Paul Krugman, "Marches of Folly": Krugman Shoots Himself in the Foot

In his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "Marches of Folly" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/18/opinion/krugman-marches-of-folly.html), Paul Krugman draws an analogy between the "groupthink" that led to America's entry into the Second Gulf War and the "obsession" with the US deficit:

"Now, I don’t want to push the analogy too far. Bad economic policy isn’t the moral equivalent of a war fought on false pretenses, and while the predictions of deficit scolds have been wrong time and again, there hasn’t been any development either as decisive or as shocking as the complete failure to find weapons of mass destruction.

. . . .

But now as then we have the illusion of consensus, an illusion based on a process in which anyone questioning the preferred narrative is immediately marginalized, no matter how strong his or her credentials. And now as then the press often seems to have taken sides. It has been especially striking how often questionable assertions are reported as fact. How many times, for example, have you seen news articles simply asserting that the United States has a 'debt crisis,' even though many economists would argue that it faces no such thing?"

Well, I opposed the Second Gulf War, which destroyed the equilibrium between a Sunni-dominated Iraq and a Shiite-ruled Iran. I have also opposed US ground involvement in Afghanistan, which was escalated by Obama, goes unmentioned by Krugman, and is costing the US some $6 billion per month. But no debt crisis?

However, as observed by Krugman in an earlier op-ed (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/17/opinion/krugman-that-terrible-trillion.html?_r=0), the ratio of debt to G.D.P. is "the best measure of our debt position."

US debt is currently some $16.7 trillion, which is more that 100% of America's G.D.P. Those "fools" at the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office recently warned that "U.S. debt is on track to be nearly twice the size of the U.S. economy by 2037" (http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/budget/230901-cbo-warns-of-grim-long-term-debt-outlook). Sure, in the meantime the American Taxpayer Relief Act and the sequester may have delayed "achievement" of that 200% debt to G.D.P. ratio by a few years; however, as acknowledged by the Peterson Foundation (http://www.pgpf.org/Issues/Fiscal-Outlook/2013/01/fiscal-cliff-atra-2012-long-term-analysis.aspx), we're still headed for that astronomical percentage by 2040.

Compare US involvement in Iraq with attempts to rein in America's spiraling debt? Apples and oranges. No way, Jose!

Vali Nasr, "Why Iran May Be Ready to Deal": Believing in the Tooth Fairy

In a guest New York Times op-ed entitled "Why Iran May Be Ready to Deal" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/18/opinion/why-iran-may-be-ready-to-deal.html?_r=0), Vali Nasr, dean of the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, writes:

"FOR the first time since 2009, there may be signs of a break in the deadlock over Iran’s nuclear program. Iran entered the latest talks with a slightly softened position. That is good news, but the United States will have to change its negotiating strategy to take advantage of it.

Economic sanctions are biting hard in Iran. Meanwhile, its strategic position is crumbling because of the turmoil in its ally Syria and the rise of militant Sunni Islamism throughout the Arab Middle East. Together, these forces seem to have forced Iran to reconsider its own bargaining position.

So rather than strengthen sanctions another notch, America should give Iran a little tit for tat: begin negotiating directly, and put on the table the prospect of lifting sanctions, one by one, as bargaining chips."

Now compare Nasr's thesis with a lead article in yesterday's Washington Post entitled "Despite sanctions’ toll on Iran, U.S. sees no shift in nuclear behavior" (http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/despite-sanctions-toll-on-iran-us-sees-no-shift-in-nuclear-behavior/2013/03/17/d23b3b6a-8dad-11e2-b63f-f53fb9f2fcb4_story.html?hpid=z1) by Joby Warrick and Anne Gearan:

"Harsh economic sanctions have taken a serious toll on Iran’s economy, but U.S. and European officials acknowledge that the measures have not yet produced the kind of public unrest that could force Iranian leaders to change their nuclear policies.

Nine months after Iran was hit with the toughest restrictions in its history, the nation’s economy appears to have settled into a slow, downward glide, hemorrhaging jobs and hard currency but appearing to be in no immediate danger of collapse, Western diplomats and analysts say.

At the same time, the hardships have not triggered significant domestic protests or produced a single concession by Iran on its nuclear program. Although weakened, Iran has resisted Western pressure through a combination of clever tactics, political repression and old-fashioned stubbornness, analysts say."

It's been clear since Obama's initial Nowruz overtures to the mullahs in 2009 that Iran has no intention of halting its nuclear weapons development program, regardless of the economic damage. As reported by The Tehran Times in 2012 (http://www.tehrantimes.com/politics/96949-iran-has-no-intention-to-halt-20-enrichment-jalili):

"The secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, Saeed Jalili, has said that Tehran does not intend to stop producing uranium enriched to a purity level of 20 percent.

Jalili, who is Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator, made the remarks during a press conference in Istanbul on Saturday after two rounds of talks between representatives of Iran and the 5+1 group (the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China, and Germany), which ended a 15-month hiatus in talks."

Regarding the position of Iran's Supreme Leader Khamenei, Yahoo! News (http://news.yahoo.com/irans-top-leader-unhappy-nuclear-talks-180459305.html) reported earlier this month:

"Iran's top leader said on Thursday that the West failed to offer any concessions during the latest talks aimed at resolving a standoff over Tehran's nuclear program.

Remarks by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, which were broadcast on Iranian state TV, were his first public comments on last week's talks with the United States, China, Russia, Britain, France and Germany.

'The Westerners did not do any substantial work that could be interpreted as concessions,' said Khamenei, who has final say on all state matters. 'They, minimally, admitted part of (the) rights of the Iranian nation, only.'"

Will Iran continue to talk as they build their first nuclear weapon? They will talk until the cows come home. But will Iran halt its nuclear development program? Not a snowball's chance in hell.

Aaron David Miller, "One trip won’t fix things between Obama and Netanyahu. Here’s what might.": Aaron, Get Real

Obama is arriving this week in Israel for his first time as president, and in a Washington Post guest opinion piece entitled "One trip won’t fix things between Obama and Netanyahu. Here’s what might." (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/one-meeting-wont-fix-things-between-obama-and-netanyahu-heres-what-might/2013/03/15/f31d7eca-8b27-11e2-9f54-f3fdd70acad2_story.html), Aaron David Miller, vice president and distinguished scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center, writes:

"For almost 25 years as an analyst, adviser and negotiator in Republican and Democratic administrations, I observed the U.S.-Israel relationship up close. And it’s been clear from the beginning that Obama and Netanyahu were doomed to dysfunction. Netanyahu is preternaturally suspicious of America’s role in the peace process, and particularly of someone like Obama, who aspires to do big things. And Obama’s naive push for a settlement freeze and apparent lack of an emotional connection to Israel have contributed to the tension.

One presidential visit won’t forge a reconciliation. But increasing pressures to manage the Iranian nuclear issue, the peace process and Netanyahu’s need to remain relevant in his new government just might.

. . . .

What is required, though, is respect, understanding and reciprocity that create trust, or at least the ability to work together on things that are important to both countries. And despite the dysfunction at the top, the institutional relationship between the United States and Israel is probably closer than ever, through security cooperation, intelligence-sharing and joint military exercises."

Ah, yes, "understanding and reciprocity that create trust." In recent weeks, Obama appointed Chuck Hagel, an anti-Semite, as his secretary of defense, and appointed John Kerry, an idiot (Syria's Bashar al-Assad was - or perhaps still is - his "dear friend") as his secretary of state.

In his latest display of naivete, Kerry, who recently declared that "Americans have a right to be stupid," turned to Turkish foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu to assist in mediating between Israel and the Palestinians (see: http://www.jpost.com/DiplomacyAndPolitics/Article.aspx?id=306619) immediately after Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan labeled Zionism a "crime against humanity." At a subsequent press conference with Kerry, Davutoglu defended Erdogan's racist allegation, and needless to say, Turkey refused Kerry's request.

Trust Obama? No way. Obama is Rashid Khalidi's friend, and The Los Angeles Times still refuses to allow us to see the video of Obama toasting Khalidi at a Chicago dinner party after Khalidi received his appointment as Professor of Modern Arab Studies at Columbia and director of that university’s Middle East Institute.

Yes, I can personally attest to "security cooperation, intelligence-sharing and joint military exercises" involving the US and Israel; however, Obama is a foreign relations naif and much of his first term as president was devoted to goodwill gestures toward Iran, Syria and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.

The US Embassy held a contest to select up to 20 "lucky" persons who will be given the opportunity to watch Obama recite a speech in Israel using his beloved teleprompters. However, Obama will not address the Israeli parliament and will not be visiting the Western Wall in Jerusalem so as not to antagonize Israel's Muslim neighbors.

This is a man who has Israel's back at a time when Iran is threatening Israel with a nuclear holocaust? Sorry if I have my doubts.

Bill Keller, "Smart Drones": Keller Never Served in the Military and It Shows

New York Times columnist Bill Keller never served in the military, and it shows. But heck, everyone is entitled to an opinion regarding anything and everything, and as Secretary of State John Kerry so aptly declared, "In America you have a right to be stupid."

In his latest Times op-ed entitled "Smart Drones" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/17/opinion/sunday/keller-smart-drones.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0), Keller weighs the morality of "fully autonomous weapons" with a special focus on drones. Not surprisingly, Keller points an accusing finger at Israel:

"Israel is the first country to make and deploy (and sell, to China, India, South Korea and others) a weapon that can attack pre-emptively without a human in charge. The hovering drone called the Harpy is programmed to recognize and automatically divebomb any radar signal that is not in its database of 'friendlies.' No reported misfires so far, but suppose an adversary installs its antiaircraft radar on the roof of a hospital?"

Israel's Harpy? Sorry, but it only carries a 70-pound high-explosive warhead, which will cripple a radar facility, but not bring down Keller's "hypothetical" hospital. Moreover, unbeknownst to Keller, the issue is anything but hypothetical:

• In its last two engagements with Israel, the Hamas leadership has hidden in the basement of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza.
• During Israel's Operation Pillar of Defense in November, the IDF attacked a Hamas intelligence headquarters in the Al-Showa Media Building in Gaza, where Agence France-Presse and Al Jazeera had offices.
• Over the past decade, most of the rockets and missiles fired at southern Israel from Gaza have been launched from heavily populated residential areas.
• Much of Hezbollah's arsenal of missiles for launch against Israel is housed in villages throughout southern Lebanon.
• In the past, Hezbollah has fired rockets at Israel from positions in close proximity to UN bases so as to avoid counterstrikes.

In a nutshell, both Hamas and Hezbollah have not hesitated to make use of human shields in violation of the Geneva Convention.

How did Israel, using its smart weapons, manage during Operation Pillar of Defense, which involved an asymmetric conflict? According to the Israel Defense Forces, 57 civilians died and 120 combatants from Hamas and Islamic Jihad were killed. Compare this ratio with the estimated ratio of three civilians killed for every one combatant in Afghanistan and an estimated four-to-one ratio in Iraq.

Keller concludes his opinion piece by observing:

"If war is made to seem impersonal and safe, about as morally consequential as a video game, I worry that autonomous weapons deplete our humanity. As unsettling as the idea of robots’ becoming more like humans is the prospect that, in the process, we become more like robots."  

Keller worries "that autonomous weapons deplete our humanity," but consider how Hamas fired more than 10,000 unguided rockets and missiles at Israel's civilian population over the past decade. Was this somehow more humane? And on the subject of morality, where were the protests from Keller, executive editor of the Times from 2003 until 2011 and his op-ed pundits, while this was happening?

Bottom line: War is inhumane; however, Israel has demonstrated that smart weaponry can significantly reduce civilian casualties.

Gail Collins, "The Dread That Is Ted": The Tall Tale Told by Gail

"I know the sense of helplessness that people feel. I know the urge to arm yourself because that's what I did. I was trained in firearms. I walked to the hospital when my husband was sick. I carried a concealed weapon and I made the determination if somebody was going to try and take me out, I was going to take them with me."

- Dianne Feinstein

In her latest New York Times op-ed entitled "The Dread That Is Ted" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/16/opinion/collins-the-dread-that-is-ted.html?_r=0), Gail Collins takes Senator Ted Cruz to task for daring to lecture 79-year-old Senator Dianne Feinstein during a Judiciary Committee hearing this past week regarding the sale of assault rifles. Collins writes of Cruz:

"If you combine a lack of a sense of humor with an absence of humility and then stir in a cup of self-righteousness, you are definitely not working on a recipe for cooperative achievement."

Ah, yes, let's blame freshman Senator Cruz for a lack of "cooperative achievement." In this vein, consider what Olympia Snowe, one of the most moderate Republicans in Washington, had to say when explaining her retirement from the US Senate, i.e. before Cruz arrived on the scene (http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/02/29/snowe-explains-decision-to-leave-defends-tough-criticism-of-senate/):

"People are just stunned by the debilitating partisanship, polarization and the overall dysfunction of the institution and political paralysis as we come, you know, to the point of extreme when it comes to resolving the problems facing our country."

And what did Snowe, one of three Republicans in the US Congress who voted for Obama's economic stimulus plan in 2009, have to say about President Obama? Snowe told Jonathan Karl that she has not had a face-to-face meeting with Obama in two years, and asked if she had to grade Obama on his willingness to work with Republicans, she replied that he would be "close to failing on that point" (see: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/power-players-abc-news/frustrated-senator-olympia-snowe-gives-obama-f-101657433.html).

Yup, the US government is dysfunctional, but let's not blame Ted Cruz for that. There is someone else at whom Gail should be pointing her finger.

But I stray from the issue of gun control and a ban on assault rifles. I favor a ban on assault rifles; however, I also acknowledge that they are not the problem. Have a look at the data from the FBI on all murders from 2007 to 2011 (http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-2011/tables/expanded-homicide-data-table-8). In a nutshell, handguns (what Feinstein used to carry around with her) are far more of a problem than assault rifles. For that matter, between 2007 and 2011 clubs and hammers killed more persons than "rifles" (not just assault rifles), and knives killed four times more people than rifles. In all but one year, shotguns killed more people than rifles.

Shotguns? Recall what Vice President Biden had to say about shotguns in a recent interview with Field & Stream magazine (see: http://washingtonexaminer.com/more-advice-from-joe-biden-just-fire-the-shotgun-through-the-door/article/2522791):

"Well, the way in which we measure it is—I think most scholars would say—is that as long as you have a weapon sufficient to be able to provide your self-defense," Biden said. "I did one of these town-hall meetings on the Internet and one guy said, 'Well, what happens when the end days come? What happens when there’s the earthquake? I live in California, and I have to protect myself.'

I said, "Well, you know, my shotgun will do better for you than your AR-15, because you want to keep someone away from your house, just fire the shotgun through the door."

So just remember, should you accidentally kill the UPS man who arrived to deliver a package, or a Girl Scout who came to sell cookies, have your lawyer tell the court that none other than the Vice President of the United States told my client to "just fire the shotgun through the door."

On a more somber note, both Collins and Feinstein fail to understand that assault rifles are not the root of the problem. Rather, it is the violence inherent in American society, acknowledged by Feinstein, that is responsible for the rage and rampant killing.

Or as Pogo once said, "We have met the enemy and he is us."

Obama's Fantasy

Prior to next week's visit to Israel, Obama told Israel's Channel 2 News (http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2013/03/obama-fantasizes-about-hanging-out-in-israel-wearing-a-fake-mustache/):

"Sometimes I have this fantasy that I can put on a disguise, wear a fake mustache, and I can wander through Tel Aviv and go to a bar and have a conversation."

Hey, Barry, let me make it easy for you -

You can visit with me in Caesarea and have that beer without a mustache and without a "bunch of guys with machine guns with you." The only drawback is that you're not going to like what I have to say.

Waiting with bated breath . . . not.

Jeffrey

David Brooks, "How Movements Recover": Advice to Republicans or the United States As a Whole?

How to revive a movement in crisis?

In a fascinating New York Times op-ed "How Movements Recover" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/15/opinion/brooks-how-movements-recover.html?_r=0), David Brooks examines the Catholic Church at the beginning of the fourth century and contemplates the philosophies of two rival reform movements, the Donatists, who sought a return to the Church's "core identity," and the Augustines, who would accept the world's "impurities as well as purities." Brooks concludes:

"The natural instinct is to turn Donatist, to build an ark and defend what’s precious. The counterintuitive but more successful strategy is to follow Augustine, to exploit a moment of weakness by making yourself even more vulnerable, by striking outward into complexity, swallowing the pure and impure, counterattacking crisis with an evangelical assault."

Advice for the Republican Party? Possibly. Notwithstanding Obama's disastrous economic track record leading up to the 2012 presidential election, the Republicans were still unable to place Romney in the Oval Office. Should the Republicans, as advocated by the Tea Party, double down on their purist principles, e.g., demand a balanced budget, limit growth in federal spending, and abolish Obama's health care legislation? Or should the Republicans reach out to minorities, particularly Hispanics, who were responsible for their 2012 defeat, and modify immigration policies?

Alternatively, should Brooks's opinion piece be regarded as advice to the United States as a whole? Certainly the United States is in decline, given its spiraling debt of $16.7 trillion, which is never going to be repaid, and its declining influence around the globe, reflecting Obama's foreign policy of leading from behind. But is the United States a movement? I think so. With all its warts and indiscretions over the years, the United States remains the world's primary exporter of democracy and freedom. Its founding principles stand in stark contrast to radical Islamicism, which has enveloped the Middle East and much of Central Asia, and a Chinese strain of communism, financed by slave labor, which owns some eight percent of US debt, i.e. enough to cause overnight American economic collapse were this debt to be dumped on world markets.

How should the US respond to its declining internal fortunes and burgeoning external challenges?

For someone like myself, who has always believed in American exceptionalism, the answer is simple: continue to export democracy and economic freedom. But will anything remain in 2016, given incessant growth of federal debt? Recall how Obama stated in July 2008 (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.co.il/2013/03/gail-collins-last-pope-and-next-budget.html):

"The problem is, is that the way Bush has done it over the last eight years, is to take out a credit card from the Bank of China in the name of our children, driving up our national debt from $5 trillion for the first 42 presidents. Number 43 added $4 trillion by his lonesome, so that we now have over $9 trillion of debt that we are going to have to pay back, $30,000 for every man, woman and child. That's irresponsible. It's unpatriotic."

He was correct five years ago. How quickly he has forgotten.

And then there is Obama's wavering foreign and defense policies, as best exemplified by John ("Americans have the right to be stupid") Kerry and Chuck (America is the "world's bully") Hagel, i.e. a cabinet consisting of the worst and the dumbest.

Can America rise from the ashes and continue to proselytize? Stay tuned.