The Third Depression?

There was the Long Depression, then the Great Depression, and the 2008 winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics argues that we are now in the early stages of a third depression because of a failure of policy. Read The New York Times, The Third Depression.

Our Afghanistan Strategy is Not McCrystal Clear

UPDATE III: "What exactly was McChrystal fired for? A closer read of Rolling Stone's article shows bad judgment. But insubordination?" Read The New York Times, Media Decoder: McChrystal’s Quality Time With Rolling Stone: Impertinent? Check. Insubordinate? Maybe Not.


UPDATE II: For an interesting take on the changing role of the media, especially as it relates to the McCrystal story in Rolling Stone, read The New York Times, The Culture of Exposure, which concludes that "the exposure ethos, with its relentless emphasis on destroying privacy and exposing impurities, has chased good people from public life, undermined public faith in institutions and elevated the trivial over the important. "

As my Mama always said, watch who you kvetch with.


UPDATE: "Although McChrystal is a fine soldier who rendered especially distinguished service in Iraq, there is no reason to ascribe to him either egomania or insubordination. He did, however, emphatically disqualify himself from further military service and particularly from service in Afghanistan. There the military's purely military tasks are secondary to the political and social tasks for which the military is ill-suited, and for which McChrystal is garishly so. " Read the Washington Post, McChrystal had to go.

Gen. McCrystal's impertinent comments renew attention on that other war. For more read:

Washington Post, A flawed strategy and a failed war in Afghanistan;

The New York Times, Karzai Is Said to Doubt West Can Defeat Taliban;

Washington Post, U.S. indirectly paying Afghan warlords as part of security contract;

Washington Post, The wound McChrystal opened;

The New York Times, General Faces Unease Among His Own Troops, Too; and

The New York Times, What’s Second Prize?.

McCrystal is the one who wanted the 'surge' in Afganistan, so Obama should have left him in charge. Now if things look as bleak next year, Republi-cons will blame failure on the change of commanders.