Friday, February 23, 2007

The Passing of a Legend

It’s a sad day for the Ole Miss family. Dr. Jordan’s work of course speaks for itself but personally, he was one of the kindest souls I have ever had the opportunity to meet. Heaven will only be bettered by his presence.


UM Mourns Death of Renowned Historian Winthrop Jordan


OXFORD, Miss. Winthrop Jordan, 75, professor emeritus of history and African-American studies at the University of Mississippi, died at his home Friday (Feb. 23) after a long illness. He was a Quaker and a member of the Oxford Friends meeting.

Jordan won four national prizes in 1968-69 for his book "White Over Black: American Attitudes Towards the Negro, 1550-1812," including the Society of American Historians' Parkman Prize, Columbia University's Bancroft Prize, Phi Beta Kappa's Ralph Waldo Emerson Award and the National Book Award for History and Biography.

As part of its 50th anniversary, American Heritage magazine ranked "White Over Black" as the second-best book of all time in African American history, second only to W.E.B. DuBois' "Souls of the Black Folk."

"This book helped lead a revolution in the understanding of how slavery became an accepted part of early American life," said Robert Haws, who chaired the university's history department from 1986 to 2007. "It forever changed our understanding of the roots of racism in the United States."


Jordan received several awards, including another Bancroft Prize, for his "Tumult and Silence at Second Creek: An Inquiry Into a Civil War Slave Conspiracy" (1993). He was slated to receive the B.L.C. Wailes Award from the Mississippi Historical Society March 3 in Jackson. "Through the years, no faculty person has achieved greater distinction at Ole Miss than Winthrop Jordan," said Chancellor Robert Khayat. "Historians across the world are aware of his work, his colleagues respected him without reservation and he was much admired by his students. Although we have lost him, his legacy lives on."

Born in 1931 in Worcester, Mass., Jordan received his bachelor's degree in social relations from Harvard College in 1953, master's degree in history from Clark University in 1957 and doctoral degree in history from Brown University in 1960.

Jordan began teaching in 1955 as a history instructor at Phillips Exeter Academy before joining the faculty at the University of California-Berkeley, where he served from 1963 to 1982. He also served as associate dean for minority group affairs in the UC-Berkeley graduate school.

Jordan joined the UM faculty in 1982. He became the first holder of the William F. Winter Professorship of History in 1993 and retired in 2003. Haws called Jordan "the most distinguished faculty member ever" in the university's history department. "Before he had turned 40, his scholarship had defined the entire field of general race relations and set the scholarly agenda for the study of race in American history for two generations of scholars," Haws said

Jordan's numerous awards include fellowships from the Institute of Early American History and Culture, Guggenheim Foundation, Social Science Research Council and the Center for the Advanced Study of the Behavioral Sciences. He also received a Distinguished Alumnus Citation from Brown University.

Jordan is survived by his wife, Cora; three sons, Joshua Jordan of Davis, Calif., Mott Jordan of Santa Cruz, Calif., and Eliot Jordan of Berkeley, Calif.; three step-children; his former wife, Phyllis Jordan of Berkeley, Calif.; five grandchildren and five step-grandchildren.
Hodges Funeral Home in Oxford is handling arrangements. A campus memorial is being
planned.

Saturday, February 10, 2007

Russian Rhetoric and Reality

Talk about a good old-fashioned Cold War bitch-slap. This is a must read for all you Cold Warriors and Worriers:

Putin Blasts U.S. on Iraq, Defends Russia's Iran Ties
By Thomas E. Ricks
The Washington Post

MUNICH, Feb. 10 --Russian President Vladimir Putin blasted the United States today for acting in a unilateral, militaristic fashion that he said "overstepped" its role and made the world a more dangerous place than during the Cold War.

"Nobody feels secure anymore, because nobody can take safety behind the stone wall of international law," he told an international security conference here attended by dozens of foreign and defense ministers and other officials, including Defense Secretary Robert Gates and a congressional delegation.

He said Russia would pursue an independent foreign policy, and defended his country's arms sales to Iran as a way of reaching out to that Middle Eastern power, which is under pressure from the U.S. and Europe to curtail its nuclear program. Russia has supplied some air defense weapons to Tehran, he said, because "we don't want Iran to feel cornered," he said.

He also told the West to back off on pushing Russia to be more democratic and more respectful of human rights. "Russia is constantly being taught democracy, and the people who try to teach it don't want to learn it themselves."

The Russian leader criticized the expansion of NATO, saying the alliance is placing military forces on Russia's borders, "reducing the level of mutual trust."

Putin ended his critique of the post-Cold War world by attacking the West's view of international relations. Stability and economic justice, he said, should be "not only for the chosen ones, but for everybody."

After his 32-minute speech, Putin fielded questions from the audience, elaborating on several of his points but backing down from none. Explaining his view that the world is now more dangerous than it was during the Cold War, he said that back then, "It was a fragile peace, a scary peace, but it was fairly reliable, as it turns out. Today it is less reliable."

His one peace offering was to describe President Bush as "my friend." He added, "He is a decent man, and one can do business with him."

The response of the U.S. delegation to the annual security conference was sharply negative. During the speech, several frowned, and Gates, a professional Sovietologist, stared at the notes he was writing. Asked for comment afterward, Gates smiled and shook his head.

Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.) said he found much of the address to have been "Cold War rhetoric," and Putin's comments about Iran "outrageous."

"If you're waiting for Russia to be constructive on Iraq, forget it," commented Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.). He added that he didn't think the speech was a smart move.

"He did more in a single speech to unite Europe and America than anything we could have done in a decade," Graham said, referring to tensions between the U.S. and several European nations arising from disagreements primarily over the war in Iraq.
Most of this is the traditional Russian rhetoric, condemning the West while failing to look into the mirror. What about that invasion of Afghanistan in the 80's there Vladimir? Forget about that one?

Re Iran, Russia and China will need greater and greater access to Mideastern oil in the coming decades thanks to their slowly-emerging middle classes. Therefore, a stable Middle East is very much in Russia's interest as it gears up to compete with the Chinese. Moscow has just backed a different horse and isn't going to abandon their boy because Europe and the US want them to. Plus throwing muck at the United States is just plain fun, everybody's doin' it.

Great comments from Graham on this re Europe and it's good to know Gates, being a Russian specialist, can know Vladi's full of shit without having to say so.

Keep counting up your complaints Putin as you further alienate yourself and your country from the rest of the world while you rig a few more elections and strip some more voting rights.

Thursday, February 08, 2007

AFRICOM Formalized

Great move by Gates on this one. The creation of an Africa Command will hopefully signal an increased security presence for this God-forsaken continent and with increased security, hopefully foreign investment.

Africa Command Geared Toward Stability
By Sgt. Sara Wood, USA
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Feb. 7, 2007 – The main goal of the new U.S. command in Africa will be to develop a stable environment on the continent to promote civil society and improved quality of life for the people there, a top Defense Department official said here today.
Africa, which represents 35 percent of the world’s land mass and 25 percent of the population, is growing in significance, and it is time for the U.S. to recognize its importance and consolidate efforts there, Ryan Henry, principal undersecretary of defense for policy, said in a Pentagon news conference.

“This command will focus on some efforts to reduce conflict, to improve the security environment, to defeat or preclude the development of terrorists or terrorist networks, and support in crisis response,” Henry said.

President Bush and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates announced the establishment of a new unified command in Africa yesterday.

AFRICOM will integrate DoD efforts in Africa, which now are split among three combatant commands, and enable more cooperation with other U.S. government agencies, such as the State Department, Henry said.

“It is a continent and a group of nations who think of themselves from a continental perspective; they think of themselves as Africa,” he said. “One of the major reasons that it’s time to stand up Africa Command is for us to view the people, the nations and the continent of Africa from the same perspective that they view themselves.”

Many of the missions AFRICOM will perform will be non-kinetic, such as humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, Army Lt. Gen. Walter Sharp, director of the Joint Staff, said at the news conference. AFRICOM will have a strong emphasis on building the capacity of African nations through training and equipping African militaries, conducting training and medical missions on the continent, and supporting regional organizations like the African Union, he said.

Full article.

Wednesday, February 07, 2007

USMC's Billion Dollar Blunder

This is simply pathetic. More evidence that DOD is willing to go to great lengths to flush money into a weapon with no operational value or effectiveness. We can thank the China haters for this one. Last time I checked, our asymmetric enemies didn’t put up much of a beachhead defense and Iran is approachable, God-forbid, from the East and West. Now who does that leave...?

We can't afford to throw away this kind of money on a weapon system with absolutely ZERO utility. The Corps should be ashamed.

Problems Stall Pentagon's New Fighting Vehicle
Costly Amphibious System Not Meeting Expectations


Renae Merle
The Washington Post

After 10 years and $1.7 billion, this is what the Marines Corps got for its investment in a new amphibious vehicle: A craft that breaks down about an average of once every 4 1/2 hours, leaks and sometimes veers off course.

And for that, the contractor, General Dynamics of Falls Church, received $80 million in bonuses.

The amphibious vehicle, which can be launched from a ship and then driven on land, is so unreliable that the Pentagon is ditching plans to begin building the first of more than 1,000 and wants to start over with seven new prototypes, which will take nearly two years to deliver, at a cost of $22 million each.

The Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle is one of the Pentagon's largest weapons programs and exemplifies the agency's struggle to afford a cadre of new mega-systems that are larger and more complex, but also more trouble, than their predecessors.

Despite reforms meant to rein in costs, it is not unusual for weapons programs to go 20 to 50 percent over budget, the Government Accountability Office recently found. Among the offenders is the Army's sprawling modernization program, which aims to update everything from tanks to drones and is now expected to cost $160 billion, up from $90 billion, and a Lockheed Martin missile-warning satellite program, which is projected to cost more than $10 billion, up from $4 billion.

The Marines' troubled program is on a collision course with critics who are wary of its growing price tag and who wonder about the utility of an amphibious vehicle meant to storm beaches in a way the military hasn't done for decades, at a time when soldiers are consumed with urban warfare in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Full article.