Aye for Newt Spells Double Toil and Trouble for GOP
• May 3, 2012

The GOP primary race remains a wacky brew, although one with fewer fixins.  Gone is the amazing pizza king and his hazy harem.  Long gone is the man from Minnesota whom nobody knew.  Gone, too, is the prom queen of the Tea Party along with the Texas cowboy who couldn’t speak straight.  This week, four remain, and the man at the top is not Mitt Romney.

Newt Gingrich scored a somewhat remarkable upset in South Carolina — I throw in the caveat because South Carolina is, well, South Carolina, first in war (the Civil War, that is), a place where Yahoo is a state of mind as well as a search engine. He won the primary with 40 percent of the vote to Romney’s 28, with Rick Santorum, who didn’t light the evangelist fire and seems to have only one sweater vest to his name, finishing third, and the sweetly sunny Ron Paul fourth. Rick Perry had already dropped out earlier and endorsed Gingrich.

In South Carolina, the Evangelists and the Tea Party are strong factors, much stronger than in the Republican party at large. It’s a state where — among the GOP faithful — Barack Obama is not just the Democratic president, incumbent and opponent, he is reviled, hated and perhaps a socialist and perhaps not even a citizen of the United States. 

It’s a place, where Romney — not a moderate, not really a conservative, a nobody-knows-what — probably shouldn’t have expected to do well and where John McCain’s candidacy was derailed in 2000 and didn’t exactly rock and roll four years ago.  But Romney had a double-digit lead over what remained of the field—Gingrich, Santorum and the increasingly Yoda-like Ron Paul — as late as mid-week last week. That was before a surge toward Gingrich, mysterious but real, was detected. His surge was driven by tough debate performances, and his response in the last debate to ABC’s airing of an interview with his ex-wife in which he reportedly had asked her for an “open marriage.”

The CNN debate moderator, John King, made the mistake in bringing up the subject right off the top, giving Gingrich an open-ended question.  As all observers noted, Newt knocked it out of the park.  He railed against the establishment media, he questioned the appropriateness of the questions and railed against the media some more, all of which the audience cheered. Bashing the media in South Carolina — except for Fox News and Rush—is a no-brainer, like taking lunch money from a kid who is half your size with no karate experience.

The CNN moderate was entirely right to bring the subject up, but he asked the wrong question. It should have been, when Gingrich starts sputtering about fairness, privacy and the sanctity and sacrament of matrimony, whether Christian theology has room for open marriage and about the hypocrisy in his constant talk about family values and marriage. But, then, Gingrich thinks he’s as wise as Solomon.

Gingrich has admitted that he has made mistakes, but he’s never acknowledged what they might be. He says that he is a changed man from the bruiser, bullying Speaker of the House of yore, who led the impeachment drive against President Bill Clinton, but he never says how he’s changed. 

Romney, in his clashes with Gingrich, has steadily shrunk to the size of the rest of the field, which was generally considered weak, if not downright mediocre or worse.  Once the steady front-runner, even when the rest of the field was doing the dance of the seven minutes of fame, Romney is slowly emerging as that guy behind the curtain in “The Wizard of Oz.” He’s made some interesting comments, all of them indicating that he appears to have no clue how most Americans live, which is to say the 99 percent, in hard times.

From the $10,000 bet, to saying that his speaking fees of more than $300,000 are not a lot of money, to claiming that he feared getting the pink slip, to the blue jeans, Romney reveals himself to be out of touch with common human beings like the rest of us. He may soon release his tax information, but we already know he’s a 15 percenter.

Gingrich, on the other hand, scares the bejesus out of the regular Republican establishment types. This allows Gingrich to claim the status of fighter, rebel and Captain America, although he needs to get into the gym to get into that costume. It’s an odd thing — he’s a populist, a Reaganite and a pugnacious intellectual who presents himself as someone who can beat Obama . . . at least in a debate or in a dark alley, whichever works.

Lo and behold, here is Newt Gingrich, the Washington outsider, after years as an insider, including Speaker of the House.  This Newt is confident — always a danger for him—he’s ready to fight the long fight and lead the American people out of socialism. He’s already had a remarkable career.  As speaker, he orchestrated an amazing comeback for the GOP after it lost the presidency to Clinton.  In two years — much as was the case with Obama — he had the GOP in control of both the House and the Senate, a feat he frittered away through high-handedness and arrogance, making lots of enemies in the party, a fact which is starting to become clear now.

Old timers are starting to fret about the possibility of a Newt victory. They’re casting rumors about third parties. A Washington Post headline hyped: “A New Twist in the Search for Mr. Right.”  The GOP fears that it will get Mr. Goodbar instead.

The Opposite Ways the GOP and Dems Choose a Nominee
•

Since Franklin Roosevelt was president, Republicans and Democrats have created diametrically opposite methods for choosing their presidential nominees.

Republicans pick a nominee with deep roots in the party, usually a man who previously lost an a run for the presidency. Democrats pick a nominee with virtually no name recognition, shallow roots and who is running for the presidency for the first time.

Republicans know whom they are going to nominate. They go through the motions, but they select one of their own, a proven commodity, a person who has been running since before the previous election. Democrats nominees are a surprise to their own party, to their own voters, to the public and to the Republicans.

Republicans don’t emerge. They run, lose, run again and win. It’s called paying dues. Democratic nominees seem to emerge out of nowhere and have to battle “no experience” charges which continue even if they are elected.

Before Franklin Roosevelt was elected in 1932, the parties’ conventions selected their nominees, so all candidates had deep roots and internal party allegiances. Roosevelt had been Secretary of the Navy and Governor of New York. Entering his fourth election for president, however, Roosevelt changed vice presidents and selected a former clothing store operator, a political pawn, a little known senator. Harry Truman became president a month into Roosevelt’s fourth term, having spent very little time with Roosevelt and was completely unaware that an atomic bomb – that he would order dropped a few months later – was being produced.

Since then, the parties have followed their unique paths to the presidency.

In 1948, the Republicans anointed New York Governor Thomas Dewey, a presumable shoo-in. He was so far ahead, the pollsters quit taking the public pulse in September. Truman prevailed.

In 1952, both parties knew World War II hero, Dwight Eisenhower, would win and begged him to join their party. (Remember both parties pursuing Colin Powell?) Eisenhower picked the Republicans and cruised into the White House. Richard Nixon was his vice president.

In 1960, Nixon moved into position as the Republican nominee. The Democrats selected the little known, little accomplished, junior, but wealthy, Senator John Kennedy. Kennedy defeated his Senate boss, the inside-the-party favorite, Lyndon Johnson. Nixon lost, but he won the nomination – and the presidency – in 1968.

In 1976, President Ford, the country’s only non-elected president, faced a challenge for the Republican nomination. Ronald Reagan was a famous movie star, TV commentator and a popular governor of California, the largest and typically Democratic state. Ford beat him but lost to Jimmy Carter.

Four years later in 1980, Reagan returned and defeated George H. W. Bush for the nomination. George H. W. Bush was a Texas Republican whose father had been a U.S. senator. Bush had been a congressman, had lost a run for the Senate, and had been U.S. Ambassador to China. Reagan picked Bush as his vice president and defeated the sitting President Carter.

In 1988, George H. W. Bush was Mr. Republican Establishment, won the nomination and the election against Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis. Again, Michael Who?

In 2000, the Republicans nominated Texas Governor George W. Bush, who had defeated a popular Democratic governor in 1994. Had his name been George Walker instead of George Walker Bush, he would never have gone to Yale or Harvard, been given an ownership interest and the CEO position of the Texas Rangers major league baseball team and never have run for office. His last name was Bush, and his dad had been President. George W. Bush didn’t have to lose to win, but how establishment can a candidate be?

Since Roosevelt, the Democrats have selected Jimmy Who?, Bill Who? and Barack Huh?

In 1976, Jimmy Carter, better known as Jimmy Who, was a little known, peanut farmer who had served one term as Georgia’s governor. No one on the national scene had ever heard of him. He had a 1-percent name recognition rating going into the Iowa caucuses and defeated a slew of established Democrats for the nomination.

In 1992, establishment Democrats were afraid to run against George H. W. Bush’s 91-percent approval rating. Bill Clinton, another small-state governor who had given an awful speech at the 1988 Democratic National Convention, took the plunge. Most Americans probably cannot find Arkansas on a map. He faced ongoing charges of immoral behavior during the election (and during his presidency).

In 2008, Hilary Clinton had the nomination locked up, but Barak Obama who had served as a U.S. senator for a mere four years, surprised her, the nation and is now president.

When Democrats nominate mainstream candidates, they lose. Vice Presidents Hubert Humphrey, Walter Mondale and Al Gore couldn’t get to the finish line.

What does this mean? The only Republicans running now who have a chance to win are Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich. Romney ran in 2004 and lost. He’s ripe. Gingrich talks about being a Washington outsider, but he lives there and is trying to ride President Reagan’s coattails.

Rick Santorum is not and Jon Huntsman was not really running this year. They are running for the Republican nomination in 2016. Whom will they run against? Some Democrat who has a 1-percent name recognition right now.

Does the President Really Matter?
•

From now until November, all of us will be bombarded in print and on the airwaves with political campaign ads, polling numbers, social media advocacy, vitriol and validation.  All focused on the election of one individual to a single office, the President of the United States.  

But in the grand scheme of things, as you watch these campaign commercials, ask yourself this simple question:  Does the president really matter? 

Think about it for just a second. 

There are those who are reasonably certain that the president they elect will be their personal salvation — rendering their household bills suddenly affordable, putting cheap gas in the tanks of their SUVs, reducing crime in their neighborhoods and taking them off the unemployment rolls. 

The perception of the president as having absolute power over one’s life is nothing new.  But it is a naive and polarizing view. 

In the 1840s, Scottish writer Thomas Carlyle wrote that “the history of the world is but the biography of great men.”  Writing about men like Muhammad, Luther and Napoleon, Carlyle theorized that heroic men shape history through both their personal attributes and via divine inspiration — that all great events turned on the great decisions of great men. 

If the entire country defines the chief executive’s span of responsibility, can a president be held accountable for everything that the nation does or fails to do? 

Credit or blame, in their cumulative form, generally define a presidency.  Both are spun wildly by pundits in countless venues with countless agendas.  But the reality is that a president actually has far less influence on our daily lives than we may give him credit.  The president is routinely described as the most powerful person in the world.  It is, after all, the president who creates budgets, develops domestic policy, energy policy and conducts foreign policy.  The president nominates Supreme Court and Federal judges.  He sets legislative agendas and has veto power over congressionally passed bills. 

But they never do so in a vacuum.  There are countless countervailing, equalizing forces that face every presidential decision — from sending troops into a war zone to submitting a budget resolution.  He must face congressional opposition, media scrutiny, lobbyists, foreign leaders and Supreme Court decisions. 

We routinely elect our presidents under the promise of “change.”  But presidents are seldom the sole catalysts for change.  They get plenty of help along the way.  They can help set the conditions for progress, but they rarely directly cause it to occur.  If a president goes too far with a policy, opposition sets in, and the intended action is voted down or modified in some way.  In the longer term, if he goes way too far or doesn’t do enough, he’s not re-elected.  The president submits a budget for the nation, but Congress must pass it.  When Congress passes a budget resolution, even when he opposes it, the president has no choice but to spend the money. 

What was the last presidential decision that affected you?  Most of us will be hard-pressed to think of even one. 

Certainly, for our servicemen and women and their families, the question will be readily answered with whatever theater of war to which they or their loved ones have deployed.  For those who have been injured or killed, the loss of life or limb cannot be reversed or changed.  And so, for the 1 percent of our nation who serve, the president and the decisions he makes as commander-in-chief, matter a great deal. 

For everyone else, whoever is president affects our lives to a far lesser extent than we may believe.  We may agree or disagree with a president’s policies, but precious few of those policies represent original thought.  Chances are, for each policy cited, other presidents before them have espoused something very similar.  Agendas may matter far more than the president himself. 

So, here’s a quick drill for you.  Answer this quickly:  Who are the truly great presidents? 

Maybe you answered with names like Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, FDR.  Those Americans born before 1963 may point to President John F. Kennedy, based on the decisions he made during the Cuban Missile Crisis, that played a principal role in averting a global nuclear war. Whomever you picked, chances are, those presidents likely did indeed do great things — created the conditions for our democracy, preserved the Union, averted nuclear war, etc.  But whoever were your top picks, it’s likely that your list represents only a fraction of the 44 U. S. presidents.    

That’s why leadership matters, above all else. 

As politics becomes more and more polarizing, and as Americans are moved further and further to extremes, there will be many who attempt to attach the “Great Man” theory to the Office of the President. 

But don’t fall for it.  For even a second.

The Wealth of Presidents
•

How rich is Mitt Romney compared to other presidents?

His most recent tax return reported about $8 million in interest and dividend income. If he’s earning 3 percent on his investments, that means he’s worth a cool quarter billion.

So, where would that rank? He’d be behind only President George Washington, but, unlike Washington and most wealthy presidents, Romney didn’t inherit his wealth. He earned it.

No. 1 — George Washington

George Washington was not only “first in the hearts of his countrymen,” but he was also the richest president in our nation’s history.

How do we measure Washington’s wealth? Measuring across centuries has its challenges. One approach is to estimate the value of his property when he was alive and adjust for inflation. Another is to look at his wealth as a percentage of gross domestic product. A third is to compare his income to the national budget. Each approach leads to huge numbers.

For the first 100 years of our nation, wealth was measured mostly by land and slaves. Washington inherited ten slaves from his father at age eleven. He eventually owned more than 8,000 acres of prime farmland near what is now Washington, D.C., and more than 300 slaves. His wife, Martha, was also very wealthy, both from her dowry and inheritance from her first husband, one of the wealthiest men in Virginia. She inherited one-third of his 17,000 acres of land and 300 slaves as well as $129,650 in Colonial Virginia currency estimated by historians at Washington and Lee University to be worth $6 million in 1986.

At the time of his death, Washington’s land, slaves, house, horses and personal belongings were worth about $525,000, which has been estimated to be worth $525 million today.

In 1996, a study to calculate the 100 richest people ever in the U.S. ranked Washington 59th, the only president on the list. His net worth was estimated to be 1/777, or 0.13 percent, of GDP. By that measure, John D. Rockefeller was the wealthiest American ever. His wealth equaled 1.5 percent of GDP. Bill Gates worth about $60 billion, or about 0.4 percent of GDP, would be in the top ten.

Washington’s salary as president was 2 percent of the Federal budget in 1789, which would amount to $60 billion today. To be fair, the budget was different 225 years ago, when there was no income tax and most federal government spending was defense. Even so, 2 percent of today’s defense budget would be $2 billion per year.

For his time, Washington was incredibly wealthy, but he didn’t have air conditioning or toilets. He got strep throat riding his horse in the snow and died two days later. Today, a common antibiotic would have had him back on his horse within days.

No. 2 — Thomas Jefferson

Like Washington, Thomas Jefferson also inherited thousands of acres of land and dozens of slaves from his father. Jefferson eventually accumulated 5,000 acres of land near Charlottesville, Va., and owned hundreds of slaves. His net worth, in today’s dollars, reached an estimated $200 million. But land isn’t cash, and Jefferson had trouble maintaining his real estate late in his life. Like eight of our presidents, he was arguably bankrupt at the time of his death.

No. 3 — Theodore Roosevelt

The third wealthiest President, Theodore Roosevelt, was a trust-fund baby. Like so many lottery winners, he made some stupid investments and lost much of it. Even so, he still had his 235-acre estate, “Sagamore Hill,” located on some of the most valuable real estate on Long Island where land is worth approximately $1 million an acre.

No. 4 — John F. Kennedy

No. 4, a tough call, is probably John Kennedy, another trust fund baby. The Kennedy fortune was estimated to be worth at least $1 billion. His father Joe Kennedy’s estate was estimated to be worth $500 million when he died in 1969. Among his investments was the Chicago Merchandise Mart purchased in 1945 for $12.5 million and sold in 1998 for $625 million. JFK’s $75 million share of that one investment – worth about $100 million today – was divided between Caroline and John, Jr. In addition, the Kennedy family owned other valuable properties in Florida and Massachusetts.

Though JFK never had to file federal disclosure reports, his brother Ted Kennedy’s reports provides guidance. In 2008, Ted Kennedy reported a net worth between $50 and $150 million after parting with millions in his divorce. Caroline Kennedy is also reportedly worth $400 million, mostly from inheritances from her parents and brother. So, JFK was very wealthy.

No. 5 — Andrew Jackson

Andrew Jackson, the people’s president, was No. 5 with a net worth of about $120 million. An orphan and the first president to come from humble beginnings, Jackson married wealth and earned more. He joined the Continental Army at age 13. After the war, he studied law in Salisbury, N.C., and moved to Tennessee where he married a divorcee, whose father was wealthy and politically connected. Jackson became a gentleman, a general in the U.S. Army and a politician. After the War of 1812, Jackson “negotiated” the resettlement westward of various Indian tribes. Jackson made a fortune in the ensuing land grab. It raised ethical eyebrows, but the political climate of the times was far different than today.

Jackson’s wealth included his 1,000-acre homestead in Nashville, Tenn., “The Hermitage,” a cotton farm operated by slaves. He owned more than 500 slaves in his lifetime, including 150 at his death.

The Next Five

Rounding out the top ten wealthiest presidents are James Madison and Lyndon Johnson at about $100 million, Herbert Hoover at $75 million, Franklin Roosevelt at $60 million, and John Tyler at $50 million.

Like those of their generation, Madison and Tyler’s wealth was in land and slaves. Roosevelt, like his cousin, Teddy, inherited his wealth. Lyndon Johnson was a poor boy, but while in Congress, he and his wife, Lady Bird, purchased a small radio station in Austin, Texas. With a series of favorable rulings by the Federal Communications Commission, that radio station grew into a large regional broadcasting company that included radio, television and cable.

An orphan before age ten, Herbert Hoover was passed around between relatives. He teased that he was the first student at the newly established Stanford University where he studied geology, leading to a career and a fortune, in mining engineering. In today’s dollars, Hoover’s salary at one point reached $2.5 million. At approximately age 40, Hoover left the business world and dedicated his life to public service, where he refused any salary to avoid the appearance that he was seeking public office for money. As secretary of commerce and president, the law required Hoover to accept his salary. He gave it away, some to his political appointees whom he thought were underpaid and the rest to charity. (Kennedy was the only other president to donate his salary.)

That’s the top ten. If Mitt Romney wins the presidency, John Tyler would be bumped off.

Moving Up the List: Bill (and Hillary) Clinton

Bill Clinton left the White House millions in debt because of accumulated legal fees. Since leaving the presidency, however, he has earned a net worth that is estimated to be approaching $80 million. Hillary Clinton’s most recent public reports as secretary of state put her net worth at $30 to 35 million. Together, their net worth would put them in the top five, and their wealth is growing.

Moving the Clintons into the top ten would bump Franklin Roosevelt off the list.

A Century of Poor Presidents

As the national debate over slavery heated up, the wealth of presidents declined. For almost the next 100 years, from 1857 until 1952, the ten poorest presidents served. Other than the Roosevelts and Hoover, only one president, Grover Cleveland, accumulated any real wealth, about $25 million, from inheritance, law practice and an estate he purchased near Princeton.

Harry Truman almost went bankrupt as a haberdasher, a clothing salesman. Instead of declaring bankruptcy, he spent the rest of his life repaying those debts. When Truman returned home to Independence, Mo., after his presidency, he was 69 and unemployed. His only income was $112 per month from his U.S. Army Reserve pension. He had saved 20 to 25 percent of his presidential salary, about $150,000, over eight years. When federal retirement benefits were expanded during his term, he excluded the president.

Truman foreswore all attempts to “cash in” when he left the presidency and turned down several offers to serve on corporate boards, believing it would demean the Office of the Presidency. When Congress learned that Truman was paying for his own stamps and licking them without any administrative assistance, it passed the Former Presidents Act, providing an annual pension and gave it to him retroactively. President Hoover, who didn’t need the pension, accepted it to avoid embarrassing Truman.

In 1966, David Post bought a Volkswagen minivan for a camping trip across America with friends. They stopped at President Truman’s home in Independence, Mo. A big black car was parked on the street with about ten persons standing beside Truman’s white picket fence. They learned that Vice President Hubert Humphrey was visiting President Truman. When he left the home and came to the sidewalk, the vice president chatted with them. President Truman stood on the porch about 40 feet away and waved as if it were any other day. Other than Humphrey’s driver, there was no security detail. It was a different day.

Big Benefits of Early Childhood Education
•

On Feb. 16, the D.C. Council Committee of the Whole will hold a public hearing commencing at 10 a.m. on a bill (Bill-19-0566) I introduced titled, the “Early Childhood Education Act of 2011.” I invite you to come and testify.

If enacted, this bill will ensure a curriculum is created and implemented that guarantees a reasonable expectation that our three- and four-year-old children are adequately prepared for entry and achievement in the District of Columbia Public Schools kindergarten program. In addition, the bill will ensure a curriculum is created and implemented that guarantees a reasonable expectation that our third grade children will be able to read independently and be able to add, subtract, multiply, and divide upon being promoted to the fourth grade.

Currently, there are 10,000 preschoolers enrolled in our early childhood education program. There is also a large population of children enrolled in kindergarten, first, second and third grades. Before standardized testing begins in the fourth grade, we must ensure that our children are equipped with the basic tools to succeed by being able to read independently and add, subtract, multiply and divide upon entering the fourth grade.
According to the curriculum timetable in schools, the formative years is the time when a child is learning how to read and learning the basics of mathematics. In the fourth grade, the curriculum changes and a child is expected to read for comprehension and is no longer expected to learn the basics of how to read. The fourth grade also introduces a child to mathematical concepts such as fractions and decimals in preparation for algebra and so on.

According to the United States Department of Education, a child who has not mastered the basic foundation for education upon entering the fourth grade will have a high probability of having contact with the criminal justice system. Research indicates two-thirds of students who cannot read proficiently by the fourth grade will end up in jail or on public assistance. Moreover, several states forecast needed prison growth based on third grade reading scores. Clearly, we must do everything within our power to avert our children from having contact with the criminal justice system, by putting in place support systems that help children meet educational standards.

As community residents, parents, grandparents, educators, teachers and taxpayers, we have a vested interest in improving educational standards within our community. As taxpayers, we deserve a return on our investment with efficient and effective high-quality learning environments in which all District children are the beneficiaries.

Education is the starting line to a life of productivity. Please join me in providing our children with a curriculum designed to provide them with the opportunity to have a great start in life.

No Dodos, Bush and Obama Stopped a Depression
•

Forty years ago, I won what became my family’s first “Dodo of the Year” award. Instead of calling me an unmitigated idiot, my father called me a dodo, after the now-extinct bird famous for being too stupid not to run away from, but toward, its captors who then killed it.

Before each new year, while doing resolutions, my dad sought nominations for new “Dodos,” and an annual ritual was born.

My act of dodo-ism was parking my car on the hill on Main Street and failing to engage the parking brake. As I got out of the car, it began to roll backwards across four lanes of traffic. After making a useless effort to stop it, all I could do was watch helplessly. Fortunately, no cars were coming in either direction, and brick planters across the street stopped my car from crashing through two stores.

Had I not jumped out of the path of my runaway car, it would have crushed me. My dad may have had to bury me, but he still rightly would have called me a dodo. Instead, we had an honest conversation about the virtues of emergency brakes on hills.

If only we could do the same in this presidential election with all the screeching about jobs losses and bailouts.
In February 2008, 137.9 million Americans had jobs, a national high. In January 2009, 133.5 million people had jobs, a loss of 4.4 million jobs during the last year of President George W. Bush’s presidency.

In January 2010, at the end of President Barack Obama’s first year in office when jobs started to climb back up, another 4.3 million had lost jobs, leaving 129.2 million Americans employed. Both 2008 and 2009 saw similar losses, though technically, a few more were lost during Bush’s last year.

November 2008 and January 2009, both under Bush’s watch, were the two worst months of this recession, when more than 800,000 jobs were lost. February and March 2009, President Obama’s first two months in office, were the next two worst months.

Like my inability to stop my car rolling down the street, no one – a president, a Treasury secretary, a Fed chairman – could have stopped the job-loss express either immediately or within two months.

At the beginning of the Great Depression, President Herbert Hoover’s laissez-faire, leave-it-to-the-markets policy believed government should get out of the way and allow markets to fix the problem. At the same time, the Fed did nothing to stimulate the economy. The result? Unemployment jumped from 4.2 percent in 1928 to 8.7 percent in 1930 – very similar to President Bush’s last year in office – and with no government intervention, unemployment continued to rise until it hit 25 percent in 1933.

When Franklin Roosevelt became president in March 1933, he immediately closed the banks, instituted banking reforms and initiated a broad range of government programs. The bleeding stopped within a year – similar to President Obama’s first year. Though growth remained anemic under Roosevelt, unemployment trickled down to 17 percent in 1939 when the industrial production required by World War II pulled the country out of the Great Depression.

This time, Presidents Bush and Obama sought and received $700 and $800 billion, respectively, and the Fed kept money flowing. It stopped a depression.

Memories get fuzzy – or selective – in the heat of a presidential election. The various presidential candidates are arguing that the bailouts were failures, that Obama is the cause of the job losses, and that the Fed should be eliminated. In effect, they are arguing for Hoover’s laissez-faire policies.

When President Bush looked down the black hole of “laissez-faire,” he famously said, “This sucker could go down,” asked for $700 billion and cut the checks. Had President Bush done nothing, the two largest U.S. banks and two of the three U.S. auto companies – Citibank, Bank of America, GM and Chrysler – would have disappeared. Heaven knows what catastrophe would have followed. Yet, the presidential candidates, in effect, are suggesting that would have been better.

Like Roosevelt, Presidents Bush and Obama, and the Fed, took dramatic action. They saved a now-thriving auto industry. Our banks are recovering. More than 3 million new jobs have been created in the last two years. Government can do good.

When my car was going to crush me, I jumped out of the way. Presidents Bush and Obama had the courage to step in front of failing banks, collapsing car companies, and a landslide of job losses and try to stop them. Had they followed my example, they, too, could have won “Dodo of the Year.”

R2P: The New Obama Doctrine?
•

“More and more, we all confront difficult questions about how to prevent the slaughter of civilians by their own government, or to stop a civil war whose violence and suffering can engulf an entire region. I believe that force can be justified on humanitarian grounds. . . . Inaction tears at our conscience and can lead to more costly intervention later. That’s why all responsible nations must embrace the role that militaries with a clear mandate can play to keep the peace.” — President Barack Obama

This statement from President Obama could easily be applied to the emerging civil war in Syria, but they were actually spoken at the outset of his administration, on the occasion of his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance. In his speech, he spoke eloquently about “just war,” and “the choice between armed intervention and complicity in oppression.” Both of these messages implicitly embrace an internationalist philosophy that’s widely become known as “Responsibility to Protect,” or “R2P.”

A little over a decade ago, the phrase “responsibility to protect” was introduced by an international commission in an effort to recast the doctrines of “right to intervene” and “obligation to intervene,” while still preserving the intent to act decisively in humanitarian crises. R2P quickly assumed the status of a “norm” (rather than a law) for the United Nations in preventing mass atrocities of the kind witnessed in Rwanda and Bosnia.

A year ago, in his speech justifying the U.S. intervention in Libya, Obama announced that Libya’s assault against its civilian population created a “responsibility” for the international community, stating that “when our interests and values are at stake, we have a responsibility to act.”

Most recently, the U.S. dispatched a special operations force to Uganda to act against one of Africa’s most brutal guerrilla groups.

The precedents in word and deed clearly convey an active endorsement of R2P. However, the true test may lie ahead in our response to Syria’s ongoing repression.

R2P has evolved with a set of defining “pillars,” “thresholds” and “obligations.” Entire non-governmental organizations have since been built around R2P. It even has its own Twitter hash-tag with a host of followers, to include billionaire George Soros and actress Mia Farrow — all of the necessary marketing ingredients for a presidential doctrine, ready-made.

R2P has strong advocates within the Obama administration, including Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the UN, and Samantha Power, the National Security Council’s senior director, widely considered one of the principal architects of the Libya intervention.

In short, R2P shatters the premise that sovereignty, in the strict Westphalian sense is inviolable, arguing instead that it is a responsibility. According to R2P, every state has a responsibility to protect its population from mass atrocities. If they can’t do it themselves, the international community is obligated to assist them — even if they don’t want the help. Once peaceful measures like economic sanctions have failed, the international community has the responsibility to intervene militarily — but only as a last resort and only if the UN Security Council authorizes it.

In a narrative reminiscent of St. Augustine’s letter to Boniface outlining what would ultimately become the foundation for Just War theory, R2P advocates that all military interventions must fulfill six broad criteria:

• Just Cause
• Right Intention
• Final Resort
• Legitimate Authority
• Proportional Means
• Reasonable Prospect

Even a cursory review of President Obama’s speech justifying our Libya intervention last year shows a close alignment — even synchronization — with these criteria.

While circumventing Congress is nothing new for presidents, what is noteworthy in the case of Libya is Obama’s apparent effort to elevate R2P as a universal principle that not only trumps traditional perceptions of national sovereignty but also transcends the constitutional tenets that give Congress the sole authority to declare war.

Whether the president will declare his official sponsorship of R2P remains to be seen, but the language of his recent speeches and the actions of his administration make it clear that R2P is indeed a cornerstone of his foreign policy. A telling indicator will be whether he is willing to give R2P even more prominence by intervening militarily in Syria without UN Security Council approval.

While some may hail a unilateral NATO campaign against Syria as further strengthening R2P, the irony is that it could actually weaken it. Just as inconsistency or failure to act in humanitarian crises can diminish an R2P-based policy, any perception of “R2P-as-Subterfuge” for Western national self-interests (crushing the Iran-Syria-Hezbollah axis, for instance), could have devastating affects for the broad R2P construct, long term.

In the coming months, Obama’s action or inaction on Syria will largely determine whether R2P is to remain a UN norm or if it will ultimately emerge as the “Obama Doctrine.” It’s a topic being discussed by administration strategists — and the whispers outside the White House gates have already begun. Yet, a more fundamental, if not practical, question for those West Wing discussions will be whether an R2P policy is sustainable in a time when defense budgets are dramatically declining.

Afghanistan: Hanging in the Balance
•

For more than a decade, the Afghan War has been a costly and difficult campaign for the United States and its NATO allies.  As the United States begins to downsize its force in Afghanistan and turn combat operations over to the Afghan police and army, a persistent question is whether the U.S. strategy will be effective in preventing Afghanistan from slipping back to Taliban control over the long term.  U.S. strategy in Afghanistan has evolved over the past 11 years, and conditions have changed. As the U.S. drawdown picks up pace, success of the entire operation will be dependent on a series of complex variables over which the U.S. and NATO will have little control.  Without continued heavy, long-term support from the United States, it is likely that the current government of Afghanistan will not be sustainable in its current form.

In his remarks at West Point outlining his administration’s strategy, President Barack Obama said, “Our overarching goal remains the same: to disrupt, dismantle and defeat al Qaida in Afghanistan and Pakistan and to prevent its capacity to threaten America and our allies in the future.”  Effectively establishing Afghanistan and Pakistan as the theater of war in which to defeat Al Qaida and the Taliban, Obama set a timetable of 18 months to accomplish a series of ambitious and broadly defined objectives:  “We must deny al Qaida a safe haven.  We must reverse the Taliban’s momentum and deny it the ability to overthrow the government.  And we must strengthen the capacity of Afghanistan’s security forces and government so that they can take lead responsibility . . .”

Assessing the Obama Strategy.  Now, more than two years later, it is clear that even as the drawdown of forces in Afghanistan is set to begin, and while some headway has been made in some areas, those overarching objectives articulated by Obama have not been met.  Director of National Intelligence James Clapper reported the intelligence community’s assessment that “[the Taliban] remains resilient and capable of challenging U.S. and international goals; and Taliban senior leaders continue to enjoy safe haven in Pakistan, which enables them to provide strategic direction to the insurgency and not fear for their safety.”

A leaked U.S. military report on the “State of the Taliban 2012,” confirms that Pakistan’s ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence agency) is encouraging the Taliban to continue fighting.  It goes on to confirm that, “Though the Taliban suffered severely in 2011, its strength, motivation, funding and tactical proficiency remain intact.” 

Negotiating the Retrograde.  Ostensibly in recognition of these shortfalls, the president has announced a “new” way forward in Afghanistan that looks remarkably similar to the counter-terror strategy originally proposed by Vice President Joe Biden. It advocated an escalation of the drone war in Pakistan and direct negotiations with the Taliban.  Broadly stated, the ultimate goal of the strategy — which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has described as “fight, talk and build” — is to prevent civil war and the reestablishment of terrorist bases in the region.  A key element that has emerged for that strategy is to give the Pakistanis a prominent seat at the table in exchange for their leverage on the Taliban to negotiate in kind.  

The Obama Administration has announced the start of direct trilateral talks between the U.S., the Karzai government and the Taliban’s political front organization, headed by Mullah Mohammed Omar and the Haqqani network.  Under U.S. encouragement, the Taliban has set up an office in Doha, Qatar, explicitly for the purpose of dealing with Washington. 

Yet, with the NATO drawdown in Afghanistan imminent, the Taliban has little incentive to negotiate, believing that it can just wait NATO out.   Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta recently announced that combat operations would be turned over to the Afghan Army in 2013.  By the end of 2014, all American combat forces are scheduled to be out of the country, with the exception of a small number of Special Operations Forces and trainers.  

The Lessons of History and the Way Ahead.  As the U.S. and NATO retrograde gains momentum, Washington will unquestionably apply billions in military foreign sales, aid, inter-agency coordination, as well as air and military contract support to Afghan security forces to support the current Afghan government.  While the peace negotiations with the Taliban are intended to inject some measure of stability as western troops leave Afghanistan, they are also an implicit recognition that that the Taliban will regain some measure of political power in the country. 

Following the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989, Moscow also did its best to prop up the Communist government. However, when the aid vanished in 1992 following the Soviet Union’s downfall, Kabul became engulfed in a violent war that placed the reins of power for Afghanistan firmly in the hands of the Taliban.  More than two decades later, Washington is hoping to avoid the same fate for Afghanistan.

Steve Delonga is the president of Prometheus Security International, LLC.

Letter to the Editor: True Debate of the Issues Requires an Independence Party
•

This letter is in response to the articles covering Rush Limbaugh’s comments about Sandra Fluke.

Well, Mr. Limbaugh, you have certainly done it again. Although this is not the first time your mouth has spewed such hateful language perhaps it should be the last time you say anything more on your corporate sponsored program.?

Yes, that’s right. It is time for you to resign or be put out to pasture. You didn’t “apologize” for your remarks about Ms. Fluke until after it became apparent that your political torpedo missed its target completely and headed back to where it came from. Once you realized that your paycheck may be affected you conveniently switched on the damage control to avoid further embarrassment and save your own miserable ass. I write this because it is evident you do not represent the views of Republicans, Conservatives and Evangelicals nor do you really believe in the venom you spit out at Democrats, Liberals and Reformers. Your show is all about you and to hell with everybody else.??

This country was founded on the principle of free speech. Like it or not, we need to be open to the countervailing opinions of both sides. I am as much interested in the opinion of one side as I am the other. That is why I am longer a member of the Democratic Party but rather voted Non-Partisan in the Ohio primary on Super Tuesday. The “debates” have disintegrated into which side promotes the better rhetoric rather than which side can offer a better plan to help improve upon the quality of life for all?citizens across this once great country. There appears to be no end in sight for the gridlock plaguing all governments at the federal, state and local levels.

Perhaps the emergence of the Independence Party would cause more than a stir down the corridors of power. Maybe if such a party existed with members that could truly call themselves Independents the gridlock could slowly be chipped away. Candidates could run for office on the issues affecting their potential constituents rather than holding fast to their party platform. A Independence Party would not be hamstrung like the two major political parties are today. The will of the people tempered by the conscience of their representative would be a start to the long road to recovery of what the Founding Fathers intended. ?

Thanks to Those Who Helped in Redistricting, a Thankless Job
•

I co-chaired a meeting on the District Council’s Subcommittee on Redistricting on proposed changes to the advisory neighborhood commission (ANC) and single-member district (SMD) boundaries on March16. According to federal law, the District must perform a redistricting of its eight wards within 90 days of the council’s receipt of the U.S. Census report, which happens every ten years. After completion of the ward redistricting process, which took place last summer, the council reviews and makes adjustments to the boundaries of the ANCs and SMDs.
 
As I have said before, in my 20 years on the council, there is no issue I have encountered that evokes a stronger emotional reaction than redistricting. To co-chair the committee overseeing redistricting is a thankless job. No one ever compliments us on preparing a “great” redistricting map, but many folks find aspects of any plan that they don’t like. There is no way to make everyone happy in the redistricting process, but my goal in the ward and ANC/SMD redistricting processes was to maintain and reunite neighborhoods wherever possible, while making use of census tract lines, natural boundaries and major traffic arteries to create logical borders within the framework imposed on us by federal law.

Under § 1-1041.01 of the D.C. Code, the Council of the District of Columbia is required to appoint ward task forces to recommend adjustment of the boundaries of the ANC area and Single Member Districts. In practice, deference is given to each ward member to appoint a task force chair and membership. I want to take this opportunity to publicly thank Tom Birch for agreeing to serve as chair of the Ward 2 Task Force on Redistricting. Another thankless job, the task force chair is responsible for being an arbiter in the process if any major disagreements arise. My subcommittee sent instructions to all councilmembers recommending appointment of a broadly-based task force for each ward. The method that seems to work best in Ward 2 is to create a task force subcommittee for each neighborhood, and I want to thank all of the ANC chairs and citizen association heads or designees that co-chaired the neighborhood groups.

I think we can be proud of the outcome of these meetings in Ward 2 and across the city. Where the boundaries are working and population remained relatively constant, such as in Kalorama, it makes sense to leave boundaries as they are, which is what our task force recommended.  Where significant Ward 2 boundary changes have been made, such as the welcome reuniting of Penn Quarter, significant changes are required to create ANC and SMD boundaries that make sense.  Thanks for your patience and participation in the process.