by Peter | 20 Feb 2007 |
This was just too good to pass up. With immigration a growing political issues, The New York Times looks back and asks-- remember NAFTA, like 14 years ago? Wasn't that supposed to stop illegal immigration by building up the Mexican economy through free trade?Why didn’t Nafta curb this immigration? The answer is complicated, of course. But a major factor lies in the assumptions made in drafting the trade agreement, assumptions about the way...
by Peter | 14 Feb 2007 |
As I was saying about Frenemies (video) ....Its a must watch, especially if you're snowed in this morning like we are.
by Dan Nexon | 13 Feb 2007 |
I'm still reading reports of the North Korea nuclear deal, and I should have more to say as things develop. A few quick thoughts:1. The terms of the deal, at least as currently reported, seem reasonable. North Korea looks to get most of what it wants, but the benefits of a non-nuclear North Korea mitigate against that. The administration should ignore the howls of protest already emanating from hardliners. The US, Japan, and South Korea don't...
by Peter | 11 Feb 2007 |
Parade Magazine--that little thing in your Sunday paper with all the advertisements from Best Buy and office Depot--has one article each year that I think is completely brilliant: Who is the World's Worst Dictator?Its such a simple thing, yet such a powerful statement, I'm surprised more people don't do it. Yet I love that its in Parade magazine--something with such mass circulation in the Sunday paper that people normally look to for celebrity...
by Dan Nexon | 10 Feb 2007 |
On 6 April 1994 someone shot down a plane carrying President Juvenal Habyarimana of Rwanda and Burundian President Cyprien Ntaryamira at it attempted to land at Kigali Airport. Habyarimana's death sparked waves of killings by Hutu extremists, the Interahamwe militia, and eventually significant numbers of opportunistic collaborators. They targeted not only ethnic Tutsi but also Hutu moderates, particularly supporters of the Arusha Peace Accords....
by Dan Nexon | 9 Feb 2007 |
I assumed the data on Svalbard military spending was a mistake. But now I'm becoming quite concerned. David Johnston uncovers more about the possible threat from Svalbard. The island will soon be home to a Doomsday facility.David questions whether the bunker is really just a seed vault. Given our information about Svalbard's immense per capita military expenditures--which in absolute terms dwarf its "official" GDP--I think he's right to be...
by Peter | 7 Feb 2007 |
Over at Early Warning, William Arkin has generated incredible traffic to his site--over 1500 comments on one post--over his recent posts on the Iraq war. Arkin took on a very central issue in our debate over the war, and in doing so, exposed the continued difficulty we as a nation have in developing a language to debate the war.Arkin's initial column noted how "the troops" in Iraq--the enlisted soldiers who bear the brunt of the fighting in...
by Dan Nexon | 7 Feb 2007 |
The most recent issue of International Affairs (January 2007) includes a review of Harry Potter and International Relations.Harry Potter and international relations. Edited by Daniel H. Nexon and Iver B. Neumann. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefi eld. 2006. 245pp. Index. Pb.: £15.99. isbn 0 7425 3959 8. My first advice for readers of this book would be: do not let the title fool you, this is a serious book. I must admit I requested to review this...
by Rodger Payne | 6 Feb 2007 |
Scholar Larry Diamond resides at Stanford's conservative Hoover Institution, but he worked for the Bush administration in Iraq just a couple of years ago. He thinks that a war with Iran might be in the cards: President Bush's neoconservative advisors and pundit supporters have been beating the drums of war with Iran since 2003, when the president declared Iran to be part of an "axis of evil." Recall that a senior administration official told...
by Dan Nexon | 6 Feb 2007 |
Artist's rendition of the Svalbard Air, Nuclear, Land, Sea, and Polar Bear ForcesCan someone explain to me why the CIA World Factbook lists Svalbard as ranking 22nd in military defense expenditures (at $ 5,501,000,000)? Most of the sources I can find seem to agree that Svalbard, a territory of Norway, was demilitarized as part of the 1920 Paris Treaty. I'm not the only one to have noticed this, of course.Is someone at the Agency a Pullman...
by Peter | 5 Feb 2007 |
It is the single most viewed television event in the United States annually, and one of the most watched events in the world (and yes, its no World Cup, but there is no cup to watch this year...).After that first play, when Hester returned the opening kick-off for a Touchdown for the Bears, I thought to my self: well, game over, the Colts have won.I wasn't the only one.Still, how crazy is that, the same opening, the same result for the two...
by Dan Nexon | 5 Feb 2007 |
Does anyone know of a systematic comparison of the "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC" commercials? The US and UK ones don't seem very different--as much as it pains me, the UK PC stacks up surprisingly well against John Hodgman.The German and French variants look to be just dubbed version of the US editions. I can't parse the Japanese ones, but they seem to be about as localized (or not) as the UK versions. At the very least, the ads might provide a...