Andrew Sullivan, responding to Christopher Hitchens’ claim that an Obama presidency will mean “more war, and more bitter and protracted war at that—not less”, says:

I can face the idea of a president Obama taking on and finally defeating Osama. In fact, that’s the major reason why I favor his candidacy… . Obama will try to correct the massive stretegic error of the Iraq invasion and pivot Western allies toward a greater focus on Afghanistan and Pakistan. I believe that Obama will be able to do this with much less global p.r. blowback than McCain and that the support president Obama will get from our European allies will dwarf McCain’s.

First of all, I should point out that I, too, would welcome a President Obama “taking on and finally defeating Osama.” For what it’s worth, I could face a Honeydew-Beaker Administration “taking on and finally defeating Osama.” (Hey, I wouldn’t even mind if it happened in the next 3-4 months, under Bush, but I get the feeling that happenstance might upset someone…)

What I really wanted to draw attention to is Sullivan’s assumption that Obama will be able to formally and officially expand the Afghanistan problem into an Afghanistan-Pakistan problem with “much less global p.r. blowback than McCain.” Au contraire. I expect there will be more blowback against Obama.

Right now, he can ride high on a wave of global public support, but those thronging masses in Berlin and elsewhere are supporting him because they expect something in return: a massive rupture with Bush-era foreign policy. Since this is inchoate mob opinion we’re talking about here, it wouldn’t do to overanalyze it; basically they want more talk, fewer bombs, and they think he’s the one who’s going to give that to them. Americans, on the other hand, seem more inclined to take him at his word on his promises to get tough with Pakistan (though they still favor McCain on national security issues).

Something tells me that, if it comes to a choice between upsetting Americans’ expectations, and upsetting the world’s, the President of the United States is going to side with…well, the United States. And this is going to cut across a number of issues besides Afghanistan/Pakistan, as Slate pointed out awhile back:

If his diplomats or military advisers told him that the Iranians perceived his willingness to talk as a sign of weakness, he might reconsider his pledge to meet with the Iranian president as quickly as he now promises. Maybe when presented with confidential data gathered by eavesdropping on U.S. citizens, he would be less keen to drop all the measures taken by Bush and criticized by the opposition. Maybe his belief that “the United States needs to lead the world in ending this genocide” in Darfur would put him at odds with reality or with some members of the international community. In each of these cases, Obama would suffer the consequences of high expectations. He would be trapped between the desire to preserve his high standing in the world and the need to act in ways that would erode that standing. Of course—his advisers would argue—it is better to have this political goodwill in the first place. But even if that were true, political goodwill should always be handled delicately. Starting modestly and building up is also an option, sometimes a better one if you aim to keep expectations realistic. (This, I think, is the way John McCain would play his cards internationally.)

It’s undeniable that the “get tough on Pakistan” rhetoric is good for Obama’s short-term political interests. The world simply isn’t listening as closely to the candidates’ statements as are Americans, so it’s easier for them to bask in the unadulterated glow of St. Barack. But if Obama wins in November, he may soon come to realize that hell hath no fury like a Berliner scorned.

Hitchens:

Yet to the chief of the British defense staff, the marvelously named Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, it was somehow self-evident that the lad had to be evacuated from the scene—and with all speed at that—just as soon as Matt Drudge revealed not his whereabouts but his mere presence.

Well, at least his mother didn’t name him that.

If you don’t feel like reading a ton of Balkan history, Christopher Hitchens distills what you need to know about Kosovo and delivers it in his inimitable polemic style:

In fact, Kosovo has never been recognized internationally as part of Serbia. It was only ever recognized as part of Yugoslavia, and with the liquidation of that state Serbian claims upon its territory became null and void. A little history here is necessary.

During the Balkan wars of 1912 and 1913, the then-distinct kingdom of Serbia, with some regional allies, did manage to invade and annex a formerly Ottoman territory that had been the scene of a Serbian military defeat in—wait for it—1389. (In that year, England was laying emotional claims to large and beautiful areas of France.)

As most things Hitchens, the essay’s worth reading in its entirety. If you’re hungry for more Balkanalia after you’re done, whip out your wallet and pay Noel Malcolm. Though it’s a short history, don’t go expecting it to be particularly “lite”—it’s a solid, well sourced book written by an academic (not a sloppy prejudiced screed scribbled by some hack journalist).

I’m a fan of Obama and am pleased he’s doing well. If nothing else, it’s pleasing to finally have a candidate in the race who’s thoughtful and intelligent. If the nation could elect Bush twice because they felt they could comfortably watch NASCAR with him, I’m glad that there’s a possibility that we might elect a president with whom I could watch The Wire.

That said, I loved Hitchens’ latest deflation of the national craze. The final sentence of the essay summarizes exquisitely:

The Iowa caucuses of 2008 were not the end of our long national nightmare about race, but another stage in our protracted national nightmare of piety, “uplift,” and deceptive optimistic windbaggery.

Ouch. It hurts because it’s true. Read the whole thing.

Hitchens is in his obituary best. Apparently, Tough Guys Don’t Dance is a bad novel. That sounds about right.

I do want to look up this 12 page “heroic struggle to bring a stubborn woman to orgasm.” Nice bedtime read. If it’s online somewhere, I’ll link to it here.

EDIT: Here’s one description:

What is one to make, for instance, of the shocking story ”The Time of Her Time”? It recounts a sexual encounter between the narrator (Mailer in the guise of an Irishman named Sergius O’Shaugnessy) and Denise Gondelman, a middle-class ”Jewish girl” in her third year at New York University. Denise, though sexually experienced, has never reached orgasm, never lost her ”final virginity.” It takes three sexual encounters, an act of sodomy and a touch of Jewish self-hatred (Denise’s and perhaps Mailer’s as well) before she finally arrives at ”her time.”

Sounds promising.

EDIT 2: It gets better and better:

He constructed absurd melodramas of sexual conquest and then cast himself as their inevitable hero. His ubiquitous descriptions of sex are wince-makingly embarrassing. In “The Time of Her Time,” for example—a fictional sketch that concludes *Advertisements for Myself* and of which Mailer was particularly proud—the hero refers to his penis as “the avenger” and is taken to saying things like “For her, getting it from me, it must have been impressive.”

Off I go to Borders. This stuff is comedy gold.