Stevenson’s army, November 30

Henry Kissinger died Wednesday, 6 months after his 100th birthday. NYT has a comprehensive obit.  Fred Kaplan is more critical, drawing on declassified documents bundled by the National Security Archive.

As most of you know, Kissinger was one of my academic mentors. I TA’d in his course for two years, had weekly meetings with him. I almost went to work in his NSC — until my immediate sponsors resigned in protest because of the invasion of Cambodia.

I was disappointed that he never wrote a letter of recommendation for my academic job portfolio, but Tony Lake later told me he said he was too busy. Lake also said I was in good company. Among the other things Kissinger repeatedly didn’t have time for were relations with the UN and foreign economic policy.

– There’s a new poll showing US polarization and willingness to use political violence.

– NYT analyzes polls on US views of Israel and Palestine.

– NYT notes danger of US-Iran war.

– Paul Musgrave tells how views of war have changed.

One more point on Kissinger: while I admire many of his accomplishments and deplore others, I especially resent his way of trying to avoid responsibility by making jokes. [“The illegal we do right away; the unconstitutional takes a little longer.”]