A Thinking Reed

"Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed" – Blaise Pascal

War & Peace

  • Can we know if our wars are just?

    This post by Kelley Vlahos at The American Conservative looks at attempts to assess the number of civilians killed by U.S. “drones” in Pakistan and Yemen. She notes that the Obama administration has not exactly been forthcoming with estimates of the number of civilians killed–either because they aren’t tracking it or aren’t willing to make Read more

  • Foreign policy and the Golden Rule

    Even though I argued in my previous post that liberals are under no particular obligation to support Ron Paul (e.g., vote for him), I do agree with those who say that he is raising important issues and has a perspective that needs to be heard, particularly with respect to foreign policy. In a recent post Read more

  • What would it mean for progressives to “support” Ron Paul?

    There’s been a bit of back and forth recently in the left/progressive blogosphere about whether people who meet that particular description should “support” libertarian Texas Republican congressman Ron Paul’s candidacy for president. Andrew Sullivan, Glenn Greenwald, and others have expressed varying degrees of support for Paul’s candidacy, noting that his stances on civil liberties and Read more

  • White House: dropping bombs on Libya isn’t “hostilities”

    The New York Times is reporting that President Obama has chosen to disregard, or at least overrule, the view of some of the top lawyers in his administration on the legality of the continuing war in Libya. The head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel and the General Counsel of the Defense Department Read more

  • Friday Links

    –With the death of bin Laden, the U.S. has accomplished the aims that justified the war in Afghanistan. Time to leave. –An interview with “eco-economist” Herman Daly: Rethinking growth. –A primer on Christian nonviolence. –The collapse of the “progressive Christian” big tent? –The Presbyterian Church (USA) voted to allow non-celibate gay and lesbians to serve Read more

  • Justice, just war, and the killing of Osama bin Laden

    This story asks whether it’s wrong to celebrate bin Laden’s death. It quotes, among others, moral philosopher Christine Korsgaard who says: “Most people believe that the killing we do in war is justified as the only way to disable an enemy whose cause we believe to be unjust…. And although it is more controversial, many Read more

  • bin Laden

    Clearly no American is going to shed any tears for Osama bin Laden, me included. And based on the president’s statement last night, it sounds like the operation that got him was of the right kind–targeted, based on sound intelligence, avoiding both American and civilian casualties. If we’re going to fight terrorism, this is vastly Read more

  • Mission creep watch

    This is shaping up to be quite the splendid little war: European nations stepped up efforts Wednesday to aid Libyan rebels, with France pledging to intensify airstrikes against the forces of Moammar Gaddafi, and Italy joining the French and British in announcing plans to help train and organize the rebel fighters. […] The Obama administration Read more

  • Friday Links

    I spent the day hanging out with my family, so these are coming a little late… –Why Rep. Paul Ryan’s budget proposal is neither brave nor serious. –Free-range meat isn’t necessarily “natural.” –A case for universalism from the Scottish evangelical preacher and biblical scholar William Barclay. –A review of a recent book called What’s the Read more

  • Mission creep watch, the continuing series

    From today’s WaPo: An operation billed as a humanitarian intervention in Libya by President Obama was described in starkly more military terms Thursday by the administration’s top two defense officials. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates told lawmakers that continuing coalition attacks on Libyan government troops — even when they were not directly threatening civilians — Read more