Dominique Moisi has long been one of the most nuanced of French geopolitical analysts, even if in the French context he is often branded as excessively Atlanticist. In the Financial Times he calls for a radically altered stance from the French government.
“War is now inevitable. Instead of trying to stand in its way, Europe should try to limit the damage. Europe’s leaders should work together and with the Americans to preserve European unity and shield the transatlantic alliance from the effects of the crisis. We have been burning too many bridges; it is time to start rebuilding them.”
On the same page (although hidden behind a subscriber-only wall) Philip Stephens reckons matters have spun out of control for both sides of the current European divide. “Mr Blair and Jacques Chirac share the same ambition to constrain American power. They want a US willing to temper its unique primacy with respect for the wishes and judgments of its allies — and for an international rule of law. The divide is over tactics. The British prime minister believes that the US must be chained into the international system now. Mr CHirac has concluded that the system is not worth saving if it is so blatantly an instrument of American hegemony Mr Bush will win his war. Mr Blair and Mr Chirac will both be losers.”
Arnold Schoenberg: “My music is not modern; it is only badly played.”
There’s been an enormous amount of comment on two recently posted documents: World of Ends, by Doc Searls and David Weinberger, and The Pentagon’s New Map, by Thomas Barnett. I’m still digesting World of Ends. On the New Map, I agree that it’s largely a cogent restating of what has already been amply documented about the new strategic doctrine of the Bush administration.
Fascinatingly, Tom Coates has linked the two together, to ask whether regulation of the freedoms of the global economy is analogous to regulation of the freedoms of the Internet. As someone who believes in the largely positive effects of globalisation, I’m not sure I agree with Coates’s premise, but I find the connection he has spotted envigorating. Particularly worth noting is Doc Searls’s comment on Coates’s site about the Strict Father morality of the US government today (third comment down — there’s no permalink to comments).
Roger Ebert (of all people): “Under Bush we have had a great deal of horizontal prayer, in which we evoke the deity at political events to send the sideways message that our enemies had better look out, because God is on our side.”
Headline in today’s New York Times: A Senior Aide to Blair Says She May Quit. Of course it demonstrates the Times’s archaic headline style, but how could anyone describe a cabinet minister as an aide? Would they write about Colin Powell as a senior aide to Bush?