Morning Linkage

23 July 2012, 1410 EDT

MANOS: The Hands of Fate is supposedly getting an iOS game. But fans of MST3K are probably much more excited about the Rifftrax live MANOS event on August 16.
Dan Drezner takes on the ridiculous Jennifer Rubin piece on how Romney should attack Obama foreign policy. Drezner has regular commentators who are better conservative foreign-policy critics than the people dominating MSM op-ed space.
Andrew Yeo responds to Jennifer Lind’s analysis of the ROK-Japan treaty debacle. I think Andrew’s probably right, and that Jennifer likely got excited by the alternative line given to her by some of her sources.
Robert Beckhusen at Danger Room says that US BMD may force Chinese missile modernization. Of course, they already have plenty of incentives for modernizing their nuclear-delivery capabilities, let alone their conventional missiles. And the US doesn’t want its system to give it first-strike capability against great-power arsenals. So, Meh.
Robert W. Glover writes about the implications of complex-systems analysis for international-relations theory. It seems to me that Duck writers and bloggers would have interesting perspectives to contribute.
Dani Rodrik weighs in on the “great Baltic economic policy debate,” at least with respect to Latvia.
Juan Cole asks if Bachmann could cost the Romney the Presidency. The answer is “no.”
Yes, you should probably just subscribe to Tim Burke’s feed, but… this time he takes the rah-rah out of contemporary higher-ed techno-optimism and makes it cry for mercy: “Do you really WANT TO SAVE SOME MONEY using INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY?”
Hans-Inge Langø likes defense-spending cuts in the context of comprehensive assessment. Sequestration? Not so much.
I miss the blogging stylings of Coming Anarchy. What happened to the blog?
J. Scott Shipman reviewed The Twilight War at zenpundit ten days ago, but what the heck.
Also older, but worth linking to, the Clinton bylined piece at the New Statesmen on US “smart power” efforts.
Edward Wong at the New York Times on growing pressure within China to end the “one child” policy.
It isn’t just acidification that’s altering marine ecosystems; heat waves pose another threat.
In case you missed it, I explained the experiment in podcasting and how to subscribe.
If you have suggestions for blogs to add to my revived RSS feed, let me know.

Dan Nexon

Daniel H. Nexon is a Professor at Georgetown University, with a joint appointment in the Department of Government and the School of Foreign Service. His academic work focuses on international-relations theory, power politics, empires and hegemony, and international order. He has also written on the relationship between popular culture and world politics.

He has held fellowships at Stanford University's Center for International Security and Cooperation and at the Ohio State University's Mershon Center for International Studies. During 2009-2010 he worked in the U.S. Department of Defense as a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow. He was the lead editor of International Studies Quarterly from 2014-2018.

He is the author of The Struggle for Power in Early Modern Europe: Religious Conflict, Dynastic Empires, and International Change (Princeton University Press, 2009), which won the International Security Studies Section (ISSS) Best Book Award for 2010, and co-author of Exit from Hegemony: The Unraveling of the American Global Order (Oxford University Press, 2020). His articles have appeared in a lot of places. He is the founder of the The Duck of Minerva, and also blogs at Lawyers, Guns and Money.