Jim Lobe has written a terrific response to the stridently arrogant oped, “Britain Cannot Have Two Best Friends,” by John Bolton in yesterday’s Financial Times.
I also just learned that Fox News Sunday will feature Brookings Scholars Michael O’Hanlon and Kenneth Pollack this weekend to further explore their rosy report on the state of America’s current “military successes” in Iraq. One question I have is that it the generals are to be believed that there is “no military solution to Iraq,” then why are Pollack and O’Hanlon suggesting that “we may just yet win this war” when Iraq’s Parliament is on vacation (though US and coalition troops are not) and the Sunni bloc in government has just quit?
For a new take on Japan’s recent elections, I penned this piece, “The Sins of the Sons,” for the Guardian‘s Comment is Free Blog. Essentially, I suggest that anti-science fundamentalist Christians are politically synonymous with Japan’s strident, hawkish, history-denying agitators who fuel Shinzo Abe’s nationalist pretensions. I also suggest that Abe’s father and George W. Bush’s father each provide models that we may need to fix the messes created by their sons.
Finally, Eric Edelman gets some scrutiny from Jim Lobe. What Jim did not write is that Edelman was on the short list to become Deputy Secretary of State — and Condi Rice ultimately, finally blocked it when she realized what damage a warmer, fuzzier version of John Bolton who reported to Dick Cheney would mean to her operation.
I had forgotten that Eric Edelman had been a close aide of Strobe Talbott’s before he joined Vice President Cheney’s national security team. Another close aide of Strobe’s was Victoria Nuland, now Ambassador to NATO and spouse of neoconservative Robert Kagan.
Kudos to Lobe for his excellent research and expose on the few surviving visible neocons outside of Cheney’s office — though those not in government today ought not to be underestimated.
Finally, here is a short FT article on Obama’s plan to handle terrorism in which I offer a comment.
— Steve Clemons
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