Pamela Sargent

Professor Juan Cole argues here that Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul's fundraising success is fueled not only by opposition to the war in Iraq, but also by Bush's abuse of government's functions, thus making anarchism seem increasingly attractive.

Listened yesterday to a speech of Paul Krugman's on American Public Media's Word for Word. Turned out to be unexpectedly uplifting and heartening, as is this superb review by Michael Tomasky.

There are eulogies galore for Norman Mailer, but one of my personal favorites is "The Big Guy," blogger Phil Nugent's appreciation.

Over at his blog at the Atlantic's site, Matthew Yglesias reminds us that "smart correspondents have made the point that one of the...oddities of western press coverage of Benazir Bhutto is that you tend not to hear about how she's a huge crook. Corruption in a middle-income country, of course, is nothing new and Pakistan in general is not a paragon of good governance. Still, the best of my knowledge Bhutto and her husband [Asif Zardari] stand out as unusually corrupt by Pakistani standards, which is precisely how she wound up ejected from power."

Yglesias links to an article by the New York Times's John F. Burns, published on January 9, 1998--a long piece, but extremely illuminating.

I am a bit late in getting to this, but Frank Rich's New York Times column of last Sunday, about coups in Pakistan and the US, resonated with Naomi Wolf's even more alarming piece at the Huffington Post about growing restrictions on travel and what they might portend.

Rich writes, "Wrong track is a euphemism. We are a people in clinical depression. Americans know that the ideals that once set our nation apart from the world have been vandalized, and no matter which party they belong to, they do not see a restoration anytime soon."

My Genghis Khan novel Ruler of the Sky will finally get reissued in the U.S. My agent just informed me that a company called Boyston Books, located in Manhattan, wants to bring out a new edition, and they have obtained hardcover and trade paperback rights.

In the meantime, if you read German, check out this edition; Ruler has just been reissued yet again in Germany.

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has issued its report, and the news is even worse than many of these scientists expected. This is the most important issue the world faces right now. I wish that I could believe we're up to meeting the challenge.

The BBC has posted a draft of the executive summary of the report here.

Fatima Bhutto, Benazir Bhutto's niece, does not have a high opinion of her aunt, to put it mildly, and worries here about what her return means for the future of Pakistan.

My paper copy of The Nation arrived on Monday, in which various writers make the case for their chosen candidates. As it happens, The Nation has also posted all the contributions at their site, where you can read them here. You'll get: John Nichols for Joseph Biden; Ellen Chesler for Hillary Clinton; Katherine S. Newman for John Edwards; Bruce Shapiro for Christopher Dodd; Richard Kim for Mike Gravel; Gore Vidal for Dennis Kucinich; Michael Eric Dyson for Barack Obama; and Rocky Anderson for Bill Richardson.

You also get Robert Scheer on that voice in the Republican wilderness, Ron Paul.

Some good post-Thanksgiving advice.

Why haven't I been watching the candidates for president in any of their debates? Nicholas von Hoffman (on the most recent Democratic debate) and Steve Benen (on last night's Republican debate) explain why: I'd probably lose all faith in American "democracy."

Who anointed these media gasbags to be the interlocutors? And since when did people wanting to ask questions have to be properly "vetted"--why isn't being an American citizen enough?

Foolish questions, I know.