After I posted "Isn't this what friends are for?" Wednesday, I received an email from Kevin Anderson of the BBC News radio program, "World Have Your Say." Kevin wanted me to partake in a discussion about Brigadier Nigel Aylwin-Foster's critique of the US army in Iraq -- live Thursday (about 1:30...

A few preliminary thoughts on Rodger's discussion of the "communicative turn" in international-relations theory.The "communicative" and "linguistic" turns both occupy a great deal of attention in contemporary constructivist scholarship. One question that immediately arises is whether these are...

At least that's my impression - and that of others as well - of some recent attempts to prove that the Bush administration was right about the relationship between Hussein and al Qaeda.I'm impressed, as always, by Dan Darling's skill at connecting dots... but less so by his implication that the...

"Marginalia and Other Crimes": a Cambridge University Library exhibit on the many, many - and rather varied - sins inflicted by their patrons against posterity. Hat tip: Jasper Milvain (writing in a Crooked Timber comment thread on the dangers of using post-it notes on library books).

You know you're in a "special relationship" when your partner feels free to offer frank criticism.As reported in today's Washington Post, the Bush administration has now found that out: A senior British officer has written a scathing critique of the U.S. Army and its performance in Iraq, accusing...

The new academic year is underway and it is time to start thinking more seriously about a paper I've promised for the International Studies Association annual meeting in San Diego in March. Warning: that is a large pdf.I'm returning to a topic I explored a few years ago -- the role of "framing" in...

Because I remain outraged, and because many of my smarter conservative blogfriends don't see the problem yet.1. The leftcoaster has a FAQ, of sorts, on Republican talking points concerning Bush's FISA violations (va LGM).2. Glenn Greenwald's posts on FISA remain some of the clearest on the...

Bear with me. The sociogenesis of this post takes some strange twists.Scott Lemieux (of LGM fame) regularly points his readers to the latest idiocies of "political" film reviews. Today I followed his link-chain to alicublog's discussion of the par-for-the-course Mallard Fillmore "humor" about...

While there is a great deal I would like to post about right now I am constrained by a paper deadline that is fast approaching (forget for the moment that it might be the worst paper I have written in years). So, until my plate is clear (approx. next Tuesday) I simply want to point out some...

On September 15, 2002, when it was becoming increasingly probable that the US was gearing up to "liberate" Iraq, The Washington Post ran a front page story about the future of that state's oil. Reporters Dan Morgan and David B. Ottaway noted that Iraq had the world's second largest supply of...

ALex Motyl summarizes the answer to the debate on Crooked Timber both eloquently and effectively:The United States expanded westward in a variety of distinctly imperial ways. But by eliminating local Spanish and Indian elites, extending U.S. military, legal, and administrative organizations into...

A new year brings new revelations. Erich Lichtblau and James Risen of the New York Times reports:WASHINGTON, Dec. 31 - A top Justice Department official objected in 2004 to aspects of the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance program and refused to sign on to its continued use amid...