RE: Some interesting academic political essays

From: Lawrence DeBivort (debivort@umd5.umd.edu)
Date: Sun 10 Nov 2002 - 02:44:33 GMT

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    Pollack was on the Clinton National Security Council, for the Middle East. He has turned into quite a hawk on Iraq - one of the more thoughtful ones. He is not greatly knowledgeable about the Middle East except for its most recent US-related history, where he is very good. His book is probably the best case for Bush's Iraq posture, but weak on the political impacts of such a move. His thinking focuses on the WMD and preemptive action themes.

    "Saddam's Bombmaker" has been out for quite a while. It is a mixed bag of fact, spin, and fiction, and if one can discern which is what, the book is very interesting. It was one of the first exposes of Saddam that caught the public eye, and had a big impact on the US hawks.

    FYI, the Policy Review, which comes out of Stanford's Hoover Institute, is generally and unabashedly right-wing, as is the Institute. The Policy Review was started as a counter to Foreign Affairs. I'm not sure what the left-wing counter to Foreign Affairs is. They all try to publish articles written by Washington insiders and supportive academics.

    The Hoover Institute has one of the great collections of Middle Eastern primary materials.

    Cheers, Lawry

    -----Original Message----- From: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk [mailto:fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk]On Behalf Of Scott Chase Sent: Saturday, November 09, 2002 9:00 PM To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: Some interesting academic political essays

    >From: "Grant Callaghan" <grantc4@hotmail.com>
    >Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    >To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    >Subject: Re: Some interesting academic political essays
    >Date: Sat, 09 Nov 2002 17:26:57 -0800
    >
    >>
    >>http://www.policyreview.org/OCT02/asmus.html
    >>
    >
    >I don't know who Ronald D. Asmus and Kenneth M. Pollack are, but their New
    >Transatlantic Project makes more sense than anything else I've seen on the
    >subject. Now, if we can just get the government to take a step back and
    >look at the issues from a similar perspective there seems to be some hope
    >for the future of the Middle East.
    >
    >
    Kenneth Pollack has a new book called _Threatening Storm: The Case for Invading Iraq_ which I almost bought yesterday while at the bookstore. I opted for a new biography on Arik instead, but there's always next time. Another book called _Saddam's Bombmaker(?)_ sounds interesting too.

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