Month: May 2004

Budget Cuts Are Coming

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There’s been a bunch of chatter recently about John McCain’s question about the War on Terror: ‘Where’s the sacrifice?’

Well, it’s coming folks. If Bush is re-elected, there’s good reason to suspect that we will see significant budget cuts in 2006 in “virtually all agencies in charge of domestic programs, including education, homeland security and others that the president backed in this campaign year.”

Administration officials had dismissed the significance of the proposed cuts when they surfaced in February as part of an internal White House budget office computer printout. At the time, officials said the cuts were based on a formula and did not accurately reflect administration policy. But a May 19 White House budget memorandum obtained by The Washington Post said that agencies should assume the spending levels in that printout when they prepare their fiscal 2006 budgets this summer.

Now nothing’s chiseled in stone yet (least of all that Bush will be in office then):

J.T. Young, a spokesman for the White House Office of Management and Budget, said the memo, titled “Planning Guidance for the FY 2006 Budget,” is a routine “process document” to help agency officials begin establishing budget procedures for 2006. In no way should it be interpreted as a final policy decision, or even a planning document, he said.

But, there are folks on both sides of the political aisle suggesting these cuts would happen should Bush win (i.e., if Kerry doesn’t win and raise taxes on the wealthiest Americans):

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Fafnir Exclusive

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Whatever you do, don’t miss this exclusive interview with Donald Rumsfeld by Fafnir: A small sample: [Fafnir]: Now Secretary Rumsfeld, there are a lot of people criticizing your handling of the war over things like the undermanning of the military, the not preparing for reconstruction, the letting crazy militias run whole cities. What is your … Read more

A Sinking Ship

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So, you know it tears me up inside to be the bearer of bad news for the Bush campaign, but there’s little other news to pass along these days. First it was the Muslim Americans, now the Cuban Americans: Bush’s support among Cuban-Americans in south Florida—about 80 percent of whom backed him in 2000—shows signs … Read more

The right criticism.

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Daniel Drezner writes an essential piece on what is wrong and what is right in our invasion and occupation of Iraq. The key graf is, I think, the final one:

The craft of foreign policy is choosing wisely from a set of imperfect options. While flawed, the neoconservative plan of democracy promotion in the Middle East remains preferable to any known alternatives. Of course, such a risky strategy places great demands on execution, and so far this administration has executed poorly. It would be a cruel irony if, in the end, the biggest proponents of ambitious reform in the Middle East are responsible for unfairly discrediting their own idea.

(via Matthew Yglesias, who notes that he’s been saying much the same thing, and is being (unjustly, I think) torn up by his commenteers.)

Drezner and Yglesias are essentially correct, although I would offer one caveat. We should not expect to establish democracy with one mighty blow, or claim that we could’ve erased a thousand years of history if only we had devoted one more armored calvary division. The invasion of Iraq may be justified in order to protect ourselves or our allies, but it cannot be justified on the hope that it will remake Iraq or result in the kinky execution of a reverse domino theory — that Iraq’s liberalization will cause other regimes in the region to also liberalize.

* * * * *

Indeed, wars do not create democracies — as we should have learned from the World Wars and, more recently, from our experiences in the Balkans.* Rather, long periods of stability and growing prosperity make democracies.

We prepared for the Iraq war, but not its immediate aftermath. That latter failing cannot be undone; now we must make do. But, if we do muddle through this period, there is another challenge still looming, and we have not yet decided how we will face it. This is the challenge of sustaining the growth and stability we hope to establish. This is the challenge of not only making, but keeping, Iraq as a friend.

This means, perhaps, preferring more expensive Iraqi oil to a cheaper Saudi alternative; continuing to invest in Iraq’s infrastructure — it’s roads, bridges, harbors, oil fields. It means giving tax credits to companies that do business in Iraq. And, most importantly (and most difficult for some to swallow), it means making real progress on the Israel/Palestinian conflict.

Yup, that’s right: If we do not take steps to resolve the Israel/Palestinian conflict, we will find any popular government that emerges in Iraq to be against our single most important ally in the region, and on the wrong side of the single most important regional political issue.** This is not a recipe for long-term stability (at least as a democracy).

So, this is our task, now: peace in the Middle East. Let’s get to it, Mr. President; it’s likely not going to happen overnight.

When you dream, dream big (I suppose).

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Need to Know Basis Only

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/snark on/ Right hand, meet Left Hand… Pentagon surprised by Bush pledge to destroy Abu Ghraib: report I know he’s the boss and all that, but the President might have at least IM’d the Pentagon that he was going to announce this…a text message, courier pigeon, something… Pentagon officials were caught by surprise by President … Read more

I link to this Onion article…

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… not because it’s funny (although it is, in that cruel way that the Onion sometimes adopts), but because I am filled with a certain nostalga for that You Can’t Do That On Television, not to mention a certain other sort of nostalga for Christine “Moose” McGlade. Hey, by the time that I had started … Read more

I’ll say this for Kerry…

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…he ain’t this guy*: Gore says Rumsfeld, Rice, Tenet should step down NEW YORK (AP) — Al Gore delivered a fiery denunciation Wednesday of the Bush administration’s “twisted values and atrocious policies” and demanded the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and CIA director George Tenet. Raising his voice to … Read more

Well, that’s a relief.

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Senator Kerry will be accepting the nomination at the Democratic convention after all, thus rescuing it from a fate… not much different than it would have been anyway. It’s not like either party’s is going to be particularly surprising, tasteful and/or memorable. Then again, ‘surprising’ and ‘memorable’ may not be all that positive conditions. As … Read more