« February 2008 | Main | April 2008 »
6 posts: (1) Iraq: Basra Blues--Us v. Them; (2) Germany's Intel Curveball--Weenie Watch: (3) Can Asset Balances Weather Credit Quakes?--"It's the Economy Stupid!; (4) Islamism Takes UN By Storm!--Turtle Bay Tortoise; (5) Hillary in Bosnia: Another "Eyewitness" "Recalls"--The Home Front (6) A Great Star Passes On--Class & Crass.
Anthony Cordesman, a superb Mideast analyst with the Georgetown Center for Strategic & International Studies, fears that a widening war in the south may undo the gains in security over the past year. The Brits, it seems, governed Basra with what AC calls a "not-so-benign neglect," essentially parceling out political plums to local mafias. Also, the provincial elections set for the fall throughout Iraq may fail, due to lack of indigenous political parties and candidates. The wages of premature elections may prove grim again. American officials are aware of the problem, but whether they can fix it remains to be seen. In an example of what concerns Cordesman, the Washington Times reported Sunday that thug-cleric Moqtada al-Sadr had rejected a call for his Mahdi Army to surrender arms, as American jets carried out air-strikes around Basra, in support of Iraqi government actions on the ground. But the Los Angeles Times reported today that yesterday Sadr ordered his troops to lay down their arms. The Wall Street Journal editors worry that the Iraqi government is stopping short of what Iraqis will perceive as victory, and thus letting Sadr off the hook yet again. A complementary British perspective is offered by Con Coughlin of the Daily Telegraph. In for a dime, in for a dollar. Stay tuned.
The Wall Street Journal reviews that infamous "Curveball" intelligence controversy, based upon a major article in the high-profile magazine Der Spiegel, and finds that Germany, and not Ahmad Chalabi, was the culprit. The mendacious Iraqi whose intel proved phony was held by the Germans since 1999. The CIA was denied direct access to him, even after 9/11, and despite Gerhard Schroeder's equally phony promise of "infinite solidarity" with America after 9/11. Germany believed Curveball enough to stock 35 million doses of anthraz vaccine, fearing an attack by Saddam. David Kay, who headed the Iraq Survey Group that searched for WMD inside Iraq after the fall of Baghdad, told Der Spiegel, of access denied: "It was a blockade that made it impossible for any other service to validate his information."
Vincent Reinhardt, AEI scholar & former director of the Division of Monetary Affairs at the Federal Reserve, sees America in its worst financial crisis since the 1930s. The Fed, he writes, is overextended, with $400 billion of its $900 billion balance sheet pledged already to guarantee credit extended by financial institutions. Financial maven John Rutledge informs us in his 3/25 posting (scroll) that Goldman Sachs estimates that global credit losses will reach $1.2 trillion. The U.S., where $120 billion has already been vaporized, will bear $460 billion of the total, of which home mortgages will account for half, commercial mortgages 15 - 20 percent and consumer debt the rest.
Rutledge does not despair, noting that according to the Fed's Flow of Funds report for end-2007, U.S. financial assets total $141.9 trillion and liabilities $107 trillion, for a $34.9 trillion net positive balance. Add in an estimated $57.7 trillion in tangible assets, and Rutledge thus calculates that we have about $200 trillion in total tangible assets.
A Wall Street Journal editorial flags a bipartisan effort in Congress to impose price ceilings on consumer credit transactions. Since 1995, credit transactions have jumped from 3 percent to 40 percent of all retail sales, and are estimated to reach 56 percent by 2010. The 2 percent monthly fee on credit balances is the target of Congressional ire. The WSJ advises not to mess with a market that is growing in scope and depth. Visa (50%) and Mastercard (25%) are the Big Kahunas, but competition is emerging in the $35 billion credit card industry.
Historian James Piereson offers historical perspective by citing numbers from the great Depression: after the market crash of 1929, stocks fell 89 percent in three years. By 1933, economic output had fallen 30 percent, while unemployment rose from 4 to 25 percent; half of banks had either failed or merged with others; exports had plummeted by two-thirds. The mood was best captured in 1932 by the immortal lyrics of E. Y. (Yip) Harburg in his "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime" plea:
Once I built a railroad, I made it run,
Made it race against time.
Once I built a railroad, now it's done --
Brother, can you spare a dime?
Once I built a tower, up to the sun,
brick and rivet and lime.
Once I built a tower, now it's done --
Brother, can you spare a dime?
So do not jump out of the window--yet.
You knew it would happen: the UN's Human Wrongs Council adopted a resolution introduced by the Organization of Islamic Conference nominally, aimed at defamation of religions. Naturally, the only religion mentioned as a victim was Islam. Nothing about the Nazi TV aired in the Arab world, littered with blood libels of the Jews. The vote was 21-10 against, with the European Union & Canada commendably opposed; the U.S. is not a member. The EU's stance is especially noteworthy, as earlier it had indicated sympathy for action to curb defamation of religion. Libel's origin, in English common law, was as state prosecution against those who criticized King or Church. It seems that the UN--hardly a surprise--is joining militant Islam in a journey back over the centuries.
Peggy Noonan, in a column on how Hillary is coming apart (WSJ pundit Kimberley Strassel parallels Poetic Peg's piece with a column explaining how Bosnia has teed up Hillary's character as an issue, once off limits in the campaign), offers this terrific riff on Hill's Bosnian adventures, from a wag:
What struck me as the best commentary on the Bosnia story came from a poster called GI Joe who wrote in to a news blog: "Actually Mrs. Clinton was too modest. I was there and saw it all. When Mrs. Clinton got off the plane the tarmac came under mortar and machine gun fire. I was blown off my tank and exposed to enemy fire. Mrs. Clinton without regard to her own safety dragged me to safety, jumped on the tank and opened fire, killing 50 of the enemy." Soon a suicide bomber appeared, but Mrs. Clinton stopped the guards from opening fire. "She talked to the man in his own language and got him [to] surrender. She found that he had suffered terribly as a result of policies of George Bush. She defused the bomb vest herself." Then she turned to his wounds. "She stopped my bleeding and saved my life. Chelsea donated the blood."
The Los Angeles Times had a fine obituary last week on one of the finest and classiest actors, ome whose career spanned the latter half of Hollywood's Golden Era: Richard Widmark, at 93. His career exemplified versatility. He played villains and heroes and in-betweens. And he exuded professionalism--never did he "walk through" a role as Frank Sinatra often did--"ol' Blue Eyes" did one take only (in stark contrast to his supreme discipline as a singer, with many takes). Widmark's career, however, was noteworthy in one other respect: His was perhaps the ultimate case of one role typecasting him in the public mind. Ironically, it was in his first film, "Kiss of Death," in which he played a sadistic mob killer. Tommy Udo became Widmark's image for many viewers who fancied that Widmark was like Udo in real life (he was the polar opposite). Amazingly, a single film did this, whereas it took several James Bond films to typecast Sean Connery as 007. Hollywood's Golden Age survivors, like World War II veterans, are fading from the scene. May they, too, be well remembered.
2 posts: (1) McCain's Foreign & Mortgage Policy; 43 on Iraq--The Home Front; (2) Obama's Saving Speech?--The Home Front; (3) Hill's REAL Whooper--and Eyewitness Bosnia Film!--The Home Front; (4) Conservative Compassion; Liberal Lassitude--The Home Front.
John McCain has given a major foreign policy speech laying out his views. It is eloquent in spots, and proposes a League of Democracies to get things done when the UN drags its feet. The whole speech is worth a read, albeit I could have done without the global warming stuff, but here are the money paragraphs:
I am an idealist, and I believe it is possible in our time to make the world we live in another, better, more peaceful place, where our interests and those of our allies are more secure, and American ideals that are transforming the world, the principles of free people and free markets, advance even farther than they have. But I am, from hard experience and the judgment it informs, a realistic idealist. I know we must work very hard and very creatively to build new foundations for a stable and enduring peace. We cannot wish the world to be a better place than it is. We have enemies for whom no attack is too cruel, and no innocent life safe, and who would, if they could, strike us with the world's most terrible weapons. There are states that support them, and which might help them acquire those weapons because they share with terrorists the same animating hatred for the West, and will not be placated by fresh appeals to the better angels of their nature. This is the central threat of our time, and we must understand the implications of our decisions on all manner of regional and global challenges could have for our success in defeating it.
And:
We have incurred a moral responsibility in Iraq. It would be an unconscionable act of betrayal, a stain on our character as a great nation, if we were to walk away from the Iraqi people and consign them to the horrendous violence, ethnic cleansing, and possibly genocide that would follow a reckless, irresponsible, and premature withdrawal. Our critics say America needs to repair its image in the world. How can they argue at the same time for the morally reprehensible abandonment of our responsibilities in Iraq?
And in a clarion call no one else who ran for President this time could make:
I do not argue against withdrawal, any more than I argued several years ago for the change in tactics and additional forces that are now succeeding in Iraq, because I am somehow indifferent to war and the suffering it inflicts on too many American families. I hold my position because I hate war, and I know very well and very personally how grievous its wages are. But I know, too, that we must sometimes pay those wages to avoid paying even higher ones later.
Pundit David Brooks labels McCain's speech the best of the season, and notes two earlier milestones as to the kind of leadership McCain can provide: a Sept. 28, 1983 speech in his freshman House term, in which McCain warned against sending troops to Lebanon, because troops could not stabilize Lebanese society, and a Nov. 5, 2003 speech in the Senate, warning that the strategy in Iraq was wrong, due to failure to conduct proper counter-insurgency, lack of troops and the arrogance of Paul Bremer in treating Iraqis as defeated rather than liberated. McCain's warnings proved prescient, with the Oct. 24, 1983 terror attack that killed 241 Marines and led the Reagan administration to exit in defeat, and well, we know what happened in Iraq.
The Wall Street Journal praises Big Mac's market-based policy, in contrast to Hill's socialist view that ignores the blame the government bears for its part in the mortgage mess, with a 90-day freeze on mortgage markets, a disastrous idea. Worth a read.
As is President Bush's forceful defense of his Iraq policy, in Dayton yesterday. Especially noteworthy are the data he provides (pages 2 & 3) on Iraq's economic progress and its increasing contributions to reconstruction and security--impressive sums.
Against Big Mac this fall, Charles Krauthammer writes, Democrats will mount their best defense: the Big Lie, distorting McCain's 100 years in Iraq line to imply a century of war, rather than a postwar presence as in Japan. CK quotes an Obama aide: "It's seldom you get such a clean shot." Read CK's column to see what Big Mac actually said, and realize what the GOP is in store for come the fall campaign. Put simply, the Democrats know they cannot defeat Big Mac with the truth re national security, so they will simply lie and hope to get away with it. Which demonstrates their manifest unfitness for high office.
Victor Davis Hanson has written an alternate text for Obama, that would, Hanson believes, have been far better and more healing. VDH's take is well worth a read.
Learn more in my new book: The Long War Ahead And
The Short War Upon Us
