In the midst of the healthcare debate in Congress, other business does go on (sort of), including a subcommittee hearing on drone warfare, at which I’ll be testifying, along with some other experts, including the author of the seminal Wired for War, which put the issue of robotics and war squarely on the table. I’ll […]
Author Archive | Kenneth Anderson
Greenspan’s ‘The Crisis’ and Modigliani and Miller
I just finished reading Alan Greenspan’s paper for the spring Brookings economics confab, The Crisis, and then a bunch of reactions around the econo-blogosphere. The paper is well worth reading – it’s time to get beyond the blame game and the mea culpas and mea non-culpas, in order to get to longer term regulatory reform. […]
No Righteous Gentile Awards, Please
I’ve refrained so far from commenting on the Liz Cheney – AQ7 ad, but I want to make one lengthy statement on it and, I hope, leave it at that. (Background to this kerfuffle. At this point, there is the initial AQ7 ad, then a group response letter drafted by Ben Wittes of the Brookings […]
Telos Returns to ‘New Class’ Analysis and the Critique of the ‘Wholly-Administered Society”
The critical theory journal, Telos, returns to one of its earliest themes, the critique of what its editors in the 1970s and 80s termed the “wholly-administered society” and “New Class” analysis. It shifted away from those themes and modes of analysis for a long time, but it has re-opened that discussion with a bang. Editor […]
Happy Pi Day
March 14, Pi Day. 3.141 … also, of course, the return of daylight savings time. I regret the lost hour, and the sense of weird jet lag, and it would be great if there were any sun rather than a third day of rain, but still, light in the evening! Life can go on. I’m […]
My Contribution to the NYT ‘Room for Debate’ Blog on the AQ7 Argument
By Kenneth Anderson on March 10, 2010 2:08 pm in Counter-Terrorism Policy, Public Interest Law, War on Terror
I’ll post up something fuller on my views about the AQ7 debate, but for now, here is my contribution at the New York Times’s “Room for Debate” blog. (Like Orin, I’m a signer on the original letter objecting to the AQ7 ad.)
A Federal Receivership for a State?
Query to readers. Over at Slate Explainer, Christopher Beam explains that although municipalities and cities and such can go bankrupt under the Federal bankruptcy code, states are not included under Chapter 9. Right, got it. He then adds something I don’t doubt is true, but wonder if readers can point me to the relevant legal […]
Two Views of Credit Default Swaps
Two items in today’s Wall Street Journal (Tuesday, March 9, 2010) capture two different views of regulatory reform of credit default swaps. The first is the emerging European view: European leaders pushed for a ban on speculative bets against government debt following recent financial turmoil in Greece … German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Tuesday that […]
Drone Warfare and the Harvard National Security Conference
By Kenneth Anderson on March 9, 2010 1:51 pm in Counter-Terrorism Policy, Robotics, Targeted Killing, Terrorism, War and Armed Conflict, War on Terror
I’m writing from Cambridge, where I just finished a great short conference on targeted killing and drone warfare put on by the Harvard Law School National Security Law Society and Journal. The presentations should go up as video one of these days I hope!) and I highly recommend them if you are studying this topic. […]
Tyler Cowen in the Times Literary Supplement
My congratulations to Tyler Cowen on his lovely essay in the TLS of February 26, 2010, a review of John Lanchester, “Whoops! – Why everyone owes everyone and no one can pay.” Behind the subscriber wall, alas, but it is an intriguing, elegant review and has caused me to go order the book. (IOU rather […]
Defining Aggression for the International Criminal Court
Over at Opinio Juris, an interesting exchange on the question of defining the crime of aggression as part of the International Criminal Court statute. Professor Michael Glennon discusses his Yale Journal of International Law article, The Blank-Prose Crime of Aggression, and Carrie McDougall, Larry Johnson, and Anthony Arend respond. I broadly agree with Professor Glennon, […]
Predators over Pakistan, My New Weekly Standard Essay
By Kenneth Anderson on February 28, 2010 3:47 pm in Counter-Terrorism Policy, International Human Rights Law, International Law, Robotics, Targeted Killing, Terrorism, War and Armed Conflict, War on Terror
Well, “polemic” is probably closer to it. Regular readers have been hearing about this piece for a while, and I have posted various arguments from it (concerning targeted killing and Predator drones and the CIA and armed conflict and self-defense, and my general concern that the Obama administration has embraced a policy that its lawyers […]
Michael Weiss’ WSJ Comment on Amnesty International
We’ve had several posts at VC on Amnesty International and the controversy over its alliance with a former Guantanamo detainee and his organization, Cageprisoners. As a follow-up, see today’s WSJ comment by Michael Weiss, “Amnesty International and the Taliban.” I agree with its general disapproval of how Amnesty has behaved – Weiss is mild-mannered but […]
Drones as Strategic Airpower and the Counter-Raiding Light Cavalry?
By Kenneth Anderson on February 25, 2010 10:43 am in Counter-Terrorism Policy, International Human Rights Law, Targeted Killing, War on Terror
David Rittgers, a Cato legal analyst and former Special Forces officer, has an excellent op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal on the use of Predator drones. He cautions, on the one hand, against reflexively regarding drone attacks as nonjudicial execution or, really, functionally different from other weapons that soldiers might use – as well as […]
FCIC Hearings at American University
I would be remiss if I did not announce that the Congressionally-chartered Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission (FCIC) will be holding expert hearings this Friday and Saturday, February 26-27, at Washington College of Law, American University, Washington DC. The experts include some of the country’s leading economists, and it should be an impressive set of presentations. […]