Daddy Issues: The Reality of China’s Challenge to the United States

Michele Bachmann needs to learn a lot of things. First off, among those members of the Republican Party who can read books, her approval rating hovers tenuously between Rick Perry and genital warts. Slightly less immediately, she needs to know that puns are the absolute lowest form of humor… on Earth. And making any sort of puns relating to President Hu Jintao’s name is an exquisite means of saying “I am not, and will never be, by any definition of the words, an intentionally funny person.” I didn’t think anything could make Michele Bachmann’s already groan-inducing remarks at CPAC all the more objectively more painful when she was able to stop talking about lightbulbs long enough to touch on the subject of China, and how they hold a “vast amount” of American debt. Bachmann insisted that, “Hu is your Daddy.”

Koreablog

From the most recent fizzled flashpoint in November 2010.

It is once again the most wonderful time of the year:

The US and South Korea have begun a joint military drill to improve combat readiness on the Korean peninsula.  The annual Ulchi Freedom Guardian exercise brings together 530,000 forces in Korea and abroad, using computer programmes to simulate war situations.  North Korea has reacted furiously to the exercises, which run for 10 days.

For the uninitiated, this happens every year in August or September and has for decades, although the name of the exercise has changed.  Every year, South Korea and the United States perform large-scale exercises.  Every year, North Korea responds like a seven-year-old would.  Is this year any different, or is there something else here?

Insurgencyblog

The remains of a police station struck by the FARC in Colombia.

I know we've been quiet for a few days here at the Mob, but sometimes we find that there's nothing much new to say about anything; either there's no real new news, or everyone else has already said what we would want to say.  It can happen to anyone.  And sometimes what you need when that happens is to just dig a little.

So in the process of that digging, I turned up this.  It seems like the FARC in Colombia is starting to be a big problem again.  And that opens things up for some discussion of why insurgent/terrorist/militia groups are able to remain in existence for so long in some places, and how nations often fail to combat them well.

Things Fall Apart

We've covered the protests and crackdown in Syria before, of course.  But things are quickly escalating well past where they were last week.  Things have gotten worse in a hurry, it seems.  So it's recap time.

I Don't Want to Set the World on Fire: Part 1

It is not uncommon to hear Americans complain about the United Nations (UN) and the participation of the U.S within it. These critics, very often, simply don’t get it.  They don’t understand the reasons why the UN was created and what the goals of the institution are, and it is vital to understand those reasons in order to understand the United Nations.  

Meanwhile...

Is anyone paying attention to Syria anymore?  I mean, I know that the debtpocalypse is approaching, and Libya is much more high-profile, but is anyone paying attention to Syria?

Because you should.

Oslo

Here's a story I can't be sarcastic about:

A massive bomb blast has hit government buildings in the Norwegian capital Oslo, killing at least seven people and injuring several others.

Is This What Accountability Looks Like?

The recent cluster of testimony by the Murdochs in front of Parliament is, well...very funny.  Both weird funny and ha-ha funny, I guess:

Rupert Murdoch has said he cannot be held responsible for the scandal at the News of the World, saying he was let down by "people I trusted".

Musings on Regime Change

In light of the recent recognition of the Libyan transitional government by the United States and others, we are presented with an excellent opportunity to reflect on the Arab Spring and United States policy towards the Middle East-Northern Africa region. The last six months have seen perhaps the most widespread and significant political change in the entire Middle East-Northern Africa region since the fall of the Ottoman Empire. The world has seen successful, non-violent democratic movements take hold in Egypt and Tunisia, popular uprisings in Libya and Syria, and protests of various sorts all across the region from Algeria to Bahrain to even Jordan.

Wait, There's Two Sudans Now?

Five days ago, a new country was born. After years of conflict, the (very cleverly) named nation of South Sudan came into being. It isn't every day that a new country happens, of course, so it's worth taking a look at this particular case and see what the prospects are like for this new nation. The two big questions are, of course, why did this happen, and what are the new state's challenges? Also, what do you get a country for its birthday?