Monthly Archives: August 2012

Postponement of NATO Withdrawal from Afghanistan

30 Thursday Aug 2012

Posted by in Middle East, War

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Insignia for NATO Regional Command South in Afghanistan. Digital image. Flickr.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Aug. 2012. .
Although NATO intervention in Afghanistan has thus far been inefficient, it may be necessary to prolong the unsuccessful mission in order to make the original goal of the War on Terror, eliminating Taliban influences from Afghani government and military, possible.

The war in Afghanistan is very similar to the Vietnam War for the United States in terms of length and unpopularity.

However, it may not be time for the United States and its NATO coalition to pull out of Afghanistan. Although all NATO nations have agreed to withdraw their troops from Afghanistan by 2014, it may be necessary, though perhaps unpopular in each NATO nation, to prolong military intervention indefinitely until Afghanistan can assure a permanently legitimate government and military devoid of anti-Western sentiment.

The issue of prolonged military intervention comes up due to unprecedented killings of NATO troops by Afghani troops over the past year, particularly this past month. 5 Australian troops were shot and killed by an Afghan traitor soldier today. This is not an isolated case. This year, Afghan soldiers have killed over 40 NATO coalition troops. This figure is much higher than it was in 2011 and is twice as high as it was in 2010.

These key issues highlight the discord between Afghani troops and their Western ‘allies.’ NATO officials point to Taliban influences in the Afghani government as reasons for this violence. This is an extremely disturbing trend, as it shows that Afghanistan has not progressed from its 1990s illegitimate, violent, anti-Western government that the United States attempted to overthrow in the first place as part of its War on Terror.

Another key factor in the killing of Western troops is terrorist groups disguised as Afghani troops. This has culminated in about 60 insider killings, but the vast majority of these have been on fellow Afghani troops. Only a handful of these have resulted in foreign soldier killings. Afghanistan also seems content to blame these issues on Pakistan’s ISI, the Pakistani equivalent of the CIA. Afghanistan has blamed all of its political turmoil on Pakistan in the last decade, but these claims seem baseless.

Perhaps the Americans are part of the issue. An Afghani military commander claimed, “Burning Qurans, massacring defenseless women and children, urinating on dead bodies, and midnight raids are outrages for which the U.S. is now paying a heavy cost.” He elaborates, “America has done a lot for us. But the terrible, individual acts of a few U.S. soldiers have caused enormous collective damage to our relations.”

The United States has consistently made the mistake of retracting military intervention too early. Afghanistan is a key example of this. Throughout the 1980s, the United States funded Afghani Mujahedeen rebels against the invading Soviets. Then, in 1989, as soon as the Mujahedeen had overthrown the Soviets, the United States and Saudi Arabia abruptly cut off funding to the nation. This left Afghanistan in tatters and allowed the Taliban to come to power. Now, the United States has no excuse.  It has seen its historical failures in this regard and can see the current influence of the Taliban and strongly anti-American influence in Afghanistan’s government and military. The United States has a moral responsibility to remain actively involved in Afghani government, even if deciding to discontinue its military intervention, until it can reasonably ensure an Afghani ally with a similar government structure, outlook, and ideals as the United States.

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Ron Paul: America’s Potential Savior

29 Wednesday Aug 2012

Posted by in Government, The Americas

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Mitt Romney is now officially the Republican presidential candidate for the 2012 elections. The effect of this development is rather minute, considering that Romney was the only candidate from the Republican primaries truly in contention. All of the other candidates had dropped out, barring Ron Paul. However, Romney’s excessive advertising money allowed him to essentially put Ron Paul out of the running. Paul, however, would have been the much more appealing candidate to American voters at the time. If only he could have gotten the word around. However, despite the appeals of his no income tax policy, he was unable to gain the support of the ultra-rich who would potentially fund his campaign.

Ron Paul is clearly a great presidential candidate considering his economic policy. He seems to be the only Republican Party candidate who aims to balance the budget. His big winner, though, is his foreign policy. Undeniably, the United States is militarily overextended globally. Military overextension is often one of the main factors in the decline of an empire; the Spanish, British, and Roman empires all declined in large part because of military overextension. Ron Paul seems to be the only Republican candidate concerned with this pressing issue though; others, most notably Romney, seem content to pursue American foreign military intervention in the future.

Paul seeks to focus defense on its true priority, national defense, as opposed to diverting outrageous proportions of GDP towards militarization. Ron Paul rightly points out that although porous borders and subsequent illegal immigration plague the United States, America is overreaching its military potential abroad. Paul also cites the blowback effect, which essentially means that the United States’ foreign military provocations. This idea is not exactly revolutionary, but most politicians seem to have missed out on this. In particular, Mitt Romney seems completely oblivious to the aforementioned concepts. Romney aims to increase military spending and increase foreign military intervention to secure American interests abroad, a surprisingly backwards, Cold War era platform.

True, Paul is a radical leader. No presidential candidate in centuries has suggested completely ending income taxation in conjunction with balancing the budget or reducing America’s military scale so drastically. But, then again, isn’t a radical leader what the United States needs right now? The economy is in shambles, unemployment is still high, and, perhaps most importantly, the current Republican candidate looks to instigate a trade war with China and a conventional war with Iran. Ron Paul was the only candidate on the Republican ballot who could have saved the United States from its brinkmanship on the complete downfall of the empire from excessive military spending and overextension.

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Millard, Matt. Ron Paul. Digital image. Flickr.com. N.p., 17 Dec. 2007. Web. 29 Aug. 2012. .
Ron Paul, pictured above, could have saved America from the brink of military overextension if chosen for the Republican ballot.

America’s Power Struggle

28 Tuesday Aug 2012

Posted by in Foreign Relations, The Americas

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The United States may no longer be number 1 in coming decades. However, it will remain a powerful force in the world politically if it is able to reform its foreign policy.

America is no longer the post-World War II economic powerhouse that it once was. Contrary to common belief, this is not because the United States has stagnated in terms of research and development or entrepreneurialism. Rather, it is because the playing field has leveled. Following the Second World War,
European and the Japanese economies were in shambles after complete military decimation. By comparison, thus, the United States was able to become extremely powerful militarily, economically, and politically. Of course, the USSR was a force to be reckoned with, but its power was greatly outmatched by that of the United States. Since the recession in the 1970s, though, the rest of the world, particularly Europe and Asia, has picked up. In terms of sheer numbers, the US still wields the most military and economic power in the world. However, politically, the United States is now much less powerful than it was decades ago.

Perhaps the waning power of the American empire can best be exemplified by the ineffectiveness of its diplomatic action on Iran. While America could have been successful in pressuring Iran on its own, America instead chose to mandate its course of diplomatic action in the rest of the world. The United States demanded that all major exporters of Iran join the United States in its harsh sanctions on the Ahmadinejad regime or else face economic isolation from the United States. However, many nations, afraid to risk skyrocketing oil prices, chose to neglect America’s antagonistic sanctions. For example, powerful China, knowing fully well that Obama would not risk a potentially disastrous course of action just before his re-election, continued to import Iranian oil to regulate its oil prices.

Now, 120 nations are set to send delegates to the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) in Iran against the United States’ wishes. Even the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon will be in attendance, highlighting the international community’s unity against the United States and ally Israel in their diplomatic pressuring of Tehran through sanctions and diplomatic isolation.

Clearly, America’s time in the limelight is over. It is time for the United States to stop beating its chest and accept its declining political power. Recognizing this will allow the United States to reform its antagonistic foreign policy stance before the nation is overtaken by the Asian tiger economies. By doing so, the American empire may be able to assure a soft landing and prevent the complete dissolution that has accompanied most empire’s downfalls. America may be in decline relative to the rest of the world, but there is still hope for it to be a major power in the future if it can retain alliances through a more amiable foreign policy despite the shift in power dynamic onset by the rise of Asian markets.

Black Gold: Romney and Obama’s Misadventures with Oil

27 Monday Aug 2012

Posted by in Economy, Elections, The Americas

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Teer, Chad. Oil Platform. Digital image. Wikimedia Commons. N.p., 22 Oct. 2004. Web. 27 Aug. 2012. .
Oil appears poised to have more political power than any commodity has ever had in the past.

In terms of oil prices, the United States has nothing to complain about. Though gas prices are creeping up to nearly US $4 per gallon, this is cheaper than nearly every nation in the world barring oil-producing countries such as Venezuela and Saudi Arabia, where gas prices hovers below US $1 per gallon. In much of Europe and Asia, gas prices are generally at least US $7 per gallon. Nonetheless, despite the relatively low price of oil in the United States, it is sure to play a huge role in the upcoming presidential elections.

Sparking nationalism characteristic of the Republican Party, Mitt Romney recently declared that if elected president, he would steer the United States on the path to becoming energy independent nationally or at least make the US dependent only on energy from North America by 2020. While such a plan is potentially feasible, it does not factor in at all with Mitt Romney’s platform. After all, Romney is strongly in favor of a completely privatized energy sector determined by supply and demand. The only way to substantiate these claims would be for Romney to launch a new campaign platform based on alternate energy. Since alternate energy is currently more costly than conventional fossil fuel sources, though, Romney’s claim seems contradictory and to be little more than a political move to gain votes from moderate voters. After all, even with increased offshore drilling, an idea proposed by Romney, the United States only possesses 2% of the world’s oil reserves. It’s consumption is proportionately much higher, and thus Romney’s claim does not seem to have any semblance of feasibility, barring the possibility that the United States quickly drains all of its oil reserves in order to fulfill Romney’s political goals.

Oil will likely impact Obama’s campaign to an equal, if not greater, magnitude. A White House source recently leaked information that Obama was strongly considering using the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), a 695 million barrel emergency oil supply, in light of rising gas prices. In the past few presidential terms dominated by the GOP, the trend has generally been to avoid dipping into the SPR to reduce gas prices and instead rely on Saudi Arabia to produce a greater amount of oil to return stability to the markets. The fact that Obama would consider using the SPR reserves instead of first calling upon Saudi Arabia to fulfill its oil for protection alliance with the United States shows Obama’s attempt to slowly but surely distance the United States from its greatest Middle Eastern ally at the moment, barring only Israel. This development will highlight to voters Obama’s vigilant, bordering on mistrustful, relations with much of the Middle East.

Seemingly, oil is a topic at the forefront of Americans’ political stances, and with good merit; oil prices have nearly tripled in the past ten years, far ahead of inflation rates. The issue of oil will only become more prevalent as oil reserves gradually dry up and oil prices increase; even the sanctity of oil deals with Saudi Arabia will not save the US from this inevitable development. Moreover, the power dynamic in the Middle East has shifted quite drastically over the past two years. In the wake of the Arab Springs protests, many new anti-US, Islamist regimes have sprung up. Clearly, the United States faces many issues in the Middle East, including the over-reliance on Saudi Arabia for oil, which complicates the issue of gradually diminishing oil supplies. We can only hope that Obama and Romney’s recent moves are truly representative of their campaigns, but it seems likely that the two presidential candidates are simply playing dirty politics to gain votes, a trend all too familiar in American politics.

The Future of Somali Democracy

26 Sunday Aug 2012

Posted by in Africa, Government, Regime Change

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The creation of a new parliament in previously lawless Somalia seems like a great step forward in terms of mitigating issues like piracy and tribal violence in the nation. However, the ineffectiveness of the creation of this parliament will likely plague Somalia with the same issues as it has had in the recent past. Members of the UN-backed extremely corrupt transitional Somali government occupy roughly 1/3 of the seats in this parliament. This transitional government has embezzled about 10% of all the foreign aid money granted to Somalia over the past 8 years. Many of the remaining 2/3 of parliamentary seats were bought for up to $25,000. The warring militia clan leaders who have wracked Somalia with violence for more than a decade selected the remainder of the ‘legitimately chosen’ parliament members. The only parameters for selecting these members were basic literacy and no history of violence, the latter of which is an easy feat in an anarchic nation with no legal record or law enforcement. Clearly, Somalia’s new parliament appears to have conflicting interests with the Somali people who simply hope to improve their quality of life and end the violence and power struggles plaguing Somalia for decades.

Given its historical foreign intervention woes, Somalia does not have many options as far as reforming its political structure to a more enlightened one. It is difficult to imagine a scenario where Somali clans would give up power and a legitimate government, democratic or otherwise, could form. Therefore, the onus is on the international community, especially the United States, whose self-interested policies in the 1980s and 1990s culminated in this disaster, to assist Somalia in the transition to legitimate government.

While the United Nations lacks much power to impose its will internationally, NATO should intervene in Somalia presently. Given the recent creation of a new Somali parliament, NATO will have sufficient power to mold the Somali government’s distribution of power and legitimacy to international standards upheld by NATO members. Much as they did with Saddam Hussein in Iraq, NATO must first overthrow Somalia’s corrupt president, Mr. Ahmed, and its illegitimate newfound parliament. NATO must then send observers to recruit the most educated Somalis to form a new parliament and transitional government. NATO observers must ensure that the Somalis draft a constitution upholding human rights and democracy and orchestrate fair presidential elections. If NATO is successful in these endeavors, the quality of life for Somalis will increase drastically and violence and piracy will likely diminish in parallel.

Sri Lanka’s Higher Education Plight

25 Saturday Aug 2012

Posted by in Asia/ Pacific, Education

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The UN has set the precedent that nations should devote at least 6% of GDP to spending on education. The majority of developed countries are able to surpass this threshold, but many developing nations struggle to meet this quota due to corruption, tax evasion, and low tax rates. In Sri Lanka, just 2% of GDP is spent on education. As such, it is difficult for the small island to pay teachers appropriate salaries or afford world-class resources for students.

Two days ago, Sri Lanka shut down most of its universities after nearly two months of teacher unions protesting the low wages in Sri Lanka, a direct result of low government spending on education. These universities are all government-subsidized and the government now proposes privatization of the tertiary-level education system in Sri Lanka. However, given the presently high poverty rates in Sri Lanka, privatizing Sri Lanka’s education system will be extremely damaging to the nation’s economy.

Privatization of any economic sector is thought to be beneficial to efficiency and cost. However, education is an exception to this rule. With the exception of the United States, tertiary-level education in nearly all economically developed countries is highly government subsidized or completely government financed. Public education helps to promote greater income equality and upward socioeconomic mobility, two key economic features that promote both growth and quality of life.

This problem is further exacerbated by Sri Lanka’s poverty. In the United States, a largely privatized higher education system is successful, to an extent, due to lower income inequality and higher GDP per capita. However, privatized universities hinder even wealthy nations such as the United States. Higher education tuition rates in the United States are only 50% as high as they are in much of Western Europe where university tuition is free or heavily government subsidized. As such, the United States has the second highest income inequality of any OECD nation according to its Gini coefficient ranking.

As onlookers from the international community, we can only hope that Sri Lanka’s decision to shut down its state-run universities is a temporary one designed to end salary protests from teachers. However, it is impossible to pinpoint Sri Lanka’s aim in this decision for certain. In order to prevent greater income inequality in the future, Sri Lanka should re-open all state-owned or subsidized universities. Furthermore, to promote its value on education and ensure higher education standards, Sri Lanka should acquiesce to the demands of university professors around the country and raise their salaries. These steps will be a small price to pay for the great economic progress that they will entitle Sri Lanka to in the future.

Retribution vs. Rehabilitation in Penal Systems

24 Friday Aug 2012

Posted by in Europe, Government, The Americas

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Interior in Halden Prison. Digital image. Wikimedia Commons. N.p., 26 July 2010. Web. 24 Aug. 2012. .
Given the priority on rehabilitation as opposed to retribution, Norwegian prisons more closely resemble psychiatric wards than they do prisons.

In the United States, taxpayers often complain about the annual $60,000 fee for keeping inmates in prison. Yet, in Scandinavia, the figure for a prison sentence for a year for a single prisoner can exceed $1 million. Anders Breivik, the Norwegian madman who executed 87 people in Norway last year, most of whom were women and children, is currently being accommodated in a 3 room apartment with a bedroom, exercise room with a treadmill, and a The cost that taxpayers will have to bear for his sentence is between $1.2 and $1.7 million per year. In the United States, there would be uproar if so much taxpayer money were being spent on accommodating a mass murderer. Yet, the mentality on the penal system in Norway and Scandinavia as a whole is very different from that in the United States or virtually any other nation in the world.

The main difference between these two countries centers around the concept of justice. In the United States, the criminal justice system focuses on retribution. As such, the death penalty and life imprisonment are commonplace. In Norway and Scandinavia as a whole, the priority instead is upon rehabilitation. As such, the maximum sentence is 21 years and the death penalty is not in place. Prisoners are never ‘tortured’ as they are in American prisons. Prisoners are able to maintain contact with the outside world. They are able to have amenities such as exercise equipment and computers to pursue their hobbies. Most importantly, they have people to talk to on a daily basis such as nurses or psychologists and are thus much less likely to succumb to depression, a condition commonplace among American prisoners.

Additionally, as part of the focus on retribution, prisoners are gradually integrated into society. The penal system assists prisoners in helping them secure jobs in order to ensure that they can become valuable, contributing members of society upon their release. In this way, Norway is able to lower the rates of repeat crime. In Norway, just 20% of criminals in the penal system are or will be repeat offenders. In the United States, though, this statistic is about 80%. The results are staggering. Clearly, a system of incentives and reintegration into society is necessary for the rehabilitation of criminals. Granted, the goals of each penal system are very different and the United States does not value rehabilitation as much as it does keeping criminals off the street and granting ‘justice’ or revenge to victims’ families. However, with the highest incarceration rate per capita, the United States could afford to focus on prisoner rehabilitation in order to reduce overcrowding in prisons and excessive federal spending in this regard. Higher spending is not crucial to this process. A system of reintegrating prisoners into the workforce and ending life imprisonment and death penalty sentences will give prisoners a chance to become rehabilitated and reduce government spending in this regard in the future.

Park Geun-Hye: Park Chung-hee’s Puppet

23 Thursday Aug 2012

Posted by in Asia/ Pacific, Government

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South Koreans have much to worry about if Park Geun-Hye get elected president.

At the moment, Park Geun-Hye appears poised to win the elections for South Korean presidency. By doing so, she would become South Korea’s first female president in a patriarchal, Confucian society. Geun-Hye has already won the primaries of the current ruling party, New Frontier Party. She is now up against a candidate from the main opposition party, who will likely end up being Ahn Cheol-soo.

The most shocking fact about Park Geun-Hye is her family connections. She is the daughter of Park Chung-hee, the South Korean dictator who seized power through a coup and ruled the nation from 1961 to 1979. Granted, Chung-hee helped to develop the Korean economy into a superpower. However, his human rights violations far outweigh any benefits he may have had to the nation’s economy. It is unfair to blame Geun-Hye for her family members, but this fact must be taken into consideration during the elections because of her An article in the Herald Sun explains, “Opponents portray her as aristocratic and aloof. Analysts say she is seen by many young, urban voters as an autocratic figure who does not communicate with ordinary people.”

The fact of the matter is that Park Geun-Hye is the unfortunate victim of a father who was politically repressive. Doubtlessly, Geun-Hye’s election would be a great step forward for South Korean gender empowerment. However, her conservative human rights approach is too much of a danger to South Korea. It is likely that she will simply be a moderate conservative like previous presidential candidates from her party, but parents have too much influence over their children’s beliefs for her father, Park Chung-hee, not to play a decisive role in the election. Thus, liberals and moderates alike should vote for opposition candidate Mr. Ahn.

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Park Geun-Hye’s presidency will likely be impacted greatly by her father, Park Chung-hee, pictured above who was a hard-line authoritarian dictator.

Mitt Romney’s Worst Enemy: Gary Johnson

22 Wednesday Aug 2012

Posted by in Government, The Americas

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Skidmore, Gage. Gary Johnson. Digital image. Flickr.com. N.p., 11 Feb. 2011. Web. 22 Aug. 2012.
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Third party candidate Gary Johnson could have a much greater impact on the outcome of the elections than he or the American public would have bargained for.

Contrary to common perception, the biggest influence in swing states such as Colorado, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Virginia, Florida, and Nevada in this year’s presidential election will not be the fundraising of Super PACs nor will it be the amount spent advertising or the amount of time that Romney and Obama spend touring the swing states. Instead, the outcome of these swing states will primarily be shaped by Gary Johnson. Gary Johnson’s impact in this presidential election has gone almost unnoticed thus far because he stands no chance at winning. Indeed, he appears poised to gain just 5% of America’s popular vote. However, the Libertarian candidate will shape the election to a great extent because he disproportionately steals votes from one party: the Republican Party. Due to the conservative values shared by Republicans and Johnson, Johnson’s candidacy will likely hamper Romney greatly.

To get a sense of just how in line Johnson’s views are with American Republicans, examine his stances on the key issues in the election. Just like Republicans, Libertarian Johnson supports the right to bear arms and is against stronger gun control. In terms of foreign policy, Johnson, much the same as Romney, is in favor of maintaining or increasing the defense budget. He also emphasizes America’s role in protecting its own interests in terms of foreign policy and cutting back on foreign aid. Additionally, he aims to cut spending on Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security alongside lowering income taxes to promote job and economic growth.

The case of Johnson brings to light a more important trend in American politics, namely the influence of third parties on the primary political parties in the United States, Republicans and Democrats. Throughout history, it has been an issue that third party candidates have actually been counterproductive. They themselves had virtually no chance of winning an election. By running, though, these candidates can inadvertently sabotage candidates with views similar to theirs by stealing their votes. For example, it could be argued that Ralph Nader’s candidacies in the 2000 and 2004 elections helped President Bush because Nader stole votes from Democrat candidates.

There appears no solution to this issue. After all, presidential candidates in the United States align themselves with a specific party. If a certain candidate decides not to run in order to save the presidential hopes of a candidate from a mainstream party with similar views, another candidate with the same political values will simply replace him. The only somewhat feasible solution to this issue would be to limit the political parties in the United States to Democrats and Republicans. In order to preserve the fundamental values of limited government in America, though, the flawed multi-party system, a system that is counterproductive to the American political system as a whole, must be allowed to continue.

Key Shakeup in UN Response to Syrian Civil War

21 Tuesday Aug 2012

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United Nations Photo. South Africa’s President Visits Un Headquarters. Digital image. Flickr.com. N.p., 3 Oct. 1994. Web. 21 Aug. 2012. .
Lakhdar Brahimi, the man of the hour, will certainly have great influence over developments in the Syrian civil war in his role as UN Arab League Envoy to Syria. Only time will tell his competence but Brahimi already appears to be a much better fit for the job than his predecessor, Kofi Annan.

Lakhdar Brahimi, a man with a very different perspective on Syrian foreign intervention, has recently replaced Kofi Annan, one of the least dynamic diplomats in modern times, as UN Arab League envoy to Syria. The decision to appoint Brahimi to this office is one that will prove to reap dividends in the near future. After all, Annan’s idealistic peace plan based on a ceasefire that would require unity between rebels and the al-Assad regime was not well thought out and unable to solve the problems plaguing Syria. In contrast, Brahimi’s plans for Syria are much more feasible.

First and foremost, Brahimi has ended the UN observer mission in Syria, a move that was a complete and utter failure. Given that the observers had no political or military power, they were unable to uphold Annan’s six-point peace plan. Instead, they were forced to simply watch in horror as pro-regime forces slaughtered innocent Syrians. Brahimi hopes to replace the observer mission with a 30-person strong humanitarian team in Syria. This is a much more feasible step towards achieving his goals of long-lasting peace in Syria.

Another key step that Brahimi has taken is indicating that his goals are achieving peace in Syria as opposed to deposing al-Assad. He appears to be willing to compromise on al-Assad staying in power for the greater good of ending the Syrian civil war.

By allowing al-Assad to remain in power, Brahimi can attempt to enact a diplomatic option that was thrown open months ago but was disregarded but Kofi Annan. The plan was to create a transitional government for Syrian peace. This transitional government would comprise a coalition of pro-Assad leaders and rebels in an attempt to bridge the gap between both sides and attempt to contain the civil war. Granted, this will by no means be an easy venture. However, if Brahimi is able to accept the fact that al-Assad’s power is less important than Syrian peace, such a move could be feasible. After all, the main hindrance to foreign intervention in Syria has been the insistence of the West to uphold Security Council resolutions. Therefore, if Brahimi can negotiate a transitional government that will be in each of the 5 UN Security Council Permanent Members’ interest (China, Russia, the UK, the United States, and France), his office will be a successful one and the Arab Springs will not drag on to become the Arab Winter.

On the whole, Brahimi seems to be a much better suited diplomat for the role of UN Arab League Envoy to Syria. His willingness to support al-Assad while in office and prioritize chiefly Syrian peace will likely make him much more effective than his predecessor in preventing the Syrian conflict from escalating.

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