Rachel Maddox, secret CNAS fellow?

Hey guess what I'm going to talk about? thats right counter insurgencies! More particularly Rachel Maddow being awsome about them.

So first off, Nagl the president of CNAS was on, talking primarily about the future of Afghanistan

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Abu M (who now works with both Nagl and Kilcullen) points out what is so great about this clip:

And out of no where, Rachel Maddow -- Rachel bleeping Maddow! -- calls my boss to task and asks him if being a strategic thinker means more than tweaking our operational design. Damn! When pressed, to be fair, John gives his fellow Rhodes Scholar a pretty good answer about the costs of failure in Afghanistan. But who would have thought that lefty smart-ass on MSNBC would be the one asking the key questions? (Rumor has it that Afghanistan is actually one of Maddow's pet subjects. Good on her, I say.)

This is the type of reporting that TNC points out (in a different context) is missing in so much of the current reporting, which often lacks both intelligence and creativity. What Maddow is doing here isn foaming at the mouth or arguing about the facts on the ground. Instead she has perfect respect for Nagl's knowledge on the topic, but she still pushes him on what the role of experts should be. I've seen a lot of interviews with Nagl and others like him, and very few reporters have asked this, seemingly obvious, question.

then David Kilcullen is on tonight about halfway through this clip, basically talking about his new book... which one of the first things on my reading list, post-BA.

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Also check out this piece in the Post that outlines his views on A-stan. Given what I know about the book, I think that it is actually of much broader relevance than this article seems to imply.

And her she is making cocktails.... while threatening to make move people talk about COIN (sadly she doesnt follow through on that one)

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