In the recent conversations about Policy PhDs and such, one of the frequent assertions was that people going into PhD programs had no idea what they were getting into. Why do we assert such things? All I can say is that I had no clue not just about what was...
Especially considering that I recently criticized the human security community for failing to pay enough attention to urban violence, I'm delighted to hear of this upcoming web seminar on the topic...
The civil war continues in Syra. As does the one in Mali. Two posts at Political Violence @ a Glance. First, Ron Hassner compares "blasphemy and political violence" in 2006 and 2012. Second, Steve...
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This is cross-posted from the University of Texas website.As the March 6 Super Tuesday Republican primary looms, foreign policy issues understandably are likely to play a marginal role in the decisions of most voters. Since the middle of 2008, Gallup pollshave found that more than 60 percent of voters identified economic issues as the most important problem facing the country. In their February 2012 poll, for example, less than a half a percent of Americans identified either terrorism or conflict/war in the Middle East as their top concern.Does that mean that foreign policy concerns are...
...How I could just kill a man!Obama said today, or at least I think it was today, that "we have Israel's back." So have we replaced the cowboy swagger bullshit with some urban swagger bullshit? Fo shizzle.In general, I object to any dumbing down of foreign policy, even in the public discourse, and I don't really think Presidents did this before. This seems to be a modern phenomenon. But now, apparently even Obama feels the need to talk in this over-simplistic way. Ladies and gentlemen, President B-Real. If only that were a blunt he is smoking. Add the 40, and away we go!I always hated the...
I'm very much looking forward to attending this year's International Studies Association conference in lovely San Diego. This is partly because I can fight a losing struggle against its declared theme for this year:'Canadian communication theorist Marshall McLuhan famously said, “The medium is the message,” and coined the term “global village.” McLuhan died in 1980, but his insights are even more relevant today. The information environment is drastically different from that of even a decade ago, as new forms of information flows come into existence almost annually.Facebook now has over 500...
This is our cat in the bath. He doesn't really do anything funny. He just stands in the bathtub. Then he leaves. That was then (or, to be more precise but still vague, a few months ago). He now usually joins our daughter for her bath time. He also makes sure to come into the shower for a minute or two. And he has started imitating us by testing the temperature of the shower with his paw.So, here's the question: do we own a cat idiot, or is spending long periods of time in a filled bathtub a sign that he's some sort of feline kwisatz haderarch?
The CFR public-relations office certainly thinks they've got a winner in the "attack Iran debate." Here's a video of the recent "live" debate between Colin and Matt on the subject.
<img alt="" galleryimg="no" onload="var downlevelDiv = document.getElementById('bb5de15d-7c15-4871-a2cc-6763366de6e7'); downlevelDiv.innerHTML = "";" src="https://lh5.ggpht.com/-W1vOumSW7Og/T1A4_HIYJyI/AAAAAAAAAGk/26F_nfPYPEE/videof869ee43bf33%25255B4%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" />I guess if you speak a foreign language, you’re a traitorHere were my first, domestic politics thoughts on the GOP debate-run, particularly the competitive, extreme position-taking forced onto the candidates by the audience reactions. But I thought the debates actually...
Why should academics and policymakers prioritize a state's acquistion of "... the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory"? Obviously, this monopoly is fundamental to masking the violence of the state in daily domestic affairs, but what about in areas where that violence cannot be masked under the guise of a neutral, rational-legal state that speaks for the "nation" in the first place? Is a Eurocentric model of the state still an appropriate priority for all territories, particularly in regions which have a long history of embattled states as well as...
Citizens of Nerd Nation, I invite you to ingest (if you haven't already) this Geek-Hall-of-Fame-Worthy post. Therein, Rod Hilton explains how to properly introduce newcomers to the Star Wars films.There are two obvious choices for watching the Star Wars saga.Release Order – Watch the films in the order they came out, recreating your experience with the films for someone new to them.Episode Order – Watch the films in the order George Lucas intends, starting with Episode I and going straight through to Episode VI.There are two critical flaws with both of these orders, unfortunately, that...