Kevin Drum

What's the Endgame for Israel?

| Mon Mar. 3, 2014 7:49 PM GMT

Jeffrey Goldberg interviews President Obama about the future prospects for Israel if it continues to refuse to negotiate seriously about the creation of a Palestinian state:

OBAMA: I have not yet heard, however, a persuasive vision of how Israel survives as a democracy and a Jewish state at peace with its neighbors in the absence of a peace deal with the Palestinians and a two-state solution. Nobody has presented me a credible scenario....Do you resign yourself to what amounts to a permanent occupation of the West Bank? Is that the character of Israel as a state for a long period of time? Do you perpetuate, over the course of a decade or two decades, more and more restrictive policies in terms of Palestinian movement? Do you place restrictions on Arab-Israelis in ways that run counter to Israel’s traditions?

GOLDBERG: You sound worried.

OBAMA: Well, I am being honest that nobody has provided me with a clear picture of how this works in the absence of a peace deal....When I have a conversation with Bibi, that’s the essence of my conversation: If not now, when? And if not you, Mr. Prime Minister, then who? How does this get resolved?....And so if I’m thinking about the prime minister of Israel, I’m not somebody who believes that it’s just a matter of changing your mind and suddenly everything goes smoothly. But I believe that Bibi is strong enough that if he decided this was the right thing to do for Israel, that he could do it. If he does not believe that a peace deal with the Palestinians is the right thing to do for Israel, then he needs to articulate an alternative approach. And as I said before, it’s hard to come up with one that’s plausible.

This has long been my view as well. I'm not naive about the difficulties of negotiating with the Palestinians, but even if you're much more hawkish than I am, my question has always been: what's the endgame? If Israel continues to pursue a hawkish path, what happens? Is a permanent occupation of the West Bank the goal? Is any other outcome even possible? And is that really credible? Is it good for Israel? Will the rest of the world tolerate it forever?

Maybe in their hearts, the uber-hawks have simply accepted this as the best of a bad bunch of options. The West Bank will remain an occupied colony forever; it will be a drain on Israel, but not an unsustainable one; and the rest of the world will complain but, ultimately, do nothing. That doesn't sound like a stable solution to me, but Israelis have tolerated it for nearly half a century now, so maybe they've decided it can last forever. I just don't know.

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The Best Oscar of Last Night Was the Screenplay Award for "Her"

| Mon Mar. 3, 2014 12:29 PM GMT

Today presents a blogging problem: The news cycle is devoted almost entirely to events in Ukraine—as it should be—and I've already probably said more about this than I should. I don't have any special expertise in the area, and I really hate the phenomenon of instant expertise that takes hold of pundits everywhere whenever something like this happens. I'm keenly aware of all the big underlying issues—Russia's long cultural ties to Ukraine; the eastward spread of NATO and the EU; anti-Russian sentiment in Kiev; the weakness of Russia's military; Putin's one-note thuggishness; Ukraine's endemic corruption and its internal fights over who gets to profit from the Russian gas trade; etc. etc.—and also keenly aware that a bare knowledge of all this stuff doesn't really make me worth reading on the subject. For what it's worth, I've already made a prediction that Putin will stop at Crimea because (a) the Russian army doesn't have the strength to do much more, and (b) Putin isn't willing to pay the price both in military and diplomatic terms for a broader intervention in eastern Ukraine. But I could be wildly wrong. Who knows?

So then, what should I write about today? I'm not sure, though I imagine that I'll end up writing more about Ukraine despite everything I just said.

In the meantime, how about a nice Oscars thread? No? Oh come on. I'll toss out a provocation to get everyone started: the best award of the night was the Best Original Screenplay win for Her. Not because it was my favorite movie of the year or anything, but because it was the first screenplay in ages that genuinely surprised me. Not in the sense of a last-minute twist that comes out of nowhere—that's common enough—but in the sense of a narrative that shifted directions smoothly and naturally into something much more interesting than I thought it would be. The art of Hollywood screenwriting has deteriorated so badly that this doesn't happen very often anymore. I won't say more in case you haven't seen the movie and still plan to, but feel free to discuss in comments.

Adventures in Factoids: The Great Birthday Gap

| Mon Mar. 3, 2014 10:13 AM GMT

Joyce Carol Oates tweets:

Stunning data: though 91% of women remember virtually all birthdays of relatives, friends, etc., mere 8% of men remember more than one.

Is this true? Or just too good to check? I have to say I'm skeptical. My memory sucks pretty badly, but even I can remember half a dozen birthdays. So that's a data point against the 8 percent theory. On the other hand, it's true that these are all birthdays of immediate family members. With one exception outside of that—a friend whose birthday is the same as my mother's—I'm pretty clueless. Though, oddly enough, I remember Matt Yglesias's exact birthdate because he turned 10 the day I got married. And Jim Henley shares my birthday, so I remember that. I'm not really sure any of these coincidental dates really count, though.

Still, 8 percent? That just hardly seems likely. I demand Scientific Evidence™.

Is Putin Making a First Move to De-Escalate?

| Mon Mar. 3, 2014 9:23 AM GMT

From the LA Times:

Russian President Vladimir Putin has agreed to a German proposal for international observers to review the tense standoff in Ukraine’s Crimea area, a Kremlin news service dispatch indicated Monday.

The proposal for a “contact group” of mediating foreign diplomats and an observer delegation to assess Moscow’s claims that ethnic Russians are threatened with violence under Ukraine’s new leadership was made by German Chancellor Angela Merkel during a late Sunday phone call to Putin, her spokesman told journalists in Berlin on Monday.

Is this for real, or is it just a stalling tactic? There's no telling, of course. But I wouldn't be surprised if it's at least semi-real, since it could provide a convenient excuse to call a halt to things. And that's something Putin probably wants. I don't know what his long-term plans in Crimea are, but I doubt that he has any appetite for a military incursion into the rest of Ukraine. That's not because he's voluntarily showing a sense of restraint. It's because Russia just doesn't have the military to pull it off. A few thousand troops in South Ossetia or Crimea is one thing, but even a minimal military presence in eastern Ukraine would be orders of magnitude more difficult and expensive. Unless Putin has truly gone around the bend and is willing to risk another Afghanistan or another Chechnya, that's just not in the cards.

A lot of American pundits are pretty cavalier about Russia's military capabilities, assuming they can do anything they want simply because Putin is such a tough guy. But it's just not so. The Russian military might be up to an intervention in eastern Ukraine, but it would take pretty much everything they have. This is not the Red Army of old.

It's also the case that although Putin may put on a brave show, he's well aware that intervention in Ukraine would unite the West against him in no uncertain terms. Those same pundits who are so cavalier about Russian military strength are also far too willing to take Putin's bravado at face value. That's a mistake. He doesn't want Russia cut off from the West, and neither do his oligarch buddies. He may be willing to pay a price for his incursion into Crimea, but he's not willing to keep paying forever. As long as Western pressure continues to ratchet up, at some point he'll start looking for a way out.

Angela Merkel Says Vladimir Putin Is Out to Lunch

| Sun Mar. 2, 2014 11:01 PM GMT

The latest on the Ukraine front:


Wonderful. In related news, I think David Ignatius gets things about right here.

No, Vladimir Putin Is Not a Cunning Geopolitical Chess Player

| Sun Mar. 2, 2014 11:24 AM GMT

From House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers:

Putin is playing chess and I think we are playing marbles, and I don’t think it’s even close. They’ve been running circles around us.

This kind of knee-jerk reaction is unsurprising, but it's also nuts. Has Rogers even been following events in Ukraine lately? The reason Putin has sent troops into Crimea is because everything he's done over the past year has blown up in his face. This was a last-ditch effort to avoid a fool's mate, not some deeply-calculated bit of geopolitical strategery.

Make no mistake. All the sanctions and NATO meetings and condemnations from foreign offices in the West won't have much material effect on Putin's immediate conduct. But that doesn't mean he doesn't care about this stuff: he does, and he's been bullying and blustering for a long time in a frantic effort to avoid it. Now, however, having failed utterly thanks to ham-handed tactics on his part, he's finally decided on one last desperation move. Not because the West is helpless to retaliate, but because he's simply decided he's willing to bear the cost.1 It's a sign of weakness, not a show of strength. It's the price he's paying for his inability to control events.

1This is why a strong response from the West is a good idea even though it won't have much immediate effect. Having decided that he's willing to pay the price for his action, Putin now has to be sent the bill. It will pay dividends down the road.

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Here's What Is Going to Happen With Ukraine

| Sat Mar. 1, 2014 4:59 PM GMT
A trade union building being seized in Simferopol, Ukraine.


  1. Vladimir Putin will do something belligerent. (Already done.)
  2. Republicans will demand that we show strength in the face of Putin's provocation. Whatever it is that we're doing, we should do more.
  3. President Obama will denounce whatever it is that Putin does. But regardless of how unequivocal his condemnation is, Bill Kristol will insist that he's failing to support the democratic aspirations of the Ukrainian people.
  4. Journalists will write a variety of thumbsuckers pointing out that our options are extremely limited, what with Ukraine being 5,000 miles away and all.
  5. John McCain will appear on a bunch of Sunday chat shows to bemoan the fact that Obama is weak and no one fears America anymore.
  6. Having written all the "options are limited" thumbsuckers, journalists and columnists will follow McCain's lead and start declaring that the crisis in Ukraine is the greatest foreign policy test of Obama's presidency. It will thus supplant Afghanistan, Egypt, Libya, Syria, Iran, and North Korea for this honor.
  7. In spite of all the trees felled and words spoken about this, nobody will have any good ideas about what kind of action might actually make a difference. There will be scattered calls to impose a few sanctions here and there, introduce a ban on Russian vodka imports, convene NATO, demand a UN Security Council vote, etc. None of this will have any material effect.
  8. Obama will continue to denounce Putin. Perhaps he will convene NATO. For their part, Republicans will continue to insist that he's showing weakness and needs to get serious.
  9. This will all continue for a while.
  10. In the end, it will all settle down into a stalemate, with Russia having thrown its weight around in its near abroad—just like it always has—and the West not having the leverage to do much about it.
  11. Ukraine will....

Actually, there's no telling about #11. Maybe Ukraine will choose (or have foisted on them) a pro-Russian leader that Putin is happy with. Maybe east and west will split apart. Maybe a nominally pro-Western leader will emerge. Who knows? What we do know is that (a) the United States will play only a modest role in all this, and (b) conservative hawks will continue to think that if only we'd done just a little bit more, Putin would have blinked and Ukraine would be free.

You may now go about your regular weekend business.

Here Are Two Sentences to Ponder Over Instead of Fretting About Ukraine

| Sat Mar. 1, 2014 3:59 PM GMT

I happen to have read two things that struck me in the past hour. The first is from a back-cover blurb for a book that arrived in the mail:

Mettler powerfully and convincingly demonstrates how partisan polarization and plutocratic biases have shaped _________ policy in recent years and why reform is so urgent.

I'm convinced already. Does it even matter what this book is about? You could write this sentence about practically anything these days. For the record, though, the book is Degrees of Inequality. The author is Suzanne Mettler and the blank space is "higher education." Then there's this:

There is one great advantage to being an academic economist in France: here, economists are not highly respected in the academic and intellectual world or by political and financial elites. Hence they must set aside their contempt for other disciplines and their absurd claim to great scientific legitimacy, despite the fact that they know almost nothing about anything.

Bracing! This is from the introduction to Thomas Piketty's Capital in the 21st Century. Only 544 pages to go.

Friday Cat Blogging - 28 February 2014

| Fri Feb. 28, 2014 1:00 PM GMT

Quelle horreur! After two weeks of lovely weather, suddenly Southern California is in the middle of a monsoon. Domino is not happy about this state of affairs and blames me personally. In this, she takes after Petronius the Arbiter: "Pete had worked out a simple philosophy. I was in charge of quarters, rations, and weather; he was in charge of everything else. But he held me especially responsible for the weather."

And please do not bore Domino with your petty human concerns over "drought" and "reservoir levels." Here she is looking disdainfully through a rain-soaked window into a rain-soaked backyard that just yesterday was all sunny and beautiful. It is simply a nightmare.

Here's Who the Money Men Are Backing So Far in the Republican Field

| Fri Feb. 28, 2014 12:02 PM GMT

Wesley Lowery takes a look today at who all of Mitt Romney's donors are supporting these days. As Lowery says, this shouldn't really be taken as a look at "Romney money." It's more a look at who's getting some love from wealthy mainstream Republicans. The answer, it turns out, is unsurprising:

  1. Jeb Bush
  2. Scott Walker
  3. Paul Ryan

This makes sense to me. If I had to pick a top three, this would be it, with the order depending a lot on who decides to get serious about running. I think Paul Ryan would be very formidable, with strong appeal to both tea party types and mainstream types, but it's unclear if he has any interest in 2016. Jeb Bush is a classic candidate who, again, has some appeal in both camps, but has to decide if he thinks he can overcome the obvious baggage of being a Bush. Scott Walker has to win reelection this year—and show that he can do it handily—before he takes any further steps.

As for the rest of the field, I continue to think that (a) Chris Christie is toast, (b) Rand Paul is a vanity candidate, and (c) the rest of them are going to tear each other limb from limb fighting for the title of king of the wingnuts. Naturally I reserve the right to change my mind later and pretend that I never wrote this.

STANDARD CAVEAT: Yes, it's ridiculous to be talking about this so far ahead of the election. I apologize. But my excuse is that this is invisible primary stuff, and that really does matter this far out. Besides, talking about the "invisible primary" marks you as a sophisticate, and I wanted an opportunity to do that.