Air strikes won’t defeat ISIS. A Western ground invasion would, but the West is far short of that commitment, to its increasing peril. ISIS (the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham; more transliterately known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or ISIL; most derogatively known by its Arabic acronym “Da’ish”) is an … Continue reading »
genocide
Can’t believe it
In the flurry of reviews – and comments on the reviews – of Stephen Pinker’s recent book, The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined, I spy a frequent complaint. (Here is my own analysis of Pinker, in the Boston Review.) The book’s central claim is that rates of killing, attacks, brutality, and … Continue reading »