Hailing from Belgium is Roa, and this is a rabbit:
Posts archived in Internationalists
Apparently financial reform is in vogue and in full swing. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) just proposed what is being panned as two “radical” fees levied upon banks. These fees, basically a flat rate coupled with additional taxes on pay and profit, are intended to create a fund that would be reserved for future use in mitigating large firm collapses (re: bailouts). These funds specifically support the notion that banks, not tax payers, should bear the burden that their risky activities carry.
Does this sound familiar?
That’s because this is the exact scheme, which is included in Sen. Dodd’s Financial Regulatory Reform bill, that has been drawing so much heat from Republicans (re: Wall St. Lobbyists) in the USA. The point of this tenet of the Dodd bill is to shift any future burdens inherent in our now normal “too big too fail” capitalist America away from the tax-payer and onto the banks/hedge funds/insurers themselves.
In my personal opinion, I would think this is a great compromise for the issue. Obviously, government regulation weary Republicans would throw up barricades were the Obama administration or the Democratic Congress to try and outright prohibit the risky activities (securities bundling, derivative swaps, etc) that are simultaneously so profitable for banks and so dangerous for the economy. But instead, the administration seems to be creating incentives for banks to not partake in risky activities or to cook their books – by creating a direct relationship between fees/taxes levied upon the banks and what happens if a large institution collapses.
Of worth is also the fact that the IMF’s proposals were being received in two ways by our political allies and friends in Britain (who are in the middle of a very contentious, interesting electoral season). One, as vindication of Labour’s assertion that efforts to reform the financial institutions should be multi-national and therefore a damning of the Tories’s approach which would have privileged unilateral regulatory action over seeking an international arrangement. Two, both parties are arguing solely over the scope of reform as a matter of practicality (which scope will ensure reform gets enacted) and not over the meat and bones of reform – every party involved is urging some new form of bank taxes for this exact purpose.
Along with that, the only people who are expected to be perturbed by these proposals are the big banks who the fees target and the bailouts benefited.
Stunning sometimes the contrast between European political priorities and American.
This morning, 2nd place presidential candidate & Senator John McCain decided to run with a juicy story published by the NYTimes and declare:
“I didn’t need a secret memo to know we didn’t have a coherent policy,” McCain told Fox News’s Chris Wallace. “That’s pretty obvious.” (4/18/10)
As is the standard in our mainstream media, he was issued a severe tongue-lashing by talking heads and analysts alike. Wait, strike that.
By tongue-lashing I mean he was offered a willing audience and well-connected microphone.
“We have to be willing to pull the trigger on significant sanctions,” Senator McCain said. “And then we have to make plans for whatever contingencies follow if those sanctions are not effective.”
Those are some pretty strong words coming from a Senator, though he seems to be more reserved than usual on this subject. Need I bring up again the infamous “Bomb, bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran”?
Nevertheless, military brass refused to play to McCain’s coy presumption of the military’s and the administration’s ineptitude (even if the media wasn’t going lift a finger to do so).
Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen and Defense Secretary Robert Gates both offered their professional opinions regarding Senator McCain’s contentions following the NYTimes article. In short, they reaffirmed the pressing reality that when people like John McCain speak about “contingencies” regarding Iran, they can only mean one thing, and that such actions would do more harm than good. As well, both men took the opportunity to dispel the erroneous notions that the US doesn’t have oodles and oodles of contingency plans for every possible situation and that such a lack of planning was the direct result of the Obama administration taking the helm.
“What the mainstream of that article talked about… is that we have no policy and that the implication is that we’re not working on it. I assure you, this is as complex a problem as there is in our country. And we have expended extraordinary amounts of time and effort to figure that out — to get that right,” Mullen said. “This has a focus. The focus of the President of the United States. I am his principal military adviser, and it has from the moment I have spent any time with him — even before he has sworn in,” Mullen said… Keep Reading »
While President Obama’s recent announcements about NASA have stirred up controversy (namely between Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong), one big detail that moves beyond squabbling astronauts has caught my eye.
We’re going to land on an ASTEROID!
Fuck the moon, NASA. That’s right, fuck the moon – it hasn’t done anything new in quite some time, hasn’t even been anywhere interesting. But an asteroid? Who know where those things have been?
It seems to be a goal that has great potential for new discoveries, and none with the dubious intent of moon colonies (for those of us who absolutely love artificial ozone and hate that pesky blue sky and those menacing white, fluffy clouds).
But more to the point: With approaching realities such as landing humans on Mars and exploring an asteroid, we are living in the future.
Don’t believe me? Don’t take my word for it, just listen to my man Barry:
“Now, the challenges facing our space program are different, and our imperatives for this program are different than in decades past,” the president said. “But while the measure of our achievements has changed a great deal over the past fifty years, what we do — or fail to do — in seeking new frontiers is no less consequential for our future in space and here on Earth…
…Fifty years after the creation of NASA, our goal is no longer just a destination to reach,” Obama said. “Our goal is the capacity for people to work and learn, and operate and live safely beyond the Earth for extended periods of time, ultimately in ways that are more sustainable and even indefinite. And in fulfilling this task, we will not only extend humanity’s reach in space — we will strengthen America’s leadership here on Earth.”
‘‘Enemy Belligerent Interrogation, Detention, and Prosecution Act of 2010’’.
Brr…I think a cold chill just swept through the room. Can you hear the war drums beating towards Iran?
Back to reality in year 2 of the Obama administration though.
McCain unveiled this radical piece of legislation while providing the wisdom that only a Senator as old and as wise as he can provide:
“Mr. President, I rise to introduce legislation that sets forth a clear, comprehensive policy for the detention, interrogation and trial of enemy belligerents who are suspected of engaging in hostilities against the United States. This legislation seeks to ensure that the mistakes made during the apprehension of the Christmas Day bomber, such as reading him a Miranda warning, will never happen again and put Americans’ security at risk…
..A key provision of this bill is that it would prohibit a suspected enemy belligerent from being provided with a Miranda warning and being told he has a right to a lawyer and a right to refuse to cooperate. I believe that an overwhelming majority of Americans agree that when we capture a terrorist who is suspected of carrying out or planning an attack intended to kill hundreds if not thousands of innocent civilians, our focus must be on gaining all the information possible to prevent that attack or any that may follow from occurring. Under these circumstances, actionable intelligence must be our highest priority and criminal prosecution must be secondary…
…Mr. President, deliberate mass attacks that intentionally target hundreds of innocent civilians are an act of war and should not be dealt with in the same manner as a robbery. We must recognize the difference. If we don’t, our response will be hopelessly inadequate. We should not be providing suspected terrorists with Miranda warnings and defense lawyers. Instead, the priority and focus must be on isolating and neutralizing the immediate threat and collecting intelligence to prevent another attack…I believe the handling of the Christmas Day bomber – including the law enforcement focus and the decision to read a Miranda warning after only 50 minutes of interrogation– demand that Congress and the Administration first address the issue which is most crucial to our national security. ” (Mar. 4th, 2010)
For a taste of what exactly Senator McCain prescribes to lessen the burden of those pesky civil liberties, continue past the jump or read it for yourself in its entirety here. Keep Reading »
“Obama courts Damascus in hope of ending Middle East deadlock”
- reads a headline tonight from The Independent.
I’m terribly surprised that so few American media outlets are running stories on this. The New York Times dedicated fewer than 150 words to the story, and provided not a single reference article or background article. Yet the Independent found plenty of information to provide a full story, in context and with reference articles.
CNN does provide a bit of background on Obama’s nominee for ambassador, though not much.
This goes along the whole narrative that Obama has crafted for his administration – the diplomat, repudiating the crass mentality that cast the US away from the international community. Gibbs did speak about this in a presser recently, saying that the nomination of the first ambassador to Syria since 2005 “…represents President Obama’s commitment to use engagement to advance U.S. interests by improving communication with the Syrian government and people,”.
They’ll be holding this one in their back pocket until something comes to fruition out of it.
Well, the self-righteousness has surely hit the fan. Self-proclaimed “Constitutional conservatism” is the hero of the Mount Vernon Statement; however obliquely details, specifics, policies, evidence, history and data enter into this equation.
For one thing, is this supposed to be news? Are we in the public supposed to respect or revere these folks who are indeed, not saying anything new or of substance, while they simultaneously make unsubstantiated claims about our country? While the statement reads as a high school report on conservative talking points through American history, it sure fails to offer itself in the context of our world today and the problems we face. The only effort made to contextualize this statement is provided as follows : “In light of the challenges facing the country and the need for clarity in the age of Obama…” These are somehow new problems for these folks? As opposed to the new challenges that these conservatives did not deem politically beneficial to enunciate during the last decade (aka the lost decade)?
It reduces complex policy debates to a false framework of being against the Constitution or for it, while implicitly targeting and labeling the last year under the Obama administration as not being “consistent with the American ideal,” and a “…movement away from…our founding principles,”.
Blanketed, unsupported claims such as this are necessary to further these “Constitutional conservatives” worldview. The empty rhetorical piece de resistance :
“A Constitutional conservatism unites all conservatives through the natural fusion provided by American principles. It reminds economic conservatives that morality is essential to limited government, social conservatives that unlimited government is a threat to moral self-government, and national security conservatives that energetic but responsible government is the key to America’s safety and leadership role in the world.”
Economic conservatives would probably like to be reminded that despite all the espoused morality of the Bush administration, our economy ran full speed into a brick wall. They would also probably like to be reminded that these “new challenges” we face in the “age of Obama” are a direct result of our economy crashing under Bush and the massive job losses suffered alongside said crash.
Social conservatives would probably like to be reminded that the greatest threat to moral self-government has come in the form of the exploitation of executive power by Bush/Cheney after 9.11 (think state secrets, executive privilege, and signing statements) and the subsequent relegation of habeas corpus (a Constitutionally guaranteed right) to a privilege that can be revoked at the whim of the executive. National security conservatives would likely benefit as well from the reminder that Obama is ending the war in Iraq and successfully turning the war in Afghanistan back toward our favor, most notably with the recent capture of top Taliban commanders. These same national security conservatives, which I hope is not just a term being used in lieu of the political impotence of neo-conservatives, would also benefit from the reminder that Iran is actually negotiating its nuclear enrichment program under 6 party talks that would result in them complying with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and allowing the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) full access to all their nuclear facilities. Oh and about that whole “energetic but responsible government is the key to America’s safety and leadership role in the world” assertion : remind me what recent conservative was it that brought about the collective scorn of copious populations abroad because of its reckless, irresponsible, unilateral foreign policy regime? It starts with G and rhymes with shmorge shmush.
So are we to take this statement, if we accept it as news, as a repudiation of Bush’s legacy as none of the above-mentioned values? Or should we just take it as another empty rhetorical indulgence, carried out by conservative ideologues seeking to re-write history?
Somehow the latter option seems more in line with conservatism today.
Today, Andrew Sullivan of the Daily Dish has been featuring some historical visuals of the alleged “enhanced interrogation” (re: torture) techniques institutionalized in the Bush/Cheney anti-terrorism regime (here, here and here). The shocking nature of these images is not in their graphic content, but in their power to speak to the inhumanity inherent in any torture regime. In the context of the Obama DoJ keeping a lid on as much of the visual record of the Bush/Cheney torture practices, these images emphasize that what was done was nothing new. Whoever came up with the notion that post-9/11 terrorists somehow need to be tortured clearly cannot be said to be particularly creative or ingenious. Nay, they cannot even be said to have thought through the implications of their actions, as is evidenced by the Bush administration’s efforts to remove as much tangible evidence of their acts from the public record as possible.
It is nearly 400 years after the Peruvian Inquisition from which Sullivan’s photos draw their historical context, and history has remembered those events precisely as despicable, barbaric and as exemplifying a tattered, desperate regime clinging to power. This despite the fact that there were to cameras around to document the acts – it is only the public consciousness and what spare written record remains that shapes the perception of these acts within its history. That said, I don’t think that the Obama administration’s attempts to keep the remaining torture photos from various Bush/Cheney blacksites unpublished is going to alter how history judges the last administration’s actions. Think about how easy it is to allude towards an oppressive regime just by saying the name – the Inquisition or the Khmer Rouge. After Obama’s election and during the campaign, there came to be zero ambiguity within the institutionalized perceptions of the Bush/Cheney regime that what occurred was indeed torture and that moving forward America rejects those acts and their justifications. From a March speech by Pres. Obama at the National Archives Museum:
For reasons that I will explain, the decisions that were made over the last eight years established an ad hoc legal approach for fighting terrorism that was neither effective nor sustainable – a framework that failed to rely on our legal traditions and time-tested institutions; that failed to use our values as a compass. And that is why I took several steps upon taking office to better protect the American people.First, I banned the use of so-called enhanced interrogation techniques by the United States of America
After the apparent reversal made by Pres. Ahmadinejad this week, we learn a valuable lesson on the importance of communication in any relationship.
The following remarks, made by Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, provide some insight into the rational behind the announcement by Ahmadinejad :
“Mr President [Ahmadinejad] made the comment in a subtle way. If you paid attention to his comments, he said: Start the 20-per cent enrichment, but the doors for cooperation are still open and we are still ready for fuel swap. In other words, we – although we will start the 20-per cent enrichment tomorrow – will stop the enrichment as soon as they (West) come to their senses and provide our fuel.”
Clearly, Iran has begun to show their inclination toward directing the negotiations a bit, by applying pressure to the West. I don’t think that this news discredits any efforts made by the international community to peacefully resolve the tensions inherent in Iran’s development of nuclear technology, but it highlights the importance of goal-oriented foreign policy in this case. The US has thrown its support behind the deal brokered by the 5 + 1 talks of this past year, whose goal was to outsource most of Iran’s nuclear enrichment to France while still ensuring that Iran can pursue peaceful uses of nuclear technology to the degree they desire. The main pull towards this deal was the desire of Iran to produce these 20% enriched medical isotopes that are contentious in the West (the argument goes that the gap between 20% enriched and the higher levels needed for weapons is not as large as the gap between the 3-4% enriched and weapons grade). This latest announcement, and the translation of the above statement reinforce Iran’s commitment to using nuclear technology for purposes they see as being benign; the reaction to this statement by the West has been subdued, but a renewed call for sanctions following the statement leads me to hope that patience and reason will prevail.
Its about common interests right? The West ultimately just doesn’t want more nuclear weapons in an area that is already prone to high regional tensions. Why that principle does not apply to Pakistan and India, I do not know, but that is the principle we’ve chosen to defend in terms of Iran’s nuclear program. The opening that still exists to incorporate Iran into an international system that regulates and safeguards the use of nuclear fuel has not been more widely opened in the past. They’ve declared their terms – all they want is assurance that the West will hold up their end of the deal – and now we have an opportunity to remove the drive towards higher enrichment from Iran’s political vocabulary. What sanctions are going to do to make Iran more open to this deal, I do not know. As Juan Cole reads it:
“In a face to face meeting at the beginning of October in Geneva, the West had suggested that Iran send most of its stock of low enriched uranium to another country for enrichment to the nearly 20% that is needed to run its medical reactor. Iran’s hard liners balked at the agreement, however, presumably because they view even a stock of low enriched uranium as a sort of deterrent to a Western attempt at regime change or a military strike on Iran’s civilian nuclear enrichment facilities near Isfahan…”
“Salehi is saying that Ahmadinejad’s announcement was meant primarily to force acceptance of this alternative. At the same time, on Saturday Ahmadinejad seemed to say that he would accept the deal offered by the US in October. US officials were understandably skeptical about this alleged softening of Tehran’s position, and Salehi on Monday seemed to suggest that Iran was making a push for the hard liners’ compromise.”
Foreign Policy’s David Kenner brings us a list of the media’s most prominent Luddites : those in favor of bombing the nuclear technology out of Iran. Kenner describes these characters as a “belligerent minority”, supported by Dick Cheney, whose agitations seem unlikely to influence any opinion in the Obama administration, as “administration officials have strongly suggested they prefer to deal with Iran’s nuclear ambitions through diplomacy and sanctions,”.
At the top of that list is Daniel Pipes , whose recent “…Bomb Iran” article has been making the rounds. I derided his flimsy justification for a complete about-face of US policy regarding nuclear states (politics and ‘public opinion’) here. Next is John Bolton (fmr. US ambassador to the UN), whose favored policies toward Iran also include regime change. Following next comes Norman Podhoretz, whose argument towards urgent military action rests upon an analogy he makes comparing Iran and nuclear power to Hitler. The list finishes with Joshua Muravchik, Thomas McInerney and Max Boot – expect more of the same reasoning (and more mentions of Israel) within these arguments towards war.
I’m glad that elections can bring about change. These are all cats that whisper into the ears of Bush/Cheney (and definitely curry the good graces of McCain – remember, “Bomb, bomb, bomb Iran”?), and I don’t know who in their right mind would argue that another war is what America needs, nay favors, right now. But the important thing is that no one is power is arguing to those ends – thanks to the nearly 67 million Americans who thought otherwise.
Over the weekend, Iran stated their intent to enrich uranium to 20% and to build 10 new enrichment plants (reacting to the West’s unresponsiveness to Iran’s nuclear offer). This move also signaled Iran’s intent to allow the IAEA to fully monitor the sites where uranium would be enriched to 20%, which Iran argues it needs to continue to produce in order to provide radioactive isotopes for cancer treatment. This all sounds reasonable when viewed outside of its context, but that context is becoming increasingly looming.
This announced has spurred renewed calls for sanctions in the West, this time the idea being prominently pushed by French President Nicolas Sarkozy and US Defense Secretary Robert Gates. This move is likely to be supported by the US Congress, who as recently as December 09 passed a new gasoline embargo on Iran. As is to be expected, there is still a vocal minority in the US who advocate an all-out war with Iran, including most recently (and visibly) Sarah Palin’s endorsement of Daniel Pipes’ NRO article titled “How to save the Obama presidency: Bomb Iran”. Of the utmost importance to note when considering these urgent statements that advocate more forceful responses (re: Bomb Iran) is that these folks have placed politics as the deciding factor in whether to bomb Iran or not. Here is Pipes’ argument (I’m not paraphrasing, it is literally this shallow):
The news that an appeals court had overturned the banning of over 500 candidates for the March elections came as a boon to the perceptions of the Iraqi government’s oversight mechanisms. But it turns out that Al-Maliki and his party believe such action by the appeals panels of the Central Criminal Court of Iraq is evidence of US interference and that the un-banning was unconstitutional. The whole issue of under whose legitimate authority this decision rests is exactly what the Iraqi government should be probing, and should be rectifying (if indeed this move was unconstitutional); but to claim that this decision was made because of US interference is kind of ridiculous (keep in mind that VP Biden visited Iraq at the end of January to urge the Iraqi gov’t to reinstate the banned candidates in order for this election to be viewed as free and fair, but had little direct success). Not only is the Al-Maliki government taking a page out of the Iranian government’s playbook, but the need to demonize the US’s role is tangential to what the actual concern is over the banned candidates. Juan Cole provides an in-depth analysis of the decision making processes involved in this dispute, and conspicuously the US was never an integral part of the process nor a relevant actor.
The issue has caused the Independent High Electoral Commission to delay the beginning of campaign season in order to allow enough time for the Federal Supreme Court to decide on the constitutionality of the previous reversal.
News To (Me)dia
…and everything in between
Stay on point :
