Chris Preble raises a good point. Bi-partisanship should not be an end in itself. A primary obligation for each party is to lay out a coherent and comprehensive foreign policy vision for the country. For the party out of the White House, this is essential, since they lack the policymaking platform of the presidency. Between now and 2008, there will surely be many efforts to do so – most recently this useful contribution from the DLC. Similarly, there is the responsibility of each party – and members of each party – to stand on principle when they strongly oppose the actions of the other.

But a coherent ideology does not necessarily translate into good policy. Neo-conservatives had a usefully coherent philosophy after 9/11. The more nuanced, moderate governing philosophies within the government – notably in Colin Powell’s State Department – lacked the sharp edges and clear definition of the neo-conservatives. But, in retrospect, it is clear that the implementation of a sharp-edged, black and white, world-view has not served the United States well.

Before the war in Iraq, if some of the ideas in the Democratic Party (and from within the Republican Party) had been given a fuller airing within Congress – for instance, a more robust effort to assess the potential costs of the war, the post-war planning for Iraq, and the consideration of a more inclusive role for the UN and international partners – we might not be in the dire straits we find ourselves within today.

The problem is when partisan foreign policy ideas become fodder for pitched political battles. So you cannot hold hearings on the potential cost of the Iraq war because it does not fit with the political goal of selling the war and painting the Democratic Party as weak. Or you cannot assess the treatment of detainees in the war on terror because, well, because of the same concerns – selling the war, painting the Democratic Party as weak. Or, you hammer the Republicans on the Dubai Ports deal because it scores political points – nevermind the fallout in the Arab and Islamic world, or the implausibility that the ports deal was going to somehow enable terrorists to smuggle nuclear materials into U.S. ports.

Elections matter. So do the partisan platforms that get parties elected, and which guide foreign policy after elections. But bi-partisanship – in the form of consultation, consensus-building, and robust oversight – yields better policy. It ensures that opposing views are brought to bear, unintended consequences are considered, and policies both reflect the will of a broader segment of the American population, and stand up to more careful consideration. That may be one of the lessons from this era of partisan, one-party government.

easyboyfriend free moviesmovies free 69 suckingbestiality movie freemovies free pussy blackfree sex downloadable moviesfree clips fuck moviecock free movies monsterpornstar briana free movies on banksclips porn and free moviesgagging free cock xxx movie clips

There is strong bipartisan support for stopping the bloodshed in Darfur, Sudan. Many rightfully cheered the peace agreement reached in Abuja last week, including PSA’s Brian Vogt.

The 150-page plus agreement is good news – and calls for disarming the Janjaweed militias by October and the rebel groups after that. The ambitious accord (summary or whole agreement here) also directs the creation of buffer zones around the camps of internally displaced persons (IDPs) within Sudan and providing for humanitarian access corridors where rebel forces and Sudanese Armed Forces cannot go. 

Ok, that’s really easy. 

To get a feeling of the scale of the problem, look at the humbling maps constructed by the State Department’s Humanitarian Information Unit, showing the vast areas of IDP camps — the places needing protection. Then look at their map demonstrating the wide areas of attacks during 2005, to understand how big a task it is likely to be.

Whose job will this be? Certainly the parties to the agreement are expected to live by it – including the Government of Sudan, the Janjaweed and rebel groups. But an expanded role is also being directed for the African Union (AU) mission in Sudan, now comprised of roughly 7,000 personnel. (FYI: The AU’s first peacekeeping operation was in Burundi, in 2003. Darfur is the second operation.) In March, the members of the Security Council directed the UN headquarters staff to prepare plans for the AU mission to transition to a United Nations operation. While Khartoum has opposed the UN deploying to Darfur, the AU commander recently called for the UN to provide support, as has the United States.

With the Darfur agreement in hand, planning for a stronger peace operation there can really take hold. The United Nations, however, is strapped, leading 15 other peace operations with over 80,000 military and civilian personnel in the field. A new mission in Darfur – the size of Texas – will need nations to provide more than lip service to the UN and offer capable and sizable forces, equipment and financing at a minimum. Congress is on the verge of approving $130 million in the fiscal year 2006 appropriations supplemental for peacekeeping in Darfur. This funding is badly needed, especially at a time when the US budget for UN peace operations is already short by hundreds of millions and the Bush Administration has not yet asked Congress for what it really needs for 2007, including for Darfur.  

Hmmm, news flash. Sen. Joe Biden apparently believes in reincarnation, which would make him the Shirley MacLaine of the Senate. It seems that in a previous life he must have been H.L. Mencken, the sage from Baltimore. How else to explain his recent policy prescription for Iraq, to partition it? It is proof of what Mencken famously said, “For every problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.”

I guess that if we needed any further proof that Biden is planning to run for president in 2008 this is it. All candidates must, by definition, be able to claim credit for at least one really boneheaded proposal, and this certainly qualifies.

Of course, Biden didn’t dream this up all by himself. He is merely providing a vehicle for Leslie Gelb, formerly an assistant secretary in Jimmy Carter’s State Department and currently president emeritus of the Council for Foreign Relations, who has been peddling this idea for years. He first proposed this idea, less than seven months after President Bush proclaimed “mission accomplished.” Gelb was advocating partition even before all the present troubles emerged and before there had been a single Iraqi election.

(Note to Council: you might want to rethink that whole “nonpartisan center for scholars dedicated to producing and disseminating ideas so that individual and corporate members, as well as policymakers, journalists, students, and interested citizens in the United States and other countries, can better understand the world and the foreign policy choices facing the United States and other governments.”).

Biden spelled out his ideas in article with Leslie Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, in a New York Times op-ed “Unity Through Autonomy in Iraq” May 1 and in a speech before the World Affairs Council of Philadelphia. Although Biden says his plan is not a call for partition it is hard to see what else it could be.

Though, in fairness, Gelb and Biden, aren’t the only ones who support partition. There are others who think it inevitable. See, for example, this article by Gareth Stanfield of the University of Exeter in the British Prospect magazine.

What’s wrong with it? Let me count the ways. Here is what some of the regional and country experts say. (more…)

We give university chapters of our organization discretion in planning their events on campus, hoping they’ll use that freedom wisely to promote a responsible vision for U.S. leadership in the world. Unfortunately, one of our chapters at the University of Chicago recently used that freedom to make our country less safe. The event, entitled “Free Speech and the Danish Cartoons,” displayed the Danish cartoons that sparked controversy worldwide and then had a cadre of free speech advocates explain why the media should have broadcast these images more widely.

In my last blog entry, I wrote about how the media and politicians were basking in our differences, while Americans across the country were taking our similarities seriously. My hope was that the common sense of Americans might trickle up to the Washington divisionaries. But this event at U Chicago is definitely a set back to my thesis that our citizens are more mature than our leaders. On the Danish cartoons issue, it’s been our leaders in Washington who appear to understand the national security imperative of tolerance and understanding.

And its the students at this recent event at the University of Chicago who do not get it. They believe the decision by our government and media leaders not to show the cartoons was mistake. According to them, “our inaction leads to bigger responses from radical Islamists” and so we need to broadcast these cartoons as far as possible so “they” know we’re not cowards. We need to speak freely no matter the consequences.

I think this is the dead wrong way to understand the cartoon issue. (more…)

These days it seems that good news is hard to come by.  When I open the paper in the morning I usually brace myself for another onslaught of destruction and desperation – whether that be Iraq, Iran, or the many conflicts in Africa.  However, today I was greeted by the good news that it seems that the largest rebel group operating in Darfur has been convinced to sign onto a peace agreement.  I’ve written previously that this horrible genocide deserves immediate action by both Democrats and Republicans and I feel somewhat encouraged by events in the past week that this actually happened. 

On Sunday I attended the Save Darfur rally on the national mall.  I’ve been to my share of political rallies before.  Most of the ones that I’ve attended draw a similar cadre of people – usually those who would consider themselves on the political left.  This rally, however, was certainly a much more diverse group.  There were the expected internationalist do gooders, but also substantial representation from fundamentalist Christians.  There also were a large number of Jewish groups in attendance.  The speakers at the rally also were an interesting mix that included both Democrats (Nancy Pelosi, Barak Obama, Jon Corzine) and Republicans (Frank Wolf, Michael Steele).  While the speakers overall tended Democratic, I was encouraged by the Republican representation. 

On Sunday night it seemed that the peace talks had broken down because the rebel groups had rejected the proposed agreement.  Granted, it seems that the Sudanese government supported the agreement only after it was clear that it wouldn’t pass due to rebel opposition.  Nevertheless, the Bush administration made a last ditch effort to salvage this agreement.  Robert Zoellick, who has been very personally invested in the issue, was sent over to help renegotiate this seemingly doomed deal.  After several extended deadlines, Zoellick’s participation along with that of Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo seemed to provide the final push necessary to save the deal.  (more…)

I don’t want to focus too much on one topic, but the price of oil and gasoline is on everyone’s mind these days. Especially mine, since I gave a talk today on a panel on “America’s Oil Addiction and National Security” at Dartmouth College. My talk was about ways that the U.S. can (and especially cannot) use foreign policy to affect the price of oil. Foreign policy is a poor tool for dealing with many economic problems, and oil prices are no exception.

Many people in the audience — smart, engaged people, some students and some from the surrounding community — have trouble thinking about oil as an economic commodity. It just seems too important to our prosperity (and to the environment, which came up frequently in the Q&A session) to leave to supply and demand.

But the truth is that there really is an underlying price of oil, set by supply and demand. (more…)

Bipartisanship.  It’s a word that gets tossed around loosely inside the thick walls of Dirksen and Longworth.  Almost universally, its usage is meant to appeal to the silent majority of our country; the masses that would see our leaders place the issues ahead of party lines.  At no time in recent history has bipartisan effort been more difficult and scarcer, and at the same time, rarely has it been so important.  Yet, in spite of the growing need for true and uniting leadership to emerge from Capitol Hill, we must be conscious enough of why we demand bipartisan efforts to reject the recent political phenomenon that occurred during the DP World deal:  bipartisanship for its own sake.

The events surrounding the attempt of Dubai Ports World to obtain ownership of several major US ports need no review.  From a political perspective, the only point I want to raise is how quickly and seamlessly Democrats and Republicans banned together to strike down an otherwise legitimate business deal.  Contrary to what some believe, this movement did nothing to indicate that Washington is still capable of interjecting a thoughtful, factual debate on foreign policy or any other issue.  Rather, it only served to reflect the very worst in bipartisan consensus in that it lowered the threshold of leadership to the point that both parties sought merely to respond to a base protectionist view.

Back, now, to the why.  With bipartisanship – I mean true bipartisanship – our country has an unlimited, unfiltered source of ideas from which to choose the best and brightest.  But if we get too caught up in party lines, the number of ideas and opinions starts to diminish until we’re back down to two:  Dems vs Reps. The problem with bipartisanship for its own sake is that it results in a scenario much closer to the latter than the former.  In the paradigm of Dubai ports, the party lines were less visible, but not to facilitate meaningful debate (excepting the efforts of the Administration and a few senators) and diverse opinions.  Rather, so many of the politicos used bipartisan efforts as a bandwagon to carry them as far from the President as possible.  In other words, they only wanted to be bipartisan because that looked better to the American public than what was really happening.  This preempted much of the discussion on important related issues like Dubai’s potential role in the War on Terror, or the US’s military presence in the Middle East (including countries other than Iraq).  

Washington politicians now find themselves with something they may never see again…a second chance.  A UAE company named Dubai International Capital is in the process of purchasing a British Defense group with US security connections.  Sound familiar?  It should.  The deal went through a 45-day review by CFIUS, after which President Bush signed off on it.  Thus far, there has been little outcry from either side of the aisle.  My hope is that this reflects the true bipartisan spirit – one that sets a stage for Democrats and Republicans to discuss the important issues of foreign investment in the US, and the inevitable repercussions manifested in US investment abroad.   

Has bipartisan dialogue ended?  Certainly not.  But I think our nation would benefit from a few more passionate arguments to jumpstart that conversation.

Not that any of us want more screeching debates masquerading as a foreign policy dialogue.  But where are the robust arguments across party lines?  I wonder if our lack of conversation about some topics is partly why we lack a bipartisan approach to foreign policy.  We may simply look at – and worry about – different problems.  We exist in alternative universes.

In today’s fractured political environment, for example, think tanks and policy institutes look at modern issues and offer new ideas to all comers.  But, are they looking at the same questions?  Sure, you can find reports and opinions offered across the political spectrum on some hot issues: Iraq, energy, WMD, intelligence and this week, Iran and China.  Look deeper and you find some regional and topical debates across party lines – some. 

But dig a little further and the conversation drops off.  Do progressive organizations look at the structure of US defense budgets and military forces, think about Syria and North Korea, and analyze how doctrine for stability operations should be designed?  Not too many.  Do conservative groups look at how to better organize US interagency resources for post-conflict operations, promote peace efforts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo or fret about environmental degradation of the Amazon or oil-rich Niger Delta?  Very few.  For many foreign and defense policies, we appear cubby-holed by issue areas, segregated roughly by where we line up on concern for hard power or soft power, and what we see as the greatest concerns for the United States.

I’ve often seen the results – such as when I sought analysis as a Hill defense staffer on the Navy’s air wing configuration or frigate radars for detecting incoming missiles – and trusted progressive sources had little to say.  More recently, I hosted a workshop on US training of African and other foreign militaries for peacekeeping operations – an initiative of President Bush – and found few conservative thinkers on the subject. 

The Partnership for a Secure America argues that “Policy differences must always be debated, but growing partisan bitterness dangerously interferes with substantive discussion of our national security and foreign policy.” That is clearly true, but what if we aren’t even debating? 

I was opposed to the Iraq War from the outset, but my opposition was never based on the president’s supposedly unilateral approach to removing Saddam Hussein from power. For one thing, multilateralism has its limits. Sometimes a nation has no choice but to act unilaterally, a point recognized by leaders on both sides of the political divide.

Even the unilateralism charge was a bit overdrawn. After all, while there was a tragicomic aspect of the Bush administration’s “Coalition of the Willing” (what kind of support did we expect to receive from Eritrea and Macedonia?), there was always one genuine military power, the United Kingdom, standing by our side. The British contribution to the war effort was obviously much smaller than the role played by the U.S. Army and Marine Corps, but it was more than simply symbolic.

If the Bush administration were to learn anything from its mistakes in Iraq, it would ensure that the international community was solidly behind us before launching a military attack on Iran, if for no other reason than because we don’t want to be the only ones doing all the work.

But there was a more pessimistic view that anti-American sentiment was insurmountable, and that many countries would refuse to go along regardless of the details. Among those who assumed, for example, that the EU-3 negotiations would fail to reverse Iran’s nuclear program, and that France and Germany would again refuse to use force (as they had with respect to Iraq), there was probably also a sneaking suspicion that the UK would come through. By this logic, Tony Blair would pull yet another political rabbit out of the hat, rally his party and his country behind the effort, and therefore the United States would have at least one major European power solidly behind us.

Don’t count on it. If Blair pulls any rabbits out of hats in the next few weeks, it will be all about saving his own political skin, and the wider fortunes of the Labour Party.

Blair’s political problems first appeared in the Washington Post on Monday, but I happened to get an up-close glimpse of the developing story during a 5-day visit in England and Scotland last week. I arrived on what is now being referred to in the British press as “Black Wednesday” — a day in which three different scandals roiled the Blair government. By the time that I had left on Sunday, ominous comparisons were being made to John Major’s fall from power in 1992. (more…)

When you hear leaders in Washington demand bipartisanship, they are usually demanding support for one partisan agenda or another. The President can offer soaring rhetoric about the need for bipartisan cooperation on national security – but what he wants is for the opposition party to support his policies (and, preferably, appear behind him in a Rose Garden photo-op). The opposition party can make soaring appeals about the need for bipartisan cooperation on national security, but what they really want is for the President to change his policies (and, preferably, give them a healthy share of the credit). That is why “bipartisanship” is often seen by Americans as another empty political word.

Real bipartisanship isn’t a word to be dropped into a speech – it is a process to be pursued over weeks, months and years: the President reaching out to a broad spectrum on Capitol Hill, members of Congress working patiently across the aisle, and even opinion leaders and academics looking for the sound of consensus in the noise of their endless chatter. Why? Because it yields better policy.

No President can sustain a major foreign policy initiative without bipartisan support. If he rams a policy through with one-party backing him in Congress, that means that – on a good day – he is working with a slim majority in the Congress and the country. When things go wrong that slim majority can disappear quickly, and the policy is in jeapordy. Conversely, the opposition party must recognize that in our system the President is, far and away, the chief foreign policy-maker. So – even as you should vigorously put forward your own policy alrenatives – if you want the country to succeed, you have to work with him. Meanwhile, there is much experience to be found on both sides of the aisle. Why use only half of it?

Most people become Republicans or Democrats because of domestic reasons – for instance, a preference for lower taxes, or for national health care. The idea that we would decamp to one side or another of the foreign policy divide based on these divisions makes little sense. If anything, Iraq should remind us that foreign policy is not a game that two teams are playing in which one is the winner and the other the loser – we either all win, or all lose.

 And yes, there are examples of effective bi-partisanship in national security: the Nunn-Lugar initiative, the 9-11 Commission, and a recent panel on UN reform come to mind. So do World War II and the containment of communism.