Guest post by J.F. Murphy J.F. Murphy is a former Marine infantry officer and Iraq veteran who graduated from the U.S. Navy’s SERE program. He is a fellow of the Truman National Security Project. After nearly two months of deliberation, some have criticized the Obama Administration of foot-dragging a decision on Afghanistan. As a veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps, I could not disagree more. If the previous...

Can President Obama persuade China not to be so dependent on growth, particularly trade-dependent growth? Likening Beijing’s obsession with growth to a Chinese version of the ‘Berlin Wall,’ Feng Mengyun of China’s state-run Global Geographic Times expresses his hope that President Obama can do something to talk the Beijing leadership into turning over a new leaf. With some surprising...

Bob Englehart, The Hartford Courant This cartoon is copyrighted and licensed to appear on TMV. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited. All rights reserved.

According to this blog entry from the Web site of China’s Global Geographic Times, a U.S. Embassy request that China use a new spelling of Obama’s Chinese name has been met with suspicion among that nation’s ‘Netizens.’ So what’s in a name, one might ask? For the Global Geographic Times, Scholar Jiang Huai writes in part: “On November 12, officials at the U.S. Embassy...

On my trips abroad, I have rarely found an Indian restaurant that would satisfy my native taste buds. In the West, there has been a “curry” revolution and its impact has been the most in Britain. However, there is a growing realization that Indian cooking is not just meant to set your tongue on fire or titillate the palate, it actually mixes common sense with the ancient science of Ayurveda, gaining...

This is just incredible:

Jackson Diehl: [After months of deliberation in 2006], no one accused George W. Bush of dithering. So why does Barack Obama keep hearing the taunt as he deliberates about Afghanistan — and why do even some who sympathize with his dilemma find it hard to shake the feeling that this commander in chief lacks resolve? One part of the answer is easy: Bush was renowned for summoning plenty of resolve, and not...

Our political/diplomatic Quote of the Day comes via Professor John Brown’s must-read Public Diplomacy and Press Blog – where he points us to a post by Steven W. Lewis on the Baker Institute Blog dealing with President Barack Obama’s bow to the Japanese Emperor. This bow became the target of (what else?) a political controversy in the United States where Obama’s critics accused him of...

This has been bugging me all day. “I think that we’ve restored America’s standing in the world, and that’s confirmed by polls,” [Obama] told CNN’s Ed Henry in a wide-ranging interview this week during his trip to China. “I think a recent one indicated that around the world, before my election, less than half the people — maybe less than 40 percent of the people...

Monday NY Times, Page 1: Every time Mr. Obama declares that the United States will not have an “open-ended” military commitment in Afghanistan, he fuels a second concern of the powerful Pakistani military and intelligence establishment, which believes the United States commitment is fleeting. It is a concern that some of them say justifies Pakistan’s continuing ties to the militants who fight American...

The media will continue to speculate about the outcome of President Barack Obama’s visit to China. However, small gestures matter. The Times of London observes that Obama carrying his own umbrella while alighting from the Air Force One “may be just the right stick for China”. “Perhaps that simple umbrella moment really mattered. It showed China’s people that the arrogant America of...

In the years that we have pursued this project, today’s posting is one of the strangest international press articles I can recall. And while it indicates that Hamas may be allowing more press freedom than we thought – the conclusions of the author are anything but comforting. Keeping in mind that the accused killer is of Palestinian origin, the author of this article from the Al Watan Voice, a newspaper...

He came. He saw. His charisma was controlled. That in a nutshell seems to be the emerging verdict on President Barack Obama’s trip to China: China kept the famous Obama charisma in check in a visit that won’t be seen as a turning point. AFP paints a portrait of a visit that was more zzzz than pizazz: Something got lost in transit in US President Barack Obama’s visit to China — the charismatic...

I’m sure we’re all very shocked to hear that the man who subverted and perverted the law to give his masters the pseudo-legal cover to run a torture program against Arab and Muslim detainees doesn’t want the methods used against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to be revealed in open court.

According to China’s state-run Global Geographic Times, the state-controlled Internet chat rooms are filled with tough questions for, and sharp criticism of, President Obama. On his Global Geographic Times blog page, a man named Tian Yifeng lays out some of the comments and explains why they show the insight of Chinese Netizens. The topics of the comments run the gamut, from economics, to history, to...

I’m not sure if it’ll accomplish anything, but I think Obama’s efforts to engage the totalitarian military junta that rules Burma* and brutalizes the Burmese people are admirable, yet more evidence of the dramatic shift away from the military-oriented, unilateralist approach that characterized Bush’s foreign policy. “Despite years of good intentions,” said the president, “neither...

Guest post by Ziad Haider Ziad Haider is an MPA/JD candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School and Georgetown Law, and a Truman National Security Fellow. He conducted field research on governance in FATA with the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan in the summer of 2008 and previously worked as a foreign policy advisor in the U.S. Senate. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s recent three-day visit to...

Make a decision — any decision. That is the Dean of Washington Journalism’s advice to Pres. Obama on Afghanistan:

The right-wing tsk tsk tskers are at it again. This time it is a deep bow of respect President Barack Obama offered when greeting Japanese emperor Akihito this weekend in Tokyo. That bastion of conservatism, The Drudge Report, signaled its disgust by shouting in 42-pt. boldface headlines “How Low Can He Get?” And, get this. Drudge uses as an example of diplomatic decorum none other than former Vice...

I was reading Rick Moran’s analysis of the Great Obama Japanese Bow Disaster of Ought Nine today because, well… I’m not really sure what it is about this topic that snagged my attention, but I read Right Wing Nuthouse pretty much every day anyway, so there you are. The fact is, I didn’t get terribly excited when Obama decided to bow to King Abdullah either. Though I do agree with Rick...

Once again, Barack Obama has demonstrated his appalling hatred for America, and his elitism, and his arrogance, and his tearing down and bashing of his country and his predecessor’s foreign policies, by greeting Japan’s prime minister with a deep bow in a culturally appropriate way.

This article from the China Daily either indicates an opening up of China’s state-run media, or officials in Shanghai have done something serous to anger Beijing. Whatever the case, in this China Daily op-ed, columnist Hong Liang uses the imminent visit of Barack Obama to explain why young people in Shanghai love the president – and loath the ‘authoritarian excess’ that critics regard...

As a little boy, I used to crawl on the floor for hours setting up dozens of dominoes in various patterns, only to topple them down—and doing it over and over again. Well, the Dutch have taken this pastime to new levels. Today, “Domino Day,” they set a new world record—again—for the most consecutive dominoes to fall in succession, using over 4.5 million dominoes in a fantastic...

The attacks brought Americans together briefly, but the aftermath is still sowing division–as the decision of Attorney General Eric Holder to try five of the 9/11 terrorists in lower Manhattan brings conflict and confusion. On the surface, it’s hard to argue with Holder’s logic: “After eight years of delay, those allegedly responsible for the attacks of September 11th will finally face...

I have consistently supported publicly honoring our fallen heroes—with the consent of family members—when they touch American soil for the last time at Dover Air Force Base, Delaware. Much apprehension and controversy have surrounded this issue. Finally, this spring, the Obama administration implemented a similar policy as we have at Arlington National Cemetery which allows the family to decide...