The debate over America's decline and the emerging global order continues on the blogosphere (my previous post here), with the most interesting new contribution coming from Jim Manzi at The American Scene. He argues that what observers like Fareed Zakaria think is new about the global order — relative American decline against the rise of new Asian powers — is not new at all: 'US share of world GDP in 1945 is estimated to have been about 50%; this more than halved between 1945 and 1980.' As Manzi points out, we heard talk of US decline in the 1980s with the rise of Japan, and it came to very little. More...

Guest blogger: Andrew Selth, Research Fellow at the Griffith Asia Institute

When Tropical Cyclone Nargis cut a swathe through Lower Burma last week, it left more than death and destruction in its wake. The military government’s slow response to the disaster, including its reluctance to accept international assistance, has further blackened its name. Yet it can be argued that the international community has also failed fully to appreciate the dire situation in Burma, and has unrealistic expectations of what can be achieved in the current circumstances. More...

My reaction to the Putin-Medvedev photo Michael blogs about was quite different. Medvedev's short overcoat was certainly a pretty daring choice in the constrained world of political couture, but I thought rather handsome. And it may have been intended as a message to the world that Medvedev is a younger, more modern and perhaps more European figure than the man he succeeds.

Similarly, I thought the Condoleezza Rice black leather outfit Michael refers to was a masterful bit of theatre. She wore that outfit only a month after being sworn in as Secretary of State, and it was a bold statement of self-confidence and renewal in that office. It's a shame she has reverted to the kind of pastel conservatism that would suit a much older woman.

Peter from Illinois writes about my camel export post:

Egad, sir. An undervalued resource, useable for meat and dairy, wool and fertilizer. Properly bred in Australia they might be domesticated for plowing. Gourmet restaurants in Sydney and Melbourne might feature them as a change of pace. At the race track they probably run faster than some of the nags I have wagered on.

Without wanting to sound too defensive, Peter, Australia did move beyond plowing with beasts of burden some time ago. And horrifying as it always seems to foreigners, many Australians (and their pets) enjoy kangaroo meat rather than camel.

UPDATE: Drastic action needed to cut feral camel numbers.

A few years ago, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice caused the world’s diplomats to choke on their Ferrero Rochers when she appeared at Wiesbaden Army Airfield in Germany dressed in a long black military-style coat and black leather boots.

Now another world figure, this time new to the global stage, has defied couture expectations. The front page of today’s New York Times features a photo of the outgoing and incoming Russian presidents. Vladimir Putin is wearing a standard-issue dark political overcoat, but his replacement and protégé Dmitri Medvedev sports something that looks like a car coat, which doesn’t even reach his knee. It’s the kind of thing you might see on Liam Gallagher; it’s hard to imagine a Soviet leader wearing it on the reviewing stand atop Lenin’s mausoleum in Red Square during the May Day parade.

The potency of the image from Moscow lies in its relationship to reality. Medvedev has just been sworn into a fearsome office, yet beside Putin he looks like a boy in short pants.

Yesterday, The Economist's blog, Free Exchange, led me to this Financial Times article on India's camel boom:

As the cost of running gas-guzzling tractors soars, even-toed ungulates are making a comeback, raising hopes that a fall in the population of the desert state’s signature animal can be reversed. “It’s excellent for the camel population if the price of oil continues to go up because demand for camels will also go up,” says Ilse Köhler-Rollefson of the League for Pastoral Peoples and Endogenous Livestock Development. “Two years ago, a camel cost little more than a goat, which is nothing. The price has since trebled.”

The shift comes not a moment too soon for a national camel population that has fallen more than 50 per cent over the past decade, to about 450,000, according to government figures.

Rising prices. High demand. Falling supply. Sounds like a good scenario if you can exploit it. So I called Peter Seidel of Camels Australia Export to ask if he was detecting an export upswing. But according to Peter, Australian camels are sold to the Middle East and Southeast Asia mainly for meat and dairy production, and some as breeding stock. India couldn't afford Australian camels anyway, he reckons, though that might change if oil prices continue to head north.

Images of burning tyres and news of armed clashes between pro- and anti-government supporters in areas of Beirut on Wednesday make for sobering reading. While the clashes erupted on a day that the General Labour Confederation had called for a national strike, the industrial action merely provided the stage for sectarian grievances to be played out.

In the days leading up to the strike, the government had been ratcheting up the pressure on Hizbullah. First came accusations aired by the Druze leader Walid Jumblatt that Hizbullah had installed camera equipment at Beirut airport to monitor the movements of government officials (the government removed the head of airport security Brigadier-General Wafiq Shoukair, a Shi’a). Then cabinet decided to investigate a private telecommunications network that Hizbullah operated inside Lebanon. Outside the country, US officials in Iraq this week accused Hizbullah of training Iraqi Shi’a insurgents inside Iran. More...

Another surging wave has crashed into a vulnerable Southeast Asian country, killing tens of thousands and leaving over a million people homeless (most of the destruction of the typhoon that hit Myanmar this weekend came from the huge wave surges it triggered). Yet, while the pictures and the causes are eerily similar to the fateful Boxing Day of 2004, the differences in the reaction to the two crises are marked. More...

Guest blogger: Shiro Armstrong is a Research Scholar at the East Asian Bureau of Economic Research, Australian National University.

This week Hu Jintao is visiting Japan, the first such trip by a Chinese president in 10 years. It could produce a breakthrough in the important yet rocky relationship between the two neighbouring East Asian powers. More...

Yesterday the Australian Strategic Policy Institute released a new paper advocating a more resilient Australia. Societal and economic resilience is a topic we've tackled before here at The Interpreter, and it is very encouraging to see it get such systematic treatment from ASPI. Let's hope it kicks along a national debate, and that Ric Smith's homeland security review makes resilience a real priority.

The ASPI paper focuses deliberately on the broad topic of Australia's ability to cope with and recover from all kinds of disasters, not just man-made ones like a major terrorist attack. More...

Guest blogger: Melissa George, an intern with the Lowy Institute's West Asia Program, worked for the Palestinian Central Elections Commission (CEC), the UN Development Program and the Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces.

Jimmy Carter’s recent meeting with senior Hamas members has been controversial to say the least. In defence of his meeting, Carter stated that his intention was not to lend legitimacy to the group – which he says was realised in their 2006 electoral win – but to clarify Hamas’ position regarding Israel. Hamas’ overtures to 'accept' Israel and agree to a 10-year truce should Israel return to the pre-June 1967 boundaries is however carrying little weight among Carter’s critics. The view from Israel is that Carter is sabotaging not only the Israeli-Palestinian track in Qatar but also the wider regional framework for managing Israel-Arab relations. More...

Last week I linked to Steve Clemons' Washington Note, where a debate was starting on the proposition that the US is in relative decline in global affairs, thanks to the rise of India and China. As Clemons said, the debate about American decline does seem to be high on the list of priorities among global 'big thinkers', with new books from Kishore Mahbubani and Newsweek's foreign editor, Fareed Zakaria (you can find a long extract from Zakaria's book here, and an interesting rejoinder here).

The best contribution to this debate I have read so far came overnight on Clemons' blog, from John Ikenberry. More...

Today, there will be an important high-level meeting in Asia of great interest to Australia. No, it is not the meeting between Hu Jintao and Fukuda Yasuo but that between the new Malaysian Foreign Minister Rais Yatim and the Philippine Secretary for Foreign Affairs Alberto Romulo. This meeting is important because just as Australia is increasing its support for the peace process in Mindanao between Manila and the MILF, Malaysia may be giving up in frustration. More...

Guest blogger: Sanjay Ramesh, who teaches at the University of Technology, Sydney, is Senior Political Editor at the Sydney Fiji Times and Adjunct Fellow at the University of Fiji.

Jon Fraenkel raises some important issues about Fiji. Most important, perhaps, is his message that there could never be any justification for overthrowing an elected government. However, the latest coup in Fiji was different from the previous coups, in that it was based on ‘good governance’ and multi-ethnic collaboration. Nevertheless, a lack of success in the post-coup period on the part of the commander and the President to secure support from all sections of Fiji’s community to participate in the National Council for Building a Better Fiji and for electoral reforms highlight the difficulties behind building trust and consensus among diverse political parties and communal leaders. This leads to Fraenkel’s point whether those, like me, who are taking a 'soft' approach to the military coup in Fiji are aiding in legitimizing an unconstitutional act. More...

• Two blog posts about China's middle class: the first notes the proliferation of luxury brand outlets to 'second tier' Chinese cities, while the second warns that you shouldn't read too much into luxury goods sales.
• I've just discovered Jotman.com, which looks to be one of the better English-language blogs about South East Asian politics. It carries a round-up of blog coverage of the Burma cyclone.
• Who is Bobby Jindal? A 36 year-old Indian-American governor who might just be John McCain's running mate.