Introducing “The Analyst”, A New and Exciting Online Media Project. Oh, and It Is Good to be Back
By rights I should have been born in Holland, and lived there for a couple of years, but alas I was pretty rapt to see Spain win the World Cup especially given that the nucleus of the team hailed out of Barcelona. Barce is indeed "more than a club."
At any rate, I write this blog post to report on a new and exciting media project in Australia. The Analyst is a new online and print media project, covering a whole raft of topics of contemporary interest, that this country is really, really crying out for. I am to be involved in this project as a writer, so you shall see more meaty articles from me on arms control, global security and intellectual and current affairs being published over there, so to speak. The Analyst website is still in its formative and developmental stages.
In a previous post I had mentioned that I had wanted to write an essay on knowledge and the Iranian nuclear crisis. I have duly written such an article and it is now available at The Analyst. It's long, so beware.
I recommend that you check it out.
Now I also will have a blog at The Analyst on international relations. It is called "Maxim." Watch out Stephen Walt!
That means my other niche blog, The Vile Maxim, is pretty much done and dusted. That's gone.
So, what am I to do with this blog?
I am pretty fond of it, even though it probably has very few readers. One good thing about a blog, especially on an academic topic, is that it really helps you think. Take say the B61-Mod 7 LEP recently discussed in the media. I want to write a post on it. So you end up engaging in more detective work and thinking about the evidence than you normally would when you have a specific blog post in mind. It really is a great learning device, in my opinion. I think it's worth doing even if you have 2 readers, which is probably my market share.
So, given that, I'm keeping this nuclear-global security oriented blog. I will cross-post. So any substantive blog post here I will also post at the Maxim blog with The Analyst.
This silly blog is proving to have nine lives already.
Obama Made Me Do It
OK. Perhaps I can be accused of being fickle. However, we must move with the times. I mean, just look at the Vatican.
I am not a big fan of Obama nor of his Nuclear Posture Review, but I do like the very idea (yes, I am thinking of the philosopher Donald Davidson ) of a capacious conception of nuclear security. I don't like how Obama conceives of it, but I do like “the very idea”.
So, my emphasis on nuclear strategy is too narrow. I come across as being a “cold war era relic”, which is very much verboten these days.
Give this, I figure the blog must change title to move with the times. It should speak of “nuclear security” rather than “nuclear strategy.”
At least I have an excuse; Obama made me do it.
We have now the blog of nuclear security and strategic analyses, with a tinge of international relations and arms control on the side.
Introducing The Vile Maxim
My book on nuclear terrorism has, and continues, to occupy a lot of my time. This blog used to have much more detailed posts, but alas the nuke terror stuff has intruded a tad.
I sometimes would have liked to write about other issues. To be sure this is my blog and I can do what I want with it, but it wouldn't be right to put stuff, say on Paul Krugman or something, that is outside of the topic here. Stuff like that doesn't really belong here.
I have therefore set up another blog called The Vile Maxim.
The Nuke Strategy Wonk blog will have a much higher priority than The Vile Maxim.
Erratum on Obama Administration Gets an “A” for Enhancing Biosecurity
Having received an email from Katie Mounts at the Centre for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation I realize that I have made, like, a bit of an error in my blog post on biosecurity below.
I had assumed that the Centre for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation response to the Congressional Commission on WMD threats, that I cited from in support of my thesis, was made by the State Department arms control and non-proliferation agency.
I had overlooked that the Centre is an NGO!!!!. I had written in my post that the Centre response was the Administration's response.
Still, I think my conclusion is accurate. Moving funds from Bioshield both during and after the swine flu outbreak is an implicit if not explicit admission by the Obama administration that the bioterrorist threat has been inflated.
So Obama should still get an "A" for moving funds from Bioshield to flu virus defence. That would be like Obama getting an "A" for space security if the White House were to transfer funds from missile defence to defending Earth from Near Earth Objects.
On the error, in my defence, there is an explanation. Whilst blogging I was listening to Aleksandar "Aca" Sisic, like, very loudly and this had affected my mental capacities. It did this to such an extent that I was not able to discern the difference between the Government and an NGO.
I admit, that's bad.
I promise not to do that again.
The New Blog Title
The blog has evolved into a nuclear strategy-grand strategy blog. That wasn't planned, but neither was Homo sapiens. I figure, then, that The Nuke Strategy Wonk is a more accurate title. I confess that this comes from The Arms Control Wonk.
I guess that I'm not that creative in these things.
I'm open to better suggestions.
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About the Author
Marko is also interested in philosophy, especially the theory of knowledge, and science, especially physics, and considers himself to work within the naturalist and enlightenment tradition. He is writing a book on nuclear terrorism.