![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Altricial Wheels
May. 9th, 2012 08:50 pmObama manages to win the West Virginia primary. And who's this guy 'Judd', to have shown so strongly against the incumbent, one wonders? Ex-governor, billionaire who does a lot of charity, local sports hero, etc? Nope - just some guy in federal prison for extortion.
It's a shame Hillary didn't run. She'd have crushed him like a steamroller. Then, at least, we'd have a competent president no matter which side won.
*****
It's odd (to me, at least) that as I get older, I develop more interest in recent history. I can explain reasonably well how things got where they are today from where they were in my childhood. What begins to interest me now is how things reached the state they were in in the early 60s.
To that end, I recently read "Thunder Over China" (Theodore White, 1947), an analysis of Chinese politics during the War Against Japan, aimed at the general reader. It's appallingly hard to find anything substantive about WWII and the preceding Sino-Japanese War. This was a huge, sprawling operation, and most books on WWII just dismiss it in a paragraph or two, noting that the Chinese tied up a large part of Japan's army, and leave it at that. There's a misplaced romanticism there on my part as well. China in the late 30s was the setting of many pulp novels and serial thrillers, and much of that has stuck for me.
White was there, and knew most of the Chinese government. He evokes the times, and explains the politics and personalities. Unexpectedly, a lot of what was going on there sounded familiar - it was the Vietnam war in a different context. We were propping up a corrupt, incompetent government for geopolitical purposes, not out of any love for that government. Ngo Dinh Diem's assassination makes a lot more sense in the context of our previous experience in China. Indeed, I found myself wondering why we didn't get rid of Chiang when we had the chance.
There's this aphorism that governments always fight the last war. I can't help but apply that here. Diem was overthrown and replaced with a general based on the mistake we made in leaving Chiang in power. The memory of that mistake has played a role, I'm sure, in the decision to leave Karzai in power in Afghanistan, even though he obviously doesn't have our interests at heart.
*****
So, now Obama is going to support marriage rights. Does he mean that (i.e., will the Federal government begin enforcing "full faith and credit"), or it that just some election year scam? if he means it, then he's already missed a perfect opportunity to emphasize that marriages contracted in any state must be honoured in all states.
It's a shame Hillary didn't run. She'd have crushed him like a steamroller. Then, at least, we'd have a competent president no matter which side won.
*****
It's odd (to me, at least) that as I get older, I develop more interest in recent history. I can explain reasonably well how things got where they are today from where they were in my childhood. What begins to interest me now is how things reached the state they were in in the early 60s.
To that end, I recently read "Thunder Over China" (Theodore White, 1947), an analysis of Chinese politics during the War Against Japan, aimed at the general reader. It's appallingly hard to find anything substantive about WWII and the preceding Sino-Japanese War. This was a huge, sprawling operation, and most books on WWII just dismiss it in a paragraph or two, noting that the Chinese tied up a large part of Japan's army, and leave it at that. There's a misplaced romanticism there on my part as well. China in the late 30s was the setting of many pulp novels and serial thrillers, and much of that has stuck for me.
White was there, and knew most of the Chinese government. He evokes the times, and explains the politics and personalities. Unexpectedly, a lot of what was going on there sounded familiar - it was the Vietnam war in a different context. We were propping up a corrupt, incompetent government for geopolitical purposes, not out of any love for that government. Ngo Dinh Diem's assassination makes a lot more sense in the context of our previous experience in China. Indeed, I found myself wondering why we didn't get rid of Chiang when we had the chance.
There's this aphorism that governments always fight the last war. I can't help but apply that here. Diem was overthrown and replaced with a general based on the mistake we made in leaving Chiang in power. The memory of that mistake has played a role, I'm sure, in the decision to leave Karzai in power in Afghanistan, even though he obviously doesn't have our interests at heart.
*****
So, now Obama is going to support marriage rights. Does he mean that (i.e., will the Federal government begin enforcing "full faith and credit"), or it that just some election year scam? if he means it, then he's already missed a perfect opportunity to emphasize that marriages contracted in any state must be honoured in all states.
