A video of civilian casualties in Afghanistan was released by the London Times today. I don’t have much to say about this other than that this is war, and we’re involved in two of them. I think it’s often times thought of in too abstract a fashion, especially by its proponents.
Back on August 29, James Fallows made an observation about Sarah Palin and about running for President (or Vice President). Here’s how he described the stakes: If someone is campaigning for the presidency or vice presidency, there’s an extra twist. That person has to have a line of argument to offer on any conceivable issue. Quick, without pausing in the next ninety seconds, tell me what you think about: the balance of relations between Taiwan and mainland China, and exactly what signals we’re sending to Hamas, and what we think about Russia’s role in the G-8 and potentially in NATO, and where North Korea stands on its nuclear pledges – plus Iran while we’re at it, plus the EU after the Irish vote, plus cap-and-trade as applied to India and China, and what’s the right future for South Ossetia; and let’s not even start on domestic issues. ...
I’m obsessively watching this and this, hoping that Hurricane Ike doesn’t flood southeast Texas as badly as it looks like it might.
I was just thinking this morning about the various levels of candor I employ when I think something potentially offensive and consider talking about it, stated as the questions I ask myself. (The calculation is different if privacy is the issue.) Would I say it on my blog? Would I say it in front of my grandmother? Would I say it on Twitter? Would I say it at an all hands meeting at work? Would I say it in email? Would I say it to my mother? Would I say it to the coworkers who I know well? Would I say it to my close friends (in front of their spouses who I know less well)? Would I instant message it to a close friend? Would I say it to my close friends? Would I say it to my wife? You can infer from this that I am not as funny on my blog as I am in other settings. The other thing you can deduce from that list is that I’m a bit cautious about what I say when it’s going to live forever on a hard drive somewhere. ...
Steve Yegge talks about touch typing in today’s rant. I’m linking to it only because it reminds me that I love to tell people that typing is the most valuable class I took at any level of education. I took one semester of typing in high school, and it was the best thing I ever did.
What role have speculators played in the rapid rise and then decline in crude oil prices? Andrew Leonard cites a book that argues that commodity index speculators were a driving force behind the price fluctuations. And from elsewhere in finance, Tyler Cowen explains why the government must bail out Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.
Looks like Foreign Policy decided to play along with my little game from yesterday. Here are their 20 questions, focused on foreign policy. They seem to be designed more as a test of knowledge (and even trivia) than a test of judgement or philosophy, and they feel a little like gotcha questions to me. Update: Politico has solicited questions for Palin from a number of big names from both sides. Update: Jack Shafer offers 10 questions of his own. I think we can be fairly certain that Sarah Palin won’t be sitting down to an interview with Shafer anytime soon. ...
James Fallows writes about uptake of Hot Spot Shield in China. It’s a tool that tunnels your Web traffic through a VPN so that people can’t snoop on your Internet traffic, and is supported by ads that it inserts when you load Web pages. Among other things, it enables users in China to circumvent the Great Firewall and view Web pages that are otherwise blocked. (I wonder how long it will be before the Chinese government blocks access to anchorfree.com from inside the firewall so that people can’t download Hot Spot Shield?) ...
David Simon explains The Wire and American cities to overseas viewers: That is the context of The Wire and that is the only context in which Baltimore - and by reasonable extension, urban America - can be fairly regarded. There are two Americas - separate, unequal, and no longer even acknowledging each other except on the barest cultural terms. In the one nation, new millionaires are minted every day. In the other, human beings no longer necessary to our economy, to our society, are being devalued and destroyed. Both things are true, and one gets a sense, reading the distant reaction to The Wire, that Europeans are far more ready to be convinced by one vision than the other. ...
Andrew Leonard posts about the politics of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae: The critical difference between right and left points of view on this issue is that the right thinks the government shouldn’t be involved at all in the housing market, while the left believes that Fannie Mae – which was originally created during the Great Depression as a fully public agency entrusted with propping up the housing market – never should have been transformed into a semi-public, semi-private entity in the first place. This gets to the heart of a distinction made by Paul Krugman in his blog today between “nationalization” and “deprivatization.” Headlines declaring that Fannie and Freddie are being “nationalized” are running rampant through the blogosphere, summoning up visions of banana republics kicking out Yankee oil companies in the name of the revolution! But what’s really happening is that the bastard halfway privatization of Fannie Mae has now been revoked. ...