Top Stories Tuesday 14 Jan
Groupthink Central on the limits of US power:
For the past few weeks, I’ve been continually amazed that the crackpot leader of a Stalinist hellhole
has been able to make the president of the Most Powerful Country on Earth look like a bumbling fool
(insert snarky comment here). However, Kim Jong Il is only the latest in a series of thoroughly bad
dudes who have been successful at playing the U.S. government for dupes. What’s the secret to their
success? Well, being a megalomanical, repressive sunufubitch certainly helps. However, I think the
reason why Castro, Gadaffi, and Saddam have fended off successive administrations for so long is
that they recognize the limitations of American military power. Both Castro and Gadaffi have surely
realized that no American administration would risk launching a full-scale ground war to remove them
from power. Thus, they have been able to thumb their nose at the U.S. for decades with only minimal
repercussions (assuming you conveniently overlook the poverty and despair of the toiling masses, of
course). Likewise, Kim perceives that, for all his bellicose blustering, W isn’t about to make a march
on Pyongyang any time soon. As a result, he has continually called W’s bluff over the past few months,
which has only exacerbated the administration’s “strategic ridiculousness,” as Josh Marshall likes to
say.