Obama's Next Pinata - Netanyahu? Say UNCLE SAM!

Obama's Middle East Foreign Policy: Don't confuse me with the facts, full speed ahead. Since Obama currently has no better alternative, he must make nice to the Arab/Muslim World. Europe does not care as long as they continue getting their gas from Russia and can keep their Muslim population from rioting. (See 1 below.)

There is no visible solution for the Palestinians short of Israel's annihilation. Perhaps Netanyahu will be able to forcefully demonstrate, to our messiah, the Israelis have no desire to die for his cause.

A friend has termed it a Two State Delusion!

Failing that, it could be war. Maybe that is what Obama ultimately wants so he and Europe can have another pinata - Israel - to blame for their doomed policy? There are those who believe Roosevelt accepted Pear Harbor as the only way to get America and Congress to wake up. (See 1a, 1b and 1c below.)

Is Lieberman proving to be Netanyahu's Biden?

Annapolis, like Oslo, was stitched together by dreamy 'peacenicks' in search of mirages because of their understandable hopes and frustrations. The problem is neither have worked. Arafat killed Oslo and Hamas and Palestinian terrorists will, or have, killed a Two State solution along with insurmountable geographical barriers.

Lieberman may have spoken out of turn by churlishly telling all 'the king is naked' but eventually the world must face truths.(See 2 and 2b below.)

Obama's tax plan bombs! Figures don't lie unless they are prepared by a liar in search of political 'voodoism.' (See 3 below.)

Peggy Noonan writes an op ed piece about what 'she' has learned about Obama. The piece reveals more about what we can learn about Noonan - she became so disgusted and disenchanted with GW, she turned on him. Now, she is willing to blindly swallow whatever Obama dishes. When, if ever, she re-gains her objectivity she might actually choke.

Meanwhile, Scot Lehigh sees Obama flying too high.(See 4 below.)

Krauthammer's take on what is Obama's ultimate agenda.

Obama's mission is to narrow wealth and income spreads, inculcate us into believing government is the solution and to do it Chicago 'bludgeoning' style - my way or the highway! Because Obama and his close associates (Emanuel and Podesta) are of like mind and control all levels of government when Obama's term(s) are over he will still be there and America will never be the same.

Time will only tell whether the trauma Obama will put us through will be for better or worse. I may be jaundiced but I do not believe we will be sustantially better off and the price we will pay for any modest change and improvement will be awesome.(See 5 below.)

Chuck Raasch poses - do we want a car saleman for president? We may not but we do and he is a slick one. (See 6 below.)

Another writer sees another delusion! This time our president did not see 'soul' and rather is more likely to eat it.(See 7 and 7a below.)

Many months ago I urged readers to buy Doug Feith's book. Now he and others are under attack from a looney Spanish judge.

Will Obama slap this judge down or suck it up? If not, the "One Worlders" will be allowed to take one more unchallnged step towards their ultimate goal - abolishing national sanctity so we will live by international laws and regulations - not ours.

The "One Worlders" never stop and re-surface whenever the world faces a crisis. Like anti-Semitism, it is a viral condition brought about by a world whose moral immune system has weakened.

On the other hand, unless I am off base, what right did we have to capture and extradite Panama's Noriega and try him as well as others from S American involved in drug trade etc.? (See 8 and 8a below.)

The Editors of The New Republic ask what they deem is a fair question. (See 9 below.)

Many call these trilions being spent and wasted 'chump change" because we chumps are like the passengers sitting on the deck in 'The Ship of Fools'!

The belated change in mark to market by The FASB has three interesting and obvious conflicting implications as follows:

a) First, it could cause banks to hold their "toxic" assets because of under-valuation. This could possibly increase their earnings and investor thinking about their stock values.

b) It might cause the government to pay more for these alleged toxic assets and thus, put more tax payer money at risk.

c) Finally, you have the tug of war going on between housing pirces, which continue to decline, and the governments desire to get buyers to absorb unsold houses so the government is pushing mortgage rates lower. What ultimate effect this has on outstanding toxic paper could prove another wrinkle in the ointment.

On another note, Obama is going to get much of his outlandish budget and the Demwits will chop here and there and thus, claim their surgery proved they acted responsibly. However, the old shell game of lowering increases is alive and well so no 'change' there! (See 10 below.)

I mistakenly thought Netanyahu might be Obama's next pinata but Strassel suggests it is Cantor. Maybe he will maneuver a 'twofer?' (See 11 below.)

Finally three doses of reality:

a) A re-set on what the g-20 was all about.

b) Democrat Senators get cold feet over global warming proposals and decide to cap it and trade away Gore. (See 12 and 12a below.)

c) Mark Gongloff in his today's: "Ahead of The Tape Column" points out increasing unemployment and its resulting restraint on consumption suggests the housing sector is not likely to recover quickly and thus "...will keep a lid on hiring - and on stocks."

Have a nice weekend, a Happy Easter and Passover to all and think Peace as N Korea prepares to launch!

Dick

1) Column One: Ending Israel's conditional legitimacy.
By Caroline Glick



The time has come to launch an all-out diplomatic war against Israel. That is, the time has come to begin to unravel EU acceptance of Israel's right to exist.

Last Friday, in anticipation of the swearing in of the new Netanyahu
government, EU foreign ministers met in Prague and discussed how they would
stick it to the Jews.

According to media reports, the assembled ministers and diplomats decided
that they will freeze the process of upgrading EU relations with Israel
until Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu explicitly commits his government to
establishing a Palestinian state and accepts that the only legitimate policy
an Israeli government can have is the so-called "two-state solution."

Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg, whose country holds the rotating
EU presidency, reportedly summed up the new approach saying, "There won't be
any progress in relations between Israel and the European Union until the
Israeli government clarifies its stance on the creation of a Palestinian
state."

On an operational level, the assembled ministers and diplomats decided to
cancel the Israel-EU summit now scheduled for late May until Israel has
bowed to Europe's demand.

Europe's decision to launch a preemptive strike against the Netanyahu
government even before it was sworn into office on Tuesday came against the
backdrop of its growing enthusiasm for opening formal ties with Hamas. As
The Jerusalem Post reported on Thursday, Europe's diplomatic courtship of
the Iranian-sponsored genocidal terror group is being spearheaded by Sweden
and Switzerland. But they are far from alone.

Britain's Foreign Minister David Miliband has in recent weeks openly called
for recognizing Hamas. France is reportedly using its involvement in the
attempts to secure the release of Israeli hostage Gilad Schalit from his
Hamas-controlled captors to advance its own bilateral ties to the jihadist
group. At last Friday's meeting, Belgian Foreign Minister Karel De Gucht
reportedly also called for Europe to open ties with Hamas.

In its move to isolate Israel - and indeed to treat the only free country in
the Middle East as if it is morally and politically inferior to Hamas - the
EU reportedly believes that it is acting in concert with the Obama
administration.

Since entering office, and increasingly in recent weeks, the Obama
administration has been both directly and indirectly signaling that it will
adopt a hostile stance toward Netanyahu and his government. Unnamed
Democratic congressional and administration sources have been warning Israel
through the media that the administration does not accept the Israeli
voters' right to set a new agenda for the incoming government that rejects
the Olmert-Livni government's subordination of Israel's national interests
to the establishment of a Palestinian state.

The administration itself has stated through both White House and State
Department spokesmen that it is completely committed to the swift
establishment of a Palestinian state - regardless of Israel's position on
the issue.

Other global policy-shapers have also weighed in. Former British prime
minister and current Quartet Middle East mediator Tony Blair has been making
daily statements warning of a breach with Israel if the Netanyahu government
doesn't fall in line. On Wednesday, for instance, Blair threatened, "There
is no alternative to a two-state solution, except the one-state solution.
And if there is a one-state solution, there's going to be a big fight."

The Palestinians are enjoying the ride. Last Saturday, Fatah negotiator Saeb
Erekat published an op-ed in The Washington Post where he portrayed
Netanyahu as more radical than Hamas, and demanded that the US show that it
is a true "honest broker" by treating Israel and Palestinian terrorists as
moral, political and strategic equals.

Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas has also piled on, announcing that he will
boycott the Netanyahu government until it falls into line.

Perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of the international hysteria over the
Netanyahu government is its timing. The calls for Israel's international
isolation, the decision to treat Israel as a beyond-the-pale-pariah-nation
far worse than Hamas, emerged even before the Netanyahu government was sworn
into office. How did this foul state of affairs come about? Why is the
Middle East's only democracy being treated worse than North Korea, Iran,
Syria, Sudan, Hamas and Hizbullah?

THE RESPONSIBILITY for this horrendous state of affairs belongs mainly with
Netanyahu's predecessors - former prime minister Ehud Olmert and opposition
leader Tzipi Livni. During their tenures in office, Olmert and Livni
effectively embraced Israel's enemies' view that unlike the PLO and even
Hamas, Israel has no independent right to exist. Indeed, not only did they
accept that view, they turned it into the official policy of the government.

Around the time that prime minister Ariel Sharon was felled by a stroke in
January 2006, Olmert and Livni began asserting that Israel's very legitimacy
is dependent on the rapid establishment of a Palestinian state. For
instance, in her speech at the Herzliya conference in January 2006, Livni
stated outright that until and unless a Palestinian state is carved out of
land currently controlled by Israel, the Jewish state cannot expect for the
world to accept its right to exist. Olmert made this point explicitly in a
series of media interviews in recent months.

Livni maintained her allegiance to the view that a Palestinian state is more
legitimate than Israel when during coalition talks with Netanyahu she
stipulated that like the EU and the PLO, she would only accept the
legitimacy of the Netanyahu government, and so agree to serve in it, if it
accepted the two-state paradigm.

To fully understand the significance of what Livni and Olmert have done, it
is necessary to understand the source of the phrase "two-state solution."

The term was created by the PLO. When the PLO discussed the issue, the
question under debate was not whether or not to build a Palestinian state,
but whether or not to accept the existence of a Jewish state. That is, the
debate over whether to accept a "one-state solution" or a "two-state
solution" did not revolve around the establishment of a Palestinian state -
which would exist no matter what. At issue was whether to accept the
existence of Israel. For the Palestinians then, and for supporters of the
two-state paradigm like Blair and his European and American cohorts, it is
Israel's existence, not the existence of the Palestinian state, that is
conditional.

Israel embarked on the road toward accepting the PLO's position when it
accepted the legitimacy of the PLO with the launch of the Oslo peace process
in 1993. The first time Israel explicitly and formally accepted the
establishment of a Palestinian state, however, came only in 2004, with the
Sharon government's qualified acceptance of the Middle East Quartet's
so-called road map plan for the establishment of a Palestinian state.

That acceptance was not unconditional. As both the government's reservations
and Sharon's repeated statements made clear, Israel would only accept the
eventual establishment of a Palestinian state after the Palestinian
Authority dismantled all terror groups operating in Palestinian society
including its own Fatah terror groups. That is, for the Sharon government,
it was the Palestinian state, not the Jewish state, whose legitimacy was
contingent on its actions.

The innovation of the Olmert-Livni government was to discard this position.
In November 2007, Olmert and Livni enthusiastically signed on to the
Annapolis formula for Palestinian statehood, which itself was nothing more
than a regurgitation of the PLO's position. Then-US secretary of state
Condoleezza Rice extolled the Annapolis formula specifically because it
removed the requirement that the Palestinians dismantle all terror groups
operating in their territory before receiving statehood. That is, she
applauded the fact that at Annapolis, the goal of fostering peaceful
coexistence between the Palestinians and Israel was supplanted by the
establishment of a Palestinian state as the aim of the so-called peace
process.

By adopting the so-called the Annapolis "two-state" platform then, the
Olmert-Livni government accepted the PLO's position that it is Israel, not
the PLO and its sister terror groups, whose legitimacy is contingent on its
behavior. It is not the PLO that needs to quit the terror business in order
to be acceptable. Israel needs to accept the PLO - and for that matter
Hamas - regardless of their behavior if it wishes for anyone to even
consider recognizing it.

DUE TO the Olmert-Livni government's unconditional acceptance of the PLO's
position, today conditional Israeli acceptance of the eventual establishment
of a Palestinian state, along the lines of the Sharon government's
conditional acceptance of the road map, is no longer sufficient. Now, as
Europe, the US and regional actors are all making clear, Israel must accept
that its own right to exist is contingent on the establishment of a
Palestinian state - regardless of its character or the identity of the
Palestinian leadership. That is, if Israel doesn't accept the legitimacy of
a Hamas or Fatah-ruled Palestinian terror state in Judea, Samaria, Jerusalem
and Gaza, then it has no right to exist.

This reality, of course, was made clear by the outcry that Foreign Minister
Avigdor Lieberman's official denunciation of the Annapolis formula on
Wednesday induced. Lieberman, after all, did not say anything particularly
anti-Palestinian. Indeed, he made clear that the Netanyahu government
remains committed to the establishment of a Palestinian state.

All Lieberman said was that the Netanyahu government will not accept a
Palestinian terror state. That is, all he said was that Israel's support for
Palestinian statehood is contingent on Palestinian behavior. Additionally,
Lieberman correctly pointed out that Israel's own international position has
been harmed rather than advanced by its willingness to compromise its
positions and accept those of its Palestinian adversaries.

What the outcry at Lieberman's remarks - from both Livni and her domestic
supporters, and the international community - makes clear is that it will be
exceedingly difficult for the Netanyahu government to walk away from the
anti-Israel positions adopted by its immediate predecessor. But it also
shows how urgently those positions need to be rejected.

For the past 16 years, from Israel's first acceptance of the PLO as a
legitimate actor to Israel's acceptance of the PLO's position that it is the
Jewish state rather than the Palestinian state whose legitimacy is
conditional, Israel's international position has become ever more tenuous as
prospects for peace have become ever more remote. The Netanyahu government
was elected to put an end to this disastrous trend. It is heartening to see
that straight out of the starting gate, it is working to accomplish this
essential task.


1a) Independent Norwegian poll: Palestinian majority opposes two state

Amid the ping-pong between Washington and Jerusalem over the validity of a Palestinian state established alongside Israel as the end-product of peace negotiations, the Norwegian Fafo institute which sponsored the 1993 Oslo Framework accords decided to find out how the Palestinians felt about this solution. Its main discovery was that a majority, 53 percent, of Palestinians (like Israelis), is against two states.

This figure breaks down into 33 percent, who opt for the annihilation of the state of Israel, whether by political means or force of arms - to be replaced by a single Islamic republic on all parts of the country; and 20 percent, which favors a united Israeli-Palestinian state, to be eventually engulfed by the latter population.

When Hamas members are polled separately, support for two states drops to 21 percent.

Publication of these findings by the Fafo Institute for Applied International Studies, which is supported by Norwegian foreign ministry and respected by European Middle East policy-makers, indicates that its researchers have given up on the Oslo Accords and the two-state goal pursued by Washington.

However, Washington sources expect extreme reluctance on the part of the Obama administration to abandon this goal because it is the only policy objective it has developed and is being used, furthermore, as a key to open the administration's diplomatic door to the Muslim world, especially in the Afghanistan-Pakistan arena (now lumped together as the "Afpak" front).

The US president's advisers are urging him to speed up Israel-Palestinian peacemaking for these ends - even if it means foisting the two-state objective on the Israelis. Proof that the Palestinians too will have to be whipped into line brings the venture close to a mission impossible.

1b) MSM Nothwithstanding, New Israeli Government Aims For Palestinian Statehood
By Leo Rennert

One day after Israel's new government was sworn in, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman declared that Israel remains fully committed to Palestinian statehood. Specifically, he confirmed that Israel will abide by the terms of the 2003 "road map" (full text) promulgated by George W. Bush, which explicitly calls for "Israel and a sovereign, independent, democratic and viable Palestine, living side by side in peace and security."


However, you wouldn't know this from mainstream media reports that Lieberman was walking away from the peace process and meaningful negotiations with the Palestinians, because he said that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's government is not obligated to pursue a different route to Palestinian statehood as drafted by an international conference in Annapolis, in late 2007.


For example, the New York Times, in a sky-is-falling dispatch by Israel Kershner, sounded an alarm of dire prospects on the peace front, focusing on the Annapolis formula, which envisaged a short-cut to final status negotiations . Yet, after a year of high-level talks between Mahmoud Abbas and then-Prime Minister Olmert and then- Foreign Minister Livni, these negotiations yielded absolutely nothing.


"New Israeli Foreign Minister Bluntly Dismisses U.S. Peace Effort," screamed the headline over Kershner's article, which labeled Lieberman variously as "hawkish nationalist," "ultranationalist" and, for good meaasure, "racist." Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat, in contrast, was presented as a statesman bewailing that "Israel closed the door in the face of the international community."


Of course, Israel did no such thing. By firmly endorsing the road map, it is in total synch with "the international community" since the road map is also the handiwork of the European Union, Russia and the United Nations in concert with Washington.


Times readers got only a brief , belated glimpse -- in Kernshner's 16th paragraph -- that Lieberman preferred the road map as a more promising approach toward a sustainable two-state solution.


Why such glaring misreporting?


Since February's Israeli election results, mainstream media have become invested in delegitimizing Netanyahu's Likud-led government as a far-right, ultra-nationalistic regime that would block all paths toward a two-state solution. Demonization of the Likud and Lieberman became part of their agenda.


Never mind that Israel signed a peace treaty with Egypt that surrendered the Sinai 30years ago under then-Likud Prime Minister Menachem Begin. Never mind that Ariel Sharon, an erstwhile Likudnik, unilaterally withdrew from all of Gaza. And never mind that Netanyahu already made clear that he would continue peace talks with the Palestinians.


None of this mattered. Mainstream media had too much invested in their anti-Bibi coverage agenda to get out of that groove. If Netanyahu didn't immediately accept Palestinian statehood -- with no ifs, and, or buts -- he was labeled a radical foe of a two-state solution.


Thus, the media brushed aside the real news from Lieberman's debut as foreign minister -- that Israel remains ready for further peace talks explicitly aimed at Palestinian statehood under Bush's road map, as signed by Israel and endorsed by its parliament, the Knesset. At the same time, Lieberman pointed out that Israel never signed the Annapolis declaration nor did the Knesset ratify it.


What's the difference between the two approaches, which both call for Palestinian statehood? The difference is critical. The road map puts a permanent end to Palestinian terrorism at the head of the negotiating line. The Annapolis formula starts with an immediate lunge toward Palestinian statehood, disregarding Hamas rule in Gaza and continued terrorist threats from the West Bank.


The road map delineates a three-stage, "performance-based: process of reciprocal steps by the two parties. It's a mutual confidence-building formula that conditions progress on full implementation of obligations at each step before the next one can be taken.


Thus, Phase One calls on Palestinians to put a permanent end to terrorism and to anti-Israel incitement, and for Israel to freeze settlement activity and remove illegal outposts in the West Bank. Palestinian statehood, it asserts, can come about only "when Palestinians have a leadership acting decisively against terrorism."


Phase 2 envisages strengthening Palestinian institutions and establishment of temporary borders for an eventual Palestinian state. But it's not until Phase 3 that the parties are called on to negotiate final-status issues, including permanent borders, refugees and Jerusalem.


Thus, Lieberman unmistakably served notice that Israel was prepared to move toward a two-state solution contingent on an end to terrorism -- a condition then-Secretary of State Rice gave short shrift to in Bush's second term. With Bush and Rice nearing the end of their tenure and wishing to leave some kind of peacemaking legacy, Rice arranged an international conference in Annapolis in November, 2007, that ended up standing the road map on its head.


Instead of waiting until the parties had fulfilled their obligations under the first two phases of the "road map," Rice pushed through a declaration that called for immediate final-status talks, even as Israel was under continued rocket attacks from Hamas-ruled Gaza and the Palestinian Authority under Mahmoud Abbas didn't even take baby steps to dismantle terrorist cells in the West Bank , while countenancing anti-Israel hatred in its media, schools and mosques.


Under White House pressure, Olmert accepted Annapolis . Livni met for nearly a year in intensive negotiations with PA leaders. Olmert offered Abbas 93 to 95 percent of the West Bank, plus all of Gaza, plus a land corridor between Gaza and the West Bank. Abbas, like Arafat at Camp David in 2000, walked way, sticking to maximalist demands like a "right of return" to Israel for millions of Palestinian refugees and their descendants.


In recent weeks, President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton -- without signaling whether they had a preference between the "road map" and Annapolis -- started a drumbeat that Palestinian statehood is Priority One in their diplomacy for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This, in turn, fueled media predictions that Jerusalem and Washington were headed toward a collision over peace talks and moves toward Palestinian statehood.


But now that Lieberman has embraced the road map, Palestinian statehood is back on the table -- once Palestinians get rid of Hamas and other terrorist groups.


And what, pray tell, is wrong with that? Wouldn't any other nation, faced with terrorist threats on its borders, demand the same before cutting irreversible deals with neighbors? In fact, wasn't insistence on an end to sectional terrorism in Northern Ireland as a pre-condition for power-sharing the key to the success of the Good Friday agreement?


Given the dismal failure of Annapolis, Obama is now left with a clear choice -- to opt for Palestinian statehood via the road map and to make good on his pledge of unalterable support of Israel's security interests, or to pressure Israel to continue the kabuki dance of pretend negotiations leading nowhere that Livni and Rice choreographed in the final year of Bush's presidency.


Either way, there is no quick payoff in the offing. The choice is between genuine diplomatic realism that could lead to some progress and illusionism that cheats both sides of their futures.

1c) Liberal Kuwaiti Journalist Ahmad Sarraf: The Palestinians Would Have Been Better Off If the Arabs Had Disengaged from the Palestinian Cause

Following are excerpts from an interview with Kuwaiti journalist Ahmad Al-Sarraf, which aired on Al-Arabiya TV on March 20, 2009.

I Have Never Hurt Anyone With My So-called "Extremist Liberalism," Never Denied Anybody the Right of Speech, Attacked Anybody, or Harmed His Reputation

Interviewer: "Do you agree with those who label you an ‘extremist liberal?'"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "First of all, there is no such thing as an "extremist liberal." There are extremist terrorists, extremist religious people, extremist racists, but extremist liberals – that's the first time I've heard this."

Interviewer: "Haven't you heard that term used?"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "No. I haven't heard it from a reliable source. As for people who curse me using this term – this happens a lot."

Interviewer: "So I'm not the first?"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "No, it happens a lot. If my extremism serves the interests of my country and my society... Being an extremist liberal is a good thing. I have never hurt anyone with my so-called "extremist liberalism." I have never denied anybody the right of speech. I have never eliminated anyone. I've never attacked anybody, or harmed his reputation. If that's what being an extremist liberal means, I welcome it."

[...]


Inciting One Group Against Another Constitutes Terrorism

Interviewer: "Do you think there are terrorists writing in the Kuwaiti press?"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Undoubtedly."

Interviewer: "On what grounds do you classify them as terrorists?"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Inciting one group against another constitutes terrorism. When you say that the members of a certain tribe, group, sect, or faith are not worthy of living... A well-known writer, or academic, gave a lecture, which was posted by MEMRI on the Internet. He called for the killing of any journalist who attacked Hamas. This is verbal extremism. One says it verbally, another writes it, but they both call for the killing of anybody who writes anything against Hamas. This is a terrorist call for murder. I have never said things like: "Kill so-and-so, finish so-and-so off, destroy so-and-so's business, or make so-and-so divorce his wife."


Without a Doubt, Hamas Bears Greater Responsibility

Interviewer: "In the recent war in Gaza, you were opposed to Hamas. Many people thought that this was an attempt to justify the Israeli aggression against Hamas, against Gaza."

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Nobody justifies aggression against an innocent, defenseless people. My problem with Hamas is that it gave Israel the pretext to carry out this treacherous aggression."

Interviewer: "So you think that Hamas bears greater responsibility than Israel?"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Without a doubt, Hamas bears greater responsibility for this aggression. At the time, there was a truce, which Hamas staunchly refused to renew. If this [non] renewal had stemmed from the beliefs of Hamas or of the people ruled by Hamas, we could have lived with it. But the fact that the decision was influenced from abroad, according to what has been said and published, makes it even more painful."

Interviewer: "What do you mean by ‘influence from abroad?'"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "I believe that Iran was involved in the non-renewal of the truce. They thought that the ‘celebration' they had in Lebanon in 2006 could be repeated in Gaza."

Interviewer: "Do you mean the July war?"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Yes, the 2006 war between Hizbullah and Israel. The attack and the destruction were ultimately the influence of Iran."

Interviewer: "You consider the war in Lebanon to be a ‘celebration?'"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "It was a tragic celebration, in which there were only losers. I'm sad to say that the party that caused the war is now claiming victory.

[...]

"Israel has defeated us once, twice, three times, because of our backwardness. Now, when it is killing us and making us regress even further – our schools are being destroyed, our universities are collapsing, and our poverty and disintegration are growing – we claim that we have won."

[...]

Interviewer: "Do you believe that Kuwaiti nationality will only be complete by disengaging from the Palestinian cause?"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Exactly. You must focus on your own affairs, because zero plus zero still adds up to zero."

Interviewer: "In your opinion, nobody really cares about the Palestinian cause?"


The Palestinian People Have Been Tormented and Dispersed by the Arabs, Have Been Killed By the Arabs

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "The Palestinian cause would have been better off – and this has been my view since 1967 – if it had been left up to the Palestinians. If Africa, by way of example, had not received Western aid, which makes them lazy... If they had been left to their own devices, they would have made greater progress. As long as you keep giving your son money, and helping him, and so on, his desire to work hard weakens.

[...]

"The Palestinian people have been tormented and dispersed by the Arabs. The Palestinian people have been killed by the Arabs. If we just left them to their own devices... We should give them this material aid without laying down conditions."

Interviewer: "So you agree to give them aid without laying down..."

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "It's difficult. How can I give them 20 million without saying ‘do this' or ‘do that?'"

Interviewer: "So with regard to the rebuilding of Gaza, you believe you should give Hamas money for reconstruction."

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "No, I don't. The inclination in the Arab League, the oil-producing countries, and the U.N. is to refrain from giving Hamas any money for reconstruction."

Interviewer: "What do you think about this?"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "This corroborates my approach. If you give aid to Hamas, you lay down your conditions, just like Iran did with Hamas and with Hizbullah in Lebanon. The guy who puts the money in the jukebox hears the song he wants, while all the others hear his song, whether they like it or not..."

Interviewer: "Then who would you give the aid to? Someone must be entrusted with it."

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "I say: Stop giving aid. Every time Israel strikes, [they say]: ‘Come on, give money, construct homes, build schools, infrastructure, and streets – and then leave.' Then we wait for the next disaster. Then Israel strikes again, and they go: ‘Come on, do this and that'... This scenario has repeated itself for 20 or 30 years. Somebody has to come and say: ‘Guys, let's change this.' If the Palestinians had been left to deal with their Israeli enemy on their own, they would have reached agreements and made peace a long time ago. The problem is that we all want the Palestinians to sign an agreement with Israel according to our terms – the Saudi want them to sign an agreement according to their terms, the Egyptians want them to... and so on. They have not been able to reach common ground with Israel.

[...]

"In my opinion, there is no such thing as a justified war. Peace is justified. Nothing justifies the collective killing of people. In my opinion, what happened in Lebanon – the 2006 war – was a crime against Lebanon."

Interviewer: "But it was Israel that attacked."

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "No, it wasn't Israel that kidnapped soldiers."

[...]


I Have A Clear Opinion Regarding Any Religious Rule In Politics, My Secularism Rejects [the Notion] of a Religious Scholar As a Head of State, This Is Unacceptable

Interviewer: "You have a clear opinion about Iran and its intervention in the region."

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "I have a clear opinion regarding any religious rule in politics. My secularism rejects [the notion] of a religious scholar as a head of state. This is unacceptable."

Interviewer: "You are one of the few writers in Kuwait who proclaim their secularism."

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Yes."

Interviewer: "The question is whether this secularism leads you to take an anti-religious stance."

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Not necessarily. I am not against religion."

Interviewer: "So it is possible, then."

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Absolutely not. I believe that religion is a necessity for most of the nations of the world. Everybody is free in his relations with his Lord. There are numerous religions. I have nothing against religion or religious thought. I am against the practice of those who like to act as God's representative on Earth. They tell me how to drink, how to get married, how to enter the house, how to enter the bathroom, how to have sex, and how to get dressed. The continuous interference in my life is what I oppose."

Interviewer: "You present yourself as a liberal, and one of the basic principles of liberalism is respecting other people's freedom of choice. Why do you interfere with the right of others to seek the guidance of muftis, and ask them how to dress, how to conduct their lives, how to eat or drink, as long as they made this choice?"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "That's all well and good, but the problem with this interference, and this is what has happened in our case... After all these years in which we kept silent about this religious interference, they have begun deciding who has the right to live, to exist. True, at first it seems as if they are just giving you guidance on how to lead your life according to religion, but if you keep silent about this, it grows to the point that we end up with fatwas accusing people of apostasy.

[...]

"There are innumerable fatwas issued by Shiites, accusing Sunnis of apostasy, and among Sunnis, accusing Shiites of apostasy. And this is only among ourselves. But once we reach the Buddhists and the Hindus – this is a whole different story altogether. It's a complete disaster."

[...]


I Have Lived in England and in America, and I Never Felt, For a Single Day, That They Had Any Advantage Over Me

"More than 63% of the population of Kuwait are not Kuwaitis. It has become normal for people in Kuwait to act arrogantly toward others. The fact that you have rights which others do not enjoy has become a norm. As a liberal, I do not accept this. I have lived in England and in America, and I never felt, for a single day, that they had any advantage over me, even though it was me who was working for them. So why should I make the Lebanese, Palestinians, or Egyptians, who come to work for me, feel that I am better than them?"

[...]

Interviewer: "Have you ever thought about leaving Kuwait?"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Yes, more than once."

Interviewer: "Why? After all, you say there are people [in Kuwait] who support your ideas, and you say that it is our homeland, and that we should defend it."

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "That's all very well, but this was before the [Iraqi] invasion and occupation, and the liberation of Kuwait."

Interviewer: "That's when you considered emigrating?"

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Yes. I was in a different psychological state of mind. My wife and I have a son with special needs, who is in need of treatment. Unfortunately, despite all our wealth, we have been unable to open a suitable school. In all the Arab countries – with the exception of Dubai, which opened a school for the disabled or slow learners twenty years ago – there is not one recognized school for children who are slow in learning."

[...]


We Need to Distance Religion From Our Lives, All the Constitutions in the World are Based on Man-made Law

"We need to distance religion from our lives. All the constitutions in the world are based on man-made law."

Interviewer: "You call for man-made law, rejecting any role for religion..."

Ahmad Al-Sarraf: "Religion is the relation between you and your Lord, your Creator, which pertains to personal matters in life – marriage, death, divorce, and so on. We Muslims criticize the Christians for having a formidable hierarchy in the clergy – starting with the Pope, in the case of Catholicism, or the other denominations, and including a large class of clergyman. We are becoming the same, I'm sad to say. We are getting to the point where we have a hierarchy of muftis. A child, who has just graduated from the shari'a department and who hasn't even grown a beard yet, issues fatwas, accusing people of apostasy, or excommunicating people. On what grounds?"

2) What are you talking about? Lieberman needs to learn some basic facts before he speaks up
By Eitan Haber

It is still unclear how long Avigdor Lieberman will remain in the post of foreign minister, yet it is already completely clear that he needs to get some “tutoring” so that he will become familiar with basic fact before he says more foolish things – because on Wednesday, at the reception in the Foreign Ministry, the honorable minister said some foolish things.

Opposing View

In praise of Lieberman.

Foreign minister’s induction speech merely expressed what most Israelis think


Mr. Lieberman showed contempt to the various Oslo Accords and claimed that Israel was popular in the world only after the Six-Day War victory and that “nothing was achieved by our concessions.”


Indeed, the Oslo Accords were shrouded by great controversy, and some would say they were disastrous for us. However, as far as I remember, both Benjamin Netanyahu and Ariel Sharon were elected as prime ministers in the past only after they accepted Oslo and pledged to continue on the Oslo path.


Here is the first “private lesson” for the foreign minister, as I rely on my memory at this late hour of night. It would be good for him to learn about the “nothing that came out of Oslo,” as he put it.


• A total of 33 states recognized the State of Israel (for the foreign minister this should be basic knowledge.)


. Economic growth reached 6% and beyond (and what is it at this time?)


• A total of 600,000 new immigrants moved here and settled in the country (and how many came here ever since then?)


• Israeli diplomatic missions were opened in seven Arab capitals (and how many were opened during the time you, Mr. Lieberman, served in the government?)


• The education budget was doubled, for the first time in the history of the state.


• About 200 international companies, most of them giant, made it to Israel for the first time (yes, this includes McDonald’s.)


• Unemployment decreased from 11.7% to 6.2%.


• States where an Israeli prime minister never traveled to hosted an Israeli prime minister for the first time: Russia, Japan, China, Korea, Indonesia, Morocco, and Oman.


• A peace treaty was signed with Jordan.


• A decision was taken to build the Cross-Israel Highway (Highway 6,) and construction work got underway.


• The decision was taken to build the new Ben-Gurion International Airport, and construction work got underway.


• The ratio between our national debt and production decreased by 28%.


• Incoming wealth went up from $120 million per year to about $5 billion.


• Seven new interchanges were built across Israel’s road system.


And this is only a partial list.

2b) Who killed Annapolis?

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman has made a stormy entrance. The "ultra-nationalist" (BBC and al-Jazeera); is "blunt and belligerent" (The New York Times); "aggressive" (Haaretz) and a "racist" (Yasser Abed Rabbo). This new government will make "no concessions for peace" (Guardian) and "spurn the peace process" (CNN)

Why the uproar? Because Lieberman announced: "The Israeli government never ratified the Annapolis accord."

Ahem. Actually, the cabinet did endorse Annapolis, on December 2, 2007. Ehud Olmert sold it to his colleagues with the argument that the negotiations would not be constrained by any deadline, and with the promise that if an agreement was reached, it would be implemented only after the Palestinians halted all violence. Privately, prior to the cabinet's endorsement, Olmert briefed Lieberman; who then absented himself from the vote.

BUT THE thing is, Annapolis is dead - just as Lieberman so undiplomatically stated. And everyone knows it. It died when Mahmoud Abbas and Ahmed Qurei rejected Olmert's and Tzipi Livni's offer last year of virtually the entire West Bank (the Palestinians already have Gaza), plus tracts of the Negev to make up for strategic settlement blocs retained beyond the Green Line.

Olmert and Livni proffered international stewardship for the holy places, and were prepared to turn over east Jerusalem. A tunnel or bridge would connect east and west "Palestine," providing contiguity between the West Bank and Gaza.

The Kadima government balked only at a total pullback to the 1949 Armistice Lines, and on granting millions of Palestinian "refugees" the right to "return" to a truncated Israel - something that would demographically smother our Jewish population.

In other words, had the Palestinians taken Olmert's and Livni's astonishingly magnanimous deal, "Palestine" would have become the 22nd Muslim Arab state in the Middle East.

Still, the petulant way Lieberman made his Annapolis announcement detracted from the substance of what Israel's argument should be. Had he handled himself more adroitly, the next day's headlines might have read: "New Government Embraces Road Map." For Lieberman did pledge a total commitment to what is officially known as a "Performance-Based Road Map to a Permanent Two-State Solution to the Israel-Palestinian Conflict."

The Annapolis process was a stab at leapfrogging over the road map because the Palestinians could not - or would not - fulfill their obligation to end the violence. And the international community preferred the illusion of momentum Annapolis provided. The alternative would have been to concede that even "moderate" Palestinians are not prepared follow through on the hard work necessary to achieve a two-state solution.

Lieberman is convinced that all the sweet talk from Olmert and Livni got Israel precisely nowhere. Yet, significantly, the Netanyahu-Lieberman-Barak government is committed to achieving a Palestinian state via the road map. What now needs to be worked out is whether the Palestinians remain committed, and whether the steps to implement the road map must be taken sequentially (the Israeli view), or in some other undefined fashion (the Palestinian view).

The road map stipulates that,"A two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will only be achieved through an end to violence and terrorism, when the Palestinian people have a leadership acting decisively against terror and are willing and able to build a practicing democracy based on tolerance and liberty, and through Israel's readiness to do what is necessary for a democratic Palestinian state to be established…"

That would require Israel to freeze settlements and dismantle those established since February 2001.

This is what Lieberman supports. What could be clearer?

THE Lieberman flap comes as Israel buries another victim of Palestinian terror, 16-year-old Shlomo Nativ, who was hacked to death on Thursday in Bat Ayin, a settlement southwest of Jerusalem. It is this kind of Palestinian brutality - combined with diplomatic obduracy - that keeps the road map grounded.

By talking tough instead of talking smart, Lieberman claimed he won "respect." In fact, he handed an unnecessary win to those who misrepresent Israel's stance by arguing that it is blocking the creation of a Palestinian state.

This was an inept performance by our novice foreign minister, no question. Nevertheless, Annapolis has become just another footnote in the 100-year history of Palestinian rejectionism.



3) Obama's $163,000 Tax Bomb: Families well below the president's 'no-tax' threshold will get a six-figure bill.
By MICHAEL J. BOSKIN

The House and Senate are preparing to pass President Barack Obama's radical budget blueprint, with only minor modifications, by using (abusing would be more accurate) the budget "reconciliation" process. This process circumvents the Senate's normal rules requiring 60 votes to prevent a filibuster. Reconciliation was created by Congress in the mid-1970s to enforce deficit reduction, the opposite of what the president and his party are aiming for.


The immense increase in non-defense spending and taxes, and the tripling of the national debt in Mr. Obama's budget, have been the subject of considerable scrutiny since it was announced. Mr. Obama and his economic officials respond, not without justification, that he inherited an enormous economic and financial crisis and a large deficit. All presidents present the best possible case for their budgets, but a mind-numbing array of numbers offers innumerable opportunities to conjure up misleading comparisons.

Mr. Obama's characterizations of his budget unfortunately fall into this pattern. He claims to reduce the deficit by half, to shave $2 trillion off the debt (the cumulative deficit over his 10-year budget horizon), and not to raise taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year. While in a Clintonian sense correct (depends on what the definition of "is" is), it is far more accurate to describe Mr. Obama's budget as almost tripling the deficit. It, (prospectively - my addition)adds $6.5 trillion to the national debt, and leaves future U.S. taxpayers (many of whom will make far less than $250,000) with the tab. And all this before dealing with the looming Medicare and Social Security cost explosion.

.
Some have laid the total estimated deficits and debt projections (as more realistically tallied by the Congressional Budget Office) on Mr. Obama's doorstep. But on this score the president is correct. He cannot rightly be blamed for what he inherited. A more accurate comparison calculates what he has already added and proposes to add by his policies, compared to a "do-nothing" baseline.

The CBO baseline cumulative deficit for the Obama 2010-2019 budget is $9.3 trillion. How much additional deficit and debt does Mr. Obama add relative to a do-nothing budget with none of his programs? Mr. Obama's "debt difference" is $4.829 trillion -- i.e., his tax and spending proposals add $4.829 trillion to the CBO do-nothing baseline deficit. The Obama budget also adds $177 billion to the fiscal year 2009 budget. To this must be added the $195 billion of 2009 legislated add-ons (e.g., the stimulus bill) since Mr. Obama's election that were already incorporated in the CBO baseline and the corresponding $1.267 trillion in add-ons for 2010-2019. This brings Mr. Obama's total additional debt to $6.5 trillion, not his claimed $2 trillion reduction. That was mostly a phantom cut from an imagined 10-year continuation of peak Iraq war spending.

The claim to reduce the deficit by half compares this year's immense (mostly inherited) deficit to the projected fiscal year 2013 deficit, the last of his current term. While it is technically correct that the deficit would be less than half this year's engorged level, a do-nothing budget would reduce it by 84%. Compared to do-nothing, Mr. Obama's deficit is more than two and a half times larger in fiscal year 2013. Just his addition to the budget deficit, $459 billion, is bigger than any deficit in the nation's history. And the 2013 deficit is supposed to be after several years of economic recovery, funds are being returned from the financial bailouts, and we are out of Iraq.

Finally, what of the claim not to raise taxes on anyone earning less than $250,000 a year? Even ignoring his large energy taxes, Mr. Obama must reconcile his arithmetic. Every dollar of debt he runs up means that future taxes must be $1 higher in present-value terms. Mr. Obama is going to leave a discounted present-value legacy of $6.5 trillion of additional future taxes, unless he dramatically cuts spending. (With interest the future tax hikes would be much larger later on.) Call it a stealth tax increase or ticking tax time-bomb.

What does $6.5 trillion of additional debt imply for the typical family? If spread evenly over all those paying income taxes (which under Mr. Obama's plan would shrink to a little over 50% of the population), every income-tax paying family would get a tax bill for $163,000. (In 10 years, interest would bring the total to well over a quarter million dollars, if paid all at once. If paid annually over the succeeding 10 years, the tax hike every year would average almost $34,000.) That's in addition to his explicit tax hikes. While the future tax time-bomb is pushed beyond Mr. Obama's budget horizon, and future presidents and Congresses will decide how it will be paid, it is likely to be paid by future income tax hikes as these are general fund deficits.

We can get a rough idea of who is likely to pay them by distributing this $6.5 trillion of future taxes according to the most recent distribution of income-tax burdens. We know the top 1% or 5% of income-taxpayers pay vastly disproportionate shares of taxes, and much larger shares than their shares of income. But it also turns out that Mr. Obama's massive additional debt implies a tax hike, if paid today, of well over $100,000 for people with incomes of $150,000, far below Mr. Obama's tax-hike cut-off of $250,000. (With interest, the tax hike would rise to more than $162,000 in 10 years, and over $20,000 a year if paid annually the following 10 years). In other words, a middle-aged two-career couple in New York or California could get a future tax bill as big as their mortgage.

While Mr. Obama's higher tax rates are economically harmful, some of his tax policies deserve wide support, e.g., permanently indexing the alternative minimum tax. Ditto some of the spending increases, including the extension of unemployment benefits, given the severe recession.

Neither a large deficit in a recession nor a small increase from the current modest level in the debt to GDP ratio is worrisome. And at a 50% debt-to-GDP ratio, with nominal GDP growing 4% (the CBO out-year forecast), deficits of 2% of GDP would not be increasing the debt burden relative to income.

But what is not just worrisome but dangerous are the growing trillion dollar deficits in the latter years of the Obama budget. These deficits are so large for a prosperous nation in peacetime -- three times safe levels -- that they would cause the debt burden to soar toward banana republic levels. That's a recipe for a permanent drag on growth and serious pressure on the Federal Reserve to inflate, not the new era of rising prosperity that Mr. Obama and his advisers foresee.

Mr. Boskin is a professor of economics at Stanford University and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. He chaired the Council of Economic Advisers under President George H.W. Bush.

4) Obama's Domestic Agenda Gains Clarity: A certain grandiosity contrasts with his steady hand on foreign affairs.
By PEGGY NOONAN

Barack Obama was elected in part because of his singularity. There was no one like him. He was a break with the past, not only because of his youth and race but also his cerebral bent, his cool demeanor. He seemed free of the partisan muck. He was hard to categorize because we didn't have categories for him. This was part of his power. It denied his foes purchase; they didn't know how to get at him. It allowed others to project on his canvas. After the thickly drawn George W. Bush, he seemed something refreshing: a mystery.


He has been criticized in the past for not being philosophically clear, but Mr. Obama possesses the canny knowledge that in modern politics, clarity can sometimes get in your way. You don't always want to shoot arrows that pierce; sometimes it's better to be a great enveloping fog, something your enemies get lost in.

The big thing that has happened the past few weeks is that he's become more sharply defined. Actions and decisions clarify, and he's been quite the decider.

In foreign affairs he has shown the impulses of a moderate: watching (Iran), waiting (Iraq), beefing up (Afghanistan), standing down (the nomination of Charles Freeman as National Intelligence Council chairman, which brought more drama than he wanted). His attitude at this week's summit was one of welcome modesty, which might or might not have tipped into a mea culpa (he agreed that America bears great responsibility for the world economic meltdown, and that some previous U.S. foreign policy attitudes have been poor). Or perhaps that's a you-a culpa.

In any case, his freshness and persona probably contributed to the fact that the predictable riots, while anticapitalist and antiglobalist, were not in their focus anti-American. This was a welcome relief. It won't last forever, and let's enjoy it while we can. Michelle Obama enjoyed a well-deserved triumph, representing her country with grace and elegance. She continued to signal a secret conservatism by demonstrating support for the right to bare arms. I very much wish that were my joke and not that of the editor Jason Epstein.

In domestic affairs, however, in the economy, Mr. Obama's actions since February have left him not so much more deeply defined as tagged. They can arguably be understood not as a conglomeration of moderate impulses but an expression of a kind of grandiosity. He thinks big! His plans are all-encompassing! There is so much busyness, and so much spending, that journalists have been in an unofficial race to keep track of the flurry of numbers. From Bloomberg News this week: "The U.S. government and the Federal Reserve have spent or lent or committed $12.8 trillion" in new pledges. This they note is almost the value of everything the United States produced last year. The price tag comes to $42,105 for every man, woman and child in the U.S.

I happened to be rereading the economics section of Mr. Obama's second book, "The Audacity of Hope," when I read the Bloomberg story. Mr. Obama scores President Bush for contributing to a national debt that amounted to a $30,000 bill for each American. Those were the days!

The tagging was done, definitively, by an increasingly impressive (because unusually serious and sincere) member of the U.S. Senate, who happens also to be Mr. Obama's friend. Tom Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican, has been close with the Illinois Democrat since their Senate orientation in 2004; he's the man the president hugged after his big joint sessions speech last month. Thursday, in a column on RealClearPolitics.com, Mr. Coburn wrote, "I believe President Obama has proposed the most significant shift toward collectivism and away from capitalism in the history of our republic. I believe his budget aspires to not merely promote economic recovery but to lay the groundwork for sweeping expansions of government authority in areas like health care, energy and even daily commerce. If handled poorly, I'm concerned this budget could turn our government into the world's largest health care provider, mortgage bank or car dealership, among other things."

To be defined in this way is not just a negative for Mr. Obama in terms of its criticism, it amounts to being robbed, by a friend, of the vagueness that was part of his power. Mr. Coburn was all the more deadly for being fair-minded: he was tough on both parties as operating in a crisis from "scripts," with Democrats saying everything is Bush's fault and Republicans decrying high spending and taxing while failing to abjure earmarks and admit what must be cut.

The great long-term question about Mr. Obama's economic program, the great political question, is: Is this what the people want? There are economists who believe, and who make a reasonable case, that more money is needed to get the credit system, now frozen like icebergs, flowing in warm streams again. But in terms of leaps in the size of government, including a new health-care system, and higher deficits, and increased borrowing, and debt—in terms of the sheer scope and size of what is being planned—one simply wonders: Is this what the people want?

Different pollsters offer different data. The Washington Post this week put the president's approval ratings at 60% or higher; the Washington Times had a Zogby poll saying Mr. Obama's popularity has dipped below 50%; in this paper, the pollsters Douglas Schoen and Scott Rasmussen said the American people "are coming to expressing increasingly significant doubts about his initiatives," and placed the president's approval rating at 56%, "with substantial polarization."

That last qualification certainly sounds true. So does the assertion that there's a gulf between the president's popularity and the popularity of his programs. Messrs. Schoen and Rasmussen had 83% of respondents saying his programs will not work, 82% saying they're worried about the deficit, 78% worried about inflation, and 69% worried about the increasing role of the government in the economy.

This is a hard time to be president. The questions and issues that arise, their depth, complexity and implications, amount to an almost daily parade of horribles. There is considerable goodwill for the president, and all the polls show considerable support—half the nation in a time of sustained crisis is not a small thing—but one wonders for the first time if Mr. Obama's support isn't becoming, in the old phrase, a mile wide and an inch deep. Something has been lost in terms of fervor when one talks to Obama supporters. There is little of the spirit that led FDR's supporters, for instance, in another great economic crisis, to put signs in their front windows supporting the National Recovery Act. We were a younger country then, and the two crises are not completely comparable, but there's a lot of wait-and-see out there. There's also a growing divide observable between the American establishment—of both parties—and the rank and file of Americans living normal, non-politically-obsessed lives. The latter seem more patient, more forgiving toward the president. The former, the establishment—again, in both parties—now commonly voice grave doubts as to his domestic ambitions.

Mr. Obama had a strong closing news conference in Europe, and it looks to have been a successful trip, marked at the end by an air of relative and surprising G-20 unity. The president will get some bounce from it, as they say, and it may be considerable. But then the Europe trip speaks of the part of his administration, foreign affairs, that is marked by an air of moderation, not the part involving ambitions that are grand to the point of grandiosity.


4a) A dose of fiscal reality for Obama
By Scot Lehigh

PRESIDENT OBAMA has Icarus issues.

Having escaped from exile in Crete, the exuberant mythological lad flew too close to the sun, thereby melting the wax that held together his make-shift wings. The result: one precipitous plunge.

Having led the Democrats out of Oval Office exile, Obama is also soaring - but worries about the cost of his ambitious plans have started to warm the wax of Democratic cohesion. Catalyzing that concern is the Congressional Budget Office's prediction that the president's program will be significantly more expensive than advertised.

The Budget Office foresees a 10-year cumulative deficit of $9.3 trillion - which is $2.3 trillion higher than the administration's estimate. The government will spend an average of 23.7 percent of GDP yearly while taking in 18.4 percent of GDP in revenue during that period, it says.

The bottom line: yearly federal deficits averaging 5.3 percent of GDP - and a budget gap of about $1.2 trillion in 2019.

Although the government needs to run large deficits now to inject some demand into a cratering economy, once the recovery comes, we'll have to reduce the huge fiscal imbalances.

Take it from the president himself. This is what he said in February about the $1.3 trillion deficit he inherited: "We cannot and will not sustain deficits like these without end."

But that's where Obama's plans would lead, according to CBO.

Now some Democrats are digging in their heels.

Senator Kent Conrad, chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, has expressed skepticism about rendering permanent the president's "Making Work Pay" tax break supposedly targeted at lower and middle earners. That tax benefit, which phases out at family incomes of $190,000 or more, carries a 10-year cost of $537 billion. Obama is also calling for at least another $234 billion in individual and $100 billion in business breaks atop that.

There's an obvious tension between the president's ambitious agenda and his political desire to avoid being labeled a reflexive tax-raiser. The latter explains why the administration regularly notes that the two top income-tax rates will merely be reverting to their Clinton levels and that his proposed limitations on itemized deductions would only return things to the Reagan era.

Obama, of course, frames his major initiatives as absolute imperatives if we want a robust recovery.

But surveying the president's ambitious agenda, which also includes healthcare expansion, new spending on clean energy and education, and a cap-and-trade system to combat global warming, others are left wondering.

"I think the reality is going to settle in that we are going to have to pull back on something," says US Representative Richard Neal, Democrat of Massachusetts, a longtime member of the House Ways and Means Committee.

Here's another unwelcome reality: Over the longer term, the federal government is going to need more revenue than Obama is proposing.

"Anybody who has looked at the problem and doesn't have ideological blinders on reaches that conclusion," says James Horney, director of federal fiscal policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a progressive think tank.

The administration has nodded in that direction, announcing that former Fed chairman Paul Volcker will head a commission exploring ways to bring in more owed but uncollected taxes, close tax loopholes, and reduce corporate welfare.

Still, budgetary experts see much tougher decisions ahead.

"The unvarnished truth is that as we move forward over the next five to 10 years, we are going to have to raise taxes across the board or significantly cut back programs which affect the middle class and the lower class," says Robert Reischauer, former director of the Congressional Budget Office.

"Taxes are going to have to go up at some point," says Bob Bixby, executive director of the Concord Coalition. "One of the mistakes Obama is making is saying nobody under $250,000 is going to be affected. The deficit is just too big, and you can't get it all from families earning more than $250,000."

That's a reality policy-makers will have to confront when the economy recovers. And it's another reason why a president embarked on an Icarus arc needs to find a more realistic flight plan.

5) Obama's Ultimate Agenda
By Charles Krauthammer

WASHINGTON -- Five minutes of explanation to James Madison, and he'll have a pretty good idea what a motorcar is (basically a steamboat on wheels; the internal combustion engine might take a few minutes more). Then try to explain to Madison how the Constitution he fathered allows the president to unilaterally guarantee the repair or replacement of every component of millions of such contraptions sold in the several states, and you will leave him slack-jawed.

In fact, we are now so deep into government intervention that constitutional objections are summarily swept aside. The last Treasury secretary brought the nine largest banks into his office and informed them that henceforth he was their partner. His successor is seeking the power to seize any financial institution at his own discretion.

Despite these astonishments, I remain more amused than alarmed. First, the notion of presidential car warranties strikes me as simply too bizarre, too comical, to mark the beginning of Yankee Peronism.

Second, there is every political incentive to make these interventions in the banks and autos temporary and circumscribed. For President Obama, autos and banks are sideshows. Enormous sideshows, to be sure, but had the financial meltdown and the looming auto bankruptcies not been handed to him, he would hardly have gone seeking to be the nation's car and credit czar.

Obama has far different ambitions. His goal is to rewrite the American social compact, to recast the relationship between government and citizen. He wants government to narrow the nation's income and anxiety gaps. Soak the rich for reasons of revenue and justice. Nationalize health care and federalize education to grant all citizens of all classes the freedom from anxiety about health care and college that the rich enjoy. And fund this vast new social safety net through the cash cow of a disguised carbon tax.

Obama is a leveler. He has come to narrow the divide between rich and poor. For him the ultimate social value is fairness. Imposing it upon the American social order is his mission.

Fairness through leveling is the essence of Obamaism. (Asked by Charlie Gibson during a campaign debate about his support for raising capital gains taxes -- even if they caused a net revenue loss to the government -- Obama stuck to the tax hike "for purposes of fairness.") The elements are highly progressive taxation, federalized health care and higher education, and revenue-producing energy controls. But first he must deal with the sideshows. They could sink the economy and poison his public support before he gets to enact his real agenda.

The big sideshows, of course, are the credit crisis, which Obama has contracted out to Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, and the collapse of the U.S. automakers, which Obama seems to have taken on for himself.

That was a tactical mistake. Better to have let the car companies go directly to Chapter 11 and have a judge mete out the bitter medicine to the workers and bondholders.

By sacking GM's CEO, packing the new board, and giving direction as to which brands to drop and what kind of cars to make, Obama takes ownership of General Motors. He may soon come to regret it. He has now gotten himself so entangled in the car business that he is personally guaranteeing your muffler. (Upon reflection, a job best left to the congenitally unmuffled Joe Biden.)

Some find in this descent into large-scale industrial policy a whiff of 1930s-style fascist corporatism. I have my doubts. These interventions are rather targeted. They involve global financial institutions that even the Bush administration decided had to be nationalized, and auto companies that themselves came begging to the government for money.

Bizarre and constitutionally suspect as these interventions may be, the transformation of the American system will come from elsewhere. The credit crisis will pass and the auto overcapacity will sort itself out one way or the other. The reordering of the American system will come not from these temporary interventions, into which Obama has reluctantly waded. It will come from Obama's real agenda: his holy trinity of health care, education and energy. Out of these will come a radical extension of the welfare state, social and economic leveling in the name of fairness, and a massive increase in the size, scope and reach of government.

If Obama has his way, the change that is coming is a new America: "fair," leveled and social democratic. Obama didn't get elected to warranty your muffler. He's here to warranty your life.

6) Obama: Car salesman in chief
By Chuck Raasch

WASHINGTON — Full disclosure: I drive a 2006 Ford Escape Hybrid.
The SUV is a good ride, although it rarely reaches its mid-30s miles per gallon rating. I take personal responsibility for that, though. Ford did not make my lead foot.

Robert Gibbs, President Barack Obama's press secretary, also drives an Escape Hybrid. As middle-aged men have done for generations, we briefly corresponded on how much we like our American Fords.

But Gibbs' car stories go far beyond that. He has the unenviable task of defending the government's role in the attempted bailout of rivals Chrysler and GM, two teetering giants that have so far needed about $17 billion in loans from taxpayers to stay afloat, and are asking for $21.6 billion more.

Continuing those bailouts is among the most controversial moves by this new president so far, yet many believe failure in Detroit is imponderable. So Gibbs has extolled the virtues of Jeeps and Buicks. And his boss has guaranteed government warranties on Chrysler and GM products. (It's a unique inter-generational warranty: Buy a Chrysler or GM and your kids and their kids will back it, because it's all borrowed money).

What's next? Putting up a tent, hanging plastic red, white, and blue streamers, and driving in some cars for a weekend sales event at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue? Could we see Obama reprising actor Ricardo Montalban's cult classic '70s Chrysler ads?

The Escape's maker, Ford, is trying to escape bankruptcy by rejecting federal aid. Some think Ford faces a day of reckoning later in the year if car sales don't rebound, and that the government will be less inclined to step in by then.

In the meantime, Ford has gotten concessions on worker benefits and financing that the companies that took federal bailouts weren't able to get. Its leaders seem more bullish than those that partnered with the feds.

"I think clearly the degrees of freedom we have to operate the company are a lot greater than if we had lots of restrictions put on us," Ford Executive Chairman Bill Ford told the Detroit Free Press. "And the (federal) money comes with some pretty powerful strings."

This is an important point that Americans, amid joblessness, economic malaise and angry blame aimed at Reagan-Bush deregulation, have yet to fully comprehend.

What is the long-term cost to American innovation, risk-taking, ingenuity and pluck when the government bails out entire industries with money put on the tab of future generations?

Is the risk of failure necessary, even with the inevitable pain it brings, if it produces a new generation of innovators and risk takers better than the last?

Bankruptcy may eventually be in GM's future, its new government-mandated CEO says. Would it have been better to get on with it, many months and billions of dollars ago?

And finally, can government force-feed innovation?

There's reluctance in taking federal aid, and it's not coming only from Republican governors. The Washington Post reported that small business lenders that were supposed to benefit from a $15 billion bailout to unlock credit markets are not participating because of government restrictions on compensation and demands on ownership rights.

When this economic crisis subsides, look for two phases of post-stimulus hangover.

First, with trillions of dollars in spending and debt for stimulus and financial rescue floating around, it's a pretty good bet there will be as much outrage over what was wasted and corruptly spent as there's been over the financial misdeeds that created the crisis.

The second phase will come when the government tries to untangle its suddenly large stake in private banking, insurance and transportation. Unless the U.S. is to become a social democracy — and Obama adamantly says it will not — that will be a greater challenge than most realize.

Like the war in Iraq, getting out could be just as difficult as the decision to go in.

The government has committed trillions to priming the economy and bailing out failing business. It is dictating who will run companies and what they will be paid. As a condition of further government support, Obama ousted GM CEO John Wagoner.

His replacement, Frederick Henderson, is under a strict two-month government deadline to come up with a plan almost sure to include concessions and downsizing for autoworkers, parts suppliers, and dealers.

In Henderson's words, "We need to reinvent GM and we need to do it in a very abbreviated time... so we do not spend our time careening from crisis to crisis."

And so the White House can get out of the business of selling cars.

7) The Moscow Delusion
By Rich Lowry

One would think Barack Obama would have learned something about the limits of his personal charm at the G-20 summit in London. Even with the hated George W. Bush back in Texas, the anarchists still rage in the streets, the French and Germans still hate "Anglo-Saxon-style" capitalism, and the nations of the world still won't take dictation -- on the need for a coordinated, global stimulus -- from Washington.

But Obama's faith that his fresh attitude -- more flexible and thoughtful -- will in itself open new international vistas is unshaken. It's on that basis that he hit "reset" with Russian president Dmitry Medvedev at the London meeting, in a joint statement touted by the international press as one of the summit's few accomplishments.

Obama and Medvedev agreed to negotiate a new arms-control treaty and work together on a host of initiatives from the Afghan War to the Iranian nuclear program. Medvedev -- and his master, Vladimir Putin -- must be delighted enough to consider sanctioning the beating of yet another meddlesome journalist in celebration.

"[The meeting] brought Russia a shot of prestige, upbeat headlines about nuclear-arms cuts and a powerful signal that Moscow has the ear of the new U.S. president," the Associated Press wrote. "The price tag for Russia so far: virtually zero." Medvedev likes that price point.

"We, the leaders of Russia and the United States, are ready to move beyond Cold War mentalities," the joint statement said. With no apparent sense of irony, both sides also pledged to reinstitute a Cold War-style arms-control process, with an alphabet soup of treaties and elaborate compliance mechanisms that recall the days when the fate of the world hung on the U.S.-Soviet nuclear balance.

The Russians revel in this. It makes them feel important and puts the focus on nuclear warheads, their last truly impressive measure of national power. It might be worth indulging the Russians in endless arms-control talk -- in fact, it's a perfect assignment for Vice President Joe Biden -- if it were part of a broader strategic scheme from which the U.S. would benefit. Instead, the arms-control process will likely become an end in itself.

The Obama administration wants to win Russian cooperation in squeezing the Iranian nuclear program. To this end, its chief bargaining chip is the proposed U.S. missile-defense site in Poland. The Russians pretend that this site -- designed to defend against a threat emanating from Iran -- will neutralize Moscow's nuclear arsenal. How ten interceptors can work this magic against 2,800 warheads is never explained.

The flaw with the bargaining chip is that everyone knows it is worthless to Obama. Even if the Russians had no objection, the administration would want to be rid of the missile-defense site -- if it could eliminate the two sites here in the U.S., it would do that, too. Obama officials are suffused with the Left's instinctive hostility to missile defense, an ideological reflex left over from the Cold War.

The Russians can surely get Obama to ditch missile defense in exchange for a more cooperative-sounding version of the same double game they've been playing on Iran. They can cite their votes for Security Council resolutions sanctioning Iran -- once they've been watered down to meaninglessness. At the same time they continue to build Iran's reactor at Bushehr and provide the regime with sophisticated conventional arms, including air defenses.

It's foolish to think the Russians behave this way out of pique at George W. Bush. The Russians have a geopolitical goal of establishing dominance again in as much of Eastern Europe and Central Asia as possible, and will do whatever is necessary to achieve it -- from cutting off fuel to Ukraine, to invading Georgia, to getting us kicked out of our air base in Kyrgyzstan. They view us as a rival power to be frustrated, and therefore our enemy Iran is -- if not their friend -- their useful foil.

Barack Obama didn't claim to see Medvedev's soul, but demonstrates his own form of naïveté.

Rich Lowry is the editor of National Review.


7a) Why a Russian 'Reset' Won't Work
By Svante Cornell

The Obama administration has famously sought to “reset” relations with Russia. This move may be well-intentioned, but it is ultimately unlikely to succeed, because it fails to take the nature of the regime in the Kremlin into account.

The Obama administration has been much credited for the realist nature of its foreign policy. But the realist understanding of international relations is based on certain assumptions, most crucially that leaders are rational actors, making decisions on the basis of a cool calculation of national interests. If these calculations are understood and addressed, it follows that it is possible to work with Russia’s leaders, to seek and perhaps even find common ground.


Thus, we assume that Russia has no interest in a nuclear-armed Iran, or in a Taliban victory in Afghanistan. Since we assume that these outcomes would threaten Russia, we conclude that Russia should be willing to cooperate with America - if only it is approached rightly.

But the "rationality" that informs Russia's actions, while real, is based on entirely different assumptions than those ascribed to it by enthusiasts of the "reset" doctrine.

As Iran is concerned, pundits often say the U.S. "needs" Russia on Iran. But Moscow has been building an alliance with Tehran for a decade. It has actively helped Iran’s nuclear program by building the Bushehr reactor; it has used its veto power in the UN Security Council to block sanctions on Iran; and it continues to supply Iran with advanced weaponry. The Kremlin even regularly denies the existence of an Iranian threat, as Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov did in late March. If Russia would be concerned of Iranian nuclearization, why has it acted in an opposite manner for a decade?

In Afghanistan, Moscow has publicly offered the U.S. to cooperate, including on logistics to supply the operation. But it is beyond doubt that it was Russian pressure and promises of aid that prompted Kyrgyzstan’s government to expel the U.S. from its only airbase in Central Asia. If Russia wants to stabilize Afghanistan, why is it undermining the U.S. efforts to do so?

Similarly, following its invasion of Georgia last August, Moscow recognized the independence of the Georgian breakaway territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Leaving aside the breach of international law involved, the decision was stunning given the precedent it established for Russia’s own numerous ethnic minorities. From Chechnya to Tatarstan, nationalists among Russia’s minorities now argue that the Kremlin’s decision provides for an excellent precedent for them to secede from Russia.

In all these cases, the Russian leadership has clearly been acting against its own long-term national interests – at least the way we construe these in the West. How can this be explained? Because the Russian regime has a different set of priorities, much more short-sighted in nature, and in which anti-Americanism holds a prominent place, and because for Putin and his associates, the regime’s interests trump national interests.

Russia has made Iran its main ally in the Middle East exactly because the Iranian theocracy is the major regional force undermining America’s position in the region. From Moscow’s perspective, the prospect of a nuclear and anti-American Iran keeps America bogged down, while also providing an avenue for lucrative arms contracts with the Iranian regime. That enriches defense industries, and benefits high-level members of the regime running them. Likewise, Moscow may not desire a Taliban victory in Afghanistan, but sees this as a much lesser danger to itself than a permanent American military and political presence in Central Asia and Afghanistan. Should America succeed in Afghanistan that would open up the former Soviet colonies in Central Asia, making them less dependent on Russia. As for Georgia, the imperative of denying Georgia NATO membership appears to trump the danger of causing a rise in separatism inside Russia itself.

All of this indicates the key role of anti-Americanism at the heart of the ‘Putinist” ideology. This is illustrated by the Kremlin’s harsh anti-American rhetoric at home and abroad.

The Kremlin leaders see the world almost exclusively in zero-sum terms: America’s loss is Moscow’s gain, and helps undermining the “unipolar world” and restoring “multipolarity.”

Just like the Obama administration, the Bush administration went about seeking to play a “win-win” game with Moscow, pointing out common interests and priorities. It found out the hard way the perils of playing a win-win game when faced with a zero-sum opponent. The Obama administration will surely learn the same lessons; let us hope that it will do so sooner than its predecessor did.


Svante E. Cornell is Research Director of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute, Johns Hopkins University-SAIS, (www.silkroadstudies.org) and co-founder of the Stockholm-based Institute for Security and Development Policy.



8) Spain Has No Right to Try U.S. Officials: What next? Prosecutions for bad advice on global warming?
By DOUGLAS J. FEITH

A lawyer in Spain -- who did his legal studies while serving over seven years in prison for kidnapping and terrorism -- has engineered a complaint accusing the U.S. government of systematically torturing war-on-terrorism detainees. He filed this complaint with Baltasar Garzon, an activist magistrate famous for championing the "universal jurisdiction" of Spanish courts. That magistrate is now asking a Spanish prosecutor to bring criminal charges on this matter against former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, four other former Bush administration lawyers, and me.

The allegation is not that any of us tortured anyone. And it is not that any of us even directed anyone to commit torture. The allegation is that, when we advised President George W. Bush on the Geneva Conventions and detainee interrogations, our interpretations were wrong -- in the view of the disapproving Spaniards. According to the complaint, these wrong interpretations encouraged the president to make decisions that led to torture.

The Spanish magistrate apparently believes that it can be a crime for American officials to offer the wrong kind of advice to a president of the United States and, furthermore, it can be a crime punishable by a Spanish court. This is a national insult with harmful implications.

The general sloppiness of the complaint's factual assertions is clear from its discussion of my work. The entire case against me hinges on my alleged role in arguing that the detainees in Guantanamo Bay should not receive protection under Geneva Article 3 relating to humane treatment. I never made any such argument.

On the contrary, the most significant role I played in the debates about Geneva was in early 2002 when I -- together with Chairman of the Joints Chiefs of Staff Gen. Richard Myers -- helped persuade Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to take a strongly pro-Geneva position in the first National Security Council meeting on the subject on Feb. 4.

Noting in writing that Geneva is part of U.S. law, I argued it is a good treaty and it is "important that the President appreciate DOD's interest in the Convention." I wrote that "U.S. armed forces are trained to treat captured enemy forces according to the Convention," that Geneva is "morally important, crucial to U.S. morale," and that it is also "practically important, for it makes U.S. forces the gold standard in the world, facilitating our winning cooperation from other countries."

In conclusion, I urged "[h]umane treatment for all detainees" and recommended that the president explain that Geneva "does not squarely address circumstances that we are confronting in this new global war against terrorism, but while we work through the legal questions, we are upholding the principle of universal applicability of the Convention."

I briefed these arguments directly to the president at that Feb. 4 NSC meeting, and his decision on Geneva's applicability to the war against the Taliban was consistent with them.

The allegation that I argued against Article 3 protection was invented by a British lawyer named Philippe Sands and published in an angry, wildly inaccurate book called "Torture Team." Mr. Sands asserts that, in our interview, I admitted making the case against Article 3. He was eventually compelled to publish the interview transcript, however, and it shows that nothing I said supports his allegation, that he grossly misquoted me on a number of points, and that he never asked me a single question about Article 3. Mr. Sands has to this day never accounted for how he could charge me with opposing Article 3 based on an interview in which the term "Article 3" was never even mentioned by me or him. I dissected Mr. Sands's misrepresentations in detail in testimony I gave to the House Judiciary Committee last summer.

As bad as the Spanish complaint is for relying expressly on Mr. Sands's discredited book for facts, it is far worse for the principle it is trying to establish -- that a foreign court should punish former U.S. officials criminally if the judge thinks their official advice to the U.S. president violated international law. Whatever advice any of us offered the president on these debatable issues, it would be an unprecedented outrage to make our participation in government policy making a subject for second-guessing in a foreign criminal court.

From the Nuremburg trials of the Nazi leadership forward, none of the cases in which former government officials have been tried for international crimes are actually precedents for what the Spanish officials are now considering. In countries run by officials who rule by force, commit aggression, perpetrate humanitarian outrages and stand above and out of reach of any domestic law, leaders are sometimes tried by international tribunals. Such countries' sovereignty is not respected because their own domestic laws -- let alone their international legal obligations -- do not bind their leaders.

But ours is a country of laws, and no reasonable person doubts that the American legal system has integrity. If President Barack Obama and the prosecutors see a crime to be prosecuted, they can act. It would be hostile for a foreign official to decide that U.S. sovereignty on this matter should not be respected because the U.S. is like Nazi Germany or Serbia under Slobodan Milosevic.

What if a Spanish magistrate doesn't like the legal analyses prepared by U.S. officials on other subjects, such as nuclear weapons, or the death penalty, or atmospheric pollution, or border security with Mexico? Any of these matters could be the basis for a claim by a creative European jurist that a U.S. official is taking a position contrary to international law as interpreted by right-thinking Europeans.

It seems clear that the goal of this judicial exercise is to carry a political disagreement into criminal courts and thereby to intimidate U.S. officials. If Spanish officials decide to carry the prosecution forward, then Americans who know that their views run contrary to those of various Spanish or other European activists would have to think twice about voicing those views -- or stay out of U.S. government service altogether -- if they want to avoid being threatened with arrest in Europe.

The American people can tolerate this only if they are willing to forfeit the right to make their own laws and policies. This is not a left-versus-right political issue. It is a question of preserving the American constitutional system of government in which U.S. officials are answerable for their opinions and advice to the American people -- but not to foreign criminal courts.

Mr. Feith, a former under secretary of defense for policy (2001-05), is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute. He is the author of "War and Decision: Inside the Pentagon at the Dawn of the War on Terrorism" (HarperCollins, 2008).


8a)CIA Torture -- And A Spanish Inquisition: We need a thorough, credible public accounting of the ugly details of the Bush administration's 'enhanced' interrogations.
By Stuart Taylor Jr.


"The cell and room were air-conditioned and were very cold. Very loud, shouting-type music was constantly playing.... One of the interrogators wrapped a towel around my neck, they then used it to swing me around and smash me repeatedly against the hard walls of the room. I was also repeatedly slapped in the face.... I was then put into the tall black box for what I think was about one and a half to two hours.... It was difficult to breathe.... I had to crouch down.... The wound on my leg began to open and started to bleed.... I may have slept or maybe fainted. I was then dragged from the small box ... and strapped down very tightly with belts. A black cloth was then placed over my face and the interrogators [poured] water on the cloth so that I could not breathe. After a few minutes the cloth was removed and the bed was rotated into an upright position.... I vomited. The same torture [was] carried out again.... I thought I was going to die."

These chilling excerpts only begin to sketch the horrors described in a leaked copy of a report to the CIA by the International Committee of the Red Cross, detailing its interviews with Abu Zubaydah (who is quoted above) and 13 other Qaeda terrorists at Guantanamo Bay in late 2006 about their interrogations in secret CIA prisons starting in 2002.

Laid out last month by journalist Mark Danner in a 13,000-word New York Review of Books article, the interviews paint an even uglier picture than I had imagined of the months of multiple, unrelenting torments that the CIA used to break "high-value" Qaeda detainees. Some of these CIA practices have become familiar. Others are detailed for the first time in the Red Cross report: smashing defenseless men against hard walls over and over again; forcing them to stand naked and cold with arms shackled over their heads for days at a time while urinating and defecating on themselves; and more.

Why am I inclined to believe what terrorists, trained by Al Qaeda to fabricate torture claims, told the Red Cross? One reason is that these men were held in strict isolation and "the striking similarity in their stories, even down to small details, would seem to make fabrication extremely unlikely," as Danner writes. Another reason is that their stories are substantially corroborated by multiple media interviews of U.S. officials and by a source who has no motive to mislead me.

All of this makes it hard for me to avoid the conclusion that the CIA -- with Justice Department assurances of legality and high-level White House approvals -- repeatedly crossed the line from harsh treatment into what was, by any reasonable definition, illegal torture.

It also argues strongly that President Obama and Congress, understandably preoccupied with averting another Great Depression, must also focus harder on the need to come to terms with the abuses done in America's name by a Bush team that was understandably preoccupied with averting a nuclear or biological 9/11.

But first, the Obama administration needs to slap down an insult to U.S. sovereignty now brewing in the Spanish courts.

It began with a complaint by "human-rights" lawyers, including one Gonzalo Boye -- who served time for his role in a left-wing terrorist group's 1988 abduction of a Spanish businessman for ransom -- against former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and five other Bush administration lawyers who vouched for the legality of various harsh interrogation practices.

Last week it was reported that Baltasar Garzon, a much-lionized but flamboyantly biased Spanish judge with a grandiose vision of his own "universal jurisdiction," had sent the matter to prosecutors for review. This was a step toward embarking on an inquisition into America's sins. Garzon's ultimate objective may well be to charge officials up to and including President Bush and Vice President Cheney with war crimes and thus to embarrass the United States -- which, he knows, would never extradite any of his targets to face his kangaroo court.

"For Garzon to second-guess U.S. decisions in this area amounts to a violation of international law and an affront to U.S. sovereignty by Spain," David Rivkin, a conservative expert on the universal jurisdiction doctrine, asserts.


By Garzon's tortured logic, isn't Obama also committing war crimes by ordering Predator strikes against suspected terrorists in Pakistan?

Garzon's record invites the inference that he may also see Obama as a war criminal, if one whose rock-star status across Europe may immunize him for now. Soon after 9/11, Garzon published in El Pais and the Financial Times a commentary denouncing "the bellicose plans proclaimed repeatedly by U.S. leaders." He suggested that "justice ... should be brought to bear" on Bush, among others, for spreading "panic among the Afghan people" and setting the stage for "a human catastrophe" in their country by planning to attack suspected terrorists there. By that tortured logic, isn't Obama also committing war crimes by ordering Predator strikes against suspected terrorists in Pakistan?

It's noteworthy that Garzon's past targets have included such people as Augusto Pinochet, Henry Kissinger, Silvio Berlusconi -- and not, say, Vladimir Putin, who has presided over massive war crimes in Chechnya, or Syrian leaders who have done the same there and in Lebanon.

But Garzon's affront may serve as a reminder that the U.S. needs to take serious steps to show reasonable critics at home and abroad that we are not going to sweep the evidence of Bush administration torture under the rug.

This is not necessarily to suggest that Bush, his appointees, or other U.S. officials should be prosecuted. Most or all would have a valid defense of good-faith reliance on then-authoritative -- although erroneous and now-repudiated -- legal advice from the Justice Department. And the lawyers who gave the advice were writing memos, not supervising interrogations.

But the Obama administration's prosecutors should nonetheless conduct a serious investigation into whether any officials knew that anything they did or approved was illegal, and, if so, whether prosecuting them for trying too hard to save innocent lives is warranted and likely to be successful.

We also need a thorough, credible public accounting of the ugly details of the "enhanced" interrogations; of exactly who approved what; and of the plausibility of the Bush-Cheney-CIA claims that the information obtained saved innocent lives. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., aptly identified what the objective should be: "I don't want to embarrass anybody. I don't want to punish anybody. I just want the truth to come out so this never happens again."

But the sort of "truth commission" that Leahy and many others (including me, at one point) have proposed could degenerate into a bitter partisan brawl, as could any investigation conducted by politically appointed commissioners in the glare of nationally televised hearings.

Avenging human-rights groups would push commissioners to tee up witnesses for prosecution. Most or all witnesses would incur burdensome legal fees and take the Fifth. Grants of immunity to force them to testify would be bitterly resisted by the avengers and, coming from a committee outside the legislative and executive branches, constitutionally problematic. The CIA's institutional reflex would be to resist declassifying critical documents. And so on.

What we need is not a public circus but rather a definitive public report documenting and drawing lessons from the Bush interrogation abuses.

The best approach might be for the Senate Select Intelligence Committee to beef up the review of the CIA's detention and interrogation program that it announced on March 5. Among the advantages: The committee, like its House counterpart, has unparalleled access to the classified CIA documents that tell much of the story. Congress's Democratic majority has no reason to cover up for the Bush team and has ample reason to avoid exposing career CIA public servants to public vilification that could chill their zeal to pursue terrorists.

But the investigation as constituted at present has problems: The committee has not yet decided to produce a public report at all, let alone one thorough and unvarnished enough to command respect at home and abroad. The panel does not speak for Obama, and it has a reputation for coziness with the CIA. Committee members who were briefed on brutal interrogation practices would, to some extent, be investigating themselves. And the Democrats might be tempted to score partisan points.

A single decisive step could solve all five problems: The committee should bring in an outsider of unquestioned stature, with Obama's public blessing, and with a mandate to assemble a special investigative staff, push for declassification of key documents, grant witnesses immunity in exchange for cooperation, and produce a public report accepted as definitive by the legislative and executive branches alike. The ideal person would also be a Republican known for courage and for independence from both Bush and Obama -- and for personal knowledge of the horrors of torture.

His name is John McCain.

9) Fair Question
By The Editors, The New Republic



Joe Cassano, former head of AIG Financial Products (Credit: Zuma/Newscom)There are moral hazards--and then there's just plain morality. Our leaders have deployed the public's money to prop up financial institutions without demanding that the recipients of our largesse bend their objectives toward the public good. We have used the power of the state to salvage banks and corporations without exacting any costs from the executives who trashed those institutions and the whole economic order along with them. And now, with the Geithner bank plan, the government aims to reactivate the credit markets by further enriching private investors.


We don't mean to diminish the necessity of the policies or their ultimate prudence. Bashing Tim Geithner has become a cheap media sport. What, after all, are the alternatives to the current course of action? Perhaps nationalization (or temporary receivership or whatever you want to call it), but that's riddled with logistical complications and not politically plausible at the moment. And there's even a non-trivial chance that Geithner's proposed fixes for the financial system might actually work.

Constructing such unprecedented state interventions--on the fly, without a full grasp of circumstances--is like trying to solve Fermi's paradox on a live game show with the 30-second clock ticking. Given the stakes involved, the first question asked of any policy must be: Does it have a shot at staving off greater financial catastrophe? But the other crucial question is whether it's fair. And, while some on the left have conflated the two--arguing that a policy can't work just because it isn't fair--that shouldn't be a pretext for erasing fairness from the calculus altogether.

It's hard to know how much questions of fairness have been on the administration's brain. The fact that it is proposing the most aggressive regulatory regime in generations is certainly a good sign. But the administration's public rhetoric-- a significant force in shaping the conventional wisdom that will emerge from this era--has been strangely tentative when it comes to wrestling with these questions about the beneficiaries of government policy. According to The Wall Street Journal, the president removed language from his February address to Congress that stated the obvious truth: "Americans are justifiably angry." The president, despite having made similar statements many times before, told his advisers that "he wanted to inject some balance." More recently, Obama has commanded that we not "demonize" Wall Street. But demonization would imply tagging banks and executives with unjust criticisms--and, while there's some of that in the air, why can't the president speak forcefully about the genuine misdeeds of certain players?

The logic driving Obama's rhetorical tepidness boils down to this: If we say too many mean things about investors, then they won't participate in the purchase of toxic assets. This is a strange analysis. The Geithner plan offers investors a sweetheart deal. Investors should jump on it because they stand to make money, regardless of the adjectives Obama affixes to them.

No, the president shouldn't become William Jennings Bryan, and he needs to be sensitive to the potential for the public's emotions to run amok. But the success of his presidency and his policies ultimately demands candor. There's some chance that the Geithner program will allow Wall Street to reap handsome rewards from the public's subsidization of its investment, while the government doesn't realize anywhere near the same returns. In other words, if everything doesn't fall the right way, the public could well lash out against the Geithner plan with the same ferocity that it unleashed against the AIG bonuses. Only the president plainly laying out the potential risks of his plans can prevent this ugly scenario and best protect his credibility for the long haul.

His rhetoric matters for another reason, too. There are plenty of ways that government can tamp down the insane levels of executive compensation that contributed to the bubble of the past decade--namely, by closing tax loopholes and implementing "say on pay" laws that empower shareholders. But, in the end, there are limits to government policy. The culture of Wall Street must also change, and it will do so only if its denizens are shamed. Larry Summers has done some of this, decrying an environment with "too much greed and too little fear." And, apparently, Rahm Emanuel has done his bit, chewing out the president of Goldman Sachs in a White House meeting, according to the Journal. But Barack Obama is the one man in the country with the moral authority to really make this case--to demand that American capitalists act a bit more like citizens of the United States.


10) Congress passes $3.5 trillion budget in the dark
By Ed Morrissey

Congress approved Barack Obama’s sweeping new budget late last night, approving a level of spending over 10% more than the final year of the Bush administration despite the economic crisis. The $3.5 trillion budget grew over 2009’s $3.1 trillion spending plan, and left almost all of Obama’s wish lists intact despite the supposed intervention of Senate Democrat Kent Conrad:

Congressional Democrats overwhelmingly embraced President Obama’s ambitious and expensive agenda for the nation yesterday, endorsing a $3.5 trillion spending plan that sets the stage for the president to pursue his most far-reaching priorities.
Voting along party lines, the House and Senate approved budget blueprints that would trim Obama’s spending proposals for the fiscal year that begins in October and curtail his plans to cut taxes. The blueprints, however, would permit work to begin on the central goals of Obama’s presidency: an expansion of health-care coverage for the uninsured, more money for college loans and a cap-and-trade system to reduce gases that contribute to global warming.

The measures now move to a conference committee where negotiators must resolve differences between the two chambers, a prelude to the more difficult choices that will be required to implement Obama’s initiatives. While Democrats back the president’s vision for transforming huge sectors of the economy, they remain fiercely divided over the details.

There is no agreement, for example, on how to pay for an overhaul of the health-care system expected to add more than $1 trillion to the budget over the next decade, nor is there consensus on how to spend the hundreds of billions of dollars the government stands to collect by setting limits on greenhouse gas emissions and forcing industry to buy permits to pollute. Those issues will be decided in committees where lawmakers have begun the torturous work on the specifics of Obama’s broad plans.

President Obama has lost some Congressional support since Porkulus. The Washington Post doesn’t mention this in its report, but Democratic defectors grew from seven in the House to 20 defectors last night. In the Senate, where Democrats won three key Republican votes for Porkulus, they didn’t get a single GOP vote. In fact, they lost two Democrats: Ben Nelson (D-NE) and Evan Bayh (D-IN). Bayh had tried to lead a centrist bloc to gain more concessions from Reid, Pelosi, and Obama, but in the end his Gang of 15 seems to have been a duet.

This budget does at least one thing right. Instead of getting separate “emergency” authorizations for war appropriations, the funding for Iraq and Afghanistan are built into the budget. That accounts for $130 billion of the increase over FY2009, and it ends the ridiculous practice of pretending that no one could plan for war resources. The Bush administration should have made that move after the 2003 invasion instead of continuing to use emergency supplementals that became a poltical lightning rod every time it went to Congress for the funding.

Other than that, though, Judd Gregg has this budget analyzed correctly:
“The practical implications of this budget are that we will put in place spending and borrowing which will absolutely put this country on an unsustainable path and WILL create massive problems for us in the out years if it’s followed,” said ranking Senate Budget Committee member Judd Gregg (R-N.H.).

Even the White House’s rosy projections show this to be a disaster. It grows the deficits in every year over the next 12 even under the best of circumstances. In an era where Americans have to tighten their belts and reduce their borrowing in order to shore up their own financial situations, Congress and Obama have shown no such sense of shared sacrifice. Instead, they’re busy borrowing like maniacs to pay for their own pet projects. It’s a disgrace, and even some Democrats have discovered this.

10a) The Dems own the budget: $3.5 Trillion Spending Plan Paves Way for Obama Goals


Congressional Democrats overwhelmingly embraced President Obama’s ambitious and expensive agenda for the nation yesterday, endorsing a $3.5 trillion spending plan that sets the stage for the president to pursue his most far-reaching priorities.

Voting along party lines, the House and Senate approved budget blueprints that would trim Obama’s spending proposals for the fiscal year that begins in October and curtail his plans to cut taxes. The blueprints, however, would permit work to begin on the central goals of Obama’s presidency: an expansion of health-care coverage for the uninsured, more money for college loans and a cap-and-trade system to reduce gases that contribute to global warming.

Twenty Democrats voted against the budget.

The Bush tax cuts are gone. The energy taxes will affect everyone. The amount of debt incurred is exorbitant:

May I also remind you, “the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve have spent, lent or guaranteed $12.8 trillion, an amount that approaches the value of everything produced in the country last year,” an amount that is 14 times the $899.8 billion of currency in circulation.

As I said, the Dems have full ownership of this budget.

11) Obama's Attack Machine
By KIMBERLEY A. STRASSEL.

The thing about fear is that you can see it. For an insight as to what the left today fears most, witness its attempted political assassination of Eric Canto

The 45-year-old Virginia congressman came to Washington in 2001, and by last year had been unanimously elected Republican Whip, under Minority Leader John Boehner. In recent months, Mr. Cantor has helped unify the GOP against much of President Barack Obama's agenda, in particular his blowout $787 billion stimulus, and yesterday, his blowout $3.6 trillion budget.

He's also one of the GOP's up-and-coming talents. Along with Wisconsin's Paul Ryan, or California's Kevin McCarthy, he represents a new guard, one that's sworn off earmarks and brought the conversation back to fiscal responsibility and economic opportunity. They've focused on party outreach, and are popular with younger voters and independents. They are big fund-raisers, part of a drive to recruit and elect more reformers. And they are on the rise.

All of which threatens the left. Democrats know their current dominance in Washington is in no small part due to public disillusionment with the GOP. They are also aware that their current tax-and-spend governance is creating plenty of opportunities for that opposition to remake itself. Thus the furious campaign -- waged by every blog, pundit, union, 527, and even the White House -- to kneecap Republicans who might help lead a makeover. Mr. Cantor is the top target.

This kicked off after the GOP's unanimous vote against the stimulus, which Democrats saw as an opening to brand Mr. Cantor as the public face of partisan opposition to the "bipartisan" president. The Virginian has in fact publicly reached out to the White House, and has been deeply involved in producing alternatives to administration policies. But never let the facts get in the way of a good smear.

Within days of the vote, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee was up with radio ads targeting 28 Republicans who'd voted no. Mr. Cantor was the only member of the House GOP leadership to get hit. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), the big union, and Americans United for Change, the pro-Obama group, launched their own ads against 18 members, again singling out Mr. Cantor. The groups also ran a national TV spot sporting a picture of the whip with text that read "just saying no" -- which earned Mr. Cantor a new liberal nickname: Dr. No.

Mr. Obama joined in at his Fiscal Responsibility Summit. As the TV cameras rolled, he deliberately turned to the whip to say: "I'm going to keep on talking to Eric Cantor. Some day, sooner or later, he's going to say 'Boy, Obama had a good idea.'"

The Rush Limbaugh flap inspired a new AFSCME and American United for Change ad, accompanied by a statement that when Rush says jump, "Eric Cantor and other Republicans say 'how high.'" At nearly the precise moment Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel made Sunday news by claiming Mr. Limbaugh was rooting for Obama "failure," George Stephanopoulos (who, take note, has daily calls with Mr. Emanuel) demanded on his own show that Mr. Cantor tell him if this was indeed the GOP strategy. David Plouffe, the president's campaign wizard, followed up with an anti-Limbaugh screed for the Washington Post, zeroing in on that "new Republican quarterback Eric Cantor, who says "the GOP's strategy will be to 'Just Say No.'"

And then there's the echo chamber. MSNBC's Keith Olbermann is so obsessed with Mr. Cantor, he can barely find time to be indignant about anything else. Talking Points Memo, Huffington Post, Think Progress and other leading liberal blogs are today all-anti-Cantor-all-the-time.

But the real ugly was unleashed a few weeks ago, when the goon squad set on Mr. Cantor's wife. An outfit called Working Families Win began running robocalls in five districts noting that Diana Cantor was a "top executive" at a bank that had received bailout funds -- the clear implication being that Mr. Cantor's vote for said bailout hinged on this fact. "In the middle of the AIG scandal, our congressman [fill in the blank] voted to make Virginia Republican, Eric Cantor, the conservative leader in Congress," it droned (incoherently and incorrectly), before demanding voters oppose the "Cantor Family Bank bailout."

At least when Chuck Schumer ran ads targeting Republicans for voting for a "bailout" that his own party brought to the floor -- and passed -- he kept his attacks on the members. And the last anyone looked, the AIG intervention was being overseen by the Obama administration, not the House minority whip. This may set a new political low, not the least because Mrs. Cantor in fact works at a subsidiary of the bank in question. Not to mention that Mr. Cantor led the initial GOP revolt against the "bailout."

The Virginian has a new, high-profile job, and that means taking some knocks. Mr. Cantor is also where he is for a reason, and has so far weathered the onslaught. But the coordinated takedown attempt is yet more proof that the Obama-led Democrats aren't nearly as interested in changing the "tone" as they are in holding on to power.

12) G-20 Reality Check: An awareness that stimulus has limits.

The headline news out of the G-20 meeting concluded in London yesterday was that the leaders plan about $1 trillion in new spending through the International Monetary Fund. Beyond that big, easy-to-remember number, the loudest sound from the group's communique was that of 20 hands mutually patting each other's backs for a job well done.


"Taken together," the 20 national leaders said in unison, "these actions will constitute the largest fiscal and monetary stimulus and the most comprehensive support program for the financial sector in modern times."

Before stepping further, let us note that some prudent soul in the G-20 process managed to insert into this grandiloquent spending statement a needed note of restraint.

Buried in the middle of the communique is a paragraph about "exit strategies" to ensure "price stability." This is reassuring. It suggests there is at least some awareness that the U.S.-led strategy of printing many trillions in dollars to pay for global stimulus carries the threat of significant future inflation -- unless central banks tighten this expansionary monetary policy before the inflation arrives.

The second-best takeaway is that most of the group's other commitments will have to be implemented not by a single unit called the G-20 but by 20 or more separate, sovereign nations. In other words, don't hold your breath waiting for Nicolas Sarkozy's new Financial Stability Forum to write global regulations for hedge funds and "all systemically important financial institutions, instruments and markets." That could take awhile. The Europeans have been working for years to create a standard system of banking supervision. They're still working on it.

The G-20 also agreed to pump "at least" $100 billion into the World Bank and its regional cousins like the African Development Bank. There's also another $50 billion for something called the Global Trade Liquidity Program, which World Bank President Robert Zoellick said will "provide trade finance to support businesses across the developing markets." Translation: Subsidies for businesses from Bangladesh to Bolivia.

Operationally, this is a tall order for the bank despite its 60 years of experience in shoveling money out the door. As for the other $100 billion, anyone who has followed our editorials on the corrupt uses to which the bank's existing $30 billion annual budget is routinely put can easily imagine that much of the G-20's financial benevolence will never reach its intended targets in poor countries.

As for near-term global growth, perhaps the communique's two most telling measures concern tax and trade policy. On taxes, the G-20 makes a forceful commitment to eliminate "tax havens." The nominal point of this effort is to ensure fairness and eliminate "banking secrecy." In fact, it looks more like a last-ditch effort by nations whose spending has reached such levels that they've become desperate for tax revenue. If the real point is to mandate "harmonization" across borders at relatively high levels of taxation, one has to ask where the world is going to find incentives for new economic growth.

One traditional answer has been trade. The primary vehicle for producing more of that is the Doha free-trade round. The G-20 commits itself to Doha and rejects protectionism and competitive currency devaluations. Good. But it pointedly did not set a date for renewing the Doha trade round. Bad.

On balance, the G-20 meeting ended as a reality check. The leaders arrived in London with the media billing it as virtually the Committee to Save the World. Led by the Obama Presidency, we are living through a period of inflated roles for government in the lives of nations. What emerged from London suggests these leaders recognize that even they are mere mortals and the real work of economic recovery will have to resume when their planes touch down back home.


12a) Cap and Tax Collapse: Congress balks at one more bad Obama idea.

Please pass Al Gore a Valium -- and better make it a double -- because his cap-and-trade dreams just took a dive in the U.S. Senate. In a vote late Wednesday, no fewer than 26 Democrats joined all 41 Republicans to insist that any new cap and tax on carbon energy would require at least 60 votes.

Tennessee Republican Lamar Alexander called it "the biggest vote of the year" so far, and he's right. This means Majority Leader Harry Reid can't jam cap and tax through as part of this year's budget resolution with a bare majority of 50 Senators. More broadly, it's a signal that California and East Coast Democrats won't be able to sock it to coal and manufacturing-heavy Midwestern states without a fight. Senators voting in favor of the 60-vote rule included liberals from Wisconsin, Michigan and West Virginia. Now look for Team Obama to attempt to impose cap and tax the non-democratic way, via regulation that hits business and local governments with such heavy costs that they beg Congress for a less-harmful version.

Though the press corps has barely noticed, this means that two of President Obama's most economically destructive priorities have taken major hits in the last two weeks. The cap-and-tax collapse follows Pennsylvania Republican Arlen Specter's decision to oppose Big Labor's attempt to eliminate secret ballots in union organizing elections. If Mr. Specter holds firm, and as swing state Democrats also look for cover, Republicans will be able to prevail on a filibuster.

Opponents can't get complacent because the left will regroup, and the media-liberal activist consortium will start to get nasty with dissenters. But for now these are major victories for the U.S. economy, and we suspect they are also helping the stock market rally.

The most important remaining fight this year is over health care. Democrats seem intent on trying to plow that monumental change through with only 50 votes, even as they negotiate to bring along some Republicans. We hope these Republicans understand that a new health-care "public option" -- a form of Medicare for all Americans -- guarantees that the 17% of GDP represented by the health-care industry will be entirely government-run within a few years. This is precisely Mr. Obama's long-term goal, though he doesn't want to say it publicly.

If Republicans acquiesce, they will spend the rest of their days in public life raising taxes to pay for liabilities that will grow into the trillions of dollars. GOP leaders need to get out of the backrooms and start the same kind of public-education campaign on state-run health care that has helped to stall cap and tax and coercive unionization.