright admission, every specific accusation that a secretive regime has engaged in a specific nefarious act is subject to the collateral attack that it rests upon the inexact science of intelligence. Intelligence errors cut both ways, of course, and any administration facing a hostile press is certain to face withering criticism no matter where it chooses to assign the very real risk of error. What is so often missing in these discussions...

Daily NK reports two items of interest today. The first is purportedly the text of the judgments against those executed and imprisoned by the North Korean authorities there. Although it accuses most of the condemned of trafficking in North Korean women, treat that characterization with extreme caution; putting a sexual taint on a dissenter is an old trick that China has used pretty shamelessly against Korean underground railroad activists. It could be true, too. But then, why add this language?...

On her return from an eight-day trip to the United States, Park Geun-hye, chairwoman of Grand National Party, told reporters yesterday that relations between South Korea and the United States are far worse than Koreans imagine they are. “I met various politicians,” said Ms. Park. “If the mistrust that prevails among the politicians spreads to the general public of the United States, bilateral ties between the two countries will face greater problems.”Ms. Park had a meeting with U.S. Secretary of...