“And kiss that child!”

Why is Hillary lying over something so verifiable? It’s so embarrassing and unnecessary.

“Tribunalations” is not my favorite pseudo-pun of all time, but it does the job. My afore-mentioned article in The American Interest is up, free to the loyal readers of this blog.

Click here to enjoy.

Ed Joseph and Mort Abramowitz penned an interesting op-ed in the WSJ last week. To get a sense of the nastiness of the situation unfolding in Bosnia today, read their article for a succinct backstory. The authors’ main insight, that EU membership is a rotten carrot—an ineffective inducement to better behavior—is a very important one.

But their suggested solution, perhaps borne of desperation at circumstances, seems impractical:

The way to recruit the Serbs for this project is to give them a stake in its success. As a result of the short-sighted implementation of the Dayton Agreement, Sarajevo, which before the war had the largest concentration of Serbs outside Serbia, is today a Muslim-dominated city. It is difficult to interest the Serbs in an effective multiethnic state without a major Serb presence in Sarajevo.

Converting the capital into a truly shared “national district” and encouraging all ethnicities to resettle there would vitiate a core Serb argument against centralizing state power. It would also reaffirm the principle that a country’s capital and institutions must reflect the interests and makeup of its peoples.

The problem is that the Bosnian Serbs’ goal is not a well-functioning Bosnia. Backed by a nasty nationalist government in Belgrade, which is in turn supported by Russia, and faced with a dithering EU which seems to take every opportunity to appease Belgrade over Kosovo, the Bosnian Serbs must be starting to believe that breaking apart Bosnia is a feasible course of action.

The authors quip:

Secession from Bosnia is not realistic as it would carry substantial political, human, and financial risks for the Serbs, whose economy has just begun to prosper. It should be noted, however, that realism has not been a Balkan trait. Nor can another war for “independence” be discounted; there is growing nationalism among all elements of the Bosnian population.

Is the Bosnian Serb secessionist attitude so unrealistic, given that their leaders’ goal has been incorporation into Greater Serbia from day one, and given that they see before them the opportunities to realize these goals?

Also note that “growing nationalism among all elements” is basically shorthand for the same sort of misunderstanding of that happened during the fall of Yugoslavia. Let’s get it straight: the rise of belligerent Serbian nationalism is forcing the other groups to seek protection among their own. Whatever happens in Bosnia, it’ll be important to remember how this ubiquitous nationalism came to be. “All sides are guilty” is a pernicious meme which has in large part gotten us to where we are in the Balkans today.