You know, I'm starting to think Joe Biden might not be The Most Progressive President Since FDR™ after all: https://twitter.com/ddayen/status/1329466536231276545 He seems nice: In 2010, Reed served as executive director of the Bowles-Simpson Commission, one of Barack Obama’s worst blunders. The commission was created in order to put the federal budget on an automatic pilot … Continue reading wE cAn pUsH hIM lEFt
Category: blog
Fraying nerves
Something stood out to me in Daniel Bessner's post-election column at Foreign Exchanges: 2020 was the most important election of our lifetimes.Just like 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, and so on. Since the 1984 presidential elections, as the Google N-gram below suggests, American media has argued that every subsequent election is the most important in history. … Continue reading Fraying nerves
The Political Economy of Kyrgyzstan
by Zack Kramer The Kyrgyz are a Turkic ethnic group first recognized as a distinct people by Chinese sources dating back to the second century B.C.E. The ethnonym “Kyrgyz” has its origins in a Turkic root meaning “forty”, a reference to a legendary forty original tribes that made up the ancient Kyrgyz people. They appear … Continue reading The Political Economy of Kyrgyzstan
What Wheels?
I swear I keep trying to stop blogging, but every time I think I'm out, Donald Trump pulls me back in. https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1075878792168685568 Mattis is quitting because he opposes the withdrawal from Syria that Trump announced yesterday. That much is plain from his relatively (for DC) frank resignation letter: My views on treating allies with respect … Continue reading What Wheels?
The Political Economy of Kazakhstan
by Zack Kramer The Kazakhs emerged as a distinct ethnic group in the 14th and 15th centuries, essentially through an intermingling of local Turkic tribes with more recently arrived Mongolian peoples. The ethnonym Kazakh derives from an old Turkic root meaning “wanderer,” reflecting their nomadic origins. That same root, via a fairly circuitous path, is … Continue reading The Political Economy of Kazakhstan
Culture and Politics in Tokugawa Japan, Part 2: The Floating World
by Carson Rogers Ukiyo is Japanese for “the floating world.” It is a term that has multiple meanings and is used throughout most of Japan’s history. But it is most closely identified with the Tokugawa period, used to describe both its overall culture and its art. Before the Tokugawa period ukiyo was used by monks … Continue reading Culture and Politics in Tokugawa Japan, Part 2: The Floating World
Inaccurate Conception: Orthodoxy, Autocephaly, and the Nation-State
It's time for another guest post! Today we've got a piece by freelance writer and Harvard Divinity School student Hannah Gais on the recent schism between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople over the latter's decision to give Ukrainian church leaders permission to form an autocephalous Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Hannah argues … Continue reading Inaccurate Conception: Orthodoxy, Autocephaly, and the Nation-State
Bed, Ba’ath, and Beyond, part 2: War Is a Racket
Happy Hallowen! Today I'm very pleased to bring you the second part of Travis Haycraft's two-part series on Saddam Hussein's military buildup in Iraq. Part one took us through the 1970s, leading up to the Iran-Iraq War, and today's piece looks at how the war both affected and was affected by the military machine Saddam … Continue reading Bed, Ba’ath, and Beyond, part 2: War Is a Racket
Culture and Politics in Tokugawa Japan, Part 1: Country in Chains
We've got a new guest post today from writer Carson Rogers. I love Japanese history but know very little about it. Luckily Carson does, and today he begins what looks like a two-part series on the politics and culture of the Edo/Tokugawa period. Today's installment looks at the political structure of that period and how … Continue reading Culture and Politics in Tokugawa Japan, Part 1: Country in Chains
Bed, Ba’ath, and Beyond, part 1: Saddam’s Shopping Extravaganza
Hello readers! Today I'm very pleased to bring you the second attwiw guest post! Arms proliferation researcher Travis Haycraft joins us for the first part of a two-parter (coming next month) on Iraq. Part one looks at the Saddam Hussein-organized build up of the Iraqi military in the 1970s, leading up to the Iran-Iraq War. … Continue reading Bed, Ba’ath, and Beyond, part 1: Saddam’s Shopping Extravaganza
The Foreign Exchanges Companion 