=======================
Rx for Global Poverty
By Robert J. Samuelson
Wednesday, May 28, 2008; A13

What's the world's greatest moral challenge, as judged by its capacity to inflict human tragedy? It is not, I think, global warming, whose effects -- if they become as grim as predicted -- will occur over many years and provide societies time to adapt. A case can be made for preventing nuclear proliferation, which threatens untold deaths and a collapse of the world economy. But the most urgent present moral challenge, I submit, is the most obvious: global poverty.

There are roughly 6 billion people on the planet; in 2004, perhaps 2.5 billion survived on $2 a day or less, says the World Bank. By 2050, the world may have 3 billion more people; many will be similarly impoverished. What's baffling and frustrating about extreme poverty is that much of the world has eliminated it. In 1800, almost everyone was desperately poor. But the developed world has essentially abolished starvation, homelessness and material deprivation.

The solution to being poor is getting rich. It's economic growth. We know this. The mystery is why all societies have not adopted the obvious remedies. Just recently, the 21-member Commission on Growth and Development -- including two Nobel-prize winning economists, former prime ministers of South Korea and Peru, and a former president of Mexico -- examined the puzzle.

Since 1950, the panel found, 13 economies have grown at an average annual rate of 7 percent for at least 25 years. These were: Botswana, Brazil, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Malta, Oman, Singapore, Taiwan and Thailand. Some gains are astonishing. From 1960 to 2005, per capita income in South Korea rose from $1,100 to $13,200. Other societies started from such low levels that even rapid economic growth, combined with larger populations, left sizable poverty. In 2005, Indonesia's per capita income averaged just $900, up from $200 in 1966.

Still, all these economies had advanced substantially. The panel identified five common elements of success:

· Openness to global trade and, usually, an eagerness to attract foreign investment.

· Political stability and "capable" governments "committed" to economic growth, though not necessarily democracy (China, South Korea and Indonesia all grew with authoritarian regimes).

· High rates of saving and investment, usually at least 25 percent of national income.

· Economic stability, keeping government budgets and inflation under control and avoiding a broad collapse in production.

· A willingness to "let markets allocate resources," meaning that governments didn't try to run industry.

Of course, qualifications abound. Some countries succeeded with high inflation rates of 15 to 30 percent. Led by Japan, Asian countries pursued export-led growth with undervalued exchange rates that favored some industries over others. Good government is relative; some fast-growing societies tolerated much corruption. Still, broad lessons are clear.

One is: Globalization works. Countries don't get rich by staying isolated. Those that embrace trade and foreign investment acquire know-how and technologies, can buy advanced products abroad, and are forced to improve their competitiveness. The transmission of new ideas and products is faster than ever. After its invention, the telegram took 90 years to spread to four-fifths of developing countries; for the cellphone, the comparable diffusion was 16 years.

A second is: Outside benevolence can't rescue countries from poverty. There is a role for foreign aid, technical assistance and charity in relieving global poverty. But it is a small role. It can improve health, alleviate suffering from natural disasters or wars, and provide some types of skills. But it cannot single-handedly stimulate the policies and habits that foster self-sustaining growth. Japan and China (to cite easy examples) have grown rapidly not because they received foreign aid but because they pursued pro-growth policies and embraced pro-growth values.

The hard question (which the panel ducks) is why all societies haven't adopted them. One reason is politics; some regimes are more interested in preserving their power and privileges than in promoting growth. But the larger answer, I think, is culture, as Lawrence Harrison of Tufts University argues. Traditional values, social systems or religious views are often hostile to risk-taking, wealth accumulation and economic growth. In his latest book, "The Central Liberal Truth," Harrison contends that politics can alter culture, but it isn't easy.

Globalization has moral as well as economic and political dimensions. The United States and other wealthy countries are experiencing an anti-globalization backlash. Americans and others are entitled to defend themselves from economic harm, but many of the allegations against globalization are wildly exaggerated. Today, for example, the biggest drag on the U.S. economy -- the housing crisis -- is mainly a domestic problem. By making globalization an all-purpose scapegoat for economic complaints, many "progressives" are actually undermining the most powerful force for eradicating global povert

June 11, 2008
President Bush regrets his legacy as man who wanted war

George Bush said he regretted the divisions caused by his rhetoric
Tom Baldwin and Gerard Baker in Ljubljana
President Bush has admitted to The Times that his gun-slinging rhetoric made the world believe that he was a “guy really anxious for war” in Iraq. He said that his aim now was to leave his successor a legacy of international diplomacy for tackling Iran.

In an exclusive interview, he expressed regret at the bitter divisions over the war and said that he was troubled about how his country had been misunderstood. “I think that in retrospect I could have used a different tone, a different rhetoric.”

Phrases such as “bring them on” or “dead or alive”, he said, “indicated to people that I was, you know, not a man of peace”. He said that he found it very painful “to put youngsters in harm’s way”. He added: “I try to meet with as many of the families as I can. And I have an obligation to comfort and console as best as I possibly can. I also have an obligation to make sure that those lives were not lost in vain.”

The unilateralism that marked his first White House term has been replaced by an enthusiasm for tough multilateralism. He said that his focus for his final six months in office was to secure agreement on issues such as establishing a Palestinian state and to “leave behind a series of structures that makes it easier for the next president”.

Mr Bush is concerned that the Democratic nominee Barack Obama might open cracks in the West’s united front towards Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. At the EU-US summit in Slovenia, he pressed for tougher sanctions against Iran unless it agreed to suspend its uranium enrichment programme verifiably: “They can either face isolation, or they can have better relations with all of us.”

Mr Bush told The Times that when his successor arrived and assessed “what will work or what won’t work in dealing with Iran”, he would stick with the current policy.

Shaul Mofaz, a hardline Israeli minister, has suggested that a military strike on Iran is “unavoidable”. But Mr Bush said: “We ought to work together, keep focused. His comments really should be viewed as the need to continue to keep pressuring Iran.”

The President was keen to bind his successor into a continued military presence in Afghanistan and Iraq, but offered only cautious optimism about a recent decline in violence. Asked about corruption allegations dogging Hamid Karzai, the Afghan President, Mr Bush insisted: “I have found him to be an honest man.”

He also offered words of encouragement for another ally, Gordon Brown, whom he will meet on Sunday. He said that he needed no advice on coping with political adversity. He is “plenty confident and plenty smart, plenty capable — he can sort it out”.

But he delivered a thinly veiled warning to Mr Obama that his promises to renegotiate or block international trade deals were already causing alarm in Europe and beyond.

“There is concern about protectionism and economic nationalism,” he said. “Leaders recognise now is the time to get ahead of this issue before it becomes engrained in the political systems of our respective countries.”

Acknowledging that his refusal to ratify the Kyoto Protocol once created consternation in Europe, he said that there was now a recognition that that richer countries needed to “transfer out of the hydrocarbon economy”. He insisted, however, that any binding emission targets would have to include China and India to be workable.

The President knows that Republican nominee-in-waiting John McCain will have to distance himself from the current Administration. "He's an independent person who will make his decisions on what he thinks is best."

Asked if the US is ready for a black president, Mr Bush says: "I think the fact that the Democratic Party nominated Barack Obama is a statement about how far America has come.

"Having said all that, it's going to be important for the American people to figure out who can handle the task of the 21st Century. It's a challenging job."

Polarized Presidency Of George W. Bush Buy the book

Missing the Market Meltdown


By Amory B. Lovins

This article appeared in Newsweek in its May 26, 2008 Issue

Capitalists have already scuttled Patrick Moore's claimed nuclear revival. New U.S. subsidies of about $13 billion per plant (roughly a plant's capital cost) haven't lured Wall Street to invest. Instead, the decentralized competitors to nuclear power that Moore derides are making more global electricity than nuclear plants are, and are growing 20 to 40 times faster.

In 2007, decentralized renewables worldwide attracted $71 billion in private capital. Nuclear got zero. Why? Economics. The nuclear construction costs that Moore omits are astronomical and soaring; low fuel costs will soon rise two-to fivefold. "Negawatts"—saved electricity—cost five to 10 times less and are getting cheaper. So are most renewables. Negawatts and "micro-power"— renewables other than big hydro, and cogenerating electricity together with useful heat—are also at or near customers, avoiding grid costs, losses and failures (which cause 98 to 99 percent of blackouts).

The unreliability of renewable energy is a myth, while the unreliability of nuclear energy is real. Of all U.S. nuclear plants built, 21 percent were abandoned as lemons; 27 percent have failed at least once for a year or more. Even successful reactors must close for refueling every 17 months for 39 days. And when shut by grid failure, they can't quickly restart. Wind farms don't do that.

Variable but forecastable renewables (wind and solar cells) are very reliable when integrated with each other, existing supplies and demand. For example, three German states were more than 30 percent wind-powered in 2007—and more than 100 percent in some months. Mostly renewable power generally needs less backup than utilities already bought to combat big coal and nuclear plants' intermittence.

Micropower delivers a sixth of total global electricity, a third of all new electricity and from a sixth to more than half of all electricity in 12 industrial countries (in the United States it's only 6 percent). In 2006, the global net capacity added by nuclear power was only 83 percent of that added by solar cells, 10 percent that of wind power and 3 percent that of micropower. China's distributed renewables grew to seven times its nuclear capacity and grew seven times faster. In 2007, the United States, China and Spain each added more wind capacity than the world added nuclear capacity. Wind power added 30 percent of new U.S. and 40 percent of EU capacity, because it's two to three times cheaper than new nuclear power. Which part of this doesn't Moore understand?

The punch line: nuclear expansion buys two to 10 times less climate protection per dollar, far slower than its winning competitors. Spending a dollar on new nuclear power rather than on negawatts thus has a worse climate effect than spending that dollar on new coal power. Attention, Dr. Moore: you're making climate change worse.

Media Relations
If you would like more information about our work or assistance with a story, please contact Media Relations.

E-mail: media@rmi.org

Phone: (970) 927-3851

washingtonpost.com

Iraqis Condemn American Demands
Sides Negotiating U.S. Military Role

By Amit R. Paley and Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, June 11, 2008; A01

BAGHDAD, June 10 -- High-level negotiations over the future role of the U.S. military in Iraq have turned into an increasingly acrimonious public debate, with Iraqi politicians denouncing what they say are U.S. demands to maintain nearly 60 bases in their country indefinitely.

Top Iraqi officials are calling for a radical reduction of the U.S. military's role here after the U.N. mandate authorizing its presence expires at the end of this year. Encouraged by recent Iraqi military successes, government officials have said that the United States should agree to confine American troops to military bases unless the Iraqis ask for their assistance, with some saying Iraq might be better off without them.

"The Americans are making demands that would lead to the colonization of Iraq," said Sami al-Askari, a senior Shiite politician on parliament's foreign relations committee who is close to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. "If we can't reach a fair agreement, many people think we should say, 'Goodbye, U.S. troops. We don't need you here anymore.' "

Congress has grown increasingly restive over the negotiations, which would produce a status of forces agreement setting out the legal rights and responsibilities of U.S. troops in Iraq and a broader "security framework" defining the political and military relationship between the two countries. Senior lawmakers of both parties have demanded more information and questioned the Bush administration's insistence that no legislative approval is required.

In Iraq, the willingness to consider calling for the departure of American troops represents a major shift for members of the U.S.-backed government. Maliki this week visited Iran, where Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader, urged him to reject any long-term security arrangements with the United States.

Failing to reach agreements this year authorizing the future presence of American forces in Iraq would be a strategic setback for the Bush administration, which says that such a presence is essential to promoting stability. Absent the agreements or the extension of the U.N. mandate, U.S. troops would have no legal basis to remain in Iraq.

President Bush has spoken directly to Maliki about the issue in recent days and instructed his negotiating team to show greater flexibility, Iraqi politicians said. U.S. officials circulated a draft of the status of forces agreement over the weekend without many of the most controversial demands, buoying hopes that a deal could be reached, according to Iraq lawmakers.

David M. Satterfield, the State Department's top adviser on Iraq, said he is confident the pacts can be finalized in July, a deadline that Bush and Maliki endorsed last year. "It's doable," he told reporters in Baghdad. "We think it's an achievable goal."

U.S. officials have refused to publicly discuss details of the negotiations. But Iraqi politicians have become more open in their descriptions of the talks, stoking popular anger at American demands that Iraqis across the political spectrum view as a form of continued occupation.

"What the U.S. wants is to take the current status quo and try to regulate it in a new agreement. And what we want is greater respect for Iraqi sovereignty," said Haider al-Abadi, a parliament member from Maliki's Dawa party. "Signing the agreement would mean that the Iraqi government had given up its sovereignty by its own consent. And that will never happen."

Iraqi officials plan to present the status of forces document and the security framework to parliament as a single agreement.

In a news conference in the heavily fortified Green Zone, Satterfield repeated several times that the U.S. goal is to create a more independent Iraq. "We want to see Iraqi sovereignty strengthened, not weakened," he said.

Abadi and other Iraqi officials said that assertion is undercut by the U.S. request to maintain 58 long-term bases in Iraq.

The Americans originally pushed for more than 200 facilities across the country, according to Hadi al-Amiri, a powerful lawmaker who is the head of the Badr Organization, the former armed wing of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, the country's largest Shiite political party.

Iraqi officials said the U.S. government also demanded the continuation of several current policies: authority to detain and hold Iraqis without turning them over to the Iraqi judicial system, immunity from Iraqi prosecution for both U.S. troops and private contractors, and the prerogative for U.S. forces to conduct operations without approval from the Iraqi government.

The American negotiators also called for continued control over Iraqi airspace and the right to refuel planes in the air, according to Askari, positions he said added to concerns that the United States was preparing to use Iraq as a base to attack Iran.

"We rejected the whole thing from the beginning," said Jalal al-Din al-Saghir, a senior lawmaker from the Supreme Council. "In my point of view, it would just be a new occupation with an Iraqi signature."

If the talks collapse, several Iraqi officials said, they would request another one-year extension of the U.N. mandate. But Iraqi officials said they would also ask for modifications to the mandate similar to those they are seeking in the current negotiations.

"All the same issues would then be transferred to the talks with the U.N. Security Council," Abadi said.

Assuming that violence in Iraq will continue to decrease, politicians such as Saghir have begun discussing another option: asking the U.S. military to leave Iraq.

"Maybe the Iraqi government will say: 'Hey, the security situation is better. We don't need any more troops in Iraq,' " he said. "Or we could have a pledge of honor where the American troops leave but come back and protect Iraq if there is any aggression."

The Iraqi government is also upset because it wants the United Nations to lift its Chapter 7 designation of Iraq as a threat to international security, which dates from Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Iraqi officials said the United States will not commit to supporting the removal of the label -- a position the Iraqis call an inappropriate bargaining tactic.

U.S. negotiators also said the agreements would not obligate the American military to protect Iraq from foreign aggression, Iraqi officials said, a promise they believe was a fundamental part of a declaration of principles signed by Bush and Maliki last winter.

"The prime minister is not happy about this," said Askari, who helped negotiate the declaration of principles, which outlined the strategic framework. "This is not what we agreed on."

Mahmoud Othman, an independent Kurdish member of parliament who has been briefed on the negotiations, said the Americans recently had changed their position on four key issues:

1. Private contractors would no longer be guaranteed immunity;
2.detainees would be turned over to the Iraqi judicial system after combat operations;
3. U.S. troops would operate only with the agreement of the Iraqi government;
4.and the Americans would promise not to use Iraq as a base for attacking other countries.

"Now the American position is much more positive and more flexible than before," said Mohammed Hamoud, an Iraqi deputy foreign minister who is a lead negotiator in the talks.

In Washington, the White House hastily organized a closed-door briefing on Capitol Hill on Tuesday after Sens. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) and John W. Warner (R-Va.), the chairman and ranking minority member of the Armed Services Committee, respectively, demanded Monday that the administration "be more transparent with Congress, with greater consultation, about the progress and content of these deliberations."

In a letter Monday to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Levin and Warner wrote that Congress, "in exercising its constitutional responsibilities, has legitimate concerns about the authorities, protections and understandings that might be made" in the agreements.

Although they have questioned the status of forces agreement's contents, lawmakers have not raised the issue of its congressional ratification.

The United States is a party to more than 80 such bilateral agreements in countries where American forces are stationed, but its proposals for the Iraq accord far exceed the terms of any of the others. Such agreements are traditionally signed by the U.S. president under his executive authority.

Although the administration has since said that the security framework is "nonbinding" and would not include any provisions for permanent bases or specific troop numbers, lawmakers charged that the White House was trying to tie the hands of Bush's successor and said the terms of the accord amounts to a defense treaty requiring congressional approval.

In a Senate hearing in April, a senior Defense Department lawyer acknowledged under questioning by Sen. James Webb (D-Va.) that the Pentagon had no definition for the term "permanent base" and that it "doesn't really mean anything."

DeYoung reported from Washington

MEF Personnel

MEF is centered around the work of its founder, Daniel Pipes, one of the leading commentators on the Middle East and the Islamic world. The Wall Street Journal calls Mr. Pipes “an authoritative commentator on the Middle East.” CBS Sunday Morning says he was “years ahead of the curve in identifying the threat of radical Islam.” The Boston Globe states that “If Pipes’s admonitions had been heeded, there might never have been a 9/11.” Educated at Harvard, Pipes is the award-winning author of twelve books; he writes a bi-weekly column for the New York Times Syndicate, and he frequently appears on the major television news networks.

Middle East Quarterly editor Michael Rubin, a resident scholar of the American Enterprise Institute, has advised the coalition government of Iraq and has taught at Hebrew University (Jerusalem). Assistant editor Noah Pollack is formerly an editor at Azure and writes for several blogs.

Director of Campus Watch Winfield Myers is a historian and widely published writer. Cinnamon Stillwell, CW’s northern California representative, is a contributing political columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle online.

Islamist Watch interim head David Rusin is a widely published scholar in physics and astronomy in addition to his work in Middle East affairs.

Legal Project director Brooke Goldstein is a respected attorney in New York City, a filmmaker, and a media commentator.

Timeliness

MEF’s work is of critical importance in the 2008 election year.

"The 2008 election decides, as in 2004, whether Americans believe they are in war or not against radical Islam. The Middle East Forum is working all-out to make the case that a war is underway."
       – Daniel Pipes, director, Middle East Forum

"As foreign policy and strategies to counter terrorism become central to the presidential debate, there is no better resource than the Middle East Quarterly."
       – Michael Rubin, editor, Middle East Quarterly

"The next president must recognize the importance of counteracting the ideas and institutions of lawful Islamism right here at home. Islamist Watch serves to define this rapidly evolving battlefield."
       – David J. Rusin, interim head, Islamist Watch

”It is crucial that the election brings into office someone who understands the threat of Islamist lawfare and who is willing to respond with legislation aimed at protecting the free speech rights of Americans speaking out against radical Islam.”
       – Brooke Goldstein, director, Legal Project

Recent Achievements

Now in its fifteenth year, the Middle East Quarterly has secured its place at the forefront of both the national and international debate on Middle East issues. In the past year, MEQ articles have been reprinted by book publishers in the United States, United Kingdom, India, and Brazil.

In recent months, Campus Watch exposed scandalous bias at Columbia, Georgetown, and the University of Delaware.

Islamist Watch spearheaded the opposition to Brooklyn’s Khalil Gibran International Academy (KGIA), an Arabic-language public school that has significant Islamist elements. Its website, www.Islamist-Watch.org went live in March.

Recent activities of the Legal Project include obtaining a public apology and retraction from the Muslim Weekly, a U.K.-based Islamist publication, with regards to a defamatory article it published against Daniel Pipes and helping to convince the New York state assembly to pass the Libel Terrorist Protection Act.

Projects presently supported by the Education Fund deal with such topics as reform in Saudi Arabia, the Middle East at the United Nations, Israeli-Arab media, lawful Islamist incursions, and honor killings.

The MEF lecture series has recently hosted such prominent speakers as Douglas J. Feith, David Wurmser, Philip Carl Salzman, Robert Spencer, and Brian T. Kennedy.

Contributions

The Forum is effective, as indicated above.

It is a good investment. The Forum is a well-managed, lean, but highly productive operation; our staff of 18 operates on a budget of under $2 million.

The Forum offers donors a range of benefits, such as subscription to the Middle East Quarterly and invitations to events. We are currently offering a gift (upon request) for donations of $150 or more: a signed hardback copy of Culture and Conflict in the Middle East by Philip Carl Salzman. For an assessment of this book by Daniel Pipes, see “The Middle East's Tribal Affliction.”

The MEF is a 501c3 non-profit; contributions are tax deductible to the fullest extent by law in the United States.