Morning Reads

By John Ballard

Alas, no great insights this morning.
It makes me happy to be a blogging layman with no deadline to meet.
Nevertheless, thanks to Twitter I have come across some timely and interesting reading.

?Top Ten Ways that Libya 2011 is Not Iraq 2003
Juan Cole ticks of a list of differences between US involvement in Libya that make this adventure different from the misbegotten Iraq adventure.  If the list were only three or four items the argument would be weak, but Libya really does look different from Iraq. Number seven jumped out at me.

7. The United States did not take the lead role in urging a no-fly zone, and was dragged into this action by its Arab and European allies.

It's a stretch to argue that the US was "dragged into this action by its Arab and European allies"  I would call it the other way around, especially regarding Arabs, but it sounds good anyway. 

?Along the same line Libya and Obama's Doctrine: Leading from the Back  in Time online makes a similar point with a different spin.

As the crises accumulate, Obama has remained the picture of detached serenity, which only agitates his critics more. Kori Schake, a centrist former Bush Administration official, charges that Obama "just isn't willing to bear much freight for other peoples' freedom." The Economist's Lexington column asks, "Has he, at any point in his presidency so far, demonstrated real political courage?" and is unable to find an example. David J. Rothkopf, a national-security expert who worked in the Clinton Administration, says Obama's leadership style resembles nothing so much as "the planet's master of ceremonies � nudging, exhorting and charming, but less comfortable flexing U.S. muscles than many of his predecessors." (See the coalition troops' battle in Libya.)

And yet Obama himself probably wouldn't disagree with such a caricature. The President is congenitally allergic to the bellicose language Presidents typically employ to summon the dogs of war.

Ouch.
It's hard to know whether the guy is pusillanimous or sly. Like all master politicians he's smooth enough not to reveal the difference.I highlighted nudge because it reminded me of Nudger-in-Chief which I put up about a year ago linking to previous sources from 2009.

?The NY Times story of the ordeal of their journalists in Libyan custody reads like a TV script.
Who needs fiction with reality like this?

As they were being pulled from the car, rebels fired on the checkpoint, sending the four running for their lives.

�You could see the bullets hitting the dirt,� Mr. Shadid said.

All four made it safely behind a small, one-room building, where they tried to take cover. But the soldiers had other plans. They told all four to empty their pockets and ordered them on the ground. And that is when they thought they were seconds from death.

�I heard in Arabic, �Shoot them,� � Mr. Shadid said. �And we all thought it was over.�

Then another soldier spoke up. �One of the others said: �No, they�re American. We can�t shoot them,� � Mr. Hicks said.

The soldiers grabbed whatever they could get their hands on to tie up their prisoners: wire, an electrical cord from a home appliance, a scarf. One removed Ms. Addario�s shoes, pulled out the laces and used them to bind her ankles. Then one punched her in the face and laughed.

�Then I started crying,� she recalled. �And he was laughing more.� One man grabbed her breasts, the beginning of a pattern of disturbing behavior she would experience from her captors over the next 48 hours.

�There was a lot of groping,� she said. �Every man who came in contact with us basically felt every inch of my body short of what was under my clothes.�

?Don't bet on a brief or limited war in Libya
Tony Karon quietly makes what may become the most prescient observation of what is now unfolding in Libya.

Many of the arguments for intervention derived from the Western experience in the Balkans during the 1990s, beginning with the breakup of Yugoslavia and culminating with the Kosovo conflict in 1999. It's worth remembering, then, that NATO troops were involved in Bosnia for 12 years, and there are still 8,700 NATO troops in Kosovo, which remains a ward of the West.

He's right, of course. And in the coming years we may be greatful that the costs of maintaining security in yet another "liberated" country is shared by others. Totalitarian systems seem to pop up like weeds but representative political institutions grow as slow as trees. Places like Kosovo and Libya are more like tree farms than gardens.

?Anti-cuts campaigners plan to turn Trafalgar Square into Tahrir Square
Steve picked up the Uncut story a couple weeks ago and sure enough the movement seems to be catching on.
I like to think the bravery of the young Arab democrats has inspired others to stiffen their spines. If they are courageous enough to confront actual thugs, facing tear gas and worse,  confronting selfish, manipulative crony capitalists and corrupt political types looks like a no-brainer. 

"We want Trafalgar Square to become a focal point for the ongoing occupations, marches and sit-ins that will carry on throughout the weekend," said Michael Chessum from the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts. "There are a lot of smaller scale demonstrations and actions planned and, just as we have seen in recent protests in the Middle East and north Africa, we want to create an ongoing organising hub."

Saturday's main demonstration has been organised by the TUC and is expected to see more than 200,000 people � including public sector workers, families and first-time protesters � take to the capital's streets to oppose government cuts.

Allison Kilkenny, one of the smartest of upcoming young journalists (one of Steve's links yesterday came from her tweet-feed) contributed an excellent piece in the Nation about the US Uncut movement.

?How Josef Oehmen's advice on Fukushima went viral
I'm running out of time and can't do a precis. Just go read it. Great story of how information and misinformation travels these days with the speed of light.