Foulcault on reform vs. critique Under no circumstances should one pay attention to those who tell one: ‘Don’t criticize, since you’re not capable of carrying out a reform.’ That’s ministerial cabinet talk. Critique doesn’t have to be the premise of a deduction which concludes: this then is what needs to be done. It should be [...]
With regard to the economy, conservatives always preach restraint in the face of forces beyond our control, warning of unintended consequences if we overreach. E.g. David Brooks: But you don’t have the power to transform the whole situation. Your discrete goods might contribute to an overall turnaround, but that turnaround will be beyond your comprehension [...]
In this “Thinking Allowed” interview with Stuart Hall, he discusses the Middle East and has some interesting things to say about our inability to judge the importance of history as it is unfolding. I especially liked his comments about how the manner in which history unfolds is as important, if not more important, than where [...]
On the trip to Cambodia I finally had some time to read Jon Lee Anderson’s excellent New Yorker Article on the counter-insurgency in Sri Lanka. Because the piece isn’t available online (except for this Scribd posting which I don’t expect will stay online for long), I thought it worthwhile to share some quotes: The “Sri [...]
Catching up on Cambodian history as we make our way to Phnom Penh, I came across some interesting historical context for the current squabble over Preah Vihar temple. The temple is mentioned in John Tully’s A Short History of Cambodia, during a discussion of King Sihanouk’s nonaligned policy in the 1950′s: Another running sore was [...]
Image by AdamThinks.com There has been something of a debate among the American Left as to the true nature of the anti-healthcare reform movement. One position is that while there have always been crazies on the Right, the current era represents something new, in which the crazies have taken over the party, backed by unprecedented [...]
Former Clinton White House adviser and prominent blogger, Brad DeLong says: “We have to ask ourselves: Do we want to revive our economy, or do we want to punish the bankers?” But critics of the Geithner plan are not saying he’s being too soft on the bankers because they want to see blood. They are [...]
In this clip ‘self-hating Jew’ Jon Stewart points out the obviously one-sided and mobius-strip like quality of mainstream American news coverage of the war in Gaza. Together with help from Kiven Strohm and other friends on Twitter and Facebook, I’ve compiled a list of resources about Gaza, with the aim of providing an alternative view. [...]
I wasn’t happy with similar sites I found on the web, so I created a wiki to get the word out about some of the more disagreeable positions taken by the McCain campaign. The idea being that all the claims on the wiki are verifiable statements about actual policy positions taken by John McCain. They [...]
Reading Panaj Mishra’s NYRB article about Burma, “The Revolt of the Monks,” I was reminded of the KMT’s adventures in Burma, a remarkable episode in the inglorious history of Taiwan’s ruling party. After several pages discussing the brutal suppression of last year’s protest by Burma’s monks, Mishra turns to the political-economic foundation of military rule: [...]