The World Is Not Enough

It’s hard to win these days. Not only do we have worries about war, we’ve got worries over worries about war. Is the Biden administration’s foreign policy dangerously cautious? That’s what Peter and James discuss – and argue about – with our guest, AEI’s Kori Schake.

The hosts (minus Rob, who was off podcasting elsewhere…) also chat about Italy’s Giorgia Meloni; James gets peeved, and it’a lots of fun; they do some speculating of their own about the bubbles in the Baltic; and Peter recalls the time he had dinner with a mega-celeb and had no idea who said mega-celeb was.

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  1. kedavis Coolidge
    kedavis
    @kedavis

    I’m “shocked” (see what I did there?) that Peter didn’t introduce himself again to Kori Schake.

    • #31
  2. Stina Inactive
    Stina
    @CM

    kedavis (View Comment):

    BDB (View Comment):

    Here’s how legalistic her understanding is:

    She thinks that sending “only” specialized US nuclear fallout cleanup units into Ukraine would meet Lileks’ bar of “no US troops fighting Russian troops”. Not hardly! Ukraine is a war zone. If we put US troops in on one side, then they are fair game for the other side.

    Both this cockamamie decon unit thing and the “specific consequences” thing are perfectly designed to draw us into a shooting war with Russia.

    I don’t think she’s stupid. That leaves only less pleasant options.

    Maybe she’s one of those stupid-smart people, or however they are described.

    It’s an academic smart with no human experience. As much as I am critical of our foreign diplomacy policy, I know that I’m a complete idiot wrt human interaction, perception, reaction, and emoting. I may be able to say this ain’t working, but I can’t figure out the best way to work people out.

    People good with facts tend to not be good with people communications.

    • #32
  3. kedavis Coolidge
    kedavis
    @kedavis

    Stina (View Comment):

    kedavis (View Comment):

    BDB (View Comment):

    Here’s how legalistic her understanding is:

    She thinks that sending “only” specialized US nuclear fallout cleanup units into Ukraine would meet Lileks’ bar of “no US troops fighting Russian troops”. Not hardly! Ukraine is a war zone. If we put US troops in on one side, then they are fair game for the other side.

    Both this cockamamie decon unit thing and the “specific consequences” thing are perfectly designed to draw us into a shooting war with Russia.

    I don’t think she’s stupid. That leaves only less pleasant options.

    Maybe she’s one of those stupid-smart people, or however they are described.

    It’s an academic smart with no human experience. As much as I am critical of our foreign diplomacy policy, I know that I’m a complete idiot wrt human interaction, perception, reaction, and emoting. I may be able to say this ain’t working, but I can’t figure out the best way to work people out.

    People good with facts tend to not be good with people communications.

    I’m not sure how many actual facts Kori Schake has in her portfolio either.

    • #33
  4. kedavis Coolidge
    kedavis
    @kedavis

    Kori Schake is technically correct – the best/most important kind of correct, according to the Head Bureaucrat of Futurama – that supporting Ukraine “all the way down the line” cannot logically exclude sending US troops etc.  But only some freakish type of academic could think that really matters.  Otherwise, one also couldn’t exclude the use of a nova bomb from “Star Trek: The Next Generation” and “Deep Space Nine” (or “Gene Roddenberry’s Andromeda”) to blow up the whole solar system to stop Russia.  Or, finger-snapping the entire Russian population out of existence, Thanos-style.  Or even wiping out the entire universe if that’s what it takes to stop Putin.

    • #34
  5. BDB Inactive
    BDB
    @BDB

    She’s not snooty or crude (a la a certain Mz Charen), but her haughty dismissal of a hundred million people like Lileks as cowards ( not her term, but again, @jameslileks nailed it) serves as a poor defense for her heigh-ho do-gooderism.  They’re just flyover people.  They come from the ground and it doesn’t matter to her whose soil is enriched by their eventual return.

    • #35
  6. T.C. Member
    T.C.
    @TCNYMEX

    Regarding the Nola meet up: a morning Frozen Irish coffee eye opener at Molly’s on Decatur Street. Maybe some beignets at Port of Call, (Cafe du Monde is where you take you’re out of town friends). Some P&J’s oysters. Maybe a burger at Port of Call. Perhaps Old Bughaz Martini Club at d.b.a

    But bring your beads to French Quarter Fest? Really @jameslileks? That would be like me asking for lutefisk on Easter Sunday. Or a kringle on the 4th of July.

    • #36
  7. BDB Inactive
    BDB
    @BDB

    Bishop Wash (View Comment):

    Ricochet Audio Network: Peter recalls the time he had dinner with a mega-celeb and had no idea who said mega-celeb was.

    I haven’t listened yet, to comment on the guest, but can relate to this one. My dad worked at the local gas company for the second-generation owner. The owner’s dad had started with a local station and grown it to cover a wide area. They were affiliated with Conoco and were big enough that he was invited to some big corporate event. He came back and told my dad and the others how he ended up at one of the front tables and everyone kept coming up for his neighbor’s autograph but he didn’t know who it was. That’s how my dad’s boss had dinner with Conoco spokesman Terry Bradshaw.

    Well, Conoco, no less. 

    • #37
  8. Duane Oyen Member
    Duane Oyen
    @DuaneOyen

    I can’t wait to listen to this one- Kori Schake is a classic traditional State Department lifer who frequently exhibits Valley Girl characteristics.  I stopped contributing to AEI because of her; she made a statement early in her tenure that Mike Pompeo was the worst Secretary of State in history.  That line alone should have caused AEI to jettison her.

    They didn’t, so I reluctantly (there are a lot of good people there) jettisoned them.

    • #38
  9. BDB Inactive
    BDB
    @BDB

    kedavis (View Comment):

    Math is a harsh mistress.

    Meloni can do whatever she wants – or at least whatever she can achieve – regarding immigration to Italy, and the rest of Europe can do the same for their respective countries. But as long as they aren’t having enough children to replace themselves, eventually they decline to a point where Al Queda or whoever could just walk in and take over.

    This is something that Mark Steyn addressed in his book “America Alone,” and in The Best Interview Ever.

     

    https://www.adrive.com/public/DS9Nut/NARN%2012-02-06%20NARN%201%20Hour%202%20Mark%20Steyn.mp3

    Link no longer public.  But I guarantee I heard it back in the day!

    • #39
  10. kedavis Coolidge
    kedavis
    @kedavis

    BDB (View Comment):

    kedavis (View Comment):

    Math is a harsh mistress.

    Meloni can do whatever she wants – or at least whatever she can achieve – regarding immigration to Italy, and the rest of Europe can do the same for their respective countries. But as long as they aren’t having enough children to replace themselves, eventually they decline to a point where Al Queda or whoever could just walk in and take over.

    This is something that Mark Steyn addressed in his book “America Alone,” and in The Best Interview Ever.

     

    https://www.adrive.com/public/DS9Nut/NARN%2012-02-06%20NARN%201%20Hour%202%20Mark%20Steyn.mp3

    Link no longer public. But I guarantee I heard it back in the day!

    It was supposed to be publicly accessible “forever,” but maybe that one was done with the previous version of their “dashboard.”

    So I did it again.

     

    https://www.adrive.com/public/RaM8Mj/NARN%2012-02-06%20NARN%201%20Hour%202%20Mark%20Steyn.mp3

    • #40
  11. kedavis Coolidge
    kedavis
    @kedavis

    Could the Lizzo thing have been Rob Long on GLoP?  Possibly re: JPod, who has much of the same music knowledge as Peter.

    • #41
  12. BDB Inactive
    BDB
    @BDB

    I did a little reading on this lady.  McCain-Palin crew in 2008 (I’ll hazard a guess which side), Bushie, NT in 2016, happily writes anti-Trump articles for The Atlantic, and *somehow* couldn’t seem to connect the Germany and energy problem to what Trump *told the Germans* to their faces.

    I don’t hate the Germans, but they bought this cold winter with their reliance on Russia, not with their NATO membership.  And that somehow escapes her.  “D’ye wanna punish France and Germany?”  No.  I want them to eat the sandwich they’ve made, laughing.

    Ugh.  AEI is just another institution that went progressive because it was insufficiently conservative — QED.

    • #42
  13. BDB Inactive
    BDB
    @BDB

    kedavis (View Comment):

    Could the Lizzo thing have been Rob Long on GLoP? Possibly re: JPod, who has much of the same music knowledge as Peter.

    Music knowledge won’t help with Lizzo.

    • #43
  14. BDB Inactive
    BDB
    @BDB

    kedavis (View Comment):

    BDB (View Comment):

    kedavis (View Comment):

    Math is a harsh mistress.

    Meloni can do whatever she wants – or at least whatever she can achieve – regarding immigration to Italy, and the rest of Europe can do the same for their respective countries. But as long as they aren’t having enough children to replace themselves, eventually they decline to a point where Al Queda or whoever could just walk in and take over.

    This is something that Mark Steyn addressed in his book “America Alone,” and in The Best Interview Ever.

     

    https://www.adrive.com/public/DS9Nut/NARN%2012-02-06%20NARN%201%20Hour%202%20Mark%20Steyn.mp3

    Link no longer public. But I guarantee I heard it back in the day!

    It was supposed to be publicly accessible “forever,” but maybe that one was done with the previous version of their “dashboard.”

    So I did it again.

     

    https://www.adrive.com/public/RaM8Mj/NARN%2012-02-06%20NARN%201%20Hour%202%20Mark%20Steyn.mp3

    Nabbed it.  Thanks!

    • #44
  15. kedavis Coolidge
    kedavis
    @kedavis

    My favorite David Bowie work was in the movie “Bandslam.”

    He’s not in these bits, but I really like it:

     

     

    • #45
  16. kedavis Coolidge
    kedavis
    @kedavis

    Some explication can be found here:

     

    • #46
  17. James Lileks Contributor
    James Lileks
    @jameslileks

    T.C. (View Comment):
    But bring your beads to French Quarter Fest? Really @jameslileks? That would be like me asking for lutefisk on Easter Sunday. Or a kringle on the 4th of July.

    Which you are of course free to do, and we will be happy to oblige. ;) You want some lingonberries on that?

    • #47
  18. James Lileks Contributor
    James Lileks
    @jameslileks

    I’m still cheesed about this.

    • #48
  19. DonG (CAGW is a Scam) Coolidge
    DonG (CAGW is a Scam)
    @DonG

    I don’t understand the focus on the use of nuclear weapons.   I think the conversation should have benefited from the use of more likely scenarios.   There are a lot of escalations between mortars and nukes.  For example, how should countries respond to the use of hacking, sabotage, chemical weapons, or cluster bombs?

    There are also a wide array of things that could happen to Russia, that don’t involve “boots on the ground”.  The most effective thing the US can do is to flip China from being a neutral to be against Russia.   Some people seem to want warfare more than they want peace. 

    • #49
  20. kedavis Coolidge
    kedavis
    @kedavis

    DonG (CAGW is a Scam) (View Comment):

    I don’t understand the focus on the use of nuclear weapons. I think the conversation should have benefited from the use of more likely scenarios. There are a lot of escalations between mortars and nukes. For example, how should countries respond to the use of hacking, sabotage, chemical weapons, or cluster bombs?

    There are also a wide array of things that could happen to Russia, that don’t involve “boots on the ground”. The most effective thing the US can do is to flip China from being a neutral to be against Russia. Some people seem to want warfare more than they want peace.

     

    • #50
  21. Dr.Guido Member
    Dr.Guido
    @DrGuido

    She races from sensible and principled…. to absolutely bonkers.

    Small marginal cost“???  A ludicrous phrase for the ages. The Japanese kamikaze and the 9/11 ‘pilots’ made no sense to 99.999% of those of us in the West but Vlad DOES have loose screws –and nukes– ‘Taking counsel of our fears’ is a silly statement …. we have $13Billion carriers that the Chinese want to (and CAN with their missiles designed precisely for the task!) turn into radioactive mist and deeper US involvement/distraction in Ukraine is just the opening that would allow Xi to fulfill his vision of ‘1 whole China’. (Gen. Mattis needs to school her just a bit longer….No?)

    Sorry…we’ve done more than enough —AND I also think she’s delusional about German support—I have friends from Hamburg to the Swiss border and NOT ONE of them indicates anything close to the kind of support she avers. None.

    And as to American ‘leadership”…??? She seems to think that Biden/Harris are not really there but some other Americans are at the top of the Hill…hope is not a tactic nor a strategy …nor a policy.

    Respectfully, this intellectual reminds me of a phrase from  Tom Sowell….‘Some things said are so silly that only intellectuals can believe them…’

    Lastly…there is not a soul in the Biden Admin who comes close to being accused of possessing….wisdom.

    • #51
  22. kedavis Coolidge
    kedavis
    @kedavis

    Dr.Guido (View Comment):

    She races from sensible and principled…. to absolutely bonkers.

    Small marginal cost“??? A ludicrous phrase for the ages. The Japanese kamikaze and the 9/11 ‘pilots’ made no sense to 99.999% of those of us in the West but Vlad DOES have loose screws –and nukes– and we have $13Billion carriers that the Chinese want to turn into radioactive mist and deeper US involvement/distractionin Ukraine is just the opening that would allow Xi to fulfill his vision of ‘1 whole China’.

    Sorry…we’ve done more than enough —AND I also think she’s delusional about German support—I have friends from Hamburg to the Swiss border and NOT ONE of them indicates anything close to the kind of support she avers. None.

    I listened to all of this one, just for fun and to experience the bit with James, but I usually skip over the think-tank “experts” because I don’t think any of them really knows all that much about what they’re supposed to be “experts” on.

    • #52
  23. Zafar Member
    Zafar
    @Zafar

    What’s wrong with supporting Ukrainians part way down the line?

    Also, I just didn’t like her voice :-(

    Edited to add:

    She said the quiet part out loud with “but that would make the US a regional power rather than a global power”.  There’s your motivation.

    • #53
  24. Bryan G. Stephens Thatcher
    Bryan G. Stephens
    @BryanGStephens

    Richard Easton (View Comment):

    It sounds like a compromise peace was possible last April and various western countries scuttled it. The side effects of this war are terrible. Widespread starvation is a possibility in poorer countries and Europe faces a cold dark winter. The blasé attitude of this woman is disgusting.

    This

    Jon Gabriel, Ed. (View Comment):

    Well done, @ jameslileks. I was stunned at her cavalier attitude, both to the use of nukes and to sending other people’s children to a war that doesn’t involve us. Seemed like she was phoning in from 2002.

    And this.

    • #54
  25. Bryan G. Stephens Thatcher
    Bryan G. Stephens
    @BryanGStephens

    She used a lot of things that enrage me. 

    But,

    She said of the United States of America, “We can win conventional wars”.

    Um, we can?

    • #55
  26. RufusRJones Member
    RufusRJones
    @RufusRJones

    Bryan G. Stephens (View Comment):

    She used a lot of things that enrage me.

    But,

    She said of the United States of America, “We can win conventional wars”.

    Um, we can?

     

     

    The global central planners are a menace.

    • #56
  27. RufusRJones Member
    RufusRJones
    @RufusRJones

    “It’s because they need to import people they have to redefine Europe as a sort of place that has values, and those values are transnational…” 

     Then James goes on to say that these countries are all actually very separate cultures, which is very true.

    What’s happening is, the globalists are shoving whatever they need to shove down the throat of all of these countries including immigration policy. They just need their centralized top down public policy and power to work. People hate it for good reason. What in the people that hate it are painted as backwards and a danger.

    The fact is, if you’re going to run countries on straight public policy instead of religion and heritage, they should have been paying bounties to procreate worker bees and taxpayers decades ago. Procreate for the state comrade! 

    Good luck, because everybody’s going to need it.

     

     

    • #57
  28. RufusRJones Member
    RufusRJones
    @RufusRJones

     

    One thing that I have changed my mind on a little bit is the European Union. It’s totally overwrought and evil. Central planning madness. It’s been this way for 30 years at least. The problem is they sort of need to do this because other countries and groups are getting bigger than they are. They are doing it really badly, but they probably need to do something like this. I mean are they really going to combine their legislatures? The EMU doesn’t make any sense even in theory, but they have to do it. I mean this is a bad deal.

    • #58
  29. RufusRJones Member
    RufusRJones
    @RufusRJones

    Adding to #57…

    What do I keep telling you? The whole West did every single thing wrong in the face of the wage deflation and job destruction from automation and globalized labor. The whole thing ended up with too much centralization, way faster replacement of people with capital and the attendant social problems. The people in power don’t want deflation which is what we need, we have to have constant inflation. The whole planet. Life is about production, supply, and progress through purchasing power, otherwise known as deflation. Then what happens it all goes into debt growth which goes into asset prices, which doesn’t do 90% of the West any good. Then the “good people” whine about Socialism and populism.

    We should have switched to a deflationary-libertarian system after the Soviet union fell and we never, ever should have traded with China. They should have done whatever it took to get the unfunded liabilities in order. We aren’t having enough babies? The government can make people procreate at gunpoint, which is unfortunately, because of public policy, an actual reasonable thing because we have too much government.

    “Oh my God! These immigrants are suppressing wages!” “Oh my God! They are sending so many jobs overseas!” Yeah, because the public policy is stupid.

    • #59
  30. RufusRJones Member
    RufusRJones
    @RufusRJones

    Trading with China was a huge mistake. We should have kept them alive and left it at that. Our ruling class and the globalists had *ZERO FORESIGHT  on this and it’s a disaster.

    Personally I think the mistakes were made a long time ago with Putin. Since about 2003, for whatever reason, he has been effectively mentally ill. I think we could have avoided that, and I think we made everything worse after that.

    Why in the hell we didn’t max out Ukraine on the porcupine strategy was another mistake. Personally, I think it’s a garbage country but I’m not the final word on it.

    I think sticking all of those tiny countries in NATO was stupid.

    Etc.

    The average American is just majorly pushed around by the mistakes these guys make with foreign policy and the financial system.

     

    • #60
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