FEARS. Earlier today, Rob Farley wrote, "A commercial satellite recently spotted the first Jin boat, China's new class of ballistic missile submarines. The Jins will carry 12 or 16 missiles (no one is quite sure, yet) with a range of about 8000km. Combined with the further development of Chinese ICBMs, the days in which only West Coast residents need to worry about Chinese missiles will shortly be over." You know, I spent my first 21 years on the West Coast, and never once gave a moment's thought to the possibility that I'd meet my end through a Chinese ICBM. Nor did anyone else I knew. It's actually an uplifting thing to think about: Whatever the tensions are between the world's powers, the days when large countries with the capacity to annihilate each other were in a state of constant, low-grade conflict have been dead for decades. Those of us who largely matured in the post-Cold War era just don't have the same fear set. And for all the Iran-related scare-mongering offered by the neocons, I rather like it this way. --Ezra Klein
