Here is a piece by Douglas Rushkoff at Edge which tries to get at the deep roots of economic theory, and finds it wanting: The economy in which we operate is not a natural system, but a set of rules developed in the Late Middle Ages in order to prevent […]
A new site called Big Government is doing remarkable work in exposing the seamier side of the major pro-Obama ‘community’ organisation ACORN, which up to now has been receiving US taxpayers money on a lavish scale. In particular their people have hit upon the ingenious wheeze of entering ACORN offices, saying […]
My earlier posting about Vladimir Putin’s ‘Letter to Poles’ has been taken up (in a shorter version) by RFE/RL. Have a look at the comments from pro-Russian types, which are especially agitated on the subject of whether the Red Army in 1920 was attempting another ‘land grab’ by invading Western […]
A consignment of weapons clandestinely sent from North Korea to Iran is intercepted by the UAE. Pretty big news for the UN Security Council and the different sanctions regimes against North Korea and Iran alike, huh? Of course not, when the USA is chairing the UNSC: At Ambassador Rice’s news briefing, […]
Would-be speech-makers and speech-writers! Learn to count before the speech goes live. Otherwise what seems rhetorically elegant may end up … weirdly self-referential? H/t Ed Driscoll ("The best hat in the Blogosphere"): scroll down to Update II.
Here I am, at Gatwick Airport en route to the 19th Economic Forum in Krynica (southern Poland). This is a sort of ‘economic Davos of central/eastern Europe’, a major and invariably well attended gathering. The main website is here. My own modest role in and amongst so many Good and […]
My latest article for DIPLOMAT magazine is out (not currently available online, alas). It is all about HOBGOBLINS AND OMELETTES: WHERE DIPLOMACY MEETS ETHNICITY It starts thus: A vital date in the history of the modern world is 1648. That was when the Treaties of Osnabrück and Münster were signed. […]
Remember my struggling with a paper on how best to deal with failing/fragile states? Thanks to all those who sent ideas. Here is an extract from the finished product, which lists some of the grisly dilemmas which arise at the practical and policy levels alike: There will be no consensus […]
To get that fine award you need to be really smart. And never contradict yourself.
Talking of education, President Obama’s idea of exhorting America’s children to work hard via a nationwide address to schools is (of course) encountering resistance as did a similar initiative by President Bush in 1991: … Critics are particularly upset about lesson plans the administration created to accompany the speech. The lesson […]
