| |
| There are great benefits to connectedness, but we haven't wrapped our minds around the costs. |
|
RE: Must Read: Iraq Round-Up |
|
|
|---|
| Topic: Politics and Law |
8:35 pm EST, Nov 29, 2007 |
noteworthy wrote: With every passing day, Johnathan Rapley's conception of the New Middle Ages seems increasingly likely.
Decius wrote: I don't follow how this comment relates to the context. Most of the news out of Iraq seems positive. Of course its complicated and fragile, but clearly this is progress. Worrying that too many refugees might return is a good problem to have.
I am somewhat at a loss to understand you, but I will attempt to highlight a few things that are not quite so positive. (As Packer noted, the war is Kaleidoscopic, and the lag is really bad. It's like we are watching a war in a galaxy half a light year away.) 1. Amar has taken justice into his own hands, vowing to avenge Jafaar's death 100 times over. Amar 'works for' (gets paid by) the Americans, who have no idea he is a massive serial killer on the side. Deception abounds. No one trusts anyone. 2. The people in charge are warlords, not police. Presently, the violence is suppressed, but the underlying forces are unresolved. With an eye on the clock, the Americans have resigned themselves to arming and training their former enemies, so that at least someone is in charge, knowing all the while that no one can be trusted. Increasingly, America's only leverage is its impending departure. In the vacuum that follows, power will accrue to the two-gun-toting maniacal warlords, not to the technocrats, whose most notable recent accomplishment is a restaurant opening, apparently. (Never mind that people are generally unwilling to travel or be outside after dark.) 3. Most displaced Iraqis do not want to go back to their homes. They have given up on Iraq. Still, the returnees are not "a good problem to have", because many of their homes are now occupied (illegally) by people from opposing sects. Mrs. Aasan's family fully expected to get attacked when traveling after dark. She was "thrilled and relieved" that they managed to cheat death that night. In regard to the Rapley reference, I was pointing in particular to these: The country is drifting "towards a warlord state, along a Basra model, with power devolved to local militias, gangs, tribes, and power-brokers, with a purely nominal central state."
Ameriya is a closed zone, surrounded by high concrete walls. Only pedestrians are allowed through the two Iraqi army checkpoints out of the suburb. The "knights" are the only authority inside. "This is Ameriya, not Iraq!"
Biden ... who has been praised by his rivals as a thoughtful voice on Iraq, ... frames discussions ... around his plan to create strong regional governments in Iraq ...
So here you have a collection of autonomous city states, strongly opposed and intermittently warring with each other. Although the central state nominally controls the countryside, in practice it is a no-man's land, with no expectation of safe, free movement from city to city. Inside, the cities are ruled by authoritarian gangs, and corruption is rampant. There is no law -- only the whims of the men with guns. Decius wrote: I also don't understand George Packer's comment that these developments were "unanticipated by almost everyone on the American side of the looking glass."
He should have addressed that in his next post. Read it and see what you think. I agree that calls for immediate withdrawal are unhelpful at best, and quite possibly much worse. RE: Must Read: Iraq Round-Up |
|
|
|---|
| Topic: International Relations |
7:02 am EST, Nov 29, 2007 |
A selection of important articles recommended by George Packer. It's a cycle of inter-related stories; the effect is greatest once all of the articles have been read. With every passing day, Johnathan Rapley's conception of the New Middle Ages seems increasingly likely. Letter from Iraq: Inside the Surge Amar was a lifelong friend of Karim’s. Three months earlier, Amar and his older brother, Jafaar, had been riding in the van of a friend, Sayeed, when a group of gunmen hailed them. Amar recognized them as Mahdi Army men, and assumed that they were coming to say hello. As Sayeed braked, the car was riddled with gunfire. Amar crouched as low as he could, as the Mahdi Army men emptied their Kalashnikovs. He was unhurt, but Jafaar and Sayeed were dead. That night, Amar told Karim that, at the morgue, he had sworn over his brother’s body to take revenge. He had vowed to kill a hundred Mahdi men—ten for each of Jafaar’s fingers. His mother, Um Jafaar, supported him, and begged Karim to help her son. He agreed. ... “Americans are too honorable, too clean,” he said. “They have to kill these people. They are dirty. Anyway, if they don’t kill them, I will. But helping the Americans arrest them helps them not suspect me.”
Baghdad's Weary Start to Exhale as Security Improves ... for the first time in nearly two years, people are moving with freedom ... Iraqis are clearly surprised and relieved ... But the depth and sustainability of the changes remain open to question. Many Iraqis say they would still rather leave the country than go home. The Americans describe the volunteers as heroes, part of a larger nationwide campaign known as the Sunni Awakening. But Abu Nebras said he did not trust them. "Some of the Awakening members are just Al Qaeda who have joined them," he said. "I know them from before." Mrs. Aasan said she was thrilled and relieved just a few days ago, when her college-aged son got stuck at work after dark and his father managed to pick him up and drive home without being killed. "They drove back to Dora at 8!" she added, glancing at her husband, who beamed, chest out, like a mountaineer who had scaled Mount Everest.
Iraqis Wasting An Opportunity, US Officers Say A window of opportunity has opened ... but "it's unclear how long that window is going to be open." "It is painful, very painful," dealing with the obstructionism of Iraqi ... [ Read More (0.5k in body) ]
|
|
The dynamics of Web-based social networks |
|
|
|---|
| Topic: Knowledge Management |
5:22 pm EST, Nov 21, 2007 |
Social networks on the Web are growing dramatically in size and number. The huge popularity of sites like MySpace, Facebook, and others has drawn in hundreds of millions of users, and the attention of scientists and the media. The public accessibility of Web–based social networks offers great promise for researchers interested in studying the behavior of users and how to integrate social information into applications. However, to do that effectively, it is necessary to understand how networks grow and change. Over a two–year period we have collected data on every social network we could identify, and we also gathered daily information on thirteen networks over a 47–day period. In this article, we present the first comprehensive survey of Web–based social networks, followed by an analysis of membership and relationship dynamics within them. From our analysis of these data, we present several conclusions on how users behave in social networks, and what network features correlate with that behavior.
The dynamics of Web-based social networks |
|
Thank Heavens For Barbarians! |
|
|
|---|
| Topic: Society |
6:57 am EST, Nov 16, 2007 |
You can play this game all day, going back and showing the ignoble social origins of what would later become dominant civilizations. But whether these “barbarians” sack cities, or hover on the periphery and trade with them, or ally with them in war or ally against them, one outcome in nearly certain: win, lose, or draw, the “barbarians” become vehicles for advanced memes. … So thank heavens for barbarians!
For more Robert Wright, see: Creating a New Picture of War, Pixel by Pixel -- in which Decius offers the following pearl: I've come to the conclusion that you actually want shifty, dishonest politicians elected by an apathetic populace. This means that things are working.
Contradictions of a Superpower If China, with its 1.2 billion people, does keep up its brisk economic growth, won't the day come when it can match America's defense budget without breaking a sweat?
|
|
|
|---|
| Topic: Science |
6:45 am EST, Nov 15, 2007 |
Among Neanderthals, hunting big beasts was women's work as well as men's, so it's a safe bet that female hunters got stomped, gored, and worse with appalling frequency. And a high casualty rate among fertile women - the vital "reproductive core" of a tiny population - could well have meant demographic disaster for a species already struggling to survive among monster bears, yellow-fanged hyenas, and cunning Homo sapien newcomers.
Stone Age feminism? |
|
