By Lori Montgomery - The Washington Post / MSNBC
Investors' thirst for American securities could finally be quenched
WASHINGTON - With President-elect Barack Obama and congressional Democrats considering a massive spending package aimed at pulling the nation out of recession, the national debt is projected to jump by as much as $2 trillion this year, an unprecedented increase that could test the world's appetite for financing U.S. government spending.
For now, investors are frantically stuffing money into the relative safety of the U.S. Treasury, which has come to serve as the world's mattress in troubled times. Interest rates on Treasury bills have plummeted to historic lows, with some short-term investors literally giving the government money for free.
But about 40 percent of the debt held by private investors will mature in a year or less, according to Treasury officials. When those loans come due, the Treasury will have to borrow more money to repay them, even as it launches perhaps the most aggressive expansion of U.S. debt in modern history.
With the government planning to roll over its short-term loans into more stable, long-term securities, experts say investors are likely to demand a greater return on their money, saddling taxpayers with huge new interest payments for years to come. Some analysts also worry that foreign investors, the largest U.S. creditors, may prove unable to absorb the skyrocketing debt, undermining confidence in the United States as the bedrock of the global financial system.
While the current market for Treasurys is booming, it's unclear whether demand for debt can be sustained, said Lou Crandall, chief economist at Wrightson ICAP, which analyzes Treasury financing trends.
"There's a time bomb in there somewhere," Crandall said, "but we don't know exactly where on the calendar it's planted."
The government's hunger for cash began growing exponentially as the nation slipped into recession in the wake of a housing foreclosure crisis a year ago. Washington has since approved $168 billion in spending to stimulate economic activity, $700 billion to prevent the collapse of the U.S. financial system, and multibillion-dollar bailouts for a variety of financial institutions, including insurance giant American International Group and mortgage financiers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
Despite those actions, the economic outlook has continued to darken. Now, Obama and congressional Democrats are debating as much as $850 billion in new federal spending and tax cuts to create or preserve jobs and slow the grim, upward march of unemployment, which stood in November at 6.7 percent.
Congress is not planning to raise taxes or cut spending to cover the cost of those programs, because economists say doing so would further slow economic activity. That means the government has to borrow the money.
Some of the borrowing was done during the fiscal year that ended in September, when the Treasury added nearly $720 billion to the national debt. But the big borrowing binge will come during the current fiscal year, when the cost of the bailouts plus another stimulus package combined with slowing tax revenues will force the government to increase the debt by as much as $2 trillion to finance its obligations, according to a Treasury survey of bond dealers and other market analysts.
As of yesterday, the debt stood at nearly $10.7 trillion, of which about $4.3 trillion is owed to other government institutions, such as the Social Security trust fund. Debt held by private investors totals nearly $6.4 trillion, or a little over 40 percent of gross domestic product.
According to the most recent figures, foreign investors held about $3 trillion in U.S. debt at the end of October. China, which in October replaced Japan as the United States' largest creditor, has increased its holdings by 42 percent over the past year; Britain and the Caribbean banking countries more than doubled their holdings.
Economists from across the political spectrum have endorsed the idea of going deeper into debt to combat what many call the most dangerous economic conditions since the Great Depression. The United States is in relatively good financial shape compared with other industrial nations, such as Japan, where the public debt equaled 182 percent of GDP in 2007, or Germany, where the debt was 65 percent of GDP, according to a forthcoming report by Scott Lilly, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress.
Even a $2 trillion increase would push the U.S. debt to about 53 percent of the overall economy, "only a few percentage points above where it was in the early 1990s," Lilly writes, noting that plummeting interest rates show that "much of the world seems not only willing but anxious to invest in U.S. Treasurys, which are seen as the safest security that an investor can own in a risky world economy."
Still, some analysts are concerned that the deepening global recession will force some of the largest U.S. creditors to divert cash to domestic needs, such as investing in their own banks and economies. Even if demand for U.S. debt keeps pace with supply, investors are likely to demand higher interest rates, these analysts said, driving up debt-service payments, which last year stood at $250 billion.
"When you accumulate this amount of debt that we're moving into, it's not a given that our foreign friends are going to continue on the path they've been on," said G. William Hoagland, a longtime Republican budget analyst who now serves as vice president for public policy at the health insurer Cigna. "There's going to come a time when we can't even pay the interest on the money we've borrowed. That's default."
Others say those fears are overblown. The market for U.S. Treasurys is by far the largest and most liquid bond market in the world, and big institutional investors have few other places to safely invest large sums of reserve cash.
Despite their growing domestic needs, "China and the oil countries are going to continue running large surpluses," said C. Fred Bergsten, director of the Peterson Institute for International Economics. "They certainly will be using money elsewhere, but I don't think that means they won't give it to us."
As for the specter of default, Steven Hess, lead U.S. analyst for Moody's Investors Service, said even a $2 trillion increase in borrowing would not greatly diminish the U.S. financial condition. "It's not alarmingly high by our AAA standards," he said. "So we don't think there's pressure on the rating yet."
But that could change, Hess said. Nearly a year ago, Moody's raised an alarm about the skyrocketing costs of Social Security and Medicare as the baby-boom generation retires, saying the resulting budget deficits could endanger the U.S. bond rating. Even as the nation sinks deeper into debt to finance its own economic recovery, several analysts said it will be critical for Obama to begin to address the looming costs of the entitlement programs and signal that he has no intention of letting the debt spiral out of control.
Failure to do so, Bergsten said, would "create dangers . . . in market psychology and continued confidence in the dollar."
Old habits die hard. If you're making these mistakes, the next year may be no better than the last
With more than 10 million Americans out of work and trying to get back in, job seekers have plenty of competition. By some accounts, more than half of employers have had layoffs in the last year or so, while many others have pulled back sharply on hiring, either instituting freezes or slowing the process.
In a more competitive market, small mistakes have greater repercussions. That's the bad news. (The good news about losing your job in a recession is you need not be defensive—hiring managers will understand.)
If you've been looking for a job in 2008 and have been discouraged by your lack of progress or frustrated by the doors that won't open, you should see the New Year as an opportunity to refresh and improve your search. However, old habits die hard, and if you're making one of the following seven mistakes, the next year may be no better than the last.
1. You're counting on one big thing to come through. When the economy is hauling and job openings are prevalent, you might have good reason to believe that a great interview and a connection inside the company will lead to a job offer. But with unemployment at 6.7 percent—probably heading toward 7 percent next month—and more Americans looking for work, every job opening is greeted with higher numbers of candidates who boast more impressive résumés. Also, job openings are more likely to be suddenly frozen—even after the résumés have been vetted and the interviews have been held. The fact is, you need more irons in the fire in this economy.
2. You're sending lots of recommendation letters. While recommendation letters may be useful or necessary for job applications in some business sectors, they may not be what a prospective employer wants from you—and more is certainly not necessarily better. Alison Green, a manager who blogs at Ask a Manager and U.S. News, says that, "taken to an extreme, letters can even hurt you." Green says that she's had job applicants send 10 (and more) recommendation letters. "That kind of overkill looks silly and naive," she says. It's smart to ask whether a company wants letters before you send them.
3. You're using your connections to find a job. Well, this is good. But the goal is not really to use your connections so much as to make use of your connection's connections. Brad Karsh, president of JobBound, even recommended that job seekers chat up family members over the holidays. That might sound strange, since you already know where your Uncle Al and your cousin Jen work, and you may know, too, that their industries are totally irrelevant to or disconnected from your skill set. But you don't know that about the people they know. They likely have connections to people in different industries that may be highly relevant, and you should get the details.
4. You're faking your weaknesses. You're lucky or smart enough to make it to the interview, and then you start saying things like: "My biggest weakness is that I care too much about my work" or "My biggest weakness is that I'm an incurable optimist. I just think if we can all work together to make this company strong, we'll be leaders in the recession. That's my weakness." Hiring managers want honesty. Green says candidates who offer strengths camouflaged as weaknesses come across as lacking insight or self-awareness. Faking your way through any interview answer—whether it's in reference to your weaknesses or to your work history—is just plain stupid. Either you sound totally disingenuous or out of touch, or your dishonesty will be easily found out with a quick phone call to a former employer.
5. You know exactly what you want. So, you want a job working as an information technology director at a medium-sized firm in Portland, Ore., and you're not going to consider anything else. Good luck with that. It's good to know that when job openings are scarce and the economic outlook is cloudy you are wholly committed to your singular, unflinching vision of career destiny. You better hope it works out for you in enough time for you to make next year's mortgage payments. The truth is that flexibility rules in a job search: The more requirements you're willing to relax, the more likely you'll find work. Indeed, even career sage Richard Bolles recommends taking on something temporarily—he calls it a "stopgap job"—while you look for a position that turns you on as well as pays you.
6. You see your job search as personal and private. When you're out of work, job searches aren't like religious journeys—they don't require selective communications with thoughtful and generous people. Instead, they benefit from openness and candidness with everyone. Julie O'Malley writes at the Pongo Resume blog that job seekers have "nothing to lose by spreading the word and getting your loved ones working on your side." You should be willing to talk to the grocery bagger—or to your neighbor's sister's husband's cousin. You never know who they know. Don't judge their usefulness, and don't be too proud to share.
7. You assume you know corporate culture. Maybe you're young and you think that employers will care more about your résumé than your clothes. Maybe you're older and you think that the best way to follow up after an interview is with repeated phone calls to the hiring manager. Corporate culture is important. Michael Wade of Execupundit.com says one of the key questions interviewers need answered is: "Will this person fit in?" The best thing for you to do is ask—ask about appropriate dress at a company before you go into the interview, or ask the hiring manager how you can best follow up about the position.
REUTERS/Ismail Zaydah
USA Today
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AP) — The U.S. is preparing to pour at least 20,000 extra troops into southern Afghanistan to cope with a Taliban insurgency that is fiercer than NATO leaders expected.
The new troops will augment the 12,500 NATO soldiers — mainly British, Canadian and Dutch — in what amounts to an Afghan version of the surge in Iraq.
New construction at Kandahar Air Field foreshadows the upcoming infusion of American power. Runways and housing are being built, along with two new U.S. outposts in Taliban-held regions of Kandahar province.
And in the past month the south has been the focus of visiting U.S. and other dignitaries — Sen. John McCain, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, U.S. congressional delegations and leaders from NATO headquarters in Europe.
For the first time since NATO took over the country in 2006, an experienced U.S. general, Brig. Gen. John Nicholson, is assigned to the south.
He says U.S. Gen. David McKiernan, NATO's commander in Afghanistan, has made the objectives clear in calling the situation in the south a stalemate and asking for more troops, on top of the 32,000 Americans already in Afghanistan.
"By introducing more U.S. capability in here we have the potential to change the game," Nicholson said.
The Army Corps of Engineers will spend up to $1.3 billion in new construction for troop placements in southern Afghanistan, said the corps commander in Afghanistan, Col. Thomas O'Donovan.
Violence in Afghanistan has spiked in the last two years, and Taliban militants now control wide swaths of countryside. Military officials say they have enough troops to win battles but not to hold territory, and they hope the influx of troops, plus the continued growth of the Afghan army, will change that.
U.S. officials hope to add at least three new brigades of ground forces in the southern region, along with assets from an aviation brigade, surveillance and intelligence forces, engineers, military police and Special Forces. In addition, a separate brigade of new troops is deploying to two provinces surrounding Kabul.
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said last month that Afghanistan could get up to 30,000 new U.S. troops in 2009, depending on the security situation in Iraq. Col. Greg Julian, a U.S. military spokesman, said Monday that one ground brigade should arrive by spring, a second by summer and a third by fall.
Nicholson said he expects the U.S. forces to be deployed in Kandahar city and along vital Highway 1, which links Kandahar to Kabul, and in neighboring Helmand province, the world's largest producer of opium poppies for heroin.
NATO forces are well positioned in three key areas of northern Helmand, said British Lt. Gen. J.B. Dutton, deputy commander of the NATO's Afghan mission.
"What we have not yet achieved is to join those areas up, so there is a security presence that allows locals to drive safely between those areas. That's the sort of thing we are going to want to improve," he said.
Since 2006, the U.S. has concentrated its forces in eastern Afghanistan, along the border with Pakistan, while the south is policed by 8,500 British troops, 2,500 Canadians and 2,500 Dutch.
Their overall commander is Dutch Maj. Gen. Mart de Kruif — who would also have command of any incoming U.S. forces in the south next year. By the fall of 2010 the top officer in the south will be American.
The infusion of U.S. power risks Americanizing a war that until now has been a shared mission of 41 coalition countries. But Dutton, the British general, suggested there was no choice. "It has to do with national capacity and a number of political considerations in those countries," he said.
In Canada and many European countries, governments face low public support for keeping troops in Afghanistan combat zones.
Dutton said the British contribution is "significant," as well as that of Canada, which he noted has lost more troops per capita in Afghanistan than any other nation.
Nicholson, the U.S. general, said the Canadians have fought "heroically" but simply don't have enough forces to secure all of Kandahar. The Canadian Embassy declined to comment.
More U.S. troops — 151 — died in Afghanistan in 2008 than any of the seven years since the invasion to oust the Taliban, and U.S. officials warn violence will probably intensify next year.
"If we get the troops, they're going to move into areas that haven't been secured, and when we do that, the enemy is there, and we're going to fight," said Nicholson, who spent 16 months commanding a brigade of 10th Mountain Division troops in eastern Afghanistan in 2006 and 2007.
That fighting should eventually clear the way for security and governance to take hold, he said.
"If you want to summarize that as it's going to get worse before it gets better, that's exactly what we're talking about," he said.
Let's see: Alexander the Great, Ghengis Khan, the British and Russia All Tried to Conquer Afghanistan and Failed, so naturally....
By BOB HERBERT - The New York Times
Does anyone know where George W. Bush is?
You don’t hear much from him anymore. The last image most of us remember is of the president ducking a pair of size 10s that were hurled at him in Baghdad.
We’re still at war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Israel is thrashing the Palestinians in Gaza. And the U.S. economy is about as vibrant as the 0-16 Detroit Lions.
But hardly a peep have we heard from George, the 43rd.
When Mr. Bush officially takes his leave in three weeks (in reality, he checked out long ago), most Americans will be content to sigh good riddance. I disagree. I don’t think he should be allowed to slip quietly out of town. There should be a great hue and cry — a loud, collective angry howl, demonstrations with signs and bullhorns and fiery speeches — over the damage he’s done to this country.
This is the man who gave us the war in Iraq and Guantánamo and torture and rendition; who turned the Clinton economy and the budget surplus into fool’s gold; who dithered while New Orleans drowned; who trampled our civil liberties at home and ruined our reputation abroad; who let Dick Cheney run hog wild and thought Brownie was doing a heckuva job.
The Bush administration specialized in deceit. How else could you get the public (and a feckless Congress) to go along with an invasion of Iraq as an absolutely essential response to the Sept. 11 attacks, when Iraq had had nothing to do with the Sept. 11 attacks?
Exploiting the public’s understandable fears, Mr. Bush made it sound as if Iraq was about to nuke us: “We cannot wait,” he said, “for the final proof — the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud.”
He then set the blaze that has continued to rage for nearly six years, consuming more than 4,000 American lives and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. (A car bomb over the weekend killed two dozen more Iraqis, many of them religious pilgrims.) The financial cost to the U.S. will eventually reach $3 trillion or more, according to the Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz.
A year into the war Mr. Bush was cracking jokes about it at the annual dinner of the Radio and Television Correspondents Association. He displayed a series of photos that showed him searching the Oval Office, peering behind curtains and looking under the furniture. A mock caption had Mr. Bush saying: “Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere.”
And then there’s the Bush economy, another disaster, a trapdoor through which middle-class Americans can plunge toward the bracing experiences normally reserved for the poor and the destitute.
Mr. Bush traveled the country in the early days of his presidency, promoting his tax cut plans as hugely beneficial to small-business people and families of modest means. This was more deceit. The tax cuts would go overwhelmingly to the very rich.
The president would give the wealthy and the powerful virtually everything they wanted. He would throw sand into the regulatory apparatus and help foster the most extreme income disparities since the years leading up to the Great Depression. Once again he was lighting a fire. This time the flames would engulf the economy and, as with Iraq, bring catastrophe.
If the U.S. were a product line, it would be seen now as deeply damaged goods, subject to recall.
There seemed to be no end to Mr. Bush’s talent for destruction. He tried to hand the piggy bank known as Social Security over to the marauders of the financial sector, but saner heads prevailed.
In New Orleans, the president failed to intervene swiftly and decisively to aid the tens of thousands of poor people who were very publicly suffering and, in many cases, dying. He then compounded this colossal failure of leadership by traveling to New Orleans and promising, in a dramatic, floodlit appearance, to spare no effort in rebuilding the flood-torn region and the wrecked lives of the victims.
He went further, vowing to confront the issue of poverty in America “with bold action.”
It was all nonsense, of course. He did nothing of the kind.
The catalog of his transgressions against the nation’s interests — sins of commission and omission — would keep Mr. Bush in a confessional for the rest of his life. Don’t hold your breath. He’s hardly the contrite sort.
He told ABC’s Charlie Gibson: “I don’t spend a lot of time really worrying about short-term history. I guess I don’t worry about long-term history, either, since I’m not going to be around to read it.”
The president chuckled, thinking — as he did when he made his jokes about the missing weapons of mass destruction — that there was something funny going on.
The Republicans are gearing up to fight the Obama agenda. The key battleground will be the Senate.
Paul Krugman took a look at the Republican Party of 2008, which is still using the same tactics it has used for 40 years. But, the country is different and the GOP is basically a clique of right wing Southerners:
But America in 1993 was a very different country — not just a country that had yet to see what happens when conservatives control all three branches of government, but also a country in which Democratic control of Congress depended on the votes of Southern conservatives. Today, Republicans have taken away almost all those Southern votes — and lost the rest of the country. It was a grand ride for a while, but in the end the Southern strategy led the G.O.P. into a cul-de-sac.
Mr. Obama therefore has room to be bold. If Republicans try a 1993-style strategy of attacking him for promoting big government, they’ll learn two things: not only has the financial crisis discredited their economic theories, the racial subtext of anti-government rhetoric doesn’t play the way it used to.
The GOP Senate is controlled by obstructionist Mitch McConnell from Kentucky. Over the past few weeks, we've seen Louisiana's David Vitter (of D.C. Madam infamy) emerge as a leading voice, too.
Today's LA Times also looked at the GOP, with an eye towards the so-called moderates in the Senate. But, the moderates won't set the agenda, the hard core, right wing Southerners will:
The election results -- by depleting moderate Republican ranks -- leave the congressional GOP more dominated than ever by its more dauntless conservatives, such as Sens. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) and Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), who led the charge in the lame-duck session that killed an auto industry bailout.
Moderate Republicans worry that their party's conservative wing is not going to change its ways in response to the GOP's election drubbing.
"I would hope that the more conservative members of our caucus would take a look at these election results," Collins said. "It's difficult to make the argument that our candidates lost because they were not conservative enough."
It remains to be seen how aggressively Republicans will try to wield the filibuster threat. They have recently signaled they will fight Obama's economic recovery plan if it moves too quickly. But there are political risks if the GOP is seen as obstructionist at a time when voters are clamoring for economic relief and change.
The GOP will wield the filibuster and do everything they can to obstruct the Obama agenda. It'll be interesting to see what the "moderates" like Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe do. They really have no place in that caucus.
I've written this before, but it's worth repeating. In 2006, there were 55 GOP Senators. In 2009, there are 41 GOP Senators. They've lost 25% of their caucus -- and they're keeping the same old strategy.
So, the GOP strategy is working -- for us, not them.
by David Sirota - San Francisco Chronicle / Common Dreams
If you're like me, you sometimes find yourself speechless when confronted with abject insanity.
If you're like me, for instance, you were dumbfounded when "Forrest Gump" beat out "Pulp Fiction" for best picture; when HBO's "Sopranos" received more accolades than "The Wire"; and when George W. Bush insisted Iraqi airplanes were about to drop WMDs on American cities.
So if you're like me, you probably understand why I was momentarily tongue-tied last week after running face-first into conservatives' newest (and most ridiculous) talking point - the one designed to stop Congress from passing an economic stimulus package.
During a Christmas Eve appearance on Fox News, I pointed out that most mainstream economists believe the government must boost the economy with deficit spending. That's when conservative pundit Monica Crowley said we should instead limit such spending because President Franklin Roosevelt's "massive government intervention actually prolonged the Great Depression." Fox News anchor Gregg Jarrett eagerly concurred, saying "historians pretty much agree on that."
Of course, I had recently heard snippets of this silly argument - conservative pundits are repeating it everywhere these days. But I had never heard it articulated in such preposterous terms, so my initial reaction was paralysis - the mouth-agape, deer-in-the-headlights kind. Only after collecting myself did I say that such assertions about the New Deal were absurd. But then I was laughed at - as if it was hilarious to say that the New Deal did anything but exacerbate the Depression.
Afterward, suffering pangs of self-doubt, I wondered whether I and most of the country are the crazy ones. Sure, the vast majority of Americans think the New Deal worked well. But are conservatives right? Did the New Deal's "massive government intervention prolong the Great Depression"?
Ummm ... no.
Upon deeper examination, I discovered that the right bases its New Deal revisionism on the short-lived recession in a year straddling 1937 and 1938. But that was four years into Roosevelt's term - four years marked by spectacular economic growth. Additionally, the fleeting decline happened not because of the New Deal's spending programs, but because Roosevelt momentarily listened to conservatives and backed off them. As Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman notes, in 1937-38, FDR "was persuaded to balance the budget" and "cut spending, and the economy went back down again."
To be sure, you can credibly argue that the New Deal had its share of problems. But overall, the numbers prove it helped - rather than hurt - the macroeconomy. "Excepting 1937-1938, unemployment fell each year of Roosevelt's first two terms (while) the U.S. economy grew at average annual growth rates of 9 percent to 10 percent," writes UC Davis historian Eric Rauchway.
What about the New Deal's most "massive government intervention" - its financial regulations? Did they prolong the Great Depression in ways the official data didn't detect?
Nope.
According to Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, "Only with the New Deal's rehabilitation of the financial system in 1933-35 did the economy begin its slow emergence from the Great Depression." In fact, even famed conservative economist Milton Friedman admitted that the New Deal's Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. was "the structural change most conducive to monetary stability since ... the Civil War."
OK - if the verifiable evidence proves the New Deal did not prolong the Depression, what about historians - do they "pretty much agree" on the opposite?
Again, no.
As Newsweek's Daniel Gross reports, "One would be very hard-pressed to find a serious professional historian who believes that the New Deal prolonged the Depression."
But that's the critical point I somehow forgot last week - the truism we must all remember in 2009: As conservatives try to obstruct a new New Deal, they're not making any arguments that are remotely serious.
Obama's first challenge will not be the unresolved Middle East crisis. Nor will it be Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantanamo or the economy. His primary challenge will come in coming face to face with the Bush/Cheney doctrine of permanent worldwide war. Unless Obama renounces it on inauguration day, this doctrine will continue to be U.S. policy.
Beyond that, an even larger challenge - one which he may not ever be able to meet - is healing a nation that for too long has been sickened by what American Indian historian, Jack Forbes terms in Columbus and other Cannibals: soul-sickness. It is a disease that historically has allowed a majority of EuroAmericans to believe that God has chosen them lead the rest of the world into the light, permitting the United States to employ massive military might in achieving that so-called mandate.
Over the past eight years, it is the Bush-Cheney doctrine that has drawn the particular ire of the entire world - because it permits the United States to unilaterally attack any nation with massive force or to attack any target within any nation, regardless of civilian casualties. This doctrine has also permitted this outgoing administration to assert and amass extraordinary powers that have virtually rendered the U.S. Constitution meaningless. This doctrine includes the assertion that the executive branch and its extraordinary powers can not be questioned or hindered by Congress or the courts during times of war, thus the assertion of permanent war (the war on terror).
Yet, even if Obama were to reject this Bush-Cheney doctrine, the soul sickness would remain.
That notwithstanding, the president's first order of business has to be the rejection of the Bush-Cheney doctrine. Failure to do so immediately, will cause the promise of change [to the United States, the world and the future] to fall on deaf ears.
It will not be enough to wind down the Iraq War if it means that the president will simply shift resources to broaden the war in Afghanistan and to also continue the Bush-Cheney endless worldwide war against undefined enemies into the foreseeable future.
Eradicating that soul-sickness is probably not possible; it is what sustains the myths of this nation. It is what defines this nation. The secular equivalent of believing that God has chosen the United States for a special mission is the belief that being a superpower is an elected position and that with that title, the United States and its allies are entitled to invade, topple or occupy any nation they see fit. And it is not something that began with Bush and Cheney.
It can be no irony that those that initiated the invasion and occupation of Iraq - in defiance of the UN - were the United States, Britain & Spain... on Portuguese territory. In the past 500 years, these are the world's leading imperialists and colonialist nations. Essentially, they have been the world's architects of the policies of dehumanization - feeling entitled by God and blinded by greed to trample over the lands, bodies and rights of peoples [of color] worldwide.
Despite this imperial club, there's a reason the U.S. government is particularly despised by most of the world. It isn't just the Bush-Cheney regime, though they have certainly put a face to the "ugly American." It's that smug soul-sickness that permits Americans to believe that they indeed know what's best for the rest of the world.
When Obama was elected president, it was the hope of the world - evidenced by massive celebrations worldwide - that he would indeed reverse the arrogance of the Bush/Cheney doctrine. Though for those expecting president-elect Obama to bring about radical change to the world, all signs indicate that we are all in for a very rude awakening.
But it's a sleep or dream that many Americans don't want to wake from. To be sure, being elected U.S. president is not the same thing as being elected high commissioner for human rights or prince of peace. Since WWII, the United States has become the most powerful military empire in the history of the planet. In the path of this machine, millions of casualties are strewn about in Asia, Africa and Central America. Some have been the result of secret, proxy, unnecessary, foolish and illegal wars - such as Iraq - but truly, which war or military action by the United States since WWII has been necessary and legal and not foolish?
This is what Obama is inheriting; not just a permanent war and a soul sickness, but also the reins to a voracious military-industrial complex that needs to be constantly fed. There's little indication that he will starve this machine. But there is always hope.
By Susie Madrak - Crooks and Liars
Why oh why can't we have a better press corps?
Glenn Greenwald:
Indeed. Perish the thought that a reporter should point out when government officials are making "bogus" claims and are lying a country into a war. That is "not their role," says the New Tim Russert (and, unsurprisingly, the Old Tim Russert wholeheartedly agreed). I don't know whether Gregory's public advocacy for a meek and polite press corps that would never be so rude as to point out when government leaders are lying is what sealed the deal for his new promotion to Meet the Press -- a show which centrally depends on having powerful politicians know that they can come on and, as Dick Cheney's top communications aide put it, "control the message." But I'm quite sure that it didn't hurt.
To see what Cheney aide Cathie Martin meant when she explained that Cheney knew he could go on Meet the Press and "control the message" -- and to see in action David Gregory's model of sycophantic, unchallenging "journalism" -- one could do no better than to examine Gregory's embarrassingly deferential "interview" yesterday with Israel's Foreign Minister, Tzipi Livni. It's a perfect template for how our American press corps (with some rare exceptions) functions.
Whatever one's views are on Israel's attack on Gaza -- pro, con or otherwise -- there's no denying that it's an extremely controversial matter -- at least it is in the world that exists outside of mainstream American political discourse. Even within Israel, there are scathing criticisms of what the Israeli Government is doing -- on both strategic and moral grounds. Yet none of those objections made their way into David Gregory's interview of Livni. He didn't present her with a single argument against the Israeli attack. He didn't challenge a single word she uttered. He was even more sycophantic with her than the average American journalist is with the average American political leader.
[...] There are good reasons why the media's reverent 2003 treatment of Bush matches its 2008 deference to Israeli claims. In 2003, claims about Iraq from the Bush administration -- just like claims from Israel now -- were not aggressively challenged or disputed in good company; their pronouncements were mandated orthodoxy, pieties of the highest order. And the one thing our media stars are good at doing -- what, above all else, they're programmed to do -- is to amplify and pay homage to prevailing establishment pieties. To do otherwise, as Gregory revealingly explained, "is not their role."
While it's true that blogs are dependent upon the mainstream media to an extent, it's because the media's hackery is so widespread, so consistent that consumers need us to explain exactly why they're so full of crap. (I mean, we do reward people who get it right by regularly linking to them, thus showing blog readers just who gets our respect.)
The members of the press corpse don't seem to realize that no matter who signs their paychecks, they have a moral obligation to serve as a check on government. The last eight years have proven they don't.
Aug. 15 -To beat the heat, Andrew Elliott of Issaquah swung out over the water before letting go and plunging into Echo Lake near North Bend. I grew up not too far from here, and this photo reminded me of my own high-school days when friends and I would head to different spots to cool off. The lake was a little hard to find because it's not marked. I parked at a turn-out area, headed in along a closed-off road and found a mile-and-a-half trail that opened up to a beautiful lake. Definitely remote, but worth the trip. -- Chris Joseph Taylor
We have to abandon the 30 years of crisis, threats of military action, vindictiveness and retaliation and look to diplomacy with Iran.
Just a month ago, while Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and President George W. Bush met in Washington for the last time as heads of state and continued their relentless bellicose rhetoric toward Iran, I and three activists from the United States were in Iran as citizen diplomats talking with Iranians on their views of a new American presidential administration and their hopes for their country.
We went to Iran with no illusions. We knew well the history of United States involvement in Iran. We knew of Iranian support for organizations U.S. administrations have labeled terrorist groups. And we were very familiar with international concerns about Iran's nuclear-enrichment program and human-rights record.
We wanted to talk with members of the Iranian government as well as with ordinary Iranians. We ended up meeting with officials in the Iranian president's office and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and with two female members of the Iranian Parliament (Majles). We also spoke with businesspersons, members of nongovernmental organizations, writers, filmmakers and university students and faculty.
Writing about the concerns of the Iranians we met leaves one open to comments of being one-sided, not speaking with enough Iranians to provide the "real" voices and of picking and choosing voices to record. I acknowledge the possible criticism in advance but believe our discussions are worthy of presentation to those who have not been so fortunate to have traveled to Iran to see and hear for themselves. So here goes.
Iranians Want Peace, Not War
Codepink Women for Peace co-founders Jodie Evans and Medea Benjamin, Fellowship of Reconciliation Iran Program Director Laila Zand and I were reminded in virtually every conversation that Iranians want peace with the United States. Not one person in Iran told us that, first, she believed her country would begin a war with the United States or any other country, including Israel, and second, that if the United States initiated military actions against Iran, that those actions would resolve problems in Iran or with the United States.
They reminded us that, unlike the United States, which has invaded and occupied Iran's neighbors Iraq and Afghanistan, Iran has not attacked any country in the last 200 years. They reminded us that Iran was the victim of an eight-year war in the 1980s, when Iraq invaded Iran and the United States and European countries provided Iraq with military equipment, intelligence and chemical weapons that were used at least 50 times against Iranian civilians and military forces. We learned that during that war, the Revolution's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini had mandated that it would be against Islamic precepts to bomb Iraqi cities or use chemical or unconventional weapons on Iraq -- and Iranian military forces complied.
Most Iranians Have Issues With Their Government, as Most Americans Have Issues With Theirs
Iran is a country with a population of about 70 million (two-and-one-half times as many people as Iraq) and a geographic area about the size of Alaska (four times as large as Iraq). Tehran, the nation's capital, has 7.5 million people in the urban area and 15 million in surrounding areas. It is a modern city with a beautiful subway and cosmopolitan shops, as well as a huge traditional bazaar and an incredible number of cars, trucks and motorcycles. Tehran and Iran have recovered from the Iraq war that ended 20 years ago and are holding up remarkably well to U.S. and international sanctions.
Most Iranians with whom we talked openly said they have issues with many aspects of their government. Many said the Iranian people share a common dislike with Americans -- dislike of their respective governments -- noting that Bush's and the U.S. Congress' approval ratings with the American people are extremely low, as is Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's ratings, particularly in urban areas. But, they strongly said they do not want outside interference in the internal political events of their country and definitely do not want a political system and government installed by invasion and occupation. Their democracy, even with its flaws, is better than a U.S.-enforced democracy, they said.
America's best policy would be to treat Iran with respect and not with threats of military action. Any attempt to overthrow the Iranian government would be met with stiff opposition, even from those who don't like the government, they repeated. "Regime change" will come in due time and in an Iranian manner.
U.S. Interference in Iran's Internal Affairs
Several reminded us that in January 1981, the United States and Iran signed the Algiers Accord, in which the United States agreed "not to intervene, directly or indirectly, politically or militarily, in Iran's internal affairs." The Algiers Accord was the agreement to end the 444-day U.S. Embassy hostage crisis. (continue reading)
As bloody and grotesque as Israel’s pounding of Gaza has been, it marks a bitterly disappointing end for seven-plus years of neoconservative dominion over U.S. foreign policy, a period that was supposed to conclude with the dismantling of Israel’s Muslim enemies in the region.
Contrary to those neocon plans, George W. Bush is limping toward a historical judgment as possibly “the worst President ever”; U.S. power is waning in Iraq under a “status-of-forces agreement” that is showing the Americans the door by 2011 if not earlier; and key neocon targets – Iran, Syria and Hezbollah in Lebanon – have gained in regional influence.
All the neocons have left now is to cheer the Israeli air force as it, in effect, shoots fish in a barrel, i.e. blasting away at selected Palestinian targets inside the crowded confines of Gaza, killing more than 400 people, including many children and other civilians, over the past week.
In 2001, especially after 9/11, the neocon dreams were so much more ambitious. The neocons planned to achieve “regime change” in all Middle Eastern countries that were perceived as threats to Israel and replace them with compliant, pro-Western leaders.
First on the list was Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, which was a center for Arab nationalism and an advocate for resisting Israeli occupation of Palestinian land. Since Iraq was too strong – and too far from the effective reach of the Israeli military – U.S. forces would be needed to conquer Iraq.
After that, Iraq was supposed to become the staging area for projecting American power across the region, with the governments of Iran and Syria the next targets.
A favorite neocon joke in 2003 was whether after capturing Baghdad, U.S. forces should go east or west, to either Damascus or Tehran, with the punch line: “Real men go to Tehran.” Of course, unlike American soldiers, the neocons weren’t really going anywhere, except to the next AEI conference or a Georgetown cocktail party.
By replacing the governments of Iran and Syria, the neocons would knock out the support structure for Israel’s two most immediate threats, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Palestinian territories. Then, with Israel – aided by some Arab allies – finishing off those two weakened militant groups, Israel could dictate terms of a final settlement to the Palestinians.
The Palestinians would have little choice but to accept an agreement even if it deprived them of the most desirable land. Peace would be imposed on the region by a neocon Pax Americana.
Pretty Rhetoric
Throughout this ambitious process, the neocons wrapped their plans in pretty or high-blown rhetoric.
There was talk about spreading “democracy” to the region (even though the neocons have never had much use for real democracy, having secured their place of power under George W. Bush after he and five Supreme Court allies overrode the will of American voters in 2000. The neocons also never objected to the plans of Bush’s political operatives to create a “permanent Republican majority” in America – a virtual one-party state – so long as the neocons kept their seat at the table.)
Besides “democracy promotion” in the Middle East, the neocons talked about advancing “human rights,” even as their policies rained death and destruction upon countless thousands of defenseless Arabs. There was also the claim that the United States was acting in post-9/11 self-defense because Saddam Hussein was in league with al-Qaeda’s Osama bin Laden (even though the pair actually were bitter rivals in the Arab world).
So there were plenty of pleasant rationales to justify the brutal strategies, so many that thoughtful analysts to this day express uncertainty over what the Bush administration’s real motivation was for invading Iraq.
It has always been a key part of neocon PR strategy to follow Winston Churchill’s famous advice that "in wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies." And for the neocons, it is always wartime, if not actual war then it’s the “war of ideas” or the “war on terror.”
Having covered the neocons since their emergence in the early 1980s as junior partners in the Reagan Revolution, I have always been amazed at their facility for clever arguments and their willingness to demonize or marginalize anyone who disagrees with them. In essence, they are intellectual bullies who care only about achieving their political ends.
Though Ronald Reagan “credentialed” many of the key neocons – the likes of Elliott Abrams, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle and Robert Kagan – he mostly kept them focused on Central America and other strategic backwaters.
This was not good news for Central Americans – who died by the tens of thousands as the neocons concealed or downplayed the human rights crimes committed by U.S.-supported military forces in Guatemala, El Salvador and Nicaragua – but at least Reagan knew enough not to give the neocons broad control over U.S. policy in the oil-rich Middle East.
Reagan’s key diplomats in the Middle East were more pragmatic operatives, such as James Baker and Philip Habib. In the 1980s, the Reagan administration mostly played Realpolitik games there, like helping both sides in the Iran-Iraq War to ensure that neither one got too much of an upper hand. There also was ambivalence toward the Arab-Israeli conflict.
That changed when George W. Bush became President as a born-again Christian devoted to Israel. Especially after 9/11, Bush handed control of Middle East policy to the neocons, with officials such as Elliott Abrams holding key posts on the National Security Council, Wolfowitz at the Pentagon, and Lewis Libby serving under the powerful Vice President, Dick Cheney.
Media Megaphone
By then, the neocons also had gained extraordinary sway over the Washington press corps.
In the 1980s, the neocons expanded their megaphone from relatively small-circulation magazines, like Commentary and Dissent, to more general-interest publications, such as the Wall Street Journal’s editorial pages, The New Republic and later Newsweek (where I worked in the late 1980s).
The neocon editorialists – people like Charles Krauthammer and Fred Barnes – also excelled at amplifying their political message through their seats on TV news chat shows, such as “Inside Washington,” “Crossfire” and “The McLaughlin Group.”
By the 1990s, with the emergence of right-wing talk radio and Fox News, the neocons consolidated their power in the national news media. Most notably, the Washington Post’s editorial section fell firmly under neocon domination.
As much as the Right still uttered its ritualistic complaints about the “liberal press,” the reality was quite different. As became acutely clear in 2002 and early 2003, the neocons in the news media worked hand in glove with the Bush administration to rally public support behind the Iraq War by citing such canards as the risk of Saddam Hussein giving his WMD to al-Qaeda.
It turned out, however, that manipulating reality inside the Washington Beltway was a lot easier than controlling it inside Iraq. Rather than happily accepting U.S. occupation, many Iraqis joined an armed resistance, tying down American troops in a bloody quagmire.
Also, failing to find the promised caches of Iraq’s WMD and facing new skepticism about Hussein’s ties to al-Qaeda, Bush elevated “democracy” to be the prime post facto justification for the invasion. But that led to Iraqi elections in early 2005 and they installed a Shiite government with close ties to Iran.
Similarly, U.S.-demanded elections in the Palestine territories led to victory by Hamas and its eventual takeover of Gaza. Other elections in Lebanon strengthened the position of Hezbollah.
So, very few of the Middle East plans were working out as the neocons had airily envisioned them.
Tied down by worsening violence in Iraq, the Bush administration issued belligerent warnings to Syria and Iran but lacked the military manpower to back up the threats.
Another Front
Stymied on plans to roll up Israel’s enemies via U.S.-imposed “regime change” in Iran and Syria – and thus undermine Hamas and Hezbollah – the neocons pinned their hopes on Israel’s ability to punish those two groups with military offensives in 2006 and then possibly move on to invading Syria.
After consultations between President Bush and Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Israel engaged in a series of low-key tit-for-tat exchanges with Hamas and Hezbollah, which responded by capturing several Israeli soldiers (the U.S. press corps preferred the word “kidnap”). That was followed by a massive Israeli retaliation that killed more than a thousand people, including many civilians, in Lebanon.
Inside the United States, there was a reprise of the war-drum-beating that had preceded the Iraq War. Well-placed neocons in Washington and elsewhere tried to whip the American people into a new war frenzy. Again, U.S. politicians and much of the U.S. news media fell into line.
On July 17, 2006, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton shared the stage in a pro-Israel rally with Dan Gillerman, then Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations who had espoused anti-Arab bigotry in the past and proudly defended Israel’s violence inside Lebanon.
Responding to international concerns that Israel was using “disproportionate” force by bombing Lebanon and killing hundreds of civilians, Gillerman said, “You’re damn right we are.” [NYT, July 18, 2006]
In other statements, Gillerman had been even more disdainful about Muslims. At the American Israel Public Affairs Committee conference in Washington on March 6, 2006, Gillerman virtually equated Muslims with terrorists.
“While it may be true – and probably is – that not all Muslims are terrorists, it also happens to be true that nearly all terrorists are Muslim,” Gillerman quipped to the delight of the AIPAC crowd. [Washington Post, March 7, 2006]
Despite Gillerman’s professed uncertainty about whether “all Muslims are terrorists,” this anti-Muslim bigotry didn’t generate any noticeable protest from American politicians and pundits. It would have been hard to imagine any other ethnic or religious group being subjected to a similar smear without provoking a noisy controversy.
Four months later, Sen. Clinton and other Democrats joined Gillerman at the New York rally to endorse Israel’s devastating military attacks on Lebanon. Clinton, who was then considered the Democratic presidential frontrunner, denounced Hezbollah and Hamas as “the new totalitarians of the 21st Century” who believe in neither human rights nor democracy, even though both groups had done well in elections.
Clinton was joined by two Democratic congressmen who also endorsed Israel’s bombing raids on Lebanon.
“Since when should a response to aggression and murder be proportionate?” asked Rep. Jerrold Nadler.
“President Bush has been wrong about a lot of things,” said Rep. Anthony D. Weiner. “He’s right about this.” [For more details, see Consortiumnews.com’s “A New War Frenzy.”] (continue reading)
Reuters
PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - Governors of five U.S. states urged the federal government to provide $1 trillion in aid to the country's 50 states to help pay for education, welfare and infrastructure as states struggle with steep budget deficits amid a deepening recession.
The governors of New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Ohio and Wisconsin -- all Democrats -- said the initiative for the two-year aid package was backed by other governors and follows a meeting in December where governors called on President-elect Barack Obama to help them maintain services in the face of slumping revenues.
Gov. David Paterson of New York said 43 states now have budget deficits totaling some $100 billion as tax revenues plunge.
"It's clear that the federal government needs to step in and jump-start the economy," said Gov. Deval Patrick of Massachusetts.
The latest package calls for $350 billion to create jobs by building or repairing roads, bridges and other public works; $250 billion to maintain education; and another $250 billion in "counter-cyclical" spending such as extending unemployment benefits and food stamps, which are typically a responsibility of the states.
The remainder would be used to fund middle-class tax cuts, stimulate the embattled housing market, and stem the tide of home foreclosures through a loan-modification program.
Gov. Jon Corzine of New Jersey said he hoped some of the $700 billion authorized by Congress in the Troubled Asset Relief Program would be available to help the housing market.
The governors said during a conference call with reporters that the plan had been discussed with Congressional leaders and the incoming administration, which had indicated its willingness to help.
"The Obama team has been very receptive in listening to us," said Gov. Jim Doyle of Wisconsin. He said "quite a number" of other governors back the initiative.
The Republican Governors Association, however, said the level of federal aid being sought would create a burden for the future.
"The proposal by the Democratic governors goes beyond things like 'shovel-ready' infrastructure projects and is essentially a bailout of these states' general funds," Nick Ayers, executive director of the Republican Governors Association, said in a statement. "Now is the time to focus on finding cost-effective ways to provide essential services without burdening future generations with ever greater debt."
Doyle of Wisconsin said the plan would allow states to maintain essential services at about the current level until 2010, when the national economy is expected to begin a recovery.
The proposal comes amid expectations that the Obama administration, which takes office on January 20, will provide hundreds of billions of dollars in economic stimulus to boost the shrinking U.S. economy and halt the loss of jobs.
Paterson of New York said his state's budget deficit has surged to $15.4 billion currently from $5 billion in April 2008, despite a 3.2 percent cut in the education budget.
Corzine said the money called for represents about 3 percent to 3.5 percent of the economy, equivalent to the amount that the economy is expected to contract by over the next two quarters.
In light of the $700 billion provided to bail out the financial industry, "It's not shockingly large," he said.
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The Key to Eliminating Your Slice
Making a proper “full shoulder turn” is one of the most important fundamentals of the golf swing, yet it's one of the most common mistakes made by golfers; and why so many have slice problems. A proper shoulder turn is when you rotate the shoulders so the leading shoulder comes under your chin, without letting your hips turn much at all. Below we explain the ways this eliminates the slice:
• If your shoulder rotation is stopped too early, your arms will tend to continue by fling across the target line and causing an outside-to-inside swing path, resulting in the dreaded banana-ball. A full shoulder turn will help the club fall “on plane”, which greatly reduces the chance of cutting across the target line and slicing the golf ball.
• A full shoulder turn will promote proper weight shift. Remember too keep your lower body from moving laterally. Do not confuse the full shoulder turn as meaning you must get the club back to parallel at the top of the swing. Many great golfers have a compact swing that comes up far short of parallel at the top, but all great golfers take a full shoulder turn when executing a full shot.
• A full shoulder turn will bring you to the top of the swing and assist in getting the hands and arms into proper position.
• Keep your chin up and off your chest so the leading shoulder can rotate and pass under the chin. If the shoulder hits your chin, it will cut the shoulder rotation short and encourage a slice.
• When a golfer does not utilize a full shoulder turn, they tend to rely more on the small muscles (hands and arms) to swing the golf club. This leads to inconsistent ball striking and shots prone to slicing. With a full shoulder turn, you will use more of your big muscles, which are much more consistent, and help you square the club face and avoid a slice. Don’t be in a rush; taking the club back slow will help you to finish the back swing with a full shoulder turn. More body, less arms.
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