Not to Forget the War in Afghanistan July 4, 2009
Posted by Afflatus in World Affairs.Tags: Afghanistan, Policy Analysis, Taliban
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Since President Obama’s escalation of troop levels in Afghanistan in March, much discussion has ensued around the world and around this blog, especially in this post: Underestimating Our Afghan Summer
And many developments in Afghanistan have ensued. Here is what I do know:
- Since his inauguration, President Obama has authorized 21,000 more troops to be sent to Afghanistan.
- The president correctly believes that the troops deserve a straightforward answer to the question: “What is our purpose in Afghanistan?” And his response was this:
“So I want the American people to understand that we have a clear and focused goal: to disrupt, dismantle and defeat al Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and to prevent their return to either country in the future.”
- In relation to the increased troop levels, the number of “security incidents” has also increased sharply, rising over 1,000 for the first time in May, 2009. This is a 43% increase over the same period in 2008. The bottom line: it has been the most intense fighting season so far experienced, according to the UN Security Council. This has been an expected development.
- “The first major operation launched with the additional troops ordered to Afghanistan by President Obama is devised to clear Taliban havens across a strategic southern province — and then, in a marked departure from past practice, to leave clusters of Marines in small bases close to the villagers they were sent to guard and aid, according to senior military officers.” From this article.
- Today, the NYT reported that Russia has agreed to let American troops and weapons bound for Afghanistan fly over Russian territory. Though the New York Times considers this an “achievement,” it’s hard to know whether this development is good or bad; it may be good for US – Russian relations, but bad for US – Afghani relations, and certainly bad for the Afghans and Americans dying by our prolonged and heightened involvement there.
- On a similar note, Kyrgyzstan’s Parliament ratified an agreement recently to allow the US to maintain operations at an airport that has become a key support base and transit hub for the troops in Afghanistan. (Hard to tell if this is good or bad?)
- The Department of Defense has identified 707 American service members who have died as a part of the Afghan war and related operations. It confirmed the death of the following American on Tuesday: Terry J. Lynch, 22, Sgt., Army; Shepherd, Mont.; 10th Mountain Division. (FYI, 4,308 have died in Iraq.)
- Probably more than 20,000 Afghan civilians have died as a result of the war between the US and the Afghan insurgents. A good NYT article on this note…
- Afghanistan has an upcoming election on August 20th. Current president Hamid Karzai is likely to be reelected.
So that’s what I know. There is way more that I don’t know. And I have one question: At what point do US casualties like Terry Lynch, and increasingly frequent Afghan casualties, convince policy-makers that fighting a guerrilla-style war in Afghanistan’s Helmand province is not keeping the US and the world safer, but rather is resulting in greater insecurity?
Annnd, If you only follow one link in this blog post, it should be this one: http://www.cfr.org/publication/19738/security_council_meeting_on_complex_situation_in_afghanistan_june_2009.html
The Portuguese Experiment With Drugs June 24, 2009
Posted by thetruth31 in Healthcare, History.Tags: decriminalization, drug laws, Policy Analysis, portugal
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Do you remember the controversy surrounding Portugal’s decision to liberalize their drug laws and penalties a few years ago? I do, but had not heard or thought about it in a long time. There was the whole range of recycled arguments – but the main point the opposition made was that drug usage would increase, ultimately posing a major detriment to society. Well, as it turns out, that didn’t quite happen. Today, the United Nations published a report now praising decriminalization laws, and calling for similar reforms. I know, quite an unexpected turn from a body which has in the past dictated drug policy for purely political purposes without regard for science, and been largely ineffective in combatting international drug trafficking. So today, when I was browsing through the news, came across a United Nations report published today:
… in its 2009 World Drug Report, the UN had little but kind words for Portugal’s radical (by U.S. standards) approach. “These conditions keep drugs out of the hands of those who would avoid them under a system of full prohibition, while encouraging treatment, rather than incarceration, for users. Among those who would not welcome a summons from a police officer are tourists, and, as a result, Portugal’s policy has reportedly not led to an increase in drug tourism,” reads the report. “It also appears that a number of drug-related problems have decreased.”
The report goes on to refute some notions that drug legalization leads to an increase in other crimes. Portugal’s drug program does not get nearly enough attention. It’s clear that the politicians are behind on this issue… they’ve failed to implement sound policy to make our nation safer and healthier. Instead they have ignored science in the name of political expediency, and not to mention wasted hundreds of billions of dollars of our taxpayer money on prisons, enforcement, and legally sanctioned harassment. Our enormous population of non-violent first-time drug offenders in this nation is something a free society should be ashamed of.
For some perspective, here’s a list of issues that legalizing marijuana is more popular than, at around 41%: Opposing stricter gun control laws (40%), Congress (26-40%), The war in Iraq (39%), Decreasing immigration levels (39%), Privatizing Social Security (36%), Opposing investigating the Bush administration (34%), Opposing national, government run health insurance (32%), Vetoing stem cell research (31%), The Republican Party (31%), Dick Cheney (30%), George W. Bush (24-34%), Decreasing business regulations (28%), Rush Limbaugh (28%), Mitch McConnell (22%), Preventing the openly gay from serving in the military (17%), and John Boehner (17%).
The author of a major report behind this new research had this to say,
Few political orthodoxies have more of a destructive impact than our approach to drug policy. Our harsh criminalization framework results in the imprisonment of hundreds of thousands of American citizens, breaks up families, burns tens of billions of dollars every year, erodes civil liberties, turns our police forces into para-military units, and spawns massive levels of violence and criminality — all while exacerbating the very harms it seeks to address. If a measured, rational debate over America’s extremist drug policies can take place in Time Magazine, then it can take place anywhere.
And now, as promised, one of those occasionally well-done Time articles, (more…)
Questioning the Concept of Natural Growth… June 13, 2009
Posted by thetruth31 in World Affairs.Tags: Israel, Palestine, Policy Analysis
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…seems to be more than any major outlet of the media has done, thus far, when approaching the Israeli Arab conflict. Foriegn Policy magazine had a nice piece debunking some myths and misinformation… I thought the tone was a little unnecessary, but the information still stands on its own.
…
Unnatural Growth
Bibi Netanyahu says the Israeli settlements in the West Bank must grow to accommodate population expansion. He’s full of it.
It must be said that Benjamin Netanyahu has learned a little from Barack Obama. True, the Israeli prime minister has been remarkably slow in grasping that when the U.S. president says he wants a freeze on settlement building, he means a freeze. But at least Netanyahu has learned that the way to reframe your foreign policy is to give a big, well-publicized speech at a university campus.
So on Sunday, June 14, Netanyahu will speak at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv. I can’t guess what the prime minister will say. But here’s one thing he absolutely shouldn’t say: “Construction must continue in settlements to accommodate natural growth.” If he does make this argument, no one should take it seriously. It’s built on layers of myth and misconceptions.
Let’s take them one by one.
Skepticism on the eve of Iranian “Elections” June 12, 2009
Posted by thetruth31 in Politics, World Affairs.Tags: elections, iran, Policy Analysis
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Iranian women shows the ink on their fingers after voting at a polling station in Tehran on June 12, 2009. Hundreds of voters were standing outside one of the biggest polling stations in uptown Tehran, an indication of a high voter turnout in the early hours of the presidential election in Iran.
I was having a great discussion last night with a friend about the upcoming Iranian elections. He was making some great points, but I maintained that I felt the news coverage of the elections were overblown and childish, and gave not only false hopes, but false information about the possible changes in Iran. Below is a great article from Robert Fisk, who I know has been the source of previous controversy, but hes also one of my favorite authors. Its a nice read either way-
Robert Fisk: Iran’s old guard are poised to crush any hope of revolution
The West has no right to expect the polls to bring in radical change
All the world wants to know the results of today’s presidential election in Iran, not least the Republican Guard supporters of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. But will it make a difference, either to the Iranians or to the rest of the world?
Of course the West wants to be told that this dramatic poll will change Iran’s desire for nuclear facilities. Whatever it is, this election is not about nuclear power. It may be about presidential arrogance and stupidity and fear, or about responsible government or unemployment or the economy. But the West should abandon hope of any real change in Iran’s nuclear strategy. Mirhossein Mousavi may talk more sense to the Americans – if he wins – but the nuclear facilities will keep functioning. It is all a matter of pride in Iran – where pride is a special quality.
And the thick, dark skin of clerical rule that covers Iran will remain, scratched occasionally perhaps, but unable to bleed or to re-imagine history or to reform a nation which so badly needs the change that only Mousavi, among the candidates, dreams of. Government for and by the dead – symbolised in the continued “supreme leader” ethos that old Ayatollah Khomeini constructed before his death, has effectively sealed off Iran from those human rights which obsess the West.
Only one month ago, a 22-year-old woman was dragged shrieking to the gallows as she pleaded with her mother on a mobile phone to save her. Delara Darabi was hanged for a murder supposedly committed – if indeed she was guilty – at the age of 17. In any Western election, this would cause an earthquake, the resignation of governments, the destruction of whole political parties. In Iran, the most serious scandal involving a woman during this election has been an apparently slanderous remark by President Ahmadinejad about the university qualifications of Mousavi’s wife. Is there something sick in all this? Or is savage childishness the word we are looking for?
Mousavi is at least backed by the saintly ex-president Mohamed Khatami – the West’s rejection of his rule brought us the triumph of the oddball Ahmadinejad, another victory for America at the time – and this might just give Mousavi the 50 per cent plus one seat for a clear win. But the Basiji and the Iranian Republican Guard Corps (IRGC) scream about velvet and green revolutions à la Ukraine, as if threatening a coup to overthrow a coup. It is interesting to remember that only a month ago, the corps stated that “on the eve of elections, the IRGC, as a matter of policy, does not let its official and contractual personnel nor the special Basiji interfere in election affairs, including support for or against a particular candidate.” A month is clearly a long time in Iranian politics.
True, the campaign has given us some spectacular television bust-ups in which Ahmadinejad’s loopy views on the world – not to mention his doubts about the Jewish Holocaust – have been held up to ridicule by Mousavi. But does that have them laughing in the millions of villages and hundreds of cities across Iran where the poor last gave their vote to the humble man who is the incumbent President and claimed a “halo” shone around him at the United Nations, causing his listeners not to blink for 25 minutes?
Iranian politics has always produced a weird combination of sacred old men and smart economists – occasionally in highly unsacred coalition – and Mousavi’s steady hand as prime minister during the Somme-like Iran-Iraq war may add to his popularity. But this was a war fought largely by the Basiji and the Republican Guards – as Ahmadinejad is well aware – and which Iran lost.
And now to find on the very eve of the election that Ahmadinejad is threatening to jail his opponents because of what he claims are their Hitler-like lies is surely moving towards infantilism of a unique kind. It is certainly odd that Ahmadinejad denies Hitler’s greatest crime and then accuses his opponents of being Hitler. If Hitler didn’t kill the Jews of Europe, which crimes, one wonders, was Iran’s weird President thinking of?
Here are two follow up articles by Robert Fisk -
A Revolutionary Education Project in Harlem June 8, 2009
Posted by thetruth31 in Education.Tags: Childrens Zone, Policy Analysis
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Source: Wall Street Journal
JANUARY 24, 2009, 5:58 P.M. ET
A Harlem Education Project That Won Big Corporate Backing Now Faces Cutbacks as Donors Close Their Wallets
By MIKE SPECTOR
NEW YORK — Geoffrey Canada has spent decades building a strategy for saving poor children from crime-riddenstreets and crumbling public schools.
His “Harlem Children’s Zone” now serves thousands of kids, some of whom are showing impressive test scores.
He has attracted the attention of the new White House because of his charity’s model: Instead of tackling problems here and there, the program envelops an entire neighborhood, with services ranging from parenting classes to health clinics to charter schools.
But Wall Street’s meltdown and money manager Bernard Madoff’s alleged financial fraud threaten the donor base that bankrolls Mr. Canada’s work. Facing declining revenues, he’s had to lay off staff and cancel plans to expand. He says he doesn’t yet “have a Plan B” for replacing his Wall Street support, which had reached upwards of $15 million annually.
Mr. Canada’s difficulties show how dependent nonprofits can become on certain steady donors, and how their plans can be derailed when those revenues dry up. It underscores the challenges facing nonprofits, which grew and proliferated amid the bull-market earlier this decade.
Today, the U.S. boasts more than one million nonprofits, up from about 774,000 ten years ago. Their biggest donations come from corporations, foundations and the ultra-wealthy. Many have been hit hard by the deepening recession. A drop in charitable contributions could shutter as many as 100,000 nonprofits over the next year, says Paul Light, a professor at New York University’s Wagner School of Public Service.
Mr. Canada, a 57-year-old social worker, calls his strategy the “conveyor belt,” because it aims to give children an
intensive experience in a succession of programs until they graduate from college. Children in pre-kindergarten are taught foreign languages, for instance. From there, children enter Mr. Canada’s charter schools with longer school days and a calendar lasting until the first week of August.
The approach is starting to deliver results. Last year, nearly all the third-graders in Mr. Canada’s charter schools scored at or above grade-level in math, better than recent citywide averages. Eighth-graders outperformed the average New York student in math, according to New York state data.
Underestimating Our Afghan Summer? April 30, 2009
Posted by presto21 in Politics, World Affairs.Tags: Afghanistan, Pakistan, Policy Analysis, Taliban
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Hey guys,
Most of you are aware that in what will probably go down as the most important foreign policy decision of his first term, President Obama ordered the doubling of our troop presence in Afghanistan. As one who is generally skeptical of an interventionist foreign policy, I’ll admit that I find the rationale behind this “doubling down” far more compelling than many of our other military misadventures (Iraq?). A couple major arguments for increased involvement in Afghanistan:
1. The guys who attacked us on 9/11, while not born and raised in Afghanistan, relied heavily on the safe haven the Taliban provided for fundraising, training, planning, and organizing.
2. The Taliban is, by any humane standards, a brutally repressive regime; especially so with regards to women. The other day a video leaked out of a young Pakistani woman being publicly whipped for the crime of having a man to her home who was not part of her family. Those who prosecuted her under Sharia law said that she could have been executed and claimed that, if anything, they were being lenient. Here’s a link to the video: Taliban Video Shows Teen Girl Beaten for ‘Adultery’
3. The Taliban is back on the rise in Afghanistan and the Karzai government is widely seen as ineffectual outside of Kabul.
4. The number of troops we have there now is universally seen as insufficient. Our military’s movements in most key areas are limited to the extent that soldiers rarely go far from their bases.
5. The terrorism and extremism in Afghanistan has overflown into large swaths of Pakistan’s tribal region, destabilizing it greatly and ruining the tourism driven economy the SWAT valley used to enjoy. Worst of all, Pakistan’s own military has proven either unwilling or unable to staunch the bleeding. Everyday the Taliban’s influence creeps closer to Islamabad.
6. Pakistan has a nuclear arsenal.
Comparing such imperative threats to the thread of bad intelligence our government used to link 9/11 to Iraq and launch a massive invasion, makes it clear that, for once, we may have a war of necessity on our hands. Maybe war is never justified, but some wars are certainly more justified than others.
Such has been my thinking on the prospect of a renewed campaign in Afghanistan: It’s going to be tough, it’s going to be expensive, and there’s no guarantee of success. But at least we have some solid reasons to be there. At least an honest debate on the merits of more or less involvement seems warranted.
Well, a couple days ago I read an excellent article which contained firsthand account of a firefight in the region as well as some eye-opening specifics on what we can expect from Afghanistan as the fighting ramps up this summer. While it does an excellent job of highlighting the huge strides that could be made if the massive poppy industry (which bankrolls the Taliban) can be shutdown, it is also a sobering reminder of the worst-case scenario: a protracted and bloody, conflict with heavy U.S. and civilian casualties.
Please read the article here: Poppy Fields of Afghanistan
