Politics

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Is Our Foreign Policy Stuck on Stupid?

The New York Times decided to stir the pot on Benghazi and in the process showed that after a lot of work they can arrive at the same conclusion of a massive intelligence failure that most of us arrived at two years ago.  Here is a quote from the New York Times editorial.

While the report debunks Republican allegations, it also illuminates the difficulties in understanding fast-moving events in the Middle East and in parsing groups that one moment may be allied with the West and in another, turn adversarial. Americans are often careless with the term “Al Qaeda,” which strictly speaking means the core extremist group, founded by Osama bin Laden, that is based in Pakistan and bent on global jihad.

Republicans, Democrats and others often conflate purely local extremist groups, or regional affiliates, with Al Qaeda’s international network. That prevents understanding the motivations of each group, making each seem like a direct, immediate threat to the United States and thus confusing decision-making.

The report is a reminder that the Benghazi tragedy represents a gross intelligence failure, something that has largely been overlooked in the public debate. A team of at least 20 people from the Central Intelligence Agency, including highly skilled commandos, was operating out of an unmarked compound about a half-mile southeast of the American mission when the attack occurred. Yet, despite the C.I.A. presence and Ambassador Stevens’s expertise on Libya, “there was little understanding of militias in Benghazi and the threat they posed to U.S. interests,” a State Department investigation found. The C.I.A. supposedly did its own review. It has not been made public, so there is no way to know if the agency learned any lessons.

My problem with Benghazi is that it appears to be emblematic of a foreign policy stuck on stupid. Here are some of the questions that remain unanswered.

  1. What foreign policy concerns required Ambassador Steven to ignore intelligence threat reports and conduct business in Benghazi on September 11th?
  2. Does anyone at the State Department understand the concept of fourth generational warfare? Since 1989 we have talking about the “blurring of the lines between war and politics, soldier and civilian” and we are stuck nitpicking whether Al Qaeda had operational control of the attack. To its credit the NYT complains about this, too.
  3. When I look at our foreign policy in Syria it looks like the Benghazi foreign policy on steroids. Which side are we on? What are our objectives? Would someone please call Putin so we can figure out what the US policy is?
  4. If we look dazed and confused on Syria and Libya, what message does that say to Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt? Is our sheer incompetence leading to more unrest or just more stirring of the political pot? If we do not start showing some foreign policy successes in this area maybe it is time for us to cut and run and leave the policing of the Middle East combatants to the professionals?
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The Nuclear Option and What It Means to Fixing the Problems with the Affordable Care Act in 2014

One of my many complaints about the Affordable Care Act is that it is primarily a political achievement and the heavy lifting of health care reform was left as a future exercise. Although there have been some political achievements that were translated into good government policy by our bureaucrats, this piece of legislation needed some opposition views to help detour them from changing things that are not broke. This is most evident in the policy that resulted in the cancellation of existing insurance plans. The plans seemed to be working okay and the customers were happy. There was never a good argument put forth why these people had to be the first in line for health care reform. It seems that the Affordable Care Act supporters deliberately went out of their way to make enemies and then had the nerve to gloat about it as “progress”. President Obama’s comment to the GOP sums up the Affordable Care Act supporter’s attitude.

I Won. Get Over It

This attitude leads to a political strategy that reduces good will, trust, and consensus making among our legislators at just the moment these legislators needed to back off from the partisan Kool-Aid and start fixing their mistakes. Instead the Senate embraced the nuclear option and kicked off the 2014 election debate with a bang. The congenial Senate has become more like the House and passing laws to help fix the more egregious problems with the Affordable Care Act in 2014 is one of the many losers. One of the lessons I learned in over thirty years of marriage is that being right is overrated. The Senate has set themselves up for a bitter custody battle and we, the people, have lost hope for a more perfect union.

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A Conservative Argument for Health Care Reform

Last week I was amused listening to quotes by President Obama that said:

If Americans like their doctor, they will keep their doctor. And if you like your insurance plan, you will keep it.

The reason that I found these quotes amusing is that this a traditional conservative argument being made by a progressive President. If my notes are correct we find that in Professor Allitt’s first lecture in the Conservative Tradition course, conservatives believe that at the most fundamental level, there is a strong human propensity to keep things the way they are.  Even President Obama realizes that he cannot ignore this aspect of human nature so it should not be surprising that he would use this argument to further his political cause. From this basic conservative idea we can also see why Conservatives have embraced slower, more predictable policies. Progressives are more impatient with change. They want change to happen a lot faster and are willing to trade hardships on “other people” for the greater good of society. Progressive plans generally run into problems when the “other people” is the forgotten, middle class voters. So on one hand the President would like to stick to his progressive health care reform with a “Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!” attitude. On the other hand he has this nagging fear that the signature accomplishment of his administration will not work and that his own people will unleash a rein of chaos on middle class voters if unchecked. He realizes now that what he once perceived as a loyal and competent administration is actually an insular group of people that is adamant that they can do stupid all by themselves without any help from an opposition party. This leaves the President and his administration in a quandary. They need an opposition party to check their excesses but from the opposition they have seen so far, they would prefer that this opposition is seen and not heard. Oh, how I yearn for the good old days when Republicans were the stupid party! At least they could lead.

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Echoes From Vietnam

Since I am old enough to personally remember the Vietnam war I am surprised how far we have strayed from the lessons of that war. As the Vietnam war wound down we promised ourselves we would only enter “good” wars we could win both militarily and politically and to not enter into “bad” wars we could not win either militarily or politically. That left a lot of wiggle room in the middle but from our Vietnam war experience the term, “limited” war, is both an oxymoron and a red flag. The first Iraq war was a good example of politicians and military leaders abiding by these lessons. We won the military war handily but had mixed results with political changes inside Iraq. The second Iraq war and the Afghanistan wars were less successful with the military and political objectives but at least we tried to win the hearts and minds of the people to a mutually beneficent cause. When we look at the proposed limited strike against Syria and the political plan to win the hearts of the Syrian people, this is a “bad” war. If this war is actually a campaign to counter a global Islamist insurgency then how do we pick a side? Do we help our terrorist friends in Al-Qaeda or Hamas? Is this another fourth generational war we are doomed to lose because our thinking is still stuck in the 1960’s? Similar to our problems trying to arbitrate Sunni-Shiite problems in Iraq, it is even less likely that the end game for this war will result in Syrian Sunni and Shiite people agreeing to a mutually beneficial political objective. Unfortunately for our politicians the American population know a “bad” war when they see one. It is ironic to hear John Kerry make the case to engage in this “bad” war. If anyone should know, Mr. Kerry should know that “bad” wars can make or dramatically shorten political careers. This is a war we need to walk away from.

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Does the US Government View Us at the Enemy?

I saw this on the Campaign for Liberty blog. It reminded of the legal difficulties posed by a treason charge that I pointed out in my post, Pentagon Papers Revisited. As I said in that post the Justice department could be sensing a little déjà vu with their treason case against Mr. Snowden. Here is the statement posted on Dr. Paul’s Facebook page:

My understanding is that espionage means giving secret or classified information to the enemy. Since Snowden shared information with the American people, his indictment for espionage could reveal (or confirm) that the US Government views you and me as the enemy.

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Is the USA Looking for a Few Good Men in the NSA?

Every time I hear a official explain the NSA surveillance program I am reminded of the climatic scene in the movie, “A Few Good Men”. In this scene Kaffee is pressing Colonel Jessup as to whether he ordered his men to conduct an illegal training exercise, a “Code Red”, that resulted in the death of a marine, Santiago.

Col. Jessep: I’ll answer the question!

[to Kaffee]

Col. Jessep: You want answers?

Kaffee: I think I’m entitled to.

Col. Jessep: *You want answers?*

Kaffee: *I want the truth!*

Col. Jessep: *You can’t handle the truth!*

[pauses]

Col. Jessep: Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who’s gonna do it? You? You, Lt. Weinburg? I have a greater responsibility than you could possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago, and you curse the Marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know. That Santiago’s death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives. You don’t want the truth because deep down in places you don’t talk about at parties, you want me on that wall, you need me on that wall. We use words like honor, code, loyalty. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide, and then questions the manner in which I provide it. I would rather you just said thank you, and went on your way, Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon, and stand a post. Either way, I don’t give a damn what you think you are entitled to.

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Why Does the NSA Use Contractors?

The obvious but unstated answer by most pundits is that you can fire contractors. As our experience with the IRS and State Department has shown us, firing government employees is just not done. Most of the time they are put on paid leave. If the government employee is particularly bad, you promote them to a position where they can do less harm. Hopefully they will get bored or disenchanted and seek employment elsewhere.

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Did the IRS Confuse the Tea Party with the NAACP?

Recently I did some research and figured out the NAACP is probably the best example of political activism by a 501(c)3/501(c)4 organization. While the national organization is a 501(c)3 organization, the local affiliates are 501(c)4 organizations. The national organization has strict requirements on its political activism so it is up to the local affiliates to promote voting in the black communities. When you use the 2012 presidential election voting demographics to compare the organizational effectiveness, the Associated Press concluded in its study of the 2012 election that for the first time black voter turnout rate exceeded the white turnout rate. When you look at this result the NAACP can claim that they were more successful than the conservative organizations at getting their constituency out to vote. They also successfully fought off the IRS investigations into their tax exempt status in 2004. Their “Election Year DOs and DON’Ts” document is an example of excellent, proactive instructions to their affiliates that should keep the organization safe from IRS scrutiny. In the case of political activism by a non-profit, the NAACP is arguably the best in the class. They successfully avoided extra IRS scrutiny while showing a measurable success on the voter turnout issue.  From this point of view it would not be surprising that “Tea Party” and other organizations interested in increasing the vote within their constituency would copy the organizational structure and some of the tactics used by the NACCP to improve their organizational effectiveness while staying compliant with IRS regulations. Although students of organizational effectiveness might say some non-profit organizations are “NAACP-like”, the average man or woman would never use “NAACP-like” to describe the “Tea Party” organizations. It is equally unlikely they would use “Tea Party” as shorthand  to describe the NAACP. Are we to believe that the IRS personnel commonly used the term “Tea Party” to describe the political activity by the NAACP? According to Ms. Paz that is exactly what the IRS did. If her statement is true, the IRS is naïve and probably incompetent. If the IRS was using a shorthand for politically active tax exempt organizations then the term “NAACP-like” would be a more logical shorthand term. It has more syllables but it is the organization all politically active tax exempt organizations are trying to copy. It has the additional advantage that when IRS personnel say they are scrutinizing political activities in “NAACP-like” organizations since it recognizes that the NAACP is the model everyone is following and it would be difficult for the average person to conclude that the IRS was targeting “Tea Party” organizations. The simplest solution would have been for the IRS to spend an extra second on a few extra syllables and use the term “politically active tax exempt organizations” to describe the organizations they were targeting. If Ms. Paz’s statement is false, then she is lying and attempting to cover up the IRS targeting of conservative groups in direct violation of IRS policy.

Instead, Paz described an agency in which IRS supervisors in Washington worked closely with agents in the field but didn’t fully understand what those agents were doing. Paz said agents in Cincinnati openly talked about handling "tea party" cases, but she thought the term was merely shorthand for all applications from groups that were politically active ”” conservative and liberal.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/fired-irs-supervisor-in-dc-contradicts-claim-tea-party-targeting-was-isolated-to-cincinnati-office-2013-6#ixzz2WTMqteJe

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Pentagon Papers Revisited

This Wonkblog article, No, Edward Snowden probably didn’t commit treason, got me thinking about the Pentagon Papers. The circumstances of these two events are eerily similar but I needed to refresh my memory since it occurred a long time ago. Yes, we have been down this path before. Here is the relevant part from the Pentagon Papers Wikipedia article about the  that would be pertinent to a potential Snowden treason charge.

Before publication, The New York Times sought legal advice. The paper’s regular outside counsel, Lord Day & Lord, advised against publication,[5] but house counsel James Goodale prevailed with his argument that the press had a First Amendment right to publish information significant to the people’s understanding of their government’s policy.

President Nixon’s first reaction to the publication was that since the study embarrassed the Johnson and Kennedy administrations, not his, he should do nothing. However, Kissinger convinced the president that not opposing publication set a negative precedent for future secrets.[5] The administration argued Ellsberg and Russo were guilty of a felony under the Espionage Act of 1917, because they had no authority to publish classified documents.[17] After failing to persuade the Times to voluntarily cease publication on June 14,[5] Attorney General John N. Mitchell and Nixon obtained a federal court injunction forcing the Times to cease publication after three articles.[5] Times publisher Arthur Ochs Sulzberger said:

Newspapers, as our editorial said this morning, we’re really a part of history that should have been made available, considerably longer ago. I just didn’t feel there was any breach of national security, in the sense that we were giving secrets to the enemy.[18]

Daniel Ellsberg was eventually indicted on charges of stealing and holding secret documents. The trial ended in a mistrial. The administration was in the midst of the Watergate scandal so the charges were eventually dismissed. The Justice department could be sensing a little déjà vu with their case against Mr. Snowden.

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The Mediated Man, David Brooks versus Thomas Paine

Commonsense-153pxYesterday I read David Brooks editorial about the mediated man and his allegation that because Mr. Snowden’s life is “unshaped by the mediating institutions of civil society”, Mr. Snowden sees his battle as that between  “the solitary naked individual and the gigantic and menacing state” and that he would be “more likely to share the distinct strands of libertarianism that are blossoming in this fragmenting age”. Since I had just read Thomas Paine’s “Common Sense” on Sunday, I was surprised with his analysis. It is as if Mr. Brooks borrowed the idea of mediating institutions from “Common Sense” and then promptly forgot that Thomas Paine used this “common sense” to argue against the absurdities of British rule. Thomas Paine did not mince his words. He was at least as vehement about the absurdities of British rule as Mr. Snowden has been about the absurdities of blanket data gathering by the U. S. government. Here is the opening paragraph of “Common Sense”.

SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by wickedness; the former promotes our happiness POSITIVELY by uniting our affections, the latter NEGATIVELY by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher.

“Common Sense” was popular in 1776 because common people could hold two common sense thoughts in their minds at the same time. For many of them their life was “embedded in a series of gently gradated authoritative structures: family, neighborhood, religious group, state, nation and world” and yet at the same time, they were very concerned about abuses by the British government. Their response surprised many of the pundits of that day since it was both measured and civil to “the gigantic and menacing state”. I guess that it is not surprising that Mr. Brooks would make the same mistake. Random acts of violence was no longer a solution for the common man. Within a short period of time this common sense argument had initiated a public debate about independence from England which resulted in the Declaration of Independence.  For today’s generation Mr. Snowden is their voice just like Mr. Ellsberg  was the voice of the Viet Nam war generation.

Here is the part of the David Brooks article I quoted.

If you live a life unshaped by the mediating institutions of civil society, perhaps it makes sense to see the world a certain way: Life is not embedded in a series of gently gradated authoritative structures: family, neighborhood, religious group, state, nation and world. Instead, it’s just the solitary naked individual and the gigantic and menacing state.

This lens makes you more likely to share the distinct strands of libertarianism that are blossoming in this fragmenting age: the deep suspicion of authority, the strong belief that hierarchies and organizations are suspect, the fervent devotion to transparency, the assumption that individual preference should be supreme. You’re more likely to donate to the Ron Paul for president campaign, as Snowden did….