The head of the GAO, David Walker, has been writing and speaking about how American risks repeating the fate of the Roman republic. I think it’s an important insight. Just for the record, here’s an article in the FT, and… Read More »America and Rome
The NYT op-ed by Jerry Bremer on how he did not personally make the decision to dismantle Iraq’s army rings true. What happened is about historical perspective. Other than Bush and Cheney, the main proponents of war with Iraq were… Read More »Iraq’s Army & the Nazis
Republicans have had a fit about Move-On.org’s ad changing Petraeus to Betray-us, but Bush put him in this position. The criticism may not be correct, but the Right has no justification for criticizing it because Petraeus is wearing a uniform.… Read More »Petraeus Political Spokesman for Bush
Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe has staked his job on passage by the Japanese Diet of the continuation of a law that allows Japanese ships to continue to refuel American ships on their way to Afghanistan, according to the Financial… Read More »Can Abe Survive Bush?
How ironic that after many introductory speeches by Congressmen pro and con the war, depending on whether they are Republicans or Democrats, General Petraeus was unable to speak because his microphone did not work. Time for the most anticipated testimony… Read More »Petraeus Can’t Speak to Congress
On HBO’s Bill Maher show, Col. Larry Wilkerson, Gen. Colin Powell’s aide when he was Secretary of State, talked about the dangers of Bush’s use of the military. Wilkerson cited a column by Bruce Ackerman in the September 5 Financial… Read More »Improper Use of Military
I just finished reading Woodward’s State of Denial, and he stresses the incompetence of the Bush White House, particularly Rumsfeld. Woodward talks about how hard Andy Card, who was obviously a somewhat self-serving source, tried to get rid of Rumsfeld… Read More »Incompetence Run Amok
With all the talk about what to do in Iraq after Gen. Petraeus makes his report, there is a lot of discussion about Iraq descending into civil war. I think that’s likely, although today on ABC, Zakaria said that the… Read More »There Was No Civil War Under Saddam
In recent NYT columns, Tom Friedman has praised the Kurds, and David Brooks has a “center last” process of bringing peace to Iraq. Tom Friedman talks about how well things are going in Iraqi Kurdistan. It sounds as if the… Read More »Kurds & Ethnic Cleansing
It seems like when I studied economics in college, they talked about monetary and fiscal policy. Today it’s only about monetary policy. Everybody on Wall Street wants the Fed to cut interest rates. They want Bernanke to reinstate the “Greenspan… Read More »Fed Rate Cut & Fiscal Policy