by Charli Carpenter | 9 Oct 2009 |
President Obama couldn't convince the Inernational Olympic Committee to let Chicago hold the next summer Olympics, but Nobel Committee decided he's a skilled enough diplomat to receive a Nobel Peace Prize - only months into his Presidency. This is not lost on commentators and twitterers, some of who are referring to this as a "consolation prize" for losing the Olympics bid. ChicagoBlog writes: "Barack Obama couldn't convince the IOC to award...
by Charli Carpenter | 8 Oct 2009 |
Senator Tom Coburn knows how to rankle political scientists. Float a bill claiming all their work is bunk and should receive no government funding. For those who want to read it, here's Coburn's explanation. This is stirring up some ire and concern among political scientists in the blogosphere. Some of my colleagues even feel "picked on." Well look. 1) To be fair, he's not really saying our work is bunk. Just that it's not "science." He doesn't...
by Laura Sjoberg | 8 Oct 2009 |
Though my post about serious issues in IR through gendered lenses got less attention than tongue-and-cheek discussion with Dan Drezner, it has been almost impossible to ignore gender in the news the last couple of days, so I think I'll re-try blogging about gender and IR. The New York Times led a story yesterday, front page, above the fold, called "In a Guinea Seized by Violence, Women as Prey" and followed it up with an article called "US...
by Drew Conway | 7 Oct 2009 |
Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) has proposed an amendment to the Senate Commerce, Justice, Science appropriations bill, which will end the National Science Foundation's program for political science.I have set up an online petition to rally opposition to this amendment, and I ask any and all readers to sign it, and pass it on to anyone and everyone. I also encourage everyone to call their senators and ask them to stop amendment 2631 to H.R....
by Jon Western | 7 Oct 2009 |
The Wall Street Journal reports today that the Washington policy community has been busy reading books on the Vietnam War to gain insights about what to do next in Afghanistan. According to the WSJ:The struggle to set the future course of the Afghan war is becoming a battle of two books -- both suddenly popular among White House and Pentagon brain trusts.The two draw decidedly different lessons from the Vietnam War. The first book describes a...
by Charli Carpenter | 7 Oct 2009 |
Blogging was light over the weekend while I was in DC on field research. But at least I finally got to see Inglorious Basterds while visiting my brother. Whew. Various bloggers have complained about the questionable values imparted in the film and a human security specialist can't really argue with that.But then again it wouldn't be a Quentin Tarantino movie otherwise... see? See?Actually, I thought that compared to his earlier stuff this was...
by Jon Western | 6 Oct 2009 |
The National Brands Index is out with its 2009 survey results and the United States has taken the top spot. It "soared" from seventh place in last year's survey to number one. How can this be? Well, I'm going to go out on a limb here and predict that you won't read this in The Weekly Standard, from the National Brands Index press release: "What’s really remarkable is that in all my years studying national reputation, I have never seen any...
by Charli Carpenter | 2 Oct 2009 |
The EU released its report on the August war between Georgia and Russia on Wednesday, and for the last two days the press has reported that it proves "Georgia started the war with Russia." Even Joshua Keating, who offers a more even-handed round-up at Foreign Policy, says the claim that AP's claim that "Georgia Started the War with Russia" is "basically correct."I've only finished the first volume of the report so far, but this is not how I...
by Jon Western | 1 Oct 2009 |
Peter Galbraith is now officially out as Kai Eide's deputy in Kabul. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon announced Galbraith's recall/firing this afternoon after he received a letter of dissent from Galbraith about Eide's performance in investigating allegations of fraud. Here's a portion of the letter from tonight's NYTimes: “For a long time after the elections, Kai denied that significant fraud had taken place, even going to the extreme of...
by Charli Carpenter | 30 Sep 2009 |
My son asked me this very rich question during a chess game about a week ago. Indeed, the distribution of power among the royalty on the chess board is the reverse of the gendered logic documented by feminist theorists of the state. In chess, the queen has mobility (the crucial barometer of power in the game) but less value, as the game can continue without her; the hobbled king is relatively powerless, but is the most valuable piece without...
by Charli Carpenter | 30 Sep 2009 |
The tsunami was triggered by an earthquake today and hit the islands of Samoa. The death toll is 17 so far, but likely to rise. Though this doesn't sound that high, consider that the population of Samoa is barely over 200,000 (approximately 280,000 if you include American Samoa). So by the most generous estimates this is the equivalent of an event killing approximately 18,000 Americans.This kind of vulnerability faced by low-lying island...
by Jon Western | 29 Sep 2009 |
When ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) says it's over, I guess it's over. Tomorrow, websites using the .yu domain extension will no longer be available. I guess it's some kind of ironic tribute to Milovan Djilas that Tito's dream is extinguished -- in the end -- by some anonymous bureaucracy.