tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573Sat, 21 Feb 2009 16:55:08 +0000Thoughts, views and the occasional gripe about the world. Counting down to January 2009 since November 2004.http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.com (Rob)Blogger405125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-113653010855046946Fri, 06 Jan 2006 06:48:00 +00002006-01-05T22:48:28.563-08:00With every passing day the status quo in the Middle East comes undone. Ongoing warfare in Iraq, an increasingly unhinged regime in Iran, an increasingly hard-pressed regime in Syria facing an increasingly headstrong Lebanon, and - with the incapacitation of Ariel Sharon - an uncertain situation in Israel accompanied by the rise of anarchy in the Palestinian territories: all these things augur a http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2006/01/facing-turbulence.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-113517917360226271Wed, 21 Dec 2005 15:26:00 +00002005-12-21T07:32:53.613-08:00With the election of Evo Morales to the presidency in Bolivia, we can safely say that the Bush administration lost Latin America. It did so in spite of its earlier promises to pay special attention to the region. Hugo Chavez, who Bush has handled poorly - most notably by displaying an ill-timed exuberance when a coup seemed to have occurred in Caracas - now has a new ally. Who would have http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/12/losing-latin-america.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-113409744743141478Fri, 09 Dec 2005 03:04:00 +00002005-12-08T19:07:34.670-08:00I've wanted to post here for some time, but hadn't quite felt like it. I have a backlog of observations I'd like to move off the runway. I felt like writing this months ago when Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called for Israel to be wiped off the map. He has helpfully reminded me of what I originally wanted to sayAs reported today, Ahmadinejad made headlines around the world by denying http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/12/ahmadinejads-refreshing-candor.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-113028070931573087Tue, 25 Oct 2005 22:51:00 +00002005-10-25T15:51:49.390-07:00As a perceptive Slate article points out, the new German coalition government is without one of Germany's most sincerely pro-American politicians, Joschka Fischer. Fischer - it should be remembered - stood to the right of Gerhard Schröder on the Iraq question - though a skeptic on the WMD question, he had no desire for a trans-Atlantic rift and none of Schröder's callow electoral motives. At http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/10/idiocy-of-it-all.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112840014937871931Tue, 04 Oct 2005 04:26:00 +00002005-10-03T21:29:09.386-07:00I don't have much to say about Harriet Miers's nomination to the Supreme Court other than it seems mystifying if one reads it as anything other than an act of cronyism. Miers does not stand out in any way from the pile of prospective justices; only if her loyalty to the Bush clan is taken into account does she become notable. It is truly a special kind of loyalty when she has proclaimed Bush tohttp://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/10/georgie-and-harriet.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112792866420617482Wed, 28 Sep 2005 17:31:00 +00002005-09-28T10:31:04.280-07:00Tom DeLay's indictment, coming on the heels of the announced investigation into Bill Frist's sale of stock, marks the further degeneration of the Republicans' grip on power. DeLay will fight this indictment to the bitter end - it's doubtful that anyone will be able to persuade him otherwise. The question is how many other Republicans he will take down with him. How many other representatives http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/09/cracks-in-edifice.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112752316355563293Fri, 23 Sep 2005 20:42:00 +00002005-12-21T07:34:39.286-08:002005 has not been a terribly auspicious year for Bill Frist. Any elation he carried into the new year stemming from his role in ousting Tom Daschle must have dissipated by now. The winter and spring saw him getting embroiled in the entire Terry Schiavo mess and the concurrent battle over judges, in which he attempted to paint the Democrats as being opposed to "people of faith." To his eternal http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/09/frists-bad-year.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112710126130077305Mon, 19 Sep 2005 03:31:00 +00002005-09-18T20:41:01.306-07:00I had high hopes for the German election. It seemed time for a change, and as a committed Atlanticist, the prospect of an Angela Merkel victory was tantalizing for me. Merkel is no Tony Blair, but she's a long way from being Jacques Chirac. Under her leadership, Germany could resume its old role as the continental balancer between Britain and France, rather than serving as a sidekick to http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/09/germany-muddles-along.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112657353916889382Tue, 13 Sep 2005 00:47:00 +00002005-09-14T10:54:03.830-07:00The culmination of the Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip was followed - almost immediately - by the burning of the synagogues left behind in the deserrted settlements.At the eleventh hour, the Israeli government had decided that it would not demolish these buildings; this decision followed an emotional appeal to the cabinet by a panel of rabbis. The synagogues were entrusted to the tender http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/09/fires-of-gaza.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112568539580669515Fri, 02 Sep 2005 17:59:00 +00002005-09-02T12:57:20.700-07:00Some foolish things have been said in the wake of Katrina, and in that category, one must cite the utterances of Germany's Minister of the Environment, Jurgen Trittin, who lay the blame for Katrina at the feet of the Bush administration in an article for the Frankfurter Rundschau without so much as a word of sympathy for the victims. Trittin's cold analysis has prompted outrage on both sides of http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/09/negligence.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112563379615387645Fri, 02 Sep 2005 03:58:00 +00002005-09-01T21:20:20.263-07:00At this moment, diehard Al Qaeda types are undoubtedly celebrating the flooding of New Orleans and the devastation of the Gulf Coast, attributing it to Allah's vengeance against the Great Satan or somesuch. I say this because some deranged clerics last January deemed the tsunami Allah's retribution against the sinful beaches of Thailand (but isn't it odd that Allah smote so many devout Muslims inhttp://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/09/types-of-enemies.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112488917320633675Wed, 24 Aug 2005 13:12:00 +00002005-08-24T06:12:53.256-07:00I'm far from being a fan of Robert Novak, but I rather savor his latest column, which notes the waning of John Thune's star due to the decision to close Ellsworth Air Force Base. Novak casts the closures as the act of an indifferent White House, but the article inadvertently states as well that Thune's inexperience was a factor. : When the year began, Thune's political future seemed unlimited. http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/08/bwahaha.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112483138633562121Tue, 23 Aug 2005 21:01:00 +00002005-08-23T14:09:46.346-07:00Lord help me, I have to agree with Venezuela's ambassador, Bernardo Alvarez, to the U.S. on the subject of Pat Robertson's fatwa against Hugo Chavez. I think Chavez is a repulsive throwback and a regional problem, but when a man with Pat Robertson's influence calls for an assassination the White House has to do more than say that he doesn't represent US policy and that his remarks were "http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/08/weakness-of-white-house.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112481044114875109Tue, 23 Aug 2005 15:13:00 +00002005-08-23T08:20:41.156-07:00In one of the odder geopolitical developments of the year, Canada and Denmark are engaged in a territorial dispute over the Arctic territory of Hans Island, which is located just off of Greenland. A visit by Danish warships to the area earlier in the year has triggered the dispatch of two Canadian vessels as well.Needless to say, the odds of this ever escalating to blows are slim - perhaps http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/08/arctic-tensions.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112480863246470541Tue, 23 Aug 2005 14:50:00 +00002005-08-23T07:50:32.536-07:00Pat Robertson has called for the US to assassinate Hugo Chavez. Not quite a fatwa, perhaps, but still a clear violation of the 6th Commandment (you know, "Thou shalt not kill"). Why this man hasn't gone the way of Ezra Pound, I can only guess.http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/08/ayatollah-robertson.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112480498872283276Tue, 23 Aug 2005 13:33:00 +00002005-08-23T07:01:28.213-07:00While one can access Dailykos through a sidebar link from this blog, I don't do that very often. Kos, for the most part, fights the good fight and during the election year, the blog was a valuable source of campaign information. It was also something of an echo chamber, though less so than mydd. Still, after the election ended, I found the echo chamber dynamic of these blogs a bit wearisome.Sohttp://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/08/i-must-break-you.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112416991760750811Tue, 16 Aug 2005 05:01:00 +00002005-08-15T22:25:17.630-07:00Cindy Sheehan's vigil outside Bush's Crawford ranch began as high drama, but is rapidly turning into something no one wanted to see: the spectacle of a human lost in paroxysms of grief. What else is one to make of her recent statements? It certainly isn't fair to expect Ms. Sheehan to be stoic in her grief, but there is something demeaning about televising her agonized declarations that Bush http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/08/stop-cameras.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112318663523199976Thu, 04 Aug 2005 19:51:00 +00002005-08-04T13:17:15.290-07:00The Sahel region has been in the news quite a bit lately. The belated international reaction to famine in Niger has yet to make a substantive impact. A coup in Mauritania has, for one brief moment, lifted that country to the top of headlines.The desert countries of the Sahel - in particular, Chad, Niger, Mali, and Mauritania - constitute an increasingly important region for American foreign http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/08/beyond-niger.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112293657135744337Mon, 01 Aug 2005 22:42:00 +00002005-08-01T15:49:31.366-07:00John Bolton's recess appointment marks a dicey gamble on the part of the administration. Team Bush is no stranger to the fait accompli - indeed, these have worked for them more often than not. However, the recess appointment stinks of being a runaround. While the position of UN ambassador isn't one that Americans necessarily consider important, Bush's recourse to a recess appointment may well http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/08/recess-time.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112287142555655616Mon, 01 Aug 2005 04:39:00 +00002005-07-31T21:43:45.563-07:00With the apparent death of John Garang in a plane crash the integrity of Sudan's peace process will be thoroughly tested. Garang was to serve as a counterbalancing force in the new Sudanese government. With their longtime nemesis gone, will Sudan's hardliners still accept a compromise peace with the Christian South? Or will they see the possibility of the SPLA unraveling just as the Angolan http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/07/very-bad-news.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-112204405033807820Fri, 22 Jul 2005 14:54:00 +00002005-07-22T07:54:10.420-07:00Tom Friedman's latest column is a brilliant and unusually constructive essay on the need to expose hatemongering in the world today. Too many people ask "why do they hate us?" choose their top 3-5 favorite answers (ones which usually reduce terrorism to some kind of converse reaction to the West, rather than a product of the actual goals, ideals, and methods of the terrorists themelves) and then http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/07/giving-hatemongers-no-place-to-hide.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-111915070350019564Sun, 19 Jun 2005 00:39:00 +00002005-06-18T20:11:43.530-07:00An earthquake of unprecedented scale has rocked the EU over the past month. By any account, it began with the French rejection of the Union's constitution. At the least, the current row over the Union's budget is a powerful aftershock. It may be an equal or greater temblor altogether. At times of greatest stress, Jacques Chirac goes ahead and vents. A political leader of middling caliber, http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/06/future-of-europe.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-111911842041578593Sat, 18 Jun 2005 18:00:00 +00002005-06-18T11:13:40.446-07:00Former gulag inmate Pavel Litvinov's essay in the Washington Post provides a useful corrective to Amnesty International's hyperbolic assertion that Guantanamo constitutes the gulag of our age. When one compares the scale, intent, and operation of the two systems, the uselessness of the analogy is even more apparent. Moreover, there's something offensive in such casual use of the gulag as a http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/06/dont-accept-hype.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-111845071350036319Sat, 11 Jun 2005 00:35:00 +00002005-06-10T17:52:17.840-07:00It looks to be a long four years under the erratic guidance of Dr. Dean.Unsurprisingly, I'm annoyed at Dean's recent remarks. Declaring Tom DeLay guilty before the Hammer is judged by a jury of his peers seems a mite headstrong. It seems worse if one remembers that Dean hasn't always been so keen on prejudging trial outcomes. Back in 2003, he remarked:I will have this old-fashioned notion thathttp://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/06/howards-end.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5764573.post-111789609596186157Sat, 04 Jun 2005 14:33:00 +00002005-06-04T07:41:36.023-07:00The murder of Samir Kassir illustrates one painful reality that Americans need to face about Lebanon: it is fairly likely to descend into violence if the standoff between pro-independence and pro-Syrian forces continues. The forces supporting Syria are too ruthless and too well armed to be cowed by students in Beirut. Hezbollah is lining up alongside the Syrians, and Bashar Assad will probably http://robspoliticalmusings.blogspot.com/2005/06/lebanon.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Rob)