So North Korea has issued a "Gangnam Style" video to mock a South Korean presidential candidate, Park Guen Hye, from the ruling conservative party. According to Malaysia's The Sun Daily:"The parody, posted on the official government website Uriminzokkiri, shows a crudely photo-shopped image of Park doing the "horse-riding dance" created by South Korean rapper Psy on the original "Gangnam Style" video.The North Korean version mocks Park as a...
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Saturday Morning Linkage
Mass protests against militias in Benghazi demonstrate the power of mobilization-triggers and the weakness of movements that lack proper infrastructure. Marc Lynch analyzes Newsweek's #muslimrage debacle.Chris Zambellis writes at Jamestown's China Daily Brief that Cairo is looking to China to provide it was exit options -- and hence increased leverage -- in US-Egypt relations; Prashanth Parameswaran reports on Sino-Malaysian relations; IPE Zone...
Podcast No. 9 – Interview with Kathryn Sikkink
2012 interview with Kathryn Sikkink.
Brief Friday Morning Linkage
Also Not a DuckAidan Regan: "Reflections on The Monti Python Show" (via CT).Beth Schwanke and Jenny Ottenhoff examine the party platforms for what they have to say about development policy. Dan Drezner talks about "Why Presidents Love Foreign Affairs" in the New York Times.Phil Arena is skeptical about the current tenor of "long peace" argumentation. And he has an alternative. It does seem as if a legal cartel is colluding to protect law...
Friday Nerd Blogging Actual
They are here... Westeros re-election campaign posters for your procrastinating pleasure. For some excellent commentary from the campaign trail, I am linking back to Robert Farley and Matthew Duss' analysis of recent events.Also, weigh in on Scott Eric Kaufman's GoT syllabuilding effort here, in which he unconscionably proposes to force hapless undergraduates to read only the Westerosi chapters of the novel, skipping all the Dothraki-based...
RNC: Don’t Speak in a Publicly-Built Facility when you Attack Government – D’oh!
I got bogged down with NK for awhile, so I missed a chance to comment on the RNC and the US election more generally. I have some thoughts after the break, but a Democrat friend of mine wrote the following, which is a pretty good first draft of the GOP’s problems I think, in this election cycle:On the whole, I found the Republican convention disgusting and not simply because I disagree with their policies. They substantively are disconnected...
Data is not the problem. Data is not the solution.
Data is not good government. Even when it wears a green eyeshade.The Wonkblog view of the world presumes that social problems should be met with policy solutions, and that the best way to analyze policies is to have better data. To an extent, I agree. All else being true, better data does make for better policy.But that is a trivial conclusion. Politics is not policy. Indeed, data isn't politics either. And what Wonkblog provides is frequently...
Thursday Morning Linkage
This Bear is Ready for Duck SeasonPhoto: Dan NexonMajor strike in India to protest liberalization. William Burr: Presidential Decision Directive 59 and nuclear warfighting under Carter.James Joyner provides further dissection of the apparent implosion of the US exit strategy in Afghanistan.Fresh Air interviews Doug Sanders about his new book, The Myth of the Muslim Tide. Zephyr Teachout at Mobilizing Ideas on "Big Data and Big Money."David...
Friday Nerd Blogging: A Day Early
Check out this wonderfully exhaustive application of bureaucratic politics to Star Wars. The basic argument is that it was not the rebellion that really doomed the Empire but inter-service rivalry. The best line involves the Army's limited motivation to help the Navy (who lost the plans to the Death Star). I will not give it away here. Enjoy!
New Books in Science Fiction and Fantasy: D.B. Jackson’s Thieftaker
My second NBinSFF podcast is live. “D.B. Jackson” is David B. Coe’s pen name for his new historical-fantasy series, The Thieftaker Chronicles. Thieftaker (Tor Books, 2012) centers on Ethan Kaille, a private detective and conjurer, as he investigates a murder in colonial Boston. David, who received a Ph.D. in U.S. history from Stanford University before embarking on a career as a novelist, weaves in plenty of period details and historical...
Wednesday Afternoon Video
Morning Link, with Commentary, on the Shrinking Place of Theory in Sociology and IR
I'm crashing on multiple deadlines, so in lieu of "morning linkage".... Last night I was in a twitter conversation with Phil Arena and Kindred Winecoff about Fabio Rojas' recent post at orgtheory.net concerning the incredible shrinking vocation of social theory. Roja's observations echoe themes that we've been talking about at the Duck, both in print and in PTJ and my 10 August 2012 podcast (m4a). After quoting Kieran Healy's excerpt from his...