The World Strongly Supports Capital Punishment

If you look around for information on the death penalty, you'll find many who claim that support for the practice is on the decline and that most western nations have abolished the practice, as if social thought on this issue is naturally evolving in the liberal direction. Statements like this are typical:

The United States is one of a handful of countries which still executes people.

There are also attempts to link the US with morally bereft nations. Here is one gem from Amnesty International:

China, Iran, the United States, and Viet Nam account for 97% of the executions recorded by Amnesty International in 2004.

I don't doubt the statistic, but it's worth noting that China alone is responsible for 84% of the world's executions. In 2001, China executed 2468 people. In that same year, the U.S. executed 66 (a typical number). Even so, Amnesty International plays the ridiculous game of glossing over that rather significant detail in an effort to create the impression that the U.S. is just like China in that regard. We aren't like Iran either:

Executions in Iran continue at an alarming rate. Amnesty International recorded 94 executions in 2005, although the true figure is likely to be much higher.

The U.S. has a population that is more than 4 times that of Iran, yet the number of executions documented in Iran (an unrealistically low figure) is higher than the number of executions in the US. If you do the math, you'll find that China and Iran both have a per-capita execution rate that is at least 7 times that of the U.S. (and, in both cases, it is probably more like 10 times that of the U.S.).

Even so, the attempt to associate the U.S. with China and Iran shows up in news stories all the time, as in this one:

Along with China and the United States, Iran has one of the highest execution rates in the world. Amnesty calls the death penalty the most inhumane punishment of all, one that violates the right to life as proclaimed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

It's such a silly game, and it depends on the assumption that robotic readers will mindlessly accept claims like these. You might be surprised to learn that the world strongly supports capital punishment and that there is no trend whatsoever against it (though it is true that quite a few nations have managed to abolish it against the will of their people).

Instapundit linked to this web site that presents a translation of a Spiegel Online story (in German) reporting the results of a poll on the hanging of Saddam Hussein:

Percentage of respondents in favor of executing Saddam Hussein:

USA: 82%
Great Britain: 69%
France: 58%
Germany: 53%
Spain: 51%
Italy: 46%

It's nice to see such an overwhelming majority in the US favoring the death penalty for a man who is guilty of killing and torturing hundreds of thousands. It's also nice to see that the majority of those in Great Britain, France, Germany and Spain also favor it. The real majorities in those countries are no doubt even larger because, in Europe, it's not kosher to admit that you favor the death penalty.

These findings suggest that Europeans and Americans agree that there are crimes severe enough to warrant the death penalty. They differ only in the magnitude of the crime that they believe to warrant the ultimate punishment. This is a good thing because, if you differ only on where to draw the line, then the debate does not devolve into what Thomas Sowell calls "moral exhibitionism" (great term). No one is holier than thou, we are just dickering over how severe the crime must be to warrant the death penalty.

Somewhat to my surprise, I recently learned that the death penalty is also strongly favored in Japan:

Still, not even capital punishment's opponents in Japan question the basic validity of a survey conducted by the government in 1999, which found that 79.3 percent of the public backs the death penalty. In 34 polls taken between 1953 and 1999, abolition of capital punishment has never garnered a majority.

Where do the Japanese draw the line? My own feeling is that the line should be drawn at murder with "special circumstances" (e.g., killing a police offer, the kidnapping, rape, and murder of a child, etc.). The Japanese apparently feel the same way:

Sunday, Dec. 31, 2006

Record 44 sentenced to hang in '06
Kyodo News

A record 44 people were sentenced to hang in Japan this year and 21 death sentences were finalized, bringing the number of death-row inmates to a record 94, according to the Supreme Court and other sources.

The 21 defendants include Aum Shinrikyo founder Shoko Asahara, 51, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto. He was convicted of masterminding the 1995 sarin attack on the Tokyo subway system and other heinous crimes, and Kaoru Kobayashi, 38, who murdered a 7-year-old girl in Nara Prefecture in 2004.

Sounds about right. The best argument is favor of the death penalty is that it deters murder (contrary to what you have been robotically trained to believe), and we may not need very many executions to achieve that effect. Retaining the death penalty for "special circumstance" murders does not seem like cruel and unusual punishment (instead, the punishment fits the crime), and it is probably sufficient to serve as a deterrent to murder.

In searching for a bit more information about the death penalty in Japan, I came across this site, which clearly opposes the practice. It says:

Putting the notions of economics and personal ambition aside, the strongest argument against the death penalty is that it has and will be used against innocent people. It is undoable. The conscientious nations of the world have thus abolished it.

Note the moral exhibitionism here (as if nations that have not abolished capital punishment are not conscientious). But what interests me most about this paragraph is its assertion that the strongest argument against the death penalty is that it will be used against innocent people. What this argument ignores - as it must -- is the much larger number of innocent people who will die if we "conscientiously" abolish the death penalty. That's unconscionable!

Anti-death penalty activists must cling to the belief that capital punishment does not serve as a deterrent to murder (no matter what the evidence suggests). Without that, moral exhibitionism is not possible. Don't get me wrong -- I fully understand that there are perfectly legitimate reasons to oppose the death penalty (e.g., one's religious convictions may demand it). I'm fine with that. It's the moral exhibitionism of many anti-death penalty activists that gets a rise out of me.

But let me get back to the issue of how the world feels about this issue. You may know this already, but it always surprising to hear it:

Even now, large percentages in most European nations favor the death penalty, according to polls. More countries continue to abolish it to meet a condition of inclusion in the European Union. Poland, for example, abolished the death penalty in 1997, despite surveys showing that more than 60 percent of Poles wanted to keep it.

And here is more interesting polling information from around the world:

A Gallup International poll from 2000 found that "Worldwide support was expressed in favour of the death penalty, with just more than half (52%) indicating that they were in favour of this form of punishment." A break down of the numbers of support versus opposition: Worldwide 52%/39%, North America 66%/27%, Asia 63%/21%, Central and Eastern Europe 60%/29%, Africa 54%/43%, Latin America 37%/55%, Western Europe 34%/60%.

Worldwide support is 52% in favor and only 39% against? I was surprised to learn that. Even so, quite a few nations have abolished the practive (as we once did in the U.S., back when we were unconscionable). Here is a world map that gives the whole story:


It came as a surprise to me that the normally sensible Australians abolished the death penalty. But then I discovered that this is a nanny state phenomenon, as the majority of Australians favors the death penalty:

In an opinion poll released this week, 56 percent of respondents said they supported the death penalty for those convicted of major acts of terrorism, while 36 percent opposed it.
...
Following the poll's appearance, a government lawmaker said Tuesday he had no doubt that, if the decision were left to voters, Australia would again adopt the death penalty for cases such as terrorism.

And the normally sensible British? What explains the fact that they do not have the death penalty? The nanny state:

Turning to the other question, the death penalty is consistently supported by a majority of the public, indeed it is normally given as the classic textbook example of an issue where MPs consistently vote in a way that does not reflect public opinion...Unsurprisingly therefore, the last two polls to ask whether or not capital punishment should be reintroduced for the murder of the police officer found majority support - in January 2003 YouGov found 56% supported it, later the same year in December 2003 they found 62% supported it.

What about the Canadians? I could not find a recent poll, but I did find this:

Although the Parliament of Canada abolished the death penalty as a sentencing option in 1976 (Amnesty International, 1987), a majority of Canadians (approximately 65-75%) have indicated that they would support a return of the death penalty (Reid, 1987). Furthermore, calls for the the reintroduction of the death penalty by politicians and others occur frequently. As a result of the public's apparent support for capital punishment, and the possibility of its return, it is important to continue studying factors that influence people's attitudes regarding the death penalty.

Brazil?

Many Brazilians Favour Death Penalty
August 24, 2006

Adults in Brazil think capital punishment should be put into practice in their country, according to a poll by Datafolha published in Folha de Sao Paulo. 51 per cent of respondents would vote to reinstate the death penalty in a referendum, while 42 per cent would not.

Peru?

Peruvians Would Bring Back Death Penalty
August 21, 2006

Many adults in Peru believe capital punishment should be implemented again, according to a poll by Apoyo published in El Comercio. 82 per cent of respondents support the death penalty for people convicted of child molestation and murder.

South Africa?

South Africans Support Death Penalty
May 14, 2006

Many adults in South Africa believe capital punishment should be implemented again, according to a poll by Research Surveys. 72 per cent of respondents believe the government should bring back the death penalty.

The world supports the death penalty AND nanny states have often managed to abolish it against the wishes of the people. That's worth keeping in mind the next you hear someone saying that virtually all of the civilized world (except, perhaps, the U.S. and China and Iran) is opposed to the practice.

The War in Baghdad

Over the last 3 months, the statistics at Iraq Coalition Casualty Count suggest that civilian casualties in Iraq have remained at a high and (for the moment, at least) stable rate:


Note that I added about 100 casualties to the December figure because there are still 2 days left in the month (and quite a few casualties will occur over that time). In an effort to quantify the number of deaths occurring in Baghdad vs. the rest of the country, I analyzed the casualty data in more detail. Here are the results of that analysis:


As you can see, civilian casualties in Baghdad are going up at a rapid clip, which suggests that casualties outside of Baghdad are going down (thereby keeping the overall rate of casualties more or less constant over this time period).

What accounts for the increased casualties in Baghdad? The answer would appear to be Muqtada al Sadr's execution campaign. For each of the last 3 months, I added up the number of casualties that were reported like this:

BAGHDAD - A total of 40 bodies were found, shot dead and most showing signs of torture, in different districts of Baghdad on Tuesday, an Interior Ministry source said.

I can't be sure because details are never provided, but I believe that these casualties are Sunni males being executed by Muqtada al Sadr's Mahdi Army. And here are the numbers over the last 3 months:


As you can see, the increased violence in Baghdad is largely due to a systematic execution campaign, one that is presumably orchestrated by Muqtada al Sadr's militia. One's initial instinct might be to send American troops to confront this growing menace, but the problem with that plan is that (a) it would greatly comfort the Sunni insurgency (the insurgents are demanding that something be done about the Shiite militias) and (b) it would be opposed by influential figures in Iraq, including Prime Minister Maliki and revered Shiite cleric al-Sistani. These are two very good reasons not to do it.

Basically, the Sunnis need to give up the fight, at which point it would be politically feasible to confront Muqtada al Sadr. But the Sunnis appear to have willingly chosen the path to self-destruction, and they are being accommodated by the Mahdi Army. Some believe that providing security for Sunnis in Baghdad would help to convince the insurgents that it's OK to give up the fight and join the political process. I once would have thought so, but I now believe that taking out the Mahdi Army would merely remove one impediment to the Sunnis regaining power (as they see it). The Mahdi Army should be militarily challenged only after the Sunnis give up the fight, not before.

So, we should send that surge of troops Iraq, but they should go to the Anbar province (not Baghdad) to make life even more miserable for the Sunni resistance. Should the Sunnis come to their senses, however, then sending that surge of troops to Baghdad would make a lot more sense to me.

Notes on the Bush Economy

A few news stories caught my attention over the last few days. First, this:

Consumer Confidence Hits 8 - Month High

NEW YORK ( Reuters) - U.S. consumer confidence rebounded in December, rising to an eight-month high as consumers' view of the labor market improved, a survey showed on Thursday.

Then this:

Wall Street Reaches Record Level

Wall Street extended its advance into a second session Wednesday as bargain hunters picked up stocks across a variety of sectors and sent the Dow Jones industrials past 12,500 for the first time.

And, finally, this:

New homes sales unexpectedly strong in November

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Sales of new U.S. homes were unexpectedly strong in November and the backlog of unsold homes shrank, according to government data on Wednesday that suggested the worst of the housing slump may be in the past.

New single-family home sales rose 3.4 percent last month to an annual rate of 1.047 million units from an upwardly revised 1.013 million units in October, the Commerce Department said. It also revised August and September sales higher.

Bush's legacy will be largely determined by what happens in Iraq, but the fact that he presided over a fabulous economy for an amazingly long period of time will not be irrelevant.

Saddam's Day of Reckoning Looms

It seems as if Saddam Hussein will soon be executed for his crimes against humanity. He is responsible for the deaths of at least 300,000 people -- repeat, 300,000 -- yet some are offended by the fact that he will be put to death for what he did. Nowhere is this more evident than in Europe. Western Europe really is the liberal ideal in almost every way, so liberal that they are bothered by the fact that Saddam Hussein will be put to death for crimes against humanity, this despite the fact that not one person on the planet questions his guilt.

The UN, also an amazingly liberal organization, is especially ironic in its opposition to Saddam's execution:

The UN Human Rights Commissioner Louise Arbour on Thursday evening warned against a quick execution of the death sentence against former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein for crimes against humanity.

Arbour also questioned the integrity of Saddam's trial in a statement issued in Geneva.

"There were a number of concerns as to the fairness of the original trial, and there needs to be assurance that these issues have been comprehensively addressed," she said.

What could be more detrimental to human rights around the globe than the idea that genocidal tyrants can kill hundreds of thousands -- and perhaps as many as several million -- and still enjoy the vigorous protection of the UN? Indirectly encouraging brutal tyrants to torture and kill to their heart's content does not seem like human rights advocacy to me. What is about to happen in Iraq is obviously not a miscarriage of justice, and by coming to the defense of Saddam Hussein, the UN Human Rights Commissioner will have no credibility when she weighs in on an actual miscarriage of justice down the line. If everything is a miscarriage of justice, then nothing is.

Here is Richard Dicker of the ironically named "Human Rights Watch" weighing in:

Imposing the death penalty, indefensible in any case, is especially wrong after such unfair proceedings.

That a judicial decision was first announced by Iraq's national security adviser underlines the political interference that marred Saddam Hussein's trial.

Indefensible? How so, exactly? The convicted tyrant was responsible for death on a grand scale, for rape, and for excruciating torture (and I mean actual torture, not merely what Human Rights Watch would regard as torture). Why worry about a tyrant's rights while remaining unconcerned about the human rights of those living under the iron grip of other tyrants around the world? Watching out for Saddam Hussein's welfare despite his obvious crimes against humanity threatens the welfare of the powerless who are suffering the oppression of other tyrants around the world. That ought to be acknowledged when defending the mass-murderer's right to live.

Amnesty International had this to say:

Amnesty International is very disappointed about this decision.

We are against the death penalty as a matter of principle but particularly in this case because it comes after a flawed trial.

What principal? The only one that comes to mind is that it offends one's sense of "decency" for the state to sanction killing even a genocidal tyrant once he is no longer a threat. Fine, but why doesn't it offend your sense of decency that other tyrants will feel empowered to kill if, under international law, the worst fate they have to worry about is life in prison -- and even that need not really be feared because any war to topple the tyrant is, under international law, illegal anyway?

It is simply bizarre to be overly concerned about the welfare of a genocidal dictator who everyone agrees is guilty of crimes against humanity without having the slightest concern about the effect of that protective instinct on the welfare of oppressed people suffering in other parts of the world. You may experience an exalted sense of decency because you are so principled in your opposition to the death penalty that you would defend the devil himself right up to the very end, but I don't share your positive self-evaluation. I know they are well meaning, but I'd respect Human Rights Watch or Amnesty International more if they would stand up and say:

"As a matter of principle, we oppose the execution of Saddam Hussein despite the fact that he is undeniably guilty of enormous crimes against humanity and despite the fact that if we succeed in our efforts to have his life spared, we might be effectively sanctioning the execution of many thousands of innocents at the hands of other tyrants around the world."

That's a position I could sincerely respect, but it will never happen, and that's because it is important for many people (not everyone, of course, but many people) to trumpet their own highly developed sense of decency in circumstances like this. That's why you always hear them say: "capital punishment does not deter murder." They have to believe that because to acknowledge the possible deterrent effect would be to pop their treasured holier-than-thou self image.

But I must admit that some of you are, indeed, holier than I am, and that's because I would favor Saddam's execution even if we knew for a fact that it would not deter the genocidal behavior of other tyrants in the slightest (though, in truth, I believe that it would). On the death penalty in general, my support hinges on the empirical evidence that it serves as a deterrent to murder. But when it comes to large-scale atrocities that rise to the category of "crimes against humanity," I favor the death penalty simply for the sense of justice that it will bring to millions of Iraqis who suffered for so long at the hands of this evil man.

The Death Penalty and Murder Rates, in the News

Some bad news about the murder rate in '06:

Murders Are Up in New York, Other Cities

Dec 27
By Karen Matthews

NEW YORK (AP) - After many years of decline, the number of murders climbed this year in New York and many other major U.S. cities, reaching their highest levels in a decade in some places. Among the reasons given: gangs, the easy availability of illegal guns, a disturbing tendency among young people to pull guns when they do not get the respect they demand, and, in Houston at least, an influx of Hurricane Katrina evacuees.
...
The FBI does not release its national crime statistics until several months after the end of the year. The bureau's statistics for the first six months of 2006 showed an increase of 1.4 percent in the number of murders in the first half of 2006 compared with the first six months of 2005.

Andrew Karmen, a criminologist at John Jay College in New York, said that while there are various theories for the drop in murders in New York and other cities in the 1990s, no one knows for sure why it happened. And if they are going up again, no one knows the reason for that, either, he said.

Gee, it's really a struggle to come up with hypotheses about what might be going on here. What other possible explanations could there be, I wonder? Let me think...

US death sentences, executions down sharply in '06

By James Vicini
Dec 16, 2006

WASHINGTON - Experts say eroding support for capital punishment in America is a key reason death sentences have fallen to a 30-year low this year and executions have hit the lowest level in a decade.

Contrary to what you have been trained to believe (but in agreement with common sense and the empirical evidence), the death penalty serves as a deterrent to murder. That's why, if you oppose capital punishment, I'll never consider your position morally superior to mine. Sparing the lives of the guilty, thereby (effectively) sentencing innocents to death, is not morally superior to sentencing the guilty to death, thereby sparing the lives of innocents.

The moral calculus governing one's view of the death penalty has to include a consideration of its deterrent effect, does it not? There are good reasons why the state should not sanction the killing of a human being, so I understand why some would oppose capital punishment. However, the arguments in favor of abolishing the death penalty have to be set against the consequences of not executing at least some who murder. To me, it is not reasonable to allow our natural misgivings about the death penalty to keep us from protecting innocent men, women and children by putting some guilty murderers to death.

Obviously, no one can say that the increased murder rate in 2006 was caused by the drop in the number of murderers who were executed in 2006. Still, it should be one of the possible explanations that is taken into consideration when trying to make sense out of the new murder rate statistics. As I have noted before, the negative correlation between the murder rate and the number of executions is a long-term phenomenon:



(data here and here, negative correlation = -.70). If you go further back in time, the connection between executions and murders is not as strong, which makes sense for a lot of reasons. But for the last 50 years or so, the negative correlation has been quite strong. Apparently, that negative correlation holds true in 2006 as well. When executions go down, murders go up, and that's precisely why I support capital punishment.

UPDATE: Richard Cohen has a new column in the Washington Post entitled "A Delusional System of Justice." In it, he quite reasonably laments a plan to execute someone who obviously suffers from a mental illness. But then he engages in the usual trick of generalizing from that point to a more general point about the death penalty:

My person of the year is Gregory Thompson. I choose him to call attention to the madness of the death penalty.
...
Thompson, 45, is delusional. He is also paranoid, schizophrenic and depressed. For these ailments, he receives daily doses of drugs and, twice a month, anti-psychotic injections. The state of Tennessee wants very much to put him to death for the horrendous 1985 murder of Brenda Blanton Lane, of which there is no doubt about his guilt. There is grave doubt, though, about the constitutionality, not to mention the decency, of executing an insane man.

That word "decency" makes me want to throw up. I agree with him here, it's just that I've come to dislike the superior sense of decency that many liberals seem to treasure. Anyway, he goes on to say:

If I were not forced to choose a person as my person of the year, I might choose a concept: certainty. It is the one concept we cannot afford. Certainty is where we all get into trouble...

As we keep learning, the devil is not in the details, it's in our certainty. This almost always is true of death-penalty cases. They are built on certainty -- witnesses who were certain, technicians who were certain, cops who were certain, prosecutors who were certain and jurors who were certain beyond a reasonable doubt. Yet routinely we read about convictions being overturned by DNA evidence. All those witnesses, technicians, cops, prosecutors and jurors were wrong -- certain, but wrong. That, in effect, is the only certainty. Occasionally, we will be wrong.

Indeed, we will be. About that there can be no argument. But his focus on the issue of certainty pretty much abolishes his case. Let's go on:

This year saw the fewest executions in a decade and growing public support for the alternative sentence of life without the possibility of parole. The cynic in me suspects that this is a result of historically low crime rates, not a sudden appreciation of how difficult it is to kill people properly, legally and, of course, justly.

Actually, the idea that support for the death penalty has dropped is a fiction, though the idea that executions have dropped is not. Note Cohen's failure to cite any polling data. I, by contrast, cite those data here and show that the idea that Americans are increasingly opposed to the death penalty is simply false. Here's how Cohen concludes:

Maybe, though, Americans are beginning to understand that we just don't need the death penalty, that it makes us no safer and demeans us as a people. The case of Gregory Thompson is a case in point. He was probably insane when he murdered Brenda Blanton Lane but will be deemed sane if and when he's executed. He's my person of the year -- a fleetingly sane man in the maw of a thoroughly insane system.

Richard Cohen seems certain that the death penalty makes us no safer. This, ironically, in the very same article in which he laments the fact that we cannot be certain that someone committed a murder (or is sane or whatever). Note how he cites no evidence to back his claim. Up above, I cite the relevant evidence, and in prior posts I have cited even more evidence.

Don't be so certain that the death penalty does not save innocent innocent lives. Instead of being blinded by an ideology, let the evidence influence your position on the death penalty. To do otherwise would be to "demean us as a people."

Iran Seeks to Emulate North Korea's Economic Catastrophe

In an earlier post, I suggested that we declare war on Iran's economy. That's because their economy is already in trouble, so it's a vulnerability that we could exploit to our advantage. For example, this article in BusinessWeek said:

The situation could get even tougher for the National Iranian Oil Co. (NIOC), which is responsible for all of Iran's output. Without substantial upgrades in facilities, production at Iran's core fields, several of which date from the 1920s, could go into a precipitous decline. In September, Oil Minister Kazem Vaziri-Hamaneh suggested that with no new investment, output from Iran's fields would fall by about 13% a year, roughly twice the rate that outside oil experts had expected. "NIOC is likely to find that even maintaining the status quo is a mounting challenge," says PFC Energy's Rahim.

Iran's economy is, of course, heavily dependent on oil income, and the government is hoping to diversify the economy by attracting foreign investment. They need it, especially in light of a new analysis of Iran's oil situation:

WASHINGTON — Iran is suffering a staggering decline in revenue from its oil exports, and if the trend continues income could virtually disappear by 2015, according to an analysis published Monday in a journal of the National Academy of Sciences.

Iran's economic woes could make the country unstable and vulnerable, with its oil industry crippled, Roger Stern, an economic geographer at Johns Hopkins University, said in the report and in an interview.

Iran earns about $50 billion a year in oil exports. The decline is estimated at 10 to 12 percent annually. In less than five years exports could be halved and then disappear by 2015, Stern predicted.

This analysis appeared in the prestigious Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), though it was written by a graduate student (Roger Stern), and the paper appears to have been published in a way that largely circumvents peer review (long story -- just trust me). Still, it's an undeniably interesting paper, and it's predictions about Iran's oil future are only slightly more dramatic than other analyses.

There appears to be general agreement that Iran's oil infrastructure is in decline and is in ever more dire need of foreign assistance. But desperately needed foreign investment seems unlikely to come rushing in light of the UN's recent decision to impose sanctions on Iran for its pursuit of nuclear weapons:

The UN Security Council unanimously approved a tough resolution yesterday evening authorising sanctions against Iran for refusing to suspend its uranium enrichment programme, bringing to an end two months of often fractious negotiations aimed at pressuring Tehran to clarify its nuclear ambitions.

This is really weak in terms of its direct effects on Iran, but the indirect effects (i.e., making investors even more reluctant to get involved in a country that seems determined to self-destruct) could be substantial. In addition to pushing for sanctions, the US should continue to do what it can to block Iran's admission to the World Trade Organization. Unfortunately, the US withdrew its veto of Iran's application to the WTO more than a year ago (back when negotiations with Iran looked like they might be going somewhere):

The US threw a lifeline to Europe's attempts to keep negotiations alive over Iran's nuclear programme, diplomats said on Thursday, by giving a green light to Tehran's bid to start World Trade Organisation membership talks.

Iran's membership talks, formally approved by the Geneva-based trade body on Thursday, were described as part of a broader deal securing the continuation of the European Union's talks on containing Iran's nuclear programme.

After the US confirmed that it would lift its perennial veto on WTO accession talks, Tehran agreed to maintain a freeze on its nuclear programme until early August, by which time France, Germany and the UK will produce new proposals for a settlement.
...
Iran now faces at least five years of negotiations before it can join the WTO. Russia and Saudi Arabia, the two biggest economies currently outside the WTO, have been negotiating for a decade.

Apart from making changes in domestic rules to comply with WTO rules, Tehran will have to negotiate bilateral agreements with any member who requests it, giving the US another opportunity to hold up Iranian accession if it wishes.

Well, hold it up we should. WTO membership is a good thing, especially if your economy is failing:

Iran, like other Middle East oil producers, is seeking to diversify its economy. But as long as it remains outside the WTO its manufacturers risk higher tariffs on their products than rivals in member countries.

Keep them out of the WTO, and push the UN to impose further sanctions (economic in nature) if Iran does not give up its quest for a nuclear bomb. And as a further deterrent to foreign investment, Bush should continue to pointedly remind people (on rare occasions) that the military option is still on the table with respect to Iran. Every once in a while, he should note that the list of targets could include Iran's oil industry (not just their nuclear industry). Foreign companies seem unlikely to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in Iran if there is a real prospect of it all going up in smoke (literally).

Returning to graduate student Roger Stern, he made an interesting point about what we should do:

If the United States can "hold its breath" for a few years it may find Iran a much more conciliatory country, he said. And that, Stern said, is good reason to belay any instinct to take on Iran militarily.

"What they are doing to themselves is much worse than anything we could do," he said.

"The one thing that would unite the country right now is to bomb them," Stern said. "Here is one problem that might solve itself."

This assigns too much rationality to the leaders of Iran. Yes, we should patiently work to ensure their economic destruction (until they come to their senses, in which case we should do the exact opposite). But it is a race against time. The worst possible scenario would be for Iran to become nuclear capable right before their economy completely collapses. In that case, we'd have another North Korea, except that it would be headed by maniacal Islamic radicals with apocalyptic visions of jihad dancing in their heads. Before that happens, I think we'd need to unite that country in a way that Roger Stern would not like.

John Kerry Has No Comment On Al Qaeda

John Kerry has a hilarious new op-ed in the Washington Post entitled When Resolve Turns Reckless. His column falls into the category of "Democrat explaining what to do about Iraq," and that usually tells you everything you need to know about it's analysis of al Qaeda in Iraq.

As usual, I conducted the critical "test of seriousness" by searching Kerry's op-ed for the words "al Qaeda," and I'm sure that I don't even need to tell you by now that those words are nowhere to be found. And why not? Because it is not possible to advocate withdrawal while, at the same time, acknowledging the threat posed by al Qaeda.

Here is Kerry's plan, which I am sure is music to al Qaeda's ears (note: "redeploy" = "withdraw"):

The only hope for stability lies in pushing Iraqis to forge a sustainable political agreement on federalism, distributing oil revenues and neutralizing sectarian militias. And that will happen only if we set a deadline to redeploy our troops.

How many times do we have to see that Iraqi politicians respond only to firm, specific deadlines -- a deadline to transfer authority, deadlines to hold two elections and a referendum, and a deadline to form a government -- before we understand that it's time to make it clear that we are leaving and that we will not sacrifice American lives for the sake of squabbling Iraqi politicians?

I know John Kerry wants us to leave Iraq. What I don't know is what he thinks about al Qaeda in Iraq, and my specific questions are these:

1. Does he see al Qaeda as being responsible for the worsening "civil war" he laments? If not, I'd love to know who he thinks bombed the golden mosque in Samarra back in February and who it is that is engaging in high-profile suicide bombings against Shiite civilians to this day.

2. Does he think that al Qaeda's role would greatly expand if we left? If not, I'd love to know why (because every reasonable analysis of the situation in Iraq seems to suggest otherwise).

3. Does he think that al Qaeda's recruiting efforts would be greatly enhanced by their perceived victory over America if we followed through with his plan to leave (as both the leaked NIE report and the ISG report said would happen)?

Democrats who are pushing for withdrawal from Iraq have only two options:

1. Ignore al Qaeda in Iraq and then advocate withdrawal because it's all just a big ol' civil war now (that's what Kerry did, and it's what Democrats almost always do)

2. Explicitly deny that al Qaeda is playing a significant role in Iraq.

Option 2 is what Democrats did all the time until fairly recently. Now they just ignore the issue altogether in hopes that no one will notice. I might be alone in this, but I always notice.

Finally, here is Kerry's hilarious conclusion:

When Churchill urged, "Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never -- in nothing, great or small, large or petty, never give in," he added: "except to convictions of honour and good sense."

This is a time for such convictions.

John Kerry has no idea how right he is.

Liberal Analyses Ignore al Qaeda in Iraq

Perusing RealClearPolitcs this morning, I found a standard liberal "analysis" of what to do about Iraq:

Bush would dig nation into deeper hole in Iraq
Joseph L. Galloway
McClatchy Newspapers

Will Rogers said that the first thing you do when you find yourself in a hole is quit digging. All the signs out of the nation's capital indicate that President George W. Bush — who's in a very deep hole of his own making in Iraq — is about to ask for a bigger shovel.
...
Soon we'll see if, as Gates promised Congress, he's willing to tell the president the unvarnished truth: That there are no good options for victory in Iraq; that there is no hope of victory and vindication for anyone in Iraq; and that the only real option is to declare mission accomplished again and pull our troops out as swiftly as humanly possible.

We've already spent nearly half a trillion dollars and the lives of nearly 3,000 Americans and scores of thousands of Iraqis on a war born out of a president's ego and the pipe dreams of a whole horde of neo-conservative dark princes.

Now, if you ever read my blog, you know the test that you need to perform when trying to decide if an analysis of Iraq is serious or not. It's a simple test, and it merely involves searching the document for the words "al Qaeda."

From the tone of Joseph Galloway's column, you can already tell that it is more of a cathartic release for him than it is a substantive discussion about Iraq for you. Sure enough, he makes no mention at all of al Qaeda, the terrorist group that (a) attacked us on 9/11, (b) is directly responsible for the sectarian violence we see today in Iraq, and (c) is waiting for us to hurry up and leave so that it can on with its business. Instead, he only provides the very weak liberal account of Iraq that I have seen time and again: it's all just a big ol' civil war, so we need to get out while we can.

Galloway is not talking about al Qaeda (of course), but al Qaeda is talking about him (if he's a Democrat, as I assume he is). Actually, they are talking to him:

In a portion of the tape from al Qaeda No. 2 man, Ayman al Zawahri, made available only today, Zawahri says he has two messages for American Democrats.

"The first is that you aren't the ones who won the midterm elections, nor are the Republicans the ones who lost. Rather, the Mujahideen -- the Muslim Ummah's vanguard in Afghanistan and Iraq -- are the ones who won, and the American forces and their Crusader allies are the ones who lost," Zawahri said, according to a full transcript obtained by ABC News.

Zawahri calls on the Democrats to negotiate with him and Osama bin Laden, not others in the Islamic world who Zawahri says cannot help.

I wonder how it feels to be a recently elected Democrat, knowing that your electoral success is perceived by al Qaeda to be their handiwork? And I assume that this message was intended for the newly empowered Democrats as well:

In an audiotape posted on Islamic Web sites Friday, a speaker identified as Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Mujahideen Shura Council, said that if U.S. forces begin withdrawing from Iraq immediately and leave their heavy weaponry behind, "we will allow your withdrawal to complete without anyone targeting you with any explosive or anything else."

"We say to Bush not to waste this historic opportunity that will guarantee you a safe withdrawal," al-Baghdadi said on the audiotape.

The United States was given two weeks to respond to the offer.

The Mujahideen Shura Council is an umbrella group formed in late 2005 that includes several terrorist and insurgent groups, including al Qaeda in Iraq.

There is simply no escaping it: al Qaeda is in Iraq, and the recent elections in America (and the recent ISG report) have them feeling downright giddy. 2006 was a good year for al Qaeda in Iraq. I wish it were otherwise, but there is no getting around it.

Democrats have only one choice as they embrace defeat for America in Iraq: deny that al Qaeda is a significant force in Iraq, deny that they will greatly expand their influence there when we leave, and deny that their recruiting efforts will be greatly enhanced by their perceived victory over America. There simply is no choice but to deny all of this, which may be one reason why the media has downplayed this part of the story as much as possible.

Security and Stability in Iraq

I just read through the latest Defense Department report to Congress entitled Measuring Security and Stability in Iraq. First, let me focus on what they say about al Qaeda:

High-profile terrorist attacks are most often attributed to al-Qaeda in Iraq, whose goals include instigating sectarian violence.
...
Since al-Masri assumed leadership, al-Qaeda in Iraq has continued its main strategy of instigating sectarian violence using high-profile attacks against Shi’a civilians.

This fits with what I believe to be true, and I constantly emphasize it because so few advocates of withdrawal seem to understand who it is we would be surrendering to if we left Iraq now. Also, even those who recognize a role for al Qaeda in the Anbar province rarely connect high-profile attacks in Baghdad with al Qaeda. In the minds of most, the sectarian violence in Baghdad is just Shiites and Sunnis killing each other. While that's true, it's better to think of it as al Qaeda conducting high-profile, high-casualty car bomb attacks against Shiite men, women and children coupled with Shiite militias executing large numbers of Sunni males to put a stop to it.

It's a concept that does not seem to have penetrated the minds of most, namely, that al Qaeda is operating in Baghdad. But here is a CNN story from just yesterday that would seem to reinforce that view:

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- U.S.-led forces captured a senior al Qaeda leader who was responsible for hundreds of civilian deaths and housed foreign fighters who carried out suicide bombings, the U.S. military said Wednesday.

The leader, who was not identified, was arrested December 14 in a raid in Mosul, the military said in a statement.
...
It said the suspect served as al Qaeda's military chief in Mosul in 2005, and then took up the same job in western Baghdad.

"During that time, he coordinated car vehicle-borne improvised explosives device attacks and kidnap for ransom operations in Baghdad," the military said.

2006 was, unfortunately, a good year for al Qaeda because they simultaneously made good on their pledge to incite sectarian violence while causing Americans to consider embracing the option of surrender (which, if it happens, will greatly strengthen al Qaeda's hand due to its perceived victory over the paper tiger Americans). If you are a cut-and-run American, you should grapple with the fact that you are taking your marching orders directly from the terrorist organization that attacked us on 9/11. That's not good, and you should re-think your position.

The Defense Department report shows how al Qaeda's bombing of the golden Mosque in Samarra back in February had its desired effect:


These casualty figures include wounded, and you can see that American casualties have remained more or less stable over a long period of time at about 15 to 25 per day (slightly higher lately, though). Iraqi security forces are facing increased casualties, but civilians are clearly bearing the brunt of the violence. The last 3 sets of bars show the time period since al Qaeda bombed the Golden Mosque. It's quite clear that this one action changed everything.

This next graph from the Defense Department report shows the same phenomenon:


The red line is of most interest. You can see that sectarian executions really started to take off after February, and I believe that they mostly consist of Sunni males being shot by Muqtada al Sadr's militia (in response to those continuing high-profile attacks by al Qaeda).

Many are puzzled over why al Sadr's militia has not been disarmed. The answer, as I see it, is contained in the report:

Nevertheless, Sunni Rejectionists are seeking security improvements in Sunni and mixed areas, disarmament and demobilization of Shi’a militia groups, a timetable for Coalition withdrawal, an end to de-Ba’athification, and amnesty for Rejectionist fighters.

Got that? The Sunni insurgents want the Shiite militias to be disarmed. It's important to them. And that's why it won't happen until they come to their senses, which they are not going to do.

The Sunnis are going to fight to the death, which means that the Shiites will happily kill them. The idea that there is some amnesty deal or some oil sharing deal that will cause the Sunni insurgency to join the political process seems as far fetched to me as the idea that the Palestinians will eventually negotiate a two-state peace deal with the Israelis. I sincerely hope that I am wrong, but consider the implications if I am right. In Iraq, it would mean that Muqtada al Sadr can't really be disarmed. They need to be allowed to fight for a while, with American soldiers in place to ensure that al Qaeda does not tip the scales their way and to further ensure the survival of the democratically elected government. StrategyPage seems to have it about right:

The traditional way of dealing with terrorists is to arrest family members of suspected terrorists, or simply kill those suspected of terrorism. These traditional methods are the ones Saddam used liberally, and the ones some pundits suggest should be revived in order to "restore order." That's not going to happen, at least not officially. Shia Arab death squads have been increasingly going Old School on the Sunni Arabs. This has not, as yet, slowed down Sunni Arab terrorist activity. Officially, about a hundred actual, or suspected, terrorists are killed or captured each week. A larger number appear to be murdered off the books. Dead Sunni Arabs make most Iraqis feel safer.

Muqtada al Sadr appears to be of the Old School, and stopping him would be the biggest favor we could do for the Sunni insurgency (which is precisely why we should not do it).

So, if we do send a surge of soldiers to Iraq, we should announce that they are heading to Baghdad, but they should show up in the Anbar province instead. When things become miserable enough for the Sunnis and they agree to stop their resistance, only then should we take the fight to Muqtada al Sadr (and only after the Iraqi government has explicitly denounced him).

Rich Lowry Credits the Mainstream Media

Rich Lowry is great (I mean that sincerely), but his latest article entitled When the Media's Right seems a bit silly to me. In it, he argues that:

Most of the pessimistic warnings from the mainstream media have turned out to be right -- that the initial invasion would be the easy part, that seeming turning points (the capture of Saddam, the elections, the killing of Zarqawi) were illusory, that the country was dissolving into a civil war.

Here, he falls prey to a fallacy nicely explained long ago in a brilliant article about anticipating the attacks of 9/11. The article was written by William Saletan in Slate Magazine:

Bum Rap
Bush should have anticipated Sept. 11? Easy for you to say.
...
In retrospect, it seems obvious to many people that the FBI, the CIA, and the White House should have "connected the dots" and anticipated al-Qaida's use of hijacked planes to hit the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. But everything seems more obvious in retrospect, because you know which things are true and which aren't. What makes hindsight so easy is that you know not just what you needed to worry about, but what you didn't need to worry about. Identifying threats and mobilizing to prevent them isn't as easy as finding a single pattern. Intelligence is full of patterns involving numerous groups, targets, and methods. If you're the president of the United States or one of his intelligence advisers, you have to decide which threats are most worth investigating, mobilizing for, or disrupting people's everyday lives for.

It's easy, after the fact, for reporters and political opponents to go back and dig up reports that hinted at what eventually happened. They don't have to sort through the false leads and alternative scenarios. They know how the story ends.

And that's the problem with Lowry's analysis of the supposedly prescient mainstream media. They did not uniformly predict an easy victory, nor did they predict childhood mortality rates would plummet, nor did they predict that sectarian violence would be deliberately instigated by al Qaeda. They did predict that Saddam would adopt a scorched-earth policy and set all his oil wells on fire, that Baghdad would not fall easily, that Saddam would use his chemical weapons against our advancing soldiers, that Scuds with chemical or biological weapons would be fired at Israel, that the Arab street would rise up in protest, that there would be terrorist attacks in the U.S., that the Sunnis and Shiites would finally (and ironically) put aside centuries of enmity and unite to fight the great Satan, and that there would be an immediate refugee crisis involving millions who would be starving in short order.

Had all those things happened, Lowry could have written an article entitled When the Media's Right. Oh wait, he already did that.

The media was "right" because they predicted every conceivable disaster. One disaster involved Sunnis and Shiites spontaneously engaging sectarian violence in the power vacuum that followed our ouster of Saddam Hussein. Well, that's not exactly how it went down. As it turns out, al Qaeda was unhappy with the lack of sectarian violence, so they deliberately staged one high profile attack after another to make it happen. Their efforts succeeded, unfortunately, and I'd love to see the mainstream media reporter who predicted that.

Lowry also notes that the media was right about refugees: "The U.N.'s High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that more than 1.6 million Iraqis have fled the country, about 7 percent of the population."

Well, there is a refugee problem, especially an internal one, but he should have offered some perspective about the large number of Iraqis who have fled the country. I went to the relevant web site and found this:

UNHCR estimates there are at least 1.6 million Iraqis displaced internally, and up to 1.8 million in neighbouring states, particularly Syria and Jordan. Many were displaced prior to 2003, but an increasing number are fleeing now.

Many were displaced before the war? You don't say! But we might as well just attribute them all to our invasion because, if we do, then we can say that the media was right. Well, there are a lot of refugees, but it's not like the refugee crisis predicted by the mainstream media, which was a lot like the refugee crisis that they also mistakenly predicted about Afghanistan -- remember that?. Here is what the U.N.'s High Commissioner for Refugees said about that (this article was in Lancet, and I'm not sure it will open for you if you are not at a university that subscribes to it):

News

UN pleads for break in bombing in Afghanistan

Khabir Ahmad

Available online 22 October 2001.

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCR) Mary Robinson has warned that the crisis in war-rav-aged Afghanistan could turn into “a humanitarian disaster on the same scale” as was seen in Rwanda's civil war where nearly 800 000 people were killed or died from disease and malnutrition in the mid-1990s.

“Are we going to preside over deaths from starvation of hundreds of thousands—maybe millions—of people this winter because we didn't use the window of opportunity before winter closes?” Robinson asked. She argued that the Sept 11 “attacks were acts of individuals, and should not bring about retribution against one people, or one religion”. With winter just 4 weeks away, “an estimated 7·5 million people are at risk from starvation unless food and humanitarian assistance reaches them”, she noted.

Right. My point is simply that you can find every conceivable dire prediction in the media, and when some eventually do come true, the media will seem prescient because all of the incorrect predictions will have been forgotten about.

Even during the initial invasion of Iraq, it was easy to find scary predictions of Saddam's army putting up fierce and effective effort against our invading forces:

The White House and Pentagon have forgotten the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War, when Saddam was a close American ally. Iraq fought ferocious battles against numerically superior Iranian forces, suffering 500,000 casualties. In open desert, Iraq's forces, bereft of air cover, are sitting ducks; in urban areas, they have fought, at least in the past, with skill and courage.

And many of Iraq's soldiers are veterans of the war with Iran.

This does not bode well for the upcoming U.S. attack on Baghdad.

But Baghdad was a cakewalk. Had it not been, Lowry could be holding this out as an example of the media getting it right.

Here is another prediction:

In short, it is possible that the United States is headed for a battle in Baghdad that resembles the horrific battle for Stalingrad in World War II or Grozny more recently in Chechnya.

And another:

A loss of oil from Iraq could squeeze supplies for importing countries, including the United States, which depends on Iraq for 2 percent of all the crude it consumes. A scorched-earth demolition of wells and other oil facilities could also deny the U.S. and British governments an asset they hope will help pay for postwar reconstruction of Iraq.

Yet another:

March 20, 2003 | In the early hours of the U.S. attack on Iraq, there were several unconfirmed news reports of oil wells burning near Basra, the oil-rich southern city not far from Iraq's border with Kuwait. If accurate, the reports would be the first evidence that Saddam Hussein plans to repeat the scorched-earth strategy of oil-field destruction that he used in Kuwait in 1991 -- a strategy that could result, analysts say, in one of the worst environmental disasters in history.

Still more:

And that scorched-earth policy will include, they tell us, his plan to destroy oil wells, to destroy power plants, to use his biological and other weapons of mass destruction possibly against his own people and, again, against his neighbors as he has done in the past. Even, they say, he plans to manufacture civilian casualties, blame it all on the United States.

I could go on, but my point is that Rich Lowry ought to read William Saletan's article. Yes, the media got it right because they covered all their bases (including making many other dire predictions that they got wrong, but which are not easy to remember precisely because they did not come true).

I'd like to know what the mainstream media predicts about Iraq 5 years from now. I'm guessing that they predict every nightmare you can imagine. If a subset turn out to be correct, they'll seem prescient (again).

Perhaps He Should Have Lightly Abused An Iraqi Prisoner

Had he done that, and had some pictures been taken, his would be a household name, and his misbehavior would have been wildly celebrated in the mainstream media and on liberal web pages the world over. But he didn't do that. Instead, he did this (so you'll never hear his name):

Multi-National Division – Baghdad PAO

FORWARD OPERATING BASE LOYALTY, Iraq – Private First Class Ross A. McGinnis packed only 136 pounds into his 6-foot frame, but few have ever matched his inner strength.

McGinnis sacrificed himself in an act of supreme bravery on Dec. 4, belying his status as the youngest Soldier in Company C, 1st Battalion, 26th Infantry Regiment, attached to the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division.

The 19-year-old amateur mechanic from Knox , Pa. , who enjoyed poker and loud music, likely saved the lives of four Soldiers riding with him on a mission in Baghdad .

McGinnis was manning the gunner’s hatch when an insurgent tossed a grenade from above. It flew past McGinnis and down through the hatch before lodging near the radio.

His platoon sergeant, Sgt. 1st Class Cedric Thomas of Longview , Texas , recalled what happened next.

Pfc. McGinnis yelled ‘Grenade…It’s in the truck,’” Thomas said. “I looked out of the corner of my eye as I was crouching down and I saw him pin it down.”

McGinnis did so even though he could have escaped.

He had time to jump out of the truck,” Thomas said. “He chose not to.”

Thomas remembered McGinnis talking about how he would respond in such a situation. McGinnis said then he didn’t know how he would act, but when the time came, he delivered.

He gave his life to save his crew and his platoon sergeant,” Thomas said. “He’s a hero. He’s a professional. He was just an awesome guy.”

Three of the Soldiers with McGinnis who were wounded that day have returned to duty, while a fourth is recovering in Germany .

For saving the lives of his friends and giving up his own in the process, McGinnis earned the Silver Star, posthumously. His unit paid their final respects in a somber ceremony here Dec. 11.

Why is it so easy to relentlessly savage soldiers who let dogs bark at prisoners (an inappropriate but outrageously minor transgression in the grim calculus of warfare) yet so difficult to honor true heroes like Pfc. McGinnis? Forgive my brief foray into psychobabble, but I think the reason is this:

To present the case of someone like Pfc. McGinnis is to make oneself -- and one's readers -- feel small and insignificant by comparison (as well it should). To enthusiastically and hysterically denounce an abuser at Abu Ghraib, on the other hand, is to implicitly establish oneself as a paragon of virtue by comparison.

Don't get me wrong, there were a few cases of what everyone would agree amounts to torture at Abu Ghraib. In fact, citing those few cases is how how torture hysterics (Andrew Sullivan being the iconic exemplar) react whenever anyone states that the abuse was minor when placed into the context of war. Yes, there were some major cases, too, but they were incredibly few considering the scale of the operation in Iraq. Measured against the history of armed conflict (instead of against a liberal ideal), our soldiers have performed admirably. Better, I would guess, than any military force in history. As such, when thinking about Iraq, the mind should associate to people like Pfc. Ross McGinnis, not to people like Pfc. Lynndie England:
Yes, what she did shocks the mind, but, except for what we made of it, its importance is close to zero. Because the pictures were shocking, and because they afforded a glorious opportunity to sanctimoniously squeal "not in my name, no sir, not in my name!!" the media and war critics alike simply went bananas.

Is anything that is happening in Iraq today traceable to the Abu Ghraib incident? No, and the fact that it would be that way was clear all along. The coverage that Abu Ghraib received elevated its apparent importance to the second coming of Jesus Christ, but, in the grand scheme of things, it wasn't really important at all (in contrast, say, to al Qaeda's bombing of the holy mosque in Samarra, which ignited the current sectarian conflict --- that was important).

There are no sensational pictures to accompany what Pfc. Ross McGinnis did, which makes it hard to associate American activity in Iraq with his name and picture. Instead of passively forming associations like a sponge by attending too closely to what the mainstream media thinks is important, it would be worth your while to exercise your mind hard enough to form an association between Iraq and someone like Pfc. McGinnis.

Income Inequality

In an earlier post, I noted that more and more of the overall "income pie" is going to the rich. Although many reflexively blame Bush, this phenomenon has actually been underway for a long time. I made a graph of this phenomenon (using the data found here and then plotted for both pre-tax and after-tax income):


In 1980, the top 1% made off with 8% of the total income pie, but that value has been climbing over the years, and it reached a peak of more than 16% during the Clinton years (just before the stock market crashed). After falling a bit, it seems to be on its way up again.

You can see that our tax code is "progressive" in the sense that the share of income enjoyed by the rich is lower after taxes than before taxes (i.e., taxes redistribute the wealth a bit), but their share is still considerable and is still growing.

It's probably not good to have the rich making off with an ever increasing share of the pie even if everyone's absolute income is increasing. That is, even if everyone is better off now than they were in 1980, having the rich becoming dramatically richer while everyone else is getting only somewhat better off does not seem ideal.

Why is this happening? A while ago, I noticed that Robert Samuelson is unsure about that:

Trickle-Up Economics?
No one should be happy with today's growing inequality. It threatens our social compact, which relies on a shared sense of well-being.

The bottom line: productivity gains (improvements in efficiency) are going disproportionately to those at the top. We do not really understand why.

If even Robert Samuelson doesn't know why, then it must be an unresolved mystery. At least that's what I thought. I was therefore stunned to come across an article by Alan Reynolds, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute. In it, he is clearly arguing that there has been no significant change in income inequality despite what the numbers seem to suggest. Here are some selected paragraphs from his article:

As many others have done, Virginia's Democratic Senator-elect Jim Webb recently complained in The Wall Street Journal (article available here) of an "ever-widening divide" in America, claiming "the top 1% now takes in an astounding 16% of national income, up from 8% in 1980." Those same figures have been repeatedly echoed in all major newspapers, including The Journal. Yet the statement is clearly false.

Wow. I had thought that we could all agree on the numbers and that any disagreement would center on what, if anything, should be done about increasing income inequality. Here's more:

As was well-documented years ago by economists Roger Gordon and Joel Slemrod, a great deal of the apparent increase in reported high incomes has been due to "tax shifting." That is, lower individual tax rates induced thousands of businesses to shift from filing under the corporate tax system to filing under the individual tax system, often as limited liability companies or Subchapter S corporations.
...
Switching income from corporate tax returns to individual returns did not make the rich any richer. Yet it caused a growing share of business owners' income to be newly recorded as "individual income" in the Piketty-Saez and Congressional Budget Office studies that rely on a sample of individual income tax returns. Aside from business income, the top 1%'s share of personal income from 2002 to 2004 was just 7.2%--the same as it was in 1988.
...
In a forthcoming Cato Institute paper I survey a wide range of official and academic statistics, finding no clear trend toward increased inequality after 1988 in the distribution of disposable income, consumption, wages or wealth. The incessantly repeated claim that income inequality has widened dramatically over the past 20 years is founded entirely on these seriously flawed and greatly misunderstood estimates of the top 1%'s alleged share of something-or-other.

The politically correct yet factually incorrect claim that the top 1% earns 16% of personal income appears to fill a psychological rather than logical need. Some economists seem ready and willing to supply whatever is demanded. And there is an endless political demand for those able to fabricate problems for which higher taxes are, of course, the preferred solution. In Washington higher taxes are always the solution; only the problems change.

So, hold your horses. I had not previously doubted the income inequality story (and that story even weakened my opposition to increasing taxes on the rich), but this person is about to offer a serious analysis that challenges the conventional wisdom in this regard. I think this is going to be an interesting -- and important -- debate. The numbers I plotted will, for example, be cited by John Edwards as he touts his "two Americas" idea. We'll see how it all plays out.

Agenda Journalism on the Issue of Capital Punishment

I ran across a news article on the death penalty yesterday, and it got my attention right off the bat:

US death sentences, executions down sharply in '06

By James Vicini

WASHINGTON - Experts say eroding support for capital punishment in America is a key reason death sentences have fallen to a 30-year low this year and executions have hit the lowest level in a decade.

Eroding support for capital punishment? No evidence is cited, which is one thing I don't like about news stories. Instead of citing evidence, the reporter did what reporters often do: he found an expert or two who, I assume, told a story that the reporter would like to be true:

"Support for the death penalty is on the decline and more people are embracing the alternative sentence of life without parole," said Richard Dieter, executive director of the information center.
...
James Alan Fox, a criminal justice professor at Northeastern University in Boston, said the drop in executions and death sentences partly reflected changes in attitudes and slipping public support for the death penalty.

Slipping support? I went looking for the evidence because I've learned never to let a reporter do your thinking for you. Here are the results of a relevant ABC News/Washington Post poll conducted over the years:


Does that look like eroding support to you? It's about 2-to-1 in favor, and that margin has scarcely changed since 1998. But support for the death penalty was a bit higher in 1996. Is that the decline they are talking about? Let's look at the results of a Harris Poll (found at the same site) that takes us farther back in time:


As you can see, the American public actually opposed the death penalty back in 1965. Support peaked in the mid 1990s and then dropped a bit shortly thereafter, but it has been stable ever since (at levels well above where it was in the 1960s and 1970s). These polls results make it pretty clear that this reporter is just reporting what he deeply wishes were true, not what is actually the case. I'm amazed by how often this happens, and I wonder if reporters are even aware of the biases they bring to hot-button issues. Probably not, which is why it would be better to have an approximately equal mix of liberal and conservative reporters.

Support for the death penalty is probably even higher than these polls would suggest. In the ABC/Washington Post poll, the question was: "Do you favor or oppose the death penalty for persons convicted of murder?" Well, in a way I do, but I don't want every murderer automatically sentenced to death (as the question almost implies). A question that comes a bit closer to what should be asked is one that was asked in a 2002 Fox News poll: "Do you favor or oppose making the death penalty mandatory for anyone found guilty of abducting and murdering a child?" 71% were in favor, with 17% opposed. The reason why this question is a bit better is that it asks about "special circumstances" instead of asking about murder in general. But even this question is slightly flawed because it asks whether or not the death penalty should be mandatory in this circumstance. A much better poll question would be this:

"Do you favor or oppose having, as an option, the death penalty for people who are found guilty of murder with special circumstances, such as raping and murdering a child, or killing a police officer in the line of duty?"

What percentage of the population would be opposed to this policy? Whatever it is, that's the percentage of the population that is actually opposed to the death penalty. I'd guess it's around 15%. And if people better understood that capital punishment likely deters murder (based on inconclusive but suggestive evidence) -- in which case eliminating it would be tantamount to executing innocent people instead of guilty people -- an even smaller segment of the population would probably be opposed to it.

Liberals pride themselves on being scientific in their approach to important issues and questions (e.g., the origin of life on Earth, whether or not embryonic stem cell research ought to be supported, etc.). That's why support for the death penalty is not really a conservative or a liberal issue. If you let the evidence influence your view on this matter, it will push you in favor of the death penalty for people convicted of especially heinous crimes.

A Surge of American Soldiers to Baghdad?

I've seen several reports that Bush is planning to address the heightened level of sectarian violence in Iraq by sending a surge of additional troops to Baghdad. Here is one:

Bush May Back Sending More Troops to Iraq
Pentagon Plan to Send Thousands Would Attempt to Control Baghdad and Anbar Province

Dec. 16, 2006 — President Bush is likely to support a "surge" of additional U.S. troops to Iraq, officials familiar with planning believe.

The surge could include more than 30,000 additional troops and last as long as two years, sources tell ABC News. That could bring the total number of troops in Iraq to at least 164,000 — the highest total yet.

And here is Fred Barnes describing the plan that Bush appears to favor:

It envisions a temporary addition of 50,000 troops on the ground in Iraq. The initial mission would be to secure and hold the mixed Baghdad neighborhoods of Shia and Sunni residents where most of the violence occurs. Earlier efforts had cleared many of those sections of the city without holding them. After which, the mass killings resumed. Once neighborhoods are cleared, American and Iraqi troops in this plan would remain behind, living day-to-day among the population. Local government leaders would receive protection and rewards if they stepped in to provide basic services. Safe from retaliation by terrorists, residents would begin to cooperate with the Iraqi government. The securing of Baghdad would be followed by a full-scale drive to pacify the Sunni-majority Anbar province.

I don't really know if this will happen, but as I said before, this is the strategy you need to embrace if you really believe that Muqtada al Sadr must be removed from the equation. If Bush is not going to commit extra troops, then al Sadr's militia will be needed to stave off the Sunni insurgency (and al Qaeda) when we leave. But if we are going to commit to securing Baghdad, then it's another story altogether.

I didn't think this was really a possibility (e.g., Americans wouldn't support it, Maliki wouldn't support it, we don't have enough troops, etc.), so I've been imagining a Baghdad with Muqtada al Sadr remaining as a potent and necessary force. An ally, in essence, though an unintentional one (and one who happens to hate us). But if we actually have the troops available, and if Bush has the political will to send them there, and if the plan gives Prime Minister Maliki the strength to finally confront Muqtada al Sadr, then I would support the effort. It is vastly preferable to surrendering to al Qaeda in Iraq on a timetable.

My own reading of the situation is that al Qaeda is in Baghdad, deliberately inciting sectarian violence with large scale suicide bombings targeting innocent men, women and children from the Shiite population (in exact accordance with Zarqawi's plan). Muqtada al Sadr is responding by killing Sunni males by the dozens every few days. This is why we could not simply disarm al Sadr's Mahdi Army, as many have been calling for. Remember this news story?

“I can’t drive (the Mahdi Army) into the dirt and let (al-Qaida) basically conduct suicide attacks at will,” one senior coalition intelligence officer said on condition of anonymity for security reasons. “I’ve got to take both elements out of the equation.”

With thousands more US troops on the way, both elements can be taken out of the equation. And don't forget about this overlooked detail from back in October:

"Pace said a berm designed to encircle Baghdad and restrict the movement of death-squad members and insurgents in and out of the city had been completed recently and that 28 checkpoints staffed by Iraqis controlled the entrances to the city."

If we are planning to send a surge of troops, I suspect that those checkpoints will soon be staffed by American soldiers instead. And I can't help but wonder if that berm was put into place mainly to lock the bad guys into Baghdad. Tens of thousands of American troops may be coming for them, and they'll have no where to go (and no choice but to fight).

John Edwards is Running for President in '08

It looks like John Edwards is going to make another run for the White House:

Officials: John Edwards to announce '08 run
North Carolina Democrat expected to publicize decision late this month

Updated: 11:55 a.m. PT Dec 16, 2006
WASHINGTON - Former Democratic vice presidential nominee John Edwards intends to enter the 2008 race for the White House, two Democratic officials said Saturday.

I think the left is obligated to absolutely savage the man for lying to the nation in the exact same way that George Bush supposedly did. In a 2003 interview on Hardball, he had some interesting and honest things to say to Chris Matthews:

MATTHEWS: Let me ask you about-Since you did support the resolution and you did support that ultimate solution to go into combat and to take over that government and occupy that country. Do you think that you, as a United States Senator, got the straight story from the Bush administration on this war? On the need for the war? Did you get the straight story?

EDWARDS: Well, the first thing I should say is I take responsibility for my vote. Period. And I did what I did based upon a belief, Chris, that Saddam Hussein’s potential for getting nuclear capability was what created the threat. That was always the focus of my concern. Still is the focus of my concern.

So did I get misled? No. I didn’t get misled.

MATTHEWS: Did you get an honest reading on the intelligence?

EDWARDS: But now we’re getting to the second part of your question.

I think we have to get to the bottom of this. I think there’s clear inconsistency between what’s been found in Iraq and what we were told.

And as you know, I serve on the Senate Intelligence Committee. So it wasn’t just the Bush administration. I sat in meeting after meeting after meeting where we were told about the presence of weapons of mass destruction. There is clearly a disconnect between what we were told and what, in fact, we found there.

Unacceptable. As everyone on the left knows, one cannot be mistaken in good faith. It is not logically possible (if you are on the left, anyway). Obviously, it's time to maliciously savage John Edwards. Not convinced? OK, how about this interview with Larry King in February of 2002:

KING: Senator Edwards, when discussing the North Korean problem, the president wants to confront the regime, deal with its own missiles program plus its exports. There is not a reasonable military option when it comes to North Korea is there?

EDWARDS: Well, I don't think we're focused on military options right now, John.

I think it was important, in answer to your last question, it was important for the president to go to the region. I think he did help alleviate some of the concerns that people in that area had about this "axis of evil" comment.

But I do think that the more serious question going forward is, what are we going to do? I mean, we have three different countries that, while they all present serious problems for the United States -- they're dictatorships, they're involved in the development and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction -- you know, the most imminent, clear and present threat to our country is not the same from those three countries. I think Iraq is the most serious and imminent threat to our country.

And I think they -- as a result, we have to, as we go forward and as we develop policies about how we're going to deal with each of these countries and what action, if any, we're going to take with respect to them, I think each of them have to be dealt with on their own merits.

And they do, in my judgment, present different threats. And I think Iraq and Saddam Hussein present the most serious and most imminent threat.

No matter how hard you look, you won't find George Bush using the words "imminent threat" to describe Saddam Hussein's Iraq. But John Edwards used those words. Therefore, by the logic of the left (which is not liberal logic, mind you), he must be maliciously savaged. According to left-wing logic, one cannot be wrong in good faith. Instead, if one is wrong, one must be a liar. Therefore, by this curious logic, John Edwards is a liar.

It's time for the left to have another apoplectic fit.

Handy-Dandy List of my Prior Posts on the Economy

In response to another post, reader Giuseppe asked for more posts on the economy. I'll be doing that in due course, but it occurred to me that I should occasionally make it easy for people to find what I've said about that in the past. So, here is a handy-dandy reference guide:

Our fabulous economy (Clinton vs. Bush years):

Americans Hate Their Fabulous Economy

The Rich Were Better Off Under Clinton Than Bush

America: I can't get no...Satisfaction

Poverty Rates and our Fabulous Economy

Judging the Republican Economy


The income story:

Why Does Average Income Go Up When Median Income Goes Down?

The Median Family Income Picture is Bright, Too

The "Wages and Productivity" Hoax


The federal deficit:

Update on the Federal Budget Deficit


The value of the US dollar:

The Falling Dollar


U.S. vs. European economies:

On Top of the World (and Pulling Away)

A Look at the Rich, the Poor and the Middle Guy in America and in Europe

When Executions Go Wrong

The big fuss over the botched execution of Angel Diaz in Florida warrants some further discussion about the death penalty. First, let's consider the execution in question:

JACKSONVILLE, Florida (AP) -- It seemed like Angel Nieves Diaz would never die.

Two executioners injected him with three chemicals that were supposed to do the job in a few minutes.

But 10 minutes later, he was still alive, his eyes darting back at the 25 witnesses.

Diaz shuddered several times, but continued moving and breathing for nearly half an hour.

He finally died 34 minutes after the execution began.

I've witnessed all 20 lethal injections in Florida.

In most cases, the inmate is unconscious in three to five minutes and dies in 10 to 15 minutes.

So, it usually takes 15 minutes to die, but he took 19 minutes longer than that in this case. It would have better not to have those additional minutes, but the reaction to the problem seems way out of proportion to the event. On a scale of 0 (not an issue at all) to 100 (an appalling outrage), I'd put it about a 20. Others see it differently:

"I am definitely appalled at what happened. I have no doubt he suffered unduly," Angel Nieves Diaz's attorney, Suzanne Myers Keffer, told the AP.

Well, I don't know about that. Who is this guy, anyway? I found some information about him here:

Diaz was convicted of fatally shooting Joseph Nagy with a silencer-equipped gun while robbing The Velvet Swing with two accomplices Dec. 22, 1979.

Diaz fired into the air after they entered the bar, authorities said. They then robbed several patrons and locked them in a restroom. Nagy was shot when he confronted the intruders.
...
Diaz has a long criminal history including a murder conviction and an escape from prison in his native Puerto Rico and another prison escape in Connecticut.

So, although it's unfortunate that the state inadvertently required an extra 19 minutes to end this habitual murderer's life, it's not appalling, and it certainly does not seem like cruel and unusual punishment to me. Death penalty opponents are, I assume, the ones who are particularly appalled by this event, and I am guessing that they will use it to advance their potentially murderous cause. Perhaps they won't, but let's assume that they will for the sake of argument.

As I see it, the idea that the death penalty is not a deterrent to murder flies in the face of the best evidence we have available (not to mention common sense). As I noted in an earlier post, I went to the Bureau of Justice web site and collected data on the murder rate since 1950 (number of murders per 100,000, which can be found here) and the number of executions each year since 1950 (found here). There is a lot of variability in the number of executions because it went out of style in the 1960s and the Supreme Court even suspended executions in the United States between 1973 and 1976, which obviously kept the execution rate at zero for a while. What happened to the murder rate when executions ceased? Here is the amazing story:


The number of executions (blue line) can be read off the vertical axis on the left and the murder rate (magenta line) can be read off the vertical axis on the right. What you see is a fairly clear result: as the execution rate falls, the murder rate goes up, and as the execution rate goes up, the murder rate goes down. The correlation coefficient is a whopping -.70, which is highly, highly significant (p < .0001). No, this doesn't prove that capital punishment deters crime, but common sense and the evidence conspire to at least suggest that it does. Many death penalty opponents will never be persuaded by any evidence (of that I am sure), but my position on this matter has been fully determined by the evidence. It is too complex an issue to resolve definitively with data, but the evidence leans more towards a deterrent effect than against it. And if it does have a deterrent effect, then allowing a few minutes of inadvertent (but well deserved) pain for convicted murderer Angel Diaz to help abolish capital punishment amounts to equating multiple innocent lives with a 19-minute episode of discomfort. That is, your position would be that we should trade innocent lives (lives that will likely be lost if we abolish the death penalty) for the comfort of knowing that murderers won't occasionally take an extra 19 minutes to die when they are executed.

That reasoning just doesn't work for me. Given that the death penalty probably serves as a deterrent to murder, the response should be to fix the execution method, not abandon the death penalty. So far, that seems to be the response in Florida, but I feel sure that death penalty opponents believe that it should advance their cause (perhaps that's nothing more than my imagination).

It is getting harder and harder for me to understand opposition to the death penalty given that the evidence leans in favor of its deterrent effect. I found an interesting web site that seems to present both sides of the story pretty well (though it simply does not discuss the evidence concerning deterrence, which makes it a bit too balanced in my book). Except for the deterrence issue, here is probably the most commonly made argument against capital punishment:

Most death penalty critics have an ethical basis for their opposition. They argue that a government's act to execute is a violation of human rights, especially if there remains a possibility that the individual is innocent.

I don't get it. Why doesn't this way of thinking rule out fighting Hitler in WW II? Our government sent soldiers to kill, and there was simply no doubt at all that innocents would die (inadvertently) in the process. By this ethical reasoning (according to which the state cannot be involved in killing, especially if innocents might die), Hitler should have been allowed to conquer the world. One possible response is that, well, sure, innocents would die, but even more innocents would have died had we not stopped him. But that's precisely my argument in favor of the death penalty, and it is more of an empirical argument than an ethical one.

According to what ethical reasoning is it appalling to execute a wretched murderer but it is perfectly OK for the US Air Force to drop a bomb on a house full of enemy soldiers (and, perhaps, a few other people as well)?

One Last Chance in Iraq?

The Iraq Study group report seems to have cemented some new conventional wisdom about Iraq, specifically, that there is "one last chance" to correct the course. ISG co-chair Lee Hamilton got this ball rolling when he said "We have one last chance at making Iraq work, more importantly, one last chance to unite this country on this war." Well, making Iraq work is more important than uniting this country on the war, but that's another matter. The question I have is this:

Is this our last chance in Iraq?

If you search google news, you'll find that many believe that it is. Even the great Charles Krauthammer agrees that it is:

"Now that these 10 establishment sages have labored mightily to produce a mouse, the president has one last chance to come forward with a new strategy."

To say that the next strategy we try is the very last effort we will make is to say that if our next initiative fails to pacify Iraq, then we will surrender to al Qaeda in Iraq, bring our troops hope, and hope and pray that things work out for us in the long run.

The "We have one last chance" conventional wisdom needs to be expanded to include the words: "..to avoid losing to al Qaeda in Iraq." That may help to concentrate some minds on the stakes involved. It's only a last chance if you are prepared to hand a victory to al Qaeda if the new plan doesn't work. I'm not.

Choosing Sides in Iraq

Do you think Muqtada al-Sadr Mahdi Army (the Shiite militia that is killing large numbers of Sunni males) should be forcibly disarmed?

Let me approach this question from another angle. Which proposal do you support, the one suggested by John McCain or the one suggested by the Iraq Study Group? Here are their suggestions, in essence:

1. The John McCain plan

McCain: Deploy More Troops to Iraq
Visiting Baghdad, Senator Says Up To 30,000 U.S. Troops Needed To Stabilize Iraq

(AP) Sen. John McCain said Thursday that America should deploy 15,000 to 30,000 more troops to Iraq to control its sectarian violence, and give moderate Iraqi politicians the stability they need to take the country in the right direction.

Joe Lieberman supports McCain's plan, and he thinks Muqtada al Sadr needs to be marginalized:

Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., said the delegation had met with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, and urged him to break his ties with anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and disarm his Mahdi Army militia.

2. The Iraq Study Group Plan:

By the first quarter of 2008, subject to unexpected developments in the security situation on the ground, all combat brigades not necessary for force protection could be out of Iraq.

This plan to leave as soon as possible is a far cry from sending more troops, but the Iraq Study Group agrees that the Shiite militias needs to be addressed:

Militias are currently seen as legitimate vehicles of political action. Shia political leaders make distinctions between the Sunni insurgency (which seeks to overthrow the government) and Shia militias (which are used to fight Sunnis, secure neighborhoods, and maximize power within the government). Though Prime Minister Maliki has said he will address the problem of militias, he has taken little meaningful action to curb their influence.

If you support McCain's plan, then I can understand why you think that Muqtada al Sadr needs to be confronted. After all, the McCain plan would send the message that we are committed to stabilizing Iraq and that we are going to do whatever it takes to accomplish that goal. But the plan offered by the Iraq Study Group sends just the opposite message. As such, it strengthens Muqtada al Sadr's hand considerably. After all, it clearly implies that we are about to bug out and fulfill our honorable duty to facilitate the large scale slaughter of the Iraqis callously we leave behind. That's what "peace with honor" actually means. As such, the Iraqis need to think about their security when we are no longer there, and I strongly suspect that the Shiites would rather fight the Sunni insurgency with Muqtada al Sadr than than without him. Wouldn't you, if you were a Shiite?

So, if you want something to be done about Muqtada al Sadr, fine, but, if you do, you need to get on board the John McCain train and support sending more troops to Iraq. Otherwise, you need to come to grips with the fact that Muqtada al Sadr is an essential part of the equation. He is an opposing force to al Qaeda (and the Sunni insurgency), and al Qaeda is the enemy that must be defeated in Iraq.

In time, the civil war in Iraq may come down to choosing sides between, on the one hand, the democratically elected government of Iraq and its Shiite militia allies or, on the other, the Baathist Sunni insurgency and its al Qaeda allies. Or we can just let them fight it out while we abandon ship, thereby perfectly fulfilling Zarqawi's dream for al Qaeda in Iraq.

A Phased Redeployment Plan I Can Live With, Part 2

About a month ago, I linked to a phased redeployment plan I could live with. It was the plan suggested by none other than embattled Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki.

Mr. al-Maliki wants the Americans confined to bases, where they can be called in emergencies, but he boldly predicted that his army could crush violence within six months if left alone to do the work.

This would get our troops out of harm's way, except when they are needed to confront our primary enemey (that's al Qaeda in Iraq, in case you've sight of that fact somewhere along the way). Under this plan, there would be no perceived victory for that terrorist organization, which both the leaked NIE report and the more recent Iraq Study Group report specifically mentioned as being the obvious fatal flaw in the arguments advanced by the pull-out-now crowd. The NIE report said:

...we judge that al-Qa’ida will continue to pose the greatest threat to the Homeland and US interests abroad by a single terrorist organization.
...
Should jihadists leaving Iraq perceive themselves, and be perceived, to have failed, we judge fewer fighters will be inspired to carry on the fight.

Similarly, the Iraq Study Group report said this:

Because of the importance of Iraq, the potential for catastrophe, and the role and commitments of the United States in initiating events that have led to the current situation, we believe it would be wrong for the United States to abandon the country through a precipitate withdrawal of troops and support... Al Qaeda would depict our withdrawal as a historic victory. If we leave and Iraq descends into chaos, the long-range consequences could eventually require the United States to return.

All of this fits right in with an analysis offered by Peter Bergen in a column that appeared in the New York Times:

What Osama Wants
...
To understand why, look to history. Vietnam often looms large in the debate over Iraq, but the better analogy is what happened in Afghanistan since the Soviet invasion.
...
A total withdrawal from Iraq would play into the hands of the jihadist terrorists. As Osama bin Laden’s deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, made clear shortly after 9/11 in his book “Knights Under the Prophet’s Banner,” Al Qaeda’s most important short-term strategic goal is to seize control of a state, or part of a state, somewhere in the Muslim world. “Confronting the enemies of Islam and launching jihad against them require a Muslim authority, established on a Muslim land,” he wrote. “Without achieving this goal our actions will mean nothing.”
...
And there is no riper spot than the Sunni-majority areas of central and western Iraq.

He went on to accurately describe what I call the world's most dangerous theory:

Another problem with a total American withdrawal is that it would fit all too neatly into Osama bin Laden’s master narrative about American foreign policy. His theme is that America is a paper tiger that cannot tolerate body bags coming home; to back it up, he cites President Ronald Reagan’s 1984 withdrawal of United States troops from Lebanon and President Bill Clinton’s decision nearly a decade later to pull troops from Somalia. A unilateral pullout from Iraq would only confirm this analysis of American weakness among his jihadist allies.

And then he echoes the redeployment plan offered by Prime Minister Maliki:

While withdrawing a substantial number of American troops from Iraq would probably tamp down the insurgency and should be done as soon as is possible, a significant force must remain in Iraq for many years to destroy Al Qaeda in Iraq.

That can be accomplished by making the American presence less visible; withdrawing American troops to bases in central and western Iraq; and relying on contingents of Special Forces to hunt militants. To do otherwise would be to ignore the lessons of history, lessons that Al Qaeda’s leaders certainly haven’t forgotten.

No, al Qaeda hasn't forgotten, but many Democrats have. Fortunately, our military commanders in Iraq haven't forgotten either, and, today, we learn that they are thinking along these lines:

The nation's top uniformed leaders are recommending that the United States change its main military mission in Iraq from combating insurgents to supporting Iraqi troops and hunting terrorists, said sources familiar with the White House's ongoing Iraq policy review.
...
Sources said that Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top U.S. commander in Iraq, is reviewing a plan to redefine the American military mission there: U.S. troops would be pulled out of Iraqi cities and consolidated at a handful of U.S. bases while day-to-day combat duty would be turned over to the Iraqi army.

It all sounds about right to me. The plan recognizes that we are in a fight against terrorism in Iraq, and it further recognizes the stand-off nature of the insurgency. Sadly, it seems that the Sunnis are going to resist until too many of them have died to keep up the fight (oil concessions or not). We need to turn that fight over to the Iraqis.

But who is going to fight the Sunnis if the Iraqi army is not up the task? The answer to that question is related to the answer to this question: why haven't we disarmed Muqtada al Sadr's Mahdi Army?

The Blame Game

I'm really struck by the reaction of many left-leaning thinkers to the Iraq Study Group report. I read their articles expecting to find that they either agree with the ISG's assessment of Iraq (as I do) or disagree with that assessment. And I further expected them to either agree with their recommendations, as I would expect, or disagree (as I do). Instead, their attempt to contribute intelligently to the debate is to write columns that say little more than "I blame Bush for the mess in Iraq." No matter how good that might make someone feel, it doesn't help.

Let's start with Jonathan Alter:

Trouble From the Top Down
Bush did not set out to miss the mark, of course, but his inattention to the execution of his grand ideas has had fatal consequences.

By Jonathan Alter
Newsweek

Beyond the headlines and major policy recommendations, the Iraq Study Group's mercifully readable report shows how President Bush's personal shortcomings manifest themselves in appalling miscues on the ground.
...
This is what happens when you have a president who is incurious and impatient with inconvenient facts he doesn't "need to know": hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqis, nearly 3,000 dead Americans and what the Baker-Hamilton Commission estimates as a $2 trillion tab for our children.

Jonathan Chait?

The bubble boy in the Oval Office
Try to mend Iraq all you want; just don't tell Bush the war was a mistake.
December 10, 2006

In return for these considerations, the commission generously avoided revisiting the whole question of who got us into this fiasco and how. As the Washington Post put it, "The panel appeared to steer away from language that might inflame the Bush administration."
...
Yes, Mr. President, it's good that you turned Iraq into a Hobbesian inferno of Al Qaeda terrorists and Islamist death squads. It's really, really good!

Peter Beinart, perhaps? At least he is an equal-opportunity blamer:

It's not just the Iraqis' fault

By Peter Beinart
December 10, 2006

Across ideological lines, American politicians and pundits are finally coming to a consensus on Iraq: It's the Iraqis' fault.
...
It's easy to see why this line of argument appeals to both left and right. For liberals, blaming the Iraqis justifies a U.S. withdrawal: If the Iraqis are incorrigible, then there's nothing U.S. troops can do. For conservatives, it excuses the Bush administration: If the Iraqis are incorrigible, this catastrophe is their fault, not ours.

Finding someone to blame (usually Bush) is one thing the left seems to think of as critically important. I listened to Air America yesterday for something more substantive, and it was a bit better. There was a lot of blaming, of course, but there was some useful analysis provided by a guest as well (can't recall his name). But then it became clear that the bottom-line analysis was that it's just a big ol' civil war now, so we need to get out forthwith.

But what about al Qaeda? I was nearly shouting into my radio for this otherwise thoughtful analyst to weigh in on that critical issue. Finally, those words were mentioned: the analyst simply dismissed the idea that al Qaeda has anything to do with what is going on in Iraq.

I was, paradoxically, simultaneously stunned and not surprised at all. Denying the threat posed by al Qaeda in Iraq is the only way to rationalize a defeatist's reflexive instinct to declare Iraq to be another Vietnam and to recommend withdrawing our forces as quickly as possible.

Al Qaeda is the crux of the issue. I urge anyone who doubts that to look up the Iraq Study Group report and search for the words "al Qaeda" and then read what they have to say. You can favor pulling out of Iraq now if you wish, but you can't do that without acknowledging what it would mean, namely, surrendering to the enemy who attacked us on 9/11. Unless, of course, you'd rather be in a state of denial about that and join in the fun of blaming Bush (as if that is a creative and novel contribution to the debate).

When Lesbians Have Babies

Mary Cheney is having a baby, which has a lot of people talking about lesbian couples raising kids. Well, I guess artificailly inseminating lesbians is one way to keep the fertility rate up in America, but is it a good way? Opinions differ. RealClearPolitics linked to two articles with opposing perspectives. From the right, we have James Dobson, who says this:

With all due respect to Cheney and her partner, Heather Poe, the majority of more than 30 years of social-science evidence indicates that children do best on every measure of well-being when raised by their married mother and father. That is not to say Cheney and Poe will not love their child. But love alone is not enough to guarantee healthy growth and development. The two most loving women in the world cannot provide a daddy for a little boy--any more than the two most loving men can be complete role models for a little girl.

OK, fine, makes sense to me, but the absence any specific citations to the relevant research is exasperating. Without that, this is nothing more than an impassioned plea that is not going to convince anyone of anything. Then we have Andrew Sullivan's response to this argument:

When I hear people on cable news reiterate that a child is best brought up with a mother and a father and cite studies showing the toll that fatherlessness takes on mainly black urban kids, all I can say is: yes. Yes. YES. YES. But so what? What's the relevance of that to Mary Cheney? Is she to be forbidden to have a child? Is Virginia about to pass a law not only shredding gay couples of any legal protections but threatening to take their children away from them as well? Is it not enough that one mother will have no legal rights over her child?

Here are the only relevant questions. Should it be illegal for lesbian or single women to get artificially inseminated? If artificial insemination is legal, is it better for the child to have a stable, two-person home or not? That's it.

Sheesh! This is doubly exasperating, and it is not up to Sullivan's usual standards. Why is the liberal mind so reflexively legalistic? One can think it wrong for a lesbian to go out of her way to use some man's sperm to create a baby without suggesting that the practice should be criminalized. It's wrong for a man to cheat on his wife, too, but that doesn't mean he be thrown in jail when does. Let me try to answer the two questions Sullivan asks:

1. Should it be illegal for lesbian or single women to get artificially inseminated?

Obviously not, but it might be as wrong for a lesbian couple to get artificially inseminated as it is for a man to cheat on his wife. That's the issue. The same applies to artificially inseminated single moms (lesbian or not).

2. If artificial insemination is legal, is it better for the child to have a stable, two-person home or not?

I think he means, if it is legal and a lesbian couple chooses to exercise this right, is it better for the child to have a stable, two-person home or not? Well, if the lesbian couple chooses to create a child, then, yes, obviously, it is better for the child to have a stable, two-person home.

But the question he forgets to ask is this:

3. Should a lesbian get artificially inseminated given what we know about the effects on children of being raised in a family without a father?

That's the question, and it has nothing to do with the legalities of it. Both articles allude to the relevant research that might help to provide an answer, but neither does any more than that. I guess I'll have to look it up myself! I will, and I'll let you know what I find out.

More Intelligence on the House Intelligence Commitee, Please

When Nancy Pelosi passed up Jane Harmon for the House Intelligence Committee in favor of Silvestre Reyes of Texas, it seemed like a decision that was based either on Pelosi's personal animosity towards Harmon or on the fact that Harmon did not suffer from a sufficiently severe case of Bush Derangement Syndrome. Either way, it did not seem like a choice that was made with the best interests of the country in mind.

Still, I hoped that Reyes would work out OK. I cringed, though, when I saw his background:

Known as "Silver" to his friends, Reyes retired in December 1995 after 26 ½ years with the Border Patrol to run for Congress.

Reyes holds an Associates Degree in Criminal Justice from El Paso Community College and attended the University of Texas at Austin and El Paso.

Perfectly respectable background, even for a representative, but Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee? I worried that he might be in over his head, but I had hopes that he'd be able to rise to the occasion. Unfortunately, here is some bad news that won't exactly eliminate my concerns:

House intelligence chair calls al Qaeda Shi'ite

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Is al Qaeda a Sunni organization, or Shi'ite?

The question proved nettlesome for Rep. Silvestre Reyes of Texas, incoming Democratic chairman of the House of Representatives Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.

"Predominantly -- probably Shi'ite," he said in a recent interview with Congressional Quarterly, a periodical that covers political and legislative issues in Congress.

Unfortunately for Reyes, the al Qaeda network led by Osama bin Laden is comprehensively Sunni and subscribes to a form of Sunni Islam known for not tolerating theological deviation.

That's a pretty basic issue to get wrong at this stage of the game. I suppose that being this uninformed wouldn't matter that much if he were heading up the House Ethics Committee, but having someone like this conduct "oversight" of our intelligence apparatus is worrisome.

On another note, I was glad to see yet another article in the mainstream media acknowledge al Qaeda's role in Iraq:

In fact, U.S. officials blame al Qaeda's former leader in Iraq, the late Abu Musab al Zarqawi, for the surge in sectarian violence between Sunnis and Shi'ites.

They could have noted that the "U.S. Officials" in question include the Iraq Study Group and that al Qaeda is still inciting sectarian violence, but this rare concession by the mainstream media is close enough to reality for me.

In today's news, I think we see more signs of al Qaeda in Iraq:

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Suspected insurgents set off two bombs in a main square of central Baghdad where scores of Iraqis were waiting for jobs as day laborers on Tuesday, killing at least 71 people and wounding 151, police said.

The carefully coordinated attack in Tayaran Square at 7 a.m. involved a parked car bomb and a suicide attacker who drove up in a minibus, pretended to hire day laborers, then set off his explosive as they got into his vehicle, said police Lt. Bilal Ali.

The simultaneous explosions, which occurred about 100 feet apart, shattered windows in store fronts, left craters and blood stains in the road, and set fire to about 10 other cars.

The article refers to "insurgents" being responsible, but this is al Qaeda's style, and it is not retaliation for anything. It is an attack that is designed to keep the sectarian warfare alive and to further demoralize America. This, on the other hand, is retaliation by Shiite militias:

On Monday, at least 66 people were killed or found dead in the Baghdad area and northern Iraq. They included 46 men who were bound, blindfolded and shot to death in the capital — the latest apparent victims of sectarian death squads.

The article does not say, but I suspect that all 66 were Sunni males (46 of whom were bound and shot to death). This is Muqtada al Sadr in action.

Bonuses for Babies in France

I've been interested in fertility rates for a while now, in part because the low fertility rates in Europe (which fall well below the replacement rate) seem to be, at least in part, a consequence of liberal economic policies. There is nothing particularly wrong with those policies, except for the fact that they may be impractical if they result in a disappearing population.

One of the highest fertility rates in Europe can be found in France. Its most recent fertility rate (a bit above 1.9) still falls below the replacement rate (2.1), but it is undeniably high by European standards.

France's success in achieving a relatively high fertility rate may be a direct result of its efforts to reward women for having babies, as this article suggests:

Bonuses For Having Babies In France
As Population Ages, Government Benefits Promote Family Friendly Policies

One hundred and sixty three countries around the globe offer at least some subsidy to new mothers. In America, federal law entitles some working mothers to twelve weeks unpaid leave. The rest get nothing.

But French families are entitled to up to three years paid maternity leave with a guarantee that mom's job will be there for her when she returns. There is also subsidized child care and a whole host of tax credits.
...
Most of Europe is going gray, and there are worries about a future where the number of people on pensions outnumbers younger workers funding those pensions through taxes. That kind of imbalance could be a disaster.
...
The goal now is to help women work—eighty percent of French women do—and have babies.

"We really focus now on reconciling babies and bosses, and that means we put more and more emphasis on child care facilities," says Vincent Mahe of the Health and Benefits Ministry.

And that may be the key, say the French. Not only take care of working mothers, but convince families that their children will be well cared for from a very young age, and they'll have more babies—and maybe a little less guilt.

That sounds like the liberal ideal, does it not? All moms working, children cared for by the state, and no guilt. That sounds fine to me, especially if the model allows for the mother to stay home for the first 3 years of a child's life. My own feeling is that it would be better for women who want to stay home longer than that be somehow enabled to do so, but it also seems likely that the older the child the less critical it is that mom always be there for them.

A possible (and oft-noted) problem with the economic incentive approach, though, is that the state essentially replaces the father. I found some interesting birth statistics for France here that seem to confirm that concern. The chart below shows how economic incentives have helped to increase the fertility rate in France over the years, but another unmistakable trend is evident as well:


As the fertility rate goes up (read off the left vertical axis), the percentage of out-of-wedlock births does, too (read off the right vertical axis). In other words, as fathers become increasingly irrelevant in an economic sense, they become increasing scarce. At least I think they do. If you wanted to comfort yourself in the face of statistics like these, you might cling to the belief that the dads are there and equally committed to the family despite the absence of a marriage "contract." I highly doubt it, but it might be true. Or, you could console yourself with the belief that fathers really aren't all they are cracked up to be and that mothers alone can handle teenage boys just fine, thank you very much. I highly doubt that, too, but I haven't reviewed the evidence (not yet, anyway).

I like watching France because, when I do, I feel like I am watching the liberal ideal in action.

A final note: The fertility rate in America falls at about the replacement rate, as it has for some time now. There are ethnic differences, but those differences do not seem terribly important. In France, there are ethnic differences, too, as Muslims reproduce at a far higher rate than non-Muslims do. That particular ethnic difference may be important, especially if Muslims are not integrating into French society (as they seem not be to doing).

Even the AP is starting to get it

Al Qaeda in Iraq is behind the sectarian carnage we see in that country. They strike in the most provocative ways with the express purpose inciting Shiite-on-Sunni violence.

When Bush says something like that, my liberal colleagues just scoff. To them, it's all just a big ol' civil war. But this is the AP talking, so maybe even the left will finally take notice:

A main goal of Sunni Arab insurgent groups such as al-Qaida in Iraq has been to spark sectarian violence by attacking sites considered holy by the country's Shiite majority. Attacks by Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias, and revenge killings in mixed Sunni-Shiite areas of cities such as Baghdad, often kill scores of Iraqis a day.

No kidding. I think the fact that Iraq Study Group formally recognized this obvious reality is causing it to finally penetrate even the AP's anti-Bush defense mechanisms.

It's important for this information to get through to the American public because it's important for them to appreciate who it is we will be surrendering to if we decide to abandon Iraq on a timetable (instead of leaving when the Iraqis can manage security on their own). If you want to withdraw on a timetable, that's fine, but you should be clear about the fact that not only would you be dutifully following the instructions of the Iranian foreign minister (as I noted yesterday), you would also be surrendering to al Qaeda in Iraq. I don't think anyone really wants that to happen, which is why the get-out-now crowd generally makes no mention of al Qaeda. But if al Qaeda's role continues to be noted by the mainstream media from here on out, I think we'll have the Iraq Study Group to thank for that. Their recommendations are being severely bashed (as well they should be), but their analysis of Iraq was spot on, and it appears to have done some good already.

"The habits of liberty built over generations"

One way in which liberals have long seemed unserious to me is that they are maniacally and angrily focused on condemning George Bush while remaining almost cavalier about the grave threat to the nation posed by radical Islam (including al Qaeda in Iraq). It's as if al Qaeda achieving a grand victory over America is an acceptable outcome so long as it can be blamed on Bush.

The clearest sign of this unserious attitude is the fact that many liberals have declared Iraq a failure since about 2 weeks into the campaign. They are still at it, of course:

December 08, 2006
It's Bush's Failure in Iraq
By E. J. Dionne

WASHINGTON -- One of the many disastrous consequences of President Bush's botched policy in Iraq is that it has given the promotion of democracy a bad name.

If the report of the Iraq Study Group is nothing else, it is a devastating declaration that the administration's approach is an abject failure and that the United States needs to scale back its goals.

Really? Scale back its goals? I hadn't noticed that. Which goal, exactly, has been abandoned? This one, apparently:

Grand dreams of Iraqi democracy and a transformed Middle East are out. The best we can hope for now is an Iraq that can "govern itself, sustain itself, and defend itself.''

You mean we have stopped hoping that the democratically elected government of Iraq can sustain itself? Instead, we are hoping that a new genocidal tyrant steps up to plate to once again ruthlessly pacify the country through a campaign of torture and mass murder? Now that we have become realists, have we also accepted the return of the Taliban in in Afghanistan?

Of course not. The dream of democracy in Iraq and a transformed Middle East are still in place even though the forces of evil who are opposing it are more determined than we had hoped or imagined. Bush and the Iraq Study Group are both talking about democracy succeeding, not some other model succeeding.

Dionne also thinks that Bush has given the promotion of Democracy a bad name, as if the alternative of lovingly embracing genocidal tyrants -- the only alternative we really had -- would help to move democracy forward. He goes on to say:

But there are smart ways to promote democracy, and there are stupid, even dangerous ways. Creating democracy where it has never existed is a long and painstaking process. You can't whip it up by buying a cake mix or holding a single election and declaring victory.

Gee, is that what Bush implied? Why didn't Dionne provide representative quotes from Bush to back it up? Well, I looked it up:

For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
March 29, 2005

President Discusses Freedom and Democracy
The Rose Garden

Iraqis are taking big steps on a long journey of freedom. A free society requires more than free elections; it also requires free institutions, a vibrant civil society, rule of law, anti-corruption, and the habits of liberty built over generations.

Let's recap, in case the subtlety is lost:

A free society requires more than free elections; it also requires...the habits of liberty built over generations (that's George Bush talking)

You can't whip it up by...holding a single election and declaring victory (that's Dionne's spiteful characterization of Bush)

Dionne's ranting and raving against an imaginary caricature of the president suggests that he may be suffering from a certain syndrome that his colleague Charles Krauthammer could probably help him identify.

Dionne happily declares that all hope is lost for democracy in Iraq because a small minority of al Qaeda terrorists and Baathists have managed to incite sectarian conflict resulting in 3000 to 4000 civilian deaths per month. According to a poll of Iraqis conducted this past summer (in the midst of the sectarian carnage), here is how they feel about it:



What's Dionne's response? Screw them. A minority of terrorists has stirred up large-scale violence in Iraq, so we need a genocidal strongman to restore order. Is that the liberal ideal today? I don't think so, which is why I prefer to think of Dionne as being left wing, not liberal. Siding with the vast majority of Iraqis who prefer freedom and democracy feels like the liberal position to me (and it's the position I choose to adopt).

We've had 3 years to transform Iraq into a democracy that could sustain itself. And time's up? You get 3 years, and if it hasn't worked out by them, the proper thing to do is declare failure and get out? If you knew that, say, 5 years from now, the Iraqis would have a functioning democracy with violence reduced to fairly low levels without our help, would you favor restoring a mass-murdering tyrant to power now anyway? I wouldn't, but I think that Dionne might. That's pathetic.

Iran Sets Conditions for Talks with US

Don't you love this?

Iran sets conditions for talks with U.S. on Iraq
Tehran says it will only engage in dialogue if U.S. unveils withdrawal plan

MANAMA, Bahrain - Iran will only hold direct talks with the United States on Iraq if Washington announces plans to pull its troops out, Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Saturday.
...
“Iran is ready to help the administration to withdraw its troops from Iraq,” he said...

I think it is completely fair to put the following question to John Murtha, John Kerry, and the Iraq Study Group:

Should we, despite being forbidden from setting preconditions of our own for talks with the Iranians, obey the precondition that they have set? Yes or no?

It's a simple question! Either we should obediently comply with their instructions or we shouldn't. Which is it?

I love the analysis of the current situation in Iraq that the Iraq Study Group provided, but their recommended solutions (such as talking with the Iranians) are quite silly. I'd like to thank the Iranian foreign minister for making that perfectly clear.

Declare War on Iran's Economy

In response to the invasion of Iraq, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi did what we hoped other state sponsors of terror might do: he gave up his support for international terrorism and abandoned his quest for a nuclear bomb. This is a huge dividend of the Iraq invasion, though it's one that opponents of the invasion cannot concede. This always amazes me because Gaddafi himself -- the only one who knows for sure -- acknowledges that the invasion of Iraq prompted him to finally
change his ways. To me, that ends the debate, but if you are constitutionally unable to credit Bush with anything positive from the Iraq war, nothing ever could.

Unlike Libya, Iran has opted to oppose us all the way. They are arming militias in Iraq (both Shiites and Sunnis, according to the Iraq Study Group report) because chaos there is bad for America, and they are going to pursue a nuclear bomb no matter what. They have willingly opted to be our enemy, and nothing will change that fact short of regime change (not even the entreaties recommended by the Iraq Study Group).

In an earlier post, I suggested that one way to approach the Iran problem would be to declare war on their economy. What I didn't realize at the time is that their economy is already on the ropes:

Surprise: Oil Woes In Iran
Flagging output from its vast reserves could diminish Tehran's influence

...Iran has a surprising weakness: Its oil and gas industry, the lifeblood of its economy, is showing serious signs of distress. As domestic energy consumption skyrockets, Iran is struggling to produce enough oil and gas for export. Unless Tehran overhauls its policies, its primary source of revenue and the basis of its geopolitical muscle could start to wane. Within a decade, says Saad Rahim, an analyst at Washington consultancy PFC Energy, "Iran's net crude exports could fall to zero."

That's not to say Iran doesn't have abundant resources. The country's 137 billion barrels of oil reserves are second only to Saudi Arabia's, and its supply of gas trails only Russia's, according to the BP Statistical Review of World Energy. Getting it all out of the ground, though, is another matter. Iran has been producing just 3.9 million barrels of oil a day this year, 5% below its OPEC quota, because of delays in new projects and a shortage of technical skills. By contrast, in 1974, five years before the Islamic Revolution, Iran pumped 6.1 million barrels daily.

They are struggling already, and the future looks bleak:

The situation could get even tougher for the National Iranian Oil Co. (NIOC), which is responsible for all of Iran's output. Without substantial upgrades in facilities, production at Iran's core fields, several of which date from the 1920s, could go into a precipitous decline. In September, Oil Minister Kazem Vaziri-Hamaneh suggested that with no new investment, output from Iran's fields would fall by about 13% a year, roughly twice the rate that outside oil experts had expected. "NIOC is likely to find that even maintaining the status quo is a mounting challenge," says PFC Energy's Rahim.

What this means is that they need serious help from the west:

Iran badly needs fresh foreign investment to shore up the oil industry. Tehran has attracted some $20 billion in funding for oil and gas projects since 1995 from overseas companies including Royal Dutch/Shell Group (RD), France's Total (TOT), and Norway's Statoil. But new investment has largely dried up in recent years because of lingering worries about the risk of war with the U.S. and disenchantment with Iran's tightfisted terms.

And there you have it. In an earlier post, I recommended that we make it clear that it may be necessary in the not-too-distant future to disrupt Iran's oil production capacity. Just the threat, I argued, would be enough to dissuade foreign companies from investing billions of dollars to help the Iranians produce more oil. However, it looks like foreign investment has already flown the coup. Here is another article on the subject that makes similar points:

What is the status of Iran’s economy?

Not good, experts say. Iran's unemployment level remains around 11 percent (Reuters says it could be as high as 25 percent). One out of every four Iranians lives in poverty, according to the New York Times. And double-digit inflation is expected to climb higher based on President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's recent budget proposals to ratchet up spending on job-creation programs and nebulous charity groups.
...
An estimated million young Iranians look for jobs each year, while the economy produces less than half that many jobs, according to the Economist. That is in stark contrast to Iran's pre-revolution era. In the 1970s, Iran's gross domestic product (GDP) per person was 30 percent higher [in real terms] than it is today.
...
How has Iran’s nuclear posturing affected its economy?

Tehran's decision last summer to resume nuclear activities despite Western warnings prompted many foreign and domestic investors to pull their money from the market. Soon thereafter, stock prices in Iran plummeted as the stock market tumbled to its lowest level ever last October. It has since rebounded but the threat of sanctions continues to stymie investment. "The risk of sanctions translates into uncertainty and uncertainty is not good for investment, especially private investment," Nabli told reporters. A March 2006 IMF report on Iran says "[T]he possibility of a prolonged period of 'wait and see' on the part of the private sector could adversely affect the economic outlook." Foreign direct investment, which was $500 million in 2004, has also since dropped significantly because of political uncertainties, according to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.

Iran itself is doing a good job of scaring away much-needed foreign investment by all of its nuclear sabre rattling, but we need to do enough sabre rattling in return (e.g., making it clear that their oil production facilities remain on our list of military targets) to make private investment by foreign companies seem like a very a bad risk. I suspect that's part of the reason that Bush always maintains that he will not take the military option off the table. If so, the strategy I recommended is already in place and is already having the desired effect.

Alas, I am now thinking that economic warfare may not be enough to provoke instability in Iran, and destabilizing that country needs to be a high priority. If we don't, this madman will have his hands on a nuclear bomb sometime soon:

Iran's President Says Holocaust Now Up for Debate

TEHRAN (Reuters) - The Holocaust is now a subject of serious debate, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Saturday.

Iran has invited scholars from 30 countries to attend a conference starting on Monday about the Holocaust, in which six million Jews were killed by the Nazis.
...
Ahmadinejad sparked an international outcry by referring to the Holocaust as a "myth'' and saying Israel should be relocated to Europe or North America.

"Even some Western politicians have declared that the original foundation of the Zionist regime (Israel) was a mistake,'' he said on Saturday.

Ahmadinejad has said his questioning of the Holocaust is aimed at encouraging scholarly debate and an examination of the reasons behind the creation of the state of Israel.

Deputy Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mohammadi has said the Holocaust conference will look at issues such as "whether the gas chambers were actually used by the Nazis.''

Maybe the Iraq Study Group should have recommended sending a delegation to this conference. I think we need to persuade Ahmadinejad to accept the reality of the holocaust before we'll get him to be rational about Iraq.

Al Qaeda Knows You Better Than You Know Yourself

I've been looking more carefully at the Iraq Study Group report to see where my analysis of what is going on differs from theirs, especially with regard to al Qaeda. I have only found one notable difference, but let me start with a paragraph that seems to get it exactly right:

Al Qaeda is responsible for a small portion of the violence in Iraq, but that includes some of the more spectacular acts: suicide attacks, large truck bombs, and attacks on significant religious or political targets. Al Qaeda in Iraq is now largely Iraqi-run and composed of Sunni Arabs. Foreign fighters numbering an estimated 1,300—play a supporting role or carry out suicide operations. Al Qaeda’s goals include instigating a wider sectarian war between Iraq’s Sunni and Shia, and driving the United States out of Iraq.

This paragraph suggests to me that the ISG did their homework. The first sentence notes that al Qaeda is responsible for a small portion of the violence in terms of the number of direct attacks they carry out, but those attacks have a strategic purpose, and they have been both spectacular and (to say the least) extremely effective. The strategic goals of their attacks in Iraq are to incite sectarian violence (that's a good thing from al Qaeda's point of view) and to drive demoralized Americans out of Iraq. This is precisely the plan laid out by Zarqawi in the letter that was intercepted back in 2004, and I'm glad to see that the ISG apparently read that letter.

As I said, the attacks by al Qaeda have been spectacularly effective. For example, al Qaeda bombed the mosque in Samarra back in February with the express purpose of finally setting off the sectarian warfare that their prior attacks had not succeeded in doing. I've been carefully tracking civilian casualties in Iraq for a long time, and it is clear that the violence took a huge jump on that very day (and the violence has grown even worse since). I don't think that many casual consumers of the news realize either the significance of that event or the fact that al Qaeda was behind it. But its significance is quantifiable (see graphs here), and we actually captured the al Qaeda leader who carried it out (see here).

No one should ever underestimate al Qaeda. Their insight into the Iraqi and American psyches is amazingly accurate. They conduct spectacular attacks to accomplish their strategic objectives, and, for the moment, I have to agree with Robert Gates that we are not winning in Iraq. Al Qaeda is because they have successfully drawn the Shiite militias into the conflict and they have demoralized Americans at home. This is one reason why I think it is critically important for more people to come to grips with al Qaeda in Iraq, and it's why I am at least somewhat impressed by the ISG report. If more Americans realized that their assessment of Iraq was being intentionally dictated by al Qaeda, I think they'd be more inclined to fight back than they currently are.

According to the report, there are now Sunni Arabs in Iraq who have joined al Qaeda and, in addition to that, there are about 1300 foreign members of al Qaeda in the country. That is an incredible number when you consider how al Qaeda operates. Don't forget how many al Qaeda operatives were needed in America to kill 3000 people and set off two wars in the Middle East that continue to this day. In America there were, what, 16 members of al Qaeda before 9/11? And they only attacked once, yet the attack was truly spectacular. Imagine what 1300 al Qaeda operatives could do in America. An army of 1300 would be tiny if they fought like an army, but al Qaeda doesn't do that. They can be extremely effective with a relatively small force because their method of operation makes that possible.

The ISG appreciates the role that al Qaeda plays in Iraq, and they further appreciate that we cannot allow al Qaeda to emerge as the victorious party. They will if America departs on a timetable, which is why the ISG endorses no such thing. Instead, they say we should have most of our troops out of there by 2008, but they tie our departure to events on the ground (not the clock). Here is what they say:

By the first quarter of 2008, subject to unexpected developments in the security situation on the ground, all combat brigades not necessary for force protection could be out of Iraq.

I'm 100% in favor of this plan. If the security situation on the ground can be handled by the Iraqis by then, why wouldn't want to get our troops out? The Iraqis expect to be able to take over in about 6 months, so they certainly expect to be ready by 2008. But if the Iraqis cannot stand up on their own by then (i.e., if that unexpected development occurs), then we need to stay. Note what the ISG is not saying. They are not saying that we should hand a victory to al Qaeda in 2008, which is what withdrawing on a timetable amounts to. Once you agree that we can't do that, you have become a Bush stay-the-course advocate (where "stay the course" means sticking with the objective -- not necessarily the tactics -- and staying in Iraq until those objectives are achieved).

The only place where I differ with the ISG's assessment of al Qaeda is with respect to Baghdad. They say:

In Baghdad, the violence is largely between Sunni and Shia. In Anbar, the violence is attributable to the Sunni insurgency and to al Qaeda, and the situation is deteriorating.

I believe this misses the mark because, while it is technically accurate in that members of al Qaeda are Sunnis, it fails to acknowledge the role of al Qaeda in Baghdad. Remember this attack in Baghdad from a few weeks ago?

BAGHDAD - The death toll in Thursday's multiple car bombings in Sadr City, a Shi'ite slum district of Baghdad, rose to 202 after around 40 of the wounded died overnight, police said. Another 250 were wounded and Baghdad was under a curfew.

This is the method that al Qaeda uses to incite sectarian violence and to demoralize America. The Sunni insurgents are mainly focused on attacking American troops (not Shiite civilians) because they want our troops out of there so they can restore themselves to power. It is al Qaeda that attacks Shiite civilians, and their purpose in doing so is very clear. Failing to recognize that allows one to think about the situation is a superficial way ("it's just an out-of-control civil war based on ancient sectarian hostilities between Shiites and Sunnis"). No, it is brutal sectarian violence deliberately provoked by al Qaeda. They actively want Shiite militias to attack Sunni civilians because, from their point of view, only good things come from that. The Iraqi government is destabilized, Americans start to savage their own president and demand that the troops be brought home, and Sunnis begin to seek out al Qaeda for help in fighting back against the Shiite militias.

Although everyone knows that the worst is happening in Baghdad, almost no one acknowledges that al Qaeda is stirring up all of the trouble there. President Bush acknowledged it, Bill Roggio did as well, and it is noted in an occasional article, but my liberal colleagues all scoff at the notion. They are completely invested in the belief that the trouble in Baghdad amounts to a civil war between Shiite and Sunni militias. Simple as that. The problem with that analysis is that the Sunnis don't really have organized militias. That's why "disarming the militias" is not really a sensible thing to do right now. Disarming the militias means strengthening al Qaeda in Iraq. This description taken from a recent Defense Department report makes this clear:

Unlike the Kurdish and Shi'a militia groups, Sunni Arabs do not have formally organized militias, but rely on neighborhood watches, Rejectionists, and, increasingly, al-Qaeda in Iraq (p. 30).

So, when you say "disarm the militias," you are really saying "disarm the Shiite militias so that Shiite civilians will be at the mercy of al Qaeda in Iraq."

Al Qaeda wants the Shiite militias to fight, but they may be getting more than they bargained for as Sunni attitudes begin to turn against them. For example, the ISG report says:

Arab tribal leaders in Anbar province recently took the positive step of agreeing to pursue al Qaeda and foreign fighters in their midst, and have started to take action on those commitments.

Why did the Sunni tribes turn against al Qaeda? My own feeling is that they did so because of what Shiite militias are doing to Sunni civilians in Baghdad (and for no other reason than that).

It's a race against time: will the Sunnis turn against al Qaeda before a demoralized American public demands that we withdraw, thereby handing al Qaeda a profound victory that will have negative implications for years to come? Al Qaeda seems to think that time is on their side, so they continue to provoke the Shiites in Baghdad with occasional spectacular attacks in accordance with Zarqawi's grand plan. Given the mood of the American public, they may be right.

Do not underestimate al Qaeda. They are very, very good. And they know exactly how you think.

Stop Complaining about the Iraq Study Group

The entire blogosphere is already commenting extensively on the Iraq Study Group report, so no more really needs to be said. But I'll say more anyway.

My initial test of the seriousness of any analysis of Iraq is a very simple one. The simple test is to search for the words "al Qaeda" and see what comes up. This test is more critical than most people realize because there are really only two possible outcomes:

1. the analysis fails to acknowledge the threat posed by al Qaeda in Iraq, in which case it is likely to be little more than a juvenile rant against evil neocons, one that has its origins in Bush Derangement Syndrome

2. the analysis recognizes the al Qaeda threat, which, like it or not, immediately rules out withdrawing from Iraq on a timetable (because even Democrats agree that al Qaeda is the enemy)

In a typical liberal diatribe on Iraq, the words "al Qaeda" do not even appear. For example, check out this new screed from the Cato Institute by Justin Logan (who, ironically, is described as a member of the Coalition for a Realistic Foreign Policy):

In the case of Iraq, the capital city was not quickly brought under control, and could not be brought quickly under control now, even with 50,000 more troops. A low-level civil war is ongoing, and in order for it to stop, either one side is going to have to win, or both sides must become fatigued enough that they compromise.

The Baker-Hamilton commission cannot change this reality. And if the commission were to confront the negligence and recklessness of the Bush administration's policy in Iraq, it is certain that President Bush would dismiss their thoughts out of hand. The only thing that can right our course at this point is an outright rejection of the neoconservative approach that steered us into the quagmire in Iraq in the first place.

Neoconservatives have been wrong about every possible aspect of Iraq: wrong about the threat from Saddam, wrong about the way to deal with it, wrong about the costs of war, wrong about the insurgency, and wrong about staying the course. The only question left is how long the country and the Bush administration will continue listening to them on foreign policy. And at what cost?

He's obviously having an enjoyable cathartic experience here, but he is not being very serious. If you search this article for the words "al Qaeda," you'll come up empty. It's as if, in his mind, what is happening is Iraq has nothing at all to do with the terrorist organization that attacked us on 9/11. It's all just a big ol' mess that neocons failed to anticipate, and that's pretty much all there is to it. Many liberal analyses are like this, which is why it seems fair to say that quite a few liberals are in the very state of denial that they believe afflicts President Bush.

Liberal critics need to pretend that al Qaeda is not in Iraq because only in that case does it make any sense at all to withdraw on a timetable. I'd love to see a liberal analysis that both acknowledges the role that al Qaeda is playing in Iraq and argues for withdrawal on a timetable anyway. I don't think I'll find such an analysis, but I will definitely keep my eyes open for one.

What about the Iraq Study Group report? Does it pass the superficial test of at least mentioning al Qaeda? I am happy to report that it does. In fact, it passes this test with flying colors. Al Qaeda is mentioned no less than 26 times, and the threat they pose is pretty well characterized (which is why, in the end, the study group does not recommend withdrawing on a timetable). Some excerpts from the report follow:

Iraq is vital to regional and even global stability, and is critical to U.S. interests...It has the world’s second-largest known oil reserves. It is now a base of operations for international terrorism, including al Qaeda.
...
A slide toward chaos could trigger the collapse of Iraq’s government and a humanitarian catastrophe. Neighboring countries could intervene. Sunni-Shia clashes could spread. Al Qaeda could win a propaganda victory and expand its base of operations.
...
Terrorism could grow. As one Iraqi official told us, “Al Qaeda is now a franchise in Iraq, like McDonald’s.” Left unchecked, al Qaeda in Iraq could continue to incite violence between Sunnis and Shia. A chaotic Iraq could provide a still stronger base of operations for terrorists who seek to act regionally or even globally. Al Qaeda will portray any failure by the United States in Iraq as a significant victory that will be featured prominently as they recruit for their cause in the region and around the world. Ayman al-Zawahiri, deputy to Osama bin Laden, has declared Iraq a focus for al Qaeda: they will seek to expel the Americans and then spread “the jihad wave to the secular countries neighboring Iraq.” A senior European official told us that failure in Iraq could incite terrorist attacks within his country.
...
Because of the importance of Iraq, the potential for catastrophe, and the role and commitments of the United States in initiating events that have led to the current situation, we believe it would be wrong for the United States to abandon the country through a precipitate withdrawal of troops and support. A premature American departure from Iraq would almost certainly produce greater sectarian violence and further deterioration of conditions, leading to a number of the adverse consequences outlined above. The near-term results would be a significant power vacuum, greater human suffering, regional destabilization, and a threat to the global economy. Al Qaeda would depict our withdrawal as a historic victory. If we leave and Iraq descends into chaos, the long-range consequences could eventually require the United States to return.

These are the words of actual realists (as opposed to liberal "realists" who just want to make themselves feel better by bashing neocons). No matter how bad some of the study group's recommendations might be -- and a few of them are really, really bad -- it doesn't matter so long as they recognize that failure is not an option in Iraq. The Iraq Study Group does recognize that, and that fact sets them completely apart from the defeatist wing of the Democratic party. Read what they say about our goals in Iraq and try to imagine John Kerry saying it (you won't be able to):

We agree with the goal of U.S. policy in Iraq, as stated by the President: an Iraq that can “govern itself, sustain itself, and defend itself.” In our view, this definition entails an Iraq with a broadly representative government that maintains its territorial integrity, is at peace with its neighbors, denies terrorism a sanctuary, and doesn’t brutalize its own people.

That all sounds about right to me. Achieving that goal is what I call victory. The Iraq Study Group clearly wants to achieve that goal. They want to win in Iraq because they appreciate the costs of failure (including the fact that America's failure will be al Qaeda's victory). They won't actually talk about "winning" because, for some odd reason, many Democrats are revolted by the notion of an American victory in Iraq, so they diplomatically choose to say it in a different way. Still, it is victory they have in mind.

So, in essence, the Iraq Study Group wants to achieve what Bush wants to achieve, they are arguing that we should stay the course (while making it sound like they are not doing that), and they are recommending that we do a couple of dopey things on top of that (like bringing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict into the picture). Adding a couple of useless strategies on top of staying the course is not really a big problem in my book. Moreover, one of their dopey ideas -- talking to Iran, as if the Iranians will be helpful in some way -- is pretty much eliminated as an option by the Iraq Study Group itself. In that regard, they say:

Our limited contacts with Iran’s government lead us to believe that its leaders are likely to say they will not participate in diplomatic efforts to support stability in Iraq.

So, that silly idea is in there just to appease the members of the group who worship at the altar of diplomacy. Others in the group appear to recognize that this brilliant "idea" is likely to go nowhere.

The key point is this: even if you dislike their specific recommendations (and I agree that talking to Iran and dragging in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict into the picture are just dopey ideas), it's comforting to know that the Iraq Study Group shares Bush's goal, not John Murtha's and John Kerry's goal. Staying the course means sticking with President Bush's goal in Iraq and keeping our troops in place until that goal is achieved. All the Iraq Study Group has really said is that we should (a) stay the course, (b) engage in some sabre rattling ("we might not keep our troops there forever, so don't think that we will"), and (c) do a couple of useless and dopey things on top of that. I have not read every word of the report, but, so far, I'm quite happy with it.

Semantic Wars

President Bush has said that he won't negotiate with Iran until the Iranians agree to give up their nuclear ambitions. That is, he has set a precondition. The Iraq Study Group is about to suggest that we should follow a different path and negotiate with Iran without setting any preconditions (at least I think they will). Anyone who favors that approach should ask themselves this question: although we cannot set any preconditions, can they? I make this suggestion in light of a column by David Ignatius in today's Washington Post (via RealClearPolitics):

On the eve of the Baker-Hamilton commission's report, a top Iranian official set a tough condition for his country's help in stabilizing Iraq, saying that Tehran isn't interested in such cooperation unless the Bush administration sets a timetable for withdrawing its troops.

The Iranians are so clever, and I'm somewhat impressed by their ability to exploit the idea that we should set no preconditions in our negotiations with them. Once we decide that there should be no preconditions, the Iranians are suddenly empowered to set them. And it looks like they will.

With regard to the Iraq Study group's apparent suggestion that we should begin withdrawing troops and complete that withdrawal in 2008 if conditions permit, I have to say that I'm quite pleased. Boiled down to its essence, the opposing positions are these:

1. withdraw troops on a timetable regardless of the conditions on the ground in Iraq (e.g., "it's all a big civil war now, we can't do anything about it, let's get out before any more Americans get hurt")

2. maintain troops in Iraq until the Iraqi security forces can sustain the democratically elected government of Iraq, a government that will be an ally in the war against al Qaeda

There are a lot of semantic variants of option #2. You can say, "keep the troops in Iraq until we achieve victory." Or you can say, "maintain the troops until the Iraqis can handle security," which is essentially how I phrased it above. Or you can say, "withdraw the troops by 2008, assuming the Iraqis can maintain security by then." The last variant has superficial similarities to the John Murtha get-out-now strategy (i.e., it kind of looks like a timetable), but it's actually an endorsement of option 2, not option 1. If that is what comes out in the final report, I'm perfectly OK with it. Throwing a bone to the left with a semantic rephrasing of the victory option is a shrewd move.

Speaking of semantics, a lot of civilians are dying in Iraq right now. That's the reality. Is it a civil war? That's the semantic question. As I said before, if your definition of civil war is as simple as "a bunch of Iraqis killing a bunch of other Iraqis," then what is happening in Iraq is definitely a civil war. But, according to other reasonable definitions of that phrase, it is not a civil war. Moreover, to suggest that it isn't (i.e., to take the Bush position on that question) is not to be in a "state of denial." To see why, read this column (also via RealClearPolitics) by Army Major General William Caldwell (chief U.S. military spokesman in Iraq). Here are some extended excerpts:

I don't see a civil war in Iraq. I don't see a constituency for civil war. The vast majority of the people want hope for their families, not to massacre their neighbors or divide their country. A poll conducted in June by the International Republican Institute, a nonpartisan group that promotes democracy, found 89 percent of Iraqis supporting a unity government representing all sects and ethnic communities. No wonder no "rebel army" steps forward to claim credit for vicious car bombs and cowardly executions of civilians.
...
The Council of Representatives meets here in Baghdad as the sole legitimate sovereign representative of the people, 12 million of whom braved bombs and threats last December to vote. No party has seceded or claimed independent territory.
...
I see a representative government exercising control over the sole legitimate armed authority in Iraq, the Iraqi Security Force.
...
I don't see terrorist and criminal elements mounting campaigns for territory. Al-Qaeda in Iraq doesn't use roadside bombs, suicidal mass murderers and rocket barrages to gain and hold ground. Extremist Shiite death squads don't shoot people in the back of the head to further their control of the government. I do see random executions seeking to instill fear and insecurity. I don't see a struggle between armies and aligned political parties competing to rule.
...
I studied civil wars at West Point and at the Army Command and Staff College. I respect the credentials and opinions of those who want to hang that label here. But I respectfully -- and strongly -- disagree. I see the Iraqi people suffering from overlapping terrorist campaigns by extremist groups combined with the mass criminality that too often accompanies the sudden toppling of a dictatorship. This poses a different military challenge than does a civil war.

As the Iraqi people labor to build a country based on human rights and respect for all citizens, they are moving from the law of the gun to the rule of law. Violence will increase before life gets better. Those who know that freedom and democracy offer more hope than anarchy will not give up.

It's just a semantic issue, but semantics matter because many people do not pay close attention to what is going on. Applying the label "civil war" is something that most people will hear, and it makes it sound much more dire than it really is. Of course, if you want America to accept defeat in Iraq, then it helps your cause to make the situation seem more dire and more hopeless than it really is. Thta's the main reason why those on the left want to characterize what is happening in Iraq as a civil war. Calwell's column seems well reasoned to me, and being able to reasonably assert that Iraq has not fallen into a state of civil war helps our cause in support of a new democracy and against al Qaeda in Iraq. Thus, on the question of whether or not Iraq is in the midst of a civil war, I'll adopt his definition and conclude that it isn't.

Kofi Annan Longs for Saddam Hussein's Gentle Touch

The UN's Secretary General for the last 10 years is letting his true feelings about Iraq show through now that his term is coming to an end:

Annan also said many Iraqis must believe life is even worse now than it was under Saddam, who was sentenced to death last month by an Iraqi court after he was convicted of crimes against humanity. He is now on trial on charges arising from a campaign in the 1980s that killed tens of thousands of Kurds. If convicted, he could receive a second death sentence.

"If I were an average Iraqi obviously I would make the same comparison, that they had a dictator who was brutal but they had their streets, they could go out, their kids could go to school and come back home without a mother or father worrying, 'Am I going to see my child again?,'" Annan said.

The mind simply boggles. Yes, many Iraqis -- particularly the 6 million Sunnis who comprise only 20% of the Iraqi population -- believe that life is worse now than it was under Saddam Hussein. Back when the Sunnis were uniquely privileged at the expense of 80% of the population, life was undeniably better. For them. But if you read the polls from Iraq, as I do, then you'd know that even during the heightened level of violence that has been in effect since last February, the large majority of those who were liberated from Saddam's malevolent grip -- that is, the 20 million Kurds and Shiites in Iraq -- would rather have what they have now than what they had under Saddam Hussein's reign of terror. One thing they have now is hope for the future, hope that has not evaporated despite the sectarian violence. For some unfathomable reason, Kofi Annan would rather see the previously oppressed Kurds and Shiites once again ruthlessly oppressed despite their desire to be free. It's a truly bizarre attitude.

Based on a poll taken as recently as September, here is how the Iraqis respond when asked "Thinking about any hardships you might have suffered since the US/British invasion, do you personally think that ousting Saddam Hussein was worth it or not?":


Nearly 80% of the Kurds and Shiites would rather not be brutally oppressed by Saddam Hussein despite the increased sectarian violence. That tells you how horrible life under Saddam really was. Yet Kofi Annan simply asserts that life for Iraqis is worse now, and I can only assume that he feels that way because he wants it to be that way. He opposed the invasion, and he presided over Iraq's darkest period, a period he would have extended indefinitely had it been up to him.

Is that what it means to be liberal today? To wish that millions of people were once again ruthlessly oppressed even though they, themselves, are glad to be free despite the cost? Back during America's civil war, would Kofi Annan have similarly longed to see America's blacks sent back into slavery because more than 600,000 people died fighting over their fate? I assume so. To be liberal, I think, is to abhor all short-term violence despite the long-term consequences.

Under the tyrannical reign of Saddam Hussein, Mr. Annan says that at least kids could go to school and come back home without a mother or father worrying, "Am I going to see my child again?" No, that's a Michael-Moore-like fantasy. Iraq was not a kite-flying paradise before we overthrew its dictator. Children couldn't go to school and come back home safely because they were dying of malnutrition instead. Has Mr. Annan already forgotten about his own UNICEF report on childhood mortality in Iraq in the years before we invaded? Here is what UNICEF is:

The United Nations Children's Fund (or UNICEF) General Assembly on December 11, 1946. In 1953, its name was shortened from United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund, but is still known by the popular acronym based on this old name. Headquartered in New York City, UNICEF provides long-term humanitarian and developmental assistance to children and mothers in developing countries.

This UN agency also issues reports on occasion. Gareth Jones of UNICEF issued one such report in 1999 on "under-five" mortality in Iraq in the 1990s. It tells you all about how children were doing back in the days that Kofi Annan yearns for once again. Here is some of what Jones concluded:

A conclusion from chart 3 is that if the substantial reduction in the under-five mortality rate during the 1980s had continued through the 1990s, there would have been half a million fewer deaths of children under-five in the country as a whole during the eight year period 1991 to 1998.

And here is chart 3:


Look at the projected number of deaths in the year 2000. It would have been 20,000 without sanctions, but it was projected to be over 100,000 with them. Overall, it comes to more than 500,000 extra deaths in 8 years due to the economic sanctions (not counting many more extra deaths that occurred from 1998 and 2003). In fact, it's one reason why we tried the oil-for-food program, which we now know didn't save any children but was instead just a financial boon to Saddam Hussein (on Kofi Annan's watch, by the way).

In an article in the Nation entitled "A hard look at sanctions in Iraq" from back in 2001, we find that liberals once cared about the dire situation in Iraq that Kofi Annan longs to have back again:

Changing American policy in Iraq is an urgent priority, both for humanitarian reasons and as a means of addressing an intensely felt political grievance against the United States.
...
The grim question of how many people have died in Iraq has sparked heated debate over the years. The controversy dates from 1995, when researchers with a Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) study in Iraq wrote to The Lancet, the journal of the British Medical Society, asserting that sanctions were responsible for the deaths of 567,000 Iraqi children. The New York Times picked up the story and declared "Iraq Sanctions Kill Children." CBS followed up with a segment on 60 Minutes that repeated the numbers and depicted sanctions as a murderous assault on children. This was the program in which UN ambassador (and later Secretary of State) Madeleine Albright, when asked about these numbers, coldly stated, "The price is worth it."

I guess Kofi Annan thinks that the price was worth it, too. True, UNICEF is a hysterical liberal agency that is typically prone to exaggeration. But even more sober analyses put the number of under-5 deaths at about a quarter of a million through 1998 (conservatively). Mortality estimates for children in Iraq have come way down since those days such that tens of thousands of children who would have died each year are surviving now. Kofi Annan would rather have it the other way around, apparently. It's amazing how people conveniently forget about these "statistical children" as they watch al Qaeda bomb a market place full of innocent children. You can scream with rage at George Bush each time al Qaeda sets off a bomb to elicit that very reaction from you, but, when you do, you should credit Bush for the even larger number of unseen children who are alive today because of what Bush did (you can't do that, can you?).

Or might it be that the Secretary General wants Saddam back in power with the sanctions removed so that children would not be dying of malnutrition by the hundreds of thousands? Fine. But with the sanctions removed, the no-fly zones would have to go as well. With those impediments removed, Saddam Hussein would finally be free to pursue those WMDs that he fooled the world into believing that he already had, and he could resume his slaughter of Kurds and Shiites. Or has Kofi Annan forgotten about that, too? In the late 1980s, Saddam decided to rid himself of the Kurdish threat in what was called the Al-Anfal campaign. The Wikipedia entry on this topic says that:

The al-Anfal Campaign (Arabic: حملة الأنفال; Kurdish: Şallawî Enfal) was an anti-Kurdish campaign led by the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein between 1986 and 1989 (during and just after the Iran-Iraq war).
...
Independent sources estimate 50,000-100,000 deaths; Kurds claim about 182,000 people killed."

Then there were the 1991 uprisings that followed the first Gulf War. This Wikipedia entry says:

More than 2 million Kurds fled into the snowy peaks between Iran and Turkey. Children died from typhoid, dehydration and dysentery. Some refugees were blown up by land mines. At one point in 1991, an estimated 2,000 Kurds were dying every day. The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees called the exodus the largest in its 40–year history.

And the Shiites suffered horribly as well when they attempted to free themselves from Saddam Hussein:

"Our formal documents refer to over 100,000 victims (from 1991)," said Juhi. "The unofficial information we have that is not documented until now refers to more than 180,000 victims, but for us we talk about information that has been documented."

Does the Secretary think that those no-fly zones were put in place for no reason at all? This is what life was like before the US Air Force (and the Royal Air Force) put a stop to the carnage.

You can reasonably lament the current situation in Iraq, but it is simply preposterous to suggest that life was better under Saddam Hussein. The fact that the Secretary General of the United Nations would make such a claim despite all evidence to the contrary suggests that his psychological defense mechanisms and his hatred of George Bush have completely trumped his reasoning abilities. He obviously wants it to be the case that the period of time during which the UN was calling the shots in Iraq was vastly better than the period of time since George Bush has been calling the shots. It is, however, quite obviously the other way around (despite what you see covered every day by a media that thinks just like Kofi Annan does). Don't let Kofi Annan and his like-minded Bush-haters in the mainstream media get away with pretending that Michael Moore was right about Saddam Hussein's Iraq. It was a nightmare much worse than what we see today even though the media was not there to bring it to you live and in color every day. Out of sight, out of mind. Just because Kofi Annan thinks like that doesn't mean that you have to.

Iraq Symposium

Glenn Reynolds has asked bloggers to weigh in with new ideas about what should be done to facilitate progress in Iraq. Here is my idea, boiled all the way down to its essence:

Adopt an assumption.

And here is that idea described in somewhat more detail:

Accept the possibility that the Sunnis will never, ever accept their reduced status in Iraq (no matter what the political concessions might be in terms of oil rights and such), that they are going to violently resist for the foreseeable future, and they will ally themselves with al Qaeda if that's what it takes to restore themselves to power.

Once you adopt that assumption (i.e., once you become a realist in the non-James-Baker sense), everything else pretty much takes care of itself. For example, it immediately becomes clear that we cannot just abandon Iraq because it's not just a civil war. It's a war between, on the one hand, the U.S. and it's democratically elected ally in Iraq, and, on the other hand, embittered, irrational Sunnis and their al Qaeda allies. That's a war that not even Democrats would want to lose by withdrawing on a timetable, independent of conditions on the ground.

But Glenn is probably not looking for a new mental strategy (though I think that's what is mainly needed). He's looking for some new behavioral strategy that can be used to move things along in Iraq. Before trying my hand at the kind of answer I think he is really looking for, let me first outline what our overarching strategy in Iraq should be:

1. define the goal, which amounts to training Iraqi security forces to the point where they can sustain the democratically elected government of Iraq (a government that, like us, views al Qaeda as the enemy and opposes terrorism in general). Note that this goal does not envision peaceful coexistence between the Shiites and the Sunnis (see my assumption above for why that won't happen, at least not anytime soon). Perhaps they will eventually live in peace, but whether or not they do is not up to us. It's up to them.

2. Ask our military commanders on the ground in Iraq and in the higher command structure here at home whether that goal can be achieved and what it would take to achieve it.

3. If they say it cannot reasonably be achieved, withdraw on a timetable. Otherwise, do what they say.

So far, our military leaders are still confident that this goal can be achieved even though it is taking longer than they thought it would. Do the Democrats object to the goal as described above? Or do they share that goal but think that our military commanders are incompetent liars when they profess to being able to complete the job? I'd like to know.

Although that's what I think we should do, I still haven't really provided what Glenn is looking for. What new behavioral strategy -- specifically -- might be worth a try in Iraq? The strategy I outlined above is, essentially, the Bush strategy. It's not "stay the course" except insofar as it continues to advocate seeking input from our military commanders. Their strategy evolves as the situation on the ground warrants, which is why it is not just "stay the course."

But what can Bush do differently, beyond doing what the military suggests, to help achieve our goals in Iraq? Here's my new idea in a nutshell:

Declare war on the Iranian economy.

Here is that idea in more detail:

The Iranians export about 4 million barrels of oil a day, with some of its major customers being Japan, China and India. During the upcoming no-precondition negotiations with Iran that the James Baker group will presumably recommend, quietly explain that we are preparing to announce that the Iranians have effectively declared war on the US by stirring up trouble in Iraq and that the US further believes that Iran's oil industry may not be able to maintain its export capacity in the long term. As such, buyers should begin to seek alternatives while they still can. Saudi Arabia, which views Iran as a threat, might be willing to commit to increasing their oil output in the event of an actual disruption of oil exports from Iran. The Saudis now supply about 11 million barrels of oil per day, and they claim that they could easily bump that to 15 million barrels per day. Analysts disagree about whether or not they could do that (go here for the skeptical analysis), but they might be able to compensate for the loss of Iranian oil, and we are just taking about verbal threats and promises here.

Basically, I'm advocating placing Iran's oil fields at risk (instead of their nuclear facilities). The Iranian economy is rocky and could not withstand a reduction in oil revenues for any appreciable length of time. An announcement by the US that it might be prepared to disrupt Iranian oil export capacity would be taken seriously by countries thinking about signing long-term contracts with Tehran. You might, for example, see a lot less of this sort of thing:

In early 2003, a consortium of three Japanese companies acquired a 20% stake in the development of the Soroush-Nowruz offshore field in the Persian Gulf, a reservoir thought to hold 1 billion barrels of oil. One year later, the Iranian Offshore Oil Company awarded a $1.26 billion contract to Japan's JGC Corporation for the recovery of natural gas and natural gas liquids from Soroush-Nowruz and other offshore fields.

Note that we could disrupt business deals like these merely by making it clear that such deals are bad risks because of what we might be prepared to do in the not-too-distant future. In the short term, this announcement would cause the price of oil to shoot up, which would actually help Iran (and Iraq, for that matter). In the long term, though, countries that are dependent on oil from Iraq will seek more secure supply lines.

Be clear about what I'm recommending: according to my plan, we'd be threatening to make a threat. I'm not recommending that we start bombing Iranian oil fields (yet) or that we even openly declare that we are preparing to do that. I'm recommending that we make it clear to the Iranians that we will make that announcement if they continue to make trouble in Iraq.

Just the fact that we might be prepared to go public with this announcement would not go unnoticed in Iran, and it could help to effect a major shift in their political priorities. Also, the Europeans, with economies that are not in any position to withstand an oil shock, might get more serious about imposing sanctions on Iran to keep them from acquiring a nuclear bomb (and to keep us from making this announcement). Sanctions like that would be another way to declare war on the Iranian economy, even if the Russians and the Chinese refuse to sign on.

Iran is stirring up trouble in Iraq. As such, we should make it clear during the upcoming negotiations with them that we are planning to stir up real economic trouble in Iran (which means going after their oil, not their nukes).

That Rumsfeld Memo

Rumsfeld sent an interesting memo to the White House in the days before his departure. The memo set the context like this:

In my view it is time for a major adjustment. Clearly, what U.S. forces are currently doing in Iraq is not working well enough or fast enough. Following is a range of options:

Gee, what happened to the "state of denial" that everybody was supposedly in? Some of the options he presents are worth considering, even the ones that bear a family resemblance to proposals made by Democrats who cannot wait to secure defeat for America in Iraq (a defeat they consider to be perfectly appropriate given that Iraq was a "misadventure" from the outset). The difference between what Rumsfeld proposes and what eager defeatists propose can be summed up like this: "al Qaeda."

The defeatist/realist view of Iraq is that it's a civil war now, there's nothing we can do about it , so let's cut our losses and get out before any more Americans die. The stubborn/state-of-denial view (supposedly) is that al Qaeda is inducing sectarian violence in Baghdad and is operating in a big way in the Andbar province, too. As such, the withdrawal of American troops now would be perceived as a major victory for the terrorist organization that attacked us on 9/11. Rumsfled appreciates that fact, and I only wish that more of the defeatists who will soon be running things in congress could learn how to say the words "al Qaeda" without pretending that all of the terrorists are in Afghanistan.

Anyway, here are some interesting proposals from Rumsfeld:

Retain high-end SOF [Special Operations Force] capability and necessary support structure to target Al Qaeda, death squads, and Iranians in Iraq, while drawing down all other Coalition forces, except those necessary to provide certain key enablers for the ISF [Iraqi Security Force].

Rumsfeld is not necessarily advocating this approach, but he does present it as being infinitely preferable to simply withdrawing from Iraq in a state of denial (ironically) about al Qaeda. And this is probably just what we will do when Iraqi security forces can maintain the survival of the current government of Iraq. It's not our job to stop Iraqi-on-Iraqi violence. That's going to continue until the Sunnis finally realize that the game is over and that they either have to cooperate with the government (which means ending the insurgency) or be slaughtered by the majority Shiites. They appear to be choosing the latter option (though that may yet change), and there isn't much we can do about it. But our primary job is to leave behind a democratically elected government that can sustain itself and that is an active opponent of al Qaeda.

Another option that makes a lot of sense to me is this:

Stop rewarding bad behavior, as was done in Fallujah when they pushed in reconstruction funds, and start rewarding good behavior. Put our reconstruction efforts in those parts of Iraq that are behaving, and invest and create havens of opportunity to reward them for their good behavior. As the old saying goes, “If you want more of something, reward it; if you want less of something, penalize it.” No more reconstruction assistance in areas where there is violence.

We tried to win the hearts and minds of the Sunnis, but they have decided that their hatred for the Shiites and for America is more important that their own survival. It reminds me of that famous quote by Golda Meir:

"Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us."

The Palestinians are nowhere near that point and neither, it seems, are the Sunnis. Like the Palestinians, if the choice is between a better future for their children and self-destruction, they will choose the latter option every time. And, as I said, there is nothing we can really do about that. So, I like the Rumsfeld option of de-funding Sunni areas that support the insurgency. Here is another option I quite like:

Position substantial U.S. forces near the Iranian and Syrian borders to reduce infiltration and, importantly, reduce Iranian influence on the Iraqi Government.

That will not only reduce infiltration, it will worry our new well-meaning negotiating partners in peace (well, that's what they are if you are a "realist," anyway). Still another option that seems OK to me is this:

Withdraw U.S. forces from vulnerable positions -- cities, patrolling, etc. -- and move U.S. forces to a Quick Reaction Force (QRF) status, operating from within Iraq and Kuwait, to be available when Iraqi security forces need assistance.

I previously described this as a phased redeployment plan that I could live with because -- unlike the John-Murtha-endorsed redeployment plan -- it keeps the focus on ensuring our success in Iraq. And something like this is presumably what we already planned to do once we thought that the Iraqi security forces were ready to give it a try on their own (as Maliki says they will be in June of '07).

Another option listed by Rumsfeld seems too dicey to me:

Initiate an approach where U.S. forces provide security only for those provinces or cities that openly request U.S. help and that actively cooperate, with the stipulation being that unless they cooperate fully, U.S. forces would leave their province.

Sunni attitudes are changing in favor of keeping American forces in Iraq as the Sunnis are systematically annihilated by Muqtada al Sadr's Mahdi Army. Still, they mostly seem suicidally enraged over their new diminished status in Iraq, and they might refuse to request American help. If so, that would allow al Qaeda to move in unfettered, and it's hard to see how that would help anything. But if the Sunnis did request our help, that would amount to a sea change in the battle against al Qaeda in Iraq. As positive a development as that would be, it just seems too dicey to me. The Sunnis do not appear to acting in a rational manner, so I would expect an irrational response from them on this score.

Finally, the one terrible option listed by Rumsfeld is this:

Begin modest withdrawals of U.S. and Coalition forces (start “taking our hand off the bicycle seat”), so Iraqis know they have to pull up their socks, step up and take responsibility for their country.

As I have noted before, what is in doubt is our staying power, not our leaving power. The idea that we have to "send a message" to anyone to convince them that we might abandon those who have chosen to side with us in a life-or-death struggle is ridiculous. We proved our ability to do that when we abandoned the South Vietnamese, and then we proved it again when we allowed the Shiites to be slaughtered by Saddam Hussein after the first Gulf War (back when the first George Bush encouraged the Shiites and Kurds to rise up against the Iraqi dictator).

Everybody knows that America is capable of cutting and running. Half our country votes for politicians who openly want to do that. Even the Bush/Kerry contest was amazingly close, and no one in Iraq could imagine that -- with 47% of the nation prepared to vote for someone like John Kerry -- that America will never abandon its allies. The default assumption is that we will do that, which is why this option on Rumsfeld's list is the only one that never should have made it into that memo.

UPDATE: Up above, I said "It's not our job to stop Iraqi-on-Iraqi violence. That's going to continue until the Sunnis finally realize that the game is over and that they either have to cooperate with the government (which means ending the insurgency) or be slaughtered by the majority Shiites." Well, according to this story, the Sunnis have decided to be as self-destructive as the Palestinians reliably are:

Spokesman for Saddam's Baathist loyalists cites stringent conditions before any talks
SALAH NASRAWI
Associated Press

DAMASCUS, Syria - A man claiming to be the top spokesman for Iraq's former ruling party said the group will not stop aiding the insurgency or engage in national reconciliation efforts unless the U.S.-backed government in Baghdad accepts conditions that would lead to its end.

Among the demands are the complete withdrawal of American troops, the abolition of laws enacted since the ouster of Saddam Hussein's regime and trials of all Iraqis who cooperated with the United States and the U.S.-supported administration.

I somehow doubt that the other 80% of Iraqis (the Kurds and Shiites) are going to accept such demands. They'd rather use Shiite militias to systematically exterminate the Sunnis, and that's just what is going to happen, as far as I can tell. In fact, it already is happening, and it's just going to get worse. The Sunni insurgency seems to think that it is negotiating from a position of power. It's probably too late, but they had better come running to the negotiating table now or they'll be negotiating their own demise at the hands of Muqtada al Sadr later.

Lori Hill is a Bold Soldier

I received an e-mail from CENTCOM the other day describing the actions of a soldier who received a medal for meritorious action in Iraq. It's a pretty impressive story, so I decided to just pass it along:

Pilot Earns Distinguished Flying Cross

WASHINGTON, Nov. 3, 2006 — Back in March in Iraq , Chief Warrant Officer 3 Lori Hill, with the 2nd Squadron, 17th Cavalry Regiment, was piloting her Kiowa Warrior when the lead chopper came under heavy fire. She drew the fire away, simultaneously providing suppressive fire for the troops engaged with the enemy on the ground.



A rocket-propelled grenade hit her, damaging the helo’s instrumentation, but instead of focusing on her predicament, she established communication with the ground forces and continued to provide them with aerial weapon support until the soldiers reached safety.

As she turned her attention to the aircraft, which was losing hydraulic power, the helo took on machine-gun fire, a round crashing into one of Hill’s ankles. Still, with a damaged aircraft and an injury, she landed at Forward Operating Base Normandy, saving her crew and aircraft.

For her actions she was presented the Distinguished Flying Cross by Vice President Richard Cheney at Fort Campbell , Ky. , on Oct. 16.



“It’s was a once-in-a-lifetime thing to get the award and then have the vice president come and award it to you,” she said. “It’s just incredible for any soldier.”

Recalling that day in March, Hill reflected, “I was actually just glad I didn’t pass out and very happy I was able to help the ground guys out, and get our helicopter down safely on the ground.”

The Falling Dollar

The value of the dollar has been falling fast in relation to the euro lately. Here is its value relative to 1 euro over the last year:


The dollar will now buy you only about .76 euros (as shown in the graph), which is to say that 1 euro is worth about $1.31. The dollar's value is falling, but if you zoom out to the last 5 years, you can see that it hasn't changed all that much over the last couple of years:


Still, the American currency is undeniably weakening in relation to the euro. Is it a sign that the American economy is relatively weak? Hardly. The European economies are no match for the American economy, as I explained in detail here. Why, then is the value of the dollar falling? Partly because our economy is structurally sound and partly because we want it to fall even though the rest of the world does not (more on that below).

This issue was a hot topic of discussion back in 2004. Here is one interesting story about it from back then:

JANUARY 26, 2004

The Falling Dollar's World of Hurt
A continued decline would mean bad news for just about every part of the globe, and that has World Economic Forum attendees worried

The assumption of most executives, academics, and policymakers who have gathered to brainstorm in the upmarket Swiss ski resort is that despite strong U.S. economic growth, the dollar will continue to fall, especially against the euro.

Given the vast U.S. current-account and budget deficits, the greenback's further depreciation "is all but inevitable," says Alan S. Blinder, professor of economics at Princeton University. The widespread assumption in Davos is that it'll likely lose 10% to 20% more value against the euro over the next year. That would send it from $1.27 on Jan. 23 to between $1.40 and $1.50 in early 2005.

Well, I'm not sure that the budget deficit has much to do with it because that deficit is comparatively low right now (only about 1.9% of GDP), but the dollar is falling again anyway. The trade deficit is another story. That deficit is about 6% of GDP, which everyone agrees is too big, and it would be reduced by a less valuable dollar (which is precisely why a falling dollar is bad for Europe, not America):

RISING TENSIONS. The euro zone would likely bear the brunt of that readjustment. "Europe could have a tsunami coming its way," warns Moises Naim, editor of Foreign Policy magazine. The dollar's fall to date is having a dampening effect on Europe's already weak export-led recovery. A further decline would make matters much worse. Companies would find it much harder to sell their goods abroad. They would also lose domestic market share to cheap foreign imports, which would sap corporate profits and damage economic growth.
...
An even weaker dollar also would exacerbate strained U.S.-Europe economic relations. "We'd want Washington to help stem the dollar's slide, but they probably wouldn't want to do that, given that it helps U.S. exports," says the manufacturer. "I think cross-Atlantic tensions would increase dramatically."

So, although it might seem that one's pride should be wounded by the falling dollar, it's not really that way because it's not bad for America. This article also gets at what I believe to be a major reason for the dollar's decline:

NO STRATEGIC CHANGE. Even in the face of real economic pain, Europe probably wouldn't intervene unilaterally in the markets to nudge the euro down. The European Central Bank (ECB) only has $50 billion of reserves at its disposal -- hardly enough to take on the currency markets. The Japanese spent more than twice that amount last year in their attempts to slow the yen's rise.

Of course, the ECB could probably drive the euro down by cutting interest rates from today's 2% -- twice the U.S. level -- to 1.5%. But the ECB would find that hard to swallow, given its mandate to ensure price stability. Europe's rigid economy is more prone to inflation than its flexible American counterpart. So an interest rate cut could push inflation -- now about 2% -- way up.

And there you have it. Interest rates are higher in Europe, which is bad for Europe, but it does help to make the euro more valuable relative to the dollar. And if investors think that interest rates in America are not going up very much, whereas those in Europe are, that makes the euro more attractive than the dollar (because an investor can make more investing in euros than in dollars). Given the structural rigidity of the European economies, people may be betting that Europe's already higher interest rates will be going even higher (hence, the increased value of the euro).

Fast forward to 2006, and we have this story from yesterday's New York Times:

Volatile Dollar May Not Be Scary to Washington

WASHINGTON, Dec. 1 — As the dollar tumbled against the euro this week, reflecting fresh concern about a possible weakening of the American economy, Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. issued the usual phrase from the catechism: “A strong dollar is clearly in our nation’s best interest.”
...
But many economists say that Mr. Paulson’s statement does not reflect what the United States actually seeks right now. For one thing, the Bush administration is in active pursuit of a weaker dollar against China’s currency, which would probably encourage similar changes with other Asian competitors. The goal would be making American exports there less expensive, and imports more expensive, helping to spur an industrial revival at home.

And though there are high risks if the dollar were to continue to fall rapidly against the euro and the British pound, the United States is generally seen as hoping for the economic gains delivered by a lower dollar as American exports become more competitive against planes, machinery and other goods produced in Europe.

So again, despite what you might think, the falling dollar may be a blessing in disguise for America. This article then makes two points about the falling dollar, one of which is just silly and the other of which is pretty accurate:

Part of the reason for the dollar sell-off, many analysts say, has been a recent sense of disappointment about the American economy even as Europe has picked up some momentum, prompting traders to look for more promising investments in markets overseas. The prospect of higher interest rates in Europe while rates remain stuck or drift lower in the United States has also drawn funds out of the dollar.

The idea that investors believe that the European economies will outperform the American economy simply cannot be taken seriously. All one needs to do is check GDP growth and unemployment and productivity for the EU and compare it to America's. It's no contest, and that seems unlikely to change anytime soon. The higher interest rates in Europe, by contrast, do have something to do with the exchange rate shifting in favor of the euro. And whatever European recovery might have been in the works would have been driven by its exports (to America, largely) -- which is precisely what will be hurt by the falling dollar.

Here is a new story from the AP that (in my view) gets it right:

The euro has risen from below the US$1.30 mark over the past week amid expectations that the European Central Bank will continue to raise interest rates, while the Federal Reserve holds, or eventually cuts, rates.

Analysts said it did not appear that the trend would change anytime soon.

That's why the dollar is falling against the euro. Higher interest rates in Europe are not good for the Europeans, and the problem is compounded by the fact that those higher interest rates will serve to choke off any export-driven recovery that might have otherwise occurred over there (because those higher rates increase the value of the euro). I do not want to see the European economies stagnate. Not at all. I'm just pointing out that, ironically, it is the economic mess in Europe that largely accounts for the falling US dollar.

Let the Evidence Influence Your Opinion of the Death Penalty

A while ago, I posted some surprising information about the deterrent effect of the death penalty. Some people would be against the death penalty even if it saved innocent lives, but I have a more pragmatic view. That view is best summarized by considering the case of Danielle van Damme. You may remember it from a few years ago. This was a sweet 8-year-old girl who was snatched from her bed and then strangled to death so that 50-year-old David Westerfield could use her young body to gain a few minutes of sexual gratification. He has been sentenced to death for that crime, and if his execution would save other young girls from a similar fate, I'm all for it. I'd still be for it even knowing that, sometimes, an innocent person is put to death (it can be no other way). But if the death penalty did not have a deterrent effect, then although I'd still feel like killing David Westerfield (what normal person wouldn't?), my higher intellect would favor sentencing him to life in prison instead.

Many people are quite sure that the death penalty has no effect on the murder rate. They believe that its lack of effect has been demonstrated by empirical research, but this is quite wrong. In my earlier post on the subject, I mentioned a recent review of the relevant research entitled "THE DEATH PENALTY MEETS SOCIAL SCIENCE: Deterrence and Jury Behavior Under New Scrutiny" by Robert Weisberg of the Stanford University School of Law. His review was published in the Annual Review of Law and Social Science in 2005 (link here, though you might not have access if you are not at a university computer). In that review, he says this about what he calls "an impressive new generation of deterrence studies:"

...these recent studies, using modern regression techniques, find that executions have not just a significant but a substantial deterrent effect.

He is quick to point out that other scholars have found fault with this new research are so are not persuaded by it. Still, it is fair to say that virtually all of the recent research on the subject has supported the conclusion that the death penalty has a deterrent effect. I'll bet you didn't know that. Like me (until fairly recently), you probably thought that all the research showed otherwise.

Recently, I stumbled across this web page that purported to show some interesting data supplied by the Bureau of Justice. The results were stunning, but no link was provided to the numbers, so I had my doubts. I went to the Bureau of Justice web site myself and collected data on the murder rate since 1950 (number of murders per 100,000, which can be found here) and the number of executions each year since 1950 (found here). There is a lot of variability in the number of executions because it went out of style in the 1960s and the Supreme Court even suspended executions in the United States between 1973 and 1976, which obviously kept the execution rate at zero for a while.

The question is this: What happened to the murder rate when executions ceased? It's the closest thing we have to an experimental investigation of the issue, and here is the amazing story:


The number of executions (blue line) can be read off the vertical axis on the left and the murder rate (magenta line) can be read off the vertical axis on the right. What you see is a fairly clear result: as the execution rate falls, the murder rate goes up, and as the execution rate goes up, the murder rate goes down. The correlation coefficient is a whopping -.70, which is highly, highly significant (p < .0001).

It's important to emphasize that a correlation does not establish a causal connection (a point I made rather emphatically with respect to the theory that Bush's popularity is determined by the price of gas). Still, the timing looks reasonably convincing. Executions dropped to low levels in the mid 1960s, and that's about when the murder rate started to rise dramatically. Executions came back on line in the mid 1980s, and the murder rate began to drop a few years later. The execution rate has dropped again in the last few years, and the decrease in the murder rate has come to a halt. Had the correlation gone the other way (i.e., if a higher execution rate were associated with a higher murder rate), you can be absolutely sure that death penalty opponents would be using that information to support their case. But there is a clear inverse correlation between these two variables, so you never hear about it.

I am simply amazed by these results. The interpretation is open to debate, but the numbers themselves are not. Why isn't this chart more widely known? What people seem to be aware of are statistics that are much less relevant. For example, many people know that states that have the death penalty tend to have high murder rates, whereas states that do not have the death penalty tend to have low murder rates. To some, this proves that the death penalty -- far from having a deterrent effect -- actually makes the problem worse, but that's ridiculous. The obvious alternative explanation is that states with a high murder rate enact the death penalty in an effort to bring it down.

Common sense says that the more severe the penalty, the greater the deterrent effect. That's one reason why you don't get a mere month in jail for forcible rape like you might for passing bad checks. Why would this principle cease to operate when the penalty becomes extremely severe? It doesn't make sense that it would, and all of the recent evidence suggests that what doesn't make sense is also not true.

The evidence suggests that when David Westerfield is put to death, young girls will be slightly less likely to suffer the horrible fate that Danielle van Damme suffered at the hands of this monster. You are welcome to feel morally superior if, on the day he is put to death, you stand in the rain with a candle protesting the actions of the state. But your sense of superiority (if you are the kind of person who would experience that) should be tempered by the possibility that if you manage to rescue that wretched killer from his appointment with death, you will condemn other young girls to that fate instead of him.