Senator Obama's naive, ahistorical, and unrealistic foreign policy viewpoints: His Achilles Heel for the November election

In Israel for the 60th anniversary celebration of its founding, President George W. Bush gave a speech in the Knesset, saying these words:

Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along . . . We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: 'Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided.' We have an obligation to call this what it is — the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.

Kathryn Jean Lopez writes about what happened next:

Immediately, the Democratic party responded in outrage, insisting it was an unprecedented political attack on their presumptive nominee from foreign soil. Barack Obama himself said: “It is sad that President Bush would use a speech to the Knesset on the 60th anniversary of Israel’s independence to launch a false political attack.”

Senator Joseph Biden called the president's remarks “bulls**t.”

The White House denied the remark was about Obama. White House spokeswoman Dana Perino responded, “I would think that all of you who cover these issues and for a long time have known that there are many who have suggested these types of negotiations with people that the president, President Bush, thinks that we should not talk to. I understand when you’re running for office you sometimes think the world revolves around you. That is not always true. And it is not true in this case.”

The White House’s denial is believable, and the Democrats’ accusation is a distortion and a distraction. The commander-in-chief, believe it or not, might have been concerned with something besides The Situation Room running a clip of him hitting Obama. The presidency, you see, is about more than the spin-cycle, the next election, and even the next president.

The president could have been speaking of any number of Democrats. Say, Jimmy Carter, who in April, 2008 said: “Through more official consultations with these outlawed leaders [Hamas and Syria], it may yet be possible to revive and expedite the stalemated peace talks between Israel and its neighbors. In the Middle East, as in Nepal, the path to peace lies in negotiation, not in isolation.”

Or Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, freelance diplomat, who in December 2007 said: “the road to Damascus is a road to peace.”

Or, perhaps he meant Speaker Pelosi in April 2007: “I believe in dialogue. As my colleagues have said over and over again, unless you communicate, you cannot understand each other. You cannot reach agreement.”

Or maybe he meant recent Obama endorser and former North Carolina senator John Edwards, who, according to his own press release in February of last year, believes “the U.S. should step up our diplomatic efforts by engaging in direct talks with all the nations in the region, including Iran and Syria.”

Or Bill Richardson, who has said, about meeting with Iran and Syria: “They’re bad folks … But you don’t have peace talks with your friends.”

It could have been about Congressman Henry Waxman, who in April said: “A Democratic administration would go back and try to open that possibility up for discussions [with Iran] of a grand bargain of one sort or another ... Democrats would certainly have seen that as a missed opportunity.”

Or Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich: “I can go to Syria. I can go to Iran and work to craft a path towards peace. And I will … How can you change peoples minds if you don’t meet with them?”

Or former Democratic presidential candidates and senators Chris Dodd and John Kerry, who met with Syria’s al-Assad and said: “As senior Democrats on the Foreign Relations Committee, we felt it was important to make clear that while we believe in resuming dialogue, our message is no different: Syria can and should play a more constructive role in the region … We concluded that our conversation was worthwhile, and that … resuming direct dialogue with Syria should be pursued.”

Or the former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, from April 10: “[Diplomats] can deliver some pretty tough messages … You don’t begin with a president of the country, but you do need to talk to your enemy.”

You get the idea. The world does not actually revolve around Barackstar. It doesn’t even revolve around contemporary Democrats. There are two very different ways of looking at the world, represented by the two parties here in the U.S. President Bush, obviously, believes the other party’s approach is wrong. To say so, in his mind, was of historic importance, for obvious reasons. Obvious, at least, to any statesman who can see before and beyond this current election season. Thank you, Senator Obama, for helping make clear where you stand on that front.

Two different world views, for sure. John Podhoretz and Peter Wehner have more.

Ed Morrisey reports on what Obama has said on his own website and in political debates here. (And now Obama says this? Would that be change you can believe in?)

Power Line points out another significant and contradictory foreign policy position of Obama's here. Check out the photo at the bottom of the post and reflect on these words:

Commenting on the distinction that Obama vehemently observes between Iran and Hamas, Geraghty is unconstrained by the norms that Newsweek seeks to impose: "Obama contends a face-to-face summit with the guy on the left is long overdue; a face-to-face summit with the guy on the right is crazy talk."

Taking a further step back, recall Obama's NC victory speech when he said:

I trust the American people to understand that it is not weakness, but wisdom to talk not just to our friends, but to our enemies, like Roosevelt did, and Kennedy did, and Truman did.

To which, Tom Maguire writes:

Obama's supporters are too young to know any of this, but Roosevelt led the United States in the war against Hitler; the Allied policy was unconditional surrender, so there was very little for Roosevelt and Hitler to discuss, and in fact, the two did not meet at all (but they did exchange correspondence before the war).

So my guess is that Obama is thinking of the Yalta Conference with Churchill and Stalin as talking to "our enemies," although of course we were still allied with the Soviet Union against Germany and Japan at that point. Beyond that, is the Yalta Conference something Obama and his advisers view as a success worthy of emulation? Puzzling.

Power Line adds these additional words:

And the United States has been talking with Iran right along in any event. It's not for lack of communication that Iran has been conducting its war on the United States.

Michael Novak discusses the implications of Obama's world view.

Glenn Reynolds summed it up with this pithy statement:

MEMO TO THE OBAMA CAMPAIGN: When somebody condemns appeasement, it doesn't help things to jump up and yell "Hey, he's talking about me!"

I think Obama's views on this related set of foreign policy issues are his single greatest vulnerability in the general election. They are a vulnerability because they provide the clearest and deepest insights into his view of the world and human nature, at a time of an unrelenting global war against our country. And it is in the context of those insights about Obama's world view that it is possible to attach a related and unfavorable interpretation to his parallel relationships with Reverend Jeremiah Wright and Bill Ayers.

The Ultimate Act of Nepotism and Cronyism

The United Nations was forced to temporarily suspend aid shipments to Myanmar because the ruling junta confiscated the intial materiel sent, saying that it preferred to distribute aid "with its own resources".

In order, presumably, to control exactly who receives the badly needed food and supplies. Because of unprecedented and unconscionable foot-dragging by Myanmar's government, only eleven aid planes have landed since the cyclone hit almost a week ago. The U.N. estimates that the death toll could reach 100,000 if assistance is not expedited.

Interpol Confirms FARC Data

We've heard a lot from Democrats for, what, the last 8 or so years, about how the U.S. should listen more to the "international community." Maybe we should (h/t):

The information found in the computers of the deceased leader of the rebel Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces (FARC), Raúl Reyes, was not manipulated by Colombian authorities, according to an Interpol's report to be released next May 15, as disclosed by Bogota El Tiempo daily newspaper.

The report stated that a committee comprising computer science experts from Korea, Australia, and Singapore working for the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol) completed last May 2 the investigation into the three computers found in Reyes' camp in Ecuador, Efe reported.

"The first finding was that Reyes' files were not manipulated and that security agencies and citizens who had the computer in their hands kept them safe," the Colombian newspaper stated.

Commenting on the story, Gatewaypundit summarizes the laundry list of info discovered on the computer.

-- FARC connections with Ecuadorean president Rafael Correa
-- Records of $300 million offerings from Hugo Chavez
-- Thank you notes from Hugo Chavez dating back to 1992
-- Uranium purchasing records
-- Admit to killing the sister of former President Cesar Gaviria
-- Admit to planting a 2003 car bomb killing 36 at a Bogota upper crust club
-- Directions on how to make a Dirty Bomb
-- Information that led to the discovery of 60 pounds of uranium
-- Letter to Libya's Moammar Gadhafi asking for cash to buy surface-to-air missiles
-- Meetings with "gringos" about Barack Obama
-- Information on Russian illegal arms dealer Viktor Bout who was later captured
-- FARC funding Correa's campaign
-- Cuban links to FARC
-- Links to US Democrats
-- $480,000 of FARC cash in Costa Rican safe house
-- $100,000 to President Correa's campaign for election
...And, more.

International Conservatives Continue Winning Streak

While many pundits still expect the U.S. to make a leftward move in November, it's interesting to note that political ground continues to be gained by the right in some important Western European countries. The latest example being the local elections in Great Britain:

Winning the London mayoral contest is expected to cap an historic electoral win for the Conservatives with David Cameron’s party on course for more than 44 per cent of the national vote. Labour is now expected to finish with as little as 24 per cent, humiliatingly pushed into third place by the Liberal Democrats on 25 per cent.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown admitted it had been a "bad" and "disappointing" night for the Labour Party in the local elections...The size of the Conservative majority is comparable to Labour’s local election win under Tony Blair in 1995. sparking speculation that Mr Cameron could be swept into power with a sizeable majority if repeated in a general election.

This follows wins by the more conservative parties (hey, we're being relative here) in Germany, France and Italy (off the top of my head), though Spain is still leaning left.

Being the Savior Nation

Front-page headline in the Sunday Providence Journal: "U.S. slow to react to food crisis." Page A13 detail (emphasis added):

But administration officials and legislative aides acknowledge that they have only recently begun to focus on the severity of the problem, and humanitarian groups fear that assistance from the United States, which already supplies about half of the world's total food aid, may come too late to provide much benefit in the near term.

It seems that we only find out about our positive international involvement deep in an accusatory context. (Although, of course, how and by whose authority we offer such aid is a whole 'nother topic.)

Free Trade Is a Two-Way Street

Trade isn't a topic on which I can express all of the relevant arguments, but this suggestion from University of Maryland School of Business Professor Peter Morici sounds reasonable to me:

China is the biggest problem. It subsidizes foreign purchases of its currency, the yuan, more than $460 billion a year, making Chinese products artificially cheap at Wal-Mart. The U.S. trade gap with the Middle Kingdom has swelled to $250 billion. ...

As long as China subsidizes the sale of yuan to Wal-Mart and other U.S. importers, the U.S. Treasury should tax dollar-yuan conversions. When China stops manipulating currency markets, the tax would stop. That would reduce imports from and exports to China, create new jobs in the U.S., raise U.S. productivity and workers' incomes, and reduce the federal deficit.

Free trade has to go both ways. No doubt, there are economic arguments having to do with investment and leverage that support the allowance of manipulated imbalance, but then, once again, I think we're shifting toward the topic of government's appropriate behavior as a business entity.

A New Era of Nuclear Fear

Charles Krauthammer broached a chilling subject yesterday:

The era of nonproliferation is over. During the first half-century of the nuclear age, safety lay in restricting the weaponry to major powers and keeping it out of the hands of rogue states. This strategy was inevitability going to break down. The inevitable has arrived. ...

The "international community" is prepared to do nothing of consequence to halt nuclear proliferation. Which is why we must face reality and begin thinking how we live with the unthinkable.

There are four ways to deal with rogue states going nuclear: preemption, deterrence, missile defense, and regime change.

The fall of the Berlin Wall was not the end of the story; it was the beginning of an even more complicated test. The world's leaders, it seems to me, have failed.

Being a People to Believe In

This is a point worth making over and over again:

[Iraqis] were willing to help us, but they are not a stupid people. They know that if they commit to the American side and the Americans abandon them as we did in 1991, it means death for them and their families. They know this, and it is real. It is not an abstract idea for them.

Most Iraqis don't support Al-Qaida and the militias, but when our commitment to stay in Iraq and finish the job is in doubt — as it was when Sen. Harry Reid went on TV and said, "this war is lost" *#151; Iraqis are going to hedge their bets. They may not support the militias, but when they are betting their lives, most of them are not going to commit to America unless they are assured that America is committed to them.

Perhaps our greatest difficulty in foreign affairs proceeds from the national narrative, established in the romanticized argot of '60s nostalgists, that we are a people so self-reflective that we'll stop ourselves from succeeding, no matter the cost in others' lives. Iraq would be a wholly different place, right now, if the world had thought it a conclusion without disclaimer that we would stick it out until Iraq had taken the reins of the horse that we intended to provide.

Instead, we are inundated with poseurs' attempts to make of themselves self-fulfilled prophets.

Venezuela's Casualties of Revolution

This line from Ambassador William Middendorf's scathing critique of Hugo Chavez and his enablers published in Saturday's Projo should really grab your attention…

According to a 2005 U.N. report, more people die from gunfire in Venezuela than in any other country on Earth (including Iraq).

Citing only gunfire deaths arguably obscures the issue since explosions in Iraq are also a source of civilian harm. But even after including civilian fatalities from all war-related violence, Iraq's civilian fatality rate over the past six months is still less than the most recently reported homicide rates from Venezuela.

Analyzing figures provided by the Department of Defense as part of the Iraq Index project, the Brookings Institution estimates that about 4,850 civilian deaths occurred in Iraq between September 2007 and February 2008, the last six months for which data is available. Given Iraq's population of 27.5 million, this translates to a rate of approximately 35 civilian fatalities per 100,000 people per year, which, make no mistake, is too high.

The numbers for Venezuela are significantly worse…

• According to a UNESCO study cited by the New York Times, presumably the study referred to by Ambassador Middendorf, Venezuela suffered 41.4 gun deaths per 100,000 people in 2002.
• The same New York Times article, using official figures from Venezuela's Criminal Investigations Police, reported a total of 7,616 murders in Venezuela through the first 8 months of 2006, a rate of 44 homicides per 100,000 people per year.
• According to the the Venezuelan newspaper El Universal, the Criminal Investigations Police reported a total of 12,249 murders in Venezuela between January 1 and November 30 of 2007, a rate of 51 homicides per 100,000 people per year. (h/t Gateway Pundit)
• The Times article reports that the current murder rate in Venezuela is approximately double what it was in 1999, the year President Hugo Chavez took office.

Given the Venezuelan death toll, do those who claim that the removal of Saddam Husein from power has been an unmitigated disaster void of redeeming value also say the same thing of Venezuela's "Bolivaran Revolution"? Or is a belief that any price is acceptable to build socialism, while no price is acceptable in the attempt to advance freedom still unfortunately finding its sympathizers?

Absolut Aztlan?

So the makers of Absolut vodka are advertising in Mexico with the statement that, "In an Absolut World," the Southwestern United States would be the territory of our neighbors to the south. One might call it immanentizing the endgame.

Well, my choice of vodkas just became easier by the subtraction of one.

(More on Gateway Pundit.)

What to Do About China?

Concerned about your business prospects in the domestic market? Well, Providence Journal business-section columnist John Kostrzewa has a suggestion:

With the local and national economies weakening, and perhaps already in recession, small and large businesses are worried about where the growth will come from in 2008.

How about looking overseas, especially to China?

He offers advice, gleaned from a seminar on the topic sponsored by Citizens Bank, the Bank of China and the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce. "Don't underestimate the language barrier," says one speaker. However, to complement the growing Chinese urban consumer market:

Business owners... can find lower labor, operating and land costs, a surging demand for foreign products and less competition in other parts of the country.

Ah yes. Lower labor costs:

Officially, 2,375 trafficking cases were reported in China last year, a 7.6 percent decrease from 2006, according to the Public Security Ministry.

But the statistics are based on China's narrow definition of trafficking, which covers only the kidnapping, purchase or sale of women and children younger than 14, not older teen-agers and men. Activists say the number is grossly understated and that tens of thousands of people are trafficked each year.

Historically, many victims have been women forced to marry lonely farmers, or male babies illegally adopted by couples who wanted a son. But those types of cases are leveling off, while cases of migrants deceived into sexual exploitation and forced labor are increasing, activists say.

I know, I know. I've got those libertarian, free-market leanings, as well. But I don't think we, as a nation, have come up with an adequate solution for dealing with the potential to globalize our economy without globalizing our principles — in part because we're so divided on what our principles should be. Without some truly visionary innovation on our shores, I'm not confident that either our economy or our moral center will remain strong enough for those invisible hands to crush international iniquity.

Jay Nordlinger puts it inimicably:

Reading a report about China's latest massacre in Tibet, I was struck by one line in particular: "China is gambling that its crackdown will not bring an international outcry over human rights violations that could lead to boycotts of the Olympics."

That is a very, very good gamble. Nobody gives a rat's behind what the Chinese do, to Tibetans or anybody else. It is a curious fact of modern times. If only China's rulers would embrace the Bush administration: Maybe the world would care!

So What Difference Does Dictatorship Make, Anyway?

Perhaps a new Cuban declaration could assert the right of all people to life, liberty, and the pursuit of par (paragraphs rearranged):

Golf had been played on the island since the 1920s. At the time of the 1959 revolution, Havana boasted two award-winning courses, at the Havana Country Club and the Biltmore, which hosted such greats as Sam Snead and the rookie Arnold Palmer. A third course, where Mr. Castro would lose to Che Guevara, had just opened. U.S. tycoon Irénée du Pont had a private nine-hole course in Xanadu, his fabled Varadero beach estate. ...

In 1962, Mr. Castro lost a round of golf to Ernesto "Che" Guevara, who had been a caddy in his Argentine hometown before he became a guerrilla icon. Mr. Castro's defeat may have had disastrous consequences for the sport. He had one Havana golf course turned into a military school, another into an art school. A journalist who wrote about the defeat of Cuba's Maximum Leader, who was a notoriously bad loser, was fired the next day. ...

The famous game between Messrs. Castro and Guevara took place shortly after the Cuban Missile Crisis, according to José Lorenzo Fuentes, Mr. Castro's former personal scribe, who covered the game. Mr. Lorenzo Fuentes says the match was supposed to send a friendly signal to President Kennedy. "Castro told me that the headline of the story the next day would be 'President Castro challenges President Kennedy to a friendly game of golf,'" he says.

But the game became a competitive affair between two men who did not like to lose, says Mr. Lorenzo Fuentes, who recalls that Mr. Guevara "played with a lot of passion." Mr. Lorenzo Fuentes says he felt he couldn't lie about the game's outcome, so he wrote a newspaper story saying Fidel had lost. Mr. Lorenzo Fuentes says he lost his job the next day, eventually fell afoul of the regime and now lives in Miami.

It's an iffy thing to live in a society in which one must constantly fear that the supreme leader's tastes will run afoul of one's own.

(via Instapundit)

Geldof - Press Has Shortchanged Bush's Successful Africa Policy

Live Aid organizer Bob Geldof is chastising the US Press corps for under-reporting the positive effect that President Bush's Africa policy has had:

Mr. Geldof praised Mr. Bush for his work in delivering billions to fight disease and poverty in Africa, and blasted the U.S. press for ignoring the achievement.

Mr. Bush, said Mr. Geldof, "has done more than any other president so far."

"This is the triumph of American policy really," he said. "It was probably unexpected of the man. It was expected of the nation, but not of the man, but both rose to the occasion."

"What's in it for [Mr. Bush]? Absolutely nothing," Mr. Geldof said.

Mr. Geldof said that the president has failed "to articulate this to Americans" but said he is also "pissed off" at the press for their failure to report on this good news story.

"You guys didn't pay attention," Geldof said to a group of reporters from all the major newspapers.

Bush administration officials, incidentally, have also been quite displeased with some of the press coverage on this trip that they have viewed as overly negative and ignoring their achievements.

And more...

Mr. Geldof said that he and Bono, U2's lead singer, have "gotten a lot of flak" for saying that Mr. Bush has done more for Africa than any other U.S. president.

Mr. Geldof said that "the main thing now is asking the candidates, 'What are you going to do?'"

Mr. Bush, said Mr. Geldof, has "put in place a whole foundation" in the form of aid for disease prevention, government institution building with accountability measures, and investing capital in African countries to build up their economies.

"The next guy really must take it on," Mr. Geldof said, referring to the next president.

If the press has underplayed the success of such policies that liberals would otherwise find compelling (say, if a Democrat had implemented them), then what else has the media underplayed or spun differently? In some simple minds, the man can do no good.

How Disappointing Is This Administration

As if to demoralize conservative hawks heading into an election year, the Bush administration is falling back to the U.S. political-class default with respect to Palestinian terror:

The "road map" for peace, conceived in 2002 by Mr. Bush, had become a hindrance to the peace process, because the first requirement was that the Palestinians stop terrorist attacks.

As a result, every time there was a terrorist bombing, the peace process fell apart and went back to square one. Neither side ever began discussing the "core issues": the freezing of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, the rights of Palestinian refugees to return, the outline of Israel's border and the future of Jerusalem.

"The reason that we haven't really been able to move forward on the peace process for a number of years is that we were stuck in the sequentiality of the road map. So you had to do the first phase of the road map before you moved on to the third phase of the road map, which was the actual negotiations of final status," Miss Rice said.

Was a time when this administration understood that a willingness to resort to terrorism was the "core issue" — not just in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but throughout the world. Rice goes on to explain that it was necessary to "break that tight sequentiality ... to say, you can do these in parallel, you can do road-map obligations and negotiation for the final status in parallel," but we've been through this before: The result is that Israel and the United States display their carrots and domestic and international pro-Palestinian (anti-Israeli and anti-American) forces pressure them to start handing the carrots on the promise that it will inspire the Palestinians to lower their stick just a little more.

I'm with Jeff Jacoby:

Whatever happened to the moral clarity that informed the president's worldview in the wake of 9/11? Whatever happened to the conviction that was at the core of the Bush Doctrine: that terrorists must be anathematized and defeated, and the fever-swamps that breed them drained and detoxified? ...

Now that policy has gone by the boards, replaced by one less focused on achieving peace than on maintaining a "peace process." No doubt it is difficult, as Rice says, to "move forward on the peace process" when the Palestinian Authority glorifies suicide bombers and encourages a murderous goal of eliminating the Jewish state. If the Bush Doctrine - "with us or with the terrorists" - were still in force, the peace process would be shelved. The administration would be treating the Palestinians as pariahs, allowing them no assistance of any kind, much less movement toward statehood, so long as their encouragement of terrorism persisted.

The Power of Snow

So here's a question: Does the effect of snow transcend culture, or has Iraq absorbed enough of the culture that flowed from Northwestern Europe to have a similar cultural reaction?

After weathering nearly five years of war, Baghdad residents thought they'd pretty much seen it all. But Friday morning, as muezzins were calling the faithful to prayer, the people here awoke to something certifiably new. For the first time in memory, snow fell across Baghdad.

Although the white flakes quickly dissolved into gray puddles, they brought an emotion rarely expressed in this desert capital snarled by army checkpoints, divided by concrete walls and ravaged by sectarian killings—delight.

"For the first time in my life I saw a snow-rain like this falling in Baghdad," said Mohammed Abdul-Hussein, a 63-year-old retiree from the New Baghdad area.

"When I was young, I heard from my father that such rain had fallen in the early '40s on the outskirts of northern Baghdad," Abdul-Hussein said, referring to snow as a type of rain. "But snow falling in Baghdad in such a magnificent scene was beyond my imagination."

(No word, yet, on the effects of a couple of hours of snow on traffic in the desert country.)

Benazir Bhutto Killed in Suicide Bombing

From CNN...

Pakistan's former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated Thursday outside a large gathering of her supporters where a suicide bomber also killed at least 14, doctors and a spokesman for her party said.

While Bhutto appeared to have died from bullet wounds, it was not immediately clear if she was shot or if her wounds were caused by bomb shrapnel.

Pajamas Media has a continuing roundup here (via Instapundit).

After Latest NIE, Some Appear Willing to Believe that "Death to America" Really Does Mean "I Love You"

Cliff May boils down the problem with the reaction to the NIE report:

Many commentators are fudging the distinction between Iran “suspending” and “abandoning” its nuclear weapons program. According to the new NIE, Iran not only continues to enrich uranium, it also is “continuing to develop a range of technical capabilities that could be applied to producing nuclear weapons, if a decision is made to do so.” If your teenage son tells you he doesn’t smoke, but you nonetheless find tobacco, rolling papers and matches in his knapsack, what would be your guess regarding his intentions and capabilities?

The NIE was summary explained that Iran has stopped weaponizing nuclear material. This has been extrapolated and distilled to "Iran isn't a threat anymore." The truth is that the writers of the document had a political goal themselves and this has led to various attempts to spin the report. Gives you all sorts of confidence in the ability of the "intelligence" agencies to offer objective analysis, doesn't it? So we have a choice: we continue to be wary of a country that openly proclaims it wants to destroy us or we believe them when the say that "Death to America" really means "I Love You."

Re: Thanking Hillary, Tongue in Cheek

When members of the College Republican Federation are at the corner of Post Road and Airport Road in Warwick at 3:30 today, they will have good reason to thank the Junior Senator from New York. Senator Hillary Clinton not only voted in favor of the war in Iraq, Christopher Hitchens pointed out in February that she actively made the case for our action there.

Here is what she said in her crucial speech of October 2002:

In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al-Qaida members, though there is apparently no evidence of his involvement in the terrible events of September 11, 2001.

Notice what this does not say. It does not say that she agrees with the Bush administration on those two key points. Rather, it states these two claims in her own voice and on her own authority.

Chavez Defeated

Hugo Chavez's attempt to reshape the Venezuelan constitution has failed. This despite the fact that, according to Providence City Council member Miguel C. Luna:

[T]he reforms would deepen the social and economic changes under President Chavez that have just begun to affect the population, lessening poverty and affording more human rights to the majority. Discrimination based on sexual orientation and health would be criminalized while community organizations would receive direct funding for social-development projects.

Apparently the poor didn't get the message:

The loss signals waning support for Chavez's drive to bring socialism to the region's fourth-biggest economy by concentrating power in his hands and ramping up state control of private lives. Voters refused to abolish presidential term limits or allow government censorship during declared emergencies. Chavez also sought to shorten the work day and end central bank autonomy.

``This is the first significant setback that Chavez has ever had,'' said Adam Isacson, director at the Center for International Policy in Washington. ``He has lost popular support. He has lost support of some of the army and the poor.''

Never fear, Mr. Luna, I have a feeling the Chavez will try again:

``This is a democracy,'' the president said in Caracas. ``For me, this isn't a defeat. This is for now.''

I bet.

Internet as International Allegory

The obviousness of keeping the Internet out of the hands of U.N.-approved tyrannies provides an opportunity to consider the internationalist impulse more generally:

When hundreds of technology experts from around the world gather here this week to hammer out the future of the Internet, the hottest issue won't be spam, phishing or any of the other phenomena that bedevil users everywhere.

Instead, ending U.S. control over what's become a global network will be at the top of the agenda for many of the more than 2,000 participants expected at the United Nations Internet Governance Forum ...

With the Internet now dominating nearly aspect of modern life, continued U.S. control of the medium has become a sensitive topic worldwide. In nations that try to control what people can see and hear, the Internet often is the only source of uncensored news and opinion.

U.S. officials say that keeping Internet functions under their control has protected that free flow of information and kept the Internet growing reliably.

As I understand the structure, the U.S. government's actual "control" of the functioning of the Internet is minimal. The back-room, bird's eye view of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) certainly has potential for abuse, but I bet more people than might want to admit it trust the American people and their government to keep their hands off it more than they trust any other slice of the global society to do the same.

The Dried-Up Fruits of Socialism, in Venezuela and Everywhere

You many have noticed the price of oil heading towards record highs. That should imply that the people living in oil-producing countries are doing well, right? Well, not all of them are. According to Reuters, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's socialist management of his nation's oil wealth is creating shortages of basic products and crushing the quality of life of Venezuelans, middle class and poor alike…

Venezuelan construction worker Gustavo Arteaga has no trouble finding jobs in this OPEC nation's booming economy, but on a recent Monday morning he skipped work as part of a more complicated search -- for milk.

The 37-year-old father-of-two has for months scrambled to find basic products like cooking oil, beef and milk, despite leftist President Hugo Chavez's social program that promises to provide low-cost groceries to the majority poor.

"It takes a miracle to find milk," said Arteaga, who spent two hours in line outside a store in the poor Caracas neighborhood of Eucaliptus. "Don't you see I'm here slaving away to see if I can get even one or two of those (containers)?"

The state's consumer protection agency, backed by military reserves, often shutters supermarkets for selling above the fixed price, but vendors offer their goods from makeshift stands in downtown Caracas in plain view of authorities.

"This is an insult, but I can't find it anywhere," said Jose Ferrer, paying nearly $12 for a can of powdered milk regulated at $6. "I have to buy it for my kids, there is no other way."

The economy grew by a record 10 percent in 2006, and millions of Venezuelans receive government stipends to participate in education and community development programs.

One of Chavez's most popular programs is a chain of subsidized supermarkets scattered across rural areas and in hillside slums that sells food at fixed prices unaffected by rampant inflation -- though it too has been hit by shortages.

Actually having to live under a socialist regime is making Venezuelans into the most pro-free market people in Latin America. According to a international survey conducted by the Pew Global Attitudes Project in April/May of 2007, support for the idea that "people are better off in free markets" is higher in Venezuela than in any other Latin American country surveyed…

Percentage of people who agree with the statement that "Most people are better off in a free market economy, even though some people are rich and some are poor".

Apologists here in Rhode Island like to discuss how Chavez isn't properly understood in the United States. For example, here are two Providence City councilmen, Miguel Luna and Luis Aponte, announcing a recent visit to Rhode Island by Chavez's ambassador to the United States...

“Councilman Aponte and I are honored to serve as co-hosts of the reception,” said Councilman Luna. “Our goals are to thank Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez for the heating assistance he has provided to thousands of Rhode Islanders and other Americans, and to address the myriad, troubling misconceptions about the Venezuelan government.

I wonder if the Councilmen consider the reporting on Chavez's strangulation of Venezuela's non-petroleum domestic economy to be based on "misconceptions", or if they see the problems as part of a state of emergency that will correct itself once Venezuela has been freed from capitalist encirclement. I also wonder if Councilmen Luna and Aponte have given any introspection to their role in the exploitation of Venezuela's people for political purposes, through their endorsement of a program that pays below-market value for heating oil to a country that finds it increasingly difficult to provide basic foodstuffs to its people.

In a related vein, James Keller, a local minister who has traveled to Venezuela, recently declared in a Projo op-ed that support for Chavez is obviously born of enlightened self-interest...

To add insult to injury, [an earlier Projo editorial] says that the people of Venezuela were “hoodwinked” by being given “social justice for the poor"....

Of course, the voters overwhelmingly supported Chavez for re-election to the presidency after they saw their lives improve. They weren’t “hoodwinked” but were voting out of enlightened self-interest, which every electorate does.

To Rev. Keller, an interest in living under strong government socialism apparently trumps any interest in being to obtain basic household necessities; who needs milk when you have the right to say you live in a glorious people's republic.

But the most important question that needs to be asked of Chavez's local supporters -- especially the ones in positions of political power -- is whether they believe his brand of political leadership and economic policy could provide a viable model for Rhode Island, despite the damage they inflict on the lives of regular people. After all, doesn't it reasonably follow that those who believe that welfare socialism is the right choice for a place that should be in the midst of a petro-economy boom will also believe that even stronger measures are necessary for places where the foundations of the economy are more uncertain.

The Dried-Up Fruits of Socialism, in Venezuela and Everywhere

You many have noticed the price of oil heading towards record highs. That should imply that the people living in oil-producing countries are doing well, right? Well, not all of them are. According to Reuters, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's socialist management of his nation's oil wealth is creating shortages of basic products and crushing the quality of life of Venezuelans, middle class and poor alike…

Venezuelan construction worker Gustavo Arteaga has no trouble finding jobs in this OPEC nation's booming economy, but on a recent Monday morning he skipped work as part of a more complicated search -- for milk.

The 37-year-old father-of-two has for months scrambled to find basic products like cooking oil, beef and milk, despite leftist President Hugo Chavez's social program that promises to provide low-cost groceries to the majority poor.

"It takes a miracle to find milk," said Arteaga, who spent two hours in line outside a store in the poor Caracas neighborhood of Eucaliptus. "Don't you see I'm here slaving away to see if I can get even one or two of those (containers)?"

The state's consumer protection agency, backed by military reserves, often shutters supermarkets for selling above the fixed price, but vendors offer their goods from makeshift stands in downtown Caracas in plain view of authorities.

"This is an insult, but I can't find it anywhere," said Jose Ferrer, paying nearly $12 for a can of powdered milk regulated at $6. "I have to buy it for my kids, there is no other way."

The economy grew by a record 10 percent in 2006, and millions of Venezuelans receive government stipends to participate in education and community development programs.

One of Chavez's most popular programs is a chain of subsidized supermarkets scattered across rural areas and in hillside slums that sells food at fixed prices unaffected by rampant inflation -- though it too has been hit by shortages.

Actually having to live under a socialist regime is making Venezuelans into the most pro-free market people in Latin America. According to a international survey conducted by the Pew Global Attitudes Project in April/May of 2007, support for the idea that "people are better off in free markets" is higher in Venezuela than in any other Latin American country surveyed…

Percentage of people who agree with the statement that "Most people are better off in a free market economy, even though some people are rich and some are poor".

Apologists here in Rhode Island like to discuss how Chavez isn't properly understood in the United States. For example, here are two Providence City councilmen, Miguel Luna and Luis Aponte, announcing a recent visit to Rhode Island by Chavez's ambassador to the United States...

“Councilman Aponte and I are honored to serve as co-hosts of the reception,” said Councilman Luna. “Our goals are to thank Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez for the heating assistance he has provided to thousands of Rhode Islanders and other Americans, and to address the myriad, troubling misconceptions about the Venezuelan government.

I wonder if the Councilmen consider the reporting on Chavez's strangulation of Venezuela's non-petroleum domestic economy to be based on "misconceptions", or if they see the problems as part of a state of emergency that will correct itself once Venezuela has been freed from capitalist encirclement. I also wonder if Councilmen Luna and Aponte have given any introspection to their role in the exploitation of Venezuela's people for political purposes, through their endorsement of a program that pays below-market value for heating oil to a country that finds it increasingly difficult to provide basic foodstuffs to its people.

In a related vein, James Keller, a local minister who has traveled to Venezuela, recently declared in a Projo op-ed that support for Chavez is obviously born of enlightened self-interest...

To add insult to injury, [an earlier Projo editorial] says that the people of Venezuela were “hoodwinked” by being given “social justice for the poor"....

Of course, the voters overwhelmingly supported Chavez for re-election to the presidency after they saw their lives improve. They weren’t “hoodwinked” but were voting out of enlightened self-interest, which every electorate does.

To Rev. Keller, an interest in living under strong government socialism apparently trumps any interest in being to obtain basic household necessities; who needs milk when you have the right to say you live in a glorious people's republic.

But the most important question that needs to be asked of Chavez's local supporters -- especially the ones in positions of political power -- is whether they believe his brand of political leadership and economic policy could provide a viable model for Rhode Island, despite the damage they inflict on the lives of regular people. After all, doesn't it reasonably follow that those who believe that welfare socialism is the right choice for a place that should be in the midst of a petro-economy boom will also believe that even stronger measures are necessary for places where the foundations of the economy are more uncertain.

Shhh! World Is Becoming A Better Place

Stephen Moore calls attention to a UN report that--for some reason--didn't get much play in the media:

A new United Nations report called "State of the Future" concludes: "People around the world are becoming healthier, wealthier, better educated, more peaceful, more connected, and they are living longer."

Yes, of course, there was the obligatory bad news: Global warming is said to be getting worse and income disparities are widening. But the joyous trends in health and wealth documented in the report indicate a gigantic leap forward for humanity. This is probably the first time you've heard any of this because--while the grim "Global 2000" and "Limits to Growth" reports were deemed worthy of headlines across the country--the media mostly ignored the good news and the upbeat predictions of "State of the Future."

But here they are: World-wide illiteracy rates have fallen by half since 1970 and now stand at an all-time low of 18%. More people live in free countries than ever before. The average human being today will live 50% longer in 2025 than one born in 1955.

To what do we owe this improvement? Capitalism, according to the U.N. Free trade is rightly recognized as the engine of global prosperity in recent years. In 1981, 40% of the world's population lived on less than $1 a day. Now that percentage is only 25%, adjusted for inflation. And at current rates of growth, "world poverty will be cut in half between 2000 and 2015"--which is arguably one of the greatest triumphs in human history. Trade and technology are closing the global "digital divide"...

The media's collective yawn over "State of the Future" is typical of the reaction to just about any good news. When 2006 was declared the hottest year on record, there were thousands of news stories. But last month's revised data, indicating that 1934 was actually warmer, barely warranted a paragraph-long correction in most papers.

So I'm happy to report that the world's six billion people are living longer, healthier and more comfortably than ever before. If only it were easy to fit that on a button.

Questions That Should Be Asked

Jay Nordlinger poses a series of questions that ought to be asked of the current crop of presidential candidates:

Putin's latest attacks on U.S. missile defense remind me of something: Do Democratic presidential candidates agree with those attacks? Sympathize with them? And, if one of them is elected president, are our efforts to defend ourselves, and our allies, against missiles off — dead, suspended until the next Republican president?

Will someone ask Hillary & Co. about this?

His latest Impromptus column also makes me feel a little better about not getting into a certain Ivy League graduate program (despite grades, recommendation, GED, etc.):

The Nobel peace committee is not so much a peace committee as a standard left-wing pressure group — sending these Mickey Mouse "messages." They're like the board of the MacArthur Foundation, or the English department of Brown University or something — there is no connection between what they do and quality. It's just straight politics, or, more accurately, ideology.

Wary of the News from Russia

I hate to say it, but I'll be looking for Garry Kasparov to have a horrible chess accident during the next few months:

The former world chess champion Garry Kasparov entered Russia's presidential race on Sunday, elected overwhelmingly as the candidate for the country's beleagured opposition coalition.

Kasparov has been a driving force behind the coalition, which has united liberals, leftists and nationalists in opposition to President Vladimir Putin. He received 379 of 498 votes at a national congress held in Moscow by the Other Russia coalition, coalition spokeswoman Lyudmila Mamina told The Associated Press.

Dems Showing Prudence?

If there's a Democrat elected President in 2008, will there be troops in Iraq in 2013?

"I think it's hard to project four years from now," said Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois in the opening moments of a campaign debate in the nation's first primary state.

"It is very difficult to know what we're going to be inheriting," added Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York.

"I cannot make that commitment," said former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina.

Oh, so you mean you'll gauge the situation at that time, examine the facts at hand, utilize your best judgment and then determine what is the most prudent path to follow?

Huh.

I guess your perspective can change when you might actually have to make the tough decisions instead of just second-guess them.

The Propriety of Responding to the President

Feeding into the WPRO ad, "Where do bloggers go....", Dan Yorke brings up an interesting point. Why was there a need for a "Democrat response" to the Presidential speech on the status of the conflict in Iraq? Dan talked to Brown University's Darrell West about it, and they came to the following conclusions:

1) There was never any sort of "opposition party" response to a televised Presidential address until the 1980's (Ronald Reagan). Then, the argument was that the President could offer his side of a story without rebuttal. The networks acquiesced and began allowing a response to State of the Union addresses.

2) Over the years, and despite the removal of the so-called "Fairness Doctrine", the networks continued the practice.

3) Now, it seems they've expanded the practice such that any Presidential address is effectively rebutted by the opposition. Even a speech offering an update on progress made in a war. Anyone ever here about the time Wendell Wilkie aired a rebuttal to one of FDR's fireside chats? Didn't think so.

Yorke's point is that, since the networks are under no obligation to offer the rebuttal, they are being ideological activists by continuing to provide the opportunity. As such, the office of the President--regardless of whether a Democrat or Republican--is diminished. He can't even get 5 minutes of breathing room to offer his case without the other side being able to take partisan political shots. Incidentally, it looked like ABC, CBS and NBC aired the Democratic response, but FOX did not (though FOXNEWS did, I think). That should stoke some fires.

I suppose this is of a piece of the broader trend towards diminishing the office of the President or that how some of us realize there was a time when politics really did stop at the waters edge.

On a side note, the best analysis of Sen. Reed's retort comes from Kimberly Kagan:

Senator Jack Reed gave the Democratic response, and the contrast with Bush’s speech was striking to those who paid careful attention. Bush addressed the situation in Iraq with detail and nuance. He described varying situations on the ground in different, specific regions of the country, spoke of particular movements and individuals, and showed a grasp of the complexity and reality of the struggle. Reed spoke only in generalizations. He did not refer to any specific events, places, or individuals in Iraq. He spoke generally of a “Democratic plan” for withdrawal that sounded remarkably like the Baker-Hamilton plan, originally presented at the end of 2006 in a completely different operational context. The vagueness of his discussion of the situation and of his proposals contrasted starkly with the specificity even of Bush’s speech, to say nothing of the incredible complexity and detail evinced in the testimony of General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker. That contrast highlights once more what is really the key question of the upcoming political debate over Iraq: Whom do the American people want to run this war, Congress or the people who know something about it?

Drawing the Iron Curtain?

Perhaps I'm just noticing examples more, of late, but there seems to be an increasing stream of worrying news items, such as the following, coming out of Russia:

Russia's armed forces chief of staff on Thursday described as "hallucinations" Georgia's claim that Russian warplanes had violated its border on Tuesday, Interfax news agency reported.

Georgia, which has accused Russian aircraft of dropping a missile near its capital Tbilisi earlier this month, said on Wednesday two more Russian jets had illegally crossed its borders. Russia has rejected the claims.

"It must be that our Georgian colleagues are starting to suffer from hallucinations," General Yuri Baluyevsky said.

I'm beginning to see this January 2003 post as naive and to worry that we'll too soon be looking back on the palpable excitement of the '90s in wistful lament at our subsequent loss of illusion (a pleasant fantasy that the new millennium quickly proved, of course, to be naive). How much of the next ten years' politics will suffer the turbulence of mass longing to reenter the dream?

Maybe I'm Just Paranoid...

... but this sort of news is beginning to sound less and less like a series of flukes:

Libertyville-based DMH Ingredients has filed a federal lawsuit against Changzhou Kelong Chemical Co. Ltd., saying DMH found metal shavings in 11,200 kilos of aspartame artificial sweetener the Chinese company shipped in 2005.

What's going on over there?

The Sound of the Empire's End

Promising and active young professionals (among others) are fleeing Great Britain:

BRITAIN is facing a mass exodus of people looking to escape the crime and grime of modern living.

The country’s biggest foreign visa consultancy firm has revealed that applications have soared in the last seven months by 80 per cent to almost 4,000 a week. Ten years ago the figure was just 300 a week.

Most people are relocating within the Commonwealth — in Australia, Canada and South Africa. They are almost all young professionals and skilled workers aged 20-40.

And many cite their reason for wanting to quit as immigration to these shores — and the burden it is placing on their communities and local authorities. The dearth of good schools, spiralling house prices, rising crime and tax increases are also driving people away.

Reading the whole article, Rhode Islanders may feel that the problems (and individual citizens' solution) sounds really, really familiar.

ADDENDUM:

It's a little off topic (depending how broad you take the topic to be), but coming across the statistic at the end of the following paragraph shortly after writing this post, my first thought was that we've an indication of who remains when the family and future–oriented folks look for bluer skies (emphasis added):

Today, the sexualization of girls begins in infancy with 12-month sized rompers announcing, "I'm too sexy for my diaper." At age four, it's The Bratz Babyz, singing "You've gotta look hotter than hot! Show what you've got!" At six it's a pouty, scantily dressed My Scene Bling Bling Barbie draped in diamonds. By 12, it's Ludacris singing ( Ruff sex): "make it hurt in the garden." Fully brainwashed by 13, lap dancer is by then considered a more desirable profession than teacher, as one British survey of 1,000 teenage girls found to be the case by a 7-1 ratio.

(via Mark Shea)

Good News in Iraq = Bad News for Some

Both Andrew and Mac have pointed to the NY Times piece by Brookings Institute's Michael O’Hanlon and Kenneth Pollack that claims progress is being made in Iraq. As Mac stated, it is important because of who is saying that things are looking up: "two severe critics of the Bush administration’s management of the war." Afraid of a potential sea-change in public opinion (how politically detrimental that would be for the Dems!), opponents of the Iraq War have attempted to counter the emerging meme (to use a favorite wonky term) that highlights the anti-Bush bona fides of the authors, claiming they supported the original invasion of Iraq, support the surge, one of them is friends with General Petraeus, etc. In the same NRO symposium to which Mac contributed, Victor Davis Hanson counters this argument:

What is interesting about the essay is that both scholars were early supporters of the war to remove Saddam Hussein, then constant critics of the acknowledged mistakes of the occupation, and now somewhat confident that Gen. Petraeus can still salvage a victory. In two regards, they reflect somewhat the vast majority of the American people who approved the war, slowly soured on the peace — but now have yet to be won over again by the surge to renew their erstwhile support.

Finally, what are the opponents going to do to undermine the credibility of an anti-Iraq-invasion, liberal, Muslim congressman reports that things are looking up? (h/t Capt. Ed)

[Minnesota Democratic Rep. Keith] Ellison , a vocal critic of the Iraq war, said he still believes it was a mistake for the U.S. to invade Iraq.

"But there are 150,000 American soldiers there now, and I care very deeply about them," said Ellison, one of six members on the all-freshman trip led by Rep. Jerry McNerney, D-Calif. "I also care about the Iraqi people. I don't want to see them suffer."

The group met with Iraqi and U.S. military officials, including Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq.

Ellison said that local leaders in Ramadi told him of how they partnered with U.S. and Iraqi military officials to virtually rid al-Qaeda from the city. Although the lawmakers had to travel in flak vests and helmets, "we did see people walking around the streets of Ramadi, going back and forth to the market."

There have been fewer anti-U.S. sermons as the violence has been reduced, Ellison said, and religious leaders meet regularly with U.S. military officials.

"The success in Ramadi is not just because of bombs and bullets, but because the U.S. and Iraqi military and the Iraqi police are partnering with the tribal leadership and the religious leadership," he said. "So they're not trying to just bomb people into submission. What they're doing is respecting the people, giving the people some control over their own lives."

Ellison said he was particularly impressed watching Maj. Gen. Walter Gaskin, U.S. commander in the Anbar province, greeting people with "as-salama aleikum," meaning peace be upon you.

"And they would respond back with smiles and waves," Ellison said. "I don't want to overplay it. There were no flowers. There was no clapping. There was no parade. But there was a general level of respect and calm that I thought was good."

One final, semi-related note. I highly recommend Victory Caucus as a clearinghouse for the good and bad in Iraq.

Fatherland, Socialism, or …er …uh …Something Better, Maybe?

A number of blogs have made note of the Pew Research Center global opinion study showing that the number of people who believe that suicide bombings are justified is dropping across the Muslim world.

Here’s another stat from the same study. The number of people in Venezuela who believe that “most people are better off in a free market economy, even though some people are rich and some people are poor” stands at 72% -- higher than any other Latin American country listed! That’s a very noteworthy stat in a country whose President’s motto is “Fatherland, Socialism, or Death”.

There’s nothing like living under actual socialism to drive up support for capitalism.

Iraq: Taking Stock

I'm not a dead-ender on Iraq, but I do think we've got to give the new--albeit too-long in coming--strategy time to work. I suspect readers will just breeze on past this post as many, probably most, already have their minds made up. To them, we are frozen in time: the situation in Iraq will always be as it was in November 2006, just before the election. And that's not a coincidence. The domestic political component of the entire war debate is probably the most troubli