Jimmy Carter's recent "no nuke tech for India" op-ed in the Washington Post has been reprinted in a Pakistani newspaper.

Knowing for more than three decades of Indian leaders’ nuclear ambitions, I and all other presidents included them in a consistent policy: no sales of civilian nuclear technology or uncontrolled fuel to any country that refused to sign the NPT.

Camera says this op-ed is factually incorrect.

A dangerous deal with India, by Jimmy Carter | Dawn

In a region of Pakistan almost unknown to most Americans, a sort of failed ministate offering sanctuary to our greatest enemies has arisen. It is a smaller version of what Afghanistan was before Sept. 11, 2001, and it poses a direct threat to vital American national security interests.

Afghanistan: The Long Road Ahead

What can be done if the US Federal Aviation Administration allows this madness to happen, as it will? I say: we are not out of remedies.

FT.com / Comment & analysis / Comment - Fight the mobile phone invasion at 30,000ft

I'm not really sure why she's confiding in me this way. We started speaking only moments ago when we stood up and began the overhead compartment ritual.

"Oh, I understand."

No, I don't. Why did I say that? This is just stranger-to-stranger banter. Anonymous. There is a line you're not supposed to cross, and somehow we've catapulted ourselves over it.

Planely Uncomfortable

"People think I'm crazy when they hear I'm getting my second master's degree at 27," says Krumm. "But I felt the degree was necessary to switch the direction of my life."

The Night Shift

"New" is always overrated in politics.

I was thinking of blogging a series on the theme of "overrated".

On Wednesday, Democratic leaders unveiled their new security strategy at an event in Union Station, surrounded by American flags, "REAL SECURITY" banners and other campaign-style props. The Republican National Committee quickly dismissed the new platform as "No New Ideas." The New York Times agreed: "Most of the proposals are not new."

Indeed, the Democrats rehashed their usual litany of security cliches, declaring their opposition to terrorism, proclaiming their support for the troops. And instead of offering voters a positive new agenda, they mostly complained about the Bush administration -- its approach to Iraq, its response to Hurricane Katrina, its "rank incompetence." It could be argued they offered little but obstructionist boilerplate and tired old ideas.

But is that really such an awful strategy?

Who Needs New Ideas, Anyway

This paper has been getting a lot of buzz in the press. Camera says it has errors, and Harvard has removed its logo from the paper.

For the past several decades, and especially since the Six-Day War in 1967, the centrepiece of US Middle Eastern policy has been its relationship with Israel. The combination of unwavering support for Israel and the related effort to spread ‘democracy’ throughout the region has inflamed Arab and Islamic opinion and jeopardised not only US security but that of much of the rest of the world. This situation has no equal in American political history. Why has the US been willing to set aside its own security and that of many of its allies in order to advance the interests of another state? One might assume that the bond between the two countries was based on shared strategic interests or compelling moral imperatives, but neither explanation can account for the remarkable level of material and diplomatic support that the US provides.

Instead, the thrust of US policy in the region derives almost entirely from domestic politics, and especially the activities of the ‘Israel Lobby’. Other special-interest groups have managed to skew foreign policy, but no lobby has managed to divert it as far from what the national interest would suggest, while simultaneously convincing Americans that US interests and those of the other country – in this case, Israel – are essentially identical.

An earlier version is available as a KSG working paper. Also, check out "The Paranoid Style in American Politics", a classic Harper's essay cited in Max Boot's latest column.

LRB | John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt : The Israel Lobby

Iraq is divided and the insurgency is strong, but the real reason for the collapse of Iraq is the weakness of the state. Ali Allawi, the finance minister, told me that corruption had reached Nigerian levels and that the government is just a parasitic entity living on oil revenues. Allawi says the insurgency is largely financed by oil smuggling, and 40 to 50 per cent of the vast profits go to the resistance.

The moment when Iraq could be held together as a truly unified state has probably passed. The real question now is whether Iraq will break up with or without an all-out civil war.

Iraq Diary

I heard that the US was planning an embassy in Baghdad that would cost $1.5 billion, as expensive as the Freedom Tower at Ground Zero, the proposed tallest building in the world.

What I heard about Iraq in 2005

What makes somebody a Loser, a person doomed to unfulfilled dreams and humiliation? Nobody is born to lose, and yet failure embodies our worst fears. The Loser is our national bogeyman, and his history over the past two hundred years reveals the dark side of success, how economic striving reshaped the self and soul of America.

Born Losers