Currently viewing the tag: “About”
As we noted earlier, it look like House Speaker John Boehner wants a budget deal.
The Hill reports Boehner said shutting down the federal government would be more costly than keeping it running and his party is against a shutdown.
Said Boehner: “If you shut the government down, it’ll end up costing more than
you’ll save because you interrupt contracts — there are a lot of
problems with the idea of shutting the government down — it is not the
goal.”
Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire
On Wednesday, we reported that some of the earmarks Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) had requested over the years appear have the potential to benefit Issa’s real estate empire. Yesterday, Issa responded to our article over Twitter:
Issa did not dispute the fact that his earmark could benefit his real estate property. Instead, he argued that the earmark was simply a request from a constituent. In his Tweet, Issa linked to a letter from a county government group requesting the earmarks at issue. It would be appropriate if the earmark had been requested coincidentally near property Issa already owned. Over the years, starting with fiscal year 2007, Issa had placed the West Vista Way earmark on his list of interested earmarks. However, the timeline of events shows that Issa actually purchased his $ 16.6 million office building with the knowledge that his own earmark next to it was finally pending:
– February 20, 2008: According to the letter provided by Issa’s office, the San Diego Association of Governments requested $ 2 million in taxpayer earmarks for widening and improving the West Vista Way road in Vista, California.
– April 3, 2008: Issa releases the list of over $ 200 million in earmark requests that includes the $ 2 million request for the improvements on West Vista Way.
– October 8, 2008: Issa negotiates the purchase of the Vista Medical Plaza for $ 16.6 million. The building is situated next to West Vista Way and along the area where the earmarked improvements are targeted.
– February 2009: A few months after closing the deal on his multi-million dollar Vista Medical Plaza office building, Issa pushes for his West Vista Way earmark in the Omnibus Appropriations Act of 2009. Unlike any of Issa’s other earmarks, Issa secured two separate earmarks for West Vista Way into the bill: one for $ 245,000 and another for $ 570,000.
– February 2009: Although Issa publicly listed over $ 200 million in earmarks for the FY2009 budget, he only secured a few. He did not obtain a million dollar Boys and Girl grant, nor did he secure one for a flood control grant in his district. Out of all of the earmarks he publicly listed, the West Vista Way one seemed to fair better than most.
– March 11, 2009: President Obama signs the Omnibus into law, granting a total of $ 815,000 to the West Vista Way project for Issa. Issa later begins advertising his Vista Medical Plaza and its “Excellent Access with Freeway Visibility.”
As we noted yesterday, Issa has said that an “earmark is tantamount to a bribe.” Issa’s fellow House Republicans in the San Diego area have a long history of earmark related scandals. Rep. Ken Calvert (R-CA) got caught enriching himself off of land deals boosted by the earmarking process. Former Rep. Duke Cunningham (R-CA) was embroiled in a similar controversy. Responding to the Cunningham scandal, Issa made a poignant observation:
“The Duke Cunningham earmark-bribery scandal brought new scrutiny to members of Congress and, specifically, to the appropriations process. Constituents want to know that the project requests we make benefit our communities, our country, and don’t line our pockets.”
Planning his role as chairman of the House Oversight Committee, Issa called for hearings on the earmarking process. Given Issa’s remarks on the Cunningham scandal, he should be acutely aware of the ethical problems posed by buying property next to his own earmark projects.
Why did Issa purchase the land when he had a pending earmark request that could increase its value? Will he now withdraw his earmark since he might benefit financially from the project?
I’m not saying that congressional Republicans don’t care about poor people. But they
really
care about rich people. So far, the policy agenda they’ve pushed has been a mixture of very expensive tax cuts for the very wealthy and very deep cuts to a lot of programs that focus on the very poor. It’s . . . curious.
Think back to the tax deal. The GOP’s demands were: 1) the extension of the Bush tax cuts for high-earners; and 2) a massive cut in the estate tax. Put together, the two items will increase the deficit by close to a trillion dollars over 10 years. If the GOP had wanted, they could’ve used that money for more tax cuts for the poor, or even the middle class. The Obama administration would’ve happily signed onto that compromise. But Republicans did not want that. If we were going to increase the deficit, we were going to do it on behalf of the wealthy.
Now they’ve moved onto deficit reduction, or at least spending cuts, and their priorities in the 2011 budget are telling. Their cuts are coming from non-defense discretionary spending. That’s a category of spending, as you can see here, that tends to focus on services to the poor, the jobless and children. Among other cuts, they’ve proposed slicing more than $ 1 billion off Head Start, $ 1.1 billion off the Public Housing Capital Fund, $ 752 million from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, or WIC, and $ 5.7 billion from Pell Grants. I could, of course, go on. Democrats have tried to widen the cuts out to other categories so their impact falls less heavily on the disadvantaged, but so far, Republicans have refused. If we’re going to cut spending, we’re going to do it on the backs of the poor.
As for the 2012 budget, we know Social Security is being left alone, and we know Medicaid — which is to say, health care for poor people — is taking a $ 1 trillion cut. If we’re going to reform entitlements, it seems, we’re going to start with the one that serves the poor.
It’s very difficult to argue that these programs are the most wasteful in the federal government. The Pentagon is burning through a lot more cash than Head Start. Medicare spends much more for health services than Medicaid. The mortgage-interest tax deduction is regressive, as is the deduction for employer-based health care, but as of yet, Republicans haven’t proposed reforming either. Again, I’m not saying Republicans don’t care about poor people. But so far, their policy proposals don’t. And you can’t chalk it up to an appetite for sacrifice, because for all that the GOP is asking from the poor, they’ve fought hard to protect the rich from having to make any sacrifices. So far, it’s been program cuts for the poor and tax cuts for the rich. It’s a disappointing set of priorities.
Today, House Judiciary Chairman and immigration hardliner Lamar Smith (R-TX) published an editorial which claims that the Obama administration is not telling the truth about the progress that has been made along the southern border with Mexico. Smith complains that only 15 percent of the border is “air tight” and notes that “more than 34,000 people have been killed in Mexico due to drug-related violence.” The violence hasn’t spilled over, but Smith seems convinced it will. Smith also rails on Obama for ending the practice of worksite immigration raids and accuses the administration of supposedly cooking its deportation numbers:
While the Obama administration claims their approach is working, the truth is that the Southwest border remains porous and seven million illegal immigrants work in the United States. The administration’s immigration enforcement and border security strategies cannot be effective if it amounts to little more than spin. The American people are smart enough not to buy into the false promise that legalizing millions of illegal immigrants will secure the border and reduce illegal immigration.
Smith calls for the deployment of national guard troops at the border, the expansion of the controversial electronic employment verification system (E-verify), and the completion of a double layer border fence.
Yet, experts call Smith’s “border security first” argument a red herring. The Center for American Progress contends that evaluating border security “cannot and should not be measured against a standard of total control.” Given that most security specialists out there don’t believe it is possible to completely seal the border, “The question should be: Have we implemented the right set of policies and deployed the right set of tools to minimize risk and maximize control in a constantly changing environment with evolving challenges?” While Smith is right that the border is not 100 percent airtight, in terms of risk management, DHS has made serious headway.
Meanwhile, the American people actually are smart enough to know that comprehensive immigration reform that combines a path to legalization with a modernized visa system and continued enforcement efforts will reduce illegal immigration. That’s why a large majority of the public supports it.
Finally, while Smith accuses the Obama administration of fudging its deportation numbers, the immigrant advocacy community would probably argue just the opposite. “What’s disappointing is that this administration is deporting more people than ever before — it’s more well funded than ever before, but many people have the perception that immigration enforcement is underfunded and that this administration is extremely pro-immigrant,” said one advocate. Grassroots groups have launched a campaign to “urge President Obama to use his discretionary authority to stop separating families through deportations.” The White House maintains that “administrative solutions are not feasible or do-able on a large scale.”
Smith’s criticism comes at a time when House Republicans are drafting a “legislative assault on illegal immigration” which includes plans to add more fencing, sensors, agents and drones at the border. The Secure Border Act of 2011 will reportedly require the Department of Homeland Security to submit a five-year plan to Congress that would essentially eliminate unlawful entries and smuggling down. It would be up to Congress to decide whether to fund it or not.
Washington D.C., April 1, 2011: Rev. Monique Ledbetter, president of the National Council of Churches, announced at a press conference this morning at the National Press Club that members of the Council are moving swiftly and decisively to counter the wave of Islamophobia that has been emerging in America—in the form of anti-Muslim congressional hearings, media commentary that singles out Muslims for acts of alleged religious violence, and hostile, “hurtful” statements across the Internet aimed at Muslims. “As Christ’s representatives on earth, we resolutely refudiate these gestures of intolerance,” she told a crowd of reporters Friday. A minister in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Ledbetter said that she spoke for her church and other member churches of the ecumenical, “mainline” Protestant organization. “The Gospel of Jesus is a call on the part of Transcendence that urges each of us not toward hate but toward love—a love that is limitless, directionless, insatiable, and undiscriminating. In his earthly mission of healing, feeding, and inspirational preaching, Jesus never differentiated between one set of religious beliefs and another, but embraced every attempt of human persons to feel their way toward the Source of Ultimate Love. This also describes the career of the prophet Muhammad (Peace be upon him). United by the common experience of the founders of our faiths, Christians and Muslims are meant to work together to break down all barriers that stand between us and a society of perfect justice and equality.”
However, Ledbetter acknowledged that rhetoric is not enough. “Faith without works is dead. We know that, and our meetings with leaders of the Islamic ummah have reminded us that we as Christians have much, much work to do to disarm legitimate fears on the part of Muslim-Americans. As my good friend Mr. Ibrahim Hooper of the Council for American-Islamic Relations pointed out in our recent summit in Dubai, ‘Press releases just won’t do it anymore, Monique. You people will have to go a lot further than that to win our trust.’ And Ibe is right. After that summit, I gathered the leadership of N.C.C. for a follow-up session in Taos, to work out the next step we could take. And today I’m here to announce it.”
Ledbetter distributed copies of the N.C.C.’s new outreach program, “The Shehada Initiative,” and explained how it will work. “This holy season of Lent, we must put to death our pharisaical pride, our dogmatic orthodoxies, and bury them with Christ. What will rise with him will be a new face of faith, one that is absolutely open and perfectly welcoming to the Other.” Concretely, Ledbetter explained, member churches of the N.C.C. will replace their Easter Sunday services with a festive Islamic ritual called the Shehada—which entails, she said, “an affirmation of the faithfulness of Muslims, their love of God, their reverence for the message of peace brought by the prophet Muhammad (PBUH).”
Members of the Presbyterian, Episcopal, Methodist and other churches participating in the N.C.C. will gather at services—some of them traditional “sunrise” Easter rites—but instead of Christian liturgies centered on the archaic formula “Christ is risen!” these liturgies will feature time-honored Islamic prayers such as “There is no god but God, and Muhammad is the messenger of God.” Ledbetter said that these Easter events would be conducted by local pastors in cooperation with Muslim clergy from nearby mosques and community centers, “in order to stress the new spirit of cooperation and unity we seek,” and would be followed in many communities by festive Middle Eastern themed brunches. “Instead of unhealthy, unclean fare such as ham, our congregants will have the chance to try new, exotic specialties such as goat, and plates of hummus, tabouleh, and pita bread. It should be exciting for everyone.” Acknowledging the unavailability in many communities of halal meat, Ledbetter said that some of the churches would make their sanctuaries available before the ceremonies for dabīḥah—the Arabic word for the hygenic, humane preparation of live animals for human consumption in accord with Muslim traditions. “This might prove a little disconcerting for members of our churches who are vegetarian,” Ledbetter admitted. “But Christ came to lead us out of our narrow self-definitions, to encounter and accept the Other in his or her otherness,” she said.
CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper, who appeared alongside Ledbetter at the press event, described the Shehada Initiative as “an excellent first step toward unity between the Christian and Muslim communities.”
USA Today |
Mattingly's managerial debut just about perfect
MLB.com LOS ANGELES — The first one is always the toughest and Don Mattingly was tickled to have his first win as a big league manager out of the way Thursday night at Dodger Stadium. … Clayton Kershaw has the right stuff in opener Dodgers beat World Series champion Giants 2-1 Giants-Dodgers Preview |
Judging by his appearance on CNN last night, parsing the president’s speech, recently fired State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley is making a transition to media pundit in record time. In an op-ed for the Guardian today, he addresses the reason he was fired, his desription of the treatment of accused WikiLeaker Bradley Manning as "stupid" and "counterproductive" during a speech at MIT.
Crowley starts by arguing that Manning is" rightly facing prosecution" and "if convicted, should spend a long, long time in prison." But, perhaps since he’s already been fired for them, doesn’t walk back his previous comments at all:
Private Manning’s family, joined by a number of human rights organisations, has questioned the extremely restrictive conditions
he has experienced at the brig at Marine Corps base Quantico, Virginia.
I focused on the fact that he was forced to sleep naked, which led to a
circumstance where he stood naked for morning call.Based
on 30 years of government experience, if you have to explain why a guy
is standing naked in the middle of a jail cell, you have a policy in
need of urgent review. The Pentagon was quick to point out that no
women were present when he did so, which is completely beside the
point.The issue is a loss of dignity, not modesty.
Our
strategic narrative connects our policies to our interests, values and
aspirations. While what we do, day in and day out, is broadly
consistent with the universal principles we espouse, individual actions
can become disconnected. Every once in a while, even a top-notch
symphony strikes a discordant note. So it is in this instance.
To put it another way, if your own previously reliable spokesman is calling a government policy "stupid" in public, you probably have a policy in need of urgent review.
Random UConn notes from the interview day sessions at Final Four today:
– Spent most of my time in the Kemba Walker room, since I’m working on a column for him for Friday’s paper.
– Walker came into the interview room with his jersey wrapped around his neck and hanging down his back, like a superhero. Thought it was a good metaphor.
– Lot of questions to Walker about being guarded by DeAndre Liggins. Walker got 29 points on Walker in the first meeting in Maui. Walker praised Liggins as a great defender. “I’ve gone against a lot of great defenders, and he’s one of the best. . . . But it’s not about me and DeAndre.”
– UConn is 12-0 in tournament play this year – 3-0 at Maui, 5-0 in Big East Tournament and 4-0 in the NCAA Tournament.
– Walker said he could draw on his freshman season, when UConn made the Final Four in Detroit and lost to Michigan State in the national semifinals.
– Walker was also reminded of the Big East/SEC Challenge last season, when after Kentucky beat UConn, John Calipari told Walker, “I missed on you.” Walker said that Memphis had been recruiting him, but then all of a sudden stopped.
– Jim Calhoun said that Walker is “without question the most valuable player in the country.”
– Calhoun also talked about how he saw Brandon Knight play “a ton” and how UConn did get Knight to come for an unofficial visit.
– Emerging freshman Jeremy Lamb is the son of Rolando Lamb, a former VCU star who beat Northeastern with a last-second shot in the NCAA Tournament. The coach at Northeastern at the time? Jim Calhoun.
U.S. Army Cpl. Andrew Wilfahrt, a gay service member, died for his country. His parents tell his story:
(Hat tip: Thompson)
By Barry Rubin
Now that the New York Times tells us that the Muslim Brotherhood is really strong, organized, widely supported by the army, and capable of taking over Egypt-all the things I wrote at the time and the mass media denied-the Washington Post confirms every point I made during the revolution about what was going to happen regarding Egyptian foreign policy.
Just read this article and compare it to what we were told during the revolution:
“Egypt’s relations with Israel and the U.S. are likely to become more difficult in the months ahead with an infusion of Arab nationalism and skepticism about Egypt’s landmark peace treaty with Israel. Many of those who helped oust President Mubarak, including secular democracy activists and Muslim Brotherhood leaders, say the 32-year-old treaty should be respected for now. But they add that when stability is restored, the pact should be submitted to the Egyptian people for approval, through a new parliament scheduled to be elected in September and then perhaps in a public referendum.”
In other words, all the commitments made by the military government are not valid after September and Egypt is quite likely to abrogate or simply stop paying any attention to its treaty commitments. And what is the U.S. government, the Obama Administration, going to do at that point since it is the guarantor of the treaty? Absolutely nothing.
The article continues:
“‘There was no real end to the war with Israel, just a truce,’” said Shadi Mohammed, 26, a leader of the movement that helped promote the Tahrir Square demonstrations. Mohammed Maher, a Muslim Brotherhood activist, said that if his group gains influence through the elections, Egypt is likely to pursue closer ties with Gaza, opening border crossings and promoting trade as a way to undermine the Israeli blockade.”
Did you notice that? He’s a Muslim Brotherhood activist and a leader in the Tahrir Square movement. Only yesterday I received a letter from a New York Times employee-full of curse words and insults, by the way-saying that he spoke to many people in Tahrir Square and none of them said they were Brotherhood supporters. So obviously there weren’t any Brotherhood supporters.
Yes, honestly this is the kind of reasoning that often shapes mass media coverage of the Middle East. Sort of like the president’s advisor on counterterrorism explaining that Hizballah can’t be a terrorist group because it has lawyers among its members.
Yet the facts about the movement’s alliance with the Brotherhood and anti-American leftists was already on the public record before the revolution even began.
And as for Obama Administration policymaking, well, let’s put it in one sentence:
The president of the United States has just played a central role in bringing an anti-American government to power in Egypt that may well reignite the Arab-Israeli conflict and produce new wars in the region.
Oh, by the way, the headline of the Washington Post story is: ”Egypt Likely to Face More Difficult Relations with Israel, U.S.” This makes it sound like Egypt is the victim. How about: Once Friendly, The New Egypt Now Hostile to Israel, U.S.
As if that weren’t enough, remember when we were told how the upheaval in Egypt and elsewhere frightened al-Qaida and was a defeat for that group because they showed how peaceful revolution, not terrorism, could produce change? I have not seen a single statement by any Jihadist-Iranian, Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, Hizballah, or al-Qaida-who isn’t thrilled at what’s happening and at Mubarak’s fall.
Now, after two months of daily evidence to this effect, the New York Times finally gives us, “Islamists Are Elated by Revolts, Cleric Says.”
Please email me at [email protected] to be put onto my mailing list.
Feel free to reproduce any article but please link back to http://yidwithlid.blogspot.com![]()
Feel free to reproduce any article but please link back to http://yidwithlid.blogspot.com
This post was written by Barry Rubin – the expanded version of this post is reposted here with his permission.
By Barry Rubin
Now that the New York Times tells us that the Muslim Brotherhood is really strong, organized, widely supported by the army, and capable of taking over Egypt-all the things I wrote at the time and the mass media denied-the Washington Post confirms every point I made during the revolution about what was going to happen regarding Egyptian foreign policy.
Just read this article and compare it to what we were told during the revolution:
“Egypt’s relations with Israel and the U.S. are likely to become more difficult in the months ahead with an infusion of Arab nationalism and skepticism about Egypt’s landmark peace treaty with Israel. Many of those who helped oust President Mubarak, including secular democracy activists and Muslim Brotherhood leaders, say the 32-year-old treaty should be respected for now. But they add that when stability is restored, the pact should be submitted to the Egyptian people for approval, through a new parliament scheduled to be elected in September and then perhaps in a public referendum.”
In other words, all the commitments made by the military government are not valid after September and Egypt is quite likely to abrogate or simply stop paying any attention to its treaty commitments. And what is the U.S. government, the Obama Administration, going to do at that point since it is the guarantor of the treaty? Absolutely nothing.
The article continues:
“‘There was no real end to the war with Israel, just a truce,’” said Shadi Mohammed, 26, a leader of the movement that helped promote the Tahrir Square demonstrations. Mohammed Maher, a Muslim Brotherhood activist, said that if his group gains influence through the elections, Egypt is likely to pursue closer ties with Gaza, opening border crossings and promoting trade as a way to undermine the Israeli blockade.”
Did you notice that? He’s a Muslim Brotherhood activist and a leader in the Tahrir Square movement. Only yesterday I received a letter from a New York Times employee-full of curse words and insults, by the way-saying that he spoke to many people in Tahrir Square and none of them said they were Brotherhood supporters. So obviously there weren’t any Brotherhood supporters.
Yes, honestly this is the kind of reasoning that often shapes mass media coverage of the Middle East. Sort of like the president’s advisor on counterterrorism explaining that Hizballah can’t be a terrorist group because it has lawyers among its members.
Yet the facts about the movement’s alliance with the Brotherhood and anti-American leftists was already on the public record before the revolution even began.
And as for Obama Administration policymaking, well, let’s put it in one sentence:
The president of the United States has just played a central role in bringing an anti-American government to power in Egypt that may well reignite the Arab-Israeli conflict and produce new wars in the region.
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader
(seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East
(Wiley), and The Truth About Syria
(Palgrave-Macmillan). His latest book is Israel: An Introduction, to be published by Yale University Press later this year. You can read more of Barry Rubin’s posts at Rubin Reports.
Technorati Tag: Egypt and Media Bias.
Our guest blogger is Theodora Chang, Education Policy Analyst at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) says that H.R. 471, which reauthorizes the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program, is a way for us to get serious about education reform:
So if we’re serious about bipartisan education reform, we should start by saving this successful, bipartisan program that has helped so many underprivileged children get a quality education. I urge the House to support and save this important program.
Republicans estimate that the program — which they voted yesterday to revive — has made funding available for 3,000 D.C students. But they have little to say about ways to reach the other students stuck in the 10,000+ low-performing schools across the country. As Ranking Member of the Education and Workforce Committee George Miller (D-CA) stated:
If you really care about school reform…you have to do it in a sustainable and systemic way. All children in this country deserve to be held to high standards, to be in classrooms that are safe and to have access to the special needs services to which they are entitled under federal law.
“Getting serious about education” requires addressing the deeper funding issues that affect all students, starting with fiscal equity. Equal opportunities for students are hindered by inequitable funding formulas at the state and district level as well as under Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. Studies show that students attending high-poverty schools actually need more funding to achieve at the level of their wealthier counterparts, but reality shows us shortchanging our students.
A number of districts and states have taken laudable steps to begin tackling fiscal equity. The Oakland Unified School District, for example, now uses a Results-Based Budgeting system where a minimum total expenditure level is developed for all schools and real school budgets (including the actual costs of teacher salaries) are adjusted up or down to meet that expenditure level. Schools with lower staff expenditures receive additional funds to spend on resources intended to increase academic achievement.
Moving to fair funding systems will also require action at the federal level. Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act currently allows districts to conceal considerable gaps in actual spending between high and low poverty schools, and reauthorization should address this lack of transparency. Boehner is on record as saying that he wants to give some children in need “a way out of our most underachieving public schools.” The question now is when and how our nation’s policymakers will devote the political will to ensure a fair education system for all.
Whether you think the energy plan President Obama announced yesterday is worth applauding depends on whether you think a clean-energy standard is worth supporting. For most people, that raises a second question: What’s a clean-energy standard?
Let’s start with a quick history of climate-change policy proposals: In the beginning, there was the carbon tax, which would work by putting a price on carbon. But that had no political support. Then there was cap-and-trade, which would work by making producers purchase permits for the carbon they emitted, and in so doing, would put a price on carbon. But though John McCain actually had a cap-and-trade proposal in 2008, Republicans eventually turned on cap-and-trade — Sarah Palin’s first post-election op-ed was dedicated to decrying “cap-and-tax” as “an enormous threat to our economy.” Then there was a renewable energy standard, where the government would simply tell energy utilities that they had to generate most of their power using renewables. But that was abandoned because “clean coal” isn’t renewable, but it is politically powerful.
That brings us to a clean-energy standard. It works like a renewable-energy standard — we tell utilities that they have to produce 80 percent of their energy from clean sources by 2035 — but includes non-renewables that are, in theory, clean. Like clean coal. But it’s a pale imitation of everything that came before it: worse for emissions, for the deficit, for our international strategy. Oh, and it’s less market-based than any of the others, too.
For one thing, a CES only covers electricity, which means it’s only catching about a third of emissions. For another, it targets “emissions intensity” rather than “total emissions.” If we say the economy can only emit X tons of carbon, that holds down the carbon we pump into the atmosphere. If we say that only 20 percent of our energy can come from dirty sources, well, one way to slip under the limit is to increase the amount of energy we produce. It’s the difference between trying to lose weight by cutting calories and trying to lose it by cutting the percentage of your calories that come from junk food.
In practice, that will probably still lower emissions in the United States, but as Michael Greenstone, an energy economist at MIT and director of the Hamilton Project, explains, America is not the only place we’re worried about. “The problem for the planet is its total emissions, not emissions intensity,” he says. “A CES effectively signs the United States up for agreeing that intensity targets are the way to go, not total emissions.” As he goes on to note, that’s a system China and India would much prefer: Under Copenhagen, they agreed to reduce emissions intensity rather than total emissions, as that’s a measure that allows their total emissions to continue rising.
Then there are the economic pieces. Both a carbon tax and cap-and-trade reduce the deficit — or, in some versions, provide a rebate to taxpayers. A CES doesn’t. Instead, we just give utilities free licenses to emit a certain amount of carbon. No wonder they like it better. But that’s a system that people who prefer markets should like less. When you price carbon economy-wide, you let the market decide what to do next. When you simply regulate carbon in the utility sector, there’s less room for a response. That’s not to say it’s bad, but it’s not transformative in the same way.
The upside of a CES is that it’s better than nothing. It’s a sign to the market that investing in clean energy will have pay-offs down the road, and the simple fact of its passage suggests that stronger energy legislation could pass later. “The positive case for a CES is that cap-and-trade is off the table for now,” continues Greenstone, “a carbon tax is off the table for now, EPA regulation in a command-and-control way might be on the table, and if that’s all we’ve got, a CES looks better, as it’s more flexible. And if the Senate then takes away EPA authority, having the CES means we at least have something.”
Some endorsement, huh? But it gets to the truth of the matter: The case for a CES is a political one, based on the constraints of what we can do, not the arguments for what we should do. And the reason we think we can do a CES is that a number of prominent Republican politicians — Richard Lugar, Haley Barbour, Lindsey Graham, etc. — have come out in support of it. But remember: A number of prominent Republican politicians came out in support of cap-and-trade, too. It was only once the idea got nearer to law that the conservative movement flipped into opposition.
This could happen to a CES as well. The reason Democratic politicians who know perfectly well that a CES is fifth-best policy are pushing it is because Republican politicians who know perfectly well that a carbon tax or cap-and-trade system are desirable policy have refused to stand up to the right wing of their party. They are profiles in cowardice, and there is no guarantee that they won’t prove so again.
By Justin Logan
There is good news and bad news about the report that the Obama administration authorized CIA teams to go into Libya to liaise with the Libyan opposition before instituting a no-fly zone over that country. (The phrase “sneakers on the ground” has emerged in response to the administration’s firm insistence that there are no US boots on the ground there.)
Get the map out
The good news is that the administration, despite prior appearances, does indeed have a strategy in Libya: siding with the rebels in their effort to depose Muammar Qaddafi. The bad news is that siding with the rebels in their effort to depose Muammar Qaddafi is not a good strategy.
It is probably important to make clear at the outset that I do not mean to overstate the stakes here. I am not suggesting that the Libya intervention necessarily will produce a Vietnam or Iraq-scale blunder. And it is always possible that Col. Qaddafi will be deposed swiftly and a reasonably orderly transition to a reasonably decent replacement will take place.
But I would not bet on it.
Why not? For one, the Director of National Intelligence James Clapper yesterday described the opposition itself as a “pick-up basketball team.” This, to my ear, does not sound like a group of people prepared for modern governance of a national state.There also have been somewhat murky reports that jihadists, if not inner-circle al Qaeda types, number among the opposition with whom we are siding. It is probably worth noting that Paul Wolfowitz, a vocal advocate of throwing our lot in with the Libyan opposition, responded to a question (at 56:50 of the video here) whether he could name the leaders of the opposition by admitting that he could not, advising instead that “you can Google and find out.” We just don’t know these people terribly well.
In addition, it is far from clear that the pick-up basketball team can win. A “senior U.S. intelligence official” yesterday reported that Qaddafi’s people have rather rapidly adapted to the no-fly zone:
Gadhafi’s forces have adopted a new tactic in light of the pounding that airstrikes have given their tanks and armored vehicles, a senior U.S. intelligence official said. They’ve left some of those weapons behind in favor of a “gaggle” of “battle wagons”: minivans, sedans and sport-utility vehicles fitted with weapons, said the official, who spoke anonymously in order to discuss sensitive U.S. intelligence on the condition and capabilities of rebel and regime forces. Rebel fighters also said Gadhafi’s troops were increasingly using civilian vehicles in battle.
The change not only makes it harder to distinguish Gadhafi’s forces from the rebels, it also requires less logistical support, the official said.
This seemed to me a blazingly obvious approach for Qaddafi to take, given that were he to move his armor or artillery, it would almost certainly become a target for the coalition, but it would be much harder to detect small groups of men armed with small arms. You fight with what you can use.
All of this seems to mitigate in favor of the government, but it should be pointed out that the unsophisticated, poorly led, and poorly armed rebels have some notable advantages as well. A reasonably unsophisticated force in Afghanistan currently has the modern world’s mightiest military power bogged down in that country with only limited organization, arms, and leadership of their own. From a defensive standpoint, a few thousand men with small arms who are willing to fight and die can cause a big headache for counterinsurgents, particularly were Qaddafi to attempt to retake Benghazi with these men he’s shipping eastward.
Secretary Gates was right to say that there is no vital U.S. interest at stake in Libya over the weekend, and he is right to threaten to quit if the administration moves to insert U.S. ground forces. It wasn’t worth war to get rid of Muammar Qaddafi two months ago, and it isn’t worth war today.
The Good News and Bad News about “Sneakers on the Ground” is a post from Cato @ Liberty – Cato Institute Blog
In one of those stories that seems boring but is actually really important, the Department of Health and Human Services released the rules (PDF — and a long one) that will govern Accountable Care Organizations going forward. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Director Don Berwick summarizes here. The bottom line is that ACOs are the new hotness in medicine. The idea is that rather than getting your care from one specialist after the other, each of whom is only responsible for their tiny slice of your treatment, you’ll get your care from one organization that’s responsible for coordinating all of your treatments and gets paid based on how well you do rather than how much they do to you.
When I say things like “controlling health-care costs is about treating sick people,” ACOs are the sort of thing I’m talking about. If they work as well as their advocates hope, costs could go down and quality could go up. If they don’t, it’s back to the drawing board. But most people don’t know much about them, even as their success or failure is ultimately the sort of thing that will determine whether the Medicare cuts can stick.
For more on ACOs, NPR has a good explainer. But if you’re the type of person who could do the explaining yourself, head over to the Incidental Economist, where they’re trying to crowdsource their way through the new regulations. Getting that done would be a real service.
