Commentators: Herbert London

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Herbert London

4/30/08: Carter's Misguided Peace Gambit

Could there possibly be a more naļve person on the globe than former president Jimmy Carter? Or is Carter simply seeking the Neville Chamberlain award to put beside his Nobel Prize?

After meeting with Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal, Carter claimed the terrorist group accepts the Jewish state and is ready for peace. Either Carter misunderstood what was said at this meeting or chose to misunderstand, because the statements emanating from the Hamas camp stand in stark contrast to Carter’s public remarks.

Hamas leaders state categorically that they will not recognize Israel, but will offer the Jewish state a ten year truce if it evacuates the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Golan Heights and east Jerusalem, including Temple Mount. Moreover, and most significantly, the terror group will not annul its stated goal of annihilating Israel.

It was also noted that Israel must allow the “right of return” for millions of refugees, a formula most sensible people recognize for the destruction of the Jewish state. So let me get this right: In return for a temporary truce, Israel is obliged to commit suicide. This is what Carter calls peace in our time.

One Hamas spokesman made his claim transparently clear: “For any truce to take effect, Israel would need to evacuate every centimeter of the West Bank and every centimeter of east Jerusalem.” It is instructive that not one peace plan put forward by Fatah or even Israel’s leftist parties calls for so extreme a plan.

Speaking in Israel Carter offered his Trojan horse of a peace plan by claiming Hamas has agreed to “accept” Israel. “There’s no doubt that both the Arab world and the Palestinians, including Hamas, will accept Israel’s right to live in peace within the 1967 borders,” he added. Before Carter could finish his misguided claims, Fawdi Barhoum, Hamas spokesman, said, “We stand by our line, which means no recognition of Israel.”

Is Carter deaf or just a dupe? Even the so-called ten years truce is described as a “hudna,” a Koranic term used to describe a respite from war so that troops can be assembled for the final assault. It is also the case as half a century of negotiations between Israel and its Arab neighbors attest, that deceit is part of the Arab strategy – a point, among many, Carter chooses to ignore.

In addition to his conversation with Khaled Meshaal, Carter met with President Bashar Assad of Syria. Here too President Carter asserts that Syria is ready to “make peace” with Israel. “All” Israel has to do is give up the Golan Heights. In fact, Carter was “impressed” with Assad’s eagerness to consummate a deal. Rather than broach this anticipated deal with President Olmert, Carter met with Yossi Beilin, leader of the extreme left Meretz party, and prevailed on him to be the catalyst for such an accord.

While President Carter claims he is a private citizen representing only the Carter Center in these diplomatic discussions, he also claims the U.S. government would support “any” peace agreement reached among the principal parties. Not only is this claim fatuous, but as the contradictory arguments of Hamas leaders suggest patently false. “Any agreement” means the elimination of the state of Israel either now or later. How could any sensible leader in the United States or Israel agree to these terms?

To suggest that Carter can negotiate an accord where others have failed is to underestimate past deliberations or overestimate what is now being discussed. In Carter’s case there is evidence of an ego without limit, a rube without guidance and a naļve diplomat without an appreciation of history or facts on the ground.

Herbert London is President of the Hudson Institute and a Professor Emeritus at NYU. He is the author of Decade of Denial (Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2001). London maintains a website, http://www.herblondon.org/.

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4/23/08: Iran, the Capital of Terror Central

For a considerable period after 9/11 it was customary for foreign policy analysts to argue that the war against terror, renamed more accurately as the war against radical Islam, hadn’t any national destination. Alas, it was a war against a shadowy foe that didn’t wave any flag or reside in one country.

Recently evidence contradicts that conclusion. The enemy is Iran, the center of terror central and the nation with unequivocal imperial aspirations in the region. What was once obscure is now entirely transparent.

In the recent battle in Basra an Iranian Guard general was found giving orders to al Sadr militias. Both arms and men routinely cross the border from Iran into Iraq. Confrontations in Southern Iraq suggest Iran is also willing to support AQI (al Qaeda in Iraq) despite the fact this terrorist organization is Sunni and Iran is led by a Shia majority – so much for religious differences when the U.S. and Israel are the common foe.

Second, Hamas in Gaza is now a functioning surrogate of Iran. The money and arms in this area have been provided by Iran and the rockets landing in Sderot generally have Iranian markings.

Third, Hezbollah in Lebanon has regrouped since the war against Israel last year and has, according to recent accounts, stockpiled more than 30,000 rockets north of the Litani River and another 10,000 close to the border of Israel. This remarkable buildup occurred with Iranian assistance, support and training.

Fourth, Syria is yet another geographic pawn now controlled by the mullahs in Iran. President Asad is obliged to coordinate all foreign policy decisions with Ahmadinejad. In fact, he admitted as much when he said recently that he would discuss controlling the actions of Hamas and Hezbollah through his handlers in Iran if he were absolved of the murder of former Lebanon leader Hariri, a matter being investigated by the United Nations.

Fifth, Syria at the behest of Iran has held up presidential elections in Lebanon in an effort to install a candidate agreeable to Iranian leaders. In most respects, Lebanon is to Iran what the Sudetenland was to Germany in the 1930’s; it is a client state unable to operate without the consent of Syria and Iran.

Last, Iran, for reasons of its own ambition, actively promotes the enrichment of uranium which can be used for the development of nuclear weapons. Recently, Ahmadinejad announced the deployment of another 6000 centrifuges in Natanz to accelerate the enrichment process. It has also been discovered through satellite surveillance that Iran has deployed North Korean missiles with a range of 4000 kilometers, sufficient range to reach every European capital.

Clearly these potential weapons united with a missile present a growing threat in the region and beyond. But even if that weren’t the case, the mere existence of these weapons has generated diplomatic missions from Egypt and Saudi Arabia seeking some kind of alliance with Iran. Moreover, a nuclear armed Iran offers cover for the malevolent actions of Hamas and Hezbollah. It will be increasingly difficult for Israel to respond to attacks from these surrogates knowing that an Iran with nuclear weapons stands behind them.

It is distressing that despite all we know about Iran, a policy against this nation in unambiguous language has not been developed. As a consequence, Iran is becoming the Middle East hegemon, notwithstanding the fact Arabs distrust Persians and Sunnis have a different theological perspective from Shia. Power invariably trumps principle, particularly in the Middle East.

Based on recent events, we can no longer sustain the illusion that al Qaeda is an elusive force set loose on the world stage. It needs sustenance, safe homes and national support to survive. For its own national reasons Iran provides these conditions, even if at some point it will have to face down al Qaeda. At the moment, it is a useful ally. And at the moment as well, the U.S. cannot delude itself into thinking the Iranian threat will evanesce.

Each day that passes with Iran unchallenged is another day in which its power is enhanced and America’s Middle East position is diminished.

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4/16/08: Sarkozy As A European Echo

In a recent Le Figaro report Nicolas Sarkozy said, “At the end of the French presidency, my aim is that [Europe] will have moved towards a common immigration policy, a common defense policy, a common energy policy, and a common environment policy.” He noted, “The citizens of all of Europe demand protection; they want Europe to protect them, not make them vulnerable. They want it to allow them to act, not oblige them to suffer.”

President Sarkozy goes on to contend that this “protective Europe” is incompatible with “the excesses of financial capitalism.” He maintains that France under his guidance will take initiatives “to moralize capitalism.” As part of his vision Europe is to be seen for “community preference” and to make matters perfectly clear President Sarkozy has called on the government backed Caisse des Dépōts et Consignations bank to take the lead in protecting France from the “power of extremely aggressive sovereign funds.”

How does one parse the ambiguous phrases? Is European immigration policy, to cite one example, going down a path taken by France in which more than a quarter of Marseille residents are Muslim and unrest now characterizes urban life in this once peaceful city? What does Sarkozy mean by a common environmental policy? Are European nations about to embrace a common carbon footprint? And if so, will such regulation be enforced by bureaucrats in Brussels?

Perhaps the most interesting and often heard expression used by Sarkozy is “moralizing capitalism.” For years European leaders have been decrying “the inhuman dimensions of Anglo Saxon capitalism” – code words for the free market. Sarkozy is merely following the rhetorical lead of his predecessors.

However, in his desire to place strict control on sovereign investment he may be inhibiting cash starved industries and corporations and, in the process, restricting innovation Europe needs to be competitive. If moralizing capitalism means protective regulation that keeps union control over the labor market, stagnation is the inevitable result. It has been demonstrated in France and elsewhere in West Europe that if you cannot fire, you cannot hire, a condition that has led Europeans to envy the relatively low unemployment rate in the United States.

Clearly Europe has benefited from Arab capital that has gravitated north in search of investment opportunity. This condition aimed in part as punishment for American Middle East policy, has bolstered the euro against the dollar and, to a modest degree, has had a salutary influence on European economies.

But in actuality Europe’s industries are largely moribund. They cannot compete against Asian markets and often demand protection against the economic onslaught. The unfunded liability due to cradle to grave security - even with recent modifications in outlook – is daunting.

As a consequence, the Sarkozy proposal to moralize capitalize – which has the ring of human decency to it – is catastrophic for a Europe that suffers from economic sclerosis. If anything, France and Western Europe desperately require a shot of adrenalin in the form of free market initiatives.

Clearly Europeans have a preference for security, long vacations, short work weeks and reduced competition. However, Europeans are not alone in the world. The intrusion of other markets is a reality and the interest of competitiveness will have to assuaged.

While Sarkozy’s pro-American foreign policy stance is justifiably applauded, his European economic position is hopelessly predictable and doomed to fail. Perhaps as a member of the EU in good standing, he, as the leader of France, is obliged to repeat standard European slogans. But these are empty slogans that if enacted into policies will further weaken Europe economically and make it less likely the continent will assume the defense responsibility to which is so often gives lip-service.

Sarkozy has enjoyed a honeymoon period with American leaders, but his platitudinous economic position should offer a moment of reflection. Are we merely hearing much of the bankrupt moralizing of the recent past, an echo of Chirac? I’d hope that isn’t the case, but, in my opinion, that is the most likely conclusion to be reached from his remarks.

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4/9/08: The Kurds of The Middle East

There are ghosts walking the globe, forty million of them to be precise: People who are officially non-persons; some cannot marry, cannot register as citizens and are, for all practical purposes, invisible.

Twice in the last year Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad was in a position to resolve the plight of Kurds in Syria who struggle to survive without citizenship. But he did not act.

As a consequence, Kurds in Syria face obstacles owning property, having passports, voting or being publicly employed. They are not eligible for food subsidies or admission to public hospitals. In fact, there are now approximately 300,000 stateless Kurds in Syria (about 10 percent of the Kurdish population in this nation) without legal ties to the nation and effectively stateless under international law.

While the Kurdish condition in Syria is egregious, the Kurds in Iraq, Iran and Turkey also face varying degrees of hostility. They are minorities in each of these nations, yet are by far the largest ethnic group on the globe without a nation of their own.

As a minority in Muslim societies, the Kurds often tell their children that Islam was forced on them by Arab conquerors. In recent years many have returned to the original religion of Zoroastrianism, a condition that suggests a greater ethnic rather than religious identification.

From the standpoint of American foreign policy the Kurds have the potential to liberate or, at least, disrupt the dictatorial regimes in Iran and Syria, a point made most effectively by Jack Wheeler in a September 2006 article.

Clearly, a united Kurdistan is a chimera since Turkey would never permit it and the Kurds of Turkey are plagued by a Marxist terrorist organization called the PKK (Kurdish Workers Party), generally repudiated by most Kurds in the region. But the Kurds of Iran, Iraq and Syria are a potentially liberating force, an engine of democracy, waiting on the sidelines for the fall of the mullahs.

The question that remains unanswered is why our State Department doesn’t actively recruit and work with the Kurdish minority in Iran. Ten million Kurds in Iran could be a formidable force for the much discussed scenario of regime change. In general, they detest the mullahs and are outspoken advocates of democratic reform.

Similarly, the three million Kurds in Syria are avowed opponents of Assad. After decades of abuse by the Alawite minority they are prepared to resist a seemingly implacable regime.

But where is America’s strategic vision? What kind of assistance can we provide? In fact, are the Kurds even on the radar screen at Foggy Bottom?

If the alternatives in Iran policy are the military option or regime change, it would seem that some reliance on Kurdish assistance might be contemplated. That, however, does not appear to be the case, a matter that is most perplexing.

It may well be that State Department officials know something I do not. But vague responses to queries about the Kurds are not a hopeful sign. One would think that at this juncture we would seek to exploit every potential asset in the region in our quest to prevent Iran from possession of nuclear weapons.

That the Kurds are seemingly left out of the Iran policy equation is an omission that could have dire consequences for the region and perhaps for American interests across the globe.

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4/2/08: Chavez and His American Friends: An Unholy Alliance

Venezuela’s president Hugo Chavez is feeling his oats. With oil approaching $110 a barrel, he has transformed himself into South America’s banker, paying off the debt in Argentina, being the supplier of weapons for FARC and other radical groups and stirring up well funded political activity whenever the opportunity arises.

He has also adopted the mantle of America’s leading critic. In 2006 he called President George Bush “the Devil” at the United Nations General Assembly. He invariably invokes Noam Chomsky a radical critic of U.S. foreign policy, as a “truthteller.” He has expressed great confidence in Iran’s Ahmadinejad; has supported Hezbollah and calls Fidel Castro his mentor. And he inveighs against U.S. capitalism as “savagery” and free markets as an effort to foster income disparity.

Yet remarkably Chavez has many admirers in the United States. Cindy Sheehan, the soi disant poster woman for the anti-Iraq war sympathizers, calls him a friend and said with great enthusiasm that Chavez would undermine “the U.S. empire.”

Larry Birns, director of the Council on Hemisphere Affairs in Washington, argues that “Venezuela has become a major source of interest for social visionaries in the United States.”

Representative Dennis Kucinich wrote that the U.S. administration should look at Venezuela as a “model democracy,” a point of view embraced by Jesse Jackson, Ed Asner and leftist writers Howard Zinn and Naomi Klein.

In the face of a Chavez provoked crackdown on press organizations and dissenters, Representative Brad Sherman of California said Venezuela had “a strong free press and respect for important freedom.”

As one might expect, Hollywood is solidly in the Chavez camp. Harry Belafonte said “millions of American people… support your [Chavez] revolution.” Sean Penn delivered similar encomiums when he met with the Venezuelan president. And Danny Glover has received tens of millions from Chavez for the production of three new films.

Perhaps the most interesting of Chavez’s program agents is former Representative Joseph Kennedy. Kennedy, representing Citizens Energy Corporation, has been a television spokesman for Citgo, the Venezuelan oil outlet in the United States. Kennedy maintains on camera that Citgo is donating millions of gallons to needy Americans “because no one should be left out in the cold.” The fact that many Venezuelans are left out of the nations’ political process is not mentioned by Mr. Kennedy.

There is little doubt that the Kennedy gambit is designed to elicit good will for Chavez and, in a nation naļve about foreign affairs, it appears to be working. Some spokesmen have even urged their listeners to buy Citgo gas. After all, some of these dupes contend, Chavez is using oil revenue to alleviate poverty.

Chavez is conducting a public diplomacy campaign on several fronts. He has bought ads lauding Venezuelan accomplishments in the Economist, New Yorker, and Roll Call among others. And he has hired public relations firms to burnish the image of his government.

While Chavez frequently refers to himself as a modern Jesus and goes off on rants not unlike his hero Fidel Castro, he isn’t a fool. He has carefully cultivated hard core left wing opinion in the United States and has used his plentiful oil revenue to buy friends.

However, his agenda is quite transparent. He wants to undermine American interests on the continent and he expressly desires a Marxist style revolution wherever possible. If this agenda means embracing Ahmadinejad or any other enemy of the United States, so be it.

Since the left in the U.S. detests George Bush, Chavez is a useful vehicle for its interests. Anti-Americanism is the gravaman that unites Chavez, his U.S. admirers and global terrorists. Oil lubricates this alliance and fuels the network. We would be wise to examine his aims carefully and do what we can to thwart these objectives.

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3/26/08: So You Think We Won The Cold War

There was an unparalleled celebration in the West when the Berlin Wall, the symbol of Soviet oppression, was breached and destroyed. There was the self congratulations that visited U.S. and European capitals when the so-called Cold War seemingly came to an end without a shot being fired. And there was cheering from afar when the Soviet Empire was dismantled making Russia a smaller nation without imperial ambitions, or so it was believed in 1989.

But in looking at world affairs dispassionately today and the role Putin plays in it, the conclusion the Cold War is over or that Russia’s intentions are benign or that Russia is ensconced in the family of western nations is thoroughly misguided. Through systematic intimidation and its own view of regional dominance, Russia under Putin’s leadership has systematically reclaimed many territories lost after the break-up of the Soviet Union. It is not as if jack-booted troops have moved across borders to reconquer lost nations; the power of intimidation has led to faithful alliances from Belarus to Georgia and to the Ukrainian fear Russia will cease natural gas imports and “turn out the lights.”

Perhaps even more significant than what is happening in the “near abroad” is Russian foreign policy vis-ą-vis the United States. From the bastion at the U.N. Security Council to the G-8 meetings Russia has done whatever it can to thwart American foreign policy objectives.

First, and perhaps most significantly, Russia has opposed any sanctions against Iran that have real “teeth” in them. Moreover, Russian technology is critical in the uranium enrichment program the Iranians presently pursue. It is obvious that Putin will make whatever deal he can with Ahmadinejad in an effort to diminish U.S. influence in the Middle East. Ahmadinejad may not be a reliable partner since theological considerations enter the Iranian calculus, but at the moment the enemy of my enemy is my friend is at the forefront of Putin’s position.

Second, Russian oil and natural gas represent a source of hard currency gravitating to the bank accounts of leading Russian bureaucrats, but these natural resources are also political tools useful as an extortion device. With European natural gas pipelines going directly into Russian soil, the Putin government has leverage over the continent. At any point, he can turn off the natural gas spigot, causing dramatic economic dislocations on the European continent.

Third, Russia still possesses the second largest stockpile of nuclear weapons. According to some estimates, this is arguably the largest stockpile of nuclear weapons. When the U.S. and its allies in Poland and the Czech Republic discuss an eastern European anti-missile defense system designed primarily to neutralize Iranian ambitions, the Russians see this as hostile action against them and threaten to target these two nearby nations. While this action has not received very much press attention, it has had a chastening influence on Prague and Warsaw governments.

Whether it is U.S. interests in Europe or the Middle East, Putin has presented great roadblocks. So bold has he become in promoting his foreign policy agenda that Russian agents have been assigned to kill adversaries in western capitals (vide: Litvinenko).

The U.S. may shudder at these actions, but we are virtually powerless to do anything about them. It is curious that the so-called victor in the Cold War is often put in the position of a supplicant beseeching Russia to assist in the war against radical Islam. Ironically, the defeated party holds most of the high cards in this international game of poker.

Yet U.S. officials invariably speak boastfully of our victory over the Soviet Union in the Cold War. What kind of victory can this possibly be when a Russian nation possessing little more than oil and nuclear weapons can thwart the goals of the United States? Stalin once argued that at some point the Soviet Union would offset all U.S. influence worldwide. Certainly there isn’t a Soviet Union that can achieve this end, but Putin is a formidable heir to Stalin and he is pursuing a strategy that would bring a smile to the lips of his communist ancestors.

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3/19/08: Pariah States

There are two pariah states on the globe: nations routinely criticized and censured. One is Israel and the other is Taiwan. Both states are roughly 60 years old, economic powerhouses, democratic and targets at the United Nations. Interestingly both owe their existence to President Harry Truman.

The Republic of China organized a full scale war of resistance against Japanese aggression in 1937. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Republic of China followed the U.S. and Britain in declaring war on Japan.

At the end of the war it was stipulated that all former Republic of China territories that had been colonized by Japan had to be returned. These included Manchuria, Formosa and Pescadores.

After losing control of the mainland in 1949 to the forces of communism, the Republic of China government relocated to Taipei. In 1950 President Truman said at a press conference that those territories stolen from China should be restored to the Republic of China, including Formosa. These statements made at Potsdam and reiterated in subsequent years gave legitimacy to the claim of Formosa as the Republic of China and challenged the communist contention that Formosa is merely a breakaway renegade province.

Similarly, the United Nations seeking to redress legal arguments for a homeland for those the claims of Jews systematically killed and persecuted by the Nazi regime sought a legitimate answer for several Middle Eastern claims by establishing two states in the region: Israel and Transjordan. But Arab nations would not accept a Jewish state in what was said to be “their region.”

In the war that ensued, Israel fought to retain her borders and in the end prevailed. But Arab states continue to remain in a state of war unwilling to recognize the state of Israel as a legitimate sovereign nation.

While China employs its U.N. influence to keep Taiwan out of the international organization, Israel – a state formed by the U.N. – is invariably censured for its policies, even when those policies are consistent with provisions in the U.N. Charter.

Yet despite the impediments that stand in the way, both nations have employed their technical prowess to defend themselves and to emerge as economic strongholds. An area outside of Tel Aviv is known as the Second Silicon Valley and the Science Park in Taipei has become an incubator for products distributed all over the Asian continent and beyond.

While scientific advances have been the bulwark for the economy, military strength has served as a barrier against hostile designs. In the case of Israeli it is difficult to see how a nation of 6 million can prevail against 275 million hostile neighbors. Similarly, one wonders how Taiwan would fare with its 23 million people arrayed against 1.3 billion on the mainland. Yet neither Israel nor Taiwan are intimidated by threats or by the tacit and implicit rejection within the corridors of the U.N.

These two relatively small states serve as examples that occasionally international law serves a purpose other than great power demands, notwithstanding a U.S. umbrella standing as a defense shield against putative enemies.

It should be exhilarating to know that in a post modern world where Europe is being consolidated, Asia is preoccupied with an imperial China and America’s influence is largely undiminished, two little states that apply all the principles others only give lip service to, can survive and prosper.

Perhaps those Jewish prayers installed in the Wall of the Holy Temple and the Buddhist ritual to discover your fate by dropping wooden blocks and then finding sayings comparable to numbers selected, actually work. How else can one explain the success of these remarkable places in a veritable sea of hostile neighbors?

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3/12/08: Does It Pay To Have The UN In New York?

At a recent meeting in Manhattan an assemblyman on the east side said he was thrilled to represent a district in which the U.N. is located. He noted, as Mayor Bloomberg has on numerous occasions, that the United Nations is a great asset for New York City.

I’ve heard this plaint so many times, it has become a mantra. When critics of the U.N. indicate “the U.S. should leave the U.N. and the U.N. must leave the U.S.” there is invariably a New York official who says New York derives many benefits from having the U.N. here. But how can these U.N. cheerleaders be sure this claim is accurate? What is the statistical evidence for this argument?

At the risk of reifying numbers, it seems to me, worthwhile to consider the requisite statistics on both sides of the U.N. expense and benefits ledger.

Member delegations send over 5,000 people to New York annually for General Assembly meetings. Assuming the average visitor spends $3,353, the sum used by the New York City Chamber of Commerce, that translates into $16,765,000 of anticipated revenue. In addition, children of these U.N. employees generally attend the United Nations International School (UNIS) where according to school officials the total revenue for these students is $14,427,000, yet another benefit for New York City.

Perhaps the most significant benefit is the employment opportunities, and goods and services generated to accommodate U.N. personnel. This number is estimated at $2.5 billion by city officials.

The benefits side of the ledger should also include the one-time spending on the remodeling of the U.N., as well as the new construction now underway. This infusion of capital is estimated to be $1 billion by Skanska Construction Company, albeit an exaggerated number according to construction experts in the city.

In the aggregate, the total benefit for New York City is $3,531,192,000, a number that is probably as close to reality as one can get plus or minus $200 million.

On the cost side of the ledger are unpaid taxes owed by foreign governments which according to the New York Times estimate on July 11, 2003 and the Washington Post 6/14/07 are more than $236,500,500.

The New York Traffic Authorities estimate that additional traffic congestion caused by special events such as U.N. Week and visits by national leaders costs the city $825,200,000. There is also the minor, but irritating, expense of $18 million in unpaid parking tickets and $7 million in overtime for the police department and $5 million in overtime for the fire department.

In Donald Trump’s testimony to Congress he stated that his U.N. adjacent property has about the same square footage as the United Nations’ space, about 900,000 square feet. Based on an average square foot price for a Manhattan east side apartment near the U.N. of $1083, the total opportunity cost, assuming this space was converted into apartments, would be $974,700,000. In addition, at least eight thousand people would be employed in putting up new buildings in the U.N. space – yet another opportunity cost – with an average salary according to the Economic Development Corporation of $26,727. The total would be $213,816,000. And last, this theoretical community would house 20,000 apartments for individual families earning at least $70,000 annually and generate $1.4 billion of aggregate wealth that is not now realized. These figures are modest by Manhattan standards, but I don’t want to be charged with stacking the deck. The total on the expense side is $3,680,216,500.

Assuming an error of one deviation and assuming as well that opportunity costs represent a theoretical or unrealized proposition, the slightly higher costs over benefits is not sufficient to make a dispositive case for the economic inefficiency of the United Nations in New York City. Nor can it be asserted, as Mayor Bloomberg often does, that the U.N. is an economic benefit for New York. That assertion is more likely untrue than true.

Some would say the argument for the U.N. presence should go beyond economic matters. I would agree. But when the U.N. General Assembly gives Ahmadinejad a standing ovation, when it cannot define terrorism and when Arafat was permitted to wear a revolver at his side as he addressed his confreres, it might be best for U.N. supporters to rely on the ambiguous economic statistics than other arguments.

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2/20/08: Islamic Schizophrenia

In every discussion I’ve ever engaged about Islam and the future an ideological divide emerges over the willingness of Muslims to embrace basic human rights. On one side are those who contend the large majority of Muslims want the same rights accorded other groups around the globe, notwithstanding the influence of radical opinion. On the other side are those who contend human rights, even broadly defined, are inconsistent with sharia and therefore incompatible with Islam.

As I see it concepts of freedom and equality are treated with suspicion among Muslims because these ideas are perceived as a threat to their cultural identity. For many, freedom is placed in the cauldron of colonialist policies. Therefore it isn’t a universal principle which flowered through the Rights of Man, but is rather a specific regional concept imposed by an imperialistic authority.

At the same time “freedom” is also viewed as the liberation from tyranny as well as the strategy for dealing with corruption, poverty, illiteracy and marginalization.

The consequence of these two value systems is ideological schizophrenia with democratic ideas embracing the general welfare, education and healthcare etc. and, at the same time, human rights are seen as a colonial ploy to undermine Islamic identity.

In the West, some contend Muslim societies do not possess the political background to comprehend democratic principles and human rights. Others argue that Islamic societies can only embrace human rights selectively, but do not, alas cannot, envision human rights as an indivisible system.

Still other critics maintain that Islamic societies are fundamentally different since human rights are rooted in Western heritage and cannot be appropriated by Arab nations. This view fits with the colonial interpretation of human rights and often leads Muslim scholars to search the past for home grown ideas and glories. It is a position that renders human rights a monopolistic practice of Western liberal heritage based on the assumption that human rights serve one overarching Western view of mankind.

Hence there is difficulty in creating a foundation for a political culture viewed as foreign and oppressive. The universal orientation of human rights including citizenship, freedom, equality and justice are mere words that invite cynicism, if not hostility. What the Muslim often observes in the human rights campaign is an attempt to undermine his identity and his religious frame of reference.

What can be done? And are human rights as understood in the West the medicine Islamic nations need? The answer to the second question is “yes” since oppression is a condition that breeds hostility and vengeance. In a world with weapons of mass destruction the emergence and continuation of tyrannical ideologies threatens civilizational survival.

It is instructive that there have been moments, however transitory, in Arab history when liberation inspired a desire for human rights. Ataturk started the Turkish movement for democratic reform and the anti-colonial national liberation movements appeared briefly to embody human rights development. Despite the fact a contemporary Ataturk has not emerged in the Islamic world, the idea of human rights associated with national liberation can be rekindled.

Needless to say, this is an uphill struggle since national liberation is a secular movement that challenges religious fundamentalism and feeds into the suspicion alien ideas are being imposed from without. But what are the alternatives? As Bernard Lewis, doyen of Islamic studies noted, “Either we free them or they will destroy us.”

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2/13/08: Israel’s Dilemma

With the NIE report now firmly ensconced in the Israeli imagination with the justifiable belief that the U.S. military option against Iran has been forestalled, Israel is drifting alone in a hostile sea unsure about the appropriate strategic direction.

Should Israel adopt a wait and see attitude hoping that sanctions, however diluted by China or Russia or both at the Security Council will force Iran to forego nuclear weapons? Or should it launch a preemptive strike, one that destroys the uranium enrichment facilities and heavy water plant, but leads to retaliation in the form of chemical, biological and possibly nuclear weapons?

Even if it decides on the latter course of action, dangerous as it is, does Israel have the military capability of pulling it off? I have not spoken to one military leader on either side of the Atlantic who has a definitive answer to this question even when they are prepared to address it.

If Israel does not act, the neighborhood in which it finds itself will be even more inhospitable than during the six decades of its existence. Iran will likely secure an understanding with Arab states, notwithstanding suspicions about Persian hegemony. Power has a way of glossing over ideological disputes. Shia and Sunni will be united with one goal in mind: the elimination of the Zionist state.

If Israel does act – even if its actions are successful – the Arab street will be aroused. Suicide bombings would multiply. Al Qaeda would try to destabilize Pakistan in the hope it can get its hands on a nuclear weapon. Muslim extremism would gain traction everywhere on the globe and Israel would be isolated, perhaps even estranged from the United States with politicians decrying Israeli bellicosity.

Within Israel a government pledged to provide security for its people cannot offer that assurance unequivocally. Events have overtaken principle. Moreover, Israel’s nuclear arsenal – designed to deter an attack – may be negated by Iran’s weapons should they be obtained. A theological state that gives lip service to Armageddon may actually mean what it says. It most certainly would like to wipe Israel off the map, a comment asserted several times by Ahmadinejad.

Curiously this central life and death problem has been put on the back burner by negotiations over the Palestinian territory. The inflated rhetoric of the moment suggests that peace in the Middle East is dependent on a Palestinian state and cessation of the violence against Israel. In fact, this is little more than a distraction; if a treaty were reached tomorrow, it wouldn’t have any bearing on Iran’s regional ambitions.

Prime Minister Olmert insists the negotiations with Abu Mazen must continue despite Kassem rockets fired daily from Gaza into Israel by Hamas supporters. These rockets are deadly and they threaten lives indiscriminately, but however awful and intolerable they are, these weapons represent pettifogging matters compared to an Iran with a nuclear arsenal and a seeming willingness to use these warheads.

It is also the case that Israel’s morale has to be affected by the unfolding scenario. A recent survey indicated an overwhelming majority of Israelis would sacrifice their lives for the country. Yet with the odds stacked against it, how long can this attitude be sustained? The spirit of Masada still resides in the hearts of Israelis, but for how long?

Will world opinion shift in favor of terrorism if the Iranians obtain the bomb? Will Israel become the twenty-first century Sudetenland as contemporary Chamberlains line up to appease muscular Islamic nations? It boggles the mind that the horrible lessons of the 1930’s have not yet been digested.

Clearly the beat goes on. Israel will not go down without a fight. If the mullahs don’t mind sending others to die as they did in the Iran-Iraq war in order to save their own necks, maybe it is time to threaten them directly. Israel has the means to turn Iran into a glowing dust bowl.

Yet and yet, one hopes against logic that the center will hold, that rationality will prevail over fanaticism. The problem, of course, is that a hope is not something on which you can count.

Clearly the debate about the future of Israel is in full flower. Unfortunately the answers to recalcitrant questions aren’t apparent and almost any move has grim, alas horrendous, ramifications.

There is a Hebrew prayer that says, “Deliver us from the hands of every enemy and lurking foe…. and from all kinds of calamities that may come to afflict the world; and bestow blessing upon all our actions.” It is time to repeat this prayer every day and to every child until the fanatics of the world come to their senses or are defeated.

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2/6/08: The War Against Libel Tourism

It is hard to believe that in 2008, in the center of the most liberal and tolerant society in the world, there is a war going on over the First Amendment. Moreover, this war is occurring in an industry – book publishing – whose very existence depends on the free exercise of rights guaranteed by the First Amendment.

Let me back up and explain the conditions in this war. Rachel Ehrenfeld, author of Funding Evil: How Terrorism is Financed and How to Stop It, was sued by Saudi billionaire Khalid bin Mahfouz in a London court under the UK’s notoriously plaintiff-friendly libel laws, despite the fact the book was not, published in Great Britain and neither plaintiff nor defendant live there.

Ms. Ehrenfeld refused to take part in the suit, but a default judgment involving substantial monetary damages, a “declaration of falsity” against the book and a demand for a public apology, was leveled against her. In the book Mr. Mahfouz was accused of using his vast personal wealth to fuel terrorist activity. He rejected the claim and initiated the suit seeking a congenial court for the litigation. Hence the phrase “libel tourist” which has been employed by journalists to describe the case. It should be noted that Mr. Mahforz has been unable to provide incontrovertible evidence the claims in Ms. Ehrenfeld’s book are fallacious.

On December 20 a New York court maintained that it lacked jurisdiction to hear Ehrenfeld’s counter law suit which sought to have a British default libel judgment against her declared unenforceable in the United States. Ms. Ehrenfeld, however, has been unbowed and undeterred.

Recently two New York legislators, Dean Skelos and Rory Lancman, introduced legislation to prevent “libel tourists” from threatening authors and publishers through meritless defamation actions in plaintiff – friendly courts. The proposed legislation would amend New York’s code of civil practice to prohibit enforcement of a foreign libel judgment unless a New York court determines that it satisfies the free speech provisions guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution.

The legislation would also amend an existing statute in order to allow personal jurisdiction over non-state residents who obtain foreign libel judgments against New York residents.

Yes, the lines in the war have been drawn. A bipartisan group of New York legislators, the Association of American Publishers and defenders of the First Amendment are on one side. On the other, is billionaire sheiks who neither understand nor value the guaranteed freedom of speech and press etched in the American Constitution.

It would appear that the former side will prevail and, in my judgment, should prevail. But this is the age of political correctness in which some designated, protected groups cannot be named or criticized.

Moreover, Americans have seemingly lost a sense of their own unique traditions or have been so brainwashed by historical revisionists, they don’t know what to believe. At another time in our history Americans would be at the barricades defending Ms. Ehrenfeld’s freedom of speech. Now many have been cowed into averting their gaze.

What is right, however, needs no apologias. A discontented billionaire dismayed by his description in a book is free to sue for libel, but he must be put in the position of demonstrating the veracity of this claim. Moreover, he must prove, as is the case in libel litigation, that the author had “malicious intent.”

If we err at all in these matters, it should be on the side of guaranteed freedoms. And if we entertain libel suits, we should do so with the full knowledge that free speech is protected. Americans shouldn’t merely be defending their own; they should be defending their traditions. The long arm of a plaintiff friendly judgment should not carry any special weight here. Thank goodness there are New York legislators who understand that matter. And thank goodness as well there are those prepared to fight for our national traditions.

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1/30/08: Britain's Voluntary Apartheid

The Daily Telegraph recently published an article indicating that Islamic extremists have created “no go” areas across Great Britain where it is too dangerous for non-Muslims to enter.

Reverend Michael Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester and the Church of England’s only Asian bishop, said people of a different race or faith face physical attack if they live or work in communities dominated by a strict Muslim ideology.

Clearly what is at stake is the very future of Christianity as the nation’s public religion. With multiculturalism gaining ground as a philosophical position, Islam is riding on the coat-tails of this phenomenon. Since all faiths are to be treated equally according to this multicultural faith, it isn’t possible to challenge publicly the call to prayer or the reliance on sharia to adjudicate legal claims.

Trevor Phillips, the chairman of the Commission for Equalities and Human Rights, who has said England is “sleepwalking into segregation,” has been criticized for what some consider incendiary language. However, it is clear that multiculturalism has led to deep and irrepressible social divisions, what one politician called “voluntary apartheid.”

It would appear that the divisions can be attributed to the government’s failure to integrate immigrants into the larger community. But it is also related to a diminished belief in the Church of England and Christianity in general. Most residents of Britain believe the Church will be disestablished within a generation, severing a bond that has existed between Church and State since the Reformation.

Of course, there are those who contend that the critique of multiculturalism is little more than a manifestation of intolerance. Yet it is the intolerance in the Muslim communities that has resulted in this blow-back.

Reverend Nicholas Reade, the Bishop of Blackburn, which has a large Muslim community, maintains that it is increasingly difficult for Christians to observe their faith in communities where they are a minority. He too believes that pressure put on the Government will result in the disestablishment of the Church of England.

There is little doubt that Britain is undergoing dramatic change. In a mere few decades this nation with an acknowledged Christian foundation is now routinely described as a multi-faith society. Clearly the large number of immigrants entering the British isles accounts in large part for the shift in attitude. Yet that isn’t the whole story. The loss of confidence in the Christian vision, which underlies most of the achievements and principles of the culture, may account for a reluctance to defend the nation’s heritage.

If minorities are permitted to live in their own insulated communities, communicating in their own languages and having a minimum need to build relationships with the majority, the nation will sink into balkanization. Moreover, this separation feeds and endorses Islamic extremism by alienating youngsters from the nation and creating the impression ideological devotion is a mark of acceptability.

There are, of course, Muslims and Christians who recognize the problem and are eager to do something about it. But can sharia relate to British civil law? Can sharia-compliant banking be accommodated in a free market system? Can Christianity be maintained as the nation’s public faith? Can universities transmit a sense of Britannia when multiculturalism is in the ascendancy?

These are merely several of the host of questions and issues that must be addressed by government and religious leaders. Unfortunately there are many more questions than answers and much more confusion on the part of the British public than clarity about the road ahead.

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1/23/08: South Africa’s Embrace of Totalitarians

A federal appellate court recently put the world’s largest companies on notice that they could be held liable for having engaged in business with South Africa’s apartheid regime. Presumably doing business with regimes that commit human rights violations can be litigated retroactively. Overlooked in this court decision, however, are the human rights violations of the present South African government that emerged from the apartheid era.

While the betrayal of human rights can be found across the globe, it is nonetheless frustrating when a nation liberated from the yoke of oppression is complicit in promoting oppression elsewhere. Nowhere is this more evident than in the relationship between South Africa and Zimbabwe.

Since President Robert Mugube introduced a policy of violent confiscation of white-owned farms in 2000, Zimbabwe, once the jewel of Africa, has been reduced to degeneration, starvation and one of the lowest life expectancy rates in the world.

One might assume that South Africa liberated from apartheid would condemn the lawless behavior of Mugube. Well that might be assumed, but it would be wrong. Because Mugube fought against white colonialism, the ANC has been reluctant to condemn the brutality of his regime.

Moreover, not only does it give Mugube a pass on his brutality, it props him up through a formal military alliance and, through its auspices at the U.N., it keeps the evidence of atrocities off the international agenda.

In March 2007 Mugabe’s secret police cracked down on his opponents at a public prayer meeting and assaulted the country’s opposition leader, Morgan Tsuangirai. Yet the South African ambassador to the U.N. said Zimbabwe’s issues should “remain local,” untrammeled by international intervention.

Of course this is not the first time, nor is it likely to be the last time, South Africa supports dictatorial regimes. It has consistently voted against censuring the military junta in Burma at the U.N. and has adopted a defiantly anti-American posture in every international meeting in which it has been present. The Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs, Aziz Pahad, claimed the U.S. was responsible for a “volatile, dangerous and unpredictable environment” in world affairs and has condemned the “unilateral action” against Iraq.

Although South Africa’s Muslim community is small, 1.5 percent of the population, it has become increasingly radicalized. Yet ANC leaders have condoned the action of the radicals noting “a clear distinction between terrorism and legitimate struggle for liberation.” On the week of June 4 the ANC called for South Africans to turn out “in solidarity with the Palestinian people.”

While the reflexive anti-American and anti-Israeli position is not surprising, what is most noteworthy is South Africa’s role in supporting Iran’s nuclear ambitions. According to South African officials Iran has an “inalienable right” to a “peaceful nuclear energy program,” albeit that is precisely what Iran claims as well. Enriched uranium, of course, has other purposes as well, a point South African leaders certainly understand. That South Africa supports Iran is largely related to oil since Iran supplies almost half of the oil South Africa uses.

If one were to drill down far enough, the ANC’s cozy embrace of totalitarians is related to an historic distrust of the West, solidified during the apartheid years. Bubbling to the surface is anti-American sentiment based on a belief the U.S. could have done more to end the hateful apartheid system.

Yet it is instructive that the U.S. relies heavily on South Africa to be the continental leader. And in some ways South Africa is fulfilling this role with its peacekeeping force in the Congo, the Ivory Coast and Burundi and its belief in sound economic principles.

Unfortunately the positives that have emerged are more than neutralized by ANC’s complicit support of totalitarian practices that are reminiscent of South Africa’s discredited past. As one South African spokesman noted, “South Africa is now the only state in the democratic world aside from Venezuela…that is standing behind Iran on everything.”

I wonder what Nelson Mandela thinks about this stance. I wonder and I fret.

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1/16/08: The "Overrepresentation Myth" On Campus

Russell Jacoby author of The Last Intellectuals contends on the pages of The Chronicle Review 1/11/08 that “the fate of public intellectuals today allows no neat and certain answers.” He goes on to note that the conservative critique about the Academy has arrived at the wrong conclusions, to wit: bemoaning the overrepresentation of liberals and leftists in academe.

“For starters,” he notes, “how are such political animals identified? And how much does it matter if a Republican, Democrat or Naderite teaches ‘The History of Ancient Greece’?”

Mr. Jacoby has a point, but it is certainly not as compelling as he thinks. Presumably the History of Ancient Greece should not be influenced by one’s political philosophy. And to be sure, that is sometimes the case. What Professor Jacoby overlooks, however, is that in the university hothouse everything is political including and, most especially, pedagogy.

Take his example. The quasi Marxist (real Marxists don’t admit to their leftist commitment) will contend that Athens was divided into two societies – one of slaves and the other of landholders each pitted against one another in an irrepressible conflict. The conservative will argue that arźte, the striving for individual fulfillment, represented the efflorescence of individualism. The Naderite might contend that Solon, the law giver, was a reformer keen on righting the wrongs of the Establishment.

If the instructor chooses to teach by illustrating many approaches to the subject that is one thing. But if the instructor chooses to preach by imposing his particular orientation on students that is a completely different matter. Is Professor Jacoby arguing that there aren’t professors who fall into the latter category?

In fact, as Richard Rorty and others have admitted their job as professors is to convert, to change and alter student attitudes. Hence, their pedagogy is based on a victory which translates into persuasion.

I am less convinced by the argument of “overrepresentation” to which some conservative scholars refer than I am by ideologically driven pedagogy. I recently heard an English professor who stated definitively that Hamlet had an oedipal complex over Gertrude. When a student said she doubted the veracity of this claim, she was simply shouted down and made to look foolish. The professor in question would not allow for alternative interpretations of Shakespeare’s work.

Similarly, I heard a professor of American History argue that the Civil War was inevitable, there wasn’t any compromise that could have prevented the conflict. This, in my judgment is a plausible hypothesis, but when one student maintained that there is insufficient evidence to rely on this judgment, the instructor applied Marxist logic of class and culture conflict to suggest the case is closed.

So despite Professor Jacoby’s claim that conservatives shouldn’t be overwrought by the overrepresentation of leftists on campus, I would contend that leftist bias is often the overarching pedagogical thrust in the classroom. As a consequence, what I have observed is that subjects which are not ordinarily politically sensitive, can be manipulated by the preachers in the Academy into unadorned political propaganda.

To suggest, as Professor Jacoby does, that professors “inhabit a protected environment where they can neither harm each other nor reach outsiders,” is misguided in my judgment. The outsiders in this equation are students and, from what I’ve observed, can indeed be “harmed” by politically driven professors.

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1/9/08: Rangel The Reaganaut?

Far be it for me to criticize a man who comes to his senses. And far be it for me to criticize a journalist I admire. But when George Will writes that Charlie Rangel is a tax hating Democrat, either his researchers haven’t done their homework or Mr. Will has been duped by Washington’s premier mountebank.

According to Congressman Rangel circa 2008, “Ronald Reagan opposed using the tax code as a means of achieving changes in our social structure. I don’t think the tax code should be a substitute for the appropriations process in making social change.”

Rangel contends that what we do to tax payers is embarrassing. Sounding a little like Steve Forbes, he is now a proponent of a simplified tax code, one that lowers rates and closes loopholes.

In examining his 19 year history in the Congress one would be hard pressed to find consistency. In fact, his only consistent position is inconsistency.

What is most remarkable was his voluble position against Reagan’s tax cuts. He did not rail against them because of a belief they would harm the economy; he criticized them because, as he noted at the time, they are “racist.” Yes, this same Charlie Rangel who advocates lower rates and simplicity condemned tax decreases as racist.

Could the representative from Harlem have had as epiphany? It is possible, but doubtful. As chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, he may be obliged to be more responsible than he was in the past. It may also be the case – excuse my cynicism – that Mr. Rangel is more wealthy than he used to be putting him in the highest tax paying bracket.

If one were to parse his former claim of tax decreases as racism, you would find that his presumption is African-Americans need government hand-outs and any diminution in this government role is unfair. That this stance is pandering at its worst did not phase the shameless Mr. Rangel. He knew where his electoral bread is buttered.

When I challenged him on this point during a television talk show, he accused me of racism for supporting Reagan’s tax cuts. How then can anyone take Mr. Rangel’s present claims seriously?

That a cut in tax rates might generate additional tax revenue is a concept outside of Mr. Rangel’s ken. For him, all issues were to be seen in racial terms. Before his newly discovered respectability, Mr. Rangel was a racial hustler who shot from the hip for the delectation of his constituents.

Mr. Will now claims Rangel is a new man. Well, I don’t buy it. First, I would like to know which lobbyists are paying for his trips to the Caribbean? Second, I would like to know if his advisers told him a form of triangulation might be good for a Senate run? And third, if his tax proposals are to be “revenue neutral,” what’s in and enhanced or out and diminished?

If George Will had answers to these questions, his column might be credible. Without them, I remain a skeptic. Moreover, recognizing Mr. Rangel’s chameleonic history, I tend to be skeptical about any of his public utterances.

Perhaps I should give more credit when it’s due, but in his case the past is not a distant memory and I still retain a vivid recollection of the fury of his critique. Tax cuts thy name was racism sayeth the Congressman from Harlem.

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1/2/08: Pakistan’s Future Options

There is consensus among historians of World War I that the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand was a trigger that set in motion events leading directly to the onset of war. Could it be that the assassination of Benazir Bhutto will have a similarly profound effect, except that in this case the murder mobilizes those internal forces opposed to terrorism?

While there isn’t any doubt al Qeada has deep roots in Pakistan, the majority of the people are opposed to suicide bombing and to the violence that is evident daily. Ms. Bhutto appealed to moderates in her country and her campaign rhetoric was decidedly pro-western. However, based on her pervious stint as prime minister there was every reason to believe her words were the triumph of hope over experience. She was a failed leader, better known for the corruption in her government than ferreting out terrorists.

Yet it may be that what Ms. Bhutto could not accomplish in life, she may be able to accomplish in death. Every legitimate party in Pakistan on both the left and the right is now calling for the defeat of al Qaeda and the Taliban.

When 2000 Pakistani troops were captured in Waziristan last year, General Pervez Musharraf made a deal with the terrorists that in return for the release of troops Waziristan would be a virtual sanctuary for extremists. Alas, this region is now a hotbed of terrorist training and planning and most likely the place where the assassination of Bhutto was planned.

Now pressure has arisen all through the country and in nations that provide aid to Pakistan to abrogate that understanding. Musharraf will have to demonstrate that no territory within Pakistan’s border is safe for terrorism.

Moreover, he will also have to show that the ISI, special services, has been purged of Taliban influence. It has long been known that this branch of the military has elements sympathetic to the Taliban and, while hard evidence isn’t available, there is suspicion that ISI, while not complicit in Bhutto’s assassination, did not do all it could to protect her.

Musharraf will also be obliged to prove that he is committed to a democratic process, even if the result leads to the legitimacy of extremist parties. U.S. aid will be calibrated to this State Department injunction and Musharraf can ill afford to ignore it. He is now in the awkward position of navigating between the Scylla of democratic elections with unknown outcomes and the Charybdis of overarching security concerns.

While State Department advice can be asserted glibly from the confines of Foggy Bottom, Musharraf must maintain control of the nuclear facilities at all cost.

This brings me to the last and, most important, dimension of this analysis: Musharraf himself. Musharraf is a military man inserted by history into a political maelstrom. Having spent some time with him, I believe he is an intelligent man with reasonable political instincts. But I cannot attest to his trustworthiness. He has made deals that reflect a certain prognatism, but not a vision. As a military man he understands the need for order, but not the need for openness.

In the end, he may not be an ideal leader or the one we would prefer, but under the present unsettled circumstances, he is the only reasonable option available to promote American interests in the region. At a recent presidential primary rally Governor Richardson of New Mexico called for Musharraf’s ouster claiming he did not do enough to cleanse his nation of terrorists. What Mr. Richardson did not propose, because he couldn’t, is an alternative to the present leadership.

There is the dilemma. With Bhutto’s death there isn’t an alternative to Musharraf. Despite all the criticism that has been leveled against him, he is the only slim reed on which the future stability of Pakistan can rest. Either we help to make Musharraf’s government work or we look darkly into an abyss in which extremists gain control of the country and possession of nuclear weapons.

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12/26/07: The New World Technology Is Creating

It is a virtual cliché borne of overstatements to suggest the world is interconnected. Technology has created the information economy and according to Thomas Friedman, has made “the world flat.” Presumably the p.c. has made decisions possible in real time, has offered opportunities for labor, commerce and wealth production on an unprecedented scale, and provided benefits too numerous to identify. Let me illustrate.

Most libraries will soon be book-free and devoid of people. In the cyberspace age most research is done online. Google is in the throes of digitizing 32 million books on its site. For the Google entrepreneurs, content hasn’t any value. It is the viewer who is important, the person who wants the content. Needless to say, for authors this may appear as copyright infringement, but for the researcher it is nirvana.

Any topic the mind can conjure is or will soon be researchable. Buildings housing books have become places for repose or for codgers like me who love dusty stacks. But the library of books and archives is quickly becoming an anachronism.

Similarly, a technology that transmits information in words and pictures can advise and educate. A surgeon at NYU hospital can assist with a surgery in Nairobi; a grandma in New Jersey can provide visual evidence for her cold remedy to a grandchild in Los Angeles.

Behavioral targeting to wit: the preferences of online users are collected and offered to advertisers capable of targeting individual consumers. “Deep pocket inspection boxes” inside an Internet network can track consumer visits and deliver precise data to anyone eager to sell products or influence opinion and taste.

Perhaps the most significant online break-through is the use of “virtual” manufacturing, sometimes described as nanotechnology. Products can now be produced in a virtual world without real mock-ups or materially based forms. From airplanes and cars to buildings and homes, a non-material world of products can be constructed, in fact, is being constructed as Boeing’s 777 aircraft indicates.

In a world where information and ideas count more than material resources, the gap between rich and poor will diminish in time. In fact, companies that relied on a stable of scientists or so-called experts will now be challenged by the globalization of the Internet. If a question is posted thousands of people across the globe will be able to address it in real time. Knowledge will be democratized as the aggregate views of mankind tackle issues from desertification to agricultural yield.

That technology is changing our lives is apparent as the cell phone, iPods and HDTV demonstrate. But I would be remiss if I mention only the benefits without considering the drawbacks.

A generation that relies on the Internet for research seeks specific answers to specific questions. The large universal, deeply philosophic matters are overlooked. Moreover, if intellectual property is made available without charge—the manifest form of Internet transactions—what is the incentive for scholarship?

Second, the value of the Internet is anyone can use it (this is the height of egalitarianism), but the major flaw is anyone can use it. This technology can be employed to spread knowledge and to spread rumor, to elevate the human experience and to degrade it. The fact that a false rumor can circulate the globe in seconds should give us pause.

Third, by monitoring individual preferences through advanced targeting devices, privacy can be jeopardized. Do I want advertisers to know my desires? Do I want all the information about myself collected and made readily available to a source I do not know?

As Descartes noted when he discussed “the ghost in the machine,” technology offers wonders that can influence living, but it is accompanied by a cost. It is one thing to see a world that is flat with opportunity universalized, but it is not far-fetched to envision a Brave New World as well. Clearly the choice is ours or is it? Technology seemingly has momentum of its own. Once in motion, it is hard to stop. Hence, it is wise to think through the pros and cons of new technology and never lose sight of the law of unintended consequences.

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12/19/07: $100 a Barrel Oil?

As oil approaches $100 a barrel and as some pundits contend the price could reach $200 a barrel, Chicken Littles are persuaded this could undermine western economies and involve an historic transfer of capital to oil producing nations.

While this could happen, I remain unconvinced. It is not that I am hopelessly polyannish; my guarded optimism is based on several quite logical expectations.

First, an oil price that accelerates the production of synfuel alternatives is not in the best interest of OPEC nations. Saudi economists understand that matter which explains why production increased in the 1970’s when President Carter introduced his synfuels plan.

Second, while demand has been increasing, particularly from China and India, known reserves have also been increasing in East Africa, Proudhon Bay, and the South Pacific. Of course, crude oil is meaningless without refineries. For the first time in decades the U.S. is intent on doing something about refinery capacity.

Third, the public is increasingly aware of the fact that oil revenues translate into terrorist activity, a condition that explains why Americans are eager to see a largely homegrown fossil fuel industry such as ethanol.

Fourth, steps are being taken to transfer combustion technology reliant on gasoline to hybrid and electric cars.

Fifth, the use of sovereign Arab capital to buy western companies, and financial institutions is engendering widespread uneasiness and dissatisfaction with Middle East oil.

Sixth, there isn’t a presidential candidate in either major party who doesn’t discuss “energy independence.” Of course, it would be far more accurate to say “less of a reliance on Middle East oil,” but that’s not quite as sexy as energy independence.

Seventh, it is often overlooked that Canada has the world’s largest oil reserves, more than Saudi Arabia. However, much of it is in the form of tar sands, difficult and expensive to extract. However, at $100 a barrel, this fossil fuel is starting to look economic.

One of these conditions alone might not be sufficient to change the oil pricing structure. In the aggregate, however, a scenario has emerged in which high oil prices are probably not sustainable.

Another independent variable that influences oil price is the weakness of the dollar. But that too is more a temporary condition rather than a long term prospect. When the Fed decides to control dollar production and loose credit, the dollar’s trajectory will undoubtedly change. As one might guess the weak dollar is also having a salutary effect on the current account balance since U.S. exports appear very reasonable.

Most significantly, the average person realizes something is amiss. We buy oil from sheiks who fuel terrorism and then we have to employ tax generated funds to fight the terrorists. There is something wrong with this picture. Mr. and Mrs. Man and Woman On The Street are starting to get it. And when they get it, the pols cannot be far behind.

While $100 a barrel for oil seems like an overwhelming obstacle for business development and economic growth, it is not here for the long term. Markets adapt to price escalation. The oil market is in the Spring of this adjustment, but, I’m convinced, it will flower. When it does, I’d like to be among the first to say “goodbye OPEC.” It was a cartel that lost its way and won’t be remembered for anything except the manipulation of the market for awhile. That, and making sheiks more wealthy than logic would suggest they had any right to be.

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12/12/07: Congestion Pricing Evaluated From The Standpoint of Practical Experience

The logic of “congestion pricing,” to wit: charging cars an exorbitant sum for driving into the inner city in order to avoid traffic congestion, is compelling. It flows from the free market logic that if you tax something, you get less of it. In this case, it would be fewer cars on the city streets.

London’s mayor argues this has been a grand success and Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York City agrees. In fact, he has lobbied energetically with Albany legislators to get approval for his plan.

Unfortunately, what Mayor Bloomberg has not considered is the law of unintended consequences. When asked how people would navigate about midtown Manhattan where congestion pricing would be enforced, he said, “they will use public transportation.” Here’s the rub.

For anyone using the Number 4 or 5 on the East Side Subway Line, it is apparent the trains are filled to capacity, alas beyond capacity, from 6 am to 10 pm. In fact, as a regular rider, I can attest to the condition.

At the 42nd Street Station there isn’t even standing room on the platform. Mayhem invariably results when those getting off the local Number 6 train seek a downtown express.

Now the mayor contends that the subway system can accommodate thousands of additional passengers. Is he kidding? Presumably the mayor who uses this line on his way to City Hall, or so he says, claims the trains are “not crowded.”

I find it hard to believe he uses the same line I do. On my several subway trips each weekday, I find myself converted into a sardine. I’m obliged to breathe the fumes of recently devoured onions and hair that hasn’t been washed in weeks. There are times I simply get off at the nearest station to breathe.

Needless to say, intimacy is part of the New York experience. Most people conduct themselves with reasonable respect for others and remarkably there are few subway injuries and even fewer fatalities.

Yet, as I see it, the system is at capacity. Another 50,000 users would break this precarious balance. Mayor Bloomberg may think the East Side Line can accommodate others, but he is dead wrong.

Congestion pricing is a theory in search of empirical evidence. What it may restrain on the avenues and streets, it will surely exaggerate in the subway system. Perhaps this underground congestion will render MTA efficiencies; perhaps additional trains will be employed; perhaps, as well, the Second Avenue Line will be completed. But these conditions fall into the realm of wishful thinking. What we have, is likely to be what will have, at least for the foreseeable future. Hence anticipating an illusory set of new arrangements is simply daydreaming.

Therefore, despite my predilection to embrace free market ideas, I do not believe congestion pricing can work in New York. For residents in Area Code 10021 who do not use the subway system and live in Mayor Bloomberg’s insulated New York City, the idea has resonance. But for those of us riding daily on the Numbers 4 and 5 congestion pricing is a thoroughly impractical concept.

In one respect, it reminds me of the 5¢ deposit on bottles and cans which, based on the logic of the market, was designed to clean the streets of litter. What the promoters of this idea neglected to consider is that surveyors of bottles and cans would rummage through plastic bags of garbage spreading filth across streets and placing greater demands on the Sanitation Department than was formerly the case.

As one of the great philosophers of the 20th century, Fats Waller once said, “One doesn’t know do one.” Theories do not always work as we expect them to and, one way or another, unintended consequences usually enter the social equation.

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12/05/07: The Bad News Is The Good News Is Ignored

More than a decade ago Ben Wattenberg wrote a book with the marvelous title, The Good News Is The Bad News Is Wrong. If that book were republished today I would change the title to The Bad News Is The Good News Is Ignored.

It isn’t surprising that in the world of media reportage only bad news counts. The problem with this condition is that it feeds a generally one dimensional view of politics, a misperception of the world that promotes weltschmerz and despair.

Most of the reports about Iraq, for example, emphasize sectarian violence, failed policy and tactical errors. Overlooked, with rare exceptions, is that the “surge” and an emphasis on counterinsurgency have had a profound effect on the war effort. Civilian deaths have fallen 77 percent year over year, while military fatalities have declined by 64 percent.

Needless to say, nirvana has not been achieved, nor is it appropriate to declare victory, but the trend line is clear. Al Qaeda is in retreat. Even many Sunni leaders who had provided sanctuary for Al Qaeda terrorists have turned against them. Recently the Washington Post and the BBC finally admitted that violence in Iraq is abating, but these stories appeared well into the third stage of the campaign and remain aberrational in media coverage of the war.

Second, it is noteworthy that Democratic candidates for president have placed a great emphasis on income disparity in the nation. The quasi Marxist contention is that the rich grow richer and the poor, poorer. Yet the evidence provides a somewhat different picture.

The middle class has more disposable wealth than ever before and the lowest quintile has actually improved its annual income. Moreover, the numbers overlook the extraordinary mobility of one group rising and some falling back. But perhaps the most significant finding is that the percentage of those who are poor had declined slightly and the percentage of those who earn above $150,000 per annum has increased (controlling for inflation).

Needless to say, this condition may not attract the attention of “two Americas” speech-makers since the reality is much less provocative than assertions of economic exploitation. But surely there should be space somewhere in television land where the nuanced story of class income can be described.

Last, it is often said by the panjandrums of television news that most Americans are dissatisfied with their jobs. Presumably workers are distressed by dreary dead-end positions. Yet recent polls tell a different story with more than two thirds arguing that they are satisfied or very satisfied with their present positions.

It should also be noted that most Americans between the ages of 25 and 45 change jobs multiple times indicating that there are several opportunities to find employment satisfaction. In a society that has made the transition from an industrial base to an information structured economy, those who obtain skills can dictate to the employment market. This may be the first time in history that labor influences management more than the reverse.

These largely undisclosed, or should I say non-publicized, accounts are part of a consistent media view. In the 1960’s it was argued, due in part to Paul Erhich’s book The Population Bomb, that the world’s population would double in every subsequent decade. Of course, that hasn’t happened, but the recantation hasn’t either. It was argued four years ago that several islands in the Pacific would have to be evacuated because the ocean would rise due to global warming. But the devastation of these atolls has not occurred and the media organs responsible for the initial accounts are silent.

The drum of beat of negativism is unrelenting. There may be some good news stories on t.v. and in newspapers, but it is simply hard to find them. I wonder what kind of effect a steady diet of negative news has on the public. No, I need not wonder; I see it in the mind set of nihilists who preach despair and the end of the American experiment.

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11/28/07: The Israeli Attack in Syria and The State Department Response

The veil of secrecy surrounding the Israel invasion of what is alleged to be a Syrian nuclear facility on September 6 is understandable. Israel is not willing to disclose its military capabilities and technical advantages.

On the other hand, the secrecy is having and will continue to have a profoundly negative effect on United States’ diplomatic credibility. Since North Korea was involved in one way or another with the Syrian facility either by providing enriched uranium, nuclear technology or plutonium, it makes sense to discuss Kim Il Jung’s pernicious role in exporting nuclear material.

Yet the State Department, leading a discussion in the Six Party talks over North Korea’s nuclear capability, does not want to upset the so-called apple-cart by describing North Korea’s malevolent influence. Silence in this case is deadly, but the State Department goal is an agreement, however empty the ultimate result might be.

What hasn’t been seriously entertained is the influence of silence on the talks in Annapolis and back channel conversations with the Iranians. If the United States chooses to avert its gaze to North Korea’s mischief, the message being conveyed is that you can get away with a great deal if you negotiate with the U.S. and offer the illusion of conciliation.

In fact, diplomacy has become a weapon used against this government by our enemies mindful of our energetic pursuit of treaties. This is the twenty-first century version of the Munich Accord with appeasement the goal for State Department officials who do not know how to say “no.”

Moreover, the hidden message at Annapolis is the U.S. wants a deal even if it means giving tacit support to terrorists and selling out our allies. What other conclusion can one reach if we are unwilling to blow the whistle on North Korean nuclear exports.

For some who believe it always pays to talk to adversaries (Obama Barack comes to mind), it should be noted that negotiations can serve as a cover for violent acts. In the haste to produce an “understanding” the U.S. can overlook or rationalize any action that might jeopardize a treaty. Yet as history has demonstrated treaties are worthless if one of the parties chooses to ignore its terms. Think of the Kellogg-Briand pact or the Locarno Treaty.

It should be noted that in addition to the dissemination of nuclear material, the North Koreans have provided every rogue state in the Middle East with missile technology to deliver weapons of mass destruction. The SCUD arsenal in Iran, for example, has its provenance in North Korea.

There are times in foreign affairs when silence is golden. As already noted, I can appreciate Israel’s reluctance to discuss details of its September 6 attack. But the U.S. is in a different position vis-ą-vis North Korea and its involvement with possible Syrian nuclear material. This disclosure warrants transparency in my judgment.

Unfortunately the State Department wants deals more than disclosure. As a consequence, the full story of North Korea’s involvement with Syria won’t be known in the short term. But there is something we do know: Israel would not have attacked unless the material in question was a direct threat to its security and Syria would not have cleaned up the site unless the material might prove to be an embarrassment.

What we also know is North Korea’s involvement in this imbroglio, since a North Korean vessel carrying sensitive material was monitored by Israeli surveillance satellites days before it arrived in Syria. The key question that remains open is why the State Department maintains secrecy about this matter. But, than again, I think I know the answer to this question.

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11/21/07: The Politics of Futility

There is only one way to describe the upcoming Middle East peace conference at Annapolis: the politics of futility. It is clear that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would like a plaque on her wall suggesting she achieved what her predecessors could not. But all the good will in the world can not redress an intractable reality.

As poll after poll notes, a majority of Palestinians are unwilling to recognize the legitimacy of Israel as the homeland of the Jews, even if territorial and immigration issues were resolved.

Moreover Mr. Abbas, representing Fatah, has not been able to control the violent and terroristic actions of his Hamas colleagues, notwithstanding claims to the contrary. If Arafat rejected Israel’s generous offer at the Wye Plantation to give 97 percent of the West Bank to the Palestinians and divide Jerusalem, why would Abbas accept any less, particularly when he faces even more pressure from internal rivals than his predecessor?

Similarly, how can President Olmert make any deal when his approval rating within Israel is at single digits and the level of public distrust with the government has reached unprecedented levels?

These questions beg for answers that are unavailable. Recognizing these conditions, one might ask why this peace conference is called for in the first place. The answer to this question resides in the Byzantine politics of the Middle East. President Bush wants to create the impression he is even-handed and not simply tilting in a pro-Israel direction. This posture is designed to mollify Saudi leaders who have been notoriously hypocritical about the Palestinian question.

Secondly, the Bush team wants to address European concerns about the Middle East in the hope (probably forlorn) that with the resolution of the Palestinian issue, the American government can retain support for its position against Iranian nuclear weapons. Maintaining solidarity on Iran is a key foreign policy goal and the Annapolis conference is an instrument for addressing it.

Third, Arab nations continue to claim that unless the Palestinian issue is addressed support on other matters isn’t possible. As I see it, this position is a ruse, a rationalization for inaction in Darfur and Somalia. Even if the Palestinian issue didn’t exist, these other crises would still be on the back-burner.

This peace conference is a quixotic effort that may for a temporary period bolster the political fortunes of Mr. Abbas, but in the long term will be seen for what it really is: an empty political gambit that generates a lot of thunder and very little lighting.

The pressure on Israel to give up all rights to the disputed territories in the West Bank and divide Jerusalem will be unrelenting. Israel has something to offer in these negotiations. The Palestinians, by contrast, can offer proclamations that are devoid of substance, even if well meaning. It doesn’t make any difference what Abbas says if he cannot control Hamas.

Spin meisters will likely discuss the efflorescence of peace as an aftermath of the conference. However, this will be a chimera. Peace isn’t possible unless both parties are committed to it and third parties cannot interfere with the treaty.

This may be a time for talk; it is not a time for a peace treaty. Unfortunately patience is a virtue for most of us, but not for the State Department. It would be useful if someone would recall recent history. The so-called Oslo accord produced Intifada I and II. Raising expectations – the likely result of negotiations – invariably leads to disappointment and, in this case, to the Hamas argument that violence begets more results than negotiations.

History has a strange way of insinuating unpleasant realities into well meaning goals. It would be useful if our diplomats could remember that. Unfortunately the mistakes of the past are easily forgotten. Diplomats aren’t accustomed to saying “no” even when that is the right response. As a consequence, Annapolis will be a road map to nowhere except frustration highway.

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11/14/07 What a University Education Really Means

For middle class parents who spend a king’s ransom to send their children off to college there is the expectation that their offspring will receive an education in science, math, the humanities and social sciences. This rite of passage is not merely an expensive dalliance, it is regarded as a union card for success. After all, the education pundits are always saying a college degree pays for itself in increased earnings.

What these parents don’t know or rarely realize is that universities have become reeducation centers on the model of the old communist institutions that manipulated opinion for “higher” purposes. Let me cite one example that makes this point in an unadorned way.

Professor Richard Rorty, the much acclaimed philosopher who passed this mortal coil, argued that professors in the university ought “to arrange things so that students who enter as bigoted, homophobic religious fundamentalists will leave college with views more like our own.” Rorty noted further that students are fortunate to find themselves under the control “of people like me, and to have escaped the grip of their frightening, vicious dangerous parents.” Indeed, parents who send their children to college should recognize that as professors “we are going to go right on trying to discredit you in the eyes of your children, trying to strip your fundamentalist religious community of dignity, trying to make your views seem silly rather than discussable.”

These were not comments made at Marxist Leninist University or by the Red Guard. Nor was this the ranting of a deranged atheist opposed to the Commandment that says “honor your father and mother.” These views are those of a greatly respected senior professor whose positions not only influenced his colleagues but, to a degree, embody their sentiments.

Rather than teach, the prevailing pedagogical assumption is that you should preach. Indoctrination has become the university calling card. Since students enter the halls of the Academy having been “brainwashed” by parents and religious leaders, professors have arrogated to themselves the role of oracles who can decipher moral conundrums with ideological precision.

Is it any wonder that in the hothouse of political correctness we call the university, designated subgroups have privileged status, but evangelicals are routinely ostracized? Is it any wonder that religious observance is routinely derided, while secularism is embraced with religious fervor?

At one point in the history of the university, educate was a reflexive verb. You educated yourself through exposure to great books, scientific analysis and logical exegesis. In the Rorty age, students do not have this privilege. Now they are obliged to be brow beaten into submission, mere clay in the hands of ambitious professors who are intent in shaping students beliefs.

At one point universities were committed to the transmission of knowledge from one generation to the next. That idea is also anachronistic. Now each generation confronts ideas as if existentialists resistant to a past and often loyal to the musings of teacher/preacher pronouncements.

Unfortunately most parents who pay the tuition do not have the foggiest idea of what it is they are indirectly promoting. What they see with rose colored glasses is a son or daughter closing a chapter in their lives and entering the workforce. They rarely consider what the university experience means or the extent to which their own bourgeois and religious beliefs are under assault in our colleges and universities.

Without knowing it, Professor Rorty has actually performed a service. He said what many professors think and what may students experience. Lamentably parents have not yet made the connection. But that day may be coming. And when it does, the university will have a hard time defending itself.

After all, most American parents don’t want to send their children to Peking University.

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11/6/07 The Ins and Outs of American Leisure

When Michael Harrington wrote Accidental Century in the 1960’s, he predicted an America in which work was unknown, jobs would be declining and the “statues of Daedalus” would be engaged in maintaining the economy. It was a dystopian scenario that proved to be unrelated to current reality. However, on one issue Harrington was right: Americans have more leisure time than ever before and, as a consequence, recreation has become a national past-time.

In Aristotelian terms recreation is desirable because it is time for contemplation. A restful moment is presumed to be a thoughtful moment, a time away from the quotidian rigors of work. In fact, just as God rested one day after six days of forming the earth, his progeny are asked to rest after six days of work.

That, of course, is the presumption; the reality is very different. To re-create meant to reappraise, to put life into perspective. It is instructive that recreation at the moment means the exact opposite: to pursue play with a passion, to exalt physical activity and virtually shun contemplative moments.

So passionate are Americans about recreation that a consideration of life’s meaning is rarely addressed. Why are we here; what mark can we have; what is the purpose of existence, are questions deposited in the trash heap of history. Americans have become obsessed with amusing themselves. Several years ago Neil Postman wrote an aptly titled book Amusing Ourselves To Death in which flickering television images had become an addiction. For many Americans the image is a backdrop for life. As soon as one walks into a home, the t.v. is turned on. What have I missed? The world turns on the axis of trifling events for those who want to be amused.

Is it surprising that adolescents are more likely to know the lyrics to rap songs than the Gettysburg Address? Is it any wonder that the peccadilloes of Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan and Britney Spears, the trio of vacuous vixens, receives more journalistic ink than dissidents worldwide who put their lives on the line to defend human rights and liberty?

Moreover, in the venues populated by the masters of the universe such as Aspen, Sun Valley, Jackson Hole, to name a few, conversation invariably turns to white water rafting, mountain biking, skiing the slopes, the golf handicaps, etc. The rich and famous are preoccupied with using their leisure time to recreate and since they have more leisure time than the rest of us, they recreate with a vengeance. “I’m busy,” notes a friend of mine, “golf in the morning, horseback riding in the afternoon, hiking in the evening. There aren’t enough hours in the day.”

If I told my friend that contemplation is good for the soul, he would assure me in unmistakable terms that I am insane. America is on the run literally and figuratively. There isn’t time to reflect. Those who worship the great god Aerobic spend hours each week running for health and figure. Others move from one activity to another with scarcely a deep breath to understand all the movement.

I sometimes get the impression that this activity is a device to avoid serious consideration of issues one cannot influence. With radical ideas metastasizing across the globe, it may be a safety valve to avert your gaze, to pretend that the horror that could afflict you can be wished away through the preoccupation with recreation.

Emerging from this amusement is a form of competition or, at least, invidious comparison. “Oh, you haven’t yet climbed Kilimanjaro?” “You should walk across England – I’ve done it.” “You mean you haven’t gone done the Colorado in a raft?” The comments bespeak one-upmanship in the struggle for recreation’s next challenge.

Of course, most Americans don’t actually participate in these activities. They are largely observers who attend games, films, concerts and watch t.v. programs. But whether they actually do it or observe it, they are caught in the web of ubiquitous amusement.

While the signs of this phenomenon are observed in every crevice of the culture, they are most notable in politics. Candidates have to display a soft, human side. High brow talk isn’t permitted. Jokes, particularly at the beginning of a speech, are required. Style always trumps substance. And the seemingly serious are relegated to “prissy” as in prissy intellectual.

Needless to say, I have generalized about leisure activity since there is much that is worthwhile I have overlooked. But I stand by my claims maintaining they are largely true. America may not be amusing herself to death, but she is amusing herself to the point at which reflection is an unknown act and contemplation is reserved solely for monks.

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10/31/07 Competing for The Future

Surely one of the most provocative questions of the twenty-first century is whether the United States can maintain its competitive advantage. At an earlier time, this question would not have been addressed since U.S. advantages were obvious, indeed palpable. But these advantages are no longer so obvious with a gigantic current account deficit, a declining share of science and engineering students and a technology lead that is narrowing on the world stage.

The key to the future, to economic success here and abroad, is innovation. Those who create, possess and apply knowledge are the drivers in the economy. The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology concludes that “the big winners in the increasingly fierce global scramble for supremacy will not be those who simply make commodities faster and cheaper than the competition. They will be those who develop talent, techniques and tools so advanced that there is no competition.”

Well, if true, where does the United States stand? Are we developing the talent, techniques and tools that reinforce our economic advantage? The answer is mixed.

The U.S. still has the world’s cutting edge research universities and a tradition of collaboration with businesses. There is a legal framework for the protection of intellectual property and an incentive system for entrepreneurs. Investments in the U.S. continue to be robust and are complemented by research and development in other parts of the world. Most important, the U.S. maintains an open environment where liberty translates into opportunity.

That said, there are new and emerging concerns that cloud a picture of the future. For several decades the nation has been living off its feed capital which has put a greater emphasis on development rather than basic research. As I see it, we need investment in basic research in order to create the foundation for new technologies that can be brought to the market.

Science and engineering education is undergoing a dramatic loss of interest among American students at the very time this subject is critical for the economy. China, for example, is producing three times the number of engineers as the United States. In almost every area of science education the U.S. is lagging behind foreign competitors. Since this picture is unlikely to change in the short-term and since most American students are ill equipped to be full participants in an innovation based economy, we will have to attract the best and the brightest from other countries. It should be noted that the need to match the talent flow with national security demands in an age of terrorism will be a formidable challenge for future generations.

It is also the case that in an environment of fierce competition America’s adherence to trade protocols and intellectual property rules can sometimes be a disadvantage since the U.S. loses billions of dollars each year from the theft of patents and intellectual property by nations that do not accept our legal regimen.

Last, cultural degradation in the form of perverse amusement is having its effect on the morale and seriousness of American workers, even if this matter isn’t easily measured. It explains why Asian leaders often say we want your technological advances, but we aren’t interested in your popular culture.

Even some of the nation’s most prestigious universities have lost their edge. A recent ISI (Intercollegiate Studies Institute) study indicated students at some of the nation’s best known institutions of higher learning know very little about civics and the history of the nation. Similar studies indicate a rapid decline in math and science proficiency.

What this means, of course, is that while there is much to admire in the American economy, there is much to worry about as well. There aren’t any guarantees about the future. If the U.S. loses its research advantage, the economy will suffer and the lead the U.S. has had in competitiveness will rapidly evaporate.

We know what has to be done. Every report on the subject limns the road ahead. The question that remains is whether we can marshal the will and resources to redress the deficiencies in the present system.

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10/24/07 The Madness Aired on C-SPAN

For a portion of the American public conspiracies abound. If you listen to those with a conspiracy mind set, there isn’t any way to avoid the conclusion that a cabal of secret agencies and the president is responsible for all the terrible things that happen in the world.

This is all the more remarkable when you consider that the CIA (the central nerve center for the cabal) can’t seem to provide intelligence on any matter of national significance or I should say almost any matter, notwithstanding the efficiency attributed to this organization in films such as “Syriana,” a contemporary version of the “China Syndrome.”

Yet remarkably C-SPAN, a partially tax payer funded enterprise, has taken it upon itself to offer legitimacy for the conspirators on two occasions in 2006 covering one event in Berkeley and one in Los Angeles. You might have thought one such televised event would be sufficient, but not for the decision-makers at C-SPAN.

In June and September 2006 rabble rousers from different parts of the country and from several foreign countries gathered to share their findings and insight about the 9-11 tragedy. The evidence presented at these gatherings was greeted as incontrovertible, more of a rally for the faithful who worship at the shrine of anti-Americanism.

As one might surmise the “real” culprit on 9/11 was the CIA that actually hijacked 747’s and through remote control flew them into the World Trade Center. The presumptive motive was the justification for a war against radical Islam and the protection of oil interests in the Middle East.

Alan Jones, a California radio personality, made it clear in what he called “Operation Northwoods” that this CIA contrived event on 9/11 was not really different from the staged Gulf of Tonkin engagement or the assassination of John F. Kennedy.

In the second of these circus events Roy McGovern, a soi disant, intelligence expert contrasted expert opinion of the kind that participated in his event with misguided and dangerous people like Vice President Richard Cheney. I didn’t know till I heard Mr. McGovern that Cheney “sicced the FBI on members of Congress through his “step sons” Porter Goss and John Ashcroft. The ostensible purpose was to keep Congress from a genuine investigation of 9/11.

If I didn’t know better, I could easily assume that C-SPAN was managed by Rosie O’Donnell. Imagine a fringe group, like those at these two events, that had a conference on the “Pearl Harbor Conspiracy” suggesting that FDR ordered naval intelligence officers to sink the Arizona while U.S. planes disguised as Zeros engaged in an attack on the Hawaiian Islands.

This isn’t simply fiction masquerading as truth; it is a suspension of truth. It is a belief system cast in steel that assumes the United States is malevolent and its leaders are plotting for self interested goals. Every clue, every detail that doesn’t quite fit the conspiratorial scenario is treated with disdain, a mere aberration.

That crackpots exist in this great country is hardly surprising. What is surprising is that publicly funded television takes them seriously, not once but twice. Would C-SPAN view a conference of flat-earth adherents? Come to think of it, it might. The new existentialists that undoubtedly occupy positions at the station probably believe that all ideas should be considered for viewing. I can hear them now: “We don’t make value judgments about what is acceptable viewing, nor do we censor those who express unpopular views.”

But what if the views are pernicious? What if the views are seditious and designed to undermine confidence in the government? What if the ideas are lies presented as fact based notions? What then? The answers are leave well enough alone, even if the influence of these programs is destructive.

Of course this is madness, an open invitation for revolutionary action as the real enemies watch t.v. from their caves mildly bemused by the strange dupes who are now allied to their cause and appearing on a tax supported television channel across the American nation. They have to believe the United States is a strange place indeed.

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10/17/07 The Threats To European Sovereignty

It has been argued for some time that Europe is imperiled by a demographic meltdown, Muslim influence, economic doldrums and cultural despair. There isn’t any need to rehearse these themes which have been discussed in books, articles and colloquia. But there is an issue that goes right to the heart of the European problem and is largely overlooked: the breakdown of the sovereign state.

Since the Treaty of Westphalia the sovereign state has stood as the linchpin of European politics, notwithstanding the turbulence from regional warfare and world wars in subsequent centuries. However, now Europe finds that sovereignty itself is under assault from two quarters: one, the rise of subcultures removed from the affairs of state and two, a union that is transnational and ultimately resistant to nationalistic impulses.

The rise and growth of Islam in Europe would not be regarded as a threat if Muslims assimilated and embraced the national cultures in their adopted countries. In fact, with the low birthrate of native Europeans and the unfunded liability for pensioners, Muslims might be seen as having a salutary economic influence on western Europe were it not for the fact that they generally do not integrate.

A commitment to Sharia, laws and customs alien to European practices often accounts for the separation, a separation that has led to distinct community divisions. Imams often tell the faithful that their first and overriding loyalty is to Islam, not the state in which they find themselves. In an effort to maintain stability many local officials from Malmo to Amsterdam have insisted that an accommodation with Sharia must be made. Invariably this results in acceptance, if not approval, of distinctly non-European practices.

For example, the mayor of Amsterdam said recently that in an effort to maintain peace with the growing Muslim community, he does not think the abuse of women in this subculture should lead to prosecution as it might for the larger Dutch society. By any standard, this is a remarkable concession.

As I see it, these gestures of “good will” (or cowardice) only lead to insulation. The likely effect is that Muslims believe they are not obliged to embrace Dutch culture.

The net effect of these de facto decisions is a lack of regard for the lineaments of state control and a loss of national allegiance. State authority is merely a pretense as real authority devolves to local subdivisions, in this Dutch case, Islamic leaders.

On the other side of this political equation is the effort to unify Europe under the banner of the E.U., a political and economic entity that seemingly defies centuries of national histories. This ambitious project to unite Europeans suggests that national states are neither welcome nor desirable. Moreover, the European parliament, putatively a representative body, doesn’t represent the constituents it claims as its own. To make matters even more complicated bureaucrats working feverishly in Brussels are attempting to harmonize every aspect of economic life without regard to national idiosyncrasies.

As a consequence, a powerful ideological force has been let loose on the continent that’s proto-democratic and ostensibly post-modern. The Union appears democratic, but it is not representative. Its design is a Procrustean bed that forces compliance for all member nations until national sentiments are eviscerated. And precisely because it is transnational, local sub-cultures are indirectly enhanced through the emerging weakness of national authority.

Europe is in a vise of its own making. On the one hand, a subgroup wishes and often gets separation and, on the other hand, the continent is engaged in a vast experiment to destroy the past and create a new entity that will not recognize individual states. These two phenomena are mutually self enhancing and when they reach full flowering will, in my opinion, effectively undermine sovereignty in Europe.

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10/10/07 Orwellian Logic at the U.N.

In George Orwell’s novel 1984, the protagonists in the totalitarian society employed “newspeak,” the inversion of words to create false meaning. “War is peace,” “good is bad,” “moral is immoral” are merely a few of the possible inversions.

While Orwell passed this mortal coil years ago, his notion of false meaning is alive and well and residing in the United Nations.

In fact, there is scarcely a sentence uttered at this institution that isn’t Orwellian. Human rights, for example, the hallmark of U.N. efforts does nothing to promote these rights. The commission organized to promote this goal is composed of the most serious violators of freedom.

The fifty-seven Muslim nations invariably condemn Israel as an autocratic nation occupying and dominating Arab territory in the West Bank. Yet this condemnation overlooks the fact that Arabs comprise twenty percent of Israel’s population, are accorded the citizenship and rights of every Israeli and even have representation in the Knesset. By contrast, Jews are oppressed in ev