ExtremeWisdom

Straight From Best of the Web

We don't often cut & paste whole sections from our friends in the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy, but sometimes the eloquence & reason are too clear not to.

Best of the Web Excerpt:

Liberalism in Hoc
In the Middle East, things seem to be working out according to President Bush's plan. Before the liberation of Iraq, the president argued that removing Saddam Hussein from power would pave the way for a democratic Iraq and make it possible for democracy to spread throughout the Arab world. The Washington Monthly's Kevin Drum totes up the progress:

Elections in Iraq and Egypt. Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon. Voluntary disarmament in Libya. New progress between Israel and the Palestinians. A lot has happened in the Middle East since the invasion of Iraq two years ago.

Drum grudgingly acknowledges that the president may deserve some credit for all this, but other Monthly writers are at pains to deny it. Funniest of all is goofball general Wesley Clark, who seems to deny that the liberation of Iraq had anything to do with democracy even in Iraq:

Democracy can't be imposed--it has to be homegrown. In the Middle East, democracy has begun to capture the imagination of the people. For Washington to take credit is not only to disparage courageous leaders throughout the region, but also to undercut their influence at the time it most needs to be augmented. Let's give credit where credit is due--and leave the political spin at the water's edge.

Marc Lynch, participating in an online Monthly debate, echoes the sentiment:

One of the most misleading ideas out there has to do with the supposed novelty of Arab demands for democratic reforms. The conventional wisdom that the invasion of Iraq triggered the first public Arab conversations about democracy is just flat wrong. Arabs have been talking about the need for reform and protesting against the status quo since long before the Iraqi war. . . . Iraq, and Bush, may have helped to open up some political opportunities (and to foreclose others), but credit for the so-called Arab spring should go to the Arab intellectuals and activists who have long been pushing for change for their own reasons.

This is very similar to the rationale we heard for not crediting Ronald Reagan with the democratic revolution that toppled the Soviet Empire: The Soviets were going to collapse of their own accord anyway; Reagan was just in the right place at the right time. Of course, by the time Reagan died last year, hardly anyone was still claiming this, and blogger David Adesnik notes that the same is likely to be true for Bush:

I think we know a reasonable amount about who gets to take credit when good things happen. Throughout his [re-election] campaign, Bush kept insisting that there could be a democratic revolution in the Middle East. Then he devoted his entire inaugural address to that subject.

In contrast, John Kerry kept talking about how we shouldn't be closing firehouses in Ohio while opening them in Baghdad. For their part, the center-left punditocracy kept projecting a deeper quagmire in Iraq while dismissing the democratic domino theory as a neo-con fantasy.

In other words, the differences between Bush and his critics were anything but subtle. Both sides had placed their bets on very different sets of outcomes. Moreover, Bush placed his bets on a set of outcomes with very, very long odds. And because Bush gambled his reputation on something so uncertain and so unusual, he will get to take credit for it, regardless of whether or not he got lucky.

To which we would add that it would be a lot easier to take the left's post hoc analysis seriously if anyone on that side of the fence had the foresight to see, ante hoc, that democratic changes were coming in Eastern Europe and the Arab world.

As far as we remember, the people now saying that Arab democratization was bound to happen anyway are the same ones who were aruging beforehand not only that Bush's policies would have disastrous consequences but that status quo "stabliity" was the best we could hope for. Likewise, who on the left predicted the collapse of the Soviet system? (Daniel Patrick Moynihan, yes, but he was by some definitions a "neocon.")

Even if we assume for the sake of argument that Bush just "got lucky"--and boy, that's some lucky streak we right-wing war mongers have racked up--his critics were still wrong, and they cannot be taken seriously now.

More on Why Bush will "Win" the Social Security Debate

If you read this post, you'll see why I think Bush has already won the Social Security Debate.

Here is more evidence that I was right.

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Bush takes on still more political risk (Linda Feldmann, 5/02/05, The Christian Science Monitor)

George W. Bush is a well-known risk-taker - and well-known for not giving up when he has a bee in his bonnet.

As with Iraq, so with Social Security, the president has made clear that he is pressing ahead in his goal of dramatic change. Even though his much-vaunted "60-day, 60-stop" barnstorming campaign to sell the public on Social Security reform has ended, the events continue without a break.

On Tuesday, Bush will hold a "conversation on strengthening Social Security" at a Nissan manufacturing plant in Canton, Miss., and on Wednesday, Social Security will be the focus when he appears at the Latino Coalition's Small Business Conference here in Washington.

The only alteration will be the message: He has heightened public attention to Social Security's eventual shortfalls and made his pitch for "voluntary personal retirement accounts." Now, despite solid Democratic opposition to his plan and slippage in polls, Bush is ready to start addressing the system's solvency issue with a plan to reduce benefits for 70 percent of future retirees, while keeping low-income workers out of poverty.

"He doesn't have anything to lose," says John Zogby, an independent pollster. "But oddly enough, he still could emerge a winner on this by compromise, by being the guy who moved the dime on the issue. We're talking about indexing according to inflation, we're talking about raising the retirement issue. Those were equally third-rail pieces of Social Security, and now they're on the table, at least."

Don't bother mentioning the reason

Well well well.  It appears as if the Middle East is witnessing a "reformation" or "renaissance" of sorts.  This is only the beginning.

Let's pretend that Iraq has nothing to do with this.

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Excerpt:

Some Judges in Egypt Lend Voice to Chorus for Reform (Megan K. Stack, May 2, 2005, LA Times)

The rebellion erupted last month in the sober, stolid quarters of the Alexandria Judges' Club: 1,200 magistrates publicly demanded judicial independence from an all-powerful president, and threatened to refuse to certify fall elections if they didn't get it. [...]

The judges' demand is a symptom of a new, unpredictable energy that has seized Egyptian politics after decades of stagnation — and of the popular discontent snowballing in the region.

The "Reformation" Continues

Kuwaiti women get voting rights (Reuters, 20 April 2005)

Kuwait’s parliament approved a law yesterday allowing women to vote and run for the first time in municipal elections in the country, fuelling hopes for wider female suffrage.

“The National Assembly approves women’s participation in the Municipal Council elections,” state news agency Kuna reported.

Kuwaiti women are not allowed to vote or run in parliamentary polls but the government has introduced a bill to grant full female suffrage that has yet to be approved by the 50-man house.

Has Bush already won Social Security

The short answer is "Yes." The political dynamics have already pushed Bush over the top.  Such are the results of Leadership.  Observe....

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Wall Street Journal Op-Ed Excerpt:

Why would the president risk his political capital on a plan that appears doomed to failure? I think the answer lies well beyond the politics of any single reform plan. And the president may end up a winner if his call for personal accounts ultimately fails. After all, he has raised a serious issue that needs attention--the very solvency of Social Security--which Democrats have never touched. Huge majorities of voters understand that the current system is in trouble. He will, at the very least, get credit for trying to reform the program previously referred to as the "third rail of American politics"--even if he achieves more modest change than he now proposes.

But there is a much bigger picture. The president's real prize would be a significant realignment in party politics. It has been no secret that Mr. Bush and Karl Rove have their sights set on a political realignment not experienced since FDR built a coalition of urban ethnics, liberal ideologues and Southern conservatives under the Democrats' big tent. Like the New Deal, the president's "ownership society" is a compelling new vision and veritable redefinition of a society less dependent on government largess, of a middle class more independent and more capable of securing financial security on its own....

To the president and Republicans: You may lose the battle over Social Security personal accounts, but ultimately you may very well win the war over party realignment. To the Democrats: Just saying no is not a policy and demographics are not destiny. Ignore the "ownership society" at your own peril.

click the image

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Next, let's look at the hole the Democrats have dug for themselves.  This National Review piece finds some interesting numbers under the surface.

Excerpt:

"Barely a third of the public approves of the way President Bush is dealing with Social Security," writes the Washington Post's Richard Morin, "and a majority says the more they hear about Bush's plan to reform the giant retirement system, the less they like it, according to a new Washington Post/ABC News poll."

Yet inside the same Post poll, there is news that 56 percent of those surveyed say they would support "a plan in which people who chose to could invest some of their Social Security contributions in the stock market," which is the centerpiece of the president's still-to-be-unveiled Social Security proposal. Forty-one percent say they would oppose such a plan, while three percent have no opinion.

The 56-percent support figure — 60 percent and higher among respondents under 50 years of age — is the highest level of support on that question in the last six Post polls going back before the 2000 election. The 41-percent figure is the lowest level of opposition in the last six Post polls going back before the 2000 election.

"Barely a third of the public approves of the way President Bush is dealing with Social Security," writes the Washington Post's Richard Morin, "and a majority says the more they hear about Bush's plan to reform the giant retirement system, the less they like it, according to a new Washington Post/ABC News poll."

Yet inside the same Post poll, there is news that 56 percent of those surveyed say they would support "a plan in which people who chose to could invest some of their Social Security contributions in the stock market," which is the centerpiece of the president's still-to-be-unveiled Social Security proposal. Forty-one percent say they would oppose such a plan, while three percent have no opinion.

The 56-percent support figure — 60 percent and higher among respondents under 50 years of age — is the highest level of support on that question in the last six Post polls going back before the 2000 election. The 41-percent figure is the lowest level of opposition in the last six Post polls going back before the 2000 election.

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The fact is that the Democrats have the power to stop a bill this year.  This only gives Bush a "do nothing Dems" stick with which to beat them.  If they deal on the issue, Bush will happily take their watered down bill because he gets more than they do out of it.

Simply put, if the Dems deal, and force "supplementary" personal accounts, benefit cuts, and ceiling increases, they will claim victory.  The truth however, is that these accounts will grow at a faster rate, and the consitutency for larger and more individualized accounts will grow.  Further, Rebuplicans will have all the cover they need on Social Security as far as the eye can see.

Republicans will point out that it was the Dems that forced the benefit cuts, age and ceiling increases, while the personal accounts were a Republican idea.

Genius, it tell you. Genius.  You don't believe me?  Check this out.

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Excerpt from a Washington Post "progressive":

Last year Democrats impaled themselves on the Iraq war. They were so anxious to denounce the invasion that they failed to acknowledge the most basic point of all: that, having waded into Iraq, the United States could not leave prematurely. By attacking the Bush policy relentlessly, Democrats sounded negative. By refusing to say clearly that they would finish the Iraq job, they sounded irresponsible.

Now Democrats risk making the same mistake on Social Security. They are so anxious to denounce private accounts that they fail to acknowledge the most basic point: Social Security has a serious deficit. The Post reported Friday that nearly every Democratic senator refuses even to contemplate the Bush proposals. But the Democrats have no proposal of their own. They sound negative and irresponsible.

This is a mistake, first, because it's bad for the country. [...]

A progressive Democratic Party would introduce its own Social Security reform bill. It could be based on the package designed by Gene Sperling -- a mix of benefit cuts, tax hikes, and add-on personal savings accounts targeted at poor and middle-income workers. The progressives could point out that their plan fixes not only the Social Security deficit but also the national savings deficit, since add-on personal accounts involve extra contributions from workers and extra tax collection by the government.

But progressive Democrats should also admit the truth about Republican proposals: They're a heck of a lot better than leaving Social Security's deficit to get worse.

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All Bush has to do is take the Dems up on any offer, and he's won the issue.  If the Dems don't deal, the President already is ahead of the game based upon the current poll numbers - all based upon the simple fact that he's already more credible than they are on trying to fix the problem.

If only the left could find some one who understood leadership....

Bush, Democracy, & the Direction of the Wind

Here is a post from my favorite blog, which in turn is posting from another great blog.

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It is barely six weeks since the US President delivered his second inaugural address, a paean to liberty and democracy that espoused the goal of "ending tyranny in our world". Reactions around the world ranged from alarm to amused scorn, from fears of a new round of "regime changes" imposed by an all-powerful American military, to suspicions in the salons of Europe that this time Mr Bush, never celebrated for his grasp of world affairs, had finally lost it. No one imagined that events would so soon cause the President's opponents around the world to question whether he had got it right. [...]

The winds of change

Libya

No sign yet of democracy arriving in the Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamiriyah. Although once regarded by the West as a pariah state, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's decision to take responsibility for the Lockerbie bombings and renounce WMD brought it back into the fold. However it remains a dictatorship.

Palestinian Authority

The post-Arafat era has begun. Palestinians voted for a new president in January's free elections and a parliamentary poll is set for July. New leader Mahmoud Abbas is raising hopes of peace but it is still unclear whether he will be able to exert control over militant groups and negotiate a territorial deal with Israel.

Lebanon

Assassination of former prime minister Rafik Hariri acted as a catalyst for change. Syria today begins withdrawing its forces to the eastern Bekaa Valley. Free elections may take place in May after protests brought Black down the pro-Syrian Sea government. Not known when a final pull-out of Syrian forces will take place.

Syria

Washington and Damascus are locked in a dialogue of the deaf. President Bashar Assad refuses to relinquish his trump cards (support for Hizbollah and radical Palestinians) as long as conflict with Israel over Golan Heights continues. Blamed for the murder of Rafik Hariri, Assad has reluctantly ordered his forces in Lebanon to pull back.

Iraq

Bush and his allies believe democracy is finally flowering in Iraq. Eight million voted to elect government in January. A constitution enshrining personal, political and religious freedoms is to be drawn up by October. But a bloody insurgency continues to mar progress. The under-representation of Sunnis in the new government will be a problem.

Egypt

President Hosni Mubarak -- unopposed in power since 1981 -- surprised the West in February announcing multi-candidate presidential elections for September. Health troubles have sparked succession worries though Mubarak has denied a plan for dynastic succession by his son Gamal. A close US ally, Egypt receives $3bn a year in tied aid.

Saudi Arabia

Fearful of change, accustomed to a system in which it holds enormous power and privileges, the Saudi royal family views serious reform as a risk not worth taking, although the greatest risk to its survival comes from doing nothing at all. Elections for local councils were recently held for the first time, but women were barred from voting.

Yemen

Yemen is a fragile not a failed state. A nascent democracy with the most open political system in the Arabian Peninsula, its government has shown a general commitment to developing the instruments of a modern state and has cooperated with international efforts to uproot the al-Qa'ida network. Presidential elections planned for this year.

Kuwait

Kuwait's parliament has agreed to speed up moves towards a law to grant women the same political rights as men. The decision came amid noisy street rallies by women activists. The country's ruler, Sheikh Jabir al-Ahmad al-Sabah, is moving slowly towards giving women the vote. But political parties remain outlawed.

Bahrain

Voted in 2001 to become a constitutional monarchy with elected parliament and independent judiciary.

Qatar

Greater political openness since current head of state came to power in 1995. Democratic elections were held in 1999.