Libya

Libya is too complicated for a blog post, but I'll do my best.  Most of the commentary I've read on it is either ideologically self-serving ("yes we should intervene in Libya, because military interventions are good!" or the opposite of that) or tortured, cautionary, and inherently skeptical. 

I fall more in the latter column, but I also can say that I categorically support (a) the way Obama has brought about the military action there (b) the method that force is being deployed, and (c) the proposition that we have both a human rights and realist interest in intervening in Libya.

I'd tell you why but I have to go to dinner with this nerd

You know who's the worst?

This guy!

Newt! He's probably running for President, I guess, and he has between 1 and 2% chance of winning the republican nomination and between .1 and 1% chance of winning the presidency, according to my based-on-nothing-but-probably-true-calculations.

Some people take Newt seriously. They think he has cool ideas or something. He's a "big thinker." I don't know where that meme has come from, but he hasn't said anything too useful in pretty much the 10 years that I've been paying attention to the world. He's really good at saying a LOT of things, but basing them on absolutely nothing. And he's clearly just making shit up.

Exhibit A: (from last week)
VAN SUSTEREN: What would you do about Libya?
GINGRICH: Exercise a no-fly zone this evening, communicate to the Libyan military that Gadhafi was gone and that the sooner they switch sides, the more likely they were to survive, provided help to the rebels to replace him. ...The United States doesn't need anybody's permission. We don't need to have NATO, who frankly, won't bring much to the fight. We don't need to have the United Nations. All we have to say is that we think that slaughtering your own citizens is unacceptable and that we're intervening. And we don't have to send troops. All we have to do is suppress his air force, which we could do in minutes.

Exhibit B: (from this week)
GINGRICH: I would not have intervened. I think there were a lot of other ways to affect Qadhafi. I think there are a lot of other allies in the region we could have worked with. I would not have used American and European forces.

Then he said that Libya is the worst-executed military intervention since WWII, which means that it's worse than Bay of Pigs, Guatamala, Iran hostages, Iraq War, Afghanistan etc. even though not a single American or allied person has yet to die, we've probably killed the bad guy's bad son, and have already neutered the Gaddafi's army. NEWT 2012!

Reelection

Yesterday Dick Morris said there is no way Obama gets reelected. For background's sake, Dick Morris maybe sort of helped Bill Clinton get reelected in 1996, but was caught cheating on his wife with a prostitute (she may have been underaged, I can't remember) and there was some creepy business involving feet. He's gross. Look:

Anyway, he now hates Democrats for some reason and is all over Fox making dumb predictions. He's an idiot.

Anyway, Obama will probably be reelected. The only reason he wouldn't is if the economy craters again. That's possible! This Middle East revolution business and Japan super-catastrophe can only hurt. But the fundamentals of the economy are looking much better. Anyway, to buttress that point, check this out:

Pew survey finds 47% of registered voters would like to see Obama reelected, vs. 37% who want a GOPer.
More: In better shape than either 43, 42 at same points in presidency.


Not bad, not bad. Sorry, Romney!

I have a lot of work

So I guess I should blog while I talk to Westlaw. Oh wait they're gone so I guess I'll work again.

Elizabeth Taylor died. She always kind of weirded me out. RIP though.