By Bal(t)imoron, 9 minutes ago

Wait for September

Obama versus McCainIt's not just that the , or that (both links via ) in Midwest states. Both of these remarkable feats are just :

MR. RUSSERT: But, Gerry and John, we're going to have big difference on the big issues. John McCain will say, "We're going to stay in Iraq"; Barack Obama say, "Get out." Barack Obama will say, "Roll back the Bush tax cuts on the top income earners"; John McCain will say, "Keep it going." John McCain will say, "No national healthcare as such"; Barack Obama will say, "national healthcare." Every issue, people are going to have to make a big choice, a big decision. John McCain will say, "No conversations with Iran, period"; Obama will say, "We'll talk to our adversaries." Big differences.

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By Bal(t)imoron, 1 hour and 12 minutes ago

Who Can Protect the Burmese?

Matthew Lee pursues the question of which countries can aid Myanmar, by what . The Burmese case doesn't fall into the four categories, genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing or crimes against humanity, that would trigger R2P. That would rule out UN action. Mark Leon Goldberg, however, advocates : "...the international community is permitted to violate the sovereignty of a country when that country is unwilling or unable to prevent mass atrocities from being visited upon its own citizens."

Although , , according to Lee's reporting. Spencer Ackerman confirms , and pleads for . I think Lee is onto a pertinent issue: not R2P, but how states disburse aid.

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By Bal(t)imoron, 23 hours and 21 minutes ago

Malthus (and McArdle) Lose

RiceBrad DeLong pits Megan McArdle against Greg Clark on the odds, that . DeLong backed Clark's optimism about "......". Still, the .

It seems DeLong was right. .

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By Bal(t)imoron, 2 days ago

More than Just a Little Beef

Could beef start a war?

As I was sitting here in Busan, working on a paper about natural resources and civil war and listening to news of , I discovered the . According to the , this civil war between Brazilians resulted in over 200,000 deaths on both sides and lasted ten years. The cause was trade.

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By Bal(t)imoron, 2 days ago

Clinton Deserves Her Electoral Predicament

A must-read for the upcoming national election!The post-mortems on Hillary Clinton are starting to appear in print (ironically, the MSM resuscitates her, and then tramples all over her). The Nation's Ari Berman wants to gloat that and the Kyl-Lieberman resolution on Iran. That's the angle that will help put Senator McCain in the White House. More plausibly and soberly, Time's Karen Tumulty . I would add: Clinton couldn't adapt nimbly enough.

Clinton's stodginess appears mostly in her inability to recover from the January 29 debacle in Florida and Michigan. After not advocating a strategy to correct for the two states' Democratic parties' embarrassing bids to join the early primary season's scrum, she got what she deserves: a delegate count just lower than the number she should have received and the loss of momentum had both states been in play. She didn't show leadership then, and now she does not deserve to be the nominee now. Senator Obama did back into his statistical column. But, then, he didn't run as the "experience" candidate!

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By Bal(t)imoron, 2 days ago

The Post-1989 Fumble

Fragment of the Berlin WallTom Engelhardt asks probably :

Almost seven and a half years later, an observer might be pardoned for wondering whether there hadn't been two super losers in the Cold War. Had the Soviet Union, the weaker of the two great powers of the second half of the last century, simply imploded first, while the U.S., enwreathed in a cloud of self-congratulation, was almost unbeknownst to itself also slowly making its way toward an exit?

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By Bal(t)imoron, 2 days ago

Myanmar's Junta Earns 10%

Burmese Village South of Yangon (FT) 10% is the Burmese junta's disaster score, the amount of cyclone survivors NGOs have assisted, according to Save the Children's Joe Lowry. Alright, !

In what appeared to be a bid to get the regime to stop hindering the relief effort, the UN launched a $187m programme of emergency food and relief for Burma.

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By Bal(t)imoron, 3 days ago

The Burmese Junta Really Dislikes Foreigners

UN Charge d-Affaires Shari Villarosa offers as succinct an answer for .

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By Bal(t)imoron, 3 days ago

Burning Thin Air

Minding my Chinese readers, there is a certain symbolic "WOW"-ness related to the lighting of a torch on Mt. Everest. I just wish it weren't an Olympic torch. And, I hope those torch-bearers .

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