Another day, another bout of bad news for the journalism industry. The New York Times has a story today about how newspapers are cutting back on Washington coverage at a time when a new administration is coming in, two wars are still going on and the economy is teetering on the brink of collapse.

“From an informed public standpoint, it’s alarming,” said Representative Kevin Brady, a Republican from the Houston area, who has seen The Houston Chronicle’s team in Washington drop to three people, from nine, in two years. “They’re letting go those with the most institutional knowledge, which helps reporters hold elected officials accountable.”

Look, I can almost understand the desire to cut back on foreign news. I don’t agree with it, but I can understand the thinking. But Washington? On a recent trip to Louisiana, family members were discussing Congressional legislation that might affect them and their mortgages. That was direct paycheck stuff and they definitely wanted to know about it. So for newspapers to cut back on Washington coverage at such a time… Well, it just shows the desperate straits the industry is in.

I’m here at Stanford giving some thought to how the industry can be triaged and transitioned to the new media future, but for the moment, we need to save what we can. Do your part. I know you’re mad at “the media” but letting newspapers go under won’t help. It will be much, much worse.

So here’s a radical thought: if you want to hold the government accountable, buy a newspaper — an actual, printed copy. Subscribe to a paper, read it. Take some time and actually peruse the paper. Think of these small steps as a democracy bond purchase in a time of crisis. As Joseph Pulitzer once said, “Our Republic and its press will rise or fall together.”

It’s hard to say whether things are heating up in Mosul between the Kurds and the Iraqi government or whether it’s the latest outbreak of a festering sore, but either way, it doesn’t look good:

The Shiite-led government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki is squeezing out Kurdish units of the Iraqi Army from Mosul, sending the national police and army from Baghdad and trying to forge alliances with Sunni Arab hard-liners in the province, who have deep-seated feuds with the Kurdistan Regional Government led by Massoud Barzani.

The Kurds are resisting, underscoring yet again the depth of ethnic and sectarian divisions here and the difficulty of creating a united Iraq even when overall violence is down. Tension has risen to the point that last week American commanders held a series of emergency meetings with the Iraqi government and Kurdish officials, seeking to head off violence essentially between factions of the Iraqi government.

“It’s the perfect storm against the old festering background,” warned Brig. Gen. Raymond A. Thomas III, who oversees Nineveh and Kirkuk Provinces and the Kurdish region.

Worry is so high that the American military has already settled on a policy that may set a precedent, as the United States slowly withdraws to allow Iraqis to settle their own problems. If the Kurds and Iraqi government forces fight, the American military will “step aside,” General Thomas said, rather than “have United States servicemen get killed trying to play peacemaker.”

Actually, it seems the entire border zone of the Kurdish region is a problem, with intense personal animosity between Barzani and Maliki. There have been armed stand-offs between the Kurdish pesh merga and Iraqi Army units in Diyala, and Barzani has referred to the Iraqi prime minister as a new Saddam Hussein. It doesn’t help that Maliki is allying himself with Arabs from Mosul who have deep ties to the former regime, including the former general who led the invasion of Kuwait. He’s also been trying to purge the Army up there of its Kurdish leadership causing some officers to announce that their loyalty is to Kurdistan and not Iraq.

If tensions do erupt up north, things could get worse all over. First of all, it would renew questions of why the Americans are in Iraq if they’re not going to stop their two biggest allies from going at each other. Secondly, it could create a security vacuum that foreign fighters could exploit to start entering Iraq in larger numbers again. The exodus of Christians could worsen. And of course, the price of oil could start to creep up.

All in all, not a good sign and a reminder that Iraq ain’t over yet.

Huzzah. After weeks of wrangling, I was able to recreate the old style sheets that made B2I readable. Which is a good thing, as I plan to pick up the keyboard again.

To bring you guys up to date, I’m currently at Stanford University for the John S. Knight Fellowship for Professional Journalists. Back to Iraq was, of course, a major selling point for the selection committee, as the program is really reaching out to non-traditional media people. (You can see my essays, including the plan of study here.) My colleagues in the program are exceptionally talented and smart and it’s an honor to get to spend a year palling around with such folks.

My project here is to look at a way to scale the Back to Iraq model up to an institutional level. Perhaps it won’t work; perhaps what’s needed is a networked system of correspondents in conflict zones around the world supported by subscriptions, donations, licensing fees and advertising. Whatever. I’m here for a year to try to figure it out. being close to Silicon Valley and all those venture capitalists probably doesn’t hurt. Oh, and I’m going to learn how to play the guitar.

But that doesn’t mean I’m abandoning commentary and analysis of Iraq. I’m still deeply attached to the place and, yes, hope one day to go back. Even as Western media organizations are dialing back their coverage. (Mind you, I think this is a trough in the staffing and coverage, coming as it does in the closing weeks of the presidential campaign. While the economy will continue to dominate the news, by spring of next year I suspect Iraq will once again be on America’s radar as military pullouts commence.)

So I will endeavor to share some of the interesting things here at Stanford — many of my coursework and research is directly tied to the Middle East, terrorism, the usual areas of interest — and also look at developments in the war. It’s not over yet, folks. And neither is B2I.

I don’t know much about international finance, I’ll admit. So I’ll let Stratfor do the talking for me, below:

The finance ministers of the G-7 countries are meeting in Washington. The first announcements on the meetings will come this weekend. It is not too extreme to say that the outcome of these meetings could redefine how the financial markets work, certainly for months and perhaps for a generation. The Americans are arguing that the regime of intervention and bailouts be allowed to continue. Others, like the British, are arguing for what in effect would be the nationalization of financial markets on a global scale. It is not clear what will be decided, but it is clear that this meeting matters.

The meetings will extend through the weekend to include members of the G-20 countries, which together account for about 90 percent of the global economy. This meeting was called because previous steps have not freed up lending between financial institutions, and the financial problem has increasingly become an economic one, affecting production and consumption in the global economy. The political leadership of these countries is under extreme pressure from the public to do something to solve — or at least alleviate — the problem.

Underlying this political pressure is a sense that the financial class, people who run global financial institutions, have failed to behave responsibly and effectively, and have therefore lost their legitimacy. The expectation, reasonable or not, is that the political system will now supplant these managers and impose at least a temporary solution. The finance ministers therefore have a political mandate, almost global in scope, to act decisively. The question is what they will do?

That question then divides further into two parts. The first is whether they will try to craft a single, global, integrated solution. The second is the degree to which they will take control of the financial system — and inter-financial institution lending in particular. (A primary reason for the credit crunch is that banks are currently afraid to lend — even to each other.) Thus far, attempts at solutions on the whole have been national rather than international. In addition, they have been built around incentivizing certain action and increasing the available money in the system.

So far, this hasn’t worked. The first problem is that financial institutions have not increased interbank lending significantly because they are concerned about the unknowns in the borrower’s balance sheet, and about the borrowers’ ability to repay the loans. With even large institutions failing, the fear is that other institutions will fail, but since the identity of the ones that will fail is unknown, lending on any terms — with or without government money — is imprudent. There is more lending to non-financial corporations than to financial ones because fewer unknowns are involved. Therefore, in the United States, infusions and promises of infusion of funds have not solved the basic problem: the uncertain solvency of the borrower.

The second problem is the international character of the crisis. An example from the Icelandic meltdown is relevant. The government of Iceland promised to repay Icelandic depositors in the island country’s failed banks. They did not extend the guarantee to non-Icelandic depositors. Partly they simply didn’t have the cash, but partly the view has been that taking care of one’s own takes priority. Countries do not want to bail out foreigners, and different governments do not want to assume the liabilities of other nations. The nature of political solutions is always that politicians respond to their own constituencies, not to people who can’t vote for them.

This weekend some basic decisions have to be made. The first is whether to give the bailouts time to work, to increase the packages or to accept that they have failed and move to the next step. The next step is for governments and central banks to take over decision making from financial institutions, and cause them to lend. This can be done in one of two ways. The first is to guarantee the loans made between financial institutions so that solvency is not an issue and risk is eliminated. The second is to directly take over the lending process, with the state dictating how much is lent to whom. In a real sense, the distinction between the two is not as significant as it appears. The market is abolished and wealth is distributed through mechanisms created by the state, with risk eliminated from the system, or more precisely, transferred from the lender to the taxing authority of the state.

The more complex issue is how to manage this on an international scale. For example, American banks lend to European banks. If the United States comes up with a plan which guarantees loans to U.S. banks but not European banks, and Europeans lend to Europe and not the United States, the integration of the global economy will very quickly shatter, leading to significant limitations on international trade, currency convertibility and so on. You will nationalize economies that can’t stand being purely national.

At the same time, there is no global mechanism for managing radical solutions. In taking over lending or guarantees, the administrative structure is everything. Managing the interbank-lending of the global economy is something for which there is no institution. And even with coordination, finance ministries and central banks would find it difficult to bear the burden — not to mention managing the system’s Herculean size and labyrinthine complexity. But if the G-7 in effect nationalize global financial systems and do it without international understandings and coordination, the consequences will be immediate and serious.

The G-7 is looking hard for a solution that will not require this level of intrusion, both because they don’t want to abolish markets even temporarily, and more important, because they have no idea how to manage this on a global scale. They very much want to have the problem solved with liquidity injections and bailouts. Their inclination is to give the current regime some more time. The problem is that the global equity markets are destroying value at extremely high rates and declines are approaching historic levels.

In other words, a crisis in the financial system is becoming an economic problem — and that means public pressure will surge, not decline. Therefore, it is plausible that they might choose to ask for what FDR did in 1933, a bank holiday, which in this case would be the suspension of trading on equity markets globally for several days while administrative solutions are reached. We have no information whatsoever that they are thinking of this, but in starting to grapple with a problem of this magnitude — and searching for solutions on this scale — it is totally understandable that they might like to buy some time.

It is not clear what they will decide. Fundamental issues to watch for are whether they move from manipulating markets through government intrusions that leave the markets fundamentally free, or do they abandon free markets at least temporarily.

Another such issue is whether they can find a way to do this globally or whether it will be done nationally. If they do go international and suspending markets, the question is how they will unwind this situation. It will be easier to start this than to end it and state-controlled markets are usually not very attractive in the long run. But then again, neither is where we are now.

Reprinted with the permission of Stratfor.

As of 0855 GMT Tuesday, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has ordered a halt to Russian operations in Georgia, South Ossetia and Abkhazia. This is according to the Russian press agency Interfax. Hürriyet reports that French President Nicolas Sarkozy will attempt to cement a cease-fire.

“On the basis of your report, I have taken the decision to bring to an end the operation to force the Georgian authorities to peace,” Medvedev told Russian Defence Minister Anatoly Serdyukov, according to a Kremlin spokesman.

The ceasefire proposal is apparently the one drawn up by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which was signed yesterday by Georgian president Mikhail Saakashvili.

Not that this will return the region to normal. NATO’s eastward expansion has now finished, and American promises of friendship are not worth the paper they’re written on. As the Georgians have complained, why did the help the U.S. in Iraq if Washington turns its back on them when they come under attack? (That it appears that Saakashvili walked into a trap set by Russia is almost beside the point.) And could President Bush have appeared less concerned as he yukked it up with volleyball players in Beijing?

The world has entered a both a new period, but one that looks very familiar to those of us who remember the Cold War.

Greetings all... Sorry for the site problems. I upgraded MovableType and the site went all sideways. I'm thinking of switching over to WordPress, but I'm worried that the old content would then be unavailable (as happened with a WP experiment I'm running right now.)

Does anyone have any suggestions?

A Journal editorial picks up on Gina Chon’s non-scoop front-page story yesterday to crow that “Moqtada packs it in.” Well, as I pointed out yesterday, there was little in that story that was new, as Moqtada al-Sadr seemed to be more clarifying earlier instructions to his people than issuing new ones. He will still maintain secret cells to attack U.S. troops, for instance.

And does the Journal really want a kinder, gentler al-Sadr? Paradoxically, keeping him an angry, violent outsider will go a lot further toward advancing the Journal’s goals in Iraq than having him as a peaceful political player. Because if he’s on the outside, his unruly Mahdi Army will continue to act like thugs, causing Iraqis to resent them and cling to the Maliki government (which the neo-cons at the Journal like.)

Having him inside the process, while decreasing the violence, gives him a chance to win at Maliki’s own game of politics, however. And if al-Sadr wins, does the Journal think an Iraq dominated by Shi’ite nationalists will be very friendly to U.S. interests? Perhaps it does, but I certainly don’t.

Like most Journal editorials, this is a grunt from the reptilian cortex, in line with the triumphalist bullying so common to that page.

This is great, and a welcome respite from politics. Researchers have found the world’s oldest joke.

“Something which has never occurred since time immemorial; a young woman did not fart in her husband’s lap,” goes the joke, which dates from 1900 B.C. and which originated in what is now southern Iraq.

Now, I like a good fart joke as much as the next guy, but WTF? Does anyone actually get that?

No matter. Iraqi humor even today doesn’t quite translate into English, a fact that often left me feeling damn confused over gruesome tales that my Iraqi friends found hilarious.

Many of modern day Iraqi jokes deal with the Dulaimi tribe from Anbar and tend to focus on their perceived backwardness and sheer yokelry. One I remembered went something like, “A Dulaimi drove his cousin to Baghdad. His cousin sat behind the driver so he could take over the wheel after he killed the first guy.” Much laughter would then ensue, and no, I still don’t get it.

But the real genius of Iraqi humor was poking fun at Saddam and making word plays. (Too bad puns don’t translate well.) ‘Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, the sickly vice chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council who today may or may not be part of the neo-Ba’athist insurgency (what’s left of it) often came in for humiliating jokes. The craven yes-man was often pictured impersonating a woman, for some reason.

Ancient humor was no different, and megalomaniacal rulers have always been good for a laugh. Some of the ancient jokes the researchers found poked fun at Egyptian pharaohs.

“How do you entertain a bored pharaoh?” goes one. “Sail a boatload of young women dressed only in fishing nets down the Nile — and urge the pharaoh to go fishing.”

Put your favorite Iraqi joke — not jokes about Iraqis, mind you — in the comments.

Kudos to TPMMuckraker for looking into Randy Scheunemann’s record on Iraq. Scheunemann is Sen. John McCain’s chief foreign policy strategist and a spokesman, but he’s also part of the Project for the New American Century, helped draft the letter making regime change on Iraq official U.S. policy after 1998, a man who saw WMDs under every Iraqi rock and pebble and, perhaps most damningly, a backer of Ahmad Chalabi, who did a pretty good job of snookering the U.S. into invading Iraq.

To me, all of Scheunemann’s sins pale compared to his backing of Chalabi, a man who not only lied to get the U.S. to take down his nemesis, Saddam Hussein, but might also have given information to the Iranians that America had cracked their codes. Chalabi denies any wrong doing.

Josh Marshall and his team complain that the mainstream media (whatever that is these days) have ignored or glossed over Scheunemann’s appalling track record. Usually, when a blog complains about this, it’s hooey, but a quick Google News search comes up with no major coverage of his past errors in judgment. And since this campaign seems to be focusing on the very pertinent question of who has the better judgment on Iraq, this seems a valid press inquiry. And if Obama is going to take heat for his advisors, shouldn’t McCain’s be under similar scrutiny?

Bret Stephens, a regular columnist for the Journal’s op-ed page, finds four American-installed leaders in Iraq who back McCain. Imagine that. He then takes these four guys’ views and extrapolates them to include all Iraqis. And while he mentions a Pew poll that shows the overwhelming majority of the world supports Sen. Barack Obama, he notes that the poll skips Iraq. And he adds that he did no polling of his own. But speaking to four guys allows him to state: “Iraq, all but alone among the nations, will be praying for a McCain victory on the first Tuesday in November.”

This column is so silly it’s barely worth mentioning, especially because there are dozens of polls that have been taken over the years that show Iraqis overwhelmingly despise the American presence and most of them want the troops out. (This is not to say that all Iraqis want the Americans to leave. I’m very aware some want the troops to stick around.)

Anyway, two can play at this game. According to a Facebook poll I found using a simple Google search, 62% of Iraqis prefer Obama as president. Now, obviously, my “research” is about as scientific at Stephens’s. Which is to say, not at all. But then, I’m not desperately trying to preach to the choir.

DUBAI — Greetings all… As is obvious, I’ve not been writing much. There are some good reasons for that. First and foremost, I’ve been busy. Since November of last year, I’ve

• Gotten married
• Moved to Dubai
• Taken on a new job
• And started a new phase in my career.

Married life is great, and very comfortable. Mrs. Back-to-Iraq seems to like it, too, but to be honest, I got the better end of the deal. (That’s usually the case, no?)

Dubai is less comfortable. It’s a strange place, an odd cross between Singapore and Las Vegas without the former’s clean efficiency and the latter’s cheerful and unapologetic sinfulness. Its love of bureaucracy, lack of any concept of customer service and no real planning makes it much less of an ideal place than people should believe. It’s also damn expensive, and the era of good living, cheap housing and fat salaries is long over.

But the new job is a good one. I’m editing Trends Magazine, one of the region’s top business and political magazines, if I do say so myself. My bosses are really devoted to the idea of journalism — a rarity in this part of the world — and are willing to take on big powers here, like real estate companies. (They’re all connected to the government, which has any number of vaguely defined “red lines” that journalists cross — or even approach — at risk to their jobs and residency visas.)

But the big news is that I actually won’t be staying here. I’ve been awarded the Knight Stanford Fellowship, one of America’s big journalism fellowships, to go study the feasibility of various business models for online news. I plan to concentrate on foreign correspondence, naturally. Back-to-Iraq.com was a big part of getting me into the fellowship and I look forward to nine months at Stanford University with excitement and humility.

So my four years in the Middle East seem to be coming to an end, for now. I’ll be back in Dubai in July 2009, armed with experience, contacts and new language skills. Let’s hope Back-to-Iraq can be revitalized with the experience.

Check out my World Economic Forum twitter here.

DUBAI — Just a few thoughts and observations from the Vegas-meets-Singapore hotspot on the Gulf:

Tom Vanden Brook of USA Today writes yet another story for his growing clip collection on MRAPs), those big, expensive and lifesaving armored vehicles used by Marines in Anbar. The news in this story? Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates says they’re great. Seriously. Four hundred words for what should have been a single sentence in another story. Please stop, Tom. The Pulitzers have already been announced. You didn’t win.

Meanwhile, in Lebanon, I’ve heard from friends that Beirut is calm but tense. (I’m not there anymore so I can’t really report too easily.) March 14 is increasingly dispirited and hoping for a response from the world greater than simple condemnation. The SSNP has taken over Hamra, which is bizarre. And what’s up with Hezbollah advancing on the Chouf? And then whining when two of their fighters get taken by the Druze? You don’t mess with the Druze, man. And if you invade someone’s territory — and let’s be honest, that’s what’s going on — you’re bound to take some casualties. Hezbollah can’t have it both ways.

Some of the Lebanese blogs I’ve started reading are From Beirut To the Beltway, Lebanese Political Journal and The Beirut Spring. These are solidly March 14 blogs and the authors hold political views I don’t necessarily agree with, but at least there’s some on-the-ground postings going on.

DUBAI — First of all, thanks to people for writing to check on me. The long radio silence has worried people, but there’s a reason for it. My wife and I left for Dubai back in February, and there’s not been much to write about from here. Anyway, we’re perfectly safe here. Bored, too.

I’m greatly wishing I could get back to Beirut right now. But the airport is closed, and we’re hearing that Hezbollah is attempting to close Beirut’s port, too. In fact, from the sounds of it, Hezbollah is taking the city — at least the western part of it. This was the threat, and it seems like they’re making good on it.

At the moment, it appears the only way in is overland through Syria via Tripoli — although even that road may have been blocked. NOW Lebanon is currently reporting it’s blocked by burning tires. Not sure who is doing the northern blocking, but that’s a heavily Sunni area, so local Salafis might be attempting to block infiltration of forces from Syria. Masnaa, the other main land crossing was closed by Salafists last night. They have good reason to fear reinforcements from Syria or Iran. When I entered Lebanon on July 13, 2006 to get to the war, an Iranian man came in at the same time — I saw his passport. We exchanged glances and went our separate ways.

Friends in Hamra and nearby ‘hoods report that Hezbollah gunmen have taken the streets and are telling people to stay indoors. They’re also taking pro-government people from their homes. One friend near Sporting Club reported a Shi’ite man in her (mixed) neighborhood was taken by gunmen as he was screaming, “I’m from the Dahiyeh!”

Reports coming in right now report that RPGs are hitting Qoreitam, Saad Hariri’s home in West Beirut.

Streets are being sectioned off by sectarian division. There are reports of Hezbollah checkpoints around the information and defense ministries. Young men’s IDs are being checked.

Meanwhile, in the eastern, mainly Christian, part of the city, it’s quiet. Most stores are shuttered and many residents have apparently fled for the hills and mountains north and east of Beirut — the traditional Christian heartlands of Lebanon.

LBC, one of the main broadcasters, is showing patriotic songs on its satellite feed — usually a bad sign.

Mustafa Alouch, a Future Movement MP from Beirut is on Al Jazeera right now saying Hezbollah is the only organized force in Lebanon. The Sunnis fighting back are just citizens defending their homes, he says. This is patently untrue, as Hariri’s Future movement has a militia. It’s just not as adept as Hezbollah.

“Hezbollah has been victorious,” he said. “It has taken over Beirut. But this is a wound that will not heal. … The state of Hezbollah wants to dominate the Lebanese state. … Hezbollah represents in Lebanon an Iranian proxy. This is not a local conflict.”

He’s right. This currently has all the earmarks of a Sunni-Shi’ite scrap as you’ve been seeing in Iraq. Lebanon is — again — a front line in a conflict between Iran/Syria and the U.S.

UPDATE 1148 +4 GMT: Hezbollah and Amal militiamen have cut off the road near the Phoenicia Intercontinental Hotel near where former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri was assassinated. Speculation: Hezbollah may be plannin to take the hotel, as it housed members of parliament during the long siege of the Serail. I’ve head they’ve since left, but Hezbollah may think some are still in there, given that they’ve already taken over the homes of other pro-government MPs.

Also, the Port of Beirut is apparently in Army hands. There’s light traffic around the port, but it’s calm there.

I’m starting to think this is a calibrated show of strength by Hezbollah. Based on the neighborhoods they’re going into — mainly Sunni and mixed ‘hoods in West Beirut, along with symbolic attacks on Hariri landmarks — his home, his TV station — it appears Hezbollah is showing that it can take over if it wants to. This, in fact, was a threat made by Hassan Nasrallah yesterday when he said if the group wanted to stage a coup, government leaders would be in prison or the sea by dawn. Likewise, Hezbollah is organized enough that if it wanted to take West Beirut completely, they could. (East Beirut is another story. That’s an express trip to Civil Warville, and Hezbollah doesn’t want to be the one to fire the first shot on that conflict.)

I could be very wrong, but I predict the fighting will be over later today or tomorrow and Hezbollah will begin turning the areas its taken over to the Lebanese Army. People taken will be released — most of them. Hezbollah won’t pass up the opportunity to take care of some political enemies and people it considers traitors.

UPDATE 1234 +4 GMT: This isn’t a war, this a bitch-slap. Judging from reports, the only March 14 faction targeted by Hezbollah seems to be the Future Movement, a primarily Sunni group. It’s also the militarily weakest of the March 14 factions. The PSP and Christian parts of March 14 have stayed out of the fighting for the most part. These past two days have been a public humiliation of Saad Hariri.

Already, civilians are walking the streets normally, based on Al Jazeera video. (Most of them have suitcases, indicating a desire to flee.) Most — perhaps even all? — of the press outlets associated with Hariri have been closed down. Fighting is dying down all across the city as the army and militias take control of security in their various sectors.

This wasn’t a war… This was a warning.

UPDATE 1804 +4 GMT: Actually, I take that back. This may well be a coup. It looks like most of the government may well be capitulating to Hezbollah’s actions. We’re waiting to see what Hariri, Siniora and others will do. They’re all in a big meeting at Geagea’s place. Like that won’t throw gasoline on the fire.

UPDATE 2037 +4 GMT: Well, leader of the Lebanese Forces Samir Geagea came out and pledged defiance to Hezbollah, saying Lebanon and Beirut would not fall. By using their weapons, he said, they have lost their right to them. Does that mean the LF is going to get into the fight and disarm Hezbollah? Not likely. Amin Gemayel spoke earlier, and mouthed similar platitudes, but based on their demeanor and lack of any offered solutions or compromise, they seemed beaten to me. Where is Saad Hariri and Fuad Siniora?