Asymptosis: Always Approaching

Category: Foreign policy

  • The Macroeconomics of Chinese Kleptocracy

    Damn, Krugman beat me to this yesterday. I thought I would be bringing in a fascinating piece from the fringes of the Australioblogosphere. Bronte Capital: The Macroeconomics of Chinese kleptocracy. My basic take is the same as Paul’s: I have no idea whether this John Hempton piece on China is at all right, but it’s a terrific read,…

  • A Lean, Mean Fighting Machine: Radical Plan for Cutting the Defense Budget and Reconfiguring the U.S. Military

    This is not some limp-wristed notion from a coastal-elite dressing-gown blogger. (That would be me, caricatured uncharitably but not completely inaccurately.) It’s from the man who one Army National Training Center official described,* in 1997, as “the best war fighter the army has got.” Douglas Macgregor thinks we can cut the defense budget by $280 billion over ten…

  • Staunch Conservatives Hate Trade, Prefer Chest-Thumping

        Section 9: Foreign Policy and National Security | Pew Research Center for the People and the Press. Related posts: Demilitarize U.S. Foreign Policy: Mullen Agrees with Gates (and Me) A Lean, Mean Fighting Machine: Radical Plan for Cutting the Defense Budget and Reconfiguring the U.S. Military It’s Unanimous: Cut Spending! (As long as…

  • What Conservatives Should Ask Themselves Every Day: What Would Dwight David Eisenhower Do?

    These posts by Arnold Kling and Will Wilkinson prompt me to write up a post I’ve had in mind for a long time. I don’t want to write a history paper here, so I’ll just share a few facts, and some quotes from Wikipedia to highlight the differences between Eisenhower’s prudence and responsibility,  and the…

  • Pacifism: Bryan Caplan Gets It (Almost) Totally Right

    I often disagree with Bryan Caplan — often quite vehemently — but not always, by any means. He’s one of the people who I’m constantly testing my thinking against. He gets it so right with the following post that I’m going to make an exception (first time?) and reproduce his whole post here. Cliches of…

  • What’s Wrong with Free Markets: “The ‘Wisdom’ of the Crowds”

    This may seem obvious to many, but it’s been very clarifying for me. People often argue against the free-market system — which is based on the idea of rational actors — by saying “people are obviously not rational actors!” But that’s a stupid argument. It misses the point. Nobody thinks that everyone, always, makes rational…

  • Does the Liberal Arts Model Deliver Life Success? National Success?

    My friend Steve wonders at all the college students who study Lithuanian folk dancing and the like, and wonders whether they shouldn’t study something useful instead, and pursue less remunerative interests when they’re past their prime earning years. This makes some sense to me, theoretically. But here’s what’s weird, something I’ve been wondering at myself…

  • On That New York Mosque

    Michael Bloomberg: The simple fact is, this building is private property, and the owners have a right to use the building as a house of worship, and the government has no right whatsoever to deny that right. And if it were tried, the courts would almost certainly strike it down as a violation of the…

  • The Best Argument Against Climate Legislation — And the Best Answers

    I’ve long lauded Jim Manzi for his cogent and convincing arguments against carbon taxes. He’s the antithesis of the “1998 was really hot! Look: it’s cooler now!” school of head-in-in-the-sand self-delusionists. Rather, he takes the 2007 IPCC report as the best available consensus scientific knowledge we have, and uses it to think through a clear-eyed,…

  • Intel’s Andy Grove, Refugee from Communism, Champions Centralized Economic Planning: “rebuild our industrial commons”

    If you’re like me, you hear your friends say this a lot about America: “we need to start making things again.” It seem intuitively correct, but there’s a pretty standard economic response: if we’re getting all the profits based on our knowledge and innovation, even though we’re not doing all the work, what’s the problem?…

  • Do Experts Know Better?

    My friend Steve likes to proclaim the value of casual intuition — based on one’s day-to-day observations over the course of life — and downplay the value of expertise, analysis, and data in making good judgments. Among other things, he defends Sarah Palin and other less-thinkerly politicians on these grounds. He also points to Robert…

  • Incarceration and Unemployment: U.S. and Europe

    Ever since Bryan offered this bet on future unemployment rates in the U.S. and Europe, I’ve been wondering: how do incarceration rates affect those numbers? Europe has consistently higher unemployment than the U.S., but the U.S. has far and away the highest incarceration rate in the world — .75% of the population. (World Prison Population…

  • True Conservative Values, and Torture

    In my earlier post I didn’t give Jim Manzi sufficient credit. He argues that a systematic government policy of torture (as distinguished from the torturous acts that Americans have engaged in over the centuries) is 1. a radical break with American tradition, and 2. because of 1, is quite possibly (I would say definitely) damaging…

  • “The Commander-in-Chief and those under him authorized a systematic regime of torture.”

    “The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account.” –Major General Antonio Taguba, USA (Ret.) Read the Report. Related posts: True Conservative Values, and Torture The Strategic Value of Torture Businesses Constrained by Lack of Investment? Oh, Maybe Not. Even Fox Sez…

  • The Strategic Value of Torture

    Jim Manzi discusses torture here. I find the discussion uncomfortably cold-blooded, but it has the accompanying virtue of clear-headedness and cutting to the crux (unlike those from his compatriot Johah Goldberg at The Corner). The important (extra-moral) question is not torture’s tactical value, but whether it achieves America’s strategic goals. That’s a damned good question–it’s…

  • More Popular than Republicans: China, Venezuela, and Legalized Marijuana

    You can see the polling data here, here, and here. Related posts: Congressional Republicans’ Approval Ratings in Freefall. Dems Hold Steady. Polling the Pollster Pollers: Obama Still Strong It’s Working: Pubs’ Polls Plummeting Why nominating Clinton would be a Very Bad Thing Everything Sez: “Obama Landslide.” What Gives?

  • Demilitarize U.S. Foreign Policy: Mullen Agrees with Gates (and Me)

    AFP: US forces chief urges less military use in foreign policy. The top US military officer cautioned against ever growing militarization of US foreign policy, urging greater support for civilian approaches to the world’s problems. … “We must be just as bold in providing options when they don’t involve our participation or our leadership, or,…

  • Gates Saying All the Right Things

    I first read Robert Gates’ book several years ago, and re-read chunks of it last month. He’s a seriously sensible guy. (He even managed to come through Reaganville/Iran-Contraland with his integrity mostly intact.) I’ve been touting him for SecDef for more than a year–ever since he started clamoring for more money and resources at State.…