Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George W. Bush by John Yoo and Lincoln at Two Hundred by Walter Berns.
Acting Before It’s Too Late: Time for Change in Libya
February 19, 2011, 8:44 pmThe situation in Bahrain has taken a turn for the better. The army has been called off the streets. In an apparent victory over the king’s uncle Prince Khalifa—the long-serving hard-line prime minister—Crown Prince Salman has been asked by King Hamad to start a national dialogue “with all parties.”
The Obama administration may have helped to tip the balance in Bahrain by putting its weight on the side of restraint. But it should not equate the situations in Bahrain and Libya as the president seemed to do today in a statement urging the governments of Bahrain, Libya, and Yemen to “show restraint and respect the rights of their people.” Instead, the United States should be calling for an end to the Qaddafi regime.
The communications black-out imposed by the regime makes it difficult to know what is going on in Libya, but the 84 confirmed dead reported by Human Rights Watch is probably a conservative estimate. In a powerful conversation with Al Jazeera, an unidentified resident of Benghazi pleads desperately for help: “It’s not a war, it’s a big, big massacre . . . They don’t care about us. They can destroy us completely.” Professor Abdel Rahman Al-Swaihlee, an incredibly brave university professor from Misurata, said there is no turning back and called for an end to the regime.
This could be a turning point in the tyrannical rule of Muammar Qaddafi. Either this crack in the wall of fear that has imprisoned Libyans for four decades will open wide, or Qaddafi will succeed with his goons and mercenaries in crushing the rebellion and condemning the Libyan people to more decades of subjugation.
The administration should speak with a strong voice about the need for an end to the regime of terror in Libya. And it should back that up with actions, including suspending ambassadorial-level relations; pursuing all possible means to break through the information blockade that prevents Libyans from communicating with one another or with the outside world; and mobilizing international support for the tormented Libyan people.
Qaddafi will not change—he will do whatever he can to stay in power—but international support can embolden the brave people who are resisting him and give pause to those doing his dirty work. There are risks in acting boldly, but there are risks in continuing to temporize. By next week—or even tomorrow—it may be too late to make a difference.
No Way to Do Crisis Management
February 18, 2011, 4:58 pmThree weeks ago, President Obama met for more than an hour on a Saturday with “his national security team” to discuss the situation in Egypt, just before former Ambassador Frank Wisner was dispatched to meet with President Mubarak.
There were 11 people in the room in addition to the president. That was probably four or five too many, but the bigger problem is that people who should have been there were absent, and some people who probably shouldn’t have attended were there. Here’s the White House Press Office’s “Readout of the President’s Meeting on Egypt”:
At 1:00 pm today, the President convened a meeting of his national security team at the White House. Participants included Vice President Joe Biden, National Security Advisor Tom Donilon, Deputy National Security Advisor Denis McDonough, Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism John Brennan, National Security Advisor to the Vice President Tony Blinken, Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications Ben Rhodes, Senior Director for the Central Region Dennis Ross, Senior Director for the Middle East and North Africa Dan Shapiro, Chief of Staff Bill Daley, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, and Senior Advisor David Plouffe. The meeting lasted just over an hour. The President was updated on the situation in Egypt. He reiterated our focus on opposing violence and calling for restraint; supporting universal rights; and supporting concrete steps that advance political reform within Egypt.
Most striking is the paucity of people with substantive knowledge of the situation in Egypt, and even more is that there was no one from State, Defense, or the CIA. Not only did those departments have the best sources of information available to the U.S. government on the current situation, but they were the ones most responsible for implementing any policies that the president might direct. Perhaps that helps to explain how an experienced diplomat like Wisner could so quickly find himself speaking at cross-purposes with the administration. Press Secretary Robert Gibbs’s attempt to distance the White House from Wisner suggests a serious lack of coordination within the U.S. government: “Former Ambassador Wisner is not an employee of the government. He was, based on his broad experience in Egypt, asked by the State Department—and I would direct you to the State Department on the specifics of anything regarding him—to travel to Cairo and have a specific conversation with President Mubarak.”
The presence of so many political and public relations advisers in the meeting was also problematic. At best that tends to produce a focus on the very short term at the expense of any forward thinking. At worst it produces a decision process that begins with the question of how best to spin the position of the moment.
Are You Ready for Some Football (Playoffs)?
February 18, 2011, 3:41 pmThe Kauffman econo-blogger survey (of which I am a part) just came out. Read the whole thing. But since it’s Friday, let’s have a bit of fun. If there’s one thing for which there is strong support among econo-bloggers, it’s for a college football playoff.
Yemen Is Not Egypt, and That’s a Problem
February 18, 2011, 2:47 pmThe call for reform first heard in Tunisia and Egypt has spread throughout the Middle East. Yemen has not escaped the wave of unrest. Unlike Tunisia or Egypt, however, Yemen hosts an al Qaeda franchise, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), that is determined to attack U.S. interests. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper testified this month that “Deterioration of governance will present serious challenges to U.S. and regional interests, including leaving AQAP better positioned to plan and carry out attacks.” This is the al Qaeda group that John Brennan, assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism, called “the most operationally active node of the al Qaeda network.” The spread of protests across Yemen should be alarming not just for what they could herald for the Yemeni government, but for how they affect counterterrorism operations against AQAP.
Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who has governed for more than 30 years, made preemptive economic and political concessions after the January 14 ousting of Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. But decades of political and economic marginalization could not be undone over the course of a few weeks. Saleh, who has managed to maintain power through the manipulation of tribal factions and blatant corruption, has not had popular support for years, and it came as no surprise that the concessions were not enough to stave off country-wide protests. The protesters do not have a unified voice, however. Some seek further reforms within the government or for Saleh to step down, and others in the south are calling for secession from the north.
The government response has been to increase the security presence in areas where major demonstrations are taking place. But Yemen doesn’t have sufficient military resources to deploy forces to all areas that are experiencing unrest, and there have been reports that civilian pro-government supporters were recruited to disperse protesters. Saleh, who has watched two Arab heads of state fall, is rightly concerned about the gravity of the situation for his own hold on power. Wednesday, Saleh said (apparently without a hint of irony) that those who seek power should use the ballot box, not chaos.
Needless to say, the battle against AQAP is now on the back burner. Security resources are focused on putting down the protests, and this bottom line is good news for al Qaeda. The group could well co-opt the protests to further its own goals. Increased unrest and a heavy-handed response by Yemen security forces would also play into AQAP’s portrayal of itself as a protector of the Yemeni tribes. Most importantly for the United States, AQAP can take advantage of the diversion of attention—both Yemeni and international—from its activities to plan operations to attack U.S. interests.
Herein lies the challenge for the Obama administration: The protesters have legitimate grievances that need to be recognized; Saleh, like most authoritarian dictators, has ignored those he hasn’t repressed. Still, the United States needs to have a strong partner in Yemen to defeat AQAP; Saleh, the United States’ only option, has been inconsistent and is now weakened by the protests. Squaring this circle isn’t going to be easy for President Obama. But square it he must.
AEI Elsewhere — the President’s Foreign Policy, the Muslim Brotherhood, and More
February 18, 2011, 2:19 pm• Political Corner: Recent polls show Americans approve President Obama’s handling of foreign policy. “AEI Political Report”
• Hirsi Ali: The Muslim Brotherhood’s motto offers a reminder of its true intentions. “The Quran Is Our Law; Jihad Is Our Way”
• Goldberg: “Honor, the Mideast Rebels—and Us”
• Pollock: Bankers need to separate real innovations from the illusory ones. “Dupes of False Innovation“
Obama Backs Protesters… in Wisconsin
February 18, 2011, 11:38 amEver since the revolution in Egypt, the White House has been trying to sell the yarn that it was behind the protesters all along. Well, if you want to see what it looks like when the Obama administration actually backs a protest, look no further than the state of Wisconsin. The Washington Post reports:
President Obama thrust himself and his political operation this week into Wisconsin’s broiling budget battle, mobilizing opposition Thursday to a Republican bill that would curb public-worker benefits while planning similar action in other state capitals….
The president’s political machine worked in close coordination Thursday with state and national union officials to mobilize thousands of protesters to gather in Madison and to plan similar demonstrations in other state capitals.
Their efforts began to spread, as thousands of labor supporters turned out for a hearing in Columbus, Ohio, to protest a measure from Gov. John Kasich (R) that would cut collective-bargaining rights.
By the end of the day, Democratic Party officials were working to organize additional demonstrations in Ohio and Indiana, where an effort is underway to trim benefits for public workers. Some union activists predicted similar protests in Missouri, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
The difference, of course, is that in Egypt the protesters were marching to get rid of a public-sector kleptocracy, while in Wisconsin they are marching to preserve one. Perhaps that is why President Obama is speaking out so clearly on their behalf.
Energy Fact of the Week: Oil as a Share of U.S. Energy
February 17, 2011, 4:22 pmIn a very interesting article in the Boston Globe, journalist Jeremy Kahn argues that the United States is much less vulnerable to global oil shocks than we think, and he offers a slew of academic papers that conclude the effect of the oil shocks of the 1970s and after were overstated. I’m skeptical, though it is worth noting that, since the 1970s, oil has been a declining share of America’s total energy use, which should diminish the effects of future oil shocks. As the table below shows, in 1973, the time of the first great oil shock, oil accounted for 46 percent of total energy use in the United States. By 2009, that had fallen almost a full 10 percent, to 37.3 percent. Since we import more than half of our oil, this means we depend on foreign oil for about 20 percent of our total energy needs.
However, keep in mind that in 1973, we only imported about one-third of our oil, instead of roughly 60 percent today. In other words, in 1973 we were dependent on foreign oil for about the same 20 percent of our total energy needs. It is not clear that our circumstances today are markedly better from 1973 overall, though there is more to the story than just these general numbers. As mentioned in a previous Energy Fact of the Week, we now use oil almost exclusively in the transportation sector, so an oil shock today wouldn’t ripple through the entire economy as it did in the 1970s, when oil was implicated more widely throughout the electricity sector and elsewhere. Still, I’d rather not find out how vulnerable we are to an oil shock.
Cap-and-Trade Is Not Dead
February 17, 2011, 3:10 pm
For months now, everyone has been proclaiming the death of greenhouse gas controls using cap-and-trade. To remind you, cap-and-trade is what’s called an emissions-trading system. The idea is that the government sets a cap on greenhouse gas emissions that declines over time. Some firms will be able to outperform the new limits and generate extra credits for emission reduction that they could, in theory, sell to a firm that was unable to afford, or was technologically incapable of reducing emissions enough, to fit under the cap. Cap-and-trade is essentially a rationing scheme, where the government gives each person a ration book, and if, for some reason, you need more than what they’ve given you, you barter with someone else for their ration stamps. The environmentalists and the Left really love this idea, because it lets them play political favorites with the ration coupons, giving them for free to people they like, and making people they don’t like pay for them.
But those clever environmentalists and their democratic allies have found a new way to slip cap-and-trade in under false colors. Now, according to Politico, Harry Reid and his ilk are pushing for a federal “Clean Energy Standard.” And what is that, you ask? Well, under a clean energy standard, the government puts a declining cap on how much energy can be generated with fossil fuels, and then electricity utilities have to either produce their own non-fossil fuel energy, or buy credits for “clean energy,” from someone else who can. By gosh, that sounds like… cap-and-trade for the electricity sector!
And let’s be clear here: this is not about conventional air pollutants like soot and ozone precursors, this is about greenhouse gases. The environmentalists have intentionally been piling the greenhouse gases into the language used to refer to conventional pollutants for years now, for exactly this reason: they want the public confused enough to implement something they don’t really want, which is for the United States to implement unilateral greenhouse gas controls.
Republicans need to understand this: despite the president’s rhetoric of including nuclear power, natural gas, and coal with “carbon capture and storage” as clean energy, environmentalists are not going to consider them to be “clean.” They will insist that a credit of solar power or wind power be worth several times a credit for natural gas or nuclear power. As for coal with carbon capture and storage, the economics and engineering logistics of that are so horrendous as to render it a fantasy. Once again, this “trading system” will be used for political purposes of favoring friends and punishing enemies, while putting the bill for more expensive energy on the ratepayers.
For our economy to flourish, we need abundant and affordable energy. A clean energy standard would guarantee us less abundant, more expensive energy—it’s a profoundly bad idea dressed up in pretty, deceptive language.
The Pendulum Swings Again on Government Regulation
February 17, 2011, 3:09 pmYesterday, CBS News released a new poll that shows Americans are worried about excessive regulation. In the poll, 45 percent of respondents said there was too much federal regulation of business. Twenty-seven percent said there was too little.
Those answers represent a significant change from attitudes immediately after the financial crisis, when the responses were almost reversed. In September 2008, 28 percent said there was too much regulation and 43 percent said there was too little. The results of the new poll reinforce the argument that Karlyn Bowman made in her recent AEI Regulation Outlook. She noted that Americans are often of two minds about regulation, wanting government to watch over business while simultaneously worrying that too much regulation undermines the free-enterprise system. She concludes:
The cumulative impact of federal government action on TARP, the auto bailout, the stimulus, and the healthcare bill accentuated fears about government’s power, and in Pew and Gallup polls in2009 and 2010, record numbers of Americans criticized the size and scope of government … The pendulum has swung again in the direction of greater concern about government overreach. Americans may still be ambivalent about government regulation, but today they believe things have gone too far.
The new CBS poll confirms the shift.
U.S. vs. Israel, Again
February 17, 2011, 1:48 pmOver at the Post’s Right Turn blog, Jenn Rubin asks, “What in the world was the White House thinking?” Today she’s wondering why President Obama has chosen to throw Israel under the bus with a “compromise” U.N. Security Council statement deeming settlements illegal. The White House’s thinking, officials have telegraphed, is that accepting this lousy statement will preempt an even lousier resolution the Palestinians are pushing to a vote. Colum Lynch reports at Foreign Policy’s Turtle Bay blog that “in exchange for scuttling the Palestinian resolution, the United States would support the council statement, consider supporting a U.N. Security Council visit to the Middle East, the first since 1979, and commit to supporting strong language criticizing Israel’s settlement policies in a future statement by the Middle East Quartet.”
Jenn, in answer to your question about what the heck the White House is thinking, my bet is it goes something like this: Hmmm, trouble in the Arab world. Hmmmm, we’re being forced to support Arab and Persian citizens against their regimes. Hmmmm, how do we get back to a more “balanced approach”? Aha! The way we always do: Screw Israel. After all, the resolution the Palestinians are pushing is little more than cheap maneuvering. It certainly isn’t going to advance the peace. What the administration fails to appreciate is that this “feed the beast” move is going to have the effect that feeding the beast always has. It will be hungrier. So of course, the White House’s execrable “compromise” has only encouraged Israel’s (and our) enemies to up the ante. Clever.
Obama’s Egypt Revisionism Continues
February 17, 2011, 1:45 pm
From its vacillating response, it was abundantly clear to even the most casual observer that the Obama administration was caught completely unprepared by events in Egypt. Officials made all sorts of excuses during the crisis—at one point even blaming the CIA, with officials telling the press on deep background that the president was “disappointed” that the agency never warned him that Egypt might blow up.
Now we learn, via the New York Times, that someone in the administration did anticipate the unrest in Egypt—President Obama. The Times reports:
President Obama ordered his advisers last August to produce a secret report on unrest in the Arab world, which concluded that without sweeping political changes, countries from Bahrain to Yemen were ripe for popular revolt, administration officials said Wednesday.
Mr. Obama’s order, known as a Presidential Study Directive, identified likely flashpoints, most notably Egypt, and solicited proposals for how the administration could push for political change in countries with autocratic rulers who are also valuable allies of the United States, these officials said …
“There’s no question Egypt was very much on the mind of the president,” said a senior official who helped draft the report and who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss its findings …
The White House held weekly meetings with experts from the State Department, the C.I.A. and other agencies. The process was led by Dennis B. Ross, the president’s senior adviser on the Middle East; Samantha Power, a senior director at the National Security Council who handles human rights issues; and Gayle Smith, a senior director responsible for global development.
The effort to whitewash the White House bungling of Egypt continues, though this is an odd way to go about it. For if it is in fact true that the White House has been leading an interagency effort since August, replete with weekly meetings, to prepare for unrest in the Arab world, that makes Obama’s handling of the Egypt revolt all the more inexcusable. Imagine: if this is how the White House manages a crisis officials had anticipated, how badly they would have mismanaged things if they had been caught by surprise?
Image by the White House.
The Passing of Our Colleague and Friend, Jack Calfee
February 17, 2011, 11:33 am
AEI mourns the passing of our colleague and friend Jack Calfee. Jack joined AEI in 1995 after a distinguished academic and government career. Although his recent writings have focused on pharmaceutical markets and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulation, he was also widely known for his work on patent law, tort liability, advertising, and consumer information. A recent article on advances in treating coronary heart disease sounded a familiar Calfee theme when he criticized unnecessary FDA requirements that retard innovation and access to medical devices. His biography and published work are posted here.
Image by AEI.
Farm Bill Continues to Be Generous to Wealthy Farmers
February 17, 2011, 11:32 amBy any reasonable standard, agricultural policy in the United States is exceptionally generous to wealthy farmers and land owners (who don’t need any help), fairly generous to moderately wealthy farmers (who also don’t need any or much help), and provides some scraps from the rich people’s tables to very poor farmers. Wealth and income limits do exist for some agricultural subsidy payments and, as a result of changes in the 2008 Farm Bill, they have a little but not much more bite than in the past. Two amendments to the Continuing Budget Resolution Bill currently before the House would tighten those restrictions to some extent.
AEI Elsewhere — India and Pakistan, the Financial Crisis Inquiry, and More
February 17, 2011, 11:17 am• Majidyar and Shah: Pakistan needs to rethink its policy on terrorism before peace talks can work with India. “A Reality Check on India, Pakistan”
• Wallison: “The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission”
• Brill: “The Stimulus: Two Years Later“
Protests Reach Iraqi Kurdistan
February 17, 2011, 10:34 amThe wave of protests that have erupted across the Middle East have reached Iraqi Kurdistan. A Kurdish journalist writes in:
Five killed and 15 injured in a Sulaymaniya protest against Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan. It was a gathering in Sara square to support Tunisian and Egyptian people. After the gathering, some youths marched through the streets of Mawlawi to Sahollaka. In front of KDP’s branch office, people threw stones. The KDP answered with guns.
Sulaymaniya had been not only the most pro-American city in Iraq, but also home to the American University of Iraq. That said, corruption is rife and even though the city has been secure, repression has been extreme. Anti-Americanism has grown as former American officials have entered into business relationships with the Kurdish leadership. I have written about the struggle for civil society in Iraqi Kurdistan, here, and recently defied an arrest warrant issued by the local government to give a seminar in the city, here. While I have been critical of the Barzani family’s corruption, I also do not hold a grudge. If popular outrage forces Masud Barzani from power and European officials seize his bank accounts, which reportedly rival Mubarak’s, I have a couch in my office on which Kak Masud can sleep.
They Might Have Been Giants
February 17, 2011, 8:05 amLast week, the University of California at Berkeley announced that it will restore three varsity teams it eliminated last fall: women’s gymnastics and lacrosse and men’s rugby. It will not, however, restore men’s baseball and gymnastics. This Solomonic solution would very likely have been worse without Title IX, the federal law that bans gender discrimination in education. [emphasis added]
So editorializes the New York Times. I know Christina and Mark might have more to say on this, but just allow me suggest it’s a little sad when the huge university on the other side of the Bay Bridge from the home of the World Champion San Francisco Giants doesn’t have a ball club. Solomonic? I don’t think so. Solomon was the son of David, who slew Goliath with a pretty nasty Lincecum-esque slider.
To see why all of this is particularly egregious, take a look at Christina’s essay, “Take Back the Sports Pages?”
D.C.’s Mayor Gray Throws School Chief Under Bus
February 16, 2011, 4:45 pm
Last fall, Vincent Gray upset incumbent D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty in a momentous election. The outcome was denounced by champions of tough-minded reform as a crushing setback—especially after the resignation of Chancellor Michelle Rhee. However, when Gray promised to stay the course on D.C.’s promising reform efforts and welcomed Fenty’s decision to name Rhee’s deputy Kaya Henderson as interim chancellor, reformers crossed their fingers and hoped (especially since Gray knows that any serious retreat from the D.C. reform agenda risks tens of millions in philanthropic support, and an equal amount in federal Race to the Top funds).
Well, Gray’s handpicked education transition team yesterday made it clear that reformers can pretty much pack it in. Gray’s transition team, headed by Michael Lomax of the United Negro College Fund and Katherine Bradley of CityBridge, unfurled the threadbare tapestry of “can’t-we-all-just-get-along?” reform. They called for remaking D.C.’s nationally regarded evaluation instrument into one more professional development tool. Lomax and Bradley deemed it problematic that D.C.’s pioneering IMPACT system for teacher evaluation “is seen by many teachers as a sorting and terminating tool.” (That suggests D.C. teachers are perceptive, because all serious evaluation systems are conceived in part as tools for sorting and terminating personnel. It’s kind of management 1A and all.)
This whole sorting and terminating notion quite bothered Lomax, Bradley, and their 30-member (!!) team of educators, parents, students, and activists. So they recommended bringing in outside experts to declaw IMPACT and turn the system—crafted under Henderson’s supervision—into one more tool for professional development. Apparently very concerned with ensuring that the Washington Teachers Union’s preferences are fully aired, Lomax and Bradley will be including the union’s own report in their final draft.
Meanwhile, just to pile on, Gray went out of his way to inform the press that Henderson has been lusting after the chief’s job. (I’m skeptical, to say the least, given that she had mixed feelings about taking the interim job in the first place. And given that she’s said nothing publicly on the question so far, it’s a hell of a thing for Gray to give the impression that he’s dangling the job in front of her.) Oh, and Gray took pains to say he’s working closely with anti-IMPACT Washington Teachers Union chief Nathan Saunders to name the 16-person panel that will select the new chief. The panel will be co-chaired, conveniently enough, by… Lomax and Bradley.
I’ll say this for Gray: when he throws someone under the bus, he does it with vigor.
Christie: ‘It’s Time for Us to Get to Work to Find Our Greatness Again’
February 16, 2011, 3:28 pmGovernor Chris Christie (R-New Jersey) discusses the future of American exceptionalism during his visit to AEI today.
Happy Birthday, Kim Jong-il!
February 16, 2011, 2:44 pm
Well, I sure am glad I didn’t choose this year to finally make that trip to Pyongyang for Kim Jong-il’s birthday bash. That’s right, folks, today is the Dear Leader’s birthday! And to celebrate turning 69 (or 70, depending on whom you ask), Kim is giving away luxury items cheap knock-offs from Beijing’s Silk Street Market, a tourist trap for Western travelers and Kim’s royal court shoppers alike.
Believe it or not, this is significant. Kim is able to count on the absolute loyalty of his subordinates in large part because he has bought that loyalty with cash and luxury goods. Kim’s birthday has always been an occasion for him to grant such gifts. But thanks to sanctions—which have been tightened over the past year in response to the North’s murderous provocations—the international community (and especially the United States, South Korea, and Japan) is starving Kim of the resources he needs to keep his subordinates content.
It is imperative that the allies keep up this pressure. Over the longer term, a cash-strapped Kim will not only be unable to regale his pals with Rolexes and Mercedes, but also unable to arm the military with the weapons his generals desire. Unable to fund the needs of the armed forces or the luxurious habits of his senior officials, the stability of the North Korean regime—which depends on absolute acceptance of Kim’s authority—may begin to suffer.
By destabilizing the regime, we help create the conditions for eventual reunification, which is in the long-term interests of both the United States and South Korea. As South Korean President Lee Myung-bak and President Obama wrote in their June 2009 joint statement, “Through our Alliance we aim to build a better future for all people on the Korean Peninsula, establishing a durable peace on the Peninsula and leading to peaceful reunification on the principles of free democracy and a market economy.” In putting pressure on the Kim regime, the alliance is taking the first steps towards building that better future.
So here’s wishing Kim Jong-il a happy birthday. May his future be filled with Fauxlexes, Foakleys, and an ever-present sense of impending doom!
Condi Rice, Revised
February 16, 2011, 12:15 pm
The former Secretary of State and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice has a piece in the Washington Post today talking up democracy. Nice piece, thoughtful, mindful of the risks, etc. But it leads with Rice’s synopsis of the Bush administration on Egypt. Rice, as she watched good old Hosni Mubarak address the Egyptians last week, tells us that she thought to herself “it didn’t have to be this way.” If only Hosni had listened to Condi. If only he had stayed on track with his reforms and not “reversed course.” Cue soft music. Tears of regret.
What nonsense.
In the wake of Rice’s own quite forward-leaning speech in Cairo in June 2005, there were hopes Mubarak would suspend emergency laws. In 2006 he renewed them. There were hopes for more open elections. Instead, that same year, local elections were postponed. In 2007, controversial changes to the Egyptian constitution that limited civil rights were pushed through by Mubarak, and Rice mustered the following wet noodle of a response: “We always discuss these things in a way that is respectful, mutually respectful, but I have made my concerns known and we have had a good discussion.” In January 2008, President George Bush helpfully underscored the administration’s position on Egypt while in Sharm el Sheikh: “I appreciate very much the long and proud tradition that you’ve had for a vibrant civil society.”
After Bush and Rice’s early commitment to democracy in the Middle East, things went swiftly downhill. Democracy activists in Egypt who had once been on the White House’s hit parade were forgotten. Efforts to crowbar open Egypt’s political system were tossed. And it didn’t happen slowly. It was, after all, the Bush administration that first gave the seal of approval to Gamal Mubarak’s dynastic succession with a widely noticed Gamal “drop by” at the White House in May 2006.
The Bush administration deserves enormous credit for many things—contending with the aftermath of 9/11, taking the war to al Qaeda, ousting Saddam and more. It also deserves credit for a real vision for a better Middle East. What it doesn’t deserve is credit for the courage of its rhetorical convictions or the execution of that vision. And of all those who ensured that nothing would be done to undermine Egyptian President Mubarak, Condi Rice did the most.
I remember a meeting with Secretary Rice at the State Department in the second term of the Bush administration. I asked why the president and secretary had not been more public in their condemnation of Mubarak’s “reversal of course” on democratic reform. Turning to me with considerable animus in her voice, Dr. Rice informed me that diplomacy was not a “cartoon” and proceeded to virtually shout justifications for the administration’s positions at me in a room full of other Middle East types about town. As we left the room, one of those experts (who shall remain unnamed) smiled at me and said: “Democracy in the Middle East. It’s over.”
Yes indeed, Dr. Rice. It didn’t have to be this way.
AEI Elsewhere — Medical Innovation, Egypt and Iran, the President’s Budget, and More
February 16, 2011, 11:06 am• Gottlieb: “Accountable Care Organizations: The End of Innovation in Medicine?”
• Rubin: “Hearing Obama in Tehran: Apply Lessons from Egypt to Iran—While Understanding One Big Difference ”
• Barone: “Obama Budget Offers Inertia, Not Hope and Change”
• Ornstein: “Serious Debt Reduction Will Require Courage”
• Gottlieb: “Obama’s Medicaid Provisions Are an Albatross to Economic Recovery”
• DeMuth: “Testimony before the Subcommittee on Environment and the Economy“
Take the President at His Word
February 16, 2011, 10:52 am
The Wall Street Journal recently reported that President Obama was poised to propose three specific reforms to Social Security in his State of the Union address: reducing Cost of Living Adjustments (COLAs); lowering the rate of growth of future benefits; and increasing the maximum taxable wage, currently $106,800, to around $180,000. The president backed off out of fear of, well, it seems just plain fear. I didn’t find this particularly inspiring.
But House Republicans are in a position to do the president and themselves a favor. The president, and surely congressional Democrats, would love it if House Republicans “went first” on entitlement reform, giving the Left an opportunity to demagogue its way back into office in 2012. There’s no reason Republicans should offer an easy target. But they could make significant proposals, and perhaps overcome President Obama’s fear of action, by simply proposing (part of) what Obama’s staff claims he favors on Social Security reform. Here are two ideas:
Cost of Living Adjustments: Most economists believe that the Consumer Price Index (CPI) used to measure price changes and calculate annual COLAs overstates the true rate of inflation, resulting in benefits higher than Congress intended. Substituting the more accurate “chained weighted” CPI for the CPI-W currently used would reduce annual COLAs by around 0.3 percentage points and eliminate about 25 percent of the long-term Social Security shortfall.
Benefit growth: The most prominent way of reducing the growth of future benefits without significantly harming the truly poor is through so-called “progressive indexing,” which limits benefit growth for the very highest earners to the rate of inflation while allowing benefits for low earners (in this iteration, the bottom 30 percent of workers) to grow at the same rate as under current law. This would eliminate around 65 percent of the long-term deficit.
But what about raising the “tax max,” which the president also apparently favors? Tough. If you’re sitting on the bench you don’t get to score any points. If President Obama wants more, he needs to get in the game. I’m also confident the administration would like to apply a lower CPI across the board, which would generate higher income-tax revenues by reducing the degree to which the tax brackets are indexed. Tough on that, too.
But rather than fully expose themselves on entitlement reform, which in truth is unlikely to occur under President Obama, Republicans can make serious, good faith proposals to reduce the Social Security deficit by adopting a number of changes that the administration has already endorsed. That’s about as good as things are going to get under the current circumstances.