ARTICLE: "With First Car, a New Life in China: Attracting New Respect and a Good Marriage," by Keith Bradsher, New York Times, 24 April 2008, p. C1.

Pretty standard stuff, by historical terms. Huntington says Western and modern are different, but more and more, Asia proves that surface similarities hide deeper ones. We keep looking for the political similarities, but the similarities in human needs (and what is economics but the meeting of human needs?) are stunning.

People get rich and they want respect for their accomplishment, which they externalize and internalize similarly the world over.

Go back far enough and big muscles and other outward signs of you (the male) being a good provider is what gets you a bride. Deal doesn't change that much when you get money; you just adorn yourself differently.

ARTICLE: "At Expense of All Others, Putin Picks a Church," by Clifford J. Levy, New York Times, 24 April 2008, p. A1.

The siloviki ("power guys") know only one thing: how to crush opposition. Getting power, they don't know much about wielding it, but getting it is all they're about, along with turning Russia into a business masquerading as a government.

Company town needs a company church.

Stupid and pointless effort to homogenize religion.

Putin really isn't smart, just paranoid. He wields power very unimpressively, dominating things he has now requirement to control.

As one Russian reader commenting on the story put it best, this is mostly about the Russian Orthodox Church, a weak-ass institution if ever there was one, seeking religious protectionism: "The Russian Orthodox Church chose a simple and efficient method of building up its might—instead of going to the people, it went to the authorities."

Religious protectionism gets you an uncompetitive, non-service-friendly religion. Over time, that becomes a drag on all sorts of needed social upgrades and improvements in efficiency.

ARTICLE: "Pentagon Seeks Authority to Train and Equip Foreign Militaries," by Thom Shanker, New York Times, 16 April 2008, p. A8.

The task previously owned by State (til 2003), but let's get real: DoD should be in charge of training foreign militaries, so program rights extended and made permanent by Congress. The give was promised to shift some DoD bucks to pay for State Department-led joint program to build up civilian expertise for SysAdmin work. Watch State run that idea into the ground.

But I thought, in the vein of Army Chief of Staff General Casey, that the U.S. wasn't going to make future efforts to train foreign militaries like in Iraq? That's why we don't need a military advisory corps suggested by Nagl?

Hmmm.

Seems like the one-off crowd loses again. I just wish the Pentagon could get its story straight.

ARTICLE: Russian Output Slumps As Oil Hits New Highs," by Guy Chazan and Neil King Jr., Wall Street Journal, 15 April 2008, p. A1.

As always, I'm shocked—SHOCKED!

INTERNATIONAL: "The Opium Brides of Afghanistan: In the country's poppy-growing provinces, farmers are being forced to sell their daughters to pay loans," by Sami Yousafzai and Ron Moreau, Newsweek, 7 April 2008, p. 38.

The story quotes one local saying that his five-year-old is worth $500-600. Sad indeed.

+ Andrew Sullivan linked Speaking of growing food dependency …
+ And linked Remember the bit in Esquire about "if your grad degree involved a lot of memorization"?

+ The Politics of Scrabble linked Rock and a hard place.
+ And linked last week's column.

+ Indistinct Union linked Our leadership is needed now more than ever.
+ And linked McCain could easily destroy globalization.

+ zenpundit recommended What I think I learn at the company retreat.
+ SWJ Blog linked Great article on unflat world.
+ The Charleston (WV) Gazette cites Tom's article on Fallon.
+ Fear and Loathing in the Blogosphere calls Zakaria's new book as much of a must-read as PNM.
+ Exploded Clown wonders what Matthew Yglesias thinks of Tom's ideas.
+ Cyberhillbilly also linked Rock and a hard place.
+ Growth Matters linked Throw Momma under the surge.
+ The Duck of Minerva ties Core/Gap to Firefly/Serenity.
+ SWJ Blog linked Alarmist on Iran, except...
+ So did Quality Leadership Weblog.
+ Left Flank linked PNM.
+ Dean Barnett (no relation) wonders (I think) if Obama is advocating Tom's idea to add more states to the Union.
+ Catherine Lionheart recommended BFA.
+ Advisory Bored added this weblog to his blogroll.
+ Epistemic Games also linked Remember the bit in Esquire about "if your grad degree involved a lot of memorization"?

+ Rainbow Boys (there's some weird stuff going on over there ;-) embedded the TED talk.
+ So did DailyDigital.
+ Brian Smith linked it.
+ MarifasaLupina dugg it.

+ World Messenger says Tom's one of the Illuminati. Yes!
+ Filing among those who confuse tactics with strategy, we find this please-take-my-blog-seriously entry from Registan.net who took great exception with Connectors v. Disconnectors.

Did you notice I expanded Tom's website recommendations? The lucky devils:

Andrew Sullivan
China Law Blog
Outside the Beltway
Danger Room
Phil Windley
Gunnar Peterson

(Phil and Gunnar: if you want a different name/title, drop me a line or comment here.)

ARTICLE: "U.S. Accepts International Criminal Court," by Jess Bravin, Wall Street Journal, 26-27 April 2008, p. A5A.

Hold your horses!

State's chief lawyer now says the U.S. "must acknowledge that the ICC enjoys a large body of international support."

Well, duh!

Same guy gave the usual bitch list to boot, so don't hold your breath on hearing Bush or Cheney make any different noises on the subject.

Bush-Cheney "unsigned" the Rome Statute setting up the ICC in 2002, and Bush then signed legislation "authorizing military action, should the court arrest an American."

Nice, but par for the neocon course.

But I suppose years of Abu Ghraib and Gitmo stories do soften the administration up a bit.

All the prez candidates make similar noises while offering similar bitch lists--wah wah wah!

The only reason why we can't "submit" to the ICC is because we don't want anyone telling us when we can employ our military might.

If you want that kind of freedom, you better expect balancing.

And when you can't afford your military, expect others to "vote" down your implied global service by making it harder for you to float public debt. Other powers will simply stop paying for the service—unless they see it offered according to some mutually agreed-upon rule set.

The ICC is one such rule set. We ignore it at our strategic risk.

ARTICLE: "China Moves To Prop Up Stock Market By Paring Tax," by James T. Areddy, Wall Street Journal, 24 April 2008, p. C1.

Still crude, but better than hanging some executives in a stadium.

ARTICLE: "850,000 lawsuits in the making: Chinese firms and lawyers warm to intellectual property," The Economist, 12 April 2008, p. 74.

ARTICLE: "U.S. Says China, Russia Lag On Intellectual-Property Crime," by Corey Boles, Wall Street Journal, 26-27 April 2008, p. A5A.

In 2003, Chinese trademark applications grow by 60%, resulting in twice as many patents granted (850,000). Meanwhile, court cases jump from 7-8,000 in 2003 to about 18,000 in 2007. China recently open 50 courts just to deal with IP cases.

Who cleans up the most? Chinese lawyers, naturally.

Still, the U.S. can and should continue to complain. Naturally, the "priority watch list" put out by our trade rep office features New Core (China, Russia, Argentina, Chile, India) and Seam States (Pakistan, Thailand, Venezuela) and that way too entrepreneurial island of Coredom deep inside the Gap—Israel.

ARTICLE: "Bush Silent, but Others Speak Out on Tibet Crackdown," by Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Somini Sengupta, New York Times, 22 March 2008, p. A3.

When the U.S. gave the Dalai Lama the gold medal last fall, part of Bush's give to the Chinese was to promise to come to the Olympics no matter what—a secret side deal. Not publicized but known in diplomatic circles.

That's why Bush is remaining so cool on the whole Tibet deal, which was a sensible response anyway.

Buying wings but operating rotors

If I told you that improvised explosive devices (IEDs) were the leading cause of U.S. casualties in Iraq, you'd expect the Pentagon would have mounted a major R&D effort to defeat this threat. And you'd be right.

If I told you that helicopter crashes and shoot-downs were the leading cause of U.S. casualties in Afghanistan, you'd expect the Pentagon would have mounted a major R&D to defeat that threat as well. But you'd be wrong.

Read on at KnoxNews.

Can't find it at Scripps Howard, but here's a version picked up by the Abilene Reporter-News. I liked my title better ;-)

After 3 days with Enterra staff at retreat, I head to Dulles and check in for my 1645 United flight to Indy.

I check in, entering my FF#, whose absence I found strange.

The machine asks me if I checked luggage from my "incoming flight"--also puzzling. I said no.

Then I ask for receipt and it listed me flying in from Vienna. It also said my flight cost 2100 Euros.

I question the United checker. She can't figure it out. I call Jenn, and she said UA kept telling her I was already scheduled on the flight. But United charged us $550 on my AMEX, and the receipt I held listed a VISA.

Hmmm.

Lady then checks to make sure there's not 2 Thomas Barnetts. No, she says, you're the only one.

So I check the bag, go through Clear Traveler (very nice at Dulles because you go through a separate crew security gate), and then head to Terminal A.

I resist the Five Guys temptation (burgers) and start blogging. Flight is called and I step up. Ticket taker gets weird alert, but checks again and it's okay, so I head to plane.

Then we're turned back and told mechanical delay, so back into terminal.

Then we're called again and I show stub and board.

Get to 13F and see middle-aged (roughly same age) white guy who's maybe 5'11" (I'm 6'2"), slightly balding, neatly dressed business casual in my seat. So I figure he can have window and I'll take aisle.

Then burly guy shows up with crewcut and says politely that I must be in his seat. I tell guy in my seat and he shows us his 13F. Burly guy seems to know him, even defer, and so I point out that I have 13F too.

Then I notice "Thomas Barnett," plus "premier executive," plus my FF#.

Burly guy, apparently junior to my namesake, volunteers to go up and report problem. I watch and see that steward seats him up front.

All these voices start commenting from behind in a manner I instantly recognize as military, and I realize this guy is the crew's senior officer.

Steward comes back, collects tickets, demands ID, and then just laughs, saying this is first time in his many years that two people with the same names are boarded to occupy the same seat.

They let us both stay on, to my amazement, because the flight seemed full.

Thomas Barnett turns out to be an Army National Guard officer coming back from a year in Kosovo with his comrades, heading home ultimately to Kansas. He had been under the overall command of Admiral Harry Ulrich until Harry retired at the end of 2007 and joined Enterra.

Weird, huh?

And some top-notch security all around, I'd have to say.