Wednesday Morning Linkage

• Saudia Arabia seeks water in Ethiopia with violent consequences. Via Laleh Khalili.
• “Morsi and the Deep State.”
• The case for the US continuing a hard line against Cuba.
• First-image explanations for US strategic failure.
• Walt’s “Top 5 parties in World History” should include instead the celebration of the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis rather than “The Fields of the Cloth of Gold.”
• On SFF books that authors “didn’t love.”
• Classicists and reception studies.

And also:

• How important is blogging for academia? Extremely important, say Patrick Dunleavy and Chris Gilson.
• A petition to the White Houe aims to ban the construction of Death Stars.
• “World War I is the war of poetry and literature.”
• Andrew Yeo discusses a magisterial work of unparalleled brilliance — and not a few historical howlers.