Squaring the Pentagon, by Doug Bandow
The U.S. government should focus on defending America, allowing friends and allies to defend themselves and their regions.
Cato, Mar 10, 2009
President Barack Obama has unveiled his new budget, which proposes continued increases in military outlays. What for? The United States is spending far too much on the Pentagon.
There is no more important federal role than providing for the common defense. But what is required for defense depends upon circumstances. Military requirements in 1900 differed dramatically from those in 1940 and in 1980. What are the requirements today?
The latest Pentagon budget suggests that the United States is embattled and isolated, its territory threatened and its future imperiled. The Obama administration has proposed a $40 billion (8 percent) hike in military outlays in 2010 to $527.7 billion. (Counting Iraq and Afghanistan will push annual military spending up to around $700 billion.) President Obama plans to continue increasing the size of the Army and Marine Corps.
This proposal comes on top of a 75 percent increase in real military outlays under the Bush administration. Today, Washington possesses the world's most sophisticated nuclear arsenal, most powerful air force, most dominating navy and most effective army. America accounts for roughly half of global military outlays. Observes the Cato Institute's Ben Friedman: "Add the wars, nuclear weapons research, veterans, and homeland security, and you get about $750 billion. That is more than six times what China spends, 10 times what Russia spends and 70 times what Iran, North Korea and Syria spend combined."
Nevertheless, Pentagon officials and conservative activists are complaining about defense "cuts" since the new administration has reduced the Pentagon's request for even more money. Robert Kagan of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace even contends that the Obama administration is signaling that "the American retreat has begun."
Thus, a mix of officials, lobbyists, and analysts advocate spending a fixed percentage of GDP on the military, irrespective of circumstance. Both Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen advocate setting a spending floor of 4 percent of GDP. Marion Blakey, president of the Aerospace Industries Association says the 4 percent floor should be "front and center for any new president's agenda." Former Missouri Senator James Talent has been promoting the same number. The Heritage Foundation calls this the "4% for Freedom Solution." (Baseline spending currently runs 3.7 percent.)
Steven Kosiak of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments figures that a four percent rule would increase military outlays above current plans by between $1.4 and $1.7 trillion over the next decade. Even that isn't enough money for some uber-hawks. Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson wanted 4.5 percent of GDP. AEI's Gary Schmitt prefers five percent. The Wall Street Journal has editorialized for five to six percent. Former and potential GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee advocated six percent—more than a 50 percent hike over today's levels.
Whatever could justify such increases?
The United States already spends more on the military in real terms than it did during the cold war, even as the very hot Korean and Vietnam Wars raged. America devotes a lower percentage of its GDP to the military, but the U.S. economy is much greater today—six times (adjusting for inflation) as big as at the end of World War II. Total resources for defense are higher today than at any other point in over six decades.
Nevertheless, worries Admiral Mullen: "the four percent floor is . . . really important, given the world we're living in, given the threats that we see out there, the risks that are, in fact, global, not just in the Middle East." Bret Stephens of the Wall Street Journal believes that we are in what amounts to a new post-Locarno world like that before World War II, as the forces of darkness were gathering. AEI's Frederick Kagan argued that "American inattention to the world in the coming years could lead to a similarly devastating result" like World War II, since "the current international environment is by any comparison more dangerous for the U.S. than the one that led to World War II." Jim Talent contended: "We live in a multipolar world with threats that are highly unpredictable and therefore, taken as a whole, more dangerous than the threats we faced during the cold war." Representative John Shadegg claimed that "Our nation is facing the threat of Radical Islam, the gravest threat to our national security in history."
If these claims are true, then why spend only four percent of GDP on defense? Why not 9.4 percent, as during the Vietnam War? Or 14.2 percent, as during the Korean War? Or 37.8 percent, as during World War II? Or even more? After all, we can never be too safe.
The reason why not is simple. These apocalyptic claims are absurd.
There is no longer a Nazi Germany or imperial Japan. Nor even a fascist Italy. There is no more Soviet Union or Warsaw Pact. There is no longer an ideologically-aggressive Communist China allied with the Soviet Union. The patchwork of Third World states backed by the Soviet Union has dissolved. As Gertrude Stein once said of Oakland, there is no there there in terms of traditional military threats.
At the same time, Washington spends almost as much as the rest of the world combined on our military. Sure, some small or poor states devote a larger percentage of their limited resources to defense, but their total outlays remain minuscule compared to those of America. That's not all, however. The United States is allied with every major industrialized state save China and Russia. America and other NATO members together account for about $1.05 trillion out of $1.470 trillion in world military expenditures. Adding Japan, South Korea, and Australia take the allied up to $1.15 trillion.
Nevertheless, when running for president Rudy Giuliani opined: "The idea of a post-Cold War 'peace dividend' was a serious mistake—the product of wishful thinking and the opposite of true realism." The Washington Examiner worries that "potential adversaries rapidly are ramping up their militaries."
Precisely who?
America's relationship with Moscow and Beijing is civil, if sometimes difficult. Even if one assumes greater hostility not today evident, the United States vastly outranges both militarily. America's defense expenditures—not counting spending for the Afghanistan and Iraq wars—run at least four times and as much as seven times as much as each of their outlays (for which estimates vary). America has eleven carrier groups, while Russia has one and China has none. Moscow has a nuclear force sufficient to deter U.S. military action, but little conventional capability beyond its own borders. Russia can beat up neighboring Georgia, but not threaten the United States.
Beijing is investing more in the military, but is starting with a far lower base and still spending far less. If the People's Republic of China (PRC) wants to overtake Washington as a global power, the PRC will have to spend more than America for years. What China is doing today is creating a defensive force capable of deterring U.S. intervention, not an offensive force capable of attacking America. And even as China grows economically, it will remain well behind the United States in wealth. America's per capita GDP last year was $48,000. That of China was $6,100. The PRC is in no position to match, let alone overtake, America, in the foreseeable future.
Moreover, Russia's and China's neighbors, most of whom are close friends of Washington, could do much more if necessary: America's allies account for about three-quarters of world GDP, and the number goes higher when one includes friendly states like India. The European Union's GDP alone is thirteen times as great as that of Russia.
Japan's economy remains roughly as large as that of the PRC (estimates differ). Still, China has a greater prospect than Russia of becoming regionally dominant. But Beijing is surrounded by countries with which it has fought wars: Russia, Japan, India and Vietnam. Further, India, Japan, South Korea, Australia and ASEAN states have created or could create militaries capable of deterring Chinese adventurism. Beijing would have to undertake a dramatic military build-up to overwhelm Washington's East Asian friends, let alone threaten America's territory.
Could circumstances change in five, ten or twenty years? Yes, but it makes no sense for the United States to waste money today dealing with unlikely scenarios which, even if they occurred, could be dealt with less expensively in the future. America will be stronger and better prepared to face future challenges if it husbands its resources and encourages economic growth today. The United States should work to defuse, not exacerbate conflict. For instance, philosophical distaste for Vladimir Putin's Russia is no reason to turn it into a military adversary.
If not China and Russia, then who threatens America? Washington has forged better ties with India and has no serious conflicts with other emerging powers, such as Brazil, Indonesia and South Africa. America's presumed enemies are few and pitiful: North Korea, Iran, Cuba. Maybe Burma and Venezuela. Toss in Sudan and Somalia, as if the latter actually existed as a nation. Stretch to include Syria. This disparate group is no replacement for the Axis alliance or Soviet empire.
None of these countries actually endangers the United States. Nasty actors, yes, but with very limited ambitions and abilities. Writes Friedman, "North Korea and Iran trouble their citizens and neighbors, but with decaying economies, shoddy militaries, and aversion to suicidal behavior, they pose little threat to the United States."
Only North Korea has a serious military, but it is directed at the Republic of Korea (ROK), not the United States. The ROK is a long-time friend, but can defend itself. With 40 times the GDP, twice the population, a vast technological edge and far more international friends, including the North's old allies Beijing and Moscow, South Korea no longer needs America's help.
Iran doesn't even threaten U.S. allies. Tehran remains far away from developing actual nuclear weapons, is surrounded by potential adversaries and faces Israel, which is a regional superpower with a sizable nuclear arsenal. The other hostile states are militarily irrelevant—brutal towards their own people, but unable to harm anyone else.
Washington is not without serious security concerns, most obviously terrorism. However, carrier groups and armored divisions are largely irrelevant to this issue. Better intelligence, improved allied cooperation and expanded special forces are far more useful tools. Indeed, military involvement itself encourages terrorism: intervening in the Lebanese civil war, placing a garrison on Saudi territory and sending the USS Cole to Yemen all helped spark terrorist attacks. So did the occupation of Iraq. In these and other cases, a smaller and less active military would have done more to reduce terrorism.
Washington should spend heavily, if necessary, to safeguard America's population, territory, constitutional system and liberties. But this mission cannot explain Washington's current military outlays. Observes Richard Betts of Columbia University,
such levels cannot be justified based on any actual threats that the U.S. armed forces might plausibly be expected to encounter. The military capabilities of the United States need to be kept comfortably superior to those of present and potential enemies. But they should be measured relatively, against those enemies' capabilities, and not against the limits of what is technologically possible or based on some vague urge to have more.
Today most U.S. military outlays are directed at offense, not defense, to underwrite populous and prosperous allies and remake failed societies. This is why defense expenditures are seen by some as "inadequate." Military spending is the price of one's foreign policy, and it is expensive to attempt to micromanage world affairs. Thus, Tom Donnelly of the American Enterprise Institute correctly complains of "the large and long-standing gap between U.S. strategy and military resources." But he is wrong to assume that promiscuous intervention is Washington's only policy option.
How should America decide how much to spend on the military? Steven Kosiak writes:
considering the range of military threats and challenges the country faces, and determining the strategy, forces and capabilities needed to counter those challenges and advance U.S. interests, at an acceptable level of risk—as well as at an acceptable cost, in terms of other national priorities (including everything from homeland security to health care).
By this standard, military expenditures should come down substantially. The point is not that Washington cannot afford to be a global cop and social engineer, though the economic crisis—with the collapse in private asset values and explosion of federal debt—has made such a policy much more difficult. But it is not in America's interest to devote so much of its resources to activities with so little relevance to American security. The U.S. government should focus on defending America, allowing friends and allies to defend themselves and their regions.
If spending as much as the rest of the world on the military isn't enough, how much is? If accounting for nearly 80 percent of world military outlays isn't enough for the United States and its allies, how much is? America is by far the most powerful nation on earth. What the United States needs is not a bigger military budget, but a more restrained foreign policy. That is, a foreign policy befitting a democratic republic.
Monday, March 16, 2009
A Dialogue With Lebanon's Ayatollah, Muhammad Hussein Fadhlullah
A Dialogue With Lebanon's Ayatollah. By Robert L Pollock
WSJ, Beirut, Mar 16, 2009, page A7
'I have not found in the whole long history of the Arab-Israeli conflict even one neutral American position. We used to love America in the region in the '40s. [President Woodrow] Wilson's principles [of national self-determination] represent freedom facing a Europe that was colonizing us. But America now is living a policy worse than that of British and French colonialism."
So said Muhammad Hussein Fadhlullah early one morning last week, and I suppose I should not have been surprised.
We met in a nondescript -- but heavily guarded -- office building in south Beirut. On my way there I had noticed, as in the Bekaa Valley a day earlier, numerous posters celebrating Hezbollah "martyrs." According to many, the Grand Ayatollah Fadhlullah is Hezbollah's spiritual leader. He is not actually a member of the famous Lebanese Shiite organization headed by Hassan Nasrallah. But his interpreter tells me the Israelis bombed his house during their 2006 air campaign in Lebanon. There is no doubt someone -- the CIA and the Saudis, according to a detailed account in Bob Woodward's book "Veil" -- targeted him in 1985, when a massive bomb aimed in his direction killed nearly 80 civilians in Beirut.
That, readers may recall, was not long after alleged Hezbollah suicide bombers directed by the late Imad Mugniyeh -- one of the "martyrs" celebrated in the posters -- murdered hundreds at the American Embassy and Marine barracks. And it was in the midst of the hostage crises that would define Lebanon in the minds of my own generation of Americans. Outside of the Iranian theocrats, no group did more than Hezbollah to associate Shiism, once known for its political quietism, with radicalism and terror.
And what of Mr. Fadhlullah today? The aging cleric (born 1935), sports the requisite black turban and a disarming twinkle in his eyes. He is often described as a "progressive" religious thinker because of views such as his egalitarian outlook on the role of women in Muslim society (he is online at english.bayynat.org.lb). Yet there can be little doubt the Ayatollah's views have also shaped, and been shaped by, the fragile and often violent country he has called home since the mid-1960s.
The Lebanese-born scholar Fouad Ajami draws my attention to Mr. Fadhlullah's preface to the 1984 edition of his book, "Islam and the Logic of Force": "Civilization does not mean that you face a rocket with a stick or a jet-fighter with a kite, or a warship with a sailboat. . . . One must face force with equal or superior force. If it is legitimate to defend self and land and destiny, then all means of self-defense are legitimate."
I decide to start our interview by asking what people mean when they describe him in "progressive" terms. "When man thinks," he tells me, "he should live in his own age, not think through the past . . . When I am in dialogue with anyone, I attempt to study their mind and to speak to them in the language of their mind, not to address them in the way I think but rather in the way they think. On this basis we begin this dialogue with you."
Mr. Fadhlullah tells me that though he is originally Lebanese, he was born in Najaf, Iraq, where his father was a teacher at the Hawza, or religious seminary, from which he would eventually earn his current distinction. (He holds the same rank as Iraq's Ali Sistani; Shiites recognize a small number of "grand ayatollahs" who issue religious rulings known as fatwas and serve as objects of "emulation.") He says his international upbringing shaped his way of thinking.
I ask if he thinks Iraq is better off now than it was under Saddam. Iraq had a problem with "dictatorship," he concedes. But this "dictatorship had a relationship with the former American administration," he says, pointing to Saddam's invasion of Iran and other actions that allegedly "serv[ed] the American strategy . . . Saddam Hussein was an employee of the CIA but his job was finished by the end." He accuses the Bush administration of pursuing a policy of "constructive chaos" during the occupation.
Mr. Fadhlullah's fellow Shiite scholars in Najaf have been heard to complain about such sour pronouncements, but I see no reason to belabor the point. There is a rivalry of sorts with Mr. Sistani. And when it comes to the upcoming parliamentary elections in Lebanon -- the country shook off Syrian occupation in 2005, some say inspired by Iraq -- Mr. Fadhlullah even points to the West as a good example:
"We hope that that the elections will be as free as in civilized nations. Our problem in the Arab world is that people fear their rulers and therefore fall short of changing them, whereas the natural course of things is that rulers should fear their peoples. . . . We appreciate the way elections are run in America or the West; the Americans or the Europeans are not frozen over one personality. They study the success or failure of this president or this administration, and therefore they change it from time to time."
I point out that many people associate political Shiism with Iran and a concept known as Welayat al-Faqih -- or Guardianship of the Jurist -- which has been used to justify the authoritarian regimes of the Ayatollahs Khomeini and Khameini.
"I don't believe that Welayat al-Faqih has any role in Lebanon," Mr. Fadhlullah says without hesitation. "Perhaps some Lebanese commit themselves to the policy of the Guardian Jurist, as some of them commit themselves to the policy of the Vatican [Lebanon's large Maronite community is Catholic]. My opinion is that I don't see the Guardianship of the Jurist as the definitive Islamic regime."
When a Muslim goes to vote should he care more about a cleric's opinion than anyone else's?
"He should care about his own stance . . . . The Islamic idea says: When you cast your ballot, you have to watch for God because God will hold you responsible for the results of this ballot. If the person you voted for was unjust, God will hold you accountable for participating in his injustice. . . . Hence, the Americans who voted for George Bush are responsible for all the blood shed in his wars and occupations."
That seems as good an opening as any to broach the subject of Hezbollah. Does he think it's healthy that Lebanon's Shiites are increasingly associated with such a party?
His answer, in effect, is that Hezbollah is a force for modernization: "Hezbollah is a group of Shiites who are university educated. We know that you will find at universities, whether here in Lebanon or in the West, many who agree with the thought of Hezbollah." True enough, at least as concerns attitudes toward Israel.
Then the answer gets more interesting: "We do not reject the West. But we disagree with some Western administrations. We believe that America is not the administration ruling America. America is rather the universities, the research centers and the American people. That is why we want to be friends with the American people with all their variation. I was the first Islamic figure to denounce what happened on September 11. I issued a press release after four hours saying that this affair is not acceptable by any mind, divine law or religion. What these people did was directed to the American people not to the American administration."
I can't help but interject. Hadn't he just told me the American people were in fact responsible for the actions of the leaders they voted for?
He responds that the people bear "a responsibility," but concedes they can't predict their leaders' future actions. "What I am trying to say," he continues, "is that perhaps we want to be friends with the American people to engage them in a dialogue about their choices as they engage in a dialogue about our choices. Friendship does not mean adhering to whatever your friend commits to and does. Dialogue strengthens friendship; it does not annul it."
What does the Ayatollah think of President Obama? Does he think he might improve relations between the Islamic world and the United States?
Again, an interesting answer: "I think that some of his statements show that he believes in the method of dialogue. But here is an important point: America is not ruled by a person, it is ruled by institutions. The question is what is the influence of institutions like the Congress and others on the president. Can the president, if he has private opinions, can he carry them out facing institutions and conditions challenging the administration? We, in the Arab countries or in the East, we don't have institutions. The ruler is one person or one family. Therefore the people cannot object.
"We wish that President Obama tries with all his mandate to confirm the slogans he launched while still a candidate, that he tries with all power to make the world a field of dialogue not a field of war. We don't have a problem with any American president, but our problem is with his policy that might affect our strategic interest. We love freedom, therefore we are with whoever lives with us on the basis that we are free."
But didn't George Bush say that he wanted to bring freedom and democracy to the Middle East? Was he not sincere in those words?
"Does occupation . . . ?" He pauses. "Could democracy be forced upon peoples? Does occupation represent a title of democracy for people? Democracy sets out from the free choices of peoples. Therefore President Bush managed to get America hated everywhere in the world. His policy was the mentality of war, not a humane mentality. He might have spoken about 'peace,' but he saved 'war' inside the word 'peace.' That is why he was even rejected by American public opinion."
I raise Hezbollah again. Does the Iranian-backed group have Lebanon's best interests at heart? Or does it have ambitions outside Lebanon? For whom is it working?
"I don't think that the Lebanese Hezbollah has a project beyond Lebanon. Because it does not have the capacity to do so . . . . Hezbollah emerged in Lebanon as a reaction to the recurrent Israeli aggression over decades. The Lebanese army is weak with regard to its power of deterrence. Therefore it cannot face any Israeli aggression. Hezbollah is supplementary to the Lebanese Army defending the country. If the Lebanese Army reaches a level of strength enabling it to defend the country, there would be no longer a need for the resistance."
And what about the posters, I ask? Imad Mugniyeh didn't just fight Israel, he killed a lot of Americans. Does he think the children of the neighborhood should look at the posters and think Mugniyeh is a hero?
"I think that the stage Lebanon lived [when the Americans were killed] was one without clear limitations. It is very natural that the American policy was interconnected with the Israeli policy. The stage when this took place was one of the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the West. Therefore the issue was not setting out from a person, but from the conflict between the East and the West, and through the political and security anarchy in Lebanon. In my own belief, this stage is no longer existent, but the problem remains that the American policy is 100% identical to the Israeli policy. We have not found an American position condemning the massacres in Palestine and particularly in Gaza. The missiles launched by the resistance were a reaction to the Israeli aggressors, who own American fighter jets that are never used but in massive warfare . . . .
"We in the region therefore consider the American policy responsible for whatever Israel does, because there is a strategic alliance between Israel and America in all the aggressions carried out by Israel. There is an impression in the Arab region, that might be controversial, that Israel is the one ruling the United States and not the other way around. America is one of the Jewish colonies."
Does the Ayatollah believe that?
"I am close," he says. "Anyway, we believe that Obama lived in a poor and disadvantaged environment. He was poor. Therefore, we might listen to some of his statements trying to alleviate taxes on the poor and impose them on the rich. We say to him: Be with the disadvantaged, be with the poor, be with the people living and seeking their humanity, and you will be the best American president in history. Be humane."
The interview is over. We pose for pictures and the Ayatollah presents me with an English translation of one of his books: "Islam: The Religion of Dialogue." He signs it for me in Arabic: "With my affection and prayers."
Mr. Pollock is the Journal's editorial features editor.
WSJ, Beirut, Mar 16, 2009, page A7
'I have not found in the whole long history of the Arab-Israeli conflict even one neutral American position. We used to love America in the region in the '40s. [President Woodrow] Wilson's principles [of national self-determination] represent freedom facing a Europe that was colonizing us. But America now is living a policy worse than that of British and French colonialism."
So said Muhammad Hussein Fadhlullah early one morning last week, and I suppose I should not have been surprised.
We met in a nondescript -- but heavily guarded -- office building in south Beirut. On my way there I had noticed, as in the Bekaa Valley a day earlier, numerous posters celebrating Hezbollah "martyrs." According to many, the Grand Ayatollah Fadhlullah is Hezbollah's spiritual leader. He is not actually a member of the famous Lebanese Shiite organization headed by Hassan Nasrallah. But his interpreter tells me the Israelis bombed his house during their 2006 air campaign in Lebanon. There is no doubt someone -- the CIA and the Saudis, according to a detailed account in Bob Woodward's book "Veil" -- targeted him in 1985, when a massive bomb aimed in his direction killed nearly 80 civilians in Beirut.
That, readers may recall, was not long after alleged Hezbollah suicide bombers directed by the late Imad Mugniyeh -- one of the "martyrs" celebrated in the posters -- murdered hundreds at the American Embassy and Marine barracks. And it was in the midst of the hostage crises that would define Lebanon in the minds of my own generation of Americans. Outside of the Iranian theocrats, no group did more than Hezbollah to associate Shiism, once known for its political quietism, with radicalism and terror.
And what of Mr. Fadhlullah today? The aging cleric (born 1935), sports the requisite black turban and a disarming twinkle in his eyes. He is often described as a "progressive" religious thinker because of views such as his egalitarian outlook on the role of women in Muslim society (he is online at english.bayynat.org.lb). Yet there can be little doubt the Ayatollah's views have also shaped, and been shaped by, the fragile and often violent country he has called home since the mid-1960s.
The Lebanese-born scholar Fouad Ajami draws my attention to Mr. Fadhlullah's preface to the 1984 edition of his book, "Islam and the Logic of Force": "Civilization does not mean that you face a rocket with a stick or a jet-fighter with a kite, or a warship with a sailboat. . . . One must face force with equal or superior force. If it is legitimate to defend self and land and destiny, then all means of self-defense are legitimate."
I decide to start our interview by asking what people mean when they describe him in "progressive" terms. "When man thinks," he tells me, "he should live in his own age, not think through the past . . . When I am in dialogue with anyone, I attempt to study their mind and to speak to them in the language of their mind, not to address them in the way I think but rather in the way they think. On this basis we begin this dialogue with you."
Mr. Fadhlullah tells me that though he is originally Lebanese, he was born in Najaf, Iraq, where his father was a teacher at the Hawza, or religious seminary, from which he would eventually earn his current distinction. (He holds the same rank as Iraq's Ali Sistani; Shiites recognize a small number of "grand ayatollahs" who issue religious rulings known as fatwas and serve as objects of "emulation.") He says his international upbringing shaped his way of thinking.
I ask if he thinks Iraq is better off now than it was under Saddam. Iraq had a problem with "dictatorship," he concedes. But this "dictatorship had a relationship with the former American administration," he says, pointing to Saddam's invasion of Iran and other actions that allegedly "serv[ed] the American strategy . . . Saddam Hussein was an employee of the CIA but his job was finished by the end." He accuses the Bush administration of pursuing a policy of "constructive chaos" during the occupation.
Mr. Fadhlullah's fellow Shiite scholars in Najaf have been heard to complain about such sour pronouncements, but I see no reason to belabor the point. There is a rivalry of sorts with Mr. Sistani. And when it comes to the upcoming parliamentary elections in Lebanon -- the country shook off Syrian occupation in 2005, some say inspired by Iraq -- Mr. Fadhlullah even points to the West as a good example:
"We hope that that the elections will be as free as in civilized nations. Our problem in the Arab world is that people fear their rulers and therefore fall short of changing them, whereas the natural course of things is that rulers should fear their peoples. . . . We appreciate the way elections are run in America or the West; the Americans or the Europeans are not frozen over one personality. They study the success or failure of this president or this administration, and therefore they change it from time to time."
I point out that many people associate political Shiism with Iran and a concept known as Welayat al-Faqih -- or Guardianship of the Jurist -- which has been used to justify the authoritarian regimes of the Ayatollahs Khomeini and Khameini.
"I don't believe that Welayat al-Faqih has any role in Lebanon," Mr. Fadhlullah says without hesitation. "Perhaps some Lebanese commit themselves to the policy of the Guardian Jurist, as some of them commit themselves to the policy of the Vatican [Lebanon's large Maronite community is Catholic]. My opinion is that I don't see the Guardianship of the Jurist as the definitive Islamic regime."
When a Muslim goes to vote should he care more about a cleric's opinion than anyone else's?
"He should care about his own stance . . . . The Islamic idea says: When you cast your ballot, you have to watch for God because God will hold you responsible for the results of this ballot. If the person you voted for was unjust, God will hold you accountable for participating in his injustice. . . . Hence, the Americans who voted for George Bush are responsible for all the blood shed in his wars and occupations."
That seems as good an opening as any to broach the subject of Hezbollah. Does he think it's healthy that Lebanon's Shiites are increasingly associated with such a party?
His answer, in effect, is that Hezbollah is a force for modernization: "Hezbollah is a group of Shiites who are university educated. We know that you will find at universities, whether here in Lebanon or in the West, many who agree with the thought of Hezbollah." True enough, at least as concerns attitudes toward Israel.
Then the answer gets more interesting: "We do not reject the West. But we disagree with some Western administrations. We believe that America is not the administration ruling America. America is rather the universities, the research centers and the American people. That is why we want to be friends with the American people with all their variation. I was the first Islamic figure to denounce what happened on September 11. I issued a press release after four hours saying that this affair is not acceptable by any mind, divine law or religion. What these people did was directed to the American people not to the American administration."
I can't help but interject. Hadn't he just told me the American people were in fact responsible for the actions of the leaders they voted for?
He responds that the people bear "a responsibility," but concedes they can't predict their leaders' future actions. "What I am trying to say," he continues, "is that perhaps we want to be friends with the American people to engage them in a dialogue about their choices as they engage in a dialogue about our choices. Friendship does not mean adhering to whatever your friend commits to and does. Dialogue strengthens friendship; it does not annul it."
What does the Ayatollah think of President Obama? Does he think he might improve relations between the Islamic world and the United States?
Again, an interesting answer: "I think that some of his statements show that he believes in the method of dialogue. But here is an important point: America is not ruled by a person, it is ruled by institutions. The question is what is the influence of institutions like the Congress and others on the president. Can the president, if he has private opinions, can he carry them out facing institutions and conditions challenging the administration? We, in the Arab countries or in the East, we don't have institutions. The ruler is one person or one family. Therefore the people cannot object.
"We wish that President Obama tries with all his mandate to confirm the slogans he launched while still a candidate, that he tries with all power to make the world a field of dialogue not a field of war. We don't have a problem with any American president, but our problem is with his policy that might affect our strategic interest. We love freedom, therefore we are with whoever lives with us on the basis that we are free."
But didn't George Bush say that he wanted to bring freedom and democracy to the Middle East? Was he not sincere in those words?
"Does occupation . . . ?" He pauses. "Could democracy be forced upon peoples? Does occupation represent a title of democracy for people? Democracy sets out from the free choices of peoples. Therefore President Bush managed to get America hated everywhere in the world. His policy was the mentality of war, not a humane mentality. He might have spoken about 'peace,' but he saved 'war' inside the word 'peace.' That is why he was even rejected by American public opinion."
I raise Hezbollah again. Does the Iranian-backed group have Lebanon's best interests at heart? Or does it have ambitions outside Lebanon? For whom is it working?
"I don't think that the Lebanese Hezbollah has a project beyond Lebanon. Because it does not have the capacity to do so . . . . Hezbollah emerged in Lebanon as a reaction to the recurrent Israeli aggression over decades. The Lebanese army is weak with regard to its power of deterrence. Therefore it cannot face any Israeli aggression. Hezbollah is supplementary to the Lebanese Army defending the country. If the Lebanese Army reaches a level of strength enabling it to defend the country, there would be no longer a need for the resistance."
And what about the posters, I ask? Imad Mugniyeh didn't just fight Israel, he killed a lot of Americans. Does he think the children of the neighborhood should look at the posters and think Mugniyeh is a hero?
"I think that the stage Lebanon lived [when the Americans were killed] was one without clear limitations. It is very natural that the American policy was interconnected with the Israeli policy. The stage when this took place was one of the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the West. Therefore the issue was not setting out from a person, but from the conflict between the East and the West, and through the political and security anarchy in Lebanon. In my own belief, this stage is no longer existent, but the problem remains that the American policy is 100% identical to the Israeli policy. We have not found an American position condemning the massacres in Palestine and particularly in Gaza. The missiles launched by the resistance were a reaction to the Israeli aggressors, who own American fighter jets that are never used but in massive warfare . . . .
"We in the region therefore consider the American policy responsible for whatever Israel does, because there is a strategic alliance between Israel and America in all the aggressions carried out by Israel. There is an impression in the Arab region, that might be controversial, that Israel is the one ruling the United States and not the other way around. America is one of the Jewish colonies."
Does the Ayatollah believe that?
"I am close," he says. "Anyway, we believe that Obama lived in a poor and disadvantaged environment. He was poor. Therefore, we might listen to some of his statements trying to alleviate taxes on the poor and impose them on the rich. We say to him: Be with the disadvantaged, be with the poor, be with the people living and seeking their humanity, and you will be the best American president in history. Be humane."
The interview is over. We pose for pictures and the Ayatollah presents me with an English translation of one of his books: "Islam: The Religion of Dialogue." He signs it for me in Arabic: "With my affection and prayers."
Mr. Pollock is the Journal's editorial features editor.
Why the GOP Can't Win With Minorities
Why the GOP Can't Win With Minorities. By Shelby Steele
WSJ, Mar 16, 2009
Today conservatism is stigmatized in our culture as an antiminority political philosophy. In certain quarters, conservatism is simply racism by another name. And minorities who openly identify themselves as conservatives are still novelties, fish out of water.
Yet there is now the feeling that without an appeal to minorities, conservatism is at risk of marginalization. The recent election revealed a Republican Party -- largely white, male and Southern -- seemingly on its way to becoming a "regional" party. Still, an appeal targeted just at minorities -- reeking as it surely would of identity politics -- is anathema to most conservatives. Can't it be assumed, they would argue, that support of classic principles -- individual freedom and equality under the law -- constitutes support of minorities? And, given the fact that blacks and Hispanics often poll more conservatively than whites on most social issues, shouldn't there be an easy simpatico between these minorities and political conservatism?
But of course the reverse is true. There is an abiding alienation between the two -- an alienation that I believe is the great new challenge for both modern conservatism and formerly oppressed minorities. Oddly, each now needs the other to evolve.
Yet why this alienation to begin with? Can it be overcome?
I think it began in a very specific cultural circumstance: the dramatic loss of moral authority that America suffered in the 1960s after openly acknowledging its long mistreatment of blacks and other minorities. Societies have moral accountability, and they cannot admit to persecuting a race of people for four centuries without losing considerable moral legitimacy. Such a confession -- honorable as it may be -- virtually calls out challenges to authority. And in the 1960s challenges emerged from everywhere -- middle-class white kids rioted for "Free Speech" at Berkeley, black riots decimated inner cities across the country, and violent antiwar protests were ubiquitous. America suddenly needed a conspicuous display of moral authority in order to defend the legitimacy of its institutions against relentless challenge.
This was the circumstance that opened a new formula for power in American politics: redemption. If you could at least seem to redeem America of its past sins, you could win enough moral authority to claim real political power. Lyndon Johnson devastated Barry Goldwater because -- among other reasons -- he seemed bent on redeeming America of its shameful racist past, while Goldwater's puritanical libertarianism precluded his even supporting the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Johnson's Great Society grandly advertised a new American racial innocence. If it utterly failed to "end poverty in our time," it succeeded -- through a great display of generosity toward minorities and the poor -- in recovering enough moral authority to see the government through the inexorable challenges of the '60s.
When redemption became a term of power, "redemptive liberalism" was born -- a new activist liberalism that gave itself a "redemptive" profile by focusing on social engineering rather than liberalism's classic focus on individual freedom. In the '60s there was no time to allow individual freedom to render up the social good. Redemptive liberalism would proactively engineer the good. Name a good like "integration," and then engineer it into being through a draconian regimen of school busing. If the busing did profound damage to public education in America, it gave liberals the right to say, "At least we did something!" In other words, we are activists against America's old sin of segregation. Activism is moral authority in redemptive liberalism.
But conservatism sees moral authority more in a discipline of principles than in activism. It sees ideas of the good like "diversity" as mere pretext for the social engineering that always leads to unintended and oppressive consequences. Conservatism would enforce the principles that ensure individual freedom, and then allow "the good" to happen by "invisible hand."
And here is conservatism's great problem with minorities. In an era when even failed moral activism is redemptive -- and thus a source of moral authority and power -- conservatism stands flat-footed with only discipline to offer. It has only an invisible hand to compete with the activism of the left. So conservatism has no way to show itself redeemed of America's bigoted past, no way like the Great Society to engineer a grand display of its innocence, and no way to show deference to minorities for the oppression they endured. Thus it seems to be in league with that oppression.
Added to this, American minorities of color -- especially blacks -- are often born into grievance-focused identities. The idea of grievance will seem to define them in some eternal way, and it will link them atavistically to a community of loved ones. To separate from grievance -- to say simply that one is no longer racially aggrieved -- will surely feel like an act of betrayal that threatens to cut one off from community, family and history. So, paradoxically, a certain chauvinism develops around one's sense of grievance. Today the feeling of being aggrieved by American bigotry is far more a matter of identity than of actual aggrievement.
And this identity calls minorities to an anticonservative orientation to American politics. It makes for an almost ancestral resistance to conservatism. One's identity of grievance is flattered by the moral activism of the left and offended by the invisible hand of the right. Minorities feel they were saved from oppression by the left's activism, not by the right's discipline. The truth doesn't matter much here (in fact it took both activism and principle, civil war and social movement, to end this oppression). But activism indicates moral anguish in whites, and so it constitutes the witness minorities crave. They feel seen, understood. With the invisible hand the special case of their suffering doesn't count for much, and they go without witness.
So here stands contemporary American conservatism amidst its cultural liabilities and, now, its electoral failures -- with no mechanism to redeem America of its shames, atavistically resisted by minorities, and vulnerable to stigmatization as a bigoted and imperialistic political orientation. Today's liberalism may stand on decades of failed ideas, but it is failure in the name of American redemption. It remains competitive with -- even ascendant over -- conservatism because it addresses America's moral accountability to its past with moral activism. This is the left's great power, and a good part of the reason Barack Obama is now the president of the United States. No matter his failures -- or the fruitlessness of his extravagant and scatter-gun governmental activism -- he redeems America of an ugly past. How does conservatism compete with this?
The first impulse is to moderate. With "compassionate conservatism" and "affirmative access" and "faith-based initiatives," President George W. Bush tried to show a redemptive conservatism that could be activist against the legacy of America's disgraceful past. And it worked electorally by moderating the image of conservatives as uncaring disciplinarians. But in the end it was only a marketer's ploy -- a shrewd advertisement with no actual product to sell.
What drew me to conservatism years ago was the fact that it gave discipline a slightly higher status than virtue. This meant it could not be subverted by passing notions of the good. It could be above moral vanity. And so it made no special promises to me as a minority. It neglected me in every way except as a human being who wanted freedom. Until my encounter with conservatism I had only known the racial determinism of segregation on the one hand and of white liberalism on the other -- two varieties of white supremacy in which I could only be dependent and inferior.
The appeal of conservatism is the mutuality it asserts between individual and political freedom, its beautiful idea of a free man in a free society. And it offers minorities the one thing they can never get from liberalism: human rather than racial dignity. I always secretly loved Malcolm X more than Martin Luther King Jr. because Malcolm wanted a fuller human dignity for blacks -- one independent of white moral wrestling. In a liberalism that wants to redeem the nation of its past, minorities can only be ciphers in white struggles of conscience.
Liberalism's glamour follows from its promise of a new American innocence. But the appeal of conservatism is relief from this supercilious idea. Innocence is not possible for America. This nation did what it did. And conservatism's appeal is that it does not bank on the recovery of lost innocence. It seeks the discipline of ordinary people rather than the virtuousness of extraordinary people. The challenge for conservatives today is simply self-acceptance, and even a little pride in the way we flail away at problems with an invisible hand.
Mr. Steele is a research fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
WSJ, Mar 16, 2009
Today conservatism is stigmatized in our culture as an antiminority political philosophy. In certain quarters, conservatism is simply racism by another name. And minorities who openly identify themselves as conservatives are still novelties, fish out of water.
Yet there is now the feeling that without an appeal to minorities, conservatism is at risk of marginalization. The recent election revealed a Republican Party -- largely white, male and Southern -- seemingly on its way to becoming a "regional" party. Still, an appeal targeted just at minorities -- reeking as it surely would of identity politics -- is anathema to most conservatives. Can't it be assumed, they would argue, that support of classic principles -- individual freedom and equality under the law -- constitutes support of minorities? And, given the fact that blacks and Hispanics often poll more conservatively than whites on most social issues, shouldn't there be an easy simpatico between these minorities and political conservatism?
But of course the reverse is true. There is an abiding alienation between the two -- an alienation that I believe is the great new challenge for both modern conservatism and formerly oppressed minorities. Oddly, each now needs the other to evolve.
Yet why this alienation to begin with? Can it be overcome?
I think it began in a very specific cultural circumstance: the dramatic loss of moral authority that America suffered in the 1960s after openly acknowledging its long mistreatment of blacks and other minorities. Societies have moral accountability, and they cannot admit to persecuting a race of people for four centuries without losing considerable moral legitimacy. Such a confession -- honorable as it may be -- virtually calls out challenges to authority. And in the 1960s challenges emerged from everywhere -- middle-class white kids rioted for "Free Speech" at Berkeley, black riots decimated inner cities across the country, and violent antiwar protests were ubiquitous. America suddenly needed a conspicuous display of moral authority in order to defend the legitimacy of its institutions against relentless challenge.
This was the circumstance that opened a new formula for power in American politics: redemption. If you could at least seem to redeem America of its past sins, you could win enough moral authority to claim real political power. Lyndon Johnson devastated Barry Goldwater because -- among other reasons -- he seemed bent on redeeming America of its shameful racist past, while Goldwater's puritanical libertarianism precluded his even supporting the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Johnson's Great Society grandly advertised a new American racial innocence. If it utterly failed to "end poverty in our time," it succeeded -- through a great display of generosity toward minorities and the poor -- in recovering enough moral authority to see the government through the inexorable challenges of the '60s.
When redemption became a term of power, "redemptive liberalism" was born -- a new activist liberalism that gave itself a "redemptive" profile by focusing on social engineering rather than liberalism's classic focus on individual freedom. In the '60s there was no time to allow individual freedom to render up the social good. Redemptive liberalism would proactively engineer the good. Name a good like "integration," and then engineer it into being through a draconian regimen of school busing. If the busing did profound damage to public education in America, it gave liberals the right to say, "At least we did something!" In other words, we are activists against America's old sin of segregation. Activism is moral authority in redemptive liberalism.
But conservatism sees moral authority more in a discipline of principles than in activism. It sees ideas of the good like "diversity" as mere pretext for the social engineering that always leads to unintended and oppressive consequences. Conservatism would enforce the principles that ensure individual freedom, and then allow "the good" to happen by "invisible hand."
And here is conservatism's great problem with minorities. In an era when even failed moral activism is redemptive -- and thus a source of moral authority and power -- conservatism stands flat-footed with only discipline to offer. It has only an invisible hand to compete with the activism of the left. So conservatism has no way to show itself redeemed of America's bigoted past, no way like the Great Society to engineer a grand display of its innocence, and no way to show deference to minorities for the oppression they endured. Thus it seems to be in league with that oppression.
Added to this, American minorities of color -- especially blacks -- are often born into grievance-focused identities. The idea of grievance will seem to define them in some eternal way, and it will link them atavistically to a community of loved ones. To separate from grievance -- to say simply that one is no longer racially aggrieved -- will surely feel like an act of betrayal that threatens to cut one off from community, family and history. So, paradoxically, a certain chauvinism develops around one's sense of grievance. Today the feeling of being aggrieved by American bigotry is far more a matter of identity than of actual aggrievement.
And this identity calls minorities to an anticonservative orientation to American politics. It makes for an almost ancestral resistance to conservatism. One's identity of grievance is flattered by the moral activism of the left and offended by the invisible hand of the right. Minorities feel they were saved from oppression by the left's activism, not by the right's discipline. The truth doesn't matter much here (in fact it took both activism and principle, civil war and social movement, to end this oppression). But activism indicates moral anguish in whites, and so it constitutes the witness minorities crave. They feel seen, understood. With the invisible hand the special case of their suffering doesn't count for much, and they go without witness.
So here stands contemporary American conservatism amidst its cultural liabilities and, now, its electoral failures -- with no mechanism to redeem America of its shames, atavistically resisted by minorities, and vulnerable to stigmatization as a bigoted and imperialistic political orientation. Today's liberalism may stand on decades of failed ideas, but it is failure in the name of American redemption. It remains competitive with -- even ascendant over -- conservatism because it addresses America's moral accountability to its past with moral activism. This is the left's great power, and a good part of the reason Barack Obama is now the president of the United States. No matter his failures -- or the fruitlessness of his extravagant and scatter-gun governmental activism -- he redeems America of an ugly past. How does conservatism compete with this?
The first impulse is to moderate. With "compassionate conservatism" and "affirmative access" and "faith-based initiatives," President George W. Bush tried to show a redemptive conservatism that could be activist against the legacy of America's disgraceful past. And it worked electorally by moderating the image of conservatives as uncaring disciplinarians. But in the end it was only a marketer's ploy -- a shrewd advertisement with no actual product to sell.
What drew me to conservatism years ago was the fact that it gave discipline a slightly higher status than virtue. This meant it could not be subverted by passing notions of the good. It could be above moral vanity. And so it made no special promises to me as a minority. It neglected me in every way except as a human being who wanted freedom. Until my encounter with conservatism I had only known the racial determinism of segregation on the one hand and of white liberalism on the other -- two varieties of white supremacy in which I could only be dependent and inferior.
The appeal of conservatism is the mutuality it asserts between individual and political freedom, its beautiful idea of a free man in a free society. And it offers minorities the one thing they can never get from liberalism: human rather than racial dignity. I always secretly loved Malcolm X more than Martin Luther King Jr. because Malcolm wanted a fuller human dignity for blacks -- one independent of white moral wrestling. In a liberalism that wants to redeem the nation of its past, minorities can only be ciphers in white struggles of conscience.
Liberalism's glamour follows from its promise of a new American innocence. But the appeal of conservatism is relief from this supercilious idea. Innocence is not possible for America. This nation did what it did. And conservatism's appeal is that it does not bank on the recovery of lost innocence. It seeks the discipline of ordinary people rather than the virtuousness of extraordinary people. The challenge for conservatives today is simply self-acceptance, and even a little pride in the way we flail away at problems with an invisible hand.
Mr. Steele is a research fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
WaPo: Gay couples should be allowed to stay together in the US
Separation Anxiety. WaPo Editorial
Gay couples should be allowed to stay together in the United States.
Monday, March 16, 2009; A16
THE UNITING American Families Act would allow gay and lesbian Americans and permanent residents to sponsor their foreign-born partners for legal residency in the United States. The bill, introduced last month in the Senate by Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and in the House by Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), would add "permanent partner" and "permanent partnership" after the words "spouse" and "marriage" in relevant sections of the Immigration and Nationality Act. If passed, it would right a gross unfairness.
Under the proposal, a "permanent partnership" is defined as a "committed, intimate relationship" with another adult "in which both parties intend a lifelong commitment." The couple must be financially interdependent and not married to or in a permanent partnership with anyone else. And the partners can't be related. The benefit comes with the same immigration restrictions and enforcement standards that apply to heterosexual couples. Fraudulent permanent partnerships face the same penalties as fake marriages: up to five years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.
"Under current law, committed same-sex foreign partners of American citizens are unable to use the family immigration system, which accounts for a majority of the green cards and immigrant visas granted annually by the United States," Mr. Leahy said upon introducing the bill. "The promotion of family unity has long been part of federal immigration policy, and we should honor that principle by providing all Americans the opportunity to be with their loved ones." According to the most recent census, he added, about 35,000 binational, same-sex couples are living in the United States. The new legislation would ensure that the family connections valued under immigration law are extended to gays and lesbians.
The strain of the status quo on gay and lesbian binational couples should not be discounted. Because their relationships are not legally recognized by the United States, some couples have resorted to illegal marriages where the foreign nationals marry Americans to get green cards that allow them to stay in the country permanently. In other cases, Americans have exiled themselves to be with their partners. Sixteen countries, including Australia, Brazil, Canada, Israel, South Africa and the United Kingdom, allow residents to sponsor same-sex permanent partners for legal immigration. American gays and lesbians should not have to choose between their country and their partners.
Gay couples should be allowed to stay together in the United States.
Monday, March 16, 2009; A16
THE UNITING American Families Act would allow gay and lesbian Americans and permanent residents to sponsor their foreign-born partners for legal residency in the United States. The bill, introduced last month in the Senate by Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and in the House by Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), would add "permanent partner" and "permanent partnership" after the words "spouse" and "marriage" in relevant sections of the Immigration and Nationality Act. If passed, it would right a gross unfairness.
Under the proposal, a "permanent partnership" is defined as a "committed, intimate relationship" with another adult "in which both parties intend a lifelong commitment." The couple must be financially interdependent and not married to or in a permanent partnership with anyone else. And the partners can't be related. The benefit comes with the same immigration restrictions and enforcement standards that apply to heterosexual couples. Fraudulent permanent partnerships face the same penalties as fake marriages: up to five years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.
"Under current law, committed same-sex foreign partners of American citizens are unable to use the family immigration system, which accounts for a majority of the green cards and immigrant visas granted annually by the United States," Mr. Leahy said upon introducing the bill. "The promotion of family unity has long been part of federal immigration policy, and we should honor that principle by providing all Americans the opportunity to be with their loved ones." According to the most recent census, he added, about 35,000 binational, same-sex couples are living in the United States. The new legislation would ensure that the family connections valued under immigration law are extended to gays and lesbians.
The strain of the status quo on gay and lesbian binational couples should not be discounted. Because their relationships are not legally recognized by the United States, some couples have resorted to illegal marriages where the foreign nationals marry Americans to get green cards that allow them to stay in the country permanently. In other cases, Americans have exiled themselves to be with their partners. Sixteen countries, including Australia, Brazil, Canada, Israel, South Africa and the United Kingdom, allow residents to sponsor same-sex permanent partners for legal immigration. American gays and lesbians should not have to choose between their country and their partners.
Are depressions “green”?
Are depressions “green”?, by Marlo Lewis
Master Resource, March 16, 2009
Cambridge University economist Dr. Terry Barker told delegates at the recent Copenhagen climate conference that if the current economic downturn persists for several years, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions worldwide could drop by 40% to 50%, the Irish Times reports.
Dr. Barker, who is director of the Cambridge Center for Climate Research, said the Great Depression of the 1930s reduced global emissions by 35% because so many factories shut down, especially in the United States. He adds:
The depression could be worse this time because of globalization. Emissions in the U.S. fell by 3 per cent last year and could fall by 10 to 20 per cent this year because the economy is dropping like a stone with up to 600,000 a month becoming unemployed.
The former Soviet Union provides additional proof of the emission-cutting power of economic collapse. In CO2 Emissions from Fuel Combustion Highlights (2005 Edition), the International Energy Agency reports the following emission reductions during 1990-2003: Bulgaria, 38%; Estonia, 35.3%, Latvia, 52.3%, Lithuania, 43.5%, Romania, 43.3%; Russia, 24.5%, Slovak Republic, 30.2%; and Ukraine, 50.1%.
So clearly, governments do have the power to achieve deep emission cuts in in a single decade or even in a few years. However, there’s not a shred of historical evidence that they can do this without first engineering severe economic contractions.
You might suppose Dr. Barker would worry that, if depressions produce deep emission cuts, then maybe mandating deep emission cuts would produce or prolong depressions, by making energy unaffordable.
But no, Barker reportedly views the current depression as a golden opportunity to launch a “Green New Deal.” He opines that, ”Even very stringent reductions in emissions can create a macroeconomic benefit, if governments go about it the right way.” This is but a green variant of the fatal conceit that elites know better than markets how to direct economic development. Government interventions in credit and housing markets are the root cause of the ongoing financial crisis. Yet instead of humbling would-be central planners, each policy disaster just seems to feed their hubris.
You hear Barker’s message all the time. The revenues from carbon permit auctions or carbon taxes will be used to lower taxes on capital and labor, and fund R&D, making us more prosperous and competitive.
But if taxes on labor and capital are too high (they are), that’s an argument for cutting those taxes, not for imposing new or higher taxes on energy. So-called green industries and jobs were bit players even when the economy was booming. That’s because even when credit markets were flush and fossil energy prices were high, green industries were relatively unproductive. For example, as my colleague Iain Murray estimates, one coal-industry job supports seven times as much electricity as one wind-industry job.
It strains credulity to claim that diverting capital and labor from, e.g., the coal industry to the wind industry will create a macroeconomic benefit, or that economy recovery can be built on jobs and industries that depended heavily on subsidies, tax preferences, and mandates even in prosperous times.
Master Resource, March 16, 2009
Cambridge University economist Dr. Terry Barker told delegates at the recent Copenhagen climate conference that if the current economic downturn persists for several years, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions worldwide could drop by 40% to 50%, the Irish Times reports.
Dr. Barker, who is director of the Cambridge Center for Climate Research, said the Great Depression of the 1930s reduced global emissions by 35% because so many factories shut down, especially in the United States. He adds:
The depression could be worse this time because of globalization. Emissions in the U.S. fell by 3 per cent last year and could fall by 10 to 20 per cent this year because the economy is dropping like a stone with up to 600,000 a month becoming unemployed.
The former Soviet Union provides additional proof of the emission-cutting power of economic collapse. In CO2 Emissions from Fuel Combustion Highlights (2005 Edition), the International Energy Agency reports the following emission reductions during 1990-2003: Bulgaria, 38%; Estonia, 35.3%, Latvia, 52.3%, Lithuania, 43.5%, Romania, 43.3%; Russia, 24.5%, Slovak Republic, 30.2%; and Ukraine, 50.1%.
So clearly, governments do have the power to achieve deep emission cuts in in a single decade or even in a few years. However, there’s not a shred of historical evidence that they can do this without first engineering severe economic contractions.
You might suppose Dr. Barker would worry that, if depressions produce deep emission cuts, then maybe mandating deep emission cuts would produce or prolong depressions, by making energy unaffordable.
But no, Barker reportedly views the current depression as a golden opportunity to launch a “Green New Deal.” He opines that, ”Even very stringent reductions in emissions can create a macroeconomic benefit, if governments go about it the right way.” This is but a green variant of the fatal conceit that elites know better than markets how to direct economic development. Government interventions in credit and housing markets are the root cause of the ongoing financial crisis. Yet instead of humbling would-be central planners, each policy disaster just seems to feed their hubris.
You hear Barker’s message all the time. The revenues from carbon permit auctions or carbon taxes will be used to lower taxes on capital and labor, and fund R&D, making us more prosperous and competitive.
But if taxes on labor and capital are too high (they are), that’s an argument for cutting those taxes, not for imposing new or higher taxes on energy. So-called green industries and jobs were bit players even when the economy was booming. That’s because even when credit markets were flush and fossil energy prices were high, green industries were relatively unproductive. For example, as my colleague Iain Murray estimates, one coal-industry job supports seven times as much electricity as one wind-industry job.
It strains credulity to claim that diverting capital and labor from, e.g., the coal industry to the wind industry will create a macroeconomic benefit, or that economy recovery can be built on jobs and industries that depended heavily on subsidies, tax preferences, and mandates even in prosperous times.
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Chas Freeman: His wit and wisdom - compilation of statements
Chas Freeman: His wit and wisdom. By Scott Johnson
PowerLine Blog, Mar 15, 2009
Last weekend Martin Kramer compiled the statements of Saudi/Manchurian candidate Chas Freeman on al Qaeda and 9/11. Freeman is of course the former American ambassador to Saudi Arabia whom Obama administration DNI Dennis Blair appointed to chair the National Intelligence Council. In the spirit of Kramer's compilation, I thought it might be useful to collect in one place a few of the highlights of Freeman's keen analytical insight expressed over the years, grouped by subject with links to the sources.
Freeman on Tiananmen Square (May 2006):
I find the dominant view in China about this very plausible, i.e. that the truly unforgivable mistake of the Chinese authorities was the failure to intervene on a timely basis to nip the demonstrations in the bud, rather than -- as would have been both wise and efficacious -- to intervene with force when all other measures had failed to restore domestic tranquility to Beijing and other major urban centers in China. In this optic, the Politburo's response to the mob scene at "Tian'anmen" stands as a monument to overly cautious behavior on the part of the leadership, not as an example of rash action.
For myself, I side on this -- if not on numerous other issues -- with Gen. Douglas MacArthur. I do not believe it is acceptable for any country to allow the heart of its national capital to be occupied by dissidents intent on disrupting the normal functions of government, however appealing to foreigners their propaganda may be. Such folk, whether they represent a veterans' "Bonus Army" or a "student uprising" on behalf of "the goddess of democracy" should expect to be displaced with despatch from the ground they occupy. I cannot conceive of any American government behaving with the ill-conceived restraint that the Zhao Ziyang administration did in China, allowing students to occupy zones that are the equivalent of the Washington National Mall and Times Square, combined. while shutting down much of the Chinese government's normal operations. I thus share the hope of the majority in China that no Chinese government will repeat the mistakes of Zhao Ziyang's dilatory tactics of appeasement in dealing with domestic protesters in China.
Freeman on Saudi education (December 2000):
It is widely charged in the United States that Saudi Arabian education teaches hateful and evil things. I do not think that is the case.
Freeman on Saudi Arabian King Abdullah (October 2008):
I believe King Abdullah is very rapidly becoming Abdullah the Great.
Freeman on 9/11 (October 2005):
I simply want to register what I think is an obvious point:; namely that what 9/11 showed is that if we bomb people, they bomb back.
Freeman revisits 9/11 (October 2006):
Americans need to be clear about the consequences of continuing our current counterproductive approaches to security in the Middle East. We have paid heavily and often in treasure in the past for our unflinching support and unstinting subsidies of Israel's approach to managing its relations with the Arabs. Five years ago we began to pay with the blood of our citizens here at home. We are now paying with the lives of our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines on battlefields in several regions of the realm of Islam, with more said by our government's neoconservative mentors to be in prospect.
Freeman on the Arab-Israeli conflict (October 2006):
Demonstrably, Israel excels at war; sadly, it has shown no talent for peace.
Freeman on Israeli intransigence (May 2007):
Israel no longer even pretends to seek peace with the Palestinians; it strives instead to pacify them.
Freeman on Israel's harm to America (May 2007):
American identification with Israeli policy has also become total. Those in the region and beyond it who detest Israeli behavior, which is to say almost everyone, now naturally extend their loathing to Americans. This has had the effect of universalizing anti-Americanism, legitimizing radical Islamism, and gaining Iran a foothold among Sunni as well as Shiite Arabs. For its part, Israel no longer even pretends to seek peace with the Palestinians; it strives instead to pacify them. Palestinian retaliation against this policy is as likely to be directed against Israel's American backers as against Israel itself. Under the circumstances, such retaliation - whatever form it takes - will have the support or at least the sympathy of most people in the region and many outside it. This makes the long-term escalation of terrorism against the United States a certainty, not a matter of conjecture.
Freeman on the role of American Jews (October 2006):
[H]istory and the Israeli response to date both strongly suggest that without some tough love from Americans, including especially Israel's American coreligionists, Israel will not risk the uncertainties of peace.
Freeman on the withdrawal of his appointment (March 2009):
The libels on me and their easily traceable email trails show conclusively that there is a powerful lobby determined to prevent any view other than its own from being aired, still less to factor in American understanding of trends and events in the Middle East. The tactics of the Israel Lobby plumb the depths of dishonor and indecency and include character assassination, selective misquotation, the willful distortion of the record, the fabrication of falsehoods, and an utter disregard for the truth. The aim of this Lobby is control of the policy process through the exercise of a veto over the appointment of people who dispute the wisdom of its views, the substitution of political correctness for analysis, and the exclusion of any and all options for decision by Americans and our government other than those that it favors....
I regret that my willingness to serve the new administration has ended by casting doubt on its ability to consider, let alone decide what policies might best serve the interests of the United States rather than those of a Lobby intent on enforcing the will and interests of a foreign government.
Freeman on his one regret regarding his withdrawal statement (March 2009):
The only thing I regret is that in my statement I embraced the term "Israel lobby." This isn't really a lobby by, for or about Israel. It's really, well, I've decided I'm going to call it from now on the [Avigdor] Lieberman lobby. It's the very right-wing Likud in Israel and its fanatic supporters here. And Avigdor Lieberman is really the guy that they really agree with. And I think they're doing Israel in.
In part via Andrew Bolt and The Blog (the Weekly Standard's Michael Goldfarb).
PowerLine Blog, Mar 15, 2009
Last weekend Martin Kramer compiled the statements of Saudi/Manchurian candidate Chas Freeman on al Qaeda and 9/11. Freeman is of course the former American ambassador to Saudi Arabia whom Obama administration DNI Dennis Blair appointed to chair the National Intelligence Council. In the spirit of Kramer's compilation, I thought it might be useful to collect in one place a few of the highlights of Freeman's keen analytical insight expressed over the years, grouped by subject with links to the sources.
Freeman on Tiananmen Square (May 2006):
I find the dominant view in China about this very plausible, i.e. that the truly unforgivable mistake of the Chinese authorities was the failure to intervene on a timely basis to nip the demonstrations in the bud, rather than -- as would have been both wise and efficacious -- to intervene with force when all other measures had failed to restore domestic tranquility to Beijing and other major urban centers in China. In this optic, the Politburo's response to the mob scene at "Tian'anmen" stands as a monument to overly cautious behavior on the part of the leadership, not as an example of rash action.
For myself, I side on this -- if not on numerous other issues -- with Gen. Douglas MacArthur. I do not believe it is acceptable for any country to allow the heart of its national capital to be occupied by dissidents intent on disrupting the normal functions of government, however appealing to foreigners their propaganda may be. Such folk, whether they represent a veterans' "Bonus Army" or a "student uprising" on behalf of "the goddess of democracy" should expect to be displaced with despatch from the ground they occupy. I cannot conceive of any American government behaving with the ill-conceived restraint that the Zhao Ziyang administration did in China, allowing students to occupy zones that are the equivalent of the Washington National Mall and Times Square, combined. while shutting down much of the Chinese government's normal operations. I thus share the hope of the majority in China that no Chinese government will repeat the mistakes of Zhao Ziyang's dilatory tactics of appeasement in dealing with domestic protesters in China.
Freeman on Saudi education (December 2000):
It is widely charged in the United States that Saudi Arabian education teaches hateful and evil things. I do not think that is the case.
Freeman on Saudi Arabian King Abdullah (October 2008):
I believe King Abdullah is very rapidly becoming Abdullah the Great.
Freeman on 9/11 (October 2005):
I simply want to register what I think is an obvious point:; namely that what 9/11 showed is that if we bomb people, they bomb back.
Freeman revisits 9/11 (October 2006):
Americans need to be clear about the consequences of continuing our current counterproductive approaches to security in the Middle East. We have paid heavily and often in treasure in the past for our unflinching support and unstinting subsidies of Israel's approach to managing its relations with the Arabs. Five years ago we began to pay with the blood of our citizens here at home. We are now paying with the lives of our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines on battlefields in several regions of the realm of Islam, with more said by our government's neoconservative mentors to be in prospect.
Freeman on the Arab-Israeli conflict (October 2006):
Demonstrably, Israel excels at war; sadly, it has shown no talent for peace.
Freeman on Israeli intransigence (May 2007):
Israel no longer even pretends to seek peace with the Palestinians; it strives instead to pacify them.
Freeman on Israel's harm to America (May 2007):
American identification with Israeli policy has also become total. Those in the region and beyond it who detest Israeli behavior, which is to say almost everyone, now naturally extend their loathing to Americans. This has had the effect of universalizing anti-Americanism, legitimizing radical Islamism, and gaining Iran a foothold among Sunni as well as Shiite Arabs. For its part, Israel no longer even pretends to seek peace with the Palestinians; it strives instead to pacify them. Palestinian retaliation against this policy is as likely to be directed against Israel's American backers as against Israel itself. Under the circumstances, such retaliation - whatever form it takes - will have the support or at least the sympathy of most people in the region and many outside it. This makes the long-term escalation of terrorism against the United States a certainty, not a matter of conjecture.
Freeman on the role of American Jews (October 2006):
[H]istory and the Israeli response to date both strongly suggest that without some tough love from Americans, including especially Israel's American coreligionists, Israel will not risk the uncertainties of peace.
Freeman on the withdrawal of his appointment (March 2009):
The libels on me and their easily traceable email trails show conclusively that there is a powerful lobby determined to prevent any view other than its own from being aired, still less to factor in American understanding of trends and events in the Middle East. The tactics of the Israel Lobby plumb the depths of dishonor and indecency and include character assassination, selective misquotation, the willful distortion of the record, the fabrication of falsehoods, and an utter disregard for the truth. The aim of this Lobby is control of the policy process through the exercise of a veto over the appointment of people who dispute the wisdom of its views, the substitution of political correctness for analysis, and the exclusion of any and all options for decision by Americans and our government other than those that it favors....
I regret that my willingness to serve the new administration has ended by casting doubt on its ability to consider, let alone decide what policies might best serve the interests of the United States rather than those of a Lobby intent on enforcing the will and interests of a foreign government.
Freeman on his one regret regarding his withdrawal statement (March 2009):
The only thing I regret is that in my statement I embraced the term "Israel lobby." This isn't really a lobby by, for or about Israel. It's really, well, I've decided I'm going to call it from now on the [Avigdor] Lieberman lobby. It's the very right-wing Likud in Israel and its fanatic supporters here. And Avigdor Lieberman is really the guy that they really agree with. And I think they're doing Israel in.
In part via Andrew Bolt and The Blog (the Weekly Standard's Michael Goldfarb).
Solar Energy Firms Leave Waste Behind in China
Solar Energy Firms Leave Waste Behind in China. By Ariana Eunjung Cha
Washington Post, Sunday, March 9, 2008; A01
GAOLONG, China -- The first time Li Gengxuan saw the dump trucks from the nearby factory pull into his village, he couldn't believe what happened. Stopping between the cornfields and the primary school playground, the workers dumped buckets of bubbling white liquid onto the ground. Then they turned around and drove right back through the gates of their compound without a word.
This ritual has been going on almost every day for nine months, Li and other villagers said.
In China, a country buckling with the breakneck pace of its industrial growth, such stories of environmental pollution are not uncommon. But the Luoyang Zhonggui High-Technology Co., here in the central plains of Henan Province near the Yellow River, stands out for one reason: It's a green energy company, producing polysilicon destined for solar energy panels sold around the world. But the byproduct of polysilicon production -- silicon tetrachloride -- is a highly toxic substance that poses environmental hazards.
"The land where you dump or bury it will be infertile. No grass or trees will grow in the place. . . . It is like dynamite -- it is poisonous, it is polluting. Human beings can never touch it," said Ren Bingyan, a professor at the School of Material Sciences at Hebei Industrial University.
The situation in Li's village points to the environmental trade-offs the world is making as it races to head off a dwindling supply of fossil fuels.
Forests are being cleared to grow biofuels like palm oil, but scientists argue that the disappearance of such huge swaths of forests is contributing to climate change. Hydropower dams are being constructed to replace coal-fired power plants, but they are submerging whole ecosystems under water.
Likewise in China, the push to get into the solar energy market is having unexpected consequences.
With the prices of oil and coal soaring, policymakers around the world are looking at massive solar farms to heat water and generate electricity. For the past four years, however, the world has been suffering from a shortage of polysilicon -- the key component of sunlight-capturing wafers -- driving up prices of solar energy technology and creating a barrier to its adoption.
With the price of polysilicon soaring from $20 per kilogram to $300 per kilogram in the past five years, Chinese companies are eager to fill the gap.
In China, polysilicon plants are the new dot-coms. Flush with venture capital and with generous grants and low-interest loans from a central government touting its efforts to seek clean energy alternatives, more than 20 Chinese companies are starting polysilicon manufacturing plants. The combined capacity of these new factories is estimated at 80,000 to 100,000 tons -- more than double the 40,000 tons produced in the entire world today.
But Chinese companies' methods for dealing with waste haven't been perfected.
Because of the environmental hazard, polysilicon companies in the developed world recycle the compound, putting it back into the production process. But the high investment costs and time, not to mention the enormous energy consumption required for heating the substance to more than 1800 degrees Fahrenheit for the recycling, have discouraged many factories in China from doing the same. Like Luoyang Zhonggui, other solar plants in China have not installed technology to prevent pollutants from getting into the environment or have not brought those systems fully online, industry sources say.
"The recycling technology is of course being thought about, but currently it's still not mature," said Shi Jun, a former photovoltaic technology researcher at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Shi, chief executive of Pro-EnerTech, a start-up polysilicon research firm in Shanghai, said that there's such a severe shortage of polysilicon that the government is willing to overlook this issue for now.
"If this happened in the United States, you'd probably be arrested," he said.
An independent, nationally accredited laboratory analyzed a sample of dirt from the dump site near the Luoyang Zhonggui plant at the request of The Washington Post. The tests show high concentrations of chlorine and hydrochloric acid, which can result from the breakdown of silicon tetrachloride and do not exist naturally in soil. "Crops cannot grow on this, and it is not suitable for people to live nearby," said Li Xiaoping, deputy director of the Shanghai Academy of Environmental Sciences.
Wang Hailong, secretary of the board of directors for Luoyang Zhonggui, said it is "impossible" to think that the company would dump large amounts of waste into a residential area. "Some of the villagers did not tell the truth," he said.
However, Wang said the company does release a "minimal amount of waste" in compliance with all environmental regulations. "We release it in a certain place in a certain way. Before it is released, it has gone through strict treatment procedures."
Yi Xusheng, the head of monitoring for the Henan Province Environmental Protection Agency, said the factory had passed a review before it opened, but that "it's possible that there are some pollutants in the production process" that inspectors were not aware of. Yi said the agency would investigate.
In 2005, when residents of Li's village, Shiniu, heard that a new solar energy company would be building a factory nearby, they celebrated.
The impoverished farming community of roughly 2,300, near the eastern end of the Silk Road, had been left behind during China's recent boom. In a country where the average wage in some areas has climbed to $200 a month, many of the village's residents make just $200 a year. They had high hopes their new neighbor would jump-start the local economy and help transform the area into an industrial hub.
The Luoyang Zhonggui factory grew out of an effort by a national research institute to improve on a 50-year-old polysilicon refining technology pioneered by Germany's Siemens. Concerned about intellectual property issues, Siemens has held off on selling its technology to the Chinese. So the Chinese have tried to create their own.
Last year, the Luoyang Zhonggui factory was estimated to have produced less than 300 tons of polysilicon, but it aims to increase that tenfold this year -- making it China's largest operating plant. It is a key supplier to Suntech Power Holdings, a solar panel company whose founder Shi Zhengrong recently topped the list of the richest people in China.
Made from the Earth's most abundant substance -- sand -- polysilicon is tricky to manufacture. It requires huge amounts of energy, and even a small misstep in the production can introduce impurities and ruin an entire batch. The other main challenge is dealing with the waste. For each ton of polysilicon produced, the process generates at least four tons of silicon tetrachloride liquid waste.
When exposed to humid air, silicon tetrachloride transforms into acids and poisonous hydrogen chloride gas, which can make people who breathe the air dizzy and can make their chests contract.
While it typically takes companies two years to get a polysilicon factory up and running properly, many Chinese companies are trying to do it in half that time or less, said Richard Winegarner, president of Sage Concepts, a California-based consulting firm.
As a result, Ren of Hebei Industrial University said, some Chinese plants are stockpiling the hazardous substances in the hopes that they can figure out a way to dispose of it later: "I know these factories began to store silicon tetrachloride in drums two years ago."
Pro-EnerTech's Shi says other companies -- including Luoyang Zhonggui -- are just dumping wherever they can.
"Theoretically, companies should collect it all, process it to get rid of the poisonous stuff, then release it or recycle. Zhonggui currently doesn't have the technology. Now they are just releasing it directly into the air," said Shi, who recently visited the factory.
Shi estimates that Chinese companies are saving millions of dollars by not installing pollution recovery.
He said that if environmental protection technology is used, the cost to produce one ton is approximately $84,500. But Chinese companies are making it at $21,000 to $56,000a ton.
In sharp contrast to the gleaming white buildings in Zhonggui's new gated complex in Gaolong, the situation in the villages surrounding it is bleak.
About nine months ago, residents of Li's village, which begins about 50 yards from the plant, noticed that their crops were wilting under a dusting of white powder. Sometimes, there was a hazy cloud up to three feet high near the dumping site; one person tending crops there fainted, several villagers said. Small rocks began to accumulate in kettles used for boiling faucet water.
Each night, villagers said, the factory's chimneys released a loud whoosh of acrid air that stung their eyes and made it hard to breath. "It's poison air. Sometimes it gets so bad you can't sit outside. You have to close all the doors and windows," said Qiao Shi Peng, 28, a truck driver who said he worries about his 1-year-old son's health.
The villagers said most obvious evidence of the pollution is the dumping, up to 10 times a day, of the liquid waste into what was formerly a grassy field. Eventually, the whole area turned white, like snow.
The worst part, said Li, 53, who lives with his son and granddaughter in the village, is that "they go outside the gates of their own compound to dump waste."
"We didn't know how bad it was until the August harvest, until things started dying," he said.
Early this year, one of the villagers put some of the contaminated soil in a plastic bag and went to the local environmental bureau. They never got back to him.
Zhang Zhenguo, 45, a farmer and small businessman, said he has a theory as to why: "They didn't test it because the government supports the plant."
Researchers Wu Meng and Crissie Ding contributed to this report.
Washington Post, Sunday, March 9, 2008; A01
GAOLONG, China -- The first time Li Gengxuan saw the dump trucks from the nearby factory pull into his village, he couldn't believe what happened. Stopping between the cornfields and the primary school playground, the workers dumped buckets of bubbling white liquid onto the ground. Then they turned around and drove right back through the gates of their compound without a word.
This ritual has been going on almost every day for nine months, Li and other villagers said.
In China, a country buckling with the breakneck pace of its industrial growth, such stories of environmental pollution are not uncommon. But the Luoyang Zhonggui High-Technology Co., here in the central plains of Henan Province near the Yellow River, stands out for one reason: It's a green energy company, producing polysilicon destined for solar energy panels sold around the world. But the byproduct of polysilicon production -- silicon tetrachloride -- is a highly toxic substance that poses environmental hazards.
"The land where you dump or bury it will be infertile. No grass or trees will grow in the place. . . . It is like dynamite -- it is poisonous, it is polluting. Human beings can never touch it," said Ren Bingyan, a professor at the School of Material Sciences at Hebei Industrial University.
The situation in Li's village points to the environmental trade-offs the world is making as it races to head off a dwindling supply of fossil fuels.
Forests are being cleared to grow biofuels like palm oil, but scientists argue that the disappearance of such huge swaths of forests is contributing to climate change. Hydropower dams are being constructed to replace coal-fired power plants, but they are submerging whole ecosystems under water.
Likewise in China, the push to get into the solar energy market is having unexpected consequences.
With the prices of oil and coal soaring, policymakers around the world are looking at massive solar farms to heat water and generate electricity. For the past four years, however, the world has been suffering from a shortage of polysilicon -- the key component of sunlight-capturing wafers -- driving up prices of solar energy technology and creating a barrier to its adoption.
With the price of polysilicon soaring from $20 per kilogram to $300 per kilogram in the past five years, Chinese companies are eager to fill the gap.
In China, polysilicon plants are the new dot-coms. Flush with venture capital and with generous grants and low-interest loans from a central government touting its efforts to seek clean energy alternatives, more than 20 Chinese companies are starting polysilicon manufacturing plants. The combined capacity of these new factories is estimated at 80,000 to 100,000 tons -- more than double the 40,000 tons produced in the entire world today.
But Chinese companies' methods for dealing with waste haven't been perfected.
Because of the environmental hazard, polysilicon companies in the developed world recycle the compound, putting it back into the production process. But the high investment costs and time, not to mention the enormous energy consumption required for heating the substance to more than 1800 degrees Fahrenheit for the recycling, have discouraged many factories in China from doing the same. Like Luoyang Zhonggui, other solar plants in China have not installed technology to prevent pollutants from getting into the environment or have not brought those systems fully online, industry sources say.
"The recycling technology is of course being thought about, but currently it's still not mature," said Shi Jun, a former photovoltaic technology researcher at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Shi, chief executive of Pro-EnerTech, a start-up polysilicon research firm in Shanghai, said that there's such a severe shortage of polysilicon that the government is willing to overlook this issue for now.
"If this happened in the United States, you'd probably be arrested," he said.
An independent, nationally accredited laboratory analyzed a sample of dirt from the dump site near the Luoyang Zhonggui plant at the request of The Washington Post. The tests show high concentrations of chlorine and hydrochloric acid, which can result from the breakdown of silicon tetrachloride and do not exist naturally in soil. "Crops cannot grow on this, and it is not suitable for people to live nearby," said Li Xiaoping, deputy director of the Shanghai Academy of Environmental Sciences.
Wang Hailong, secretary of the board of directors for Luoyang Zhonggui, said it is "impossible" to think that the company would dump large amounts of waste into a residential area. "Some of the villagers did not tell the truth," he said.
However, Wang said the company does release a "minimal amount of waste" in compliance with all environmental regulations. "We release it in a certain place in a certain way. Before it is released, it has gone through strict treatment procedures."
Yi Xusheng, the head of monitoring for the Henan Province Environmental Protection Agency, said the factory had passed a review before it opened, but that "it's possible that there are some pollutants in the production process" that inspectors were not aware of. Yi said the agency would investigate.
In 2005, when residents of Li's village, Shiniu, heard that a new solar energy company would be building a factory nearby, they celebrated.
The impoverished farming community of roughly 2,300, near the eastern end of the Silk Road, had been left behind during China's recent boom. In a country where the average wage in some areas has climbed to $200 a month, many of the village's residents make just $200 a year. They had high hopes their new neighbor would jump-start the local economy and help transform the area into an industrial hub.
The Luoyang Zhonggui factory grew out of an effort by a national research institute to improve on a 50-year-old polysilicon refining technology pioneered by Germany's Siemens. Concerned about intellectual property issues, Siemens has held off on selling its technology to the Chinese. So the Chinese have tried to create their own.
Last year, the Luoyang Zhonggui factory was estimated to have produced less than 300 tons of polysilicon, but it aims to increase that tenfold this year -- making it China's largest operating plant. It is a key supplier to Suntech Power Holdings, a solar panel company whose founder Shi Zhengrong recently topped the list of the richest people in China.
Made from the Earth's most abundant substance -- sand -- polysilicon is tricky to manufacture. It requires huge amounts of energy, and even a small misstep in the production can introduce impurities and ruin an entire batch. The other main challenge is dealing with the waste. For each ton of polysilicon produced, the process generates at least four tons of silicon tetrachloride liquid waste.
When exposed to humid air, silicon tetrachloride transforms into acids and poisonous hydrogen chloride gas, which can make people who breathe the air dizzy and can make their chests contract.
While it typically takes companies two years to get a polysilicon factory up and running properly, many Chinese companies are trying to do it in half that time or less, said Richard Winegarner, president of Sage Concepts, a California-based consulting firm.
As a result, Ren of Hebei Industrial University said, some Chinese plants are stockpiling the hazardous substances in the hopes that they can figure out a way to dispose of it later: "I know these factories began to store silicon tetrachloride in drums two years ago."
Pro-EnerTech's Shi says other companies -- including Luoyang Zhonggui -- are just dumping wherever they can.
"Theoretically, companies should collect it all, process it to get rid of the poisonous stuff, then release it or recycle. Zhonggui currently doesn't have the technology. Now they are just releasing it directly into the air," said Shi, who recently visited the factory.
Shi estimates that Chinese companies are saving millions of dollars by not installing pollution recovery.
He said that if environmental protection technology is used, the cost to produce one ton is approximately $84,500. But Chinese companies are making it at $21,000 to $56,000a ton.
In sharp contrast to the gleaming white buildings in Zhonggui's new gated complex in Gaolong, the situation in the villages surrounding it is bleak.
About nine months ago, residents of Li's village, which begins about 50 yards from the plant, noticed that their crops were wilting under a dusting of white powder. Sometimes, there was a hazy cloud up to three feet high near the dumping site; one person tending crops there fainted, several villagers said. Small rocks began to accumulate in kettles used for boiling faucet water.
Each night, villagers said, the factory's chimneys released a loud whoosh of acrid air that stung their eyes and made it hard to breath. "It's poison air. Sometimes it gets so bad you can't sit outside. You have to close all the doors and windows," said Qiao Shi Peng, 28, a truck driver who said he worries about his 1-year-old son's health.
The villagers said most obvious evidence of the pollution is the dumping, up to 10 times a day, of the liquid waste into what was formerly a grassy field. Eventually, the whole area turned white, like snow.
The worst part, said Li, 53, who lives with his son and granddaughter in the village, is that "they go outside the gates of their own compound to dump waste."
"We didn't know how bad it was until the August harvest, until things started dying," he said.
Early this year, one of the villagers put some of the contaminated soil in a plastic bag and went to the local environmental bureau. They never got back to him.
Zhang Zhenguo, 45, a farmer and small businessman, said he has a theory as to why: "They didn't test it because the government supports the plant."
Researchers Wu Meng and Crissie Ding contributed to this report.
Medvedev Urges Russia's Richest To Return "Moral Debts"
Medvedev Urges Russia's Richest To Return "Moral Debts"
Mar 15, 2009 11:13
MOSCOW (AFP)--President Dmitry Medvedev Sunday urged Russia's largest businesses to return "moral debts" during an economic crisis which he called " cleanup time."
"Nowhere in the world perhaps has the development of entrepreneurship in recent times happened as quickly as in our country.
"People simply have been getting very rich in a very short time," Medvedev said in an interview to be broadcast on national television later Sunday..
"Now it is time pay off debts, moral debts because the crisis is a test of maturity," he said.
Medvedev said the current crisis, Russia's worst economic collapse in a decade, was the time for the richest businessmen to embrace social responsibility and put interests of their employees before their own.
"If a person has really become a genuine businessman he can appreciate his employees," he said in comments released by the presidential administration.
"He will perhaps try to put off part of his proposals, part of his ideas or personal consumption, save his staff, pay them salaries, save what he's been doing in recent years."
Many of Russia's richest people earned fortunes through controversial loans- for-shares privatization in the 1990s and an economic bonanza fueled by high oil and gas prices gave birth to yet more tycoons.
Today Russia's richest are struggling to pay off billions of dollars in debts built up in better times, while the government has said businesses shouldn' assume there would be a blanket bailout of all.
"In this sense, this is probably cleanup time: he who survives the crisis conditions will be an effective entrepreneur, an effective manager in a good sense of the word," Medvedev said.
(END)
Mar 15, 2009 11:13
MOSCOW (AFP)--President Dmitry Medvedev Sunday urged Russia's largest businesses to return "moral debts" during an economic crisis which he called " cleanup time."
"Nowhere in the world perhaps has the development of entrepreneurship in recent times happened as quickly as in our country.
"People simply have been getting very rich in a very short time," Medvedev said in an interview to be broadcast on national television later Sunday..
"Now it is time pay off debts, moral debts because the crisis is a test of maturity," he said.
Medvedev said the current crisis, Russia's worst economic collapse in a decade, was the time for the richest businessmen to embrace social responsibility and put interests of their employees before their own.
"If a person has really become a genuine businessman he can appreciate his employees," he said in comments released by the presidential administration.
"He will perhaps try to put off part of his proposals, part of his ideas or personal consumption, save his staff, pay them salaries, save what he's been doing in recent years."
Many of Russia's richest people earned fortunes through controversial loans- for-shares privatization in the 1990s and an economic bonanza fueled by high oil and gas prices gave birth to yet more tycoons.
Today Russia's richest are struggling to pay off billions of dollars in debts built up in better times, while the government has said businesses shouldn' assume there would be a blanket bailout of all.
"In this sense, this is probably cleanup time: he who survives the crisis conditions will be an effective entrepreneur, an effective manager in a good sense of the word," Medvedev said.
(END)
Counterfeit Drug Policy in India
Counterfeit Drug Policy in India. By Roger Bate
India's major pharmaceutical companies have been badly served by India's political system.
The New Ledger, March 12, 2009
For the past decade India's major pharmaceutical companies, alongside the public health community and police services, have attempted to drive forward a modern drug regulatory system which, among other things, would have effectually combated the scourge of counterfeit and substandard drugs. But due to a combination of lobbying from middle-sized companies making suspect quality drugs, as well as some states, which wanted to maintain control of drug quality decisions, the status quo is to remain. This is a tragedy for the many thousands who die annually from substandard medicines in India (and from India exports to Africa and Asia), most estimates say that at least 10% of Indian drugs are substandard.
Radical revisions to the Drugs and Cosmetics Act of 1940 have been proposed on and off for the past thirty-odd years. Yet the major amendments proposed in October 2007 would have increased the minimum jail time for convicted drug counterfeiters from five years to ten years and increased the minimum fine for such offenses from 10,000 rupees (about $320) to a million rupees (about $32,000).
In November 2008, The Indian health minister, Anbumani Ramadoss from Tamil Nadu, pledged that through this amendment the Indian government would "go all out to do away with spurious drugs." But while he certainly tried to push the amendments through parliament, and succeeded through the upper house, he has failed to even get the lower house to hear the bill. With an election expected in two months the amendments will have to wait for another administration. Some local pharmaceutical company experts consider it may be years before the amendments are tabled again.
The amendments would have created a central drug authority, which in principle would have administered the entire drug regulatory system, overseeing drug quality and authorizing product marketing. At the moment the Drug Controller General of India authorizes new domestic and imported drugs but the manufacture of drugs is controlled by individual state drug authorities. The DCGI is underfunded and the states vary in the demands they place on companies and the monitoring and enforcement of those companies infringing rules. Maharastra, home to many large and respected pharmaceutical companies has nearer western style quality control, with at least some push towards what would be considered oversight of Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP). Whereas Uttar Pradesh, home to many counterfeiters, has weaker oversight and non-existent GMP control. Yet a drug manufactured and approved in one state can be sold anywhere in the country, or exported. Substandard producers can locate in states with weak controls and ply their wares everywhere, allowing hundreds of substandard state-approved medicines to proliferate.
According to well placed locals, behind the scenes lobbying by politicians from states with weak GMP controls, prevented the amendments from becoming law. If they had failed they would lose revenue paid by pharmaceutical companies and perhaps more importantly they would lose control. According to experts from world class domestic and international pharmaceutical companies, while the revenue loss would be minimal the loss of control would have meant a reduction in opportunities for graft.
Meanwhile the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is establishing an office in India to oversee drug quality exports to America. Now that the Indian Government has effectively abdicated responsibility for quality control, it has made FDA's job much harder. By not squashing political opposition to the necessary legal changes, India's best companies may lose out on increasingly important export markets.
India's major pharmaceutical companies have been badly served by India's political system. While the Government plays to the militant anti-patent crowd, defending the rights of politically connected companies that enjoy ripping off western patents, it does nothing to improve the image of Indian companies oversees. When the FDA banned the exports to US in fall 2008 of India's largest drug company, Ranbaxy, it was a major blow to Indian prestige, yet few found the ban unexpected, given the lack of oversight by the Indian Government. Companies like Ranbaxy are always looking for ways to cut costs, and even if top management want to maintain high quality it is very easy for lower level managers to cut corners if there is no local oversight.
If some of Ranbaxy's drug stability data was falsified, as alleged by FDA and US Department of Justice, is anyone really surprised?
India has seen how a series of product scandals took a harsh toll on China's global credibility, its arch-rival in industrial development, yet it has squandered the chance to clean up its own act. This will, sooner or later, come back to bite them.
Since 1975, successive Indian government commissions have urgently recommended product safety reforms and been ignored. Perhaps only when hundreds die oversees from Indian exports, and its drugs are discredited and then banned across the world, will the necessary changes be made.
Roger Bate is a resident fellow at AEI.
India's major pharmaceutical companies have been badly served by India's political system.
The New Ledger, March 12, 2009
For the past decade India's major pharmaceutical companies, alongside the public health community and police services, have attempted to drive forward a modern drug regulatory system which, among other things, would have effectually combated the scourge of counterfeit and substandard drugs. But due to a combination of lobbying from middle-sized companies making suspect quality drugs, as well as some states, which wanted to maintain control of drug quality decisions, the status quo is to remain. This is a tragedy for the many thousands who die annually from substandard medicines in India (and from India exports to Africa and Asia), most estimates say that at least 10% of Indian drugs are substandard.
Radical revisions to the Drugs and Cosmetics Act of 1940 have been proposed on and off for the past thirty-odd years. Yet the major amendments proposed in October 2007 would have increased the minimum jail time for convicted drug counterfeiters from five years to ten years and increased the minimum fine for such offenses from 10,000 rupees (about $320) to a million rupees (about $32,000).
In November 2008, The Indian health minister, Anbumani Ramadoss from Tamil Nadu, pledged that through this amendment the Indian government would "go all out to do away with spurious drugs." But while he certainly tried to push the amendments through parliament, and succeeded through the upper house, he has failed to even get the lower house to hear the bill. With an election expected in two months the amendments will have to wait for another administration. Some local pharmaceutical company experts consider it may be years before the amendments are tabled again.
The amendments would have created a central drug authority, which in principle would have administered the entire drug regulatory system, overseeing drug quality and authorizing product marketing. At the moment the Drug Controller General of India authorizes new domestic and imported drugs but the manufacture of drugs is controlled by individual state drug authorities. The DCGI is underfunded and the states vary in the demands they place on companies and the monitoring and enforcement of those companies infringing rules. Maharastra, home to many large and respected pharmaceutical companies has nearer western style quality control, with at least some push towards what would be considered oversight of Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP). Whereas Uttar Pradesh, home to many counterfeiters, has weaker oversight and non-existent GMP control. Yet a drug manufactured and approved in one state can be sold anywhere in the country, or exported. Substandard producers can locate in states with weak controls and ply their wares everywhere, allowing hundreds of substandard state-approved medicines to proliferate.
According to well placed locals, behind the scenes lobbying by politicians from states with weak GMP controls, prevented the amendments from becoming law. If they had failed they would lose revenue paid by pharmaceutical companies and perhaps more importantly they would lose control. According to experts from world class domestic and international pharmaceutical companies, while the revenue loss would be minimal the loss of control would have meant a reduction in opportunities for graft.
Meanwhile the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is establishing an office in India to oversee drug quality exports to America. Now that the Indian Government has effectively abdicated responsibility for quality control, it has made FDA's job much harder. By not squashing political opposition to the necessary legal changes, India's best companies may lose out on increasingly important export markets.
India's major pharmaceutical companies have been badly served by India's political system. While the Government plays to the militant anti-patent crowd, defending the rights of politically connected companies that enjoy ripping off western patents, it does nothing to improve the image of Indian companies oversees. When the FDA banned the exports to US in fall 2008 of India's largest drug company, Ranbaxy, it was a major blow to Indian prestige, yet few found the ban unexpected, given the lack of oversight by the Indian Government. Companies like Ranbaxy are always looking for ways to cut costs, and even if top management want to maintain high quality it is very easy for lower level managers to cut corners if there is no local oversight.
If some of Ranbaxy's drug stability data was falsified, as alleged by FDA and US Department of Justice, is anyone really surprised?
India has seen how a series of product scandals took a harsh toll on China's global credibility, its arch-rival in industrial development, yet it has squandered the chance to clean up its own act. This will, sooner or later, come back to bite them.
Since 1975, successive Indian government commissions have urgently recommended product safety reforms and been ignored. Perhaps only when hundreds die oversees from Indian exports, and its drugs are discredited and then banned across the world, will the necessary changes be made.
Roger Bate is a resident fellow at AEI.
John Bolton: Team Obama's Anti-Israel Turn
Team Obama's Anti-Israel Turn. By John R. Bolton
The Mideast "peace process" is the ultimate self-licking ice cream cone--its mere existence being its basic justification.
AEI, March 13, 2009
The Obama administration is increasingly fixed on resolving the "Arab-Israeli dispute," seeing it as the key to peace and stability in the Middle East. This is bad news for Israel--and for America.
In its purest form, this theory holds that, once Israel and its neighbors come to terms, all other regional conflicts can be duly resolved: Iran's nuclear-weapons program, fanatical anti-Western terrorism, Islam's Sunni-Shiite schism, Arab-Persian ethnic tensions.
Some advocates believe substantively that the overwhelming bulk of other Middle Eastern grievances, wholly or partly, stem from Israel's founding and continued existence. Others see it in process terms--how to "sequence" dispute resolutions, so that Arab-Israeli progress facilitates progress elsewhere.
Pursuing this talisman has long characterized many European leaders and their soulmates on the American left. The Mideast "peace process" is thus the ultimate self-licking ice cream cone--its mere existence being its basic justification.
And now the Obama administration has made it US policy. This is evidenced by two key developments: the appointment of former Sen. George Mitchell as special envoy for the region, and Secretary of State Hillary's Clinton's recent insistence on a "two-state solution" sooner rather than later.
Naming Mitchell as a high-level, single-issue envoy--rather than keeping the portfolio under Secretary Clinton's personal control--separates Israel from the broader conduct of US diplomacy. Mitchell's role underlines both the issue's priority in the president's eyes and the implicit idea it can be solved in the foreseeable future.
Obama and Mitchell have every incentive to strike a Middle East deal--both to vindicate themselves and, in their minds, to create a basis for further "progress." But there are few visible incentives for any particular substantive outcome--which is very troubling for Israel, since Mitchell's mission essentially replicates in high-profile form exactly the approach the State Department has followed for decades.
When appointed, Mitchell said confidently: "Conflicts are created, conducted and sustained by human beings. They can be ended by human beings." This is true, however, only if the conflict's substantive resolution is less important than the process point of "ending" it one way or another. Surrender, for example, is a guaranteed way to end conflict.
Here, Clinton's strident insistence on a "two-state solution" during her recent Mideast trip becomes important. She essentially argued predestination: the "inevitability" of moving toward two states is "inescapable," and "there is no time to waste." The political consequence is clear: Since the outcome is inevitable and time is short, there is no excuse for not making "progress." Delay is evidence of obstructionism and failure--something President Obama can't tolerate, for the sake of his policies and his political reputation.
In this very European view, failure on the Arab-Israeli front presages failure elsewhere. Accordingly, the Obama adminstration has created a negotiating dynamic that puts increasing pressure on Israel, Palestinians, Syria and others.
Almost invariably, Israel is the loser--because Israel is the party most dependent on the United States, most subject to US pressure and most susceptible to the inevitable chorus of received wisdom from Western diplomats, media and the intelligentsia demanding concessions. When pressure must be applied to make compromises, it's always easier to pressure the more reasonable side.
How will diplomatic pressure work to change Hamas or Hezbollah, where even military force has so far failed? If anything, one can predict coming pressure on Israel to acknowledge the legitimacy of these two terrorist groups, and to negotiate with them as equals (albeit perhaps under some artful camouflage). The pattern is so common that its reappearance in the Mitchell-led negotiations is what is really "inevitable" and "inescapable."
Why would America subject a close ally to this dynamic, playing with the security of an unvarying supporter in world affairs? For America, Israel's intelligence-sharing, military cooperation and significant bilateral economic ties, among many others, are important national-security assets that should not lightly be put at risk.
The only understandable answer is that the Obama administration believes that Israel is as much or more of a problem as it is an ally, at least until Israel's disagreements with its neighbors are resolved. Instead of seeing Israel as a national-security asset, the administration likely sees a relationship complicating its broader policy of diplomatic "outreach."
No one will say so publicly, but this is the root cause of Obama's "Arab-Israeli issues first" approach to the region.
This approach is exactly backward. All the other regional problems would still exist even if Mahmoud Ahmadinejad got his fondest wish and Israel disappeared from the map: Iran's nuclear-weapons program, its role as the world's central banker for terrorism, the Sunni-Shiite conflict within Islam, Sunni terrorist groups like al Qaeda and other regional ethnic, national and political animosities would continue as threats and risks for decades to come.
Instead, the US focus should be on Iran and the manifold threats it poses to Israel, to Arab states friendly to Washington and to the United States itself--but that is not to be.
President Obama argues that he will deal comprehensively with the entire region. Rhetoric is certainly his specialty, but in the Middle East rhetoric only lasts so long. Performance is the real measure--and the administration's performance to date points in only one direction: pressuring Israel while wooing Iran.
Others in the world--friend and foe alike--will draw their own conclusions.
John R. Bolton is a senior fellow at AEI.
The Mideast "peace process" is the ultimate self-licking ice cream cone--its mere existence being its basic justification.
AEI, March 13, 2009
The Obama administration is increasingly fixed on resolving the "Arab-Israeli dispute," seeing it as the key to peace and stability in the Middle East. This is bad news for Israel--and for America.
In its purest form, this theory holds that, once Israel and its neighbors come to terms, all other regional conflicts can be duly resolved: Iran's nuclear-weapons program, fanatical anti-Western terrorism, Islam's Sunni-Shiite schism, Arab-Persian ethnic tensions.
Some advocates believe substantively that the overwhelming bulk of other Middle Eastern grievances, wholly or partly, stem from Israel's founding and continued existence. Others see it in process terms--how to "sequence" dispute resolutions, so that Arab-Israeli progress facilitates progress elsewhere.
Pursuing this talisman has long characterized many European leaders and their soulmates on the American left. The Mideast "peace process" is thus the ultimate self-licking ice cream cone--its mere existence being its basic justification.
And now the Obama administration has made it US policy. This is evidenced by two key developments: the appointment of former Sen. George Mitchell as special envoy for the region, and Secretary of State Hillary's Clinton's recent insistence on a "two-state solution" sooner rather than later.
Naming Mitchell as a high-level, single-issue envoy--rather than keeping the portfolio under Secretary Clinton's personal control--separates Israel from the broader conduct of US diplomacy. Mitchell's role underlines both the issue's priority in the president's eyes and the implicit idea it can be solved in the foreseeable future.
Obama and Mitchell have every incentive to strike a Middle East deal--both to vindicate themselves and, in their minds, to create a basis for further "progress." But there are few visible incentives for any particular substantive outcome--which is very troubling for Israel, since Mitchell's mission essentially replicates in high-profile form exactly the approach the State Department has followed for decades.
When appointed, Mitchell said confidently: "Conflicts are created, conducted and sustained by human beings. They can be ended by human beings." This is true, however, only if the conflict's substantive resolution is less important than the process point of "ending" it one way or another. Surrender, for example, is a guaranteed way to end conflict.
Here, Clinton's strident insistence on a "two-state solution" during her recent Mideast trip becomes important. She essentially argued predestination: the "inevitability" of moving toward two states is "inescapable," and "there is no time to waste." The political consequence is clear: Since the outcome is inevitable and time is short, there is no excuse for not making "progress." Delay is evidence of obstructionism and failure--something President Obama can't tolerate, for the sake of his policies and his political reputation.
In this very European view, failure on the Arab-Israeli front presages failure elsewhere. Accordingly, the Obama adminstration has created a negotiating dynamic that puts increasing pressure on Israel, Palestinians, Syria and others.
Almost invariably, Israel is the loser--because Israel is the party most dependent on the United States, most subject to US pressure and most susceptible to the inevitable chorus of received wisdom from Western diplomats, media and the intelligentsia demanding concessions. When pressure must be applied to make compromises, it's always easier to pressure the more reasonable side.
How will diplomatic pressure work to change Hamas or Hezbollah, where even military force has so far failed? If anything, one can predict coming pressure on Israel to acknowledge the legitimacy of these two terrorist groups, and to negotiate with them as equals (albeit perhaps under some artful camouflage). The pattern is so common that its reappearance in the Mitchell-led negotiations is what is really "inevitable" and "inescapable."
Why would America subject a close ally to this dynamic, playing with the security of an unvarying supporter in world affairs? For America, Israel's intelligence-sharing, military cooperation and significant bilateral economic ties, among many others, are important national-security assets that should not lightly be put at risk.
The only understandable answer is that the Obama administration believes that Israel is as much or more of a problem as it is an ally, at least until Israel's disagreements with its neighbors are resolved. Instead of seeing Israel as a national-security asset, the administration likely sees a relationship complicating its broader policy of diplomatic "outreach."
No one will say so publicly, but this is the root cause of Obama's "Arab-Israeli issues first" approach to the region.
This approach is exactly backward. All the other regional problems would still exist even if Mahmoud Ahmadinejad got his fondest wish and Israel disappeared from the map: Iran's nuclear-weapons program, its role as the world's central banker for terrorism, the Sunni-Shiite conflict within Islam, Sunni terrorist groups like al Qaeda and other regional ethnic, national and political animosities would continue as threats and risks for decades to come.
Instead, the US focus should be on Iran and the manifold threats it poses to Israel, to Arab states friendly to Washington and to the United States itself--but that is not to be.
President Obama argues that he will deal comprehensively with the entire region. Rhetoric is certainly his specialty, but in the Middle East rhetoric only lasts so long. Performance is the real measure--and the administration's performance to date points in only one direction: pressuring Israel while wooing Iran.
Others in the world--friend and foe alike--will draw their own conclusions.
John R. Bolton is a senior fellow at AEI.
WaPo: Burma's bullies are always ready with fresh examples of ruthlessness. U.S. engagement must be conditional
Burma's Bullies. WaPo Editorial
They're always ready with fresh examples of ruthlessness. U.S. engagement must be conditional.
WaPo, Sunday, March 15, 2009; A18
THE CRUELEST dictatorships, like the most ruthless criminal gangs, always have understood that the most effective way to deter opposition is to go after the innocent loved ones of potential enemies. Thus it was not enough for Gen. Than Shwe and his junta in the Southeast Asian nation of Burma (also known as Myanmar) to sentence the Buddhist monk U Gambira to prison for 68 years last fall. It was learned last week that his brother, his brother-in-law and four cousins have been sentenced to five years in Burma's gloomy prisons. We hope that this small piece of data is fed into the review of U.S. policy on Burma that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has promised.
U Gambira, 28 at the time, was a leader of the nonviolent protests that broke out in Burma in September 2007. Thousands of Burmese followed him and other monks in peaceful protest against one of the world's most brutal dictatorships, despite understanding the possible consequences. U Gambira himself, in an op-ed published in The Post on Nov. 4, 2007 -- the day, as it happened, of his arrest after weeks on the run -- said that he understood the risks he was taking. "It matters little if my life or the lives of colleagues should be sacrificed on this journey," he wrote. "Others will fill our sandals, and more will join and follow." We can only guess whether he understood that even his uninvolved relatives would be victimized.
The United States has been frustrated in its efforts to promote democratization in Burma, a nation of about 50 million, so Ms. Clinton's policy review is well timed. No doubt her team will talk to academics and humanitarian aid workers who favor more engagement with the regime and the country. (Those who tout Burma's recent cooperation with relief agencies might, however, want to take note of another prison sentence handed down last week: 17 years to Min Thein Tun, who was arrested last July for distributing relief supplies to the victims of Cyclone Nargis in the Irrawaddy delta.) They should talk with officials in neighboring countries, who have been pursuing a policy of engagement for years; in addition to its impact on the wealth of the regime and its trading partners in countries such as Thailand and Singapore, U.S. officials might ask, what effect has this policy had?
It may be that the U.S. review can lead to smarter and more targeted sanctions, with better coordination among allies and neighbors. Certainly, we hope that Ms. Clinton will make clear to Burma's government that the United States could never ease sanctions without first conducting full and free consultations with Aung San Suu Kyi, Burma's rightful ruler. Aung San Suu Kyi's party overwhelmingly won an election in 1990, but the junta ignored the results and has kept her isolated and under house arrest for most of the time since. Her release, and that of thousands of other political prisoners -- and their families -- remains essential.
They're always ready with fresh examples of ruthlessness. U.S. engagement must be conditional.
WaPo, Sunday, March 15, 2009; A18
THE CRUELEST dictatorships, like the most ruthless criminal gangs, always have understood that the most effective way to deter opposition is to go after the innocent loved ones of potential enemies. Thus it was not enough for Gen. Than Shwe and his junta in the Southeast Asian nation of Burma (also known as Myanmar) to sentence the Buddhist monk U Gambira to prison for 68 years last fall. It was learned last week that his brother, his brother-in-law and four cousins have been sentenced to five years in Burma's gloomy prisons. We hope that this small piece of data is fed into the review of U.S. policy on Burma that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has promised.
U Gambira, 28 at the time, was a leader of the nonviolent protests that broke out in Burma in September 2007. Thousands of Burmese followed him and other monks in peaceful protest against one of the world's most brutal dictatorships, despite understanding the possible consequences. U Gambira himself, in an op-ed published in The Post on Nov. 4, 2007 -- the day, as it happened, of his arrest after weeks on the run -- said that he understood the risks he was taking. "It matters little if my life or the lives of colleagues should be sacrificed on this journey," he wrote. "Others will fill our sandals, and more will join and follow." We can only guess whether he understood that even his uninvolved relatives would be victimized.
The United States has been frustrated in its efforts to promote democratization in Burma, a nation of about 50 million, so Ms. Clinton's policy review is well timed. No doubt her team will talk to academics and humanitarian aid workers who favor more engagement with the regime and the country. (Those who tout Burma's recent cooperation with relief agencies might, however, want to take note of another prison sentence handed down last week: 17 years to Min Thein Tun, who was arrested last July for distributing relief supplies to the victims of Cyclone Nargis in the Irrawaddy delta.) They should talk with officials in neighboring countries, who have been pursuing a policy of engagement for years; in addition to its impact on the wealth of the regime and its trading partners in countries such as Thailand and Singapore, U.S. officials might ask, what effect has this policy had?
It may be that the U.S. review can lead to smarter and more targeted sanctions, with better coordination among allies and neighbors. Certainly, we hope that Ms. Clinton will make clear to Burma's government that the United States could never ease sanctions without first conducting full and free consultations with Aung San Suu Kyi, Burma's rightful ruler. Aung San Suu Kyi's party overwhelmingly won an election in 1990, but the junta ignored the results and has kept her isolated and under house arrest for most of the time since. Her release, and that of thousands of other political prisoners -- and their families -- remains essential.
WaPo: Mr. Obama's next step on stem cell research
A Moral Stand. WaPo Editorial
Mr. Obama's next step on stem cell research
Sunday, March 15, 2009; A18
PRESIDENT OBAMA'S pronouncement on stem cell research last week, as we noted at the time, was only a partial decision. He decreed that federal funding of such research could go forward on a much broader scale than President George W. Bush had permitted. But he didn't say whether it could proceed on stem cells derived from embryos created specifically for the purpose of research. This is in large part an ethical question. Mr. Obama is right to turn to scientists for advice on the matter, but he should not hide behind them in making the ultimate decision.
Embryonic stem cell research is thought to hold great promise for the treatment of Parkinson's and other debilitating diseases and conditions. But many Americans are troubled by the destruction of human embryos that such research requires. As a result, Mr. Bush limited federal funding to research on stem cell lines in existence at the time of his 2001 decision; there would be no incentive for further creation or destruction of embryos for experimentation.
A breakthrough came in 2007: Scientists learned to develop stem cells from adult skin cells. Some argued that this would end the need to use embryos. Others, though, said that the field was too young to close off any avenue, and that the embryonic lines available under Mr. Bush's order had proved too limiting.
Mr. Obama accepted the latter argument, and we supported him. In so doing, though, he shunned a possible compromise: to allow research on stem cell lines grown from embryos that were created in fertility laboratories but never implanted. Thousands are frozen and awaiting destruction; with permission of the egg and sperm donors, they might satisfy researchers' needs. Mr. Obama did not embrace this opportunity to reach out to opponents -- not all of whom, of course, would have been satisfied by such a compromise.
The president has asked the National Institutes of Health to develop guidelines for research. Scientists can develop rules to make sure donors are dealt with ethically. If the scientists so believe, they can present reasons why existing frozen embryos aren't enough -- why research would benefit from having embryos created. But it's not the job of the scientist to decide whether those reasons outweigh concerns about such a practice. That's the president's job. He should listen to the scientists' arguments, make his decision and -- as Mr. Bush did in 2001 -- explain it to the American people.
Mr. Obama's next step on stem cell research
Sunday, March 15, 2009; A18
PRESIDENT OBAMA'S pronouncement on stem cell research last week, as we noted at the time, was only a partial decision. He decreed that federal funding of such research could go forward on a much broader scale than President George W. Bush had permitted. But he didn't say whether it could proceed on stem cells derived from embryos created specifically for the purpose of research. This is in large part an ethical question. Mr. Obama is right to turn to scientists for advice on the matter, but he should not hide behind them in making the ultimate decision.
Embryonic stem cell research is thought to hold great promise for the treatment of Parkinson's and other debilitating diseases and conditions. But many Americans are troubled by the destruction of human embryos that such research requires. As a result, Mr. Bush limited federal funding to research on stem cell lines in existence at the time of his 2001 decision; there would be no incentive for further creation or destruction of embryos for experimentation.
A breakthrough came in 2007: Scientists learned to develop stem cells from adult skin cells. Some argued that this would end the need to use embryos. Others, though, said that the field was too young to close off any avenue, and that the embryonic lines available under Mr. Bush's order had proved too limiting.
Mr. Obama accepted the latter argument, and we supported him. In so doing, though, he shunned a possible compromise: to allow research on stem cell lines grown from embryos that were created in fertility laboratories but never implanted. Thousands are frozen and awaiting destruction; with permission of the egg and sperm donors, they might satisfy researchers' needs. Mr. Obama did not embrace this opportunity to reach out to opponents -- not all of whom, of course, would have been satisfied by such a compromise.
The president has asked the National Institutes of Health to develop guidelines for research. Scientists can develop rules to make sure donors are dealt with ethically. If the scientists so believe, they can present reasons why existing frozen embryos aren't enough -- why research would benefit from having embryos created. But it's not the job of the scientist to decide whether those reasons outweigh concerns about such a practice. That's the president's job. He should listen to the scientists' arguments, make his decision and -- as Mr. Bush did in 2001 -- explain it to the American people.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Prepared Statement by Treas Sec Geithner at the G-20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Meeting
Prepared Statement by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner at the G-20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Meeting
March 14, 2009
tg56
Horsham, UK -- I am very pleased to be in the UK for the G-20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors meeting. I want to compliment Chancellor Darling for his leadership and the excellent work of his staff in preparing for this meeting.
We met to prepare a comprehensive set of recommendations for the meeting of the heads of state early next month. This is a global crisis and it requires a coordinated global response. We have a strong consensus on the need for both recovery and reform so that we never face a crisis like this again.
An effective response to restore global growth requires several things. It requires a sustained commitment to macroeconomic stimulus and pro-growth policies on a scale commensurate with the severity of the problem. It requires aggressive actions to fix our financial systems and get credit flowing again. It requires substantial support from the international financial institutions targeted to those emerging markets and developing economies most affected by the crisis. This means a significant increase in resources – deployed more quickly – to provide financing in support of counter-cyclical fiscal policies, bank repair and recapitalization to increase lending, trade finance, and support to the poorest countries that are most impacted by the crisis.
Alongside these actions must come a clear commitment, when recovery is firmly established, to return to fiscal sustainability and to unwind the extraordinary policy actions needed to restore economic growth and solve the financial crisis.
You are seeing the world move together at a speed and on a scale without precedent in modern times. All the major economies are putting in place substantial fiscal packages. The stronger the response, the quicker recovery will come. That is why the United States has passed the largest, most comprehensive recovery package in decades.
We are each moving preemptively to get ahead of the intensifying pressures that you see across national financial systems and we released today a common framework for restoring the flow of credit.
In the United States, we have launched a new program to help revive the credit markets. We have initiated a forward-looking assessment of the potential capital needs of our major financial institutions, and outlined the terms of the capital assistance program that will provide a backstop for those institutions that need additional capital. We will soon outline our program to use market mechanisms to help clean up the legacy assets on bank balance sheets and bring in private capital alongside government financing to help restart markets for these assets.
As President Obama has said, we will bring the full force of the federal government to ensure that the major banks are able to meet their commitments so that they continue to play critical roles in market functioning and in providing credit to households and businesses.
The G-20 has agreed to the need for mobilizing more resources for the international financial institutions to address the risks posed by the pull back of capital flows and the fall in external demand. The G-20 supports our proposal for a substantial increase to emergency IMF resources through a major enlargement of the New Arrangements to Borrow (NAB) and expansion of its membership. We have asked the World Bank and other Multilateral Development Banks to leverage existing resources by flexible use of their balance sheets to help meet financing needs.
Now turning to reform. The G-20 has agreed on a common framework of concrete changes to the international financial architecture. Risk does not respect national borders. We must establish a much stronger form of oversight and clear rules of the game, more evenly enforced across the international financial system. This will require comprehensive changes both at the national and international levels. The United States will soon be releasing a comprehensive framework of regulatory reform. Our strategy underscores our commitment to encourage a race to the top rather than a race to the bottom; a global move to higher standards.
We have committed to broad principles to guide the reform of the financial system:
First, all institutions that are important to the stability of the financial system should come within a much stronger framework of oversight, with clearer rules of the game that are enforced more evenly and consistently across countries.
Second, all markets, including the derivatives markets, need to be subject to standards for stability and a framework for disclosure.
Third, looking forward we need to provide much stronger cushions of stability to ensure that the framework of capital requirements and accounting standards dampens rather than amplifies future financial crises.
Fourth, we must promote financial market integrity. We welcome Switzerland's announcement to increase information sharing as part of the global effort to end tax evasion.
Alongside this framework, we have expanded membership of the Financial Stability Forum, and we should elevate its role in the international system so that the global economy has – alongside the original Bretton Woods institutions of the IMF, the World Bank and the WTO – a strong institution able to lead these critical efforts to a more robust framework of oversight and standards for the global financial system.
We are committed to accelerating the timetable of reform of the broader governance structure of the international financial institutions to increase the role of developing countries in these institutions.
Let me just conclude by saying that we have a very broad basis of consensus globally on the need to act aggressively to restore growth to the global economy and a commitment to move together to address the evolving crisis.
U.S. workers are among the most productive in the world, but U.S. companies need open and growing markets. As President Obama stressed this week, a healthy United States requires a healthy global economy. Our recovery will be stronger if the world is stronger.
I am very pleased by the progress achieved today on both recovery and reform.
March 14, 2009
tg56
Horsham, UK -- I am very pleased to be in the UK for the G-20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors meeting. I want to compliment Chancellor Darling for his leadership and the excellent work of his staff in preparing for this meeting.
We met to prepare a comprehensive set of recommendations for the meeting of the heads of state early next month. This is a global crisis and it requires a coordinated global response. We have a strong consensus on the need for both recovery and reform so that we never face a crisis like this again.
An effective response to restore global growth requires several things. It requires a sustained commitment to macroeconomic stimulus and pro-growth policies on a scale commensurate with the severity of the problem. It requires aggressive actions to fix our financial systems and get credit flowing again. It requires substantial support from the international financial institutions targeted to those emerging markets and developing economies most affected by the crisis. This means a significant increase in resources – deployed more quickly – to provide financing in support of counter-cyclical fiscal policies, bank repair and recapitalization to increase lending, trade finance, and support to the poorest countries that are most impacted by the crisis.
Alongside these actions must come a clear commitment, when recovery is firmly established, to return to fiscal sustainability and to unwind the extraordinary policy actions needed to restore economic growth and solve the financial crisis.
You are seeing the world move together at a speed and on a scale without precedent in modern times. All the major economies are putting in place substantial fiscal packages. The stronger the response, the quicker recovery will come. That is why the United States has passed the largest, most comprehensive recovery package in decades.
We are each moving preemptively to get ahead of the intensifying pressures that you see across national financial systems and we released today a common framework for restoring the flow of credit.
In the United States, we have launched a new program to help revive the credit markets. We have initiated a forward-looking assessment of the potential capital needs of our major financial institutions, and outlined the terms of the capital assistance program that will provide a backstop for those institutions that need additional capital. We will soon outline our program to use market mechanisms to help clean up the legacy assets on bank balance sheets and bring in private capital alongside government financing to help restart markets for these assets.
As President Obama has said, we will bring the full force of the federal government to ensure that the major banks are able to meet their commitments so that they continue to play critical roles in market functioning and in providing credit to households and businesses.
The G-20 has agreed to the need for mobilizing more resources for the international financial institutions to address the risks posed by the pull back of capital flows and the fall in external demand. The G-20 supports our proposal for a substantial increase to emergency IMF resources through a major enlargement of the New Arrangements to Borrow (NAB) and expansion of its membership. We have asked the World Bank and other Multilateral Development Banks to leverage existing resources by flexible use of their balance sheets to help meet financing needs.
Now turning to reform. The G-20 has agreed on a common framework of concrete changes to the international financial architecture. Risk does not respect national borders. We must establish a much stronger form of oversight and clear rules of the game, more evenly enforced across the international financial system. This will require comprehensive changes both at the national and international levels. The United States will soon be releasing a comprehensive framework of regulatory reform. Our strategy underscores our commitment to encourage a race to the top rather than a race to the bottom; a global move to higher standards.
We have committed to broad principles to guide the reform of the financial system:
First, all institutions that are important to the stability of the financial system should come within a much stronger framework of oversight, with clearer rules of the game that are enforced more evenly and consistently across countries.
Second, all markets, including the derivatives markets, need to be subject to standards for stability and a framework for disclosure.
Third, looking forward we need to provide much stronger cushions of stability to ensure that the framework of capital requirements and accounting standards dampens rather than amplifies future financial crises.
Fourth, we must promote financial market integrity. We welcome Switzerland's announcement to increase information sharing as part of the global effort to end tax evasion.
Alongside this framework, we have expanded membership of the Financial Stability Forum, and we should elevate its role in the international system so that the global economy has – alongside the original Bretton Woods institutions of the IMF, the World Bank and the WTO – a strong institution able to lead these critical efforts to a more robust framework of oversight and standards for the global financial system.
We are committed to accelerating the timetable of reform of the broader governance structure of the international financial institutions to increase the role of developing countries in these institutions.
Let me just conclude by saying that we have a very broad basis of consensus globally on the need to act aggressively to restore growth to the global economy and a commitment to move together to address the evolving crisis.
U.S. workers are among the most productive in the world, but U.S. companies need open and growing markets. As President Obama stressed this week, a healthy United States requires a healthy global economy. Our recovery will be stronger if the world is stronger.
I am very pleased by the progress achieved today on both recovery and reform.
In the WaPo: "Obama's New Tack: Blaming Bush"
Obama's New Tack: Blaming Bush. By Scott Wilson
President Points to 'Inherited' Economy
Washington Post, Saturday, March 14, 2009; A01
In his inaugural address, President Obama proclaimed "an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn-out dogmas that for far too long have strangled our politics."
It hasn't taken long for the recriminations to return -- or for the Obama administration to begin talking about the unwelcome "inheritance" of its predecessor.
Over the past month, Obama has reminded the public at every turn that he is facing problems "inherited" from the Bush administration, using increasingly bracing language to describe the challenges his administration is up against. The "deepening economic crisis" that the president described six days after taking office became "a big mess" in remarks this month to graduating police cadets in Columbus, Ohio.
"By any measure," he said during a March 4 event calling for government-contracting reform, "my administration has inherited a fiscal disaster."
Obama's more frequent and acid reminders that former president George W. Bush left behind a trillion-dollar budget deficit, a 14-month recession and a broken financial system have come at the same time Republicans have ramped up criticism that the current president's policies are compounding the nation's economic problems.
Obama had initially been content to leave partisan defense strategy to his proxies, but as the fiscal picture has continued to darken, he has appeared more willing to risk his image as a politician who is above petty partisanship to personally remind the public of Bush's legacy.
His approval ratings remain strong -- above 60 percent, according to the most recent Gallup poll -- but have dropped from their highs almost entirely because of falling support among Republicans since he took office.
Upon entering the White House in 2001, Bush pinned the lackluster economy on his predecessor, using the "Clinton recession" to successfully argue in favor of tax cuts that won some Democratic support. But for Obama, who built his candidacy on a promise to rise above Washington's divisive partisan traditions -- winning over many independent voters and moderate Republicans in the process -- blaming his predecessor holds special risks.
He will need support beyond his Democratic base as he begins lobbying for his $3.6 trillion budget, which proposes sweeping changes in health care, the energy sector and the public education system. The president did not receive a single House Republican vote for his stimulus plan, prompting some in his administration to view his bipartisan outreach efforts as having little hope of success.
And Republicans have seemed only more emboldened in their rhetoric. Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), for example, recently called the borrowing needed to fund the president's economic recovery plans "generational theft."
"What the administration is involved in now is the politics of attribution," said Lawrence R. Jacobs, a political scientist at the University of Minnesota. "Each week that goes by with falling job numbers and Republican criticism of the administration's flaws means falling approval ratings. What's the antidote? That the guilty party is George Bush."
"The trick," Jacobs said, "is how do you shift blame to George Bush and retain any credibility on the idea that you are looking past partisan warfare? This looks like a doubling down on a very partisan approach."
Rahm Emanuel, Obama's chief of staff, denied that the president has changed his tone toward the previous administration. He said Obama is "not trying to place blame, but he is trying to say clearly: Here's what we've got and here's our way out of it. He's offered a positive alternative to their criticism."
"The truth is that 98 percent of his speeches are about the future, and 2 percent are about inheritance," Emanuel said. "Whereas I think for Republicans it's 2 percent about the future, and 98 percent hope that the people have amnesia."
Until recently, the job of reminding the country of the Bush-era legacy had been left mostly to senior administration officials, and it sometimes ranged beyond economic matters. Referring to the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Vice President Biden said soon after the inauguration that "we're trying to figure out exactly what we've inherited here."
In early February, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said that "after I accepted the position, I began looking at the broad array of problems that we were going to inherit," citing the Middle East, Pakistan and Afghanistan in particular.
But most of the Bush-era blame has focused on the economy and the dismal state of the government's finances. Bush's spokesman, Rob Saliterman, declined to comment for this article.
Obama has strengthened his rhetoric gradually. Thomas E. Mann, a senior fellow at the liberal-leaning Brookings Institution, said the administration's "sharpened language is a response to the Republican argument against Obama based on huge deficits and big spending."
Six days after taking office, Obama kicked off an event on jobs, energy reform and climate change with "a few words about the deepening economic crisis that we've inherited." He lamented announced job cuts at such economic mainstays as Microsoft, Intel, Home Depot and Caterpillar, among others.
Just over a week later, Obama, arguing for his stimulus plan, said that "we've inherited a terrible mess," and a few days after that, in the economically depressed city of Elkhart, Ind., he told the audience, "We've inherited an economic crisis as deep and dire as any since the Great Depression."
During a prime-time news conference later that day, he used "inherited" twice in the same sentence to describe the deficit and "the most profound economic emergency since the Great Depression."
This month, Obama has described inheriting "a fiscal disaster" and "a real mess," as administration officials emphasized that the effects of the stimulus package have yet to be seen in paychecks and job-creating public-works projects.
"There's a fascinating behind-the-scenes trend taking place for someone who remains a very popular president," said Ari Fleischer, a former Bush press secretary, describing the decline in Obama's approval ratings and an increase in disapproval numbers. "His response to that trend is to turn up the blame on George Bush and everything that came before him. And he was the one who talked about getting past partisanship."
The economy continues to shed jobs -- 651,000 in February alone -- and the Dow Jones index is roughly 12 percent lower than when the market opened on the day of Obama's inauguration. Perhaps most damaging has been the uncertainty surrounding Obama's strategy to rescue the banking sector, a plan that has been criticized for lacking detail.
Host Chris Wallace asked on "Fox News Sunday" this month, "Can this now fairly be called the Obama bear market?"
House Republican Whip Eric Cantor (Va.) said, "I want to take the president at his word that he wants to work on these problems plaguing American families," adding that "people are looking for leadership."
"It is the Obama economy and the Obama stock market," Cantor said. "This is about today, and he's assumed his post."
Researcher Alice Crites contributed to this report.
President Points to 'Inherited' Economy
Washington Post, Saturday, March 14, 2009; A01
In his inaugural address, President Obama proclaimed "an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn-out dogmas that for far too long have strangled our politics."
It hasn't taken long for the recriminations to return -- or for the Obama administration to begin talking about the unwelcome "inheritance" of its predecessor.
Over the past month, Obama has reminded the public at every turn that he is facing problems "inherited" from the Bush administration, using increasingly bracing language to describe the challenges his administration is up against. The "deepening economic crisis" that the president described six days after taking office became "a big mess" in remarks this month to graduating police cadets in Columbus, Ohio.
"By any measure," he said during a March 4 event calling for government-contracting reform, "my administration has inherited a fiscal disaster."
Obama's more frequent and acid reminders that former president George W. Bush left behind a trillion-dollar budget deficit, a 14-month recession and a broken financial system have come at the same time Republicans have ramped up criticism that the current president's policies are compounding the nation's economic problems.
Obama had initially been content to leave partisan defense strategy to his proxies, but as the fiscal picture has continued to darken, he has appeared more willing to risk his image as a politician who is above petty partisanship to personally remind the public of Bush's legacy.
His approval ratings remain strong -- above 60 percent, according to the most recent Gallup poll -- but have dropped from their highs almost entirely because of falling support among Republicans since he took office.
Upon entering the White House in 2001, Bush pinned the lackluster economy on his predecessor, using the "Clinton recession" to successfully argue in favor of tax cuts that won some Democratic support. But for Obama, who built his candidacy on a promise to rise above Washington's divisive partisan traditions -- winning over many independent voters and moderate Republicans in the process -- blaming his predecessor holds special risks.
He will need support beyond his Democratic base as he begins lobbying for his $3.6 trillion budget, which proposes sweeping changes in health care, the energy sector and the public education system. The president did not receive a single House Republican vote for his stimulus plan, prompting some in his administration to view his bipartisan outreach efforts as having little hope of success.
And Republicans have seemed only more emboldened in their rhetoric. Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), for example, recently called the borrowing needed to fund the president's economic recovery plans "generational theft."
"What the administration is involved in now is the politics of attribution," said Lawrence R. Jacobs, a political scientist at the University of Minnesota. "Each week that goes by with falling job numbers and Republican criticism of the administration's flaws means falling approval ratings. What's the antidote? That the guilty party is George Bush."
"The trick," Jacobs said, "is how do you shift blame to George Bush and retain any credibility on the idea that you are looking past partisan warfare? This looks like a doubling down on a very partisan approach."
Rahm Emanuel, Obama's chief of staff, denied that the president has changed his tone toward the previous administration. He said Obama is "not trying to place blame, but he is trying to say clearly: Here's what we've got and here's our way out of it. He's offered a positive alternative to their criticism."
"The truth is that 98 percent of his speeches are about the future, and 2 percent are about inheritance," Emanuel said. "Whereas I think for Republicans it's 2 percent about the future, and 98 percent hope that the people have amnesia."
Until recently, the job of reminding the country of the Bush-era legacy had been left mostly to senior administration officials, and it sometimes ranged beyond economic matters. Referring to the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Vice President Biden said soon after the inauguration that "we're trying to figure out exactly what we've inherited here."
In early February, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said that "after I accepted the position, I began looking at the broad array of problems that we were going to inherit," citing the Middle East, Pakistan and Afghanistan in particular.
But most of the Bush-era blame has focused on the economy and the dismal state of the government's finances. Bush's spokesman, Rob Saliterman, declined to comment for this article.
Obama has strengthened his rhetoric gradually. Thomas E. Mann, a senior fellow at the liberal-leaning Brookings Institution, said the administration's "sharpened language is a response to the Republican argument against Obama based on huge deficits and big spending."
Six days after taking office, Obama kicked off an event on jobs, energy reform and climate change with "a few words about the deepening economic crisis that we've inherited." He lamented announced job cuts at such economic mainstays as Microsoft, Intel, Home Depot and Caterpillar, among others.
Just over a week later, Obama, arguing for his stimulus plan, said that "we've inherited a terrible mess," and a few days after that, in the economically depressed city of Elkhart, Ind., he told the audience, "We've inherited an economic crisis as deep and dire as any since the Great Depression."
During a prime-time news conference later that day, he used "inherited" twice in the same sentence to describe the deficit and "the most profound economic emergency since the Great Depression."
This month, Obama has described inheriting "a fiscal disaster" and "a real mess," as administration officials emphasized that the effects of the stimulus package have yet to be seen in paychecks and job-creating public-works projects.
"There's a fascinating behind-the-scenes trend taking place for someone who remains a very popular president," said Ari Fleischer, a former Bush press secretary, describing the decline in Obama's approval ratings and an increase in disapproval numbers. "His response to that trend is to turn up the blame on George Bush and everything that came before him. And he was the one who talked about getting past partisanship."
The economy continues to shed jobs -- 651,000 in February alone -- and the Dow Jones index is roughly 12 percent lower than when the market opened on the day of Obama's inauguration. Perhaps most damaging has been the uncertainty surrounding Obama's strategy to rescue the banking sector, a plan that has been criticized for lacking detail.
Host Chris Wallace asked on "Fox News Sunday" this month, "Can this now fairly be called the Obama bear market?"
House Republican Whip Eric Cantor (Va.) said, "I want to take the president at his word that he wants to work on these problems plaguing American families," adding that "people are looking for leadership."
"It is the Obama economy and the Obama stock market," Cantor said. "This is about today, and he's assumed his post."
Researcher Alice Crites contributed to this report.
ACSH: Likely FDA Appointees Will Face Scaremongers
Likely FDA Appointees Will Face Scaremongers
The American Council on Science and Health, March 13, 2009
Scientists and physicians at the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) call for the reform of a broken regulatory system -- one that now tries to appease advocates of junk science who pressure the Food and Drug Administration.
These advocates routinely demand that the FDA take unnecessary -- and possibly heath-threatening -- action against alleged environmental risks that have little or no scientific basis. The agency's time is thus wasted chasing phantom risks instead of dealing with real ones, thus indirectly imperiling Americans' health.
Non-risks that (non-science-based) environmental advocates will likely bring to the attention of new senior FDA staff include: bisphenol A in baby bottles, lead in lipstick, formaldehyde in baby shampoo, and pesticide residues in imported foods. These are just a few examples.
Putting these alleged risks in scientific perspective will be one of the most important challenges facing likely FDA Commissioner nominee Dr. Margaret Hamburg and intended Deputy Administrator Dr. Joshua Sharfstein:
•"It's high time, for example, for FDA to take aggressive action to assure people of the safety of bisphenol A in baby bottles, infant formula, and other products that infants and young children come in contact with on a daily basis," stated Dr. Elizabeth Whelan, President and Founder of the American Council on Science and Health. "These products are safe -- and FDA officers should give assurance to consumers -- in spite of the constant attacks by environmental activist groups."
"The mere fact that we can detect trace levels of BPA in plastic bottles or lead in lipstick does not mean a health hazard exists. Indeed, with today's sophisticated chemistry, you can find anything in anything at miniscule levels," stated Dr. Gilbert Ross, Medical Director of ACSH.
•Dr. Whelan noted that although groups including "Health Care Without Harm" have had a petition before the FDA for over two years, asking the agency to require labeling of medical devices containing diethyl hexyl phthalate (DEHP), an ACSH blue ribbon panel chaired by former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop concluded that phthalates as used in medical devices and other products pose no health risk. "Banning these flexible plastic medical devices would set back medicine fifty years," Dr. Whelan noted.
ACSH scientific advocates are hopeful that Hamburg and Sharfstein will address the myth that dangerous chemicals have been allowed on the market. There is no evidence whatsoever that trace amounts of chemicals are linked to the very real health problems the FDA must consider, such as obesity, diabetes, cancer, and reproductive and neurodevelopmental health problems.
The American Council on Science and Health, March 13, 2009
Scientists and physicians at the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) call for the reform of a broken regulatory system -- one that now tries to appease advocates of junk science who pressure the Food and Drug Administration.
These advocates routinely demand that the FDA take unnecessary -- and possibly heath-threatening -- action against alleged environmental risks that have little or no scientific basis. The agency's time is thus wasted chasing phantom risks instead of dealing with real ones, thus indirectly imperiling Americans' health.
Non-risks that (non-science-based) environmental advocates will likely bring to the attention of new senior FDA staff include: bisphenol A in baby bottles, lead in lipstick, formaldehyde in baby shampoo, and pesticide residues in imported foods. These are just a few examples.
Putting these alleged risks in scientific perspective will be one of the most important challenges facing likely FDA Commissioner nominee Dr. Margaret Hamburg and intended Deputy Administrator Dr. Joshua Sharfstein:
•"It's high time, for example, for FDA to take aggressive action to assure people of the safety of bisphenol A in baby bottles, infant formula, and other products that infants and young children come in contact with on a daily basis," stated Dr. Elizabeth Whelan, President and Founder of the American Council on Science and Health. "These products are safe -- and FDA officers should give assurance to consumers -- in spite of the constant attacks by environmental activist groups."
"The mere fact that we can detect trace levels of BPA in plastic bottles or lead in lipstick does not mean a health hazard exists. Indeed, with today's sophisticated chemistry, you can find anything in anything at miniscule levels," stated Dr. Gilbert Ross, Medical Director of ACSH.
•Dr. Whelan noted that although groups including "Health Care Without Harm" have had a petition before the FDA for over two years, asking the agency to require labeling of medical devices containing diethyl hexyl phthalate (DEHP), an ACSH blue ribbon panel chaired by former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop concluded that phthalates as used in medical devices and other products pose no health risk. "Banning these flexible plastic medical devices would set back medicine fifty years," Dr. Whelan noted.
ACSH scientific advocates are hopeful that Hamburg and Sharfstein will address the myth that dangerous chemicals have been allowed on the market. There is no evidence whatsoever that trace amounts of chemicals are linked to the very real health problems the FDA must consider, such as obesity, diabetes, cancer, and reproductive and neurodevelopmental health problems.
Cap and Trade: All Pain, No Gain for Consumers, Economy, Environment
Cap and Trade: All Pain, No Gain for Consumers, Economy, Environment
The Institute for Energy Research, Mar 13, 2009
WASHINGTON, D.C. – On the heels of two hearings in the House today on how an economy-wide cap and trade program might affect working-class American families, Institute for Energy Research (IER) released an analysis that demonstrates that lawmakers’ concerns about the financial burden cap and trade would impose on their constituents are well founded.
“Cap and trade has two goals: increase energy costs and reduce carbon dioxide emissions,” said IER President Thomas J. Pyle. “IER’s analysis clearly shows that cap and trade goes one for two—it is as historically ineffective at reducing carbon dioxide emissions as it is historically adept at raising gas prices and electricity bills. With our economy in free fall and millions of Americans out of work, the idea that lawmakers would enact an unnecessary policy to harm families’ budgets is as irresponsible as it is illogical.”
The analysis shows that cap and trade:
· Is designed to increase the price of 85 percent of the energy we use;
· Didn’t reduce emissions in Europe, home of the world’s only full-scale carbon dioxide cap and trade policy;
· Targets low-income earners;
· Unfairly targets rural economies; and,
· Penalizes domestic and friendly trade partners’ energy resources in favor of Middle East oil.
More from IER on carbon regulation:
· IER Study: Carbon Taxes Reduce Economic Growth & Achieve No Environmental Improvement
· Blog Posting: The Dangers of a “Carbon Fed”
· Press Release: Obama Attempts to Sneak Biggest Tax Increase in History into Budget
· IER Study: Green Jobs: Fact or Fiction?
The Institute for Energy Research, Mar 13, 2009
WASHINGTON, D.C. – On the heels of two hearings in the House today on how an economy-wide cap and trade program might affect working-class American families, Institute for Energy Research (IER) released an analysis that demonstrates that lawmakers’ concerns about the financial burden cap and trade would impose on their constituents are well founded.
“Cap and trade has two goals: increase energy costs and reduce carbon dioxide emissions,” said IER President Thomas J. Pyle. “IER’s analysis clearly shows that cap and trade goes one for two—it is as historically ineffective at reducing carbon dioxide emissions as it is historically adept at raising gas prices and electricity bills. With our economy in free fall and millions of Americans out of work, the idea that lawmakers would enact an unnecessary policy to harm families’ budgets is as irresponsible as it is illogical.”
The analysis shows that cap and trade:
· Is designed to increase the price of 85 percent of the energy we use;
· Didn’t reduce emissions in Europe, home of the world’s only full-scale carbon dioxide cap and trade policy;
· Targets low-income earners;
· Unfairly targets rural economies; and,
· Penalizes domestic and friendly trade partners’ energy resources in favor of Middle East oil.
More from IER on carbon regulation:
· IER Study: Carbon Taxes Reduce Economic Growth & Achieve No Environmental Improvement
· Blog Posting: The Dangers of a “Carbon Fed”
· Press Release: Obama Attempts to Sneak Biggest Tax Increase in History into Budget
· IER Study: Green Jobs: Fact or Fiction?
Weekly Address: President Barack Obama Announces Key FDA Appointments and Tougher Food Safety Measures
Weekly Address: President Barack Obama Announces Key FDA Appointments and Tougher Food Safety Measures
Remarks of President Barack ObamaWeekly AddressSaturday, March 14, 2009Washington, DC
I’ve often said that I don’t believe government has the answer to every problem or that it can do all things for all people. We are a nation built on the strength of individual initiative. But there are certain things that we can’t do on our own. There are certain things only a government can do. And one of those things is ensuring that the foods we eat, and the medicines we take, are safe and don’t cause us harm. That is the mission of our Food and Drug Administration and it is a mission shared by our Department of Agriculture, and a variety of other agencies and offices at just about every level of government.
The men and women who inspect our foods and test the safety of our medicines are chemists and physicians, veterinarians and pharmacists. It is because of the work they do each and every day that the United States is one of the safest places in the world to buy groceries at a supermarket or pills at a drugstore. Unlike citizens of so many other countries, Americans can trust that there is a strong system in place to ensure that the medications we give our children will help them get better, not make them sick; and that a family dinner won’t end in a trip to the doctor’s office.
But in recent years, we’ve seen a number of problems with the food making its way to our kitchen tables. In 2006, it was contaminated spinach. In 2008, it was salmonella in peppers and possibly tomatoes. And just this year, bad peanut products led to hundreds of illnesses and cost nine people their lives – a painful reminder of how tragic the consequences can be when food producers act irresponsibly and government is unable to do its job. Worse, these incidents reflect a troubling trend that’s seen the average number of outbreaks from contaminated produce and other foods grow to nearly 350 a year – up from 100 a year in the early 1990s.
Part of the reason is that many of the laws and regulations governing food safety in America have not been updated since they were written in the time of Teddy Roosevelt. It’s also because our system of inspection and enforcement is spread out so widely among so many people that it’s difficult for different parts of our government to share information, work together, and solve problems. And it’s also because the FDA has been underfunded and understaffed in recent years, leaving the agency with the resources to inspect just 7,000 of our 150,000 food processing plants and warehouses each year. That means roughly 95% of them go uninspected.
That is a hazard to public health. It is unacceptable. And it will change under the leadership of Dr. Margaret Hamburg, whom I am appointing today as Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration. From her research on infectious disease at the National Institutes of Health to her work on public health at the Department of Health and Human Services to her leadership on biodefense at the Nuclear Threat Initiative, Dr. Hamburg brings to this vital position not only a reputation of integrity but a record of achievement in making Americans safer and more secure. Dr. Hamburg was one of the youngest people ever elected to the National Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Medicine. And her two children have a unique distinction of their own. Their birth certificates feature her name twice – once as their mother, and once as New York City Health Commissioner. In that role, Dr. Hamburg brought a new life to a demoralized agency, leading an internationally-recognized initiative that cut the tuberculosis rate by nearly half, and overseeing food safety in our nation’s largest city.
Joining her as Principal Deputy Commissioner will be Dr. Joshua Sharfstein. As Baltimore’s Health Commissioner, Dr. Sharfstein has been recognized as a national leader for his efforts to protect children from unsafe over-the-counter cough and cold medications. And he’s designed an award-winning program to ensure that Americans with disabilities had access to prescription drugs.
Their critical work – and the critical work of the FDA they lead – will be part of a larger effort taken up by a new Food Safety Working Group I am creating. This Working Group will bring together cabinet secretaries and senior officials to advise me on how we can upgrade our food safety laws for the 21st century; foster coordination throughout government; and ensure that we are not just designing laws that will keep the American people safe, but enforcing them. And I expect this group to report back to me with recommendations as soon as possible.
As part of our commitment to public health, our Agriculture Department is closing a loophole in the system to ensure that diseased cows don’t find their way into the food supply. And we are also strengthening our food safety system and modernizing our labs with a billion dollar investment, a portion of which will go toward significantly increasing the number of food inspectors, helping ensure that the FDA has the staff and support they need to protect the food we eat.
In the end, food safety is something I take seriously, not just as your President, but as a parent. When I heard peanut products were being contaminated earlier this year, I immediately thought of my 7-year old daughter, Sasha, who has peanut butter sandwiches for lunch probably three times a week. No parent should have to worry that their child is going to get sick from their lunch. Just as no family should have to worry that the medicines they buy will cause them harm. Protecting the safety of our food and drugs is one of the most fundamental responsibilities government has, and, with the outstanding team I am announcing today, it is a responsibility that I intend to uphold in the months and years to come.
Thank you.
Remarks of President Barack ObamaWeekly AddressSaturday, March 14, 2009Washington, DC
I’ve often said that I don’t believe government has the answer to every problem or that it can do all things for all people. We are a nation built on the strength of individual initiative. But there are certain things that we can’t do on our own. There are certain things only a government can do. And one of those things is ensuring that the foods we eat, and the medicines we take, are safe and don’t cause us harm. That is the mission of our Food and Drug Administration and it is a mission shared by our Department of Agriculture, and a variety of other agencies and offices at just about every level of government.
The men and women who inspect our foods and test the safety of our medicines are chemists and physicians, veterinarians and pharmacists. It is because of the work they do each and every day that the United States is one of the safest places in the world to buy groceries at a supermarket or pills at a drugstore. Unlike citizens of so many other countries, Americans can trust that there is a strong system in place to ensure that the medications we give our children will help them get better, not make them sick; and that a family dinner won’t end in a trip to the doctor’s office.
But in recent years, we’ve seen a number of problems with the food making its way to our kitchen tables. In 2006, it was contaminated spinach. In 2008, it was salmonella in peppers and possibly tomatoes. And just this year, bad peanut products led to hundreds of illnesses and cost nine people their lives – a painful reminder of how tragic the consequences can be when food producers act irresponsibly and government is unable to do its job. Worse, these incidents reflect a troubling trend that’s seen the average number of outbreaks from contaminated produce and other foods grow to nearly 350 a year – up from 100 a year in the early 1990s.
Part of the reason is that many of the laws and regulations governing food safety in America have not been updated since they were written in the time of Teddy Roosevelt. It’s also because our system of inspection and enforcement is spread out so widely among so many people that it’s difficult for different parts of our government to share information, work together, and solve problems. And it’s also because the FDA has been underfunded and understaffed in recent years, leaving the agency with the resources to inspect just 7,000 of our 150,000 food processing plants and warehouses each year. That means roughly 95% of them go uninspected.
That is a hazard to public health. It is unacceptable. And it will change under the leadership of Dr. Margaret Hamburg, whom I am appointing today as Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration. From her research on infectious disease at the National Institutes of Health to her work on public health at the Department of Health and Human Services to her leadership on biodefense at the Nuclear Threat Initiative, Dr. Hamburg brings to this vital position not only a reputation of integrity but a record of achievement in making Americans safer and more secure. Dr. Hamburg was one of the youngest people ever elected to the National Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Medicine. And her two children have a unique distinction of their own. Their birth certificates feature her name twice – once as their mother, and once as New York City Health Commissioner. In that role, Dr. Hamburg brought a new life to a demoralized agency, leading an internationally-recognized initiative that cut the tuberculosis rate by nearly half, and overseeing food safety in our nation’s largest city.
Joining her as Principal Deputy Commissioner will be Dr. Joshua Sharfstein. As Baltimore’s Health Commissioner, Dr. Sharfstein has been recognized as a national leader for his efforts to protect children from unsafe over-the-counter cough and cold medications. And he’s designed an award-winning program to ensure that Americans with disabilities had access to prescription drugs.
Their critical work – and the critical work of the FDA they lead – will be part of a larger effort taken up by a new Food Safety Working Group I am creating. This Working Group will bring together cabinet secretaries and senior officials to advise me on how we can upgrade our food safety laws for the 21st century; foster coordination throughout government; and ensure that we are not just designing laws that will keep the American people safe, but enforcing them. And I expect this group to report back to me with recommendations as soon as possible.
As part of our commitment to public health, our Agriculture Department is closing a loophole in the system to ensure that diseased cows don’t find their way into the food supply. And we are also strengthening our food safety system and modernizing our labs with a billion dollar investment, a portion of which will go toward significantly increasing the number of food inspectors, helping ensure that the FDA has the staff and support they need to protect the food we eat.
In the end, food safety is something I take seriously, not just as your President, but as a parent. When I heard peanut products were being contaminated earlier this year, I immediately thought of my 7-year old daughter, Sasha, who has peanut butter sandwiches for lunch probably three times a week. No parent should have to worry that their child is going to get sick from their lunch. Just as no family should have to worry that the medicines they buy will cause them harm. Protecting the safety of our food and drugs is one of the most fundamental responsibilities government has, and, with the outstanding team I am announcing today, it is a responsibility that I intend to uphold in the months and years to come.
Thank you.
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