I feel like we've been graced with a minor celebrity, maybe. Somebody claiming to be "David Soroko" commented on this piece about the "non-profit" charity IRD and all the great work it did to enrich its owners while also (allegedly) funding the Iraqi insurgency with USAID money. Mr. Soroko, you may remember, was the USAID … Continue reading Comments from the land of the golden parachutes

My newest at Lobe Log recaps a new report from the International Crisis Group and a panel discussion held yesterday by the US Institute of Peace, both looking at what remains to be done before a comprehensive deal with Iran is reached. Both used the analogy of a Rubik's cube to describe the talks, since … Continue reading Solving the Iranian Rubik’s Cube, up now at Lobe Log

We need some music: Here is a video of a head of state who is totally not a dictator. He is playing hockey, and of all the guys he's playing hockey with, including former Soviet superstars, he is the best at playing hockey. I don't want to say he's the best at playing hockey ever, … Continue reading Neon lights, Nobel Prize, When a mirror speaks, The reflection lies

The Pew Charitable Trusts regularly does public opinion polling all over the world, but you really have to hand it to them for getting a survey done in Ukraine last month. Bravo to the interviewers who gathered this data for them, which had to be done via face-to-face interviews and especially in the tense eastern … Continue reading Public opinion in Ukraine and Russia, my latest at Lobe Log

Despite the fact that in most of the country is a thousand degrees every day and I hate excessively hot weather, I love Egypt. For people who like to look at old stuff while they're on vacation, like me, there are only a handful of countries that can rival the amazing sights that Egypt offers. … Continue reading BREAKING: Beloved TV series eerily predicted Hank Scorpio’s takeover of the eastern United States

On the one hand, we have the Rialto Unified School District, located just east of Los Angeles. For some reason, some of their eighth grade teachers thought it would be a good idea to give their students a "critical thinking exercise" that asked them to "write an argumentative essay, utilizing cited textual evidence, in which … Continue reading Today in “don’t do that”

The next time you hear or read somebody bemoan the "silence" of moderate Muslim leaders or their supposed reluctance to criticize Islamic extremists, bear in mind that they're cynically pushing a political agenda, and selectively ignoring reality in order to do it. If you're not finding any moderate Muslims who are condemning the actions of … Continue reading You’re not looking hard enough

My latest looks at Russia's turn east (and south), expanding its economic ties to China and India (as well as its presence in Africa, which I argue is related in the same way that President Obama's promised "pivot to Asia" includes competing with China for access to emerging African markets and natural resources): In the … Continue reading Russia’s Asian Pivot, now up at Lobe Log

This is a pet peeve of mine, but in my opinion it's a justifiable one. Al-Monitor has a post today about the Iraqi Presidency; the current president is a Kurd, Jalal Talabani, but he's term-limited and there's a movement in Iraq's  Sunni Arab community to see the current Speaker of the Iraqi Council of Representatives, … Continue reading When the media obscures instead of clarifying

The story of the 276 girls who were kidnapped from their school in Nigeria three weeks ago by the Islamic fundamentalist/terrorist group Boko Haram is heartbreaking and infuriating. Boko Haram's leader, Abubakar Shekau, has claimed responsibility for the kidnapping and is threatening, if he hasn't already done it, to sell the girls into slavery., though … Continue reading Recommending an excellent piece on Boko Haram by Peter Tinti