Really, it’s not funny

Two weeks ago, I joined much of the young American Left at the “Rally to Restore Sanity.” I didn’t travel down to Washington for the occasion; I’m not that much of a Daily Show devotee. I had meetings with various sources, a very good college friend to stay with, and my sister to see in Philly on the way back. The timing and location were convenient.

The rally was, to be honest, boring, certainly not as funny or as compelling as the two television shows from which it derived. Given how little effort I put into getting there, that’s fine. But when I think about how many young folks actually traveled to be there, it’s infuriating. It’s infuriating that the ideas around which young liberals rally en masse are so unsubstantial.

I was not the only person who felt that way. Mark Ames had a screed at The Exiled on the rally, and it’s definitely got a lot of problems [basically, skip the second half], but I think there’s a kernel of truth in the piece that is worth excerpting at some length. Read the rest of this entry »

A Very Quick Thought on Robert Kaplan

Crossposted from Foreign Exchange.

Robert Kaplan is a journalist and author whose work has had a huge influence on me, as someone with a background in history, and a particular passion for stories about Asia and Eastern Europe. But there is always a sense, at the end of his books, that something is missing.

He spins a great and colorful yarn and stuffs readers full of facts and anecdotes, but when he begins to articulate strategy, I often find myself raising my eyebrows. I know that Kaplan is widely regarded as a strategic thinker first and foremost, and so I’ve struggled to figure out why I dissent from that view.

While reading his latest offering, Monsoon, and some of the reviews of it, I’ve come to the following conclusion: the thing that makes Kaplan so compelling as a historian and journalist is his geographical determinism. Geography is a mostly fixed lens, a constant that lets you trace seamless stories across time. Kaplan’s approach allows him to cut through layers of information and show us The Way Things Are.

His fans like to think that this is also what makes him a great strategist: that geography can determine the way things will or should be. But the whole notion of strategic thinking is about choices, and options, and maneuvers; it is the opposite of determinism.

The result is that Kaplan’s ‘strategic’ conclusions are often too broad to be really useful, and one often feels as though the strategy has been stretched over what would otherwise be excellent travel writing. Shashi Tharoor makes this point best:

Shoehorning his travels into the book makes for an uneven effect, with some surprising inclusions and omissions, and one can’t help feeling that a country has been deemed to be important because he traveled there.

Ouch. That said, for a great story, you could do a lot worse.

India and Its Neighbors

I’ve got a piece in today’s Christian Science Monitor on India, China and the battle for South Asia.

China is certainly flexing its muscle. Last month, it sought to restrict exports of rare earth minerals to Japan, made overtures to a secession movement in southern Sudan, and wrestled with the G20 over its currency and trade imbalance.

Nowhere has China been more assertive than in South Asia. In a strategy it calls the “string of pearls,” China is building ports and infrastructure in Bangladesh and Pakistan; digging up minerals in Pakistan and Afghanistan; and refining hydropower in Nepal and Afghanistan.

According to the International Monetary Fund, China’s trade with India’s neighbors totaled $16 billion in 2008, growing at 14 percent annually. India’s regional trade was barely holding steady at $11 billion.

Yet China’s success in the Subcontinent reflects India’s own foreign policy blunders.

The takeaway: if India doesn’t improve its own regional relationships, it will not only lose South Asia to China, but it will be prevented from exercising power elsewhere. Don’t believe me? Read the whole piece.

More About Grizzlies

I’ve got a post about GOP women up at Forbes right now: basically, I took a look at how GOP candidates fared with women voters. And interestingly, in this so-called year of the GOP woman, it was GOP men who got the women’s vote, while GOP women were successful with a more traditional Republican base of white men. I’m not sure why that is, but I’m inviting theories from you, so please, go read the data and comment.