comment #1

BurmaShave says ...

How do we pursue a War on Terror and then support a seperatist movement led by a terrorist group? Confusing.

comment #2

Dave says ...

What I'm waiting for is for Kosovo to go to hell again, and all the Europeans who won't bother with the NATO mission in Afghanistan come running to the U.S. for help again.

Of course, we won't tell them to go to hell, because that's not what great powers do when hard jobs have to be done. But the irony of that will surely be lost on the Germans & French.

comment #3

D.Z. says ...

Dave: Didn't we ignore what was going on in Kosovo until the last minute, too?

comment #4

Edward says ...

From the NY Times:
"Groups broke into a McDonald’s restaurant in central Belgrade and destroyed its interior. Witnesses said vandals were attacking foreign-owned shops, including a Nike store, and were seen carrying off running shoes and other goods as the Serbian police looked on."

Got to look good while hangin' with the mob!

comment #5

Dave says ...

Well, we have ~3,000 troops as part of KFOR, so we're not exactly ignoring it. But we've let NATO and the EU set a lot of the policy there since the war, just as in the Bosnia mission.

Of course, at the *national political* level, sure, we've ignored it just as much as Europe has. Only difference is, it's *their* backyard, their bar should be a lot lower than ours.

comment #6

lindenen says ...

They're rioting because Kosovo recently declared independence and we recognized it. Putin threw a fit as well. The people rioting are the ones who are peeved they can't get back to committing genocide against their neighbors.

Can someone explain how McDonalds is Orwellian? I'm forced to decide that either I'm missing something or Jeff has no idea what that term means.

comment #7

gansibele says ...

Duh, because they force you to eat their food while wearing their uniform with your name and identification number in it, and they watch your every movement and record your every thought as you do it. Everybody knows that.

What's ironic is that the Serbian nationalist government of Kostunica, acting more and more like Milosevic, could be truly called orwellian (not to mention their friend Putin). But of course, that imperialist pig Ronald McDonald is the real threat.

comment #8

christian says ...

Or as studies have shown, a number of American families have substituted McDonalds for an actual healthy diet. And the fact that the food is cheap enough so that primarily lower-income folk eat there regularly does represent some kind of commodified control.

comment #9

christian says ...

And tell me Ronald is not a real threat to this small child...

http://youtube.com/watch?v=2tGbvfVpPGg&feature=related

comment #10

Rich S. says ...

"Freedom of choice, is what you've got;
Freedom from choice, is what you want."

-DEVO

comment #11

gansibele says ...

Well Christian, what's the alternative? Going after McDonalds for serving food nobody puts a gun to nobody's head to buy is the cheap non-solution, because you could erradicate every McDonald's on the planet and still those folks would have no source of cheap and nutritious food. I don't see anybody protesting because Whole Foods doesn't make organic affordable.

The blinders some people have on are incredible. Yeah, McDonalds is the enemy and ethnic rapists are to be admired. Please.

comment #12

christian says ...

Sadly, Mickey D stands as a global symbol of a certain kind of deified crap. Even Justin Timberlake did an ad for them. I woulda burned one down just for that..