Lying Has Become an Art Form!

Human Rights get 'left' out! (See 1 below.)

Response to my previous memo from a friend and fellow memo reader. I responded that hell is paved with good intentions and when you are normal size among a room of midgets you look like a giant. (See 2 below.)

Yesterday, Obama attacked the insurance industry - this week's pinata - and in doing so accused them of everything he is doing, ie lying, false claims and the list is endless. Obama is clever and uses the tools of propagandists.

Yes, we need health care reform, yes the insurance industry's image is tarnished and yes, government restrictions and policies force them to do things that are questionable and yes making money off sick people puts them in a bad light but if anyone thinks government bureaucrats have a better solution they will pay a very high price. When did the government ever deliver anything on time, at a reasonable cost and without mountains of red tape? It's all another Obama shell game.(See 3 and 3a below.)

Obama cannot even make his mind up about Afghanistan and protecting our military but he has all the time in the world to attack Fox News, the insurance industry and any other group that disagrees with him and gets in his way. He runs the government with non-elected czars and czarinas and the nation sits on its thumbs allowing it to happen while being called racists.

Saddest period in our nation's history since Nixon but then we had Carter followed by Clinton. Getting to be a regular habit of electing presidents who bring shame upon the office.(See 3b and 3c below.)

The U.N. dumps on Israel employing the same strategy and methods Obama uses in his attack on health care and insurers,ie projection of lies and deceit. (See 4 below.)

One of the best ways to destroy a nation is to debase its currency. The Obama Administration is well along in doing so. (See 5 below.)


From a friend and fellow memo reader who pointed out no one ever replaced Michelle in her critical position that paid so well. (See 6 below.)

Dick

1)Does Obama Believe in Human Rights? Human rights "interfere" with President Obama's campaign against climate change.
By BRET STEPHENS

Nobody should get too hung up over President Obama's decision, reported by Der Spiegel over the weekend, to cancel plans to attend next month's 20th anniversary celebration of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Germany's reunited capital has already served his purposes; why should he serve its?

To this day, the fall of the Berlin Wall on the night of Nov. 9, 1989, remains a high-water mark in the march of human freedom. It's a march to which candidate Obama paid rich (if solipsistic) tribute in last year's big Berlin speech. "At the height of the Cold War, my father decided, like so many others in the forgotten corners of the world, that his yearning—his dream—required the freedom and opportunity promised by the West," waxed Mr. Obama to the assembled thousands. "This city, of all cities, knows the dream of freedom."

Those were the words. What's been the record?

China: In February, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton landed in Beijing with a conciliating message about the country's human-rights record. "Our pressing on those [human-rights] issues can't interfere on the global economic crisis, the global climate change crisis and the security crisis," she said.

In fact, there has been no pressing whatsoever on human rights. President Obama refused to meet with the Dalai Lama last month, presumably so as not to ruffle feathers with the people who will now be financing his debts. In June, Liu Xiaobo, a leading signatory of the pro-democracy Charter 08 movement, was charged with "inciting subversion of state power." But as a U.S. Embassy spokesman in Beijing admitted to the Journal, "neither the White House nor Secretary Clinton have made any public comments on Liu Xiaobo."

Sudan: In 2008, candidate Obama issued a statement insisting that "there must be real pressure placed on the Sudanese government. We know from past experience that it will take a great deal to get them to do the right thing. . . . The U.N. Security Council should impose tough sanctions on the Khartoum government immediately."

Exactly right. So what should Mr. Obama do as president? Yesterday, the State Department rolled out its new policy toward Sudan, based on "a menu of incentives and disincentives" for the genocidal Sudanese government of Omar Bashir. It's the kind of menu Mr. Bashir will languidly pick his way through till he dies comfortably in his bed.
Iran: Mr. Obama's week-long silence on Iran's "internal affairs" following June's fraudulent re-election was widely noted. Not so widely noted are the administration's attempts to put maximum distance between itself and human-rights groups working the Iran beat.

Earlier this year, the State Department denied a grant request for New Haven, Conn.-based Iran Human Rights Documentation Center. The Center maintains perhaps the most extensive record anywhere of Iran's 30-year history of brutality. The grant denial was part of a pattern: The administration also abruptly ended funding for Freedom House's Gozaar project, an online Farsi- and English-language forum for discussing political issues.

It's easy to see why Tehran would want these groups de-funded and shut down. But why should the administration, except as a form of pre-emptive appeasement?

Burma: In July, Mr. Obama renewed sanctions on Burma. In August, he called the conviction of opposition leader (and fellow Nobel Peace Prize winner) Aung San Suu Kyi a violation of "the universal principle of human rights."

Yet as with Sudan, the administration's new policy is "engagement," on the theory that sanctions haven't worked. Maybe so. But what evidence is there that engagement will fare any better? In May 2008, the Burmese junta prevented delivery of humanitarian aid to the victims of Cyclone Nargis. Some 150,000 people died in plain view of "world opinion," in what amounted to a policy of forced starvation.

Leave aside the nausea factor of dealing with the authors of that policy. The real question is what good purpose can possibly be served in negotiations that the junta will pursue only (and exactly) to the extent it believes will strengthen its grip on power. It takes a remarkable presumption of good faith, or perhaps stupidity, to imagine that the Burmas or Sudans of the world would reciprocate Mr. Obama's engagement except to seek their own advantage.

It also takes a remarkable degree of cynicism—or perhaps cowardice—to treat human rights as something that "interferes" with America's purposes in the world, rather than as the very thing that ought to define them. Yet that is exactly the record of Mr. Obama's time thus far in office.
In Massachusetts not long ago, I found myself driving behind a car with "Free Tibet," "Save Darfur," and "Obama 08" bumper stickers. I wonder if it will ever dawn on the owner of that car that at least one of those stickers doesn't belong.

2)I had lunch with a friend of mine yesterday who is the Chair of Trustees at Bowdoin. He has a friend whose wife is the current head of the SBA under Obama. The husband gave my friend some interesting first hand observations about Obama and his administration.

1. Obama is very smart and charming. Probably the "smartest in the room" and he asks good penetrating questions.

2. Neither Obama nor any of his close advisors have any business experience. They are career politicians and/or bureaucrats. Obama is honest enough to recognize this and often calls in this head of the SBA for counsel because she does have business experience.

What I had guessed and I continue to feel is that:

1. Obama is not an evil force, just an inexperienced manager and career politician and

2. That we are seeing what happens after an administration that did have business experience but allowed a full scale economic panic to develop on their watch is succeeded by a bunch of pro labor liberals who are inexperienced managers. Maybe next time the Republicans will do a better job.


By the way, this bunch has no military experience at all either so you get all this dithering about Afghanistan thrown in as a bonus.

3)The Obamacare Shell Game?
Jonathan Chait

The latest, hottest attack on health care reform is that it's based on an accounting scam. National Review calls it "taking Obamacare off the books." The Heritage Foundation warns of the "Obamacare Shell game." What's going on here? What's going on is a perfect metaphor for how Obama and the republicans are treating fiscal policy.

More than a decade ago, Congress tried to control Medicare costs by restricting payments to doctors. But the reimbursement cut has proven unpopular. So every year, Congress appropriates more money to fill the hole and keep the doctors happy. Yet the pay cut remains on the books. So, admitting the obvious fact that the reimbursement cuts will never happen would, officially speaking, cost $247 billion over ten years.

Everybody agrees that it's a sham. Since the Democrats are trying to reform, and trim, how much Medicare spends, they planned to wipe the slate clean and just admit the obvious reality that the $247 billion is going to get spent.

Conservatives are attacking this as proof that health care reform is based on fraudulent accounting. See -- they're spending money they don't pay for! National Review calls this "offloading $247 billion in Obamacare costs onto a separate, standalone, unfinanced piece of legislation." But it's not "Obamacare costs." It's money that would get spent whether or not health reform happens. It would be fair to make this charge if Obama were using these illusury savings to cover the cost of the new spending in his health care reform, but he isn't.

So why is Obama getting attacked so bitterly over this? Because he's acknowledging it. It's the same thing that's happened to fiscal policy since he took office. The Bush administration hid the true iscal picture with a plethora of accounting gimmicks -- keeping all war costs out of the budget, pretending the middle-class tax cuts would expire, and on and on. Obama has tried to make the budget reflect reality. Alas, reality is a bummer. (And yes, the long-term deficit is entirely the fault of policies Obama inherited.) So Obama gets attacked for a "shell game" when all he's really doing is admitting the shell game that's been going on for years.

People have made this point before, but the conservative attacks on health care reform's fiscal responsibility are beyond hypocritical. George W. Bush and the Republicans created a new health care entitlement in 2003 that was completely unfinanced. Not a dime was paid for. The Democrats have decided to completely finance every cent of health care reform, and they're taking a hundred times more flack for fiscal irresponsibility than the Republicans ever did. There's a lesson here, and "fiscal responsibility pays" isn't it.

3a)Lies, Damned Lies, and Health Care Polls
By James Joyner

Ezra Klein points to a new ABC/WaPo poll showing a solid majority support “a law that requires all Americans to have health insurance, either getting it from work, buying it on their own, or through eligibility for Medicare or Medicaid.” Further, the same poll finds a third of those who oppose would switch sides “if the government gave financial assistance in getting health insurance to people with incomes below about 40-thousand dollars for an individual, and below 88-thousand dollars for a family of four.”

Kevin Drum is intrigued and guesses the phenomenon likely pretty common.

I’m pretty sure you could quote a couple of lines from Jabberwocky, ask an “in that case” followup question, and get a fair number of people to change their minds. So what I’d like to know is: what’s the average flip rate?

He thinks figuring this out would be a useful project for political scientists, adding yet another data point to Dan Drezner’s suspicion that those of our ilk are becoming more policy-relevant.

I’m sure Kevin’s right that there’s a flip factor. Partly, people just want to seem agreeable and reasonable. Mostly, though, adding a lot of caveats just makes poll questions more confusing.

And the ones Ezra cites above are, frankly, pretty damned confusing. The initial question is beyond double barreled, throwing so many things into the pot that I’m surprised they found 41% to oppose. A “law that requires all Americans to have health insurance” sounds pretty good on the surface and talk about the employer or Medicare paying for it obscures the actual policy choice. If, on the other hand, the question were phrased, “Would you support or oppose a law forcing Americans who do not have health insurance through their employer or the government to pay for it out of their own pocket or go to jail?” support would go down tremendously!

Similarly, if the follow-up were phrased, “Would you be willing to pay more in taxes so individuals making under $40,000 a year — or $88,000 for families– could get free health insurance from the government?” I’m guessing it wouldn’t do so well.

3b)Carroll: Making matters worse
By Vincent Carroll

Repeat after me: Health care reform is going to save us money. Health care reform is going to save us money. Pay no attention, please, to the fact that the Senate Finance Committee's bill imposes fees on insurance providers, as well as producers of drugs and medical devices, that it caps deductions for flexible spending accounts and slaps a 40 percent excise tax on so-called Cadillac health plans. Oh, yes: and that it raises the bar for itemizing medical expenses on your taxes.

None of this, we are assured, will raise the price of health-care premiums or boost out-of-pocket medical costs. And if you doubt it, Gov. Bill Ritter will take time from his busy day to denounce you, as he did with insurance companies recently.

Perhaps Ritter should read Michael Riley's report in The Sunday Denver Post, which explained how congressional health-care bills lack key cost-containment measures despite the insistence by everyone on their importance. Or he could review analysis in The Wall Street Journal by Douglas Holtz-Eakin, former director of the Congressional Budget Office, lamenting the dearth of "any competition-based reforms that would actually bend the curve of health-care costs."

Under the Senate Finance bill, healthy workers could actually refuse to buy insurance, pay the modest penalty and still come out ahead if they got seriously ill — because no insurer could turn them away. And yet when some executives had the temerity to point out how this could lead to higher premiums, Ritter told them, in effect, to just shut up.

"It's a self-serving, untrue, desperate effort by the insurance industry to protect its excessive profits — and one that cannot be taken seriously," Ritter thundered in his best imitation of a populist demagogue.

So it's a desperate tactic to point out that people respond to incentives? John Martie, president and general manager of Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield of Colorado, hardly sounded like a hysteric Tuesday when he told me that people will opt out of coverage if the penalty for doing so is much less than the cost of premiums.

Martie said that in Massachusetts, which has a universal mandate with weak penalties, "The average person who chooses to buy coverage through the 'connector' keeps the coverage for five months. They're coming in, paying premiums, getting their services and then dropping the coverage ... The way group insurance works is that you spread the risk. If you're only collecting premiums from people who are getting services, you can't make it work."

Politicians are reluctant to impose stiffer penalties, of course, because it would burden some consumers. So rather than admit they don't have a painless way to ensure universal coverage, elected leaders denounce anyone who points out the truth.

Over at Sen. Michael Bennet's website, meanwhile, we learn that the insurance industry not only is the perfidious puppet master of "patients, physicians, and nurses," but that it also is responsible for the "high costs for your prescription drugs and doctor's visits," too. Isn't the senator confusing his talking points? Shouldn't he be demonizing Big Pharma for the cost of drugs?

Like many in Congress, Bennet talks about the "public option" as the key to cost control, as if an existing public option — Medicare — isn't already a budgetary horror story.

It's easy to understand why most Americans yearn for health-care reform: Premiums are expected to rise again next year by 10 percent or more, once again devouring wage hikes. But since Congress doesn't have the courage to enact the sort of far-reaching reform that would actually realign incentives and constrain costs, it is poised to do what in the political world is considered the next best thing: make matters worse.

3c)Media Matters & President Obama in Lockstep
By Kyle-Anne Shiver

Revival of right-wing conspiracy charges are all the rage in the age of Obama, but liberals are just playing the same old shell game. The real action is on the left, with lockstep collusion by the President with Soros-funded Media Matters.


While the President sends his surrogates onto national network programs to decry Fox News, Media Matters is behind the scenes working its Fight Fox campaign.


Media Matters' president, Eric Burns, sent out the Fight Fox campaign announcement to supporters on September 17 and explained why Fox had to be driven out of the national political conversation


Translation: Fox is a thorn in the side of the Chavez-minded leftists.


"Since President Obama's inauguration, Fox News has officially abandoned its already dubious standing as a news organization and is now engaging in outright political activism, completing its transition into the 24/7 media wing of the far-right conservative movement."


Translation: Fox doesn't' kiss the hand of Obama.


This Media Matters Fight Fox campaign shines new light on the President's malicious joking at the White House Correspondents dinner, in which he acknowledged that all of those in the room had voted for him (a line which drew raucous, pitifully biased applause and catcalls), adding this tacky jab, "Apologies to the Fox table."


Now, if you happened to see Anita Dunn, White House Communications director, on CNN's October 9 appearance in which she called Fox News "a wing of the Republican Party," you might have surmised that substantial coordination was occurring between the White House and Media Matters. Dunn's salvo at Fox was indeed no unintended statement of her personal opinion but is now the policy of the White House Communications office.


A week later, both Rahm Emmanuel and David Axelrod continued the President's attacks on Fox News in their guest appearances on network news shows. Emmanuel said, regarding Fox News, "It is not a news organization so much as it has a perspective." Appearing on ABC, David Axelrod had this to say: "Fox shouldn't be treated as a news organization. And the bigger thing is that other news organizations, like yours, ought not to treat them that way, and we're not going to treat them that way."


Perhaps the President and his minions at Media Matters need a refresher on Journalism 101.


Of course, anyone who has graduated from high school ought to know that there is straight news reporting journalism and then there's opinion/perspective journalism. All news channels -- including Fox -- produce both kinds of journalism and even a ninth grader ought to be able to distinguish between the two.


How much are those Ivy League degrees in poppycock going for these days?


Now, one would indeed need to be living in a Siberian outpost not to understand what's behind this sudden, concerted attack on conservative journalism (targeted for now at Rush Limbaugh and Fox News). It's a simple all-American peculiarity. It's called competitive SUCCESS.


Fox and conservative talk radio are the balance in the media sphere. As the only outlets where a conservative opinion can be given a fair hearing, they serve as the balance required by a robust democracy. By serving as the only alternative to all-Obama-all-the-time-great-and-wonderful coverage, Fox is delivering a real service that is being supported by millions of astute American viewers. It's a very successful competitive enterprise.


The President has a whole slew of empty-headed mouthpieces in all the other media outlets. They stoke his flames 24/7. They cover for him on stories that are unflattering. Why, one network even did a fact-check segment on a barely bothersome Saturday Night Live comedy sketch that poked some fun at the President's utter failure to actually accomplish a single thing since taking office. So, in three corners of the ring, President Obama has a lapdog "press" willing to lick his hand and curl up at his feet for the simple pleasure of his beneficent companionship.


This president resembles his south-of-the-border ideological counterpart, Chavez, every single day.


In the single outlying corner of the ring, the President actually has to earn his accolades and explain his policies and answer a few tough questions. In our coddled President's imagination, this is quite beneath him. So, when Rush Limbaugh and other conservative radio commentators bring unpleasant-for-the-president matters to the fore and umpteen million Americans are listening, it's a problem. When Fox News reports the stories ignored by other outlets, out of misplaced fidelity to the President they all sponsored, then Fox is tarnished with the label "not a real news organization."


Media Matters is doing the behind-the-scenes work too dirty for the President's own hands. A small group of far-left 527s are working in concert, ginning up the propaganda machines against Fox and disseminating boycott information on Fox News sponsors. Media Matters pays scores of interns to listen and "report" on all major conservative media personalities. These interns then manipulate the spoken words to fit their own leftist message and spit it back out to subscribers in a propagandized version, which smears and slanders the speakers.


What's particularly interesting in all this is the fact that Eric Burns, Media Matters' president, was once a Fox News show host. For ten years, Eric Burns was the host of Fox News Watch, a roundtable discussion about the national news media that aired weekly. He was fired, according to a network spokesman because the ratings had slipped badly and the network wanted to take the show in a new direction, covering the internet. Fox didn't think Eric Burns could do that well, so they canned him.


Now, it would take a pair of common-sense blinders not to see that Eric Burns has a sour-grapes grievance against Fox News. By going over to Media Matters, he certainly has found a happy hunting ground gunning for his old employer, Fox.


Here's my big question: If a Republican President were acting in lockstep with a billionaire-financed 527 group in the rhetorical assassination of independent media organizations and individuals, wouldn't this be really hard-news news?


You betcha, it would.


So what we have here just might be bigger even than a vast left-wing conspiracy. It might actually be a President's bullhorn announcement that the end of free speech and a fully state-operated fourth estate (i.e., Pravda) is in the offing.


Now, who is shredding the Constitution for real?


Honestly, our founders are not merely turning in their graves over this. They're huddled in heaven screaming like banshees at the top of their lungs: "Americans, take back your Country now! Before it's too late."


Kyle-Anne Shiver is a frequent contributor to American Thinker and a syndicated columnist for Creators Syndicate.

4)The Latest Anti-Israel Stunt
By David Warren

The significance of Israel to the west is out of all proportion to her size and in direct relation to her place, on the front line. The country is unambiguously western, and not only her institutions but the way they operate leave no doubt of this. When, for instance, there are allegations that Israeli troops have committed crimes, in the course of military operations, there is an investigation. The contents and conclusions of that investigation are invariably made known. There will most certainly be open public discussion, and Israel's press is remarkably free.

The country is full of what we can easily recognize as "liberal" people, indeed more than to my taste, and I am frequently amazed that people who live within a mile of an enemy who obviously wants them dead, can blather on so glibly. I find it a source of discouragement: for at one level I had always assumed that "the prospect of a hanging concentrates the mind" -- that people whose minds have been scrambled by moral relativism must necessarily wake up, when their own extinction is in view. But no, they only turn in their sleep.

The significance of Israel is that she stands as a proxy for America and the West in the minds of our most lethal enemies.

In Islamist propaganda she is the "Little Satan," as the U.S. is the "Big Satan." And while there is plenty of blood-curdling anti-Semitism in Islamist pronouncements, there is also clarity about the long-term goal.

First destroy "the Jewish entity" of Israel, because she is exposed. Then destroy "the Christian entity."

The U.S. is held constantly in view as the ultimate target, to accomplish this; and the destruction of Israel is constantly presented as a means to it.

I've never noticed any subtlety in this propaganda. Whether it is rejected by the whole Arab and Muslim world -- whether that world secretly longs for peace and normal relations with Israel, as with America and the West -- is moot. The frontline states, around Israel, and all of the Arab regional powers, speak of the country only as a pariah.

Against this hard and seemingly inalterable background, western policies are made. The Camp David accords, more than a generation ago, promised real change in this background condition, falsely. Thirty years later, the Egyptian government has reverted to type and, quite frankly, they fear their own people too much to show the slightest public generosity towards Israel or Israelis (even if there is much co-operation behind the scenes).

It is against this background that we watched the latest anti-Israel stunt unfold in the United Nations, whose corrupt Human Rights Council -- loaded with some of the worst violators of real human rights on the planet -- commissioned the Goldstone report to advance the international battle against Israel.

This investigation of "war crimes," during the Israeli military campaign against Hamas in Gaza, was explicitly anti-Israel, for it began from the premise that a legitimate sovereign state, governing an open society, could be put on a level with a terrorist organization ruling a closed society.

The conclusion was cheaply, "both sides committed war crimes," but the open celebration of the report by Hamas, and outrage even from liberal elements in Israeli society, tells us what we need to know about it.

Richard Goldstone, the South African lawyer and judge, long a darling of the politically correct, was an inspired choice for the task: a man who is technically a Jew. He is a man who did well out of the old apartheid regime; who switched sides to do even better under the African National Congress.

He had, and retains, an appalling record for casually announcing very serious and consequential allegations, and then not bothering to follow up with evidence. His outrageous behaviour as prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia -- repeatedly announcing "grounds for prosecution" with sublime indifference to correct procedure, earned him condemnation from judges in the Hague.

His suggestion that Israel knowingly invaded Gaza not in order to attack the terrorist infrastructure of Hamas, but to inflict maximum harm on its defenceless people, by way of some scheme of "collective punishment" -- was of a type with his earlier performances.

The information in his report was overwhelmingly hearsay supplied from Hamas-controlled sources. But what was mostly insinuated in his report has now been formally declared by the sponsoring Human Rights Council, which tabled a resolution Friday to make Israel answerable to the International Criminal Court, for Goldstone's amorphous charges.

The U.S., which under the Obama administration has reversed Bush policy by actually joining and funding this HRC, of course voted against the resolution, but made no serious effort to defeat it. By refusing to withdraw from the council now, the U.S. government is again signalling its willingness to seek favour from its own worst enemies, by throwing Israel to the wolves.

5)Down with the dollar: Why the dollar is falling
From The Economist



ON MARCH 5th an index of the value of the American dollar against six other big currencies touched 89.11, its highest point this year. Since then, however, it has been a steady downward drift for the greenback. On Tuesday October 20th, for example, the dollar index had slipped to 75.24, its lowest point in more than a year.

This hardly constitutes an outright collapse, nor is it necessarily cause for concern. American exporters, whose goods have become more competitive abroad, are happy with their weaker currency. Similarly domestic producers may be cheered that rival, imported goods are more expensive. And European tourists, who can buy more for their euros during weekend shopping excursions to America, may cheer too. However, the continued decline of the dollar does come against a backdrop of ominous murmurs from the likes of China and Russia, who hold much of their reserves in dollars, about the need to shift their reserves out of the greenback. Brazil's imposition of a 2% levy on portfolio inflows is also a sign that other countries are getting nervous about seeing their currencies rise against the dollar.

Worries about the dollar are hardly new. Well before the credit crunch some fretted that a collapse in the currency and a jump in Treasury-bond yields, as foreigners balked at funding America’s current-account deficit, would precipitate an economic crisis. Instead sub-prime mortgages and over-leveraged financial institutions plunged the world into its worst recession since the Great Depresssion.

The recession, which reduced America’s imports as consumers tightened their belts, has improved its trade imbalance, shrinking its current-account deficit. But ironically this has been accompanied by renewed weakness for the dollar.

The simplest explanation for the currency’s decline is based on risk aversion. On the days when risky assets fall, the dollar tends to go up. When risky assets rise, the dollar falls. The dollar has fallen fairly steadily since March, a period which has seen stockmarkets enjoy a phenomenal rally. Domestic American investors may be driving the relationship, repatriating funds in 2008 when they were nervous about the state of financial markets and sending the money abroad again this summer because of a perception that the global economy is reviving.

But although risk aversion may be a factor, describing the dollar as a “safe haven” seems dubious. Indeed, the weakness of American fundamentals has revived the longstanding bearish case against the currency. Some cite the American budget deficit, expected to be 13.5% of GDP this year. There is little sign that the Obama administration has a plan to reduce it, and health-care reform may add to it.

But if foreign investors are so concerned, why is the dollar’s decline not accompanied by a sharp rise in bond yields? One reason may be that the Federal Reserve has been buying so much of the year’s debt issuance, as part of its quantitative easing programme. That has helped to keep yields down.

A simple dynamic may be at work: supply and demand. Last year the market was short of dollars because investors needed the American currency to meet their liquidity needs. This year QE is creating a surplus of dollars (and pounds) and is thus driving both currencies down.

The use of QE also creates a problem for central banks as they contemplate their exit strategies. An early abandonment of the approach could cause bond yields to rise sharply, unless there is an unexpectedly dramatic improvement in the fiscal position. But continuing QE could cause further currency weakness.

It is hard to see what the American authorities could do to bolster their currency even if they wanted to. Low yields offer little support to the dollar. The Fed seems highly unlikely to raise interest rates from their near-zero levels over the next 12 months or so.

But it is hard, also, to think of a parallel in history. A country heavily in debt to foreigners, with a government deficit it is making little headway at controlling, is creating vast amounts of additional currency. Yet it is allowed to get away with very low interest rates. Eventually such an arrangement must surely break down, bringing a new currency system into being, just as Bretton Woods emerged in the 1940s.

The absence of a credible alternative to the dollar means that, despite its declining value, its status as the world’s reserve currency is not seriously under threat. But the system could change in other ways. A world where currencies traded within bands, or where foreign creditors insist on America issuing some debt in other currencies, are all real possibilities as the world adjusts to a declining dollar.

5)At the top right hand corner of Page 17 of the New York Post of January 24th, 2009 was a short column entitled "Replacing Michelle," in the National Review "The Week" column. I found this interesting, so here it is, word for word, as it appeared:

Some employees are simply irreplaceable. Take Michelle Obama: The University of Chicago Medical center hired her in 2002 to run "programs for community relations, neighborhood outreach, volunteer recruitment, staff diversity and minority contracting.

In 2005 the hospital raised her salary from $120,000 to $317,000 - nearly twice what her husband made as a Senator.

Oh did we mention that her husband had just become a US Senator? He sure had. Requested a $1 million earmark for the UC Medical Center, in fact. Way to network Michelle!

But now that Mrs. Obama has resigned, the hospital says her position will remain unfilled. How can that be, if the work she did was vital enough to be worth $317,000?

Let me add that Michelle's position was a part time, 20 hour a week job. And to think they were critical of Blagoyovich' s wife for taking $100,000 in fuzzy real estate commission.

My thoughts: How did this bit of quid pro quo corruption escape the sharp reporters that dug through Sarah Palin's garbage and kindergarten files?
Unbelievable!

Go Along To Get Along - Our New Foreign Policy!

Iran gets a bit testy. (See 1 below.)

Columbia University does it again. (See 2 below.)

In the next century the author does not believe America will be dominant but he does believe, if we introduce education, economic and military reforms we can remain a powerful nation among other rising ones. There is much to commend this article's logic.(See 3 below.)

Germany's, Der Spiegel, editorializes about Turkey's altered and ominous relationship with Israel and the West. (See 4 below.)

Judge Goldstone defends his judgment and actions. (See 5 below.)

Obama's dithering over Afghanistan raises questions among our so-called allies. There is something to be said for caution but prolonged caution can also be interpreted as weakness and confusion and can eventually rule the day and thus, limit choices.

If you had a son or daughter in the U.S. military with Obama as CIC, what must be going through your mind? (See 6 below.)

The more I have watched Obama take over the nation's financial industry, the auto industry and now his effort to control the health care industry while wrecking the dollar, bankrupting the nation and appeasing our adversaries the more I believe those who warned about Obama being a Manchurian Candidate may have been right.

The most generous conclusion I can reach is his misguided naivete is, for sure, dangerous.

Michelle Malkin does not stop with the cazrs and czarinas. In Chapters 6
-9, she continues to report on and expose more shenanigans of Obama appointees and/or close associates and how they achieved their wealth .

I will simply refer you to the pages and names in her book in Chapter 6, "The Culture of Corruption." (See 7 below.)

In Chapter 7, Malkin discusses SEIU and the union's strong arm shake-down tactics under the thuggery type leadership of left wing militant Andy Stern and the union's connection with ACORN. SEIU is about as corrupt a union as they get.

In Chapter 8, Malkin reviews ACORN and the various ways in which it operated. Her book was written and published before the more recent revelations about ACORN.

In Chapter 9, Malkin describes the dealings of the Clintons, their personal linkage and ability to raise money from some of the most notorious people - many off shore who obtained their wealth in the most unseemly and corrupt manner. Malkin goes on to describe the potential problems this raises with respect to Obama's conduct of diplomacy and Hillary's running of the State Department.

The point of the chapter is that Hillary's position as Sec. of State, is encumbered by Bill and all his baggage and questionable practices and financial dealings in raising money for his library and other endeavors.

Obama's Czar and Czarina complete and current list. (See 7a below.)

Obama may not have met with the Dalai Lama because he thought he was an untrained animal and might soil the Oval Office Rug.

In order to get along you have to go along and not worry about principles- particularly when you seemingly have very few. (See 8 below.)

Dick



1)Iran threatens to invade Pakistan, "crushing response" for US, UK
Iranian Revolutionary Guards chief Mohammed Ali Jafari

The commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) Maj. Gen. Mohammad Ali Jafary, Monday, Oct. 19, threatened "crushing" retaliation against the US, UK and Pakistan including the invasion of its eastern neighbor. Tehran links all three to the suicide bombing attack in Sistan-Baluchistan Sunday, Oct. 18, which killed 42 people including seven senior Guards officers. One was Gen. Nur Ali Shoustari, Jafari's deputy, who was identified by counter-terror sources as commander of the al Qods clandestine terror bases in Iraq, Pakistan, Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.

Jafary said: "Behind this scene are the American and British intelligence apparatus and there will have to be retaliatory measures to punish them."

Iranian sources note that is the first time in Iran's 30-year Islamic revolution that a military leader has gone to the extreme lengths of threatening to strike US and British military targets, a measure of the damage the regime and Guards suffered from the suicide attack, which has since been condemned and denied by Washington.

Jafari expanded on his charge by saying: "New evidence has been obtained proving the link between yesterday's terror attack and the US, British and Pakistani intelligence services." He spoke of evidence showing that all three supported the group. "A delegation would soon travel to Pakistan to present it," he said.

A military official in Tehran then suggested Iran might launch a military thrust into Pakistan against the group blamed for the attack. Lawmaker Payman Forouzesh said: "There is even unanimity that these operations (could) take place in Pakistan territory."

Tehran accuses the Sunni secessionist terrorist group Jundallah of Baluchistan, which is fighting for the predominantly Sunni province's independence, of carrying out the suicide bombing in provincial town of Pisheen near the Pakistan and Afghanistan borders. In the past, Tehran has charged the Pakistani Inter-Service Intelligence agency and the CIA of supporting the group. It has carried out a string of terrorist attacks on regime and Shiite targets including in 2007 a failed assassination attempt on president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Iranian sources report that Tehran will have to make good on its threats without too much delay or lose face among the political and ethnic minority dissidents plaguing on the regime, especially those who rose up in protest against the tainted June 20 presidential election. Hesitation will be seen as weakness.

Past Iranian reprisals were usually carried against the US or Britain indirectly in the Persian Gulf or by local Islamic surrogates like Hizballah in Iraq. Jafari's words point to a more direct showdown this time by the IRGC or its terrorist arm al Qods.


2)Forum at Columbia University Whitewashes UN and Arab States
by Brendan Goldman


With all the irony of President Richard Nixon's famous quip that, "there can be no whitewash at the White House," the ivory tower played host to a September 25 "debate" at Columbia University's Casa Italiano that exonerated the United Nations Relief Works Agency in Palestine (UNRWA) and human rights violators throughout the Arab-Islamic world.

The conference was held in a small auditorium, decorated in classic Greco-Roman style with ornate columns and crimson curtains. The audience of about 100 filtered in slowly, filling the room with students, UNRWA employees, and professors.

In a debate entitled, "UNRWA historical performance in a changing context" and a roundtable labeled "The contribution of Palestine refugees to the economic and social development in the region," Rex Brynen of McGill University and Susan Akram of Boston University's School of Law distinguished themselves by castigating Israeli "occupation" while engaging in apologetics for Arab leaders who have violated Palestinian refugee rights.

Rashid Khalidi of Columbia University also made an appearance as the debate's moderator—an indication of the spectrum of opinions present—deviating from his role as an objective overseer only to reiterate his colleagues' anti-Israel and anti-Western diatribes.

To provide some context, UNRWA was established to accommodate the needs of several hundred thousand Palestinian refugees of Israel's 1948 War of Independence. The organization was originally intended to serve for a transitory period, during which Palestinian refugees would resettle in Jordan (including the Jordanian-administered West Bank), Egyptian-administered Gaza, Lebanon and Syria.

Sixty-years later, UNRWA oversees a massive welfare organization that perpetuates the economic dependency of 4.5 million Palestinians and nurtures their impractical belief that they will one day return to the homes their families abandoned in modern-day Israel.

The Arab states, as one former UNRWA commissioner general noted, want to "keep [the refugees' situation] as an open sore, as an affront to the UN and as a weapon against Israel. Arab leaders don't give a damn whether the refugees live or die."

That history seems to have escaped the panel's academics, who, along with two former commissioner generals of UNRWA and the current commissioner general, urged the audience to "draw lessons from [UNRWA's] 60 years of service."

Brynen stole the forum's first half with a witty but deceptive portrayal of the refugees' status. He related the tragedies of Palestinian history, ending with the first and second intifada.

"It sounds like a Christmas carol," he said of his list of Palestinian and (unmentioned) Israeli suffering.

He went on to implicitly chide the West for confronting UNRWA over the complete lack of Holocaust education at its schools. UNRWA initially said it would rectify the situation, yet waffled under pressure from militant Palestinian groups. Over a week after the conference ended, UNRWA announced it would incorporate Holocaust studies in its schools' curricula.

"I'm surprised you haven't sprouted horns," Brynen joked with the current UNRWA commissioner general, Karen Abu Zayed.

Akram and Khalidi chose a different path: exculpating the Arab states for their abuse of Palestinians at Israel's expense.

"I've written articles critical of Arab treatment of (Palestinian) refugees," Khalidi stated. "But the areas where the least rehabilitation (of refugees) has taken place are those under Israeli occupation (the West Bank and Gaza Strip)."

History begs to differ: Before the First Intifada, the Palestinians under Israeli administration had the fourth fastest growing economy in the world. At the same time, Arab Shi'ite and Maronite militias were hunting down Palestinians in Lebanon, while Palestinians in Jordan were reeling from the Black September massacres.

Susan Akram was even blunter than Khalidi in dismissing criticism of the Arab states' failure to take responsibility for the Palestinian refugees within their borders.

"Arab states are under no legal obligation to provide for Palestinian refugees," she said. Syria, Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon have hosted the Palestinians "at great social and economic cost" (a particularly ironic statement for a forum entitled, "The contribution of Palestine refugees to the economic and social development in the region").

She noted the "surprising respect of Arab states for Palestinians," and singled out the Casablanca Protocol, a document published by Morocco in 1965 that ostensibly gives "Palestinians the same rights as Arab citizens of the host states." There are only two minor caveats: Morocco is not a primary host of Palestinian refugees, and the Arab World has expressed little interest in its "Protocol."

Unmentioned is that of the three major Arab host states of Palestinian refugees only Jordan has unilaterally granted the Palestinians citizenship, and that step was taken before the 1967 Six-Day War as part of the Jordanians' annexation of the West Bank. It is also noteworthy that in the Israeli-administered West Bank only one-sixth of Palestinian refugees live in UNRWA camps, while in Lebanon, two-thirds of the country's approximately 400,000 Palestinians live in UNRWA housing.

Israel and the West have tried to convince UNRWA and the Arab States to repatriate the Palestinians to the nations in which they now reside. Conferences like this one only feed the impractical notion that UNRWA's program of maintaining the Palestinians' refugee status indefinitely will prevail. Akram, Khalidi, and Brynen know that there is no chance that democratic Israel will commit demographic suicide by allowing millions of Palestinian refugees to settle within its borders. Their defense of UN excesses and Arab human rights abusers does a disservice to the very people they claim to want to help.

Brendan Goldman is a senior at New York University majoring in Middle Eastern and Islamic studies, and an intern at the Middle East Forum. This essay was sponsored by Campus Watch, a project of the Middle East Forum.


3)Pillars of the Next American Century
By James Kurth


The 20th century was famously called “the American century”, yet its being so called occurred in an improbable way. The phrase itself was actually not used until Time publisher Henry Luce coined it in a special issue of Life magazine in 1941—by which time 40 percent of the 20th century had already passed. Moreover, 1941 was a year in which the superiority of America and of the American way of life appeared decidedly problematic. Only the year before had the United States finally exited, statistically speaking, the decade of the Great Depression. Nazi Germany’s armies occupied most of Europe, stretching from the Atlantic coast of France to the heartland of the Soviet Union. At the same time, Imperial Japan’s armies occupied most of East Asia, stretching from Manchuria through much of China to Indochina. No objective observer could have been blamed for entertaining a whiff of pessimism about America’s prospects.

Nevertheless, Luce was truly prescient. By the end of the 20th century, nearly everyone widely acknowledged that it had, indeed, been the American one. Certainly, no other power and way of life could claim that title. Moreover, as the 20th century passed into the 21st, it seemed reasonable and even self-evident to say that the 21st century, too, would be an American century. In the first couple years of this century there was a little boom in the publication of books and articles—some admiring, some disparaging—that even went so far as to proclaim an American empire. Then, in an amazingly short time, a relentless series of events—almost a staccato burst—perforated and punctured this centennial and imperial dream: the 9/11 attacks, the setbacks of the Iraq war and then of the Afghan War, and particularly the American-originated global economic crisis and Great Recession of 2008–09. The frustrations in Iraq and Afghanistan have largely discredited the American reputation for high moral character and judicious strategic judgment, and the global economic crisis has largely discredited the longstanding U.S. globalization project. More generally, these burdens have raised questions about the applicability abroad of such fundamental American values as liberal democracy and free markets, of “the American way” and “the Washington consensus.”

At the same time that confident visions of a second American century and a new American empire (whether benign or not) have dissipated, another great power with its own distinctive culture and way of life has been steadily rising. In the past decade, China’s ascent has neatly paralleled America’s descent. And so, in the autumn of 2009—one year into the global economic crisis—no one is making a convincing case that the 21st century could still become an American one. Conversely, amid rather a lot of declinist muttering, there is already thoughtful commentary to the effect that this century is more likely to be seen in retrospect as having been a Chinese one.1

I doubt it. The United States can still be the most prominent—although not dominant—of the great powers, and it can still offer the most attractive way of life. But to do this, America will have to become more American than it has been in recent years. This means it will have to renovate or reinvent certain pillars that raised the United States to the heights of global power and prosperity in the second half of the 20th century. These pillars remain the only solid and enduring supports for a prominent American role in the 21st century, so we need to be clear about what they are.

Pillars of the First American Century
When discussing power, most international affairs analysts reasonably focus upon military power (“hard power”), in this case America’s large-scale and high-tech military forces. The United States first achieved supremacy in vast conventional forces (World War II), then in nuclear weapons (most of the Cold War), and most recently in information-age warfare (the “Revolution in Military Affairs” that began in the 1980s). And when gauging the attractiveness of the American way of life, many analysts focus upon particular American ideas and ideals, or ideological power (“soft power”)—in this case, liberal democracy, free markets and the open society. These ideas and ideals have been grouped together and advanced under a variety of slogans, some meant to encompass the globe, some of more limited scope, some emphasizing political and others economic aspects of ideology, to wit: “the Free World”, “the Alliance for Progress”, the idea of “universal human rights”, “the Washington Consensus”, “the Freedom Agenda.”

There is no doubt that both military power and ideological power were central pillars of the first American century. However, the essential base for these, and for all power in international affairs, remains economic power. (This may sound like economic reductionism or even Marxism, but it is not: I do not argue that economic power is sufficient to account for supremacy in world affairs, only that it is necessary). Economic power in turn entails strength in three component dimensions: industrial, financial and technological (in other words, manufacturing, banking and innovation). During the first American century, which spanned from the high industrial era to the early information era, the United States obviously led the world in each of these three dimensions.

Industrial superiority. Throughout the 20th century, the United States was the largest industrial or manufacturing economy in the world. Its industrial products were generally competitive in world markets, with the U.S. economy earning substantial foreign exchange from their export. Although the United States lost its competitive advantage successively in older industrial sectors like steel, automobiles and consumer electronics, it demonstrated an extraordinary capacity to innovate whole new industrial sectors like aerospace, computers and telecommunications, each of which then gave the United States a new competitive edge in world markets for several decades.

Of course, many economists argue that as an economy becomes more sophisticated, it can leave behind its manufacturing component altogether and simply move upward into a variety of service sectors (of which finance is one). This argument is partly correct. However, although an economy may cease to produce industrial goods, it will continue to consume them, just as it earlier may have ceased to produce agricultural goods, but it obviously had to continue to consume them. Indeed, as an economy becomes more developed and richer, it may consume even more industrial products than it did before, and these products have to come from somewhere. Indeed, they have to be imported and these imports have to be paid for with exports, which would now have to come in the form of services. But only some services are exportable (“internationally tradable”), of which finance is the most important. Others have turned out to be importable: Advanced service economies are now importing services as well as manufactures, as seen in the outsourcing of data processing and telephone call centers from the United States to India.

The real issue in economic development is not the simple move from manufacturing to services, but rather the more complex move from older, static sectors that are no longer capable of generating export earnings to newer, dynamic sectors that can. Moreover, these new sectors have to be of sufficient scale to cover the costs of all those industrial products now being imported. Some of them might have industrial features, such as the new products of the renewable-energy and biotechnology sectors; some might have service features, such as new processes in the medical field.

Financial superiority. During much of the 20th century, the United States was a creditor nation. It achieved this partly because of its vast foreign-exchange earnings, but also because of political stability (and therefore political predictability) that led to the U.S. dollar becoming the principal international reserve currency. With its own vast amounts of capital and with foreign investors having great confidence in the stability of both the U.S. dollar and U.S. banks, the United States was overwhelmingly the world’s leading financial power during most of the 20th century.

Technological superiority. The reason the United States could continually create new industrial sectors was that, for most of the 20th century, it was also the leader in developing new technologies. As late as the 1930s, scientists and engineers in other nations (especially in Britain and Germany) might introduce some new invention, but then Americans would take the lead in expanding this invention into a new innovation and expanding this innovation into a new industry. With World War II, Americans also assumed the lead in new inventions, a lead which has largely continued down to the present.

American technological superiority has been grounded in several unique or unusual features. Most obviously, the United States has long had the largest—and since World War II also the best—university system in the world.2 This has provided a vast pool of scientists and engineers to develop new inventions and innovations. Second, the American free market system has enabled entrepreneurs to harness these new inventions and innovations to build new industries. Indeed, the combination of advanced universities and energetic entrepreneurs (often headquartered together in metropoles like Boston, the San Francisco Bay area and Silicon Valley) has birthed virtually all the new industrial sectors created in the United States since World War II. Third, the U.S. general population long led the world in average educational level. Although this advantage has disappeared in the past two decades, it obtained during most of the 20th century. This educated general population of Americans provided a plentiful supply of efficient and productive workers for the new industrial sectors.

From Economic to Military Superiority
The great strength of the American economy enabled the United States to possess great military power, as well. The immense U.S. industrial capacity that existed in 1941, even after a decade of Great Depression, soon overwhelmed Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan with hitherto unimaginable quantities of tanks, artillery, warships, transports, bombers and fighters. Military historians generally acknowledge that the German Army and the Japanese Army were both superb at the level of military operations or “operational art.” But the U.S. military trumped their advantage with its own in materiel and logistics. (The U.S. military was also often superior at the level of military strategy, but on this point there is more controversy among historians.)

Military historians have also often discussed what they see as a distinctive “American Way of War.” They agree that its two central features are overwhelming mass, in both men and materiel, and wide-ranging mobility—the projection and sustained support of that overwhelming mass across great distances. But after these features reached their apotheosis in World War II, the American military soon faced the fact that Soviet armies were even more massive than its own. The United States responded to this challenge by drawing upon a third military feature—advanced technology—in which it had recently acquired a substantial advantage. The United States first trumped the large Soviet armies with nuclear technology and weaponry and then, when the Soviets developed their own nuclear weapons, with the computer and telecommunications tools of the information age. These U.S. military innovations amounted to new versions of the American way of war. Just as the American economy kept re-creating itself, so did the American military. Thus, for most of the 20th century no other great power could match America’s military power, and the main reason was the dominance of American economic power as manifested in all three of the dimensions of industry, finance and technology.

Beginning with the Vietnam War, however, and again with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States has confronted a new problem. Neither its advantages in massive industrial-age armies, nor in nuclear weapons, nor even in high-tech information-age weapons, have been effective in putting down a determined and sustained insurgency (a sort of pre-industrial adversary). And so now, in the first decade of the 21st century, the U.S. military is engaged in inventing yet another effective American way of war. Its success or failure in doing so will play a large role in determining whether the 21st century can become a second American one—as will, of course, the success of American elites in re-creating an effective formula for economic dynamism.

The Pillars Today: America versus China
This review of the pillars of the first American century may occasion some discouraging thoughts. Many of those pillars have been squandered or abandoned—as Daniel Bell foresaw in his Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism—by successive generations of Americans during the very decades that comprise much of the golden age of the American century. It is obvious today that two of the economic pillars, the industrial and the financial ones, are particularly diminished. A comparison with China makes this clear.

Although the United States remains the largest manufacturing economy in the world, China is projected to overtake it by 2015 or so. And China, of course, is the largest and often most competitive producer in such basic sectors as steel, shipbuilding and consumer goods. It is rapidly expanding and upgrading its automobile and chemical sectors as well. These have been the basic sectors of any robust industrial economy, and they usually have been the generators of large export earnings. (Along with aircraft production, these sectors enabled the United States to win World War II, and long served as the basis for the American way of war.)

China’s industrial superiority, and the export earnings it brings, has of course translated into financial strength. At $2 trillion, China’s reserves of foreign currencies—especially the U.S. dollar—now exceed those of any other country. In the past year, the Chinese government has used the leverage afforded by its $800 billion in Treasury securities to pressure the U.S. Treasury and the Federal Reserve with respect to their policies affecting the value of the dollar. Even more important, it has used its financial strength to implement the most successful economic stimulus program any government has yet deployed to address the global economic crisis. In 2009, the world’s most effective practitioners of Keynesian fiscal policy are the Chinese.

Indeed, the Chinese government’s response to the current global economic crisis is remarkably similar to President Franklin Roosevelt’s response to the Great Depression. Like FDR’s New Deal, the Chinese version centers on large-scale spending on big infrastructure projects like highways, railroads, bridges, dams, rural electrification and public buildings. These infrastructure projects not only provide steady markets and continuing employment for such basic industries as steel, cement, heavy machinery and construction; they also bring long-term productivity gains to the national economy. In contrast to both the Roosevelt Administration in the 1930s and the Chinese government today, the Obama Administration is spending little on new infrastructure. Most of its stimulus program is directed at simply maintaining existing assets and employment in selected service sectors (and big Democratic Party constituencies), particularly state and local governments and public education.

The similarities between the U.S. response to the Great Depression and the Chinese response to today’s global economic crisis are not accidental. Both the United States then and China today possessed a vast industrial structure that suddenly suffered underutilization and excess capacity. With so much of the economy devoted to industry, and with industry thus having so much political influence, it is natural for governments to emphasize the revival of industry and manufacturing. An industry-centered (and industry-influenced) economic recovery program will normally emphasize government spending and some kind of Keynesian fiscal policy.

However, in the United States of recent years, industry has been a much smaller part of the economy than it was in the 1930s and than it is in China now. Rather, finance became the largest single economic sector, along with becoming the most profitable and prestigious one; it is therefore not surprising that finance became the most politically influential economic sector as well. This has meant that the U.S. response to the current economic crisis—first that of the Bush Administration in 2008 and now that of the Obama Administration in 2009—has been finance-centered (and finance-influenced). That is why it has emphasized bailouts of “too big to fail” financial institutions, the manipulation of interest rates and monetary policy (a kind of Friedmanism).

The real, and ominous historical analogue to the U.S. economy and economic policies of today, therefore, is not the United States of the 1930s, but rather the United Kingdom of the 1930s. By then, Britain’s decades as “the workshop of the world” were long past; the British economy centered on finance, and British governments devised economic policy accordingly. The City (and Lombard Street) was even more authoritative there than Wall Street has been here. The result was that, during the Great Depression, Britain never saw anything approaching New Deal deficit spending and fiscal policy (never anything like Keynesianism in Keynes’s own country). Instead, it experienced a “lost decade” of dreary stagnation, which led in turn to its inability to sustain its world power status thereafter.

In short, if China’s present trends and economic policies continue, it will likely make its exit from the current global economic crisis with its economy more developed and diverse than it was when the crisis began. Conversely, if America’s own present trends and economic policies continue, it will make its exit from the crisis with its economy more distorted and debilitated than it was before.

Technological Superiority
It is worth remembering that the economic policies of the Roosevelt Administration—both the New Deal and military spending, both civilian Keynesianism and military Keynesianism—resulted in a vast and varied industrial structure that was not just the workshop of the world, but also its wonder (as exemplified in the 1939 New York World’s Fair). This industrial structure was fully in place in 1941, and it proved to be the basic foundation of the American century. If we are to make use of the current crisis, we must produce a similar outcome, and we can do so by building on the one strong pillar that remains to us: our longstanding technological superiority.

China is clearly investing a great deal to achieve its own technological strength, rapidly expanding and upgrading universities and research institutes, as well as investing in the rigorous education of the general population. While these measures have been effective in steadily increasing its economic productivity, historically it has taken many years for an economy to translate industrial and financial superiority into technological superiority. (For example, the United States reached industrial superiority in the 1890s and financial superiority in the 1910s, but its universities did not clearly surpass the top British and German ones until World War II.) The central and strategic question about which country will achieve the technological superiority of the future will turn upon which leads in the new economic sectors of the future.

Today, the most obvious candidates for these sectors are new sustainable or “green” energy sources and uses, new biotechnology-based products and processes, and new medical and health treatments. (One might think that the latter two candidates are not really distinct, but this would be mistaken: The economic implications of biotechnology and uses of biomimicry far surpass medical applications, and not all new medical treatments need be based on biotechnology alone.) It is interesting that the Obama Administration has specified energy and medical-related advances as being at the center of its own vision for America’s economic future, and that they, along with the education sector, occupied a prominent place in the Administration’s public depiction of its own economic stimulus program and budget priorities.

The potential economic sectors of sustainable energy, biotechnology and medicine/health are clearly of vital importance to vast numbers of people around the world. Moreover, those countries with advanced or advancing economies would be able and willing to spend vast sums to import the new products and processes of these sectors. If the United States can achieve leadership in them, as it did during the 20th century in aerospace, computers and telecommunications, it will have secured a robust pillar for even broader American leadership in the world in the 21st century. The Chinese are not oblivious, however, to the promise of at least one of these new sectors, renewable energy, which they now call a strategic industry. In the past few years, as part of their own economic stimulus program, they have begun to construct large wind power farms and solar power plants and to develop promising battery-powered automobiles.

It should be a prime objective of the U.S. government to maintain and even enhance America’s technological superiority, particularly with respect to developing new economic sectors that will be leaders in global markets. This entails encouraging and enabling the traditional bases for U.S. technological superiority: the university system, with its numerous scientists and engineers; the free-market system, with its numerous innovators and entrepreneurs; and the education system for the general population (obviously in great need of improvement).

Some economists have argued that only the quality of top scientists and engineers is important for economic productivity and international competitiveness, and that the education level of the general population is not. However, the inventions of these scientists and engineers have to be transformed and expanded into entire economic sectors. That requires support from a large base of intelligent, skilled and diligent technical, clerical and industrial workers, a base that must continually be reproduced and upgraded by the education system. In any event, the United States is unlikely to continue to enjoy a productive and competitive economy if it must continue to support the large and growing number of its people who are so poorly educated as to be permanently un- and under-employed.

In order to improve general education, it is perhaps time to return to the traditional American value of competition. Numerous attempts to reform the monopolistic public schools (more accurately, government schools) have failed; the solution will come by enabling a large variety of private schools to freely compete with the government ones. All good schools could receive public assistance; none should receive a public monopoly. Unfortunately, since one of the Democratic Party’s main constituencies is the public-school teachers’ associations, the education policies of the Obama Administration will likely only make things worse.

The Military Corollary
Even if we succeed in revitalizing our economy by depending on scientific-technological leadership, we will still need to re-create a successful American way of war for current circumstances. This begs the question of how we will prevail over insurgent movements and the other slings and arrows of hostile non-state actors.

On the one hand, the dreary (but still debated) U.S. experience with counterinsurgency in Vietnam—which came at the height of the first American century—convinced the U.S. military for more than a generation thereafter that counterinsurgency warfare was incompatible with any version of the American way of war. On the other hand, the recent success in Iraq of the new (actually re-newed) U.S. counterinsurgency doctrine offers some hope.

The clue to the conundrum posed by insurgent warfare lies in looking even more closely at the features of the American way of war as they have actually been demonstrated in U.S. military history. We have already mentioned the well-known features of overwhelming mass and wide-ranging mobility, along with the later addition of high technology. But when the United States fought wars in the 20th century, it added yet another largely unacknowledged feature: a heavy reliance upon the ground forces of allies. In World War I, these were the French and the British armies; in World War II, the British and Soviet armies; in the Korean War, the South Korean army; and in the Vietnam War, the South Vietnamese army. Even in the Gulf War of 1991, the U.S. military operated with substantial ground units provided by other members of its “coalition of the willing” (for example, those of Britain, France and Saudi Arabia). In short, the “overwhelming mass” of U.S. ground forces has always been something of an illusion; the ground forces of U.S. allies were often more numerous (although less efficient and effective) than the ground forces of the United States itself, and these allied forces often assumed many of the more labor-intensive military tasks. The dirty little secret of the American way of war is that America’s allies frequently did much of the dirty work.

It was this secret that the U.S. Army and Marine Corps rediscovered and applied in Iraq in 2006–07. They realized that the key to successful counterinsurgency was to ally with local forces—in this case the Sunni tribes of the “Anbar Awakening”—who had their own reasons for opposing al-Qaeda insurgents. The U.S. military is now trying to apply a similar strategy in Afghanistan by seeking to split various Pashtun tribes from the Taliban insurgents. However, one of the reasons the Sunni tribes allied with the U.S. military in Iraq was that they feared the majority Shi‘a government as well as the al-Qaeda insurgents. The Pashtun tribes in Afghanistan lack any comparable fear, and hence any comparable incentive, to push them into alliance with U.S. forces.

The general lesson to be learned about the potential for any American way of counterinsurgency warfare is that the United States will always have to rely upon local forces, whether local militaries or merely local militias, who have their own capabilities for effective counterinsurgency. The U.S. military may be able to add certain essential ingredients or necessary conditions (such as, for example, effective weapons, professional training, mobility and logistics, or simply ample pay), but it can never successfully do the grueling job and dirty work of counterinsurgency all by itself. This means that the United States should not undertake a counterinsurgency campaign until it has developed a thorough knowledge and clear view of local forces and potential allies in a given theater.

In practice, this means too that the United States should normally seek to solve its problems without resorting to using the regular U.S. military for any counterinsurgency operations at all. Rather, the primary focus of the U.S. military should be on deterring war and, if war comes, defeating the military forces of other great powers in all forms of 21st-century warfare. The reason we are now attacked only at sub-conventional levels is not that no motive can exist for attacks against us at other levels; it is because no one dares. If we lose our superiority at these levels, however, someone might well dare.

Popular Culture and American Idealism
The reinvention and renovation of its economic and military pillars would put the United States once again in a position to exercise leadership in the world. However, having recreated its ability to be a world leader, the United States would also have to learn again how to act like one. For almost two decades, U.S. political leaders have often acted toward other nations, and particularly toward other great powers, in a way guaranteed to provoke their annoyance and disdain, and even their anger and contempt. This requires us to pay some attention to both the cultural style of American leadership and the power context in which it is exercised.

With all the talk among American political commentators about “soft power” and the attractiveness of American popular culture to the rest of the world, it is usually forgotten that this popular culture is chiefly popular with the young—particularly those young who are still irresponsible, rebellious and feckless. It does not often attract the mature, particularly those mature enough to be the leaders of their families, communities or countries who are responsible for their security and prosperity. In short, American popular culture is a culture for adolescents, not for adults, and adults around the world know and act upon this truth. If American leaders want to lead the leaders of other countries, they will have to act like mature adults, not like the attention-seeking celebrities of American popular culture.

Similarly, with all the talk among American political leaders and commentators about American “idealism”, and the attractiveness of American values to the rest of the world, it is usually forgotten that most of the political leaders in other countries are realistic men making sensible calculations about their nation’s interests (and their own). They expect the leaders of other countries, including the United States, to do the same. This is particularly true of the current leaders of China and Russia. Having learned all about the claims of ideology when they were growing up, and having put ideology aside when they became adults, they cannot really believe that U.S. political leaders in turn really believe that American ideals should be promoted for their own sake, for their “universal validity”, rather than as a legitimation or cover for U.S. interests. If American leaders want to lead such leaders of other countries, they will have to act in the style of realists, and not in the style of idealists.

That begs a key choice. Realism requires us to specify the new, 21st-century context of great powers in which the United States would exercise leadership. Although rebuilding its economic and military power pillars will make the United States the most prominent power in the world, it will no longer be a dominant one. There will be other great powers as well: some rising, like China and India; some declining, like the European Union and Japan; and some rising in some respects but declining or unstable in others, like Russia, Iran and Brazil. If the United States is to be an effective and constructive leader in world affairs, it must be able to lead at least some of these powers on issues of world importance. These include threats from transnational terrorist networks, nuclear proliferation, the global economy, global epidemics and global warming. In particular, it will have to deal in an effective and constructive way with China, India and Russia, powers that have risen or revived to the point that they seek to be the pre-eminent or even dominant power in a particular region—which is to say, to have something like a traditional sphere of influence. For China, this is Southeast Asia; for India (not quite yet, but likely within a decade), this will be South Asia and possibly the shores of the Arab Gulf; and for Russia, this is Central Asia and the Caucasus, but also the neighboring Slavic (and Orthodox) states of Belarus and Ukraine.

With respect to these great powers and these regions, the United States will have to make a choice. It can try to lead the small countries in a region in some kind of opposition or even alliance against the aspiring regional power, as the United States has done with Georgia and Ukraine against Russia. Or it can allow the regional power to exercise leadership in its region, while that power in turn allows the United States to exercise a broader leadership on issues of world importance.

Choosing this latter option would not signify anything particularly new or novel. Even when the United States was at its height in the role of a superpower, the United States reluctantly but realistically allowed the Soviet Union to dominate Eastern Europe. However, that kind of intrusive political and economic control went far beyond the traditional norms for a sphere of influence. For the most part, great powers dominant in their particular regions have been satisfied with having their security interests preserved, along with some economic presence, while allowing a large swath of political autonomy within the smaller states. In this regard, it was the Soviet relationship with Finland rather than its relationship with those neighbors upon whom it had imposed Communist regimes that fit the traditional norm. Indeed, the current Russian relationship with most of the former Soviet republics in Central Asia now largely fits this norm as well, suggesting that the traditional pattern (which the Bush and Obama Administrations have derided as so 19th century) can be reasonably updated to fit the conditions of the 21st.

The 19th century had its own distinctive features. Some historians have redefined it to be the “century” between 1815 and 1914—between the end of the Napoleonic Wars and the onset of the First World War. That 19th century then becomes an era distinguished by no general wars and by rapid economic growth, a rare era of peace and prosperity. And if any one nation was identified with that peace and prosperity, it was Britain. By the end of the 19th century, it was widely acknowledged that the century had been a British one. Certainly, no other power or way of life could claim that title.

But although Britain was the most prominent of the great powers, it was not a dominant one on the scale that the United States was dominant in the immediate post-World War II period. It certainly dominated the world’s oceans with its Royal Navy; it was the leader in the world economy, first in industry and then in finance; and it was the pre-eminent power on many issues of world importance, such as the repression of the slave trade and piracy and the development of international law. But Britain was not a dominant power on any particular continent (except Australia) or in any particular region (except in South Asia during the time of the Raj). Rather, it generally was satisfied with a division of the continents into competing spheres of influence, which then might result in continental-scale balances of power (in Europe, Africa, East Asia and even South America). Britain was the leading world power because it largely allowed other great powers to be the leaders in their own immediate regions. This allowed Britain to be the leader of the leaders without having to ask their explicit permission.

The United States will never again be a dominant power like it was during the American century, particularly in the period from the late 1940s into the early
1970's. Historically, that was an anomalous time in many respects. But a century can still be shaped and defined—and can still be guided toward greater peace and prosperity—by a nation that is only the most prominent of the great powers. And a grateful posterity can later look back upon that century and honor that nation by bestowing upon the century that nation’s very own name.

1China’s potential for rising to global power—with attention to both its strengths and its weaknesses—is debated by Aaron L. Friedberg versus Robert S. Ross, “Here be Dragons: Is China a Military Threat?” The National Interest (September/October 2009); and by Minxin Pei versus Jonathan Anderson, “Great Debate: The Color of China”, The National Interest (March/April 2009).
2See Itamar Rabinovich, “The American Advantage”, The American Interest (May/June 2009).

4)Ankara's New Foreign Policy: The Sad State of Turkish-Israeli Relations
By Daniel Steinvorth

Turkey has recently sought to secure a new role as Middle East mediator. But fallout from postponed military exercises has seen it move further from Israel and closer to Syria. Israelis are concerned, Syrians are celebrating and the Turks are guardedly diplomatic.

It was a good week for Syria's Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem. Last Tuesday, he was part of a group of Syrian and Turkish politicians that met at Oncupinar, a border crossing between Syria and Turkey, to mark the removal of entry visa requirements between the two countries.

It was a big step. As recently as the late 1990s, the two neighbors were on the verge of conflict due to Syrian support for Kurdish resistance fighters in Turkey. Parts of the Turkish-Syrian border are still mined. Times, though, have changed: These days, the two countries cooperate on joint military maneuvers and have created a High Level Strategic Cooperation Council.

A 'Spectacular' New Relationship Between Turkey And Syria

Indeed the fact that Ankara and Damascus are planning to work together militarily shortly after signing the visa exemption agreement is nothing short of spectacular. It is also a sign of just the sort of neighborly relationship that the European Union likes to see from its membership candidates. Still, the gathering on the Turkish-Syrian border would likely have generated little attention were it not for the news that immediately preceded it: Israel, a sworn enemy of Syria, was uninvited from a planned international military exercise on Turkish territory.

The reaction was prompt. Both the US and Italy immediately cancelled their participation in the maneuver, code-named Anatolian Eagle. Turkey tried to put a brave face on things, saying merely that the "international elements" of the exercise had been cancelled and tried to explain it away as being the result of "technical problems."

Later, though, it was rumored that the Turks were angry with the Israelis because of the late delivery of unmanned Heron surveillance planes. And then Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan joined the fray, indicating that the exclusion of the Israelis was indeed politically motivated -- a response to Israeli air strikes in the Gaza Strip. Turkey, Erdogan said in an interview on the television channel al-Arabiya, was merely acting "in accordance with his people's conscience." His people, Erdogan assured viewers, "were rejecting Israel's participation." Additionally Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu noted that Turkey cannot afford to be seen as Israel's military partner at a time when there are no efforts being made for peace.

These are strong words -- and cause for unease in Israel. Israel is too small to conduct air force exercises of its own, and the relationship with Turkey -- Israel's only Muslim ally in the region -- is vital. "Our relationship with Turkey is long-standing, important and strategic in nature," the Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said on Wednesday in an attempt to downplay the crisis.

Israel Has Betrayed Turkish Trust More Than Once

Still, the Turkish-Israeli relationship is worse now than it has been in a long time. Ankara remains piqued that Israeli troops marched into the Gaza Strip late last year -- just as Turkey was trying to mediate indirect peace talks between Israel and Syria. Just a few days prior to the attack, then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert reportedly told Erdogan that no offensive was planned.

The Turkish prime minister did not hide his annoyance. At the World Economic Forum in Davos in January, Erdogan referred to the Israeli operation in the Gaza Strip as "barbaric" during a podium discussion with Israeli President Shimon Peres. He then stormed off the stage in anger, claiming the moderator had not given him as much time to speak as Peres.

Erdogan has used this argument, about "the voice of the (Turkish) people," before. And when it comes to the presence of Israeli military forces in Turkey, it is not terribly far-fetched. Particularly since the Gaza offensive, the appetite for Israeli armed forces in Turkey is minimal, even beyond religious-conservative circles. Erdogan's decision to uninvite Israel has all the characteristics of an about-face.

There is more behind Turkey's Israel policy than just Erdogan's vanity and populist tendencies. Retired Turkish General Haldun Solmazturk says that the Turkish military -- the Kemalist antipode to Erdogan's conservative-Islamic politics -- has also become increasingly dissatisfied with its Israeli counterparts. A primary cause for the distrust is the 2007 Israeli air attacks on suspected Syrian nuclear plants -- strikes flown from Turkish territory. Israel, though, says Solmazturk, never bothered to inform the Turks.

"Unreliable trade relations" when it comes to military equipment is another reason, says Solmazturk. Only two of the 10 Heron surveillance drones ordered have been delivered to Turkey, he says -- and they both crashed during test flights. Still, Solmazturk doesn't see any major reason to end the "traditional partnership" with Israel. He criticizes Erdogan's conservative-Muslim administration for adopting the wrong tone.

Syria Praises New Turkish Attitude Toward Israel

Under Foreign Minister Davutoglu, though, Turkey has tried to strike more of a balance between its Western allies and its Middle Eastern neighbors. Davutoglu is the spiritual godfather of a new, more multi-dimensional foreign policy for Turkey, one he hopes will make the country more influential on the world stage.

Part of that is the forging of stronger relationships with their Muslim neighbors. Davutoglu says he has "fundamental misgivings" about Israel's current foreign policy. "When these doubts are taken seriously," he says, then the peace process can be quickly re-started.

It is a position which has been well received in Syria. "We very much welcome that decision," Reuters news agency reported al-Moualem saying. "This decision is based on Turkey's approach towards Israel and reflects the way Turkey regards the Israeli attack in Gaza."

And, Syria has indicated, Turkey won't have to look long in the search for new partners with whom to conduct military exercises. After one successful maneuver conducted by Turkish and Syrian troops in April, the Syrians have indicated that another will soon follow.

5)Why I Investigated Israel's Conduct in Gaza
By Richard Goldstone

Five weeks after the release of the Report of the Fact Finding Mission on Gaza, there has been no attempt by any of its critics to come to grips with its substance. It has been fulsomely approved by those whose interests it is thought to serve and rejected by those of the opposite view. Those who attack it do so too often by making personal attacks on its authors' motives and those who approve it rely on its authors' reputations.

Israeli government spokesmen and those who support them have attacked it in the harshest terms and, in particular my participation, in a most personal and hurtful way. The time has now come for more sober reflection on what the report means and appropriate Israeli reactions to it.

I begin with my own motivation, as a Jew who has supported Israel and its people all my life, for having agreed to head the Gaza mission. Over the past 20 years, I have investigated serious violations of international law in my own country, South Africa, in the former Yugoslavia, in Rwanda and the alleged fraud and theft by governments and political leaders in a number of countries in connection with the United Nations Iraq Oil for Food program. In all of these, allegations reached the highest political echelons. In every instance, I spoke out strongly in favor of full investigations and, where appropriate, criminal prosecutions. I have spoken out over the years on behalf of the International Bar Association against human rights violations in many countries, including Sri Lanka, China, Russia, Iran, Zimbabwe and Pakistan.

I would have been acting against those principles and my own convictions and conscience if I had refused a request from the United Nations to investigate serious allegations of war crimes against both Israel and Hamas in the context of Operation Cast Lead.

AS A Jew, I felt a greater and not a lesser obligation to do so. It is well documented that as a condition of my participation I insisted upon and received an evenhanded mandate to investigate all sides and that is what we sought to do.

I sincerely believed that because of my own record and the terms of the mission's mandate we would receive the cooperation of the Israeli government. Its refusal to cooperate was a grave error. My plea for cooperation was repeated before and during the investigation and it sits, plain as day, in the appendices of the Gaza report for those who actually bother to read it. Our mission obviously could only consider and report on what it saw, heard and read. If the government of Israel failed to bring facts and analyses to our attention, we cannot fairly be blamed for the consequences. Those who feel that our report failed to give adequate attention to specific incidents or issues should be asking the Israeli government why it failed to argue its cause.

Israel missed a golden opportunity to actually have a fair hearing from a UN-sponsored inquiry. Of course, I was aware of and have frequently spoken out against the unfair and exceptional treatment of Israel by the UN and especially by the Human Rights Council.

I did so again last week. Israel could have seized the opportunity provided by the even-handed mandate of our mission and used it as a precedent for a new direction by the United Nations in the Middle East. Instead, we were shut out.

As I stated in response to a recent letter from the mayor of Sderot, I believed strongly that our mission should have been allowed to visit Sderot and other parts of southern Israel that have been at the receiving end of unlawful attacks by many thousands of rockets and mortars fired at civilian targets by Hamas and other armed groups in Gaza. We were prevented from doing so by, what I believe, was a misguided decision by the Israeli government.

In Gaza, I was surprised and shocked by the destruction and misery there. I had not expected it. I did not anticipate that the IDF would have targeted civilians and civilian objects. I did not anticipate seeing the vast destruction of the economic infrastructure of Gaza including its agricultural lands, industrial factories, water supply and sanitation works. These are not military targets. I have not heard or read any government justification for this destruction.

Of course the children of Sderot and the children of Gaza have the same rights to protection under international law and that is why, notwithstanding the decision of the government of Israel, we took whatever steps were open to us to obtain information from victims and experts in southern Israel about the effects on their lives of sustained rocket and mortar attacks over a period of years. It was on the strength of those investigations that we held those attacks to constitute serious war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity.

The refusal of cooperation by the government of Israel did not prevent us from reacting positively to a request from Gilad Schalit's father to speak personally to our mission at its public session in Geneva. No one who heard his evidence could fail to have been moved by the unspeakable pain of a parent whose young son was being held for over three years in unlawful circumstances without any contact with the outside world and not even allowed visits from the International Committee of the Red Cross. The mission called for his release.

Israel and its courts have always recognized that they are bound by norms of international law that it has formally ratified or that have become binding as customary international law upon all nations. The fact that the United Nations and too many members of the international community have unfairly singled out Israel for condemnation and failed to investigate horrible human rights violations in other countries cannot make Israel immune from the very standards it has accepted as binding upon it.

Israel has a strong history of investigating allegations made against its own officials reaching to the highest levels of government: the inquiries into the Yom Kippur War, Sabra and Shatila, Bus 300 and the Second Lebanon War.

Israel has an internationally renowned and respected judiciary that should be envy of many other countries in the region. It has the means and ability to investigate itself. Has it the will?

The writer led the UN-mandated Gaza Fact-Finding Mission established to investigate alleged crimes committed during Operation Cast Lead earlier this year. The mission released its 575-page report last month.

6)Europe's angst over Afghanistan:Allies have a question: Will Obama walk away?
By Jackson Diehl


As the president and his National Security Council privately debate whether to send tens of thousands of troops to war, America's European allies watch with a mixture of anxiety and anguish. They know that if the deployment goes forward, they will be asked to make their own difficult and politically costly contributions of soldiers or other personnel. But they are, if anything, even more worried that the American president will choose a feckless strategy for what they consider a critical mission. And they are frustrated that they must watch and wait -- and wait and wait -- for the president to make up his mind.

"Everyone is waiting for what is going to be decided in the Oval Office, without having any chance to have our say," moans a senior commander in one European army.

No, Norwegian Nobel Committee, this is not George W. Bush but Barack Obama, the president lionized for favoring harmonious collaboration with the rest of the world. It's fair to say that Obama has tried harder than Bush to coordinate policy with U.S. allies. But his deliberations on Afghanistan are demonstrating how some fundamentals of being a superpower never really change.

For example, when you're supplying 70 percent of the troops for a war and doing 90 percent of the fighting, your allies may just have to cool their heels while you decide whether to escalate, hold steady or blow up your strategy.

And while they wait, they will stew. In conversations with senior European officials visiting Washington, and at a transatlantic conference sponsored by Italy's Magna Carta Foundation last weekend, I heard an earful of Euro-anxiety about the strategy review Obama is conducting. Some of the concern is simply about the spectacle of a young American president hesitating about going forward with a strategy that he committed himself to just months ago -- and what effect that wavering might have on enemies both in Afghanistan and farther afield.

But a surprising amount of the worry, considering the continental source, is about whether Obama will be strong enough -- whether he will, in the words of one ambassador, "walk away from a mission that we have all committed ourselves to."

European governments bought in to Obama's ambitious plan to pacify Afghanistan when he presented it in March. Unlike the U.S. president, they mostly haven't had second thoughts. By and large they agree with the recommendations developed by the commander Obama appointed, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, who says that unless the momentum of the Taliban is broken in the next year, the war may be lost.

It's hard for European leaders to argue that Obama should send the 40,000 or more reinforcements that McChrystal is seeking, since they will be accompanied, at best, by only 2,000 to 3,000 more Europeans. So they tend to focus on the other half of the equation: why the West cannot give up on the effort to stabilize Afghanistan under a decent government.

"We need to create a stable government in Afghanistan, a government we can deal with," NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said during a recent visit to Washington. "Otherwise we will be faced with permanent instability in Afghanistan and in the region."

Rasmussen and other Europeans are also happy to speak up publicly against the strategy sometimes attributed to Vice President Biden, under which the United States would focus on counterterrorism operations against al-Qaeda with drones or Special Forces. "Why are there no Predator strikes in Peshawar or Quetta? Because it can't be done," said Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, whose country currently represents the European Union. "But we know leaders of al-Qaeda and the Taliban are hiding in those urban areas. I fail to see that as a viable strategy."

Britain, naturally, has made the most direct attempt to sway the Washington debate. Last week Prime Minister Gordon Brown announced that he would add 500 troops to Britain's contingent of 9,000 -- a step that wouldn't make much sense if the United States were to scale down its own commitment. His defense staff chief left no doubt about where the British military stands. "I don't want to put words in the mouths of the Americans, but I am fairly confident of the way it is going to come out," said Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, who added that he agreed with "just about all" of McChrystal's report.

In fact, administration officials say the president hasn't made up his mind; they also say that he had no problem with Brown's announcement. For now, it seems to me that the most likely outcome of the internal debate is a decision to send some additional military trainers or other troops, but not the full combat force McChrystal wants.

If that's his decision, Obama will have some work to do with allies. "Once a decision is made, Obama is going to have to reach out directly to his European counterparts," said another ambassador. "They are going to need a lot of persuasion."

7) Monied:

Richard Holbrooke p 163

Larry Summers pp170-175

Tim Geithner pp175-182

Louis Caldera p184

Tom Doilon p185

Austin Goolsbee p185

Rahm Emanuel pp186-189

Louis Susman pp189-190

Gary Gensler p190

James Rewynoldsp191

George Madison p191

Mark Patterson pp192-194



7a)OBAMA'S "CZARS CZAR Position Summary:

Richard Holbrooke,Afghanistan Czar. Ultra liberal anti gun former Gov. of New Mexico. Pro Abortion and legal drug use.

Ed Montgomery: Auto recovery Czar. Black radical anti business activist. Affirmative Action and Job Preference for blacks. Univ of Maryland Business School Dean teaches US business has caused world poverty. ACORN board member. Communist DuBois Club member.

Jeffrey Crowley, AIDS Czar: Homosexual. A Gay Rights activist. Believes in Gay Marriage and Special Status, including free health care for gays.

Alan Bersin, Border Czar: Former failed superintendent of San Diego . Ultra Liberal friend of Hillary Clinton. Served as Border Czar under Janet Reno – to keep borders open to illegal’s.

David J. Hayes,California Water Czar: Sr. Fellow of radical environmentalist group, “Progress Policy”. No training or experience in water management.

Ron Bloom, Car Czar: Auto Union worker. Anti business & anti nuclear. Has worked hard to force US auto makers out of business. Sits on the Board of Chrysler which is now Auto Union owned. How did this happen?

Dennis Ross, Central Region Czar: Believes US policy has caused Mid East wars. Obama apologist to the world. Anti gun and pro abortion.

Lynn Rosenthal, Domestic Violence Czar: Director of the National Network to End Domestic Violence. Vicious anti-male feminist. Supported male castration.

Gil Kerlikowske: Drug Czar devoted lobbyist for every restrictive gun law proposal, Former Chief of Police in Liberal Seattle. Believes no American should own a firearm. Supports legalization of drugs.

Carol Brower, Energy and Environment Czar: Political Radical Former head of EPA - known for anti-business activism. Strong anti-gun ownership. SOCIALIST on Commission for a Sustainable World Society, which calls for "global governance" and says rich countries must shrink their economies to address climate change.

Joshua DuBois Faith Based Czar: Political Black activist-Degree in Black Nationalism—seek a separate black nation.. Anti gun ownership lobbyist.

Cameron Davis, Great Lakes Czar: Chicago radical, anti-business environmentalist. Blames George Bush for “Poisoning the water that minorities have to drink.” No experience or training in water management. Former ACORN Board member.

Van Jones: Green Jobs Czar (since resigned). Black activist Member of American communist Party and San Francisco Communist Party who said Geo Bush caused the 911 attack and wanted Bush investigated by the World Court for war crimes. MARXIST, said whites are poisoning blacks, said transformation from “suicidal gray capitalism to econ-capitalism to the complete redistribution of wealth.” Black activist with strong anti-white views.

Daniel Fried, Guantanamo Closure Czar: Rights activist for Foreign Terrorists. Believes America has caused the war on terrorism.

Nancy-Ann DeParle, Health Czar: Former head of Medicare/Medicaid. Strong Health Care Rationing proponent. She is married to a reporter for The New York Times.

Vivek Kundra Information Czar: Born in New Delhi, India. Controls all public information,, including labels and news releases. Monitors all private Internet emails.

Todd Stern, International Climate Czar: Anti-business former White House chief of Staff- Strong supportrer of the Kyoto Accord. Pushing hard for Cap and Trade. Blames US business for Global warming.

Dennis Blair, Intelligence Czar: Ret Navy. Stopped US guided missile program as “provocative”. Chair of ultra liberal “Council on Foreign Relations” which blames American organizations for regional wars.

George Mitchell,Mideast Peace Czar: Fmr. Senator from Maine, Left wing radical. Has said Israel should be split up into “2 or 3 “ smaller more manageable plots”. Anti-nuclear anti-gun & pro homosexua.

Kenneth Feinberg, Pay Czar: Chief of Staff to TED KENNEDY. Lawyer who got rich off the 911 victims payoffs.

Cass Sunstein,Regulatory Czar: Liberal activist judge believes free speech needs to be limited for the “common good”. Rules against personal freedoms many times –like private gun ownership. Says animals should be able to sue people. Anti-hunting.

John Holdren,Science Czar: Fierce ideological environmentalist, Sierra Club, Anti- business activist. Claims US business has caused world poverty. No Science training. Thinks TREES should be able to sue humans.

Earl Devaney, Stimulus Accountability Czar: Spent career trying to take guns away from American citizens. Believes in Open Borders to Mexico. Author of statement blaming US gun stores for drug war in Mexico.

J. Scott Gration, Sudan Czar: Native of Democratic Republic of Congo. Believes US does little to help Third World countries. Council of foreign relations, asking for higher US taxes to support United Nations.

Herb Allison, TARP Czar: Fannie May CEO responsible for the US recession by using real estate mortgages to back up the US stock market. Caused millions of people to lose their life savings.

John Brennan, Terrorism Czar: Anti-CIA activist. No training in diplomatic or gov. affairs. Believes Open Borders to Mexico and a dialog with terrorists and has suggested Obama disband US military.

Aneesh Chopra, Technology Czar: No Technology training. Worked for the Advisory Board Company, a health care think tank for hospitals. Anti doctor activist. Supports Obama Health Care Rationing and salaried doctors working exclusively for the Gov. health care plan.

Adolfo Carrion Jr.,Urban Affairs Czar: Puerto Rican. Anti-American activist and leftist group member in Latin America. Millionaire “slum lord” of the Bronx , NY. Owns many lavish homes and condos which he got from “sweetheart” deals with labor unions. Wants higher taxes to pay for minority housing and health care.

Ashton Carter, Weapons Czar: Leftist. Wants all private weapons in US destroyed. Supports UN ban on firearms ownership in America.

Gary Samore,WMD Policy Czar: Former US Communist. Wants US to destroy all WMD unilaterally as a show of good faith.

Kevin Jennings, SAFE SCHOOL CZAR: AS a teacher when a fifteen year old said he was having sex with an older man, instead of turning in the man to the law he asked how it was going and suggested they use condoms. Wrote the intro to the book, “Queering Elementary Education.” Has repeatedly praised and claims to be inspired by Harry Hay, early supporter of NAMBLA, (Noth American Man Boy Love Association).

8)Obama and Dalai Lama: Why Israel Worries about U.S. President
By Dennis Prager


According to the Jerusalem Post, as recently as six weeks ago, just 4 percent of the Jews of Israel regarded President Obama as pro-Israel. Even if exaggerated, it is likely the most negative Israeli view of an American president since Israel's creation.

If you think Israelis are irrational in this matter, perhaps Tibet will help persuade you otherwise.

Yes, Tibet.

Whereas every Democratic and Republican president since 1991 has met with exiled Tibetan leader, the Dalai Lama, when he visited the United States, President Obama has decided that he will not do so during the Tibetan leader's visit to the United States. The president does not wish to annoy China's dictators prior to his upcoming visit to Beijing. As US News & World Report reported, "The U.S. decision to postpone the meeting appears to be part of a strategy to improve ties with China that also includes soft-pedaling criticism of China's human rights ..."

This is particularly troubling to Israelis because it means that an American president is placing appeasement of strong dictators above America's traditional defense of embattled small countries. (One assumes that the Taiwanese are equally worried; and the Iranian fighters for liberty have come close to giving up on Obama's America.)

The line between selling out Tibetans and selling out Israelis is a direct one. Even liberal New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd was disturbed by the president's snubbing of the Dalai Lama:
"Dissing the Dalai was part of a broader new Obama policy called 'strategic reassurance' — softening criticism of China's human rights record and financial policies to calm its fears that America is trying to contain it ... the tyro American president got the Nobel for the mere anticipation that he would provide bold moral leadership for the world at the very moment he was caving to Chinese dictators. Awkward."
The world is quite aware of the importance of Mr. Obama's snubbing the Dalai Lama. Dowd noted that:

"In an interview with Alison Smale in The Times last week, Vaclav Havel � pricked Barack Obama's conscience. Havel (who led) the Czechs and Slovaks from communism to democracy, turned the tables and asked Smale a question about Obama � Was it true that the president had refused to meet the Dalai Lama on his visit to Washington?"

Those who worry about good and evil know that if America decides that the world's approval is important, evil will increase exponentially. Only an America willing to be disliked, even hated, will consistently support the smaller good guys against the bigger bad guys.

If America starts shaping its foreign policy based upon getting along well with everybody, it will become less tenable to support Israel. The number of people and countries that want Israel destroyed are far more numerous than tiny Israel and its people. The price of supporting free, democratic, tolerant Israel against its death-loving, totalitarian and authoritarian enemies is reduced popularity of America in those countries. And if America now values getting along well with everyone above moral considerations, the days of strong American support for Israel are numbered.

They may indeed be numbered for additional reasons. Having been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, President Obama may be even less inclined to consider an American attack, or in any way countenance an Israeli attack, on Iran's nuclear weapons facilities. A Nobel Peace Prize laureate isn't supposed to support, much less initiate, first strikes.

Additionally, the president, given his yearning for a nuclear weapons-free world, may support an Iranian offer to disband its nuclear weapons program if Israel is forced to abandon its nuclear arsenal.

All this combined with the economically weakest America in memory — increasingly dependent on other countries to help prevent the dollar from becoming more like Monopoly money — means that the 96 percent of Israelis who do feel they cannot rely on this president of the United States as they have on prior presidents is, unfortunately, not irrational.

This president characterizes his presidency as essentially the opposite of that of his predecessor, George W. Bush. He may be right, as reflected by this note from the Washington Post: "The last time he (the Dalai Lama) was here, in 2007, George W. Bush became the first sitting president to meet with him publicly, at a ceremony at the Capitol in which he awarded the Dalai Lama the Congressional Gold Medal, Congress's highest civilian award."

If you were Israeli, which American president would you feel more secure with — the first one in 18 years who refused to meet with the Dalai Lama or the first one ever to meet with him publicly and give him a public honor?