g m g D e s i g n . c o m

Thomas Sowell, a guy I greatly respect, has a differing view on nation-building in his recent editorial. First, his view of democracy is pretty narrow, since I believe that democracy encapsulates freedom as well as voting (and other stuff too). Further, I don’t think nation-building operations are always and have always been disastrous. But I think they have to be done right.

Some people, Sowell included, refer to Iraq as a reason not to be involved internationally in nation-building. That’s unrealistic, since Iraq won’t be the last country we invade to install better governance. But the important lesson from Iraq is that we need increase our nation-building capacity, not withdraw from our self-made role as the world’s police officer. In Iraq, what we did right was the first 4 weeks: overthrowing the regime. The war part was a success in military terms. The 2nd phase, reconstruction and natino-building, is what we failed at. There are some (critically important) steps that we can take (and even apply right now in Afghanistan and Iraq) that can help us improve our nation-building capacity. That’s a responsibility that, in all likelihood, will be passed to the next administration.

Very sensible article by WP’s Ignatius on our “allies” in Anbar province. The idea is that the Bush admin is dressing up the recent alliances w/ Sunni tribes in Anbar, but such alliances should/could have been forged years ago. Yes, it means teaming up with warlords. But it’s a (short term) tactic, not a long term strategy. Still, tactics are needed to effect strategic goals such as that of stabilizing and building Iraq and, importantly, integrating Iraq with the rest of the world economically (most important) and politically.

Good article by Stossel on the subject. Not stuff I didn’t already know, but Stossel’s a better & more cogent writer than I am, so nice to read it from him.

An excerpt for your reading pleasure:

It’s driven some Canadians to private for-profit clinics. A new one opens somewhere in Canada almost every week. Although it’s not clear that such private clinics are legal, one is run by the president of the Canadian Medical Association, Dr. Brian Day, because under government care, he says, “We found ourselves in a situation where we were seeing sick patients and weren’t being allowed to treat them. That was something that we couldn’t tolerate.”

Canadians stuck on waiting lists often pay “medical travel agents” to get to America for treatment. Shirley Healey had a blocked artery that kept her from digesting food. So she hired a middleman to help her get to a hospital in Washington state.

“The doctor said that I would have only had a very few weeks to live,” Healey said.

Yet the Canadian government calls her surgery “elective.”

“The only thing elective about this surgery was I elected to live,” she said.

Bottom line:

US healthcare ain’t perfect (indeed, reforms are certainly needed), but a more socialist system (more so than Medicare, Medicaid) is not the answer, or certainly not a good answer that is advisable and sustainable.

Great article in the NY Times about why a carbon tax is a good idea, namely in comparison w/ a cap and trade regiment.

Key paragraph:

A global carbon tax would be easier to negotiate [with other countries than a cap and trade system]. All governments require revenue for public purposes. The world’s nations could agree to use a carbon tax as one instrument to raise some of that revenue. No money needs to change hands across national borders. Each government could keep the revenue from its tax and use it to finance spending or whatever form of tax relief it considered best.

Author also points out why merely increasing fuel standards (which he doesn’t object to) does not replace a carbon tax & is not “free.” Unlike a carbon tax, fiat higher fuel standards don’t bring in revenue to the Treasury and, quite possibly, will encourage more driving so as to obviate the perceived gains due to higher efficiency.

Another well-written perspective by the ever-insightful Stossel. This one is in regards to absurd farming/agricultural subsidies. Gist: billions go to farm subsidies (our tax dollars) that disproportionately go to rich mega-farms (but not to poorer farmers) and often put land to use other than for farming. Further, many of the subsidies go to dead farmers:

From 1999 through 2005, the USDA “paid $1.1 billion in farm payments in the names of 172,801 deceased individuals. … 40 percent went to those who had been dead for three or more years, and 19 percent to those dead for seven or more years.” One dead farmer got more than $400,000 during those years.

And now, the obvious truth to any proponent of laissez-faire economics:

There’s an easy way to avoid such absurdities: Abolish all farm subsidies.

Why are taxpayers forced to pay farmers $25 billion a year? Sure, farmers face droughts and floods, but that’s been true since Moses’ day. They can’t say they weren’t put on notice that farming has risks. Running a restaurant or a software company entails risks, too, but we don’t guarantee their continued operation. Those businesses and America are stronger for it.

To add to the absurdity:

After handing out commodity subsidies that pay farmers to plant more crops,” Heritage Foundation senior fellow Bruce Riedl notes, “Washington then turns around and pays other farmers not to farm 40 million acres of cropland each year — the equivalent of idling every farm in Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana and Ohio.”

Further:

Besides all the obvious ones, there’s another reason to end farm subsidies. They show us to be hypocrites. How can we preach free trade in talks with developing nations when we subsidize farmers who then dump their crop surpluses in poor countries and wreck their domestic farms?

That last ponit is important. Since economic development, globally speaking, is the foremost antidote to the spread of Salafist terrorism (tragically displayed on 9/11), there is a strategic argument that favors getting rid of the subsidies that prevent or slow many countries from going up the economic food chain of agri-econ to industrial to advanced. The time for our political luminaries to act is now: phase out agri-subsidies for the sake of domestic economic fairness & for international security.

Ever-informative Ignatius of the WP has an editorial on Democratic strategy. The question is, if a change of course in Iraq veers in the direction of what Dems have been pushing for the past 2+ years, will Dems know how to say “yes,” or will they comply with their base & push for immediate withdrawal? I.e., how will Dems leverage current realities in Iraq? How is this important, other than to partisan political zombies? It’s important because how politics plays into US policy in the Gulf (and elsewhere, like north Africa where Salafism is increasingly brewing) affects our policy, our domestic conversation, and ultimately, both our military and non-mil action. Can the Dems pick up the Republican pieces, or will they just screw up & look like softies in the domestic & foreign security sense?

Another interesting editorial on the WP: Ayman al-Zawahiri, scarier than bin Laden. Hoffman describes a new al Qaeda that has benefited from its new de facto leader’s bloody strategic vision as well as US mistakes in both Iraq & Afghanistan. My stance on this: good points made by Hoffman. Not much we can do about Zawahiri, but definitely more we could have done to secure post-war peace in Afghanistan & Iraq. Esp in Iraq (but also in Afghanistan), the war went well, but post-war reconstruction & nation-building capacity is weak and non-internationalized (i.e., we need other countries not for the war, but for the post-war, but we don’t have those countries on board yet). Moving forward: get other countries on board with this, esp countries in developing regions of the world who actually have younger populations and greater tolerance for conflict than aged and increasingly useless Europe. Many countries face the nihilistic threat of al Qaeda, so the next president (realistically) should take the initiative & get those countries on board for future nation-rebuilding operations (Iraq definitely isn’t the last).

The AP has an article regarding the recent bin Laden tape where Osama slams capitalism & democracy. Osama invites his target audience (Americans, it seems) to “embrace Islam” in lieu of enduring the “shackles” of capitalism and democracy.

I’m not surprised that he’s opposed to capitalism, democracy and globalization. Capitalism–and it’s internationalized flavor that we call “globalization”–will always be opposed by those who offer a more authoritarian vision. In fact, all anti-capitalist models are invariably anti-freedom, from Marxist “revolutions” to Salafist-Islamist totalitarianism. Opposing capitalism is to oppose economic freedom, with other liberties (civic, religious, etc) to follow soon after. The absence of freedom in the market place intrinsically means that democracy is also absent.

Further, the likes of Osama don’t like globalization for this reason: it is the only real long-term threat to the Salafist movement to which Osama belongs (and leads, to some extent). Military strikes work in the short term, but extending globalization to all reaches of the globe is the only long-term solution to the terrorist threat. Globalized regions of the world work against terrorism, not for it. And bin Laden & Co knows it.

Interesting post on Slashdot (a geeky [that's a compliment in IT land, mind you] and very active tech discussion site) regarding India outsourcing to the US. The post links to an article on emerging market countries growing more quickly than the US and to the effect on IT salaries.

My response? People will always be protectionist in instinct when their livelihoods are at stake (and then there’s the absurd “nativist’ reaction by the far right-wing). But rapid economic growth in India, China, et al, is far from a bad thing; it’s a very good thing in fact. And this sort of thing will continue. In fact, companies in emerging market countries will likely dominate the global business atmosphere in this century.

Does the US “fall behind” due to the success of India, China, et al? The answer is no. While emerging market countries gain ground, the US benefits as well. Note the high prosperity in this country and the record unemployment & you’ll see that open economic policy provides aggregate gain & dispersed benefits.

Got back yesterday (Thursday) from my honeymoon. I’m officially married to Amanda as of Saturday, Sept 1! Some pics of the whole event will follow as soon as they come in.