Internal Monologue

It seems to me that there are two questions that are getting mushed together here: Should outside countries intervene in the Libyan civil war, protect the rebels, and help them topple Qaddafi? Should the United States be one of those countries? It seems to me that there's a better case for European and Arab states to intervene than for the United States to intervene. This is in their sphere of influence, isn't it? If the United States is justifying intervention on humanitarian grounds, then why aren't we in Ivory Coast, Congo, Burma, and other such places?

I'm trying to figure out what is going on with Libya and American intervention there. Here's what I've figured out so far: Here's a nice zoomable map of Libya so you can figure out where these places are. The UN has authorized war on Qaddafi . The rebels are currently not doing well and forces loyal to Qaddafi are pushing towards the rebel stronghold of Benghazi. There was a lot of fighting in the past 24 hours or so around the town of Adjabiya, which is about 90 miles to the south. Loyalist forces have moved onto the road from Adjabiya to Benghazi . A lot of the bloggers I've read think that it is not in the US interest to get into a war in Libya, and that we aren't thinking about the intermediate and long term consequences of military intervention there. These include Abu Muqawama from Center for a New American Security , Information Dissemination , Marc Lynch , and Andrew Sullivan , who has been particularly vehement in his opposition. Thomas E. Ricks blogg

Is the United States going to war in Libya, or are other people? Sullivan thinks we are , but commenters at this Balloon Juice post think the authorization is so that other countries like France, Italy, and Arab League countries can do this. As much as I don't like Qaddafi, I don't know who the rebels are or what kind of government they would install. I hope for the best, but I do not think US military intervention would be a good idea. Given our current global military footprint, I think we should be getting out of places, not getting into places.

Talking Points Memo : "What do I say to the idea that this [the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act] is a wedge issue? I say 'Hallelujah,'" Frank told reporters. "The fact that we've now evolved to the point where the Republicans are complaining about the fact that we introduced this bill because it causes them political problems is a great sign of progress. It used to be the other way around." I think when we look back on this era, we'll be amazed at how quickly opinions changed on this. Now let's get started on ending drug prohibition... Bonus Quote on this topic from DougJ on Balloon Juice : A lot of talk about how marriage equality is now an issue that works in Democrats’ favor. You know what that means. It means Republicans give up on the issue and start looking for some new shiny “cultural issue” to distract people with. The theocons who profess to care deeply about the “sanctity of marriage” will go gentle under that

Best 2012 roundup I've seen is here , just updated. Still pretty wide open, and lots of potential nominees haven't even declared yet. I still think that threading the "right-wing enough to get the nomination, but centrist enough to win the election" is going to be a hard needle to thread for the Republicans. Of course, all that could change depending on the economy and world events.

Ben Smith and others have remarked on the fact the Republican presidential hopeful Haley Barbour is considering reducing American presence in Afghanistan and finding some budget savings in defense. While details are sketchy, he appears to be scouting out a position to Obama's left on these issues. I'd love to have some allies on the right wing for re-evaluating our presence in Afghanistan and casting a skeptical eye on defense spending. And maybe this will prompt Obama to get out faster. More on the GOP and Afghanistan here .

Apparently, Al Qaeda doesn't like Qaddafi either . They seem a bit Johnny-come-lately about it, though. I think the recent popular uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt, and elsewhere have really stolen Al Qaeda's thunder. These uprisings have led to throwing out the rulers of Egypt and Tunisia, seriously threatened the regime in Iran, started a civil war in Libya, and sparked protests throughout the region. What have the suicide bombers done recently? I hope dissatisfied people of the world come to find that cultivating contacts with Al Jazeera TV and learning how to harness social networking is far more effective than bomb-making and suicide-glorifying. Now that I think of it, our own foreign policy establishment might consider the limits of the use of violence. On the other hand, it looks like violence will determine whether Qaddafi stays in power or not. This might be Al Qaeda's route back to relevance.

Don't be an penny-wise, pound-foolish environmentalist: support urban density . If you block the development of additional housing in your urban neighborhood, it is unlikely that any amount of carpooling or energy efficient appliances will offset the negative impact of your encouraging more people to live in suburbs. Now if I can just get OpenFeint to see the virtues of telecommuting once a week, I can have a positive impact on my time use and mitigate somewhat the environmental damage of my long commute.

"It's perfectly reasonable to argue that the problem here isn't that nukes are genuinely more dangerous or more expensive than other forms of power generation, it's that other forms of power generation aren't forced to pay for their own externalities. Charge them properly for the carbon they emit and the mercury they spew and the particulates they make us breathe and they'd be just as expensive and just as dangerous as nuclear power. I think there's a pretty good case to be made for that. Nonetheless, until we do start charging properly for all those externalities, nukes just aren't going to be cost effective and nothing is going to change that. The answer, then, is to force coal and oil and gas power plants to pay for their externalities properly. However, our most recent attempt to make even modest progress toward that goal went down in flames and the Republican Party has made it crystal clear that they'll fight to the death to keep

The State Department spokesperson who criticized the conditions under which Bradly Manning (the person suspected of leaking to WikiLeaks) is being detained without charges was forced to resign. Greenwald : On Friday, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley denounced the conditions of Bradley Manning's detention as "ridiculous, counterproductive and stupid," forcing President Obama to address those comments in a Press Conference and defend the treatment of Manning. Today, CNN reports , Crowley has "abruptly resigned" under "pressure from White House officials because of controversial comments he made last week about the Bradley Manning case." In other words, he was forced to "resign" -- i.e. , fired. So, in Barack Obama's administration, it's perfectly acceptable to abuse an American citizen in detention who has been convicted of nothing by consigning him to 23-hour-a-day solitary confinement, barring him from

Dude, this is awesome : Four new species of brain-manipulating fungi that turn ants into "zombies" have been discovered in the Brazilian rain forest. These fungi control ant behavior with mind-altering chemicals, then kill them. They're part of a large family of fungi that create chemicals that mess with animal nervous systems. [...] Of the four new species, two grow long, arrow-like spores which eject like missiles from the fungus, seeking to land on a passing ant. The other fungi propel shorter spores, which change shape in mid-air to become like boomerangs and land nearby. If these fail to land on an ant, the spores sprout stalks that can snag ants walking over them. Upon infecting the new ant, the cycle starts again. What could be cooler?

"In the short-term, you can 'save' a lot of money by ignoring national infrastructure (just imagine how much money Haiti 'saved' before their earthquake!), but when that infrastructure crumbles, you're screwed. It's a foolish strategy, doomed to failure." - Jed Lewison on Daily Kos

This large image is making the rounds. I wish I had a large, poster-sized printout of it. I wish it included role-playing games and computer games, but hey, it can't include everything.

This post (HT: Favalora on FB ) matches much of my early experience with the Apple ][e: As it happens, this computer came with the BASIC programming language pre-installed. You didn’t even need to boot a disk operating system. You could turn on the computer and press Ctrl-Reset and you’d get a prompt. And at this prompt, you could type in an entire program , and then type RUN , and it would motherfucking run. I can understand why Apple wants to make their products into something of a "walled garden" where the user is shielded from all that technical stuff. But it is sad that to program these days you generally have to jump through more hoops than you did thirty years ago. On the other hand, Apple has been great about helping new developers like me market their software. It might be harder to get started programming, but it's much easier now to go from programming to selling Apps.

John Ellis at Business Insider does better what I did here .

I haven't done much original political commentary recently. But here's a thought I'd like to share: Every single potential 2012 Republican presidential nominee seems to have some fatal flaw that would prevent them from securing the nomination. But the Republicans do have to nominate somebody , so at least one of these fatal flaws is not, in fact, fatal. Let's go through some of the potential candidates: Mitt Romney: Right now, Romney's fatal flaw is that his signature achievement as governor of Massachusetts is the passage of a health care bill that is quite similar in structure to the Affordable Health Care Act that has been demonized by the American Right. He's tried to talk about how his bill was different, and how what works for one state won't work for others, how it's constitutional for a state to impose an individual mandate but unconstitutional for the federal government to do so, etc. But I don't think Republican primary voters are buying i

I'm looking forward to this: The Game Begins I think an HBO series is a better way to adapt many novels than a movie. Movies have to leave so much out of a nove. And the next book coming out in July .

Old-school gaming blog Grognardia commemorated the 3rd anniversary of the passing of Gary Gygax by inviting readers to submit samples of "Gygaxian" prose. Here's a classic one commenter submitted from D3: Vault of the Drow : The small "star" nodes glow in radiant hues of mauve, lake, violet, puce, lilac, and deep blue. The large "moon" of tumkeoite casts beams of shimmering amethyst which touch the crystalline formations with colors unknown to any other visual experience. The lichens seem to glow in rose madder and pale damson, the fungi growths in golden and red ochres, vermillions, russets, citron, and aquamarine shades. (Elsewhere the river and other water courses sheen a deep velvety purple with reflected highlights from the radiant gleams overhead vying with streaks and whorls of old silver where the liquid laps the stony banks or surges against the ebon piles of the jetties and bridge of the elfin city for the viewers' attention.)

Chris Hayes via Kevin Drum : There are two numbers that go a long way toward explaining it. The first is 4.2. That’s the percentage of Americans with a four-year college degree who are unemployed....So while the overall economy continues to suffer through the worst labor market since the Great Depression, the elite centers of power have recovered. For those of us fortunate enough to have graduated from college—and to have escaped foreclosure or an underwater mortgage—normalcy has returned. The other number is 5.7 percent. That’s the unemployment rate for the Washington/Arlington/Alexandria metro area and just so happens to be lowest among large metropolitan areas in the entire country. ....What these two numbers add up to is a governing elite that is profoundly alienated from the lived experiences of the millions of Americans who are barely surviving the ravages of the Great Recession. As much as the pernicious influence of big money and the plutocrats’ pseudo-obsession w

What a useful concept! Gorbachev and de Klerk should start running seminars on how to be overthrown without destroying your country. And Gaddafi should sign up. Not that the former Soviet Union and South Africa are in great shape, but at least they didn't bathe their nations in a sea of blood trying to hold on to power. And that should count for something. Democracy, for all its faults, creates a mechanism by which government can be influenced even when it doesn't want to be influenced. Which is of course when it most needs it. You need the bottom-up feedback. This goes for all kinds of organizations, from nations to living organisms. Listen to your body (politic). Or it may use Facebook to plot your downfall.