Today's Fresh Blogs...

• The Straight Scoop on Congress

  Published: September 5, 2007, 7:24 am

  Tags: Eurasian Balkans, Politics, Usa

  The Brookings Institution’s Thomas E. Mann and Sarah Binder evaluate the 110th US Congress (download .pdf file) in a recent report, but it’s hard to get beyond the polls. Congress continues to be shaped by its broad political environment, one characterized by ideological polarization, intense partisanship and narrow majorities.

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• Martin McGuiness, the Mentor of Iraq

  Published: September 5, 2007, 6:11 am

  Tags: Igos, Eurasian Balkans, Europe

  If there’s any hope for the concept of rehabilitation, Martin McGuiness is the poster-child. But, he did get some help from former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari. For what it’s worth, Der Spiegel reports on the Helsinki Agreement. del.icio.us Tags: martin mcguiness, iraq, sunnis, shiites, helsinki agreement martti

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• Better Late Than Never for the Biden Plan

  Published: September 5, 2007, 8:07 am

  Tags: Military, Eurasian Balkans, Politics, Usa

  Amid the well-deserved praise for the Biden plan on Iraq (and Mike Boyer’s ironic stream of GOP abuse makes for a cold culinary delicacy fit for forced ramming down Republican throats), it’s still worth asking if the Biden would have been viable earlier than now. Or, is it the only solution now when the Bush administration finally

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• Michael Gordon on Charlie Rose

  Published: September 5, 2007, 8:42 pm

  Tags: Military, Eurasian Balkans, Books Movies Media, Politics, Usa

  Gordon argues that the “Surge” ironically has allowed rival provincial ethnic groups, with US military blessing, to reach “accomodations”. This is, if there is any reason to keep the “Surge” going until April, 2008, this is it. It’s the chance that there could be a “bottom-up”

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• Yglesias and Chait Do Brooks on the Surge

  Published: September 6, 2007, 8:01 am

  Tags: Military, Eurasian Balkans, Politics, Usa

  LF readers can prepare themselves for the Petraeus and Crocker reports and the ensuing Iraq War debate with this amazing chat between Matt Yglesias and Jon Chait, especially for those without a Times Select subscription. At first, I wanted to strangle Yglesias for his sarcastic characterization of “bottom-up reconciliation”, not

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• Not So Fast

  Published: September 6, 2007, 9:20 pm

  Tags: Military, Eurasian Balkans, Politics, Usa, Subscriptions

  Here’s another good debate on the Iraq War: Ross Douthat vs. hilzoy. Andrew Sullivan asks for the right stuff: As it happens, I think the American people are seeing reality in this. The truth is: leaving or staying are both unpredictable options in the awfulness of the likely consequences. My own judgment is that we are better off

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• The State of the Surge

  Published: September 11, 2007, 8:32 am

  Tags: Military, Eurasian Balkans, Politics, Usa, Subscriptions, Baghdad, Congress, David Petraeus, Democrats, Federalism, George W Bush, Harry Reid, Iraq, Iraq War, James Jones, Joseph Biden Jr, Republicans, Ryan Crocker, The Economist, The Surge, Tnr

  The target was supposed to be General David Petraeus, but Ambassador Ryan Crocker might suffice. Anti-war activists, like MoveOn.org (and its yellow advertisement) have highlighted the military costs of the Iraq War, but I value General Petraeus’ service and what he has tried to accomplish in Baghdad. Ambassador Crocker is target-rich, but

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• Why Is It, Go or Stay?

  Published: September 12, 2007, 7:29 am

  Tags: Military, Eurasian Balkans, Politics, Usa, Subscriptions

  In the next installment of intellectuals fighting for my soul, it’s Robert D. Kaplan vs. hilzoy. To begin with, because each pundit (and me, too) see no value in ridiculing General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker, Kaplan speaks for all three of us: The idea that General Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker are front men for the

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• The Pyongyang-Damascus Connection

  Published: September 13, 2007, 10:27 pm

  Tags: Wmd, Eurasian Balkans, East Asia, Usa

  Both DPRK Studies and DPRK Forum are pessimistically skeptical about claims by WaPo’s Glenn Kessler (reinforced by this NYT piece), that North Korea “may be cooperating with Syria on some sort of nuclear facility in Syria.” DPRK Studies’ Richardson is circumspect. The take away from these two stories is that North Korea

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• Petraeus vs. the Grunts

  Published: September 13, 2007, 10:01 pm

  Tags: Military, Eurasian Balkans, Politics, Usa, Subscriptions

  Today, it’s The Economist’s take on General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker’s testimony vs. “The War as We Saw It“. First off, I believe increasingly, that one’s opinion about the Surge and the Iraq War depends not upon “facts”, but individual perspective and the calculation of benefits-to-loss

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• Five Reasons It’s Hard To Be a Democrat

  Published: September 17, 2007, 7:48 am

  Tags: 2008 Elections, Eurasian Balkans, Politics, Usa, Barack Obama, David Petraeus, Democrats, Diplomacy, Elections, George W Bush, Hillary Clinton, Iraq, Iraq War, John Mccain, Moveon Org, Rudy Giuliani, Shia, Sunni

  It;s hard to be a Democrat trying to deal with the Iraq War issue with MoveOn.org providing a ready made bogeyman

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• Scuds for Tyranny

  Published: September 19, 2007, 9:34 pm

  Tags: Military, Wmd, Eurasian Balkans, East Asia, Asia, Israel, Missile, North Korea, Nukes, Russia, Scud, Syria, Technology, Terrorism

  The Jerusalem Post documents proof of North Korean-Syrian cooperation on missile trading and support dating back to 1991. However, there is no evidence of nukes, or biological or chemical warheads passing between them.

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• Proof #1: Israel’s Not Telling

  Published: September 24, 2007, 3:41 am

  Tags: East Asia, Eurasian Balkans, Military, Usa, Wmd

  Dennis Ross in TNR praises the September 6 Israeli raid in Syria as “statecraft”. Statecraft involves using all the tools of the state to affect the behavior of friends and foes alike. Israel’s raid against the Syrian plant reflects the use of a military instrument applied quite selectively to affect the psychologies of many

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• Deja Vu, With Nothing Else to Show

  Published: September 25, 2007, 5:57 am

  Tags: East Asia, Eurasian Balkans, Iran, Usa, Bill Clinton, Diplomacy, Dprk, George W Bush, Israel, Lebanon, Military, North Korea, Nukes, Proliferation, Syria, Wmd

  Rovin: “Of course, this all falls under the category of diplomacy, which (according to the left) the Bush Administration has no interest in pursuing.” What else could all this be? Is it the past repeating itself? On May 23, 1997, Mohammad Khatami’s unexpected election as Iran’s president sparked hopes within the Clinton

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• Yet Another Theory about Dayr az-Zwar

  Published: September 25, 2007, 9:23 pm

  Tags: East Asia, Eurasian Balkans, Usa, Wmd

  Donald Kirk offers another theory (put me in the “Nothing-to-See-Here” school) about what the Israelis found before the Dayr az-Zwar airstrike on September 6. For the record, Pyongyang denies charges of an exchange of anything nuclear. “The US government has some evidence, but they seem to be deciding now is not the right time

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