imperial watch

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[see Part I of III and Part II of III] III. A Modest Proposal Many historians are reluctant to comment on the present if a question presented to them contains a categorical assumption about the past; it’s a little like suggesting a diagnosis to an MD–no matter what is wrong with you, it’s not going [...]

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[see Part I] II. I do not ♥ Baby Boomers Aldous Huxley called occult nature worship the “perennial religion,” because it is the default to which man returns when his gods desert him. It makes sense after all to appeal directly to the effects of nature, rather than their causes, when the chips are down. [...]

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[sepoy notes: A tip from a CM reader led me to Stargates in Iraq. Feeling inadequate to the task, I called a few favors and farangi is here to tell us the story.] How I Learned to Stop Worrying–about Humanity, Ganesh, Bill Moyers, Foreign Policy, and The Strange Life of Robert Anton Wilson–and Love the [...]

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The video, by Robert Greenwald, is worth watching – if only to see how little advancement we have made in TV graphics and music in the last 4 years. You can also sign a petition – though, I admit I don’t really get the import of the petition. Our petitions and actions need to be [...]

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How can Obama be just as wrong as Bush? Yesterday Barack Obama delivered a major speech at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. I believe that despite its virtues, it is overall an erroneous reading of the world’s geo-political landscape; that his understanding of terrorism is deeply flawed and that his specifics on action [...]

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And that explains, conclusively, Al-Qaeda in Iraq. Gilbert Arenas, of the Washington Wizards: There Are No Such Thing as Shark Attacks I know this is random, but I just want to clear this up for people out there. There are these things called shark attacks, but there is no such thing as a shark attack. [...]

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Seriously. Just because he is brown?

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Pakistan has its share of violent Islamic extremists, military and civilian. But they are clearly in the minority. The best hope for diluting their political, and geopolitical, influence lies not in heating the pressure cooker of repression, but in promoting the earliest possible democratic elections, Pakistan’s Dictator, June 11, 2007. I should point that the [...]

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He wanted to dream a man; he wanted to dream him in minute entirety and impose him on reality – The Circular Ruins, Jorge Luis Borges. Rawalpindi, Pakistan – September 08, 1970 1. During Ambassador’s conversation with President Yahya here September 8, Yahya said he had been greatly upset by need for his decision to [...]

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A commercial was droning by, as I tried to watch the NBA game and tool around on the laptop. Something about Memorial Day tie-in at the local Jeep Wrangler dealer. I glanced up just in time to see a panoramic shot of Mt. Rushmore. It occured to me, in that moment, that I finally have [...]

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Mere speech against some injustice, against some regime of intolerance or hypocrisy, for some right, for some freedom is considered dangerous, radioactive and inimical by totaliarianian agendas. Such speech normally resulted in the state condemning and imprisoning the speaker and swiftly creating an apporpriate counter-narrative for the publics [Faiz is in prison because he is [...]

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Shaul Bakhash, Clarence Robinson Professor of History, George Mason University, Brookings Institution senior fellow and husband of U.S. Middle East analyst Haleh Esfandiari, will be online Thursday, May 24, at 12:15 p.m. ET to discuss his wife’s detainment by Iranian intelligence for “crimes against national security” and personal and worldwide reaction to the situation. I [...]

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I am no expert on Insurgencies. I don’t know much about Terrorism. I have very little understanding of military history. So, when I say that Richard A. Gabriel’s Muhammad: The Warrior Prophet. The Ingenious Military Mind of the First Insurgent has, on average, a mistake per sentence, I speak only as someone with some familiarity [...]

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I am vexed by a conversation today on Fresh Air about historian Robert Dallek’s new book Nixon and Kissinger: Partners in Power. I am vexed because I consider my perceptions of Nixon’s memory more positively than I do my present perceptions of 43. I’m a former movement conservative, and a fan of Hunter Thompson, which [...]

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