zenpundit.com

A PLETHORA OF PARAMILITARIES

This is probably not cutting edge information but it is a good program of Iraq’s privately organized armed groups. Can’t tell the players without a scorecard.

Hat tip to Dave Dilegge at The Small Wars Journal

RETROSPECTIVE ON THE FRENCH RIOTS

Most of the commentary on the rioting in France seemed to focus on the socioeconomic angle, something very comfortable politically to American liberals as it recalled the racial discrimination that created the 1960’s ” long hot summer” riots in this country. The second largest segment of opinion dealt with Islamism in France which American conservatives harkened to as it fit the current War on Terror framework. Very few commenters, notably John Robb, discussed the role of criminal gangs controlling TAZ in French suburbs for years, in spreading the riots.

I thought I would put forth some of the more provocative evaluations on the riots from some different ideological and theoretical perspectives that emerged as the rioting ebbed.

” Haaretz Interview with Alain Finkielkraut” via Marc at The American Future

“Why Paris is Burning” by Mark A. LeVine at HNN

” C’est la Guerre ” by William Lind at DNI

“Reflections on the Riots in France” by Dr. Michael Scheuer in U.S Cavalry On Point

My own commentary, circa day 10, can be found here.

Interestingly enough, the high rise public housing in some poor French suburbs is a very familiar sight to me or anyone from Chicago, resembling the 1950’s and 1960’s housing projects like Cabrini Green and the Robert Taylor Homes built by the first Daley administration. The solution to gang-rule and drug trade warfare in these buildings ultimately was to begin demolishing them; neither the city of Chicago’s very tough police department nor the Feds were ever able to reestablish order there after the 1980’s. Even the much publicized ” move-in” to Cabrini of Mayor Jane Byrne which flooded the projects with uniformed and plainclothes police, could not break the grip of Chicago’s paramilitary street gangs like the Vice Lords, the Black Gangster Disciples and the El Rukns over the projects.

It will be interesting to see if the French state can impose its rule-sets in these suburban zones that the French government itself admits have been beyond their effective grasp or if ultimately they will try a ” tear down and disperse” solution along with social and assimilation programs.

COMMENTARY’S 60TH ANNIVERSARY SYMPOSIUM

This is pretty impressive. Commentary asembled the following public figures to debate and evaluate the Bush Doctrine:

Paul Berman, Max Boot, William F. Buckley, Jr., Eliot A. Cohen, Niall Ferguson, Aaron L. Friedberg, Francis Fukuyama, Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., Reuel Marc Gerecht, Victor Davis Hanson, Owen Harries, Mark Helprin
Daniel Henninger, Stanley Hoffmann, Josef Joffe, Paul Johnson, Robert Kagan, William Kristol, Robert J. Lieber, Richard Lowry, Edward N. Luttwak, Joshua Muravchik, John O’Sullivan, Martin Peretz
Richard Perle, Daniel Pipes, Richard Pipes, Norman Podhoretz, David Pryce-Jones, Arch Puddington, Natan Sharansky, Amir Taheri, Ruth Wedgwood, George Weigel, James Q. Wilson, R. James Woolsey

BLOGGING AS A NETWORK OF INFLUENCE

Dan of tdaxp had an interesting post reflecting on his victory over Nationmaster after numerous blogs including Zenpundit began piling on in his defense. Quoting from an article on the recent flap over Sony’s XCP debacle, Dan posted ( quote in italics; Dan in regular text):

” ‘It seems crystal clear that but for the citizen journalists, Sony never would have done anything about this,” says Fred von Lohmann, senior intellectual property attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a cyber liberties advocacy group that has been vocal in its condemnation of Sony and may eventually file a a lawsuit against Sony, in addition to three that have already been filed.

“It’s plain to me that it was Sony’s intent to brush the story under the rug and forget about it.”Alan Scott, chief marketing office at business information service Factiva, said, “I think that we’re in an entirely new world from a marketing perspective. The rules of the game have changed dramatically. The old way of doing things by ignoring issues, or with giving the canned PR spin response within the blogosphere, it just doesn’t work.’

Without blogs, rough-shod corporations and politicians like Activa Holdings and Chris Welch could even get away with harmful lawsuits without any consequences.The Citizen-Media, also known as the blogosphere, is an important leveler, extending connectivity to those other than the Main-Stream Media and the Main-Stream Corporations”

In my view Dan is correct but he has not taken his analysis nearly far enough. In fairness though, the premise that the blogosphere is the power of vox populi incarnate is shared by the bicoastal media elite who look on with as much horror and loathing as Dan does admiration and wonder. The everyman is really irrelevant here and if Dan was only an everyman he’d have received a subpeona from NationMaster’s corporate shyster squad by now.

The number of blogs in existence is currently estimated at about 60-70 million plus. Most are admittedly, mind-numbing dreck written by 13 year old girls, spamblogs and mercifully short-lived experiments in public whining by twentysomethings in bad relationships – but that still leaves tens of millions of sober, rational bloggers, trying to get noticed. Out of that unruly horde – a larger than many nation-states – tdaxp is # 999 on the planet ! Think about the Social Darwinian implications of that stement. Any blogger who is, with regularity, interesting enough to be in the top 5000 is above the common herd.

For example, my blogroll contains: enough PhD’s to fill several departments at a large university, including one Nobel Prize winner; two nationally known defense intellectuals; several physicists; other scientists; a number of legal experts; an eminent federal judge, numerous historians; combat veterans; several journalists at medium sized city newspapers, including one editorial page editor; diplomats; computer/IT experts, a professional economist; linguists and at least one philosopher. A fair amount of collective brainpower by any measure.

The blogosphere does not empower the average person, it empowers the above average person who previously would – by chance, occupation or geography – have been excluded from having any siginificant input into the larger culture. The centralized old media of the big three networks by and large took their cue from the editorial page New York Times, as did the metropolitan newspapers of a hundred smaller cities. The Eastern Establishment truly shaped public opinion once upon a time. A few voices carried then – Walter Lipmann, Joseph Alsop, Walter Cronkite, Ben Bradlee, “Punch” Sulzberger – there were others but it was a pretty damn short list. The Establishment’s superficially diversified heirs still shape the debate to a considerable extent but with two significant changes:

a) They have lost their monopoly on the determination of the bounds of acceptable public discourse

and

b) The very bright or accomplished citizens- formally just isolated local influencers -who might never have met prior to the blogosphere, being scattered throughout the nation( or the world) now connect and form durable networks. Left or Right, this cultural “outlier elite” rejects much of what the MSM elite has to offer.

The blogosphere is an aggregator of intelligence and influence. Primarly, for the moment, blogging is an amusement for these talented individuals but when they are threatened or offended they can respond with surprising speed and intensity. Just ask John Kerry or Dan Rather. Or Trent Lott. They are not the general public which is why the corporate P.R. routine and bigshot bluster backfires so badly with bloggers.

Eventually, some shortsighted fool in the Federal government will make some arrogant gesture that will really outrage these potential leaders and all the latent strength and ability will crystallize as a blogospheric party – an organized faction that will be energized enough to create a political upheaval on par with 1932 or 1980.

Wait and see.

FRIDAY

Spending the day with The Son of Zenpundit in his world of hot wheels, Batman, nerf basketball, The Incredibles, beginning reading books and the various and sundry activities of an active and curious pre-school boy.

Posting will commence later tonight when the tyke and his sibling have gone to bed.