Preeti Aroon

The Antelope's Strategy: Living in Rwanda After the Genocide. How would you feel if the men who killed your family moved back to your town? Jean Hatzfeld interviews Rwanda's genocide survivors and killers released from prison in the early 2000s in an exploration of the difficulty of reconciliation. (Note: The book will be out in March 2009; I'm reading a review copy.)

Jerome Chen

"The New York Times' Lonely War." In Vanity Fair's December issue, Seth Mnookin looks at one of the few U.S. media outlets to maintain a presence in Iraq -- the Times' Baghdad bureau. Remarking that "135 journalists have been killed there since 2003," the Iraq War, he says, "has been, by any measure, one of the most dangerous conflicts to cover in the history of modern journalism."

Elizabeth Dickinson

Closing Guantánamo is on the short list of top priorities for the incoming Obama administration. In Harper's "Justice after Bush: Prosecuting an Outlaw Administration," lawyer Scott Horton imagines Bush officials standing trial and suggests a Truth and Reconciliation Commission that would trade confessions for amnesty.

Rebecca Frankel

"All Options Are on the Table." Der Spiegel talks to Israeli Air Force Maj. Gen. Ido Nehushtan about his country's biggest military challenges and what Israel would be willing to do should Iran manage to develop nuclear weapons. "The Air Force is a very robust and flexible force," Nehushtan says. "We are ready to do whatever is demanded of us."

Blake Hounshell

Four active-duty officers -- Lt. Col. Robert A. Downey, Lt. Col Lee K. Grubbs, Cdr. Brian J. Malloy, and Lt. Col. Craig R. Wonson -- explain how a surge in Afghanistan might work for the Small Wars Journal (pdf). The bad news? It's going to require eight brigades, or up to 40,000 additional troops.

David Kenner

"Disney Set to Entertain Middle East." The Financial Times reports that Walt Disney is making its first film marketed towards the Middle East. Because of the large number of young people in the region, and the limited number of films made targeting an Arab audience, Disney is hoping to produce a family movie that "will play to families from North Africa to the Gulf states."

Photo: JOSE CENDON/AFP/Getty Images

A quick follow-up to yesterday's post on the inaccurate reports in the Pakistani media claiming that FP had named Karachi's mayor "the second best mayor in the world":

The Dawn newspaper, which gave prominent placement to the original inaccurate story, have now run a second story that quotes FP's Media Coordinator Jina Hassan setting the record straight.

According to Dawn's site, the story is the newspaper's most read and most e-mailed item today, so hopefully this clarification should put an end to the whole mess. Although the amusing headline, "Magazine denies declaring Kamal 2nd best mayor," kind of makes it sound like this is a matter of opinion.

We invite anyone who's still confused to just read the original piece.

One of my responsibilities here at Foreign Policy is manning the "FP Editor" e-mail account. It's always fun to come in in the morning and see how readers around the world are reacting to what we print. Sometimes, the reactions can be a bit strange, though.

Yesterday, we started receiving e-mails from readers and journalists in Pakistan asking for comment on reports that we had named Karachi's mayor, Mustafa Kamal, "the second best mayor in the world." This would be an understandable query if we had actually said anything of the sort.

At issue is a sidebar from FP's recent Global Cities Index that names Kamal, Berlin's Klaus Wowereit, and Chongqing's Wang Hongju as "mayors of the moment" who have found innovative ways to globalize their cities. The mayors are not ranked, nor are we implying that they are objectively "better" than any other mayors, but that didn't stop the Karachi city government from issuing a press release on its Web site (they've changed the text since being contacted by FP) congratulating Kamal for being the No. 2 mayor in the world. For the record, the three names are not listed in any particular order.

Pakistan's biggest English-language newspaper, Dawn, then printed a glorified transcription of the mayor's press release by the government-controlled Associated Press of Pakistan as a front-page story without ever checking with us to see if it was accurate.

According to the e-mails we've received, the inaccurate story has been widely reported on Pakistani TV, radio, and blogs. Most absurdly, Karachi's city council apparently held a heated debate over whether to pass a resolution congratulating Kamal for the honor we allegedly bestowed on him. Judging by today's e-mails, the efforts of some blogs to correct the story only seem to have confused readers more.

According to one reporter, who unlike Dawn contacted us for comment, "Karachi is riddled with banners by the local government, congratulating Mr. Kamal for being declared as second best mayor of the world by the Foreign Policy."

We hate to rain on Kamal's parade, and certainly intend him and his city no disrespect, but we simply never ranked him in any way. This entire mess could have been avoided with some very basic fact-checking.

I had fun on NPR's Talk of the Nation this afternoon discussing "The Dream Team" -- fantasy picks for the incoming U.S. president's administration chosen by foreign-policy experts from around the world.

My favorite moment of the segment was when a caller suggested that John McCain would win and put Rush Limbaugh in charge of the White House communications team but make Joe Biden secretary of state.

Give a listen here, and if you haven't chosen your own "Dream Team" picks yet, you can do so here.

There are more slaves on the planet today than at any time in human history. But a landmark case in West Africa this week should give thousands of them a rare dose of hope. A court in Niger found the country's government guilty of failing to protect the rights of Hadijatou Mani, a 24-year-old woman sold into slavery at the age of 12.

Mani says she was sold as a young girl to a man for $500 and forced into domestic and agricultural work for a decade. Her master raped her repeatedly, and she bore him three children. She was freed in 2005 and, with the help of Anti-Slavery International, brought the case against the government for failing to protect her. In the judge's decision, he ordered the government to pay Mani about $20,000.

Niger officially abolished slavery in 1960, but the practice persists throughout the country, with an estimated 43,000 people enslaved. There are believed to be tens of thousands more in bondage across West Africa. Niger's government repeatedly contends that it does all it can to eradicate the practice, but this is the first time a court has held it responsible for looking the other way. There's little chance of thousands more slaves being so lucky as to be freed and rewarded, but if this compels the government to enact (or enforce) more stringent laws, all the better.

Photo: Boureima HAMA/AFP/Getty Images

Preeti Aroon

"One Man's Plan to Save a Natural Treasure" on CBS's 60 Minutes. A decade ago, wealthy American entrepreneur Greg Carr devoted himself to developing Mozambique's Gorongosa National Park. By repopulating it with animals that had nearly been decimated by years of war and poaching, he hopes to promote tourism and improve the lives of the impoverished people there.

Elizabeth Dickinson

Yesterday in Djibouti, the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia and the opposition Alliance for the Reliberation of Somalia signed a two-page peace agreement. Key to the long overdue accord is the withdrawal of the unpopular Ethiopian forces now occupying the country. Sadly, one of the main leaders of the Islamic Courts (which ruled Somalia before the Ethiopian invasion in late 2006), has rejected the deal, vowing "the jihad will carry on."

Rebecca Frankel

While many writers are focused on Sarah Palin's très expensive wardrobe and rumors of her going rogue on the McCain campaign, The New Yorker's Jane Mayer reports on how Palin actually got the VP slot. Couple this new view into the Alaska governor's mansion with musings like those of Marc Ambinder and the breadth of Palin's political ambitions take new shape.   

Joshua Keating

"The Godfather of Bangalore" by Scott Carney in Wired. This story of the mafia don-turned-real estate mogul who helps global IT companies navigate the anarchic property market in India's cybercapital is one of those Wired articles that makes you feel as if the world is fast becoming a William Gibson novel.

David Kenner

"Iranian Strategy in Iraq: Policy and 'Other Means,'" put out by Joseph Felter and Brian Fishman at West Point's Combating Terrorism Center, relies on declassified intelligence reports from Iraqi detainees trained by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps and the Lebanese militia Hezbollah. The Iraqi insurgents apparently preferred their Hezbollah trainers to the Iranians, because they "speak Arabic and treat [them] with respect," while something of a culture clash developed between the Iraqis and their Persian neighbors.

Preeti Aroon

Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace...One School at a Time, by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin. A letter to the editor in today's Washington Post explains why it's perfect reading for Gen. David Petraeus, who has been consulting authors as he prepares his strategy for Afghanistan, as it's a powerful story of how to win hearts and minds.

Jerome Chen

In "Their Own Worst Enemy," James Fallows shows how China is shooting itself in the foot with bobbled PR gestures. Why announce sanctioned "protest areas" for the Olympics, only to have the international press find out all applicants were turned down and some even arrested? Perhaps China is still far from realizing its own international reputation.

Elizabeth Dickinson

When it comes to economic turmoil, one of the few places I turn to for reason and decency is my old employer, The Economist. "When Fortune Frowned" expounds on how it was cheap money, poor oversight, overseas currency reserves, and not just a "drunken" Wall Street that sunk property values. In agreement with FP's Moises Naim, The Economist warns that the response to the crisis could worsen the economy more than the crisis itself.

Rebecca Frankel

While not about ice cream, Robert Kuttner's "The Case for Plain Vanilla" has a certain delish factor. In calling for a return to a more pure financial system, Kuttner employs language this old lit major can grab on to, such as when he compares the risk-spreading factor of derivatives to "the way an epidemic spreads diphtheria."

Blake Hounshell

"This Week in Magazines: Dirty Elections Edition," at the Huffington Post. James Warren romps through last week's "World's Ugliest Elections" list, but wonders why FP didn't include Zimbabwe. Answer: We purposely excluded elections marred by massive electoral fraud and violence and just focused on those characterized by searing personal attacks.

Joshua Keating

Peter Suderman of the new conservative online magazine Culture11 disliked Oliver Stone's W. more than I did, but he makes a good point: The left-wing director and his subject have some things in common. "Like Bush, Stone is a man of great ambition, stubbornness, and personal confidence, and he's just as likely to embark on grand projects he clearly hasn't thought all the way through." Any Given Sunday and Alexander aren't on quite the same scale as Iraq and Guantánamo, but you get the picture.

David Kenner

In "The Things He Carried," Jeffrey Goldberg tries desperately to be flagged by airport security. He passes through security checkpoints with fake boarding passes, a polyurethane bladder filled with beer, even his trusty "Osama bin Laden, Hero of Islam" T-shirt -- all to no avail. America's airport security procedures, he comes to realize, are more for show than protection.

With less than three weeks left in the presidential campaign, the conventional wisdom seems to be that barring some unforseen event, voters' economic worries will propel Barack Obama into the White House. But, unpleasant as it may be to think about, speculation has begun about what effect an "October surprise" from al Qaeda, along the lines of bin Laden's 2004 video, might have on the race. 

In a new piece for ForeignPolicy.com, I look at a recent study of the effect of terrorist attacks on election outcomes in Israel, a data-rich environment for this kind of research: 

The report attributes the Israeli right’s advantage on terrorism to its hawkish stance and opposition to concessions to Palestinian demands. “When terrorism reaches a certain level, voters conclude that there’s no alternative but to toughen up,” Berrebi says.

Surprisingly, who was in charge when terrorist attacked occurred had little effect on the outcomes. The study found that left-wing incumbents tended to lose support after attacks while hawkish right-wing incumbents saw their margins of victory increase. “Voters see attacks during a right-wing government as something inevitable,” Berrebi explains, “whereas under a left-wing incumbent, it’s seen as something that could have been prevented if they had only used tougher antiterrorism policies.”

The study sheds a lot of light on the behavior of voters as well as the terrorists who target them. It also suggests some steps politicians can take to minimize the risk. (Hint: Accusing your opponent of hanging out with terrorists doesn't help.)

Economic development blogger Chris Blattman has posted an interesting interview with Raymond "Ray" Fisman and Edward "Ted" Miguel, authors of "How Economics Can Defeat Corruption" in the September/October issue of FP:

[Chris]: Economists are fond of saying that strong institutions are at the heart of American economic growth. I say they should watch 'Gangs of New York' -- Scorsese makes Lagos and Nairobi look like kindergarten by comparison. Do we underplay violence and corruption in our own history, and overplay it in Africa today?

Ted: Yes, we could easily have written a book about violence and corruption in 19th century America or Europe. And there are surely lessons to be learned about present-day problems from looking at that earlier era, and vice versa.

Ray: But there are some highly instructive differences. In the 1970s, Sierra Leonian President Siaka Stevens destroyed the railroad in his country's southeast as a means of weakening an opposing ethnic group, the Mende. Contrast this with the equally corrupt robber barons of 19th century America, who used their power to build railways instead of tearing them down.

 

Fisman and Miguel have also started a promising-looking blog on the site for their new book, Economic Gangsters: Corruption, Violence, and the Poverty of Nations, on which their FP article was based.

FP's Elizabeth Dickinson spoke with economist Jeffrey Sachs this week about how the financial crisis will affect the world's poorest.

Surprisingly, Sachs doesn't think the mayhem on Wall Street necessarily spells doom for people living in low-income countries. It's middle-income countries, which are more connected to the global economy, that are most at risk.

His biggest worry? That the credit crunch will distract leaders from the "life-or-death" issues that affect the poor on a daily basis.

Check it out.

Keep your eyes on the coffee table during this clip from last week's episode of the Fox series Bones:

 

,

 

Yup. That's Foreign Policy's January/February 2006 issue featuring Hugo "Boss" Chávez himself on the cover. The therapist in this scene obviously has excellent taste in office reading material, though he may want to renew his subscription.

For the record, we had nothing to do with this but we think it's great and hope the trend continues. A recent issue of FP would look great on Alec Baldwin's desk on 30 Rock or in House's waiting room. We weren't founded until 1970 so I guess Mad Men might be a stretch.

(Hat tip: Agent Zero)

 

In celebration of its 10th birthday, Google is making the Web, circa 2001, available this month. (For technical reasons, 2001 was the earliest version of its index that it could make available.)

Here are some fun findings I came across while playing with the site, which proudly announces "Search 1,326,920,000 web pages":

ForeignPolicy.com. At the time I searched, there was an AIG advertisement at the top of the screen that declared, "The greatest risk is not taking one." (I guess bailed-out AIG took that statement to its extreme.)

Barack Obama. The name gets 672 results, the first to his page at the Illinois Senate.

John McCain. The first link takes you to the "Straight Talk America" site left over from his 2000 presidential campaign.

Iraq war. It gets 17,600 results, with nine of the first 10 referring to the Iran-Iraq War. (No. 10 is to the "Iraq War Drinking Game.")

Facebook. The second link that pops up takes you to a page that says, "The facebook is only accessible to people on the Harvard network."

What kind of antique jewels have you come across while playing with the 2001 Google? Feel free to comment below.

Preeti Aroon

The Partnership: The Making of Goldman Sachs, by Charles D. Ellis. Goldman Sachs has certainly fared better than Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns. The secret to its success in surviving rocky times, including the Great Depression, is revealed in this book, reviewed in the New York Times yesterday.

Jerome Chen

It's no secret that water is considered a precious resource in much of the developing world (and also in California, to be sure). "Ebb without flow: Water may be the new oil in a thirsty global economy," published by the folks at Wharton, my alma mater, explores water's crucial role in development and addresses some of the attendant ethical issues. For example, when oil prices rise, many can afford to cut back. But water? Not so much.

Elizabeth Dickinson

Aisha Labi looks at the global rankings of universities in "Obsession with Rankings Goes Global," in The Chronicle of Higher Education. Whether it's to boost their funding, their applicant pool, or merely their national pride, universities have started pandering more and more to the reviewers. Nothing wrong with accountability, but some would prefer the students -- rather than the rankings -- to the be the test.

Blake Hounshell

Warren Buffett: The Making of an American Capitalist. Thirteen years later, Roger Lowenstein's portrait of the Sage of Omaha remains the definitive biography. But if you're seeking insight into how to be like Buffett during this financial crisis, good luck. "Never lose money" isn't exactly actionable advice for most of us.

Joshua Keating

The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court by Jeffrey Toobin. A great look at the extent to which the U.S. legal system is largely defined by the idiosyncratic personalities of a small group of sometimes very odd people. Gossipy details like Clarence Thomas's love of RV travel and Anthony Kennedy's hideous office carpet alone are worth the read. And if you believe Noah Feldman's recent account of U.S. judges, it is those very quirky characters who are the movers and shakers of the world policy stage.

David Kenner

According to two former military intercept officers, whose tale makes up ABC's "Inside Account of U.S. Eavesdropping on Americans," the U.S. military is spying on telephone conversations of ordinary Americans who happen to be living in the Middle East and have nothing to do with terrorism. The military interceptors often shared "salacious or tantalizing phone calls" made by U.S. military officers, journalists, and aid workers for their own amusement.

Was George W. Bush too preoccupied with the mess in Mesopotamia to focus on things like education, healthcare, and the economy? Responding to reader questions about his FP cover story, "Think Again: Bush's Legacy," David Frum says no:

I have often written that I don't believe that George W. Bush ever had a well-considered domestic agenda. So in that sense, no, Iraq did not distract him.

Read the rest.

Economic prophet-of-doom Nouriel Roubini seems to be feeling pretty smug these days, and who can blame him. Here's part of an e-mail he sent in response to a question from Portfolio's Felix Salmon:

Read my February 12 steps to a financial disaster paper. We are now as I predicted at step 12
Sorry if I now say I told you so...
Feeling a little chastised for giving me so much s--t on your blog for the last year and siding persistently with those who missed the boat and said all wil be fine? Should I expect a public mea culpa?
It would be useful if you would publicly admit you got it totally wrong for the last year.

Salmon obliges.

For the record, no one can accuse FP of blowing off Roubini. The RGE Monitor chairman wrote a cover story on "The Coming Financial Pandemic" for our March/April issue and a Web exclusive on why "a financial meltdown is more likely than ever" exactly a year ago.

Preeti Aroon

"Spare Me the Sermon on Muslim Women," by Mohja Kahf in the Washington Post. "Being a Muslim woman is a joyful thing," says Kahf, before she goes on to list the many ways Islam is pro-women. She may have some valid points, but that certainly doesn’t mean Islam is practiced in a pro-women way in all places.

Jerome Chen

"Have Pentecostalism, will travel." As Sarah Palin's public profile grows, many are questioning her religious practices. Christian fundamentalism is common in the United States, of course. In the Times Literary Supplement, David Martin explores the side of the Alaska Governor's faith in which believers receive special gifts from God -- talking in tongues, for example. It also offers surprising insights into how Pentecostalism has gone global.

Elizabeth Dickinson

The Ibrahim Index of African Governance. Sudanese entrepreneur Mo Ibrahim thinks he knows how to make government more accountable: reward it. Several years ago, his foundation began awarding $5 million grants to the best of African leaders. The Foundation also ranks governments throughout the continent on everything from services to safety to economic growth.

Rebecca Frankel

People are still squabbling over who is qualified to be a heartbeat from the presidency after Thursday night's vice presidential debate. But in 1974, the late historian Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. took that question one step further in, "Is the Vice Presidency Necessary?" for the Atlantic Monthly. "[Presidents] pick a running mate," he writes, "because of intricate and generally mistaken calculations about the contribution he will make to victory at the polls."

Blake Hounshell

“Meet Neel Kashkari: The Man With the $700 Billion Wallet,” by Heidi N. Moore of Deal Journal, the Wall Street Journal blog. Kashkari is the bald-pated Goldman Sachs alumnus and former aerospace engineer tasked with handling the U.S. Treasury Department’s $700 toxic-waste dump. Maybe he can figure out how to make this turkey fly.

Joshua Keating

The rise and fall Muxtape, a file-sharing site that let users create 12-song mixes from their personal MP3 collections for online streaming, is a great example of the American recording industry spoiling the fun for music lovers around the world. Founder "Justin" details decisive run-ins with the Recording Industry Association of America, including meetings where he was told both "You are a willful infringer and we are mere hours from shutting you down" and "Assuming we don't shut you down, how do you see us working together?" New Yorker music critic Sasha Frere-Jones also weighs in.

Big news today: Foreign Policy was acquired by the Washington Post Company. Read all about it here.

What does this mean for Passport?

For now, very little will change. We will still be sending out the Morning Brief each day, tackling serious issues like the financial crisis, posting on not-so-important topics like upside-down houses in Germany, scrutinizing what the U.S. presidential candidates are saying and doing, and generally bringing you interesting tidbits from around the Web.

Down the road, we'll probably be looking to making some tweaks and changes to our editorial approach. And we'll need your help. So, dear readers, start thinking about what you'd like to see more and less of, and feel free to weigh in via the comments section or by e-mail.

Preeti Aroon

"Gebrselassie supplants own marathon mark, going under 2.04:00," by the Associated Press. While Americans were distracted by the financial bailout plan yesterday, something amazing happened. Ethiopian runner Haile Gebrselassie broke the marathon world record that he himself had set last year. He ran the marathon distance of 26.2 miles (42.2 km) in 2 hours, 3 minutes, and 59 seconds!

Elizabeth Dickinson

Reading Junot Diaz's The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao is like getting on an amusement park ride designed for travel-thirsty adults. Get ready for an education in Domican Republic history from its politics to its folklore. Emotions ride high in this funky and fashionable novel that offers great cultural insight into the Dominican diaspora and the United States, where so many of its people have landed.

Rebecca Frankel

"Benjamin Franklin: City Slicker," by Jerry Weinberger offers quite a few delicious anecdotes about "the first American" and his love of city life abroad. But there's far more than cheeky details about his hobnobbing savvy and appetite for socialite dames -- indeed, the author calls him "sexy." In addition to discovering that Franklin preferred the urban scape to America's rural terrain, there are relevant examples to be absorbed particulary in terms of Franklin's diplomatic finesse, his penchant for city planning, and his ability to rally the public when it would otherwise be divided.  

Blake Hounshell

"The risk of a total systemic meltdown is now as high as ever," by Nouriel Roubini. Any blog post that leads off with the words, "Let me explain now in more detail why we are now back to the risk of a total systemic financial meltdown" is probably worth reading.

Joshua Keating

"Playing With Gunfire" by Brian Howe in Paste. At the same time war-themed video games are becoming more realistic, actual warfare is becoming more "virtual." Howe talks to game designers and military personnel to explore the moral gray area where the two meet.

Sorry posting has been light today, folks. What's on your minds?

Preeti Aroon

"Fast Lane to the Future," by Don Belt in National Geographic. India has a new, elegantly named, 3,633-mile superhighway, the Golden Quadrilateral, that links four population hubs -- New Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, and Mumbai. India hopes it will vroom the economy to new heights, similar to the benefits of the U.S. interstate highway system.

Elizabeth Dickinson

Since the financial crisis starting brewing a year ago, I've been looking for good "explainers" (read: little jargon, lots of thought) to make sense of the economy. The Big Picture is one of the best places I've found online. Blogger Barry Ritholtz monitors the news, offers his take, and scrutinizes the takes of others. A host of other informative blogs can be found here -- a girl (or boy) needs many sources to think through this many bailouts.

Rebecca Frankel

"Why is Obama so vapid, hesitant, and gutless?" In his regular Slate slot, Christopher Hitchens mercilessly muses on the reasons why presidential candidate Barack Obama is having trouble slaying his competition. Although Obama fans will shudder when Hitchens suggests that their candidate is heading down the path of failed presidential hopeful Michael Dukakis, he makes an interesting stab at identifying the former law professor's potential Achilles heel. 

Blake Hounshell

"In Defense of the Paulson Plan," by Nadav Manham at Seeking Alpha. Few have come forward to defend the Bush administration's $700 billion bailout plan. Manham, who thinks it can work "if it acts as a catalyst for future positive events rather than being seen as the end in itself," gives it the old college try.

Joshua Keating 

"A Rising Tide" and "Economies of Scales." I never thought I would have any interest in fishing-quota management, but thanks to these two pieces from The Economist on property rights-based schemes for protecting commercial fisheries, I really want to understand more about how this works. According to the piece, when fishermen can buy transferable fishing rights, they are far less likely to overfish than those where fishing rights are time-limited. Anyone have recommendations?

Kate Palmer

"A Peace from the Bottom Up." In his column in today's Washington Post, Jackson Diehl ruefully reminds us of the days when the Israel-Palestine conflict was the world's most pressing. Now, even though it's overshadowed by everything from Pakistan to the global financial mess, he says, there's still a smart way to solve it -- one that doesn't mirror the fragile, short-sighted promises of the past.