Georgia Teachers Guilty of Grade Inflation

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution explains what is happening.

Economist Scott Beaulier explains why it is happening.

Why Can't I Get Laid Off By IBM?

It doesn't sound too bad.

The Mind of a Neo-Con

Daniel Larison examines one.

What Are They Eating in Japan?

Maybe I should start eating the same thing.

He's No Buddy Rich

Christian Bale is but a pale shadow of the true master of the profanity laced rant.

How Not to Lose in Afghanistan

Great New York Times symposium with various defense and foreign policy gurus.

Parag Khanna has the most realistic and depressing take:

Even if an additional 30,000 American and NATO troops were deployed in southern and eastern Afghanistan, the Taliban problem would not be reduced. It would merely be pushed back over the Pakistan border, destabilizing Pakistan’s already volatile North-West Frontier Province, which itself is more populous than Iraq. This amounts to squeezing a balloon on one end to inflate it on the other.

The tribal militias, newly armed with Chinese AK-47s, will not be able to cope with that influx. Even now, the increase in attacks on NATO convoys in Peshawar and the Khyber Pass show how the Afghan front is seriously affected by American policies in Pakistan. Fewer arms from the United States (the Obama administration intends to emphasize civilian over military aid) have diminished the Pakistani military’s willingness to support American supply routes, forcing the U.S. military to scramble for new routes through Russia, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan.

Here's a discussion of the pieces at the Small Wars Journal.

Eight Years of Necocon Foreign Policy

Willaim Dalrymple reviews "Descent Into Chaos: The United States and the Failure of Nation Building in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Central Asia and writes

Eight years of neocon foreign policies have been a spectacular disaster for American interests in the Islamic world, leading to the rise of Iran as a major regional power, the advance of Hamas and Hezbollah, the wreckage of Iraq, with over two million external refugees and the ethnic cleansing of its Christian population, and now the implosion of Afghanistan and Pakistan, probably the most dangerous development of all.

It's not funny because it's true. Let's see what the next four (or eight) years of Democrat neocons can do.

Time Lapse Baby

Here's One for You, Ron