RedState

Rethinking the Calls for Intervention in Syria

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 11:00:53 +0000

My RedState colleague and good friend Victoria Coates recently wrote a post calling for a humanitarian intervention in Syria on behalf of the opposition and civilians who are being killed daily by Bashar al-Assad’s regime. She writes:

“In dealing with Libya and Syria, consistency need not be the hobgoblin of little minds but can rather be the hallmark of a consistent and coordinated foreign policy. There are equivalencies to be drawn between the two crises, and once these are recognized we should take equivalent action. It is not a decision to be taken lightly, but we would not be alone and the cause is just. We have the unified support of our European and Arab allies. We have moral and strategic interests at stake. Rather than whining about the shocking moral turpitude of the United Nations, the President of the United States needs to remember his responsibilities as the leader of the free world–and lead.”

While I have the utmost respect for Dr. Coates, I am hesitant to agree with her in this case. There is no question that the bloodshed in Syria, which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton referred to a mere nine months ago as a simple “police action” and contrasted favorably to the violent crackdown in Libya, has been both constant and staggering (in that same interview, Clinton favorably contrasted Assad to Qaddafi, saying “many of the members of Congress of both parties who have gone to Syria in recent months have said they believe he’s a reformer”). The death toll in Homs alone has reportedly grown to 3,500 over the last eleven months, and while the Arab League has repeatedly called for an end to Assad’s crackdown, opposition from Russia and China has left the UN Security Council unable to pass even a simple resolution condemning the government’s murderous actions.

As the bodycount continues to rise in Syria, there has been an increase in calls for intervention conducted outside the auspices of the UN. However, while these calls are understandable on humanitarian grounds, their authors almost invariably neglect to include any details on just what it is they wish to see take place with regard to that intervention.

At Abu Muqawama, Andrew Exum sums up the problem nicely:

“The problem is, for me at least, ‘military intervention’ at once means everything and nothing. On the one hand, the decision to use force to achieve a desired political end is momentous in and of itself. On the other hand, though, I cannot determine whether or not “military intervention” is a good or bad idea until I have some idea of what, precisely, is meant by the term. Analysts who argue either for or against military intervention have an obligation to sketch out the ways in which one could possibly intervene so that we can determine which ways, if any, make sense given the circumstances.”

This is the real question: what would an intervention in Syria look like, and under whose auspices would it be carried out? In Libya, the most frequently cited example, the UN-approved intervention succeeded in its ultimate goal of preventing Qaddafi from crushing the rebels. It also succeeded in removing him from power, despite that not being part of the UN authorization (and despite the effort taking far longer than the “days, not weeks” that President Obama promised).

Two points on Libya are particularly worth noting. First, despite people declaring victory and then tuning out as usual upon Qaddafi’s capture (including, it appears, several of those ‘experts’ who called for intervention in Libya and who are calling for it again in Syria), the situation on the ground is poor and growing worse by the day. As Anthony Shadid noted in the New York Times Wednesday:

The country that witnessed the Arab world’s most sweeping revolution is foundering. So is its capital, where a semblance of normality has returned after the chaotic days of the fall of Tripoli last August. But no one would consider a city ordinary where militiamen tortured to death an urbane former diplomat two weeks ago, where hundreds of refugees deemed loyal to Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi waited hopelessly in a camp and where a government official acknowledged that “freedom is a problem.” Much about the scene on Wednesday was lamentable, perhaps because the discord was so commonplace.

[...]

The force at the Tripoli airport is the powerful militia from Zintan, a mountain town south of the capital, which played a role in Tripoli’s fall and still holds prisoner Colonel Qaddafi’s most prominent son, Seif al-Islam. By its count, it has 1,000 men at the airport, and one of its commanders there…The militias are proving to be the scourge of the revolution’s aftermath. Though they have dismantled most of their checkpoints in the capital, they remain a force, here and elsewhere. A Human Rights Watch researcher estimated there are 250 separate militias in the coastal city of Misurata, the scene of perhaps the fiercest battle of the revolution. In recent months those militias have become the most loathed in the country.

Second, the “no-fly zone” enforced over Libya was, in actuality, no such thing; as anybody who was paying attention at the time will recall, air power and other standoff weaponry were employed not just to ensure that the skies over Libya stayed clear, but to take out Qaddafi’s armor, vehicles, and troops between Tripoli and Benghazi. As Exum notes in another post:

The balance in Libya was only tipped when NATO warplanes began “enforcing the no-fly zone” by destroying Libyan tanks and armored personnel carriers. (I know those things don’t actually fly, but the only way you can be really sure they won’t grow wings is by dropping a GBU-31 on top of them.)

Of course, the reality – that massive mission creep was necessary to break the gridlock in Libya and push Qaddafi out of power – is frequently obfuscated or ignored when discussing the Libyan “success.” Writing in the Times a few weeks ago, Robert Pape used Libya and Syria as examples of the need for a “new standard for humanitarian intervention” (which he didn’t go into detail on), while arguing that such intervention is incumbent on America et al if people are being killed as long as there is no danger to the interveners. Along with proposing a “new standard” for intervention without actually going into what that standard should be, Pape misrepresents NATO’s Libya action (which he supports) while contrasting it with a prospective intervention in Syria (which he currently opposes, basically because it would be more difficult and more dangerous). He writes:

“[R]ather than seeking regime change to prevent genocide, President Obama focused on the narrower objective of preventing “a humanitarian catastrophe” and explicitly ruled out foreign-imposed regime change.

These more modest, pragmatic goals sidestepped Mr. Gates’s objections and reflect the emerging new standard for humanitarian intervention. The United States took the lead, but initially only to halt the mass-homicide campaign. And it rightly set goals that would not require an ambitious military commitment.”

Of course, as alluded to above, anybody who was paying attention at the time knows that the disavowal of regime decapitation and change was little more than lip service to the UN resolution that specifically authorized the protection of civilians rather than the overthrow of Qaddafi, in part because it was widely recognized that the protection of civilians from Qaddafi could only be ensured via his removal.

Libya is not Syria – and the ‘Pottery Barn Rule’ is being thoroughly ignored by those who are now focused on the latter, having abandoned the former to militias and growing chaos. However, the intervention there has impacted the willingness of America, NATO, and the United Nations to approve and participate in a similar intervention in Syria (in an interesting if incomplete piece, Joshua Foust suggeststhat Russia and China are opposing Syrian intervention specifically because of the NATO action in Libya and the severe mission creep it entailed).

More importantly, though, Syria has a functional military with significant firepower and a government that is still largely in control throughout the country. It has a powerful ally in Russia, which continues to give aid and comfort to Assad’s regime as the violent crackdown continues (and which will continue to do so as long as they consider it to be in their interest to do so, which I think may be a more significant period of time than P.J. Crowley predicts). Further, Syria currently has no Benghazi: rebels haven’t gained control of any geographic are significant enough to use as a refuge or base from which to conduct defensive operations, and potential targets for interventionist air power are interspersed with civilians and rebels, which greatly limits the effectiveness of standoff weaponry while simultaneously increasing the risk of collateral damage by orders of magnitude. In his New York Times column referenced above, Pape writes:

“Unlike Libya, where much of the coastal core of the population lived under rebel control, the opposition to Syria’s dictatorial president, Bashar al-Assad, has not achieved sustained control of any major population area. So air power alone would probably not be sufficient to blunt the Assad loyalists entrenched in cities, and a heavy ground campaign would probably face stiff and bloody resistance.”

If arming the rebels is a serious consideration, it is important to consider just how that would be carried out, who would be armed, what the response would be (on both sides), and what difference it would make in the overall battle. If employing air power and standoff weaponry is being proposed, then targeting, ordnance control, and the avoidance of collateral damage – as well as the effectiveness of that course of action – must be taken into consideration. If “boots on the ground” is a realistic option to those calling for intervention – well, a whole host of further issues must be addressed, including the risk of a proxy war with Russia that brings along its own risk (however small it might be) of further international escalation.

All of this is not to declare outright that a Syrian intervention to be outside the realm of propriety or possibility. However, it is incumbent on those who are calling for action on the part of America and her allies to address these and other issues that such action faces, and to present coherent and specific plans for the intervention they are proposing. Additionally, given the current situation in Libya mere months after the conclusion of NATO action there, it is important that conditions in Syria both during and after the proposed intervention, and over the longue duree following the conclusion of offensive operations, be both considered and adequately planned for.

Until then, it is probably best for all involved if the talk of a Syria intervention remains just that, despite the terrible human cost of Assad’s actions.

The Frontrunner

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:45:00 +0000

The other night I was having dinner and Pat Cadell, Jimmy Carter’s pollster and a very honest liberal, came up to me. He said bluntly that if his side’s front runner had lost 3 of the first 8 elections and been swept out last Tuesday, by Wednesday the Democrats would have a new candidate in the race.

He is right.

Yet the Republican Party has decided instead of finding a new guy to do what it can to get Romney across the finish line no matter how bad the limp.

On Tuesday, Santorum swept. Romney came in third in Minnesota. Counties he won big in Colorado turned on him overwhelmingly. Our “frontrunner” has one three of the first eight. With the exception of Florida, he has shown he can only win states with strong family ties like New Hampshire and states with strong Mormon participation like Nevada.

That may give him Michigan and Arizona, but it spells trouble elsewhere.

This is the seventh CPAC I have been to. The crowd is the least excited I have seen. On the first day, before the candidates have had a chance to bus in their supporters to stack the deck and straw poll, this is the least excited I’ve seen them. The crowd’s heart is with Santorum. But in their mind they do not think he can win.

Today, Mitt Romney must convince the crowd he is one of them or at least won’t betray them. Rick Santorum must convince them he can beat Barack Obama. Newt Gingrich must convince them he is still viable.

Along the way a funny thing has happened. Romney supporters are starting to be openly critical of him. The business whiz has failed to restructure his own failing organization. His support is a mile wide and an inch deep.

And he has been replaced as front runner by the crowd. They are with Rick Santorum in heart, but also in money and votes. On the horizon looms a brokered convention.

Morning Briefing for February 10, 2012

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:44:00 +0000

RedState Morning Briefing
For February 10, 2012

Go to www.RedStateMB.com to get
the Morning Briefing every morning at no charge.

If you are at CPAC today, my buddy Todd Starnes is doing a book signing at 10:00 a.m. today in Exhibit Hall B for his book Dispatches From Bitter America. Also, do not forget all the awesome Regnery authors who will be present.

1. The Frontrunner

2. Tim Murphy’s Love Affair with Big Labor

3. House Brings Conservative Reform to Broken Highway System

4. A $54 Billion Bailout

5. Why Are Republicans ‘Evolving’ On Transportation Spending?

———————————————————————-

1. The Frontrunner

He is right.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

2. Tim Murphy’s Love Affair with Big Labor

Keith Impink runs Westmoreland Electric, a small business in Tarrs, Pennsylvania which was founded in 1988 with two employees and a truck. His company, now 65 employees strong, is the type of job creator we should empower to move our state and country out of these difficult economic times.

The painful irony for local job creators like Keith is their very own Congressman, Tim Murphy, has consistently voted to make it harder for small businesses to grow, thrive and prosper.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

3. House Brings Conservative Reform to Broken Highway System

Yesterday morning we awoke to find that the New York Times Editorial Board and Redstate’s Erick Erickson had aligned themselves on an issue by both taking a shot at the American Energy & Infrastructure Jobs Act, a bill the House will consider next week. Usually when a situation like that arises, something’s amiss. And that is certainly the case today. It’s not surprising the New York Times hates the bill – it’s the most conservative plan for America’s infrastructure in anyone’s lifetime. That’s why Erick’s post this morning was so surprising. But there’s an explanation. Put simply, he has his facts wrong. I’ve known Erick a number of years, and he’s usually a straight shooter, but his critique missed the mark – big time.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

4. A $54 Billion Bailout

Our friends at Hertiage Action have a great piece out that looks at CBO data and says that if House Republicans vote for the Highway Bill, they are basically guaranteeing a $54 billion bailout of the Highway Trust fund over the next five years.

It’s incredible that anyone would even consider this good policy, let alone conservative. The Club for Growth is advocating that members of Congress vote NO on the Highway Bill and instead call for devolution of the gas tax and highway spending to the states.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

5. Why Are Republicans ‘Evolving’ On Transportation Spending?

Throughout the week, Republicans have expressed their shock and dismay that we would have the unbridled temerity to oppose a highway bill. They want to know why we are suddenly opposed to such basic things as transportation bills, even ones that will leave us with a $70 billion budget shortfall. They are impugning our motives, charging us with opposing everything that emanates from leadership.

Well, once upon a time, it wasn’t just conservative outsiders who supported the notion that we peg transportation spending to the level of gas tax revenue. In fact, just last July, members of the T and I Committee, led by Chairman John Mica, introduced a bill that would do just that. They drafted a plan for a 6-year reauthorization bill that would cost $230 billion, roughly commensurate to the gas tax revenue over that same period. At the time, we heaped accolades upon that bill.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

RS at CPAC: Sen. Ron Johnson (R, WI).

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 03:30:08 +0000

I have a lot of these, and probably more getting generated tomorrow – but I didn’t want to not get at least one of these done this evening. This clip is of Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, who of course came out of nowhere in 2010 to neatly excise Russ Feingold from his Senate seat. Which was personally one of the more satisfying results of the last election cycle: partially because Feingold’s assault on free speech was a constant irritation to me, and partially because the best presents are often the ones that you weren’t expecting.

At any rate, the Senator and I spoke briefly about CPAC. Check out the video.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

A Senate Full of Squishes

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 00:15:10 +0000

Aside from defeating Obama, the most important goal of the 2012 elections is to win back the Senate. Or is it?

On days like today we should begin to wonder if there really would be much of a difference when there are 51 senators with an R next to their name as opposed to just 47. In another terrible day on the Hill, Senate Republicans caved on two issues; judicial nominations and the stimulus highway bill.

When Obama announced his illegal appointments to executive positions last month, Republicans shook their fists heavenward and pledged to vigorously challenge those nominations. Well, instead of engaging in vapid rhetorical promises, Senator Mike Lee took action. He pledged to block all of Obama’s judicial nominations until he agrees to rescind his illegal appointees and resubmit them for confirmation before the full Senate.

Unfortunately, Senator Lee is like a general without an army. The Senate voted on a nomination for a federal district court, yet only 5 others joined him. They were Senators DeMint, Crapo, Paul, Risch, and Shelby. I’m sure that will send a powerful message to Obama and serve as a strong deterrent against future illegal appointments.

Regarding the highway bill, I know this sounds naive, but I’m stupefied by the number of Republicans who voted for it. As bad as the House version is, the Senate bill makes it look conservative. The Senate bill is a brainchild of Barbara Boxer supported by Obama. It will radically bust the budget, continue to place officious mandates on the states, and fund mass transit at prodigal levels.

Now we know that most Republicans are insincere about cutting spending, limiting government, and devolving power to the states, but one would expect them to at least hold the line against tax increases. This bill contains $7 billion in tax increases to partially fund a small portion of the deficit generated by the higher levels of transportation spending. Yet, just 9 Republicans (along with 2 Democrats) voted against cloture. Here are the Republicans who voted no DeMint, Hatch, Johanns, Johnson, Lee, Murkowski, Paul, Risch, Rubio.

It has become abundantly clear that we will get nowhere in terms of limiting government unless we elect Republicans like Jim DeMint and Mike Lee.

Cross-posted from The Madison Project

House Brings Conservative Reform to Broken Highway System

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 18:54:13 +0000

This morning we awoke to find that the New York Times Editorial Board and Redstate’s Erick Erickson had aligned themselves on an issue by both taking a shot at the American Energy & Infrastructure Jobs Act, a bill the House will consider next week. Usually when a situation like that arises, something’s amiss. And that is certainly the case today. It’s not surprising the New York Times hates the bill – it’s the most conservative plan for America’s infrastructure in anyone’s lifetime. That’s why Erick’s post this morning was so surprising. But there’s an explanation. Put simply, he has his facts wrong. I’ve known Erick a number of years, and he’s usually a straight shooter, but his critique this morning missed the mark – big time.

If the bill did what Erick suggested, heck, we’d be against it too. So let’s clear up some things.

For starters, let me explain quickly the central premise of the American Energy & Infrastructure Jobs Act. By breaking down government barriers, it expands domestic energy production and puts in place a long-term plan for America’s infrastructure that is controlled by the states and completely paid for –without raising the gas tax. The bill starts by opening up additional federal land for drilling and energy exploration and uses those royalties to shore up current shortfalls in the highway trust fund. Then, it completely overhauls the way highway spending is done and gives states the ability to set five-year plans to meet their local needs.

Erick suggests that “spending will outpace income over the next five years” in the House bill. There’s no factual basis to support that claim. He’s right that, currently, the gas tax does not generate enough revenue to meet all the infrastructure needs in America. That’s why the energy component is so critical. Not only will more domestic drilling create jobs and address rising gas prices, the additional revenue that is generated will help fill in the funding hole. And because, as some have pointed out, it takes time for additional exploration to come online and royalties to come in, the bill also cuts spending in the short term – largely for federal workers – to make sure the plan won’t add a dime – ever – to our deficit.

Erick also suggests that Washington would still be pulling the strings under the House bill. In reality, the plan eliminates federal mandates and returns control back to the states. There’s a reason President Obama’s Transportation Secretary called it “the worst transportation bill” he’s ever seen – it eliminates or consolidates 70 of his wasteful and duplicative federal programs. Currently, only about two-thirds of federal highway dollars go back to the states for them to control. Under this bill, it will be 93%. What’s more, for the first time in three decades, ALL of the gas tax revenue – the user fee paid by every motorist on the highways – will go to core highway programs. This means no more federal mandates to light a sidewalk or beautify a park. These core programs will provide state authorities with more flexibility and autonomy than ever, so that the states – not the feds – can determine how best to prioritize scarce resources.

Perhaps Erick’s biggest whopper was to say “it raids government trust funds for pet projects.” The last highway bill had more than 6,300 earmarks – including the Bridge to Nowhere. This bill has zero. No earmarks. No pet projects. No more funneling your money to parochial interests. That is a sea change in Washington that conservatives should be proud of, not cloud with false statements like that. The only specific project the bill makes sure is approved is the Keystone pipeline, overruling President Obama’s cave to his environmental base.

Some are questioning why we need to reauthorize highway spending at all. For starters, if we don’t advance conservative reform, the miserably broken system we currently have will persist. And, because of the reckless way highway spending was done under Democrats and Republicans in the past, the Highway Trust Fund will be insolvent within 16 months unless we fix it. Erick’s central, unfounded, argument seemed to be that conservatives had gone Keynesian. That’s ridiculous. No one is suggesting we need to build roads to create jobs. We’re suggesting you can’t have robust commerce and private sector growth without roads and bridges that work.

It’s difficult to find anyone with more credibility on this issue than Speaker Boehner. He has never voted for a highway bill in his 21 years in Congress. Some who want to criticize this bill have. But the Speaker was one of only eight members of the entire House to vote against the 2005 bill that still lingers as a symbol of what Republicans did wrong last time we held the majority. The American Energy & Infrastructure Jobs Act seeks to right the wrongs of the past – not only of the misguided way the President has approached infrastructure, but also the way Washington has been hosing taxpayers on highway programs for decades.

To review, this plan opens up drilling that President Obama has blocked. It approves the Keystone pipeline. It eliminates 70 wasteful government programs. It’s fully paid-for without a tax hike. It stops federal funding of sidewalks and bike paths. It allows states to control how highway dollars are spent. And it has no earmarks. Now, you see why the New York Times is so furious.

Brendan Buck serves as Press Secretary for Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH).

(With a Nod to Christopher Wren), if You Seek the Establishment, Look Around You…

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 18:00:04 +0000

From the diaries…

We had a smallish political brush-fire here in Michigan in 1982.

The grizzled old William Milliken had finally decided that 124 terms was enough as Governor, and he was hanging up the cleats.

Jim Blanchard, a weirdo Democrat downriver Detroit Big Labor congressman decided he would run, as did a few other miscreants from the Democrat party. Even the benighted John Conyers toyed with the idea, until someone pointed it out to the congressman that if he were elected Governor, he’d actually have to LIVE in Michigan, and to heck with that.

On the Republican side, all the usual suspect lined up: Jim Brickley, Bill Milliken’s lieutenant governor, filed early. Robert Tisch (a proto-Tea Partier if there ever was one, and a bit of a strangenheimer in his own right), the Shiawasee County Drain Commissioner– jumped into the race , as did several earnest, yet stilted, go-along republican state legislators. And finally, Richard Headlee, the founder of the Alexander Hamilton Life Insurance company, threw his hat in the ring.

Howard Jarvis in California ignited a property tax revolt in the Golden State that eventually swept into Michigan, and for many of the same reasons: The lion’s share of school funding was derived from the local property tax, and, schools then as now, were completely unable to control costs, and they were constantly begging for more millage. In 1978, only three months after Proposition 13 passed in California, Michigan passed Proposal B, called The Headlee Amendment, which essentially capped property tax increases only to the rate of inflation. There were other tax-limitation initiatives on the ballot that year, but Richard Headlee’s drive to reign in the natural increases resulting from inflation was the most far-reaching and sober, and it passed overwhelmingly, despite the Michigan Education Association’s pouring huge amounts of money into defeating it.

It also made Dick Headlee’s a house-hold name in Michigan.

Richard Headlee was an outstanding Michigander, and he would have made a superb governor. He was a monumentally successful businessman, a standout gentleman in his Stake (yes, all my RedState friends that like to paint us conservatives as anti-Mormon) within the LDS church, and a father, grandfather, and, in later years, a great-grandfather. Headlee (who passed away in 2004) had the sort of quiet spirit I wish I had, that bespoke an inner peace, but that also gave rise to a passionate love for his country, and his home state.

To this day, we in Michigan owe a debt of gratitude to Mr. Headlee for his tax limitation fights. They are still on the books, and working as designed.

Sadly (-very sadly), Headlee never became Governor of Michigan. He was opposed in the primaries quite early on by James Brickley, the early GOP favorite and Milliken bootlicker. Brickley was the well-groomed “electable” candidate, his moderation in politics was matched only by the sonorous quality of his gaseous orations. He had the requisite coif of executive-style hair, and he had the marvelously wide wire-frame glasses that predated George HW Bush’s by some six years. He was the very picture of executive competence. But, Jim Brickley was a carbon-copy of Bill Milliken, a governor that never met a principle he couldn’t subjugate. Brickley, like Milliken before him, and Romney before HIM, had no political core.

And everyone knew it. Including Richard Headlee.

At the time, Michigan was teetering on the brink of fiscal disaster in the depths of the ’82 recession. Milliken’s name had lost most of whatever cache it might have had, and discontent was rife in the land. Brickley couldn’t articulate a strong case for his candidacy, except that he seemed to be the next in line.

Headlee, on the other hand, made a very articulate case: He was going to slash the size of state government, sell off unneeded assets, decapitate the Michigan Education Association union, and run the place more or less as he had done in the insurance business he had created from the ground up. Headlee was a fighter, he was passionate, and he was a dyed-in-the-wool conservative.

And he was absolutely HATED by the Michigan GOP establishment. Brickley was their guy.

Who, exactly, was this “establishment”?

Well, they were the same folks back then that they are today. Two illustrative examples come to mind from that 1982 campaign…

Example the First: I had a good friend whose father was a higher muckety-muck in the Michigan Department of Corrections. He designed prisons, their physical and mechanical plants, their security systems and so on. He worked for the State of Michigan for so many years that, by the time he “retired” in the late 1980′s, he was able to take off nearly SIX MONTHS of un-collected “sick and personal” leave (of course, getting paid the whole time) while he searched for employment in Florida in preparation for his eventual REAL retirement some years later.

When I think of a Republican “moderate” I think of this man, my good friend’s father. He wore a toupee, except when it was hot –in which case, he wore a baseball cap. His favorite cologne was “Hi Karate”. He was (is, actually) a very nice man, but completely conflicted by so many circumstances in his life. Chief among them was his innate love of freedom and liberty, but he was constrained by the fact that the State of Michigan was paying his bills. Of course, the man’s candidate in the 1982 contest was Jim Brickley. I will never forget what he said about Richard Headlee: “Oh, that guy is an embarrassment to the Republican Party”.

Oh, really: An “embarrassment“. Talk about “projection”.

As I say, Richard Headlee was enormously successful by any person’s definition, let alone the Republican Party’s. Meanwhile, my friend’s dad was on the road to being a simple government pensioner, with a double-wide in Florida. Of course, there is absolutely nothing wrong with a double-wide in Florida– unless you run around calling people that have eclipsed this sort of thing on nearly every thoughtful and aesthetic measure an “embarrassment”… It rather opens one up for derision.

Of course, Richard Headlee was no embarrassment. He was, however, a threat: Not only to the MEA, but also to the entrenched bureaucracy, of which my friend’s father was a part. THAT is a major component of the GOP Establishment, however much we might deny it. They are the politically expedient, the feather-bedders.

Which brings us to Example the Second: A good friend of my mother’s, whose husband worked for a company called “Stauder-Barch”.

Stauder-Barch was a consulting, management and public debt counseling firm that consulted with Michigan school districts when they were seeking to sell revenue bonds. This firm was, at the time, probably the largest Bond Counselor in the state. They collected data about financial health of a district, created enrollment and asset projections, and lined up banking firms to underwrite the issuance.

This lady’s husband was a pretty wealthy guy, having been with this firm from it’s founding. The state (small “S”), of course, was their biggest –their only– customer. And making the payment on their 3,500 square foot home on Lansing’s Cambridge Road was dependent in perpetuity on Stauder Barch convincing school districts in Michigan to continually go into further bonded debt.

Her quote about Richard Headlee? “Oh, I hate that man. He’s already cost my husband a commission or two”.

And, there you have it. The GOP “Establishment” are the hangers-on at the periphery of the entrenched bureaucracy; they are the retained architects and lawyers of school districts, counties, and various other municipalities. They are the local banks that underwrite the sale of local revenue bonds. They are the school bus drivers, the jail cooks, the salesmen that sell the offices supplies to the bureaucrats.

They all derive their livelihoods from the state, in whatever permutation. And, they are conflicted:

On the one hand, they are sympathetic to the arguments of liberty, and personal responsibility, and of faith and family. On the other, they know who writes the check, and where the money comes from.

Make no mistake: The ‘Establishment” and the crony capitalists aren’t just in Washington. They are down the street, around the corner, and in the coffee shop. They are, indeed, in the country-club locker room– but they are also in the hardware store, and at the movies on Friday night.

And the hell of it is? The “establishment” isn’t to blame for the likes of Jim Brickley, or Mitt Romney. WE, the conservatives, are. The “Establishment” only has power if we ALLOW them to have power. As I say, most of them are conflicted -at once getting a government paycheck, and hating themselves for it–, and oftentimes embarrassed by this conflict. And, in this is a seed of hope: The vast majority of these folks (like my friend’s Dad, and my mother’s dear friend) are good and decent people. They are open to persuasion.

And that persuasion is up to US.

If you seek the Establishment, look about you…

Tim Murphy’s Love Affair with Big Labor

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 17:30:58 +0000

From the Diaries by Leon…

The painful irony for local job creators like Keith is their very own Congressman, Tim Murphy, has consistently voted to make it harder for small businesses to grow, thrive and prosper.

Small business can’t compete against Big Labor, and it’s tough to find a more reliable vote for Big Labor than Tim Murphy. And it’s really no surprise why: Half of his top ten campaign contributors are labor unions. In fact, according to a recent report, Murphy receives more money from Big Labor than all but six of his Republican colleagues.

And what does Big Labor get In return? Murphy enthusiastically supports all of Big Labor’s priorities: forced union labor on government contracts, Davis-Bacon wages, and Big Labor’s favorite, “card check.”

Card check, legislation laughably titled “The Employee Free Choice Act,” eliminates the right of employees and union members to a secret ballot in union elections. Instead of an anonymous vote, union bosses can coerce, harass, and threaten employees to sign a card as a vote to unionize. This is an anti-worker bill, which is why 70 percent of employees oppose card check.

But it’s a nice deal for union bosses and politicians and a vicious cycle of political “pay to play.” Card check increases unionization; more union members increase union dues; and padded union coffers help re-elect self-interested politicians like Tim Murphy.

Card check is a classic example of politicians putting their jobs before the jobs of their constituents.

Studies show that card check will kill as many as 600,000 jobs because as the government gives union bosses more power by forcing more employees to unionize, employers will be forced to lay off workers to pay for the increased labor costs. Why would Pittsburgh want to mimic Detroit?

A year after casting this anti-jobs, anti-worker vote, Murphy reiterated his unwavering support for Big Labor’s agenda: “On the Employee Free Choice Act, I voted for it in the past and I plan on continuing to vote for it in the future… Everybody’s got to stick together on this.”

Suddenly, after years of kowtowing to union wishes, Murphy seems to be changing his tune. In a letter sent to Mr. Impink at Westmoreland Electric, Murphy writes: “I did vote for [card check] five years ago. But if it were brought up again for a vote in the House, I would not vote for it.”

Murphy’s hypocrisy led the Pittsburgh Tribune Review’s editorial pages to label him “a weasel.”

His flip-flop is no surprise: my primary challenge has brought out Murphy’s never-before-seen conservative side. Plus, the winds of political expediency are shifting as unions’ political power is waning. Murphy is a loyal supporter of Big Labor’s priorities… until it becomes a political liability.

Murphy’s record on labor policy is unacceptable. The people of Western PA deserve a Congressman who will put their job before his own.

The author, Evan Feinberg, is a Congressional Candidate in the 18th District of Pennsylvania, challenging Tim Murphy. You can read more at www.evanfeinberg.com.

The Fiscal Conservative “Go It Alone” Strategy Failed

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 17:00:39 +0000

From the diaries by Leon…

Let me begin with two brief qualifiers. First, I believe in fiscal conservatism. I am a 100% fiscally conservative believer in small government. I also happen to be 100% in favor of social conservatism and a strong national defense. So, in short, I am a Reagan conservative. The following diary is not a critique of fiscal conservatism but rather those fiscal conservatives who continually bash social conservatives while at the same time asking for their vote. Second, those aforementioned fiscal conservatives were not exactly loners. They simply wanted social conservatives to shut up and move to the back of the bus. Despite their rhetoric, they still very much need social conservatives to triumph at the ballot box.

Throughout 2010 and 2011, fiscal conservatives loudly proclaimed that the upcoming presidential election was their election. Jobs, the economy, and small government would be the issue. Now was not the time, we were told, for a divisive cultural war or social conservative issues so we needed to call a truce and work with like minded Democrats to get the economy going again. Now, less than 10 months away from the general election, we find ourselves hoping for the Sweet Meteor of Death to save us from our own potential nominees. Where did we go wrong? The fault lies with the Fiscal Conservative “Go It Alone” strategy.

The strategy first failed us in the area of leadership. Surprisingly, in the year tailored made – we were told – for fiscal conservatism, no fiscal conservative leader stepped forward to take up the mantle. Mitch Daniels, Chris Christie, etc. all shuck their heads and walked away. Now, all three of our nominees can legitimately be called “big government” conservatives with establishment ties. Way to go fiscal conservative leadership.

The strategy failed us again because it unnecessarily provoked a rivalry between fiscal and social conservatives. Mitch Daniels provoked the struggle and ended his own candidacy with his call for a truce on social issues. Others, here on RedState and elsewhere, have trumpeted that refrain. Many fiscal conservatives [although not all] mocked and dismissed Rick Perry due to his social conservative credentials and for his call to prayer in Houston. Articles abounded about how social conservatives were no longer a force in the Republican party. Even a few days ago we saw articles about how Rick Santorum’s social conservatism was a liability that he had to overcome. The rivalry was unnecessary. It weakened the field. And it helped pave the way for Romney.

Fiscal conservatives need to understand that without social conservatism they are doomed to irrelevancy. We need unity and not division.

The left does not segregate itself into fiscal liberals, social liberals, and weak national defense liberals. They are simply liberals and each leg of their stool feeds into and feeds off of the others. Their ultimate goal is to reduce us to absolute despotism under the federal government. Fiscal liberals want a well-funded government to serve as our nanny in the same way Louis XIV considered himself the father of the French. They fund federal programs including socially liberal ones in an attempt to create that dependency. The focus on domestic programs, as well as their own flawed liberal worldview, leads to less spending on defense. Yet, we erroneously divide ourselves in the face of their unity in an attempt to break their coalition. We think if we ignore abortion then we can reach an agreement on more fiscally responsible spending. But, it does not work that way. The Left is no longer content with abortion. They want publicly funded abortions. [More on why in a later post.] The fiscal liberals are more than happy to oblige because it increases the power of the government over the individual by demeaning the individual. Abortion is about the collective not the individual child or even the mother.

Fiscal issues are social issues. There is no division. The character qualities that lead to personal responsibility, thrift, and self-dependence are social conservative values. Despotism comes when social liberalism triumphs and the people become less than God created them to be. In a society that honors and has reverence for God, the sanctity of marriage, the preciousness of life created in the image of God, and the inherent dignity of man, fiscal responsibility and independence from government is not a problem. The decadence of the Great Society flowed from the union of fiscal liberalism and social liberalism.

We need unity amongst conservatives. We need a Reagan conservative who embraces all three legs of conservatism. We need someone who can articulate a conservative (fiscal, social, and strong national defense) worldview. Any leg that tries to stand alone will cause the fall of the movement. Romney, the big government candidate, has already based his candidacy on the fiscal strategy with his focus on jobs and the economy. It will fail. He is too flawed a messenger for an already flawed message.

The World America Made

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 15:00:52 +0000

Download audio here

Download Podcast | iTunes | Podcast Feed

On today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, Brad Jackson and Ben Domenech are joined by Robert Kagan to discuss his new book, The World America Made, the importance of America’s military muscle, and how the world may change if America is no longer the world’s superpower.

We’re brought to you as always by BigGovernment and Stephen Clouse and Associates. If you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

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A $54 Billion Bailout

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 14:52:25 +0000

Our friends at Hertiage Action have a great piece out today that looks at CBO data and says that if House Republicans vote for the Highway Bill, they are basically guaranteeing a $54 billion bailout of the Highway Trust fund over the next five years.

Let your member of Congress know that you support the Club’s position on the Highway Bill. Why should taxpayers be on the hook for another unfunded government boondoggle?

Chris Chocola
President, Club for Growth

Why Are Republicans ‘Evolving’ On Transportation Spending?

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 13:40:58 +0000

“As a new spirit of fiscal discipline slowly seeps into Washington, John Mica, Chairman of the House Transportation Committee, has drafted the framework for a new highway bill that will cap the funding for highway and transportation projects to the amount of revenue supplied by the gas tax and other highway user fees.”

In fact, it wasn’t just conservative outsiders who stressed the importance of maintaining the integrity of the highway trust fund as a pay-as-you-go system. The draft proposal from the T and I Committee made that the selling point of their legislation. It appears that the document has been removed from the committee’s website (the link in the aforementioned quote is defunct), but I still have the pdf from the time I wrote the article. It reads like this:

“This proposal puts the “trust” back into the Trust Fund by ensuring that the nation is not spending money it does not have and aligning transportation expenditures with revenues. It authorizes approximately $230 billion over six years from the Highway Trust Fund — funding levels consistent with the amount of revenue being collected — and allows the Trust Fund to stay solvent well into the future.

Other options simply are not fiscally responsible or realistic.”

So here’s the $260 billion question: how do we get from a 6-year $230 billion bill, which would be in line with the gas tax revenue, to a $262.8 billion 5-year bill in just a few months? This new bill (H.R. 7) will overspend the gas tax revenue by almost $70 billion. It will rely on an assortment of random pay-fors over ten years (which will never pass), accounting gimmicks in the trust fund, a “one-time” $40 billion general fund bailout of mass transit, and it will expose us to new taxes and bailouts when the pay-fors inevitably fail. Wasn’t this exactly what the very authors of the bill deemed “not fiscally irresponsible or realistic” last year?

Why are Republicans eschewing their own principles regarding a self-sustaining trust fund?

The obvious answer is that, as with every other issue, they are terrified to stand by their bill when the expiration deadline approaches (March 31, in this case).

So if they are terrified of standing up to Democrats over the lower spending figures, how in the world are they going to find the courage to hold the line on the drilling revenue bills and cuts to federal workers’ pensions, after they have already agreed to the Democrats’ spending levels?

The answer is that they won’t hold the line. They will denude the bill of all the drilling provisions and cuts to pensions, while Democrats will agree to remove the tax increases form the Senate bill. As always, we will be left with more deficit spending, and enshrine the highway trust fund, along with the postal service, as the new bailout enterprise of the federal government. That is the inscrutable destination of any and all Republican capitulations.

House Conservatives Support Barack Obama’s Latest Stimulus

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 09:46:00 +0000

Since February of 2009 when President Barack Obama began his aggressive push for stimulus into the American economy, he focused on one core area — infrastructure.

In fact, in his stimulus speech before Congress in 2009, his States of the Union in 2010, 2011, and 2012, and his Jobs Act speech of late 2011, the President repeated referred to spending government money to create jobs to fix America’s infrastructure.

Congressman Jim Jordan (R-OH), leader of the Republican Study Committee, is confirmed to be leaning toward supporting the plan. His public pronouncements that he is leaning toward supporting the plan is leading House conservatives as a whole to support this new stimulus plan — a stimulus plan to create jobs fixing and expanding America’s infrastructure.

The plan will most likely necessitate a federal bailout of the Highway Trust Fund, which is typically funded through the gas tax and is used to pay for highway projects. But Obama’s new stimulus busts the cap on the trust fund and, like social security, gets into general fund money to pay for the spending binge.

With the House bill, as is typical of Barack Obama’s legislation, spending will outpace income over the next five years by $69.6 billion. Moreso, as is also typical of President Obama’s stimulus schemes, Washington would retain the bulk of control, even though the money would be going to state transportation projects. Federal strings and federal money will come with the legislation.

Oh, and if the House goes along with the Senate’s version of this stimulus plan, Americans could see new taxes on their IRA’s.

So why is Congressman Jim Jordan leading conservatives to support Barack Obama’s latest job creation scheme with federal tax dollars to fund a temporary infrastructure spending binge?

Part of the reason is because highway spending is kryptonite to conservatives. You want to undermine conservative principles, just throw a roads building scheme into legislation.

But the biggest reason conservatives in the House are lining up to bust the budget, bankrupt the Highway Trust Fund, and spend $69 billion more than will come in in revenue is because this is John Boehner’s stimulus scheme, not Barack Obama’s.

It busts the budget, just like Barack Obama.

It raids government trust funds for pet projects, just like Barack Obama would do.

Over five years, it adds to the federal debt, just like Barack Obama’s schemes.

But the letter next to the plan is an “R” and not a “D”, so conservatives will yet again sell out their principles because John Boehner and not Barack Obama asked them to bankrupt the country.

With leadership like this is it any wonder we’re at $16 trillion in debt?

House Conservatives Support Barack Obama’s Latest Stimulus

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 09:46:00 +0000

Since February of 2009 when President Barack Obama began his aggressive push for stimulus into the American economy, he focused on one core area — infrastructure.

Oh, and if the House goes along with the Senate’s version of this stimulus plan, Americans could see new taxes on their IRA’s.

So why is Congressman Jim Jordan leading conservatives to support Barack Obama’s latest job creation scheme with federal tax dollars to fund a temporary infrastructure spending binge?

Part of the reason is because highway spending is kryptonite to conservatives. You want to undermine conservative principles, just throw a roads building scheme into legislation.

It busts the budget, just like Barack Obama.

It raids government trust funds for pet projects, just like Barack Obama would do.

Over five years, it adds to the federal debt, just like Barack Obama’s schemes.

With leadership like this is it any wonder we’re at $16 trillion in debt?

Morning Briefing for February 9, 2012

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 09:45:00 +0000

RedState Morning Briefing
For February 9, 2012

Go to www.RedStateMB.com to get
the Morning Briefing every morning at no charge.

1. House Conservatives Support Barack Obama’s Latest Stimulus

2. President Barack Obama: “The Dependency President”

3. The State Department Staff at the Baghdad Embassy is Embarrassing Itself

4. Is Syria Really “Different?”

5. Our Constitution is not Irrelevant, Justice Ginsburg

6. What the Heck is Wrong with Mitt Romney?

7. Michael Medved Wants A Different Conservative Base

———————————————————————-

1. House Conservatives Support Barack Obama’s Latest Stimulus

Since February of 2009 when President Barack Obama began his aggressive push for stimulus into the American economy, he focused on one core area — infrastructure.

Oh, and if the House goes along with the Senate’s version of this stimulus plan, Americans could see new taxes on their IRA’s.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

2. President Barack Obama: “The Dependency President”

Government dependency is on the rise according to a new Heritage Foundation study. Americans can thank President Barack Obama for a huge spike in the numbers of Americans dependent on government resources, but both parties can share in the blame. If the federal government does not make government smaller and less intrusive, then there may not be much private sector wealth creation for government bureaucrats to take to redistribute to dependent Americans.

American are relying on government handouts rather than hard work for many of the necessities of life. One in five Americans rely on the federal government for housing, health care, food, college tuition and retirement resources. The 10th year of The Heritage Foundation government dependency study, the 2012 Index of Dependence on Government, proves that members of both parties need to take a hard look in the mirror and figure out a way to slow, then end, the creeping expansion of the federal government into every aspect of our lives.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

3. The State Department Staff at the Baghdad Embassy is Embarrassing Itself

A Tuesday New York Times article called “U.S. Planning to Slash Iraq Embassy Staff by as Much as Half” purported to describe the plight of U.S. State Department employees in Iraq, whose diplomatic efforts are being rebuffed by a host nation and government that has little use for them. According to the Times, the 16,000 employees (including 2,000 diplomats) at “the $750 million embassy building, the largest of its kind in the world, were billed as necessary to nurture a postwar Iraq on its shaky path to democracy and establish normal relations between two countries linked by blood and mutual suspicion. But the Americans have been frustrated by what they see as Iraqi obstructionism and are now largely confined to the embassy because of security concerns, unable to interact enough with ordinary Iraqis to justify the $6 billion annual price tag.”

Please click here for the rest of the post.

4. Is Syria Really “Different?”

While the recent increase of attention to the ongoing carnage in Syria is a welcome change from the Obama administration’s collective state of denial over the past ten months, signals remain mixed, and our policy is unclear if not non-existent. This week alone, for example, we got the welcome news that the Pentagon is preparing military options on Syria for the President, but at the same time White House press secretary announced those options will not be exercised.

The waters have been further muddied by the President’s insistence that there is no parity between the situation in Libya last year and what we face now in Syria. In Libya, the threat to civilians and opportunity to topple a vicious dictator were sufficient cause for Mr. Obama to engage the U.S. military, even without a pressing national security interest at stake. While it can be argued that once the U.S. engaged in Libya it might have been preferable to lead from the front to secure weapons stockpiles and guard against al Qaida encroachment, the fact remains that the world is a better place with Colonel Qaddafi gone, as Mr. Obama routinely reminds us.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

5. Our Constitution is not Irrelevant, Justice Ginsburg

If you walk by the National Archives on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington D.C. you will most likely see a line of people waiting to get just a glimpse of our Declaration of Independence and Constitution. These two aged documents are browned with time and sealed under layers of a secure glass enclosure in the domed lobby of the Archives. But they still manage to impress their visitors. The inked words of the Constitution, many of them carefully penned by Gouverneur Morris over 200 years ago, are now barely visible. While some foreign visitors may struggle to make them out, we Americans know them by heart. “We the people in order to form a more perfect union…” the Constitution starts, and what follows is one of the most awe inspiring and heartfelt treatises to freedom in the history of man. After all, this one document founded the most successful country the world has ever known.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

6. What the Heck is Wrong with Mitt Romney?

Sometimes – well, frankly, pretty often – Mitt Romney scares the crap out of me.

I’m already on record saying that I think he’d be a much better President than Newt Gingrich or Rick Santorum, and nothing that has happened in the last month has changed that. Both Gingrich and Santorum are completely devoid of either the temperament or experience to handle the job of chief executive of the massive Federal government, a point which Newt Gingrich in particular seems determined to reinforce every single day between now and Super Tuesday (at least). Additionally, both Gingrich and Santorum have been C- candidates (at best) in terms of building a national campaign organization and raising money, both of which are necessary to have any chance to get the job of President, if they want to prove that I’m wrong about their experience and temperament. I am as close to 100% certain as I can be that both would lose in a landslide to Obama.

The problem is that I’m coming close to reaching that same conclusion about Mitt Romney.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

7. Michael Medved Wants A Different Conservative Base

What is it with Salem Radio’s major hosts? Geez. You want to find out what the Romney campaign thinks, flip on Michael Medved or Hugh Hewitt or a number of the other Salem Radio hosts and you’ll find a host fully in line with Mitt Romney and fully out of step with the bulk of the conservative movement.

In fact, it is striking to find Salem’s radio hosts so in the tank for Romney when the top radio shows in the country from Rush Limbaugh to Sean Hannity to Glenn Beck to Mark Levin to Neal Boortz to Laura Ingraham have all either stayed on the sidelines or gone largely against Romney.

And if being out of step with the larger conservative movement on this issue weren’t enough, Michael Medved has decided to trot out the newest pro-Romney talking point with some serious condescension. You see, it is not Mitt Romney. It is you hicks, rubes, and idiots that are to blame. “Dammit, why won’t you like him??!!??” Medved comes close to asking.

Mitt Romney has not changed. You people have! This follows an earlier Michael Medved lament where he threw out every straw man he could at both Rush Limbaugh and me in the name of defending his Massachusetts Moderate.

Most interesting, in that earlier opinion piece Medved claimed the Republican Party had to abandon conservatism to win in 2012. This time around, Medved claims Romney actually is a conservative. It’s just conservatives have become radically conservative. He seems to be shifting positions as often as Mitt Romney.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

The State Department Staff at the Baghdad Embassy is Embarrassing Itself

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 02:23:37 +0000

A Tuesday New York Times article called “U.S. Planning to Slash Iraq Embassy Staff by as Much as Half” purported to describe the plight of U.S. State Department employees in Iraq, whose diplomatic efforts are being rebuffed by a host nation and government that has little use for them. According to the Times, the 16,000 employees (including 2,000 diplomats) at “the $750 million embassy building, the largest of its kind in the world, were billed as necessary to nurture a postwar Iraq on its shaky path to democracy and establish normal relations between two countries linked by blood and mutual suspicion. But the Americans have been frustrated by what they see as Iraqi obstructionism and are now largely confined to the embassy because of security concerns, unable to interact enough with ordinary Iraqis to justify the $6 billion annual price tag.”

Times reporter Tim Arango goes on to describe the hardships being suffered by State employees at the hands of the Iraqis (emphasis added):

After the American troops departed in December, life became more difficult for the thousands of diplomats and contractors left behind. Convoys of food that had been escorted by the United States military from Kuwait were delayed at border crossings as Iraqis demanded documentation that the Americans were unaccustomed to providing…

At every turn, the Americans say, the Iraqi government has interfered with the activities of the diplomatic mission, one they grant that the Iraqis never asked for or agreed upon. Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki’s office — and sometimes even the prime minister himself — now must approve visas for all Americans, resulting in lengthy delays. American diplomats have had trouble setting up meetings with Iraqi officials.

For their part, the Iraqis say they are simply enforcing their laws and protecting their sovereignty in the absence of a working agreement with the Americans on the embassy.

While the bolded lines above should demonstrate how ill-advised (and poorly thought through) the State buildup was in the first place, this paragraph jammed into the middle of the article shows just how sensitive our vaunted State employees are to the hardships of “deployed” life:

Within days, the salad bar at the embassy dining hall ran low. Sometimes there was no sugar or Splenda for coffee. On chicken-wing night, wings were rationed at six per person. Over the holidays, housing units were stocked with Meals Ready to Eat, the prepared food for soldiers in the field.

Emphasis added once again, of course. You know who I’m sure is full of sympathy for these poor State employees? Soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines, many of whom were deployed to Iraq multiple times, had roughly zero of the niceties the embassy staff enjoys on a daily basis, and would have gladly accepted a half-dozen chicken wings at meal time (not to mention a dip in the embassy pool).

Lest we forget, many of these same diplomats who are complaining to the public through the New York Times about the criminally torturous delay in the delivery of their precious Splenda fought tooth and nail to avoid being posted in Baghdad in the first place. As Bill Kristol and the late Dean Barnett wrote, in 2007:

the State Department found itself enmeshed in a surprisingly intense internal dust-up. Not enough career diplomats at Foggy Bottom were volunteering to serve in Baghdad. To remedy this situation, the State Department announced its intention to assign some foreign service officers to Baghdad, whether they volunteered or not. This announcement triggered an urgent State Department “town hall” meeting that took place October 31, where one Jack Croddy, a senior foreign service officer, spoke out. “It’s one thing if someone believes in what’s going on over there and volunteers, but it’s another thing to send someone over there on a forced assignment,” Croddy carped. “I’m sorry, but basically that’s a potential death sentence and you know it. Who will raise our children if we are dead or seriously wounded?”

[...]

What has happened to any sense of decency and propriety when a senior foreign service officer can say such a thing in public? Or when the State Department countenances a meeting that invites such a public display of petulance? Do the foreign service officers in Washington feel no sense of solidarity, if not with our soldiers, at least with Ambassador Ryan Crocker and their colleagues serving in Baghdad? Serving in Iraq is hazardous duty. It seems that three State Department employees have died there since 2004, among some 1,500 who have served or are now serving in Iraq.

At the same time, more State Department employees have been killed by al Qaeda and allied groups outside Iraq, in East Africa and Jordan and elsewhere, in recent years. Does their sacrifice count for nothing? Is the State Department not also involved in fighting these brutal terrorists? Are timidity and grievance-mongering appropriate for senior U.S. government officials engaged in the conduct of the nation’s foreign policy?

It’s certainly the prerogative of government employees not to “believe in what’s going on over there.” But until they resign, they are still supposed to help carry out U.S. government policy.

Now the poor diplomats assigned to the Baghdad embassy have been sentenced not to death, as one predicted five years ago, but to a life with occasionally delayed deliveries of Splenda. The horror.

Back to the Times article. Arango writes (emphasis added):

The swift realization among some top officials that the diplomatic buildup may have been ill advised represents a remarkable pivot for the State Department, in that officials spent more than a year planning the expansion and that many of the thousands of additional personnel have only recently arrived.

So the wizards at State has suddenly realized that constructing a 104-acre, $750,000,000.00 embassy complex and building up the embassy staff to 16,000 people (including 2,000 diplomats and several times more contractors), without running either by the Iraqis first, “may have been ill advised.”

Ya think?

Our Constitution is not Irrelevant, Justice Ginsburg

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 01:24:51 +0000

Unfortunately, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg doesn’t believe in the importance of the U.S. Constitution. Ironically, though her job is to “support the Constitution” (Article 6, U.S. Constitution) she instead did everything but uphold it last Wednesday. During an interview with Egyptian television network Al Hayat in Cairo, she was asked to give her opinion regarding the type of government Egypt should adopt as they try to rebuild their country following the Arab Spring. Her response? “I would not look to the U.S. Constitution, if I were drafting a constitution in the year 2012.” Though she extolled certain parts of the U.S. Constitution, she went on to propose Egypt instead use South Africa’s Constitution as a basis for their new government.

I am deeply saddened and disappointed in Justice Ginsburg’s answer. As a Supreme Court Justice who daily delves into the U.S. Constitution looking for answers to the nation’s top cases, I would hope she would have developed a love for this crucial founding document. Yet instead, she implied its irrelevancy! Why would our Constitution not be just as good a foundation for a nation’s government today as it was in 1788?

The answer is that it is, and always will be, an excellent foundation for the government of any nation. It was and still is the clearest legal protection of man’s freedoms on earth. Since our founding, our country’s unparalleled success and majestic display of human freedom has been a beacon of hope to the peoples of other nations. For years, immigrants from other countries have fled their oppressive or failing governments to come to our shores because they too sensed the meaning behind the words of our Constitution. I cannot think of another document I would more highly recommend to a country looking to make a fresh start.

I would ask Justice Ginsburg to rethink her answer and reconsider her position as a “supporter of the Constitution.” Better yet, I would encourage her to consider why people from all around the world line up to see the distinctly American documents of freedom every day at the National Archives. I hope that one day she will come to understand what the patriotic Americans in line at the Archives understand: the protection and freedom the founding documents offered to the American people over 200 years ago is just the sort of protection every country in the world needs.

Proposed ‘Pelosi Provision’ of the STOCK Act unveiled yesterday.

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 23:00:00 +0000

The STOCK Act – which is short for the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act; honestly, I wish that they’d stop coming up with cute names for these. This particular one is not really obnoxious, but some of them have really reached for the acronym – started to get really pushed through last year, once it came out that Members of Congress, including then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, were profiting unduly from legal insider trading*. I call it ‘legal’ not in the sense that there was nothing wrong with said insider trading; I call it ‘legal’ because Congress exempted itself from the rules that the rest of us have to follow. The distinction is important. It’s perfectly legal for, say, Senator Dianne Feinstein to buy into a biostock company just before the company picks up a fat government subsidy check, even if she knew about it ahead of time. That’s the problem.

Anyway, one of the more egregious things being done – again, involving then-Speaker Pelosi in at least one case – was the practice of offering Members of Congress a favorable position from which to buy into an IPO. Pelosi in particular used this practice to buy into a Visa IPO, right before credit card legislation that hampered Visa got somehow sidetracked in Congress for a year; she ended up making a killing on the (again, ‘LEGAL’) deal. And, naturally, the amendment that would ban this practice in the future has been named the ‘Pelosi Provision’ by Republicans. By all accounts, the former Speaker is unhappy about this; I am uncertain whether or not that she is as unhappy about this as I am that the woman made several million unfortunately-legal dollars off of her former position to manipulate and delay legislation, but I somehow doubt it.

The bill is largely expected to pass, by the way: the real fireworks will be in conference. If the thing gets defanged, it will be there – so keep an eye out for that particular problem. It wouldn’t be the first time that a troublesomely reformist piece of legislation got revised out of existence, while out of camera range…

Moe Lane (crosspost)

PS: Politico reports that the STOCK Act’s original sponsors Louise Slaughter and Tim Walz are unhappy that the Republican majority has taken away their bill and are now busily reshaping it. Alas for Rep. Slaughter, it’s not exactly Eric Cantor’s fault that she was incapable of getting it passed in the first place…

White House advises Senate to not lead in an election year

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 21:17:55 +0000

Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) asked Ben Bernanke at the recent Senate Budget Committee if the lack of Presidential leadership was hurting the US economy. He asked, “I’m afraid President Obama has just been phoning it in here the last couple years in terms of our debt and deficit issue. … Can you speak to how harmful that is in terms of economic growth?”

Now Bernanke can’t answer these sorts of things straight away. But he basically got there. Here’s what he said:

Well Senator, I’m not going to comment on parliamentary maneuverings, but Senator Wyden made exactly the same question. You know, is uncertainty about the future of the tax code, government programs, and so on a negative for growth? I think it is because firms like to have certainty, like to be able to plan. And again I would take on the same responsibility as a regulator, that we need to make regulations as clear and as effective as possible.

So he’s saying that firms like to have certainty and that as a regulator, Bernanke wants things to be clear and effective. Today Jake Tapper asked Jay Carney about this. Should Senate pass a budget? Does the President have an opinion on this? Turns out that the answer is no

TAPPER: The White House has no opinion about whether or not the Senate should pass a budget? The president’s going to introduce one. The Fed chair says not having one is bad for growth. But the White House has no opinion about whether –

CARNEY: I have no opinion — the White House has no opinion on Chairman Bernanke’s assessment of how the Senate ought to do its business.

I think it is worth recalling why the Senate stopped passing budgets. Because they are politically difficult, and being accountable is hard in an election year. The Senate last passed a budget on April 29, 2009. They didn’t work on a budget in 2010. Why? Because a budget requires taking responsibility for the fiscal state of our country. And it was clear that the 2010 election was going to be rough for Democrats. So what did they do? They ducked. They dodged all responsibility. Republicans were willing to do it in the House, but the Senate was not. They didn’t even bring a serious budget to the floor and haven’t since.

And since the Republicans have been able to put their ideas up for inspection by the American people. See the Ryan Budget. Republicans are willing to fight an election on ideas and tell the American people what sacrifices will need to be made to address our fiscal crisis.

But now, not only is the Senate failing the American people, but President Obama is helping the Senate in dodging this responsibility. The fact is that he has no opinion on running the country like an adult. He has “no opinion” about giving business certainty.

Thank you Ron Johnson for asking the question and getting the clarity on this from Chairman Bernanke. And thank you to Jake Tapper for asking the White House if they are interested in leading.

They aren’t.

What the Heck is Wrong with Mitt Romney?

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 20:00:03 +0000

Sometimes – well, frankly, pretty often – Mitt Romney scares the crap out of me.

I’m already on record saying that I think he’d be a much better President than Newt Gingrich or Rick Santorum, and nothing that has happened in the last month has changed that. Both Gingrich and Santorum are completely devoid of either the temperament or experience to handle the job of chief executive of the massive Federal government, a point which Newt Gingrich in particular seems determined to reinforce every single day between now and Super Tuesday (at least). Additionally, both Gingrich and Santorum have been C- candidates (at best) in terms of building a national campaign organization and raising money, both of which are necessary to have any chance to get the job of President, if they want to prove that I’m wrong about their experience and temperament. I am as close to 100% certain as I can be that both would lose in a landslide to Obama.

The problem is that I’m coming close to reaching that same conclusion about Mitt Romney. I don’t know what his problem is. I know there are some pretty serious questions about his ideological moorings, but that’s really less important (note that I did not say not important at all) in an executive than it is a legislator. That said, the number of people who have succesfully gained the nomination of either party without engaging in a substantial amount of flip-floppery is pretty small. The guy’s negatives, at least on paper, would seem to be clearly outweighed by his positives: he is clearly smart, clean cut, completely free of skeletons in his closet, able to self fund, and with a respectable dossier of executive experience. Furthermore, as I have explained before, he has spent the last 6 years ingratiating himself to conservative primary voters in a way that few previous candidates have (remember how McCain didn’t even bother to show up at CPAC in 2007 and in fact tried to set up a competing event down the hall?)

Beyond the “on paper” aspect of Mitt Romney, however, he appears to be a terrible political candidate. I mean, just awful. In debates, he can undo two solid hours of snappy comebacks and intelligent points with a single bizarre and frightening attempt at a natural laugh. (“Are you going to release twelve years of your taxes?” “Maybe! HA HA!”) This quality was absolutely laid bare in spades last night when Romney came out to speak to his supporters in Colorado. The Colorado result was still up in the air at that point but it was clear already that his campaign wasn’t going to have a good night.

Now, if there is one thing Mitt Romney should be used to by now, it is losing elections. By this point, he should have had enough practice at this that he could pull off at least a passable imitation of a leader rallying the troops. Instead, he wandered onto stage shellshocked and dazed, looking like a man who had physically taken a punch, and wandered aimlessly through almost the exact same speech he had given after his resounding victory in Florida. It was bad enough that I, as a Romney supporter, said to myself, “Holy cow, this guy is doomed.”

The problem Mitt Romney has is that he is totally and completely unable to generate loyalty in a broad enough base. He certainly has a small core of diehards, but the vast majority of his support comes from people like me who can only manage a resigned, “Well, I guess he’s the best we have. Sigh.” In modern politics, no amount of looking like a central casting President can compensate for an ability to make people feel, even through the lens of a television camera, that you are a guy who is with them and someone who they want to mount Pickett’s Charge with. Romney just can’t do it.

If you will permit me a digression here, caused no doubt by my longing for Spring Training, into a baseball analogy that I think is apt here (non-baseball fans may skip this paragraph as it will likely cause your eyes to glaze over). Bill James has noted that throughout history, Hall of Famers have accounted for just over 10% of all at-bats in the major leagues. However, only about 1% of all major leaguers make it to the Hall of Fame. Now, some of this phenomenon is explainable by what constitutes a Hall of Famer – Hall of Famers tend to be talented enough that they are not subject to platoon duty, and by definition they are the players who have longer and relatively injury-free careers. However, at least some of the effect is due to the fact that a large number of humans (especially the sort who rise to become high level baseball executives) are highly risk averse. Thus, long after Pedro Martinez, Roger Clemens, Greg Maddux and Randy Johnson were elite (or even average, in some cases) major league pitchers, MLB general managers continued to shell out huge money at least on the theory that they were safer bets than any of the prospects available in the minor league farm systems. Thus also, the Los Angeles Angels shelled out an ungodly amount of money on a 10-year contract to the 32-year-old Albert Pujols despite already having a 26-year-old first baseman who as a rookie hit 29 home runs and had a .768 OPS. Note that this risk aversion is entirely a function of perception, rather than reality. Is it really true that a 46-year-old Randy Johnson is less of a risk (particularly given the propensity for injury that comes with playing professional sports in your mid-40s) in your starting rotation than your top AAA prospect? Probably not, but due to perception some GM is going to give the geriatric Big Unit a shot. If you charted the future expected careers based on expected career paths charted by age and experience of Albert Pujols and Mark Trumbo, Trumbo’s next 10 years should be superior in the aggregate to Pujols’ – but that did not stop the Angles from spending a bazillion dollars on Pujols.

Which brings us back to Mitt Romney – there is no evidence at all that he is any less of a risk (at least electorally speaking) than any of the other candidates. In fact, the evidence seems to suggest that almost every time he actually faces the voters, he loses. His polling, several months out, always projects him to do much better than he actually does when the rubber hits the road. This is because, while picking people based on risk aversion may work to some extent in baseball, it is a recipe for failure in politics (see also Kerry, John). For the fans of Moneyball, Mitt Romney is the Billy Beane of political candidates. If he doesn’t show sometime soon that he can figure out how to actually connect with people, I’m going to lose any hope of winning this Presidential election. And I just don’t know, at this point in his career, how Mitt Romney can be taught new tricks.

Romney took a punch in the mouth yesterday, even if it was mostly a completely symbolic punch. This really is his last chance to get back up and prove to his supporters that he’s not as bad of a candidate as he has looked so far.