by David Steven | Sep 3, 2007 | Climate and resource scarcity, North America
When a member of the Bush administration tried to persuade me that her boss was a ‘thought leader’ on climate change, my first thought was that I was being punk’d. But she was serious. And now Karl Rove has emerged from the White House bunker singing a similar song…
On energy, the environment, and climate change, he is developing a new paradigm. Emphasizing technology, increased energy-efficiency partnerships, and resource diversification, his policies are improving energy security and slowing the growth of greenhouse gases without economy-breaking mandates and regulation. The president who won criticism by rejecting the failed approach of Kyoto has implemented policies that enabled the United States to grow its economy by 3.1 percent and reduce the absolute amount of CO2 emissions (by 1.3 percent).
Rove is also refreshingly honest about how the American right plans to shape its Iraq/Afghanistan legacy. Let’s take it step by step:
Option 1: “History will render a favorable verdict if the outcome in the Middle East is similar to what America saw after World War II.” If a miracle happens, Dubya wins.
Option 2: “If the outcome there is like what happened in Vietnam after America abandoned our allies and the region descended into chaos, violence, and danger, history’s judgment will be harsh. History will see President Bush as right, and the opponents of his policy as mistaken — as George McGovern was in his time.” If the worst happens, it’s the liburals fault. Georgie wins again!
Whichever way:
President Bush will be viewed as a far-sighted leader who confronted the key test of the 21st century. He will be judged as a man of moral clarity who put America on wartime footing in the dangerous struggle against radical Islamic terrorism.
Well that’s alright then…
by Alex Evans | Sep 2, 2007 | Middle East and North Africa, North America
George Packer in the New Yorker has a blog post up today quoting my CIC colleague Barney Rubin:
If there were a threat level on the possibility of war with Iran, it might have just gone up to orange. Barnett Rubin, the highly respected Afghanistan expert at New York University, has written an account of a conversation with a friend who has connections to someone at a neoconservative institution in Washington. Rubin can’t confirm his friend’s story; neither can I. But it’s worth a heads-up:
“They [the source’s institution] have “instructions” (yes, that was the word used) from the Office of the Vice-President to roll out a campaign for war with Iran in the week after Labor Day; it will be coordinated with the American Enterprise Institute, the Wall Street Journal, the Weekly Standard, Commentary, Fox, and the usual suspects. It will be heavy sustained assault on the airwaves, designed to knock public sentiment into a position from which a war can be maintained. Evidently they don’t think they’ll ever get majority support for this—they want something like 35-40 percent support, which in their book is “plenty.””
…Postscript: Barnett Rubin just called me. His source spoke with a neocon think-tanker who corroborated the story of the propaganda campaign and had this to say about it: “I am a Republican. I am a conservative. But I’m not a raging lunatic. This is lunatic.”
by Alex Evans | Aug 26, 2007 | Cooperation and coherence, Middle East and North Africa
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Back when the US chaired the 2004 Sea Island G8, George Bush’s flagship proposal centred on the idea of a Greater Middle East Initiative, or GMEI (by way of a reminder, here’s what Brookings had to say about it then). At the time, there was heavy criticism – not only of of the GMEI’s optimistic hopes about democratisation, but also its dubious geographical assumptions: could Iran and Afghanistan really be lumped together with all the Arab countries?
But here’s the thing. If the idea of a Greater Middle East was clumsy, there’s still a case for coming up with some new geographical categories to reflect changed political realities in the region. In particular, it’s surprising that we still have no one category that draws together Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
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by Alex Evans | Aug 26, 2007 | Conflict and security, Middle East and North Africa
The New York Times this morning has a leaked copy of a UN report due out on Monday, with news of another record opium crop in Afghanistan – “led by a staggering 45 per cent increase in the Taliban stronghold of Helmand”. But, the NYT goes on:
Loren Stoddard [the head of the US Agency of International Development’s agriculture program in Afghanistan], who helped Wal-Mart move into Central America in his previous posting, predicted that poppy production had become so prolific that the opium market was flooded and prices were starting to drop. “It seems likely they’ll have a rough year this year,” he said, referring to the poppy farmers. “Labor prices are up and poppy prices are down. I think they’re going to be looking for new things.”
by Alex Evans | Aug 15, 2007 | Conflict and security, Economics and development, Middle East and North Africa
My CIC colleague Barney Rubin has an excellent post this morning comparing the recent New York Times and Wall Street Journal [subscribers only, annoyingly] op-eds on Afghanistan, which have sharply divergent perspectives: broadly speaking, half empty and half full respectively. (See also Barney’s mostly approving discussion yesterday of the NYT article.)
But, Barney argues, the half empty / half full metaphor misses the point. The problem with it, he implies, is that the kind of change needed is a transformation that either does or does not take place, and which is therefore not well captured by an incremental ‘steps in the right direction’ image like that of a half full or empty glass.
“We are in Afghanistan to achieve some vital objectives. If we fail to achieve them, no one will give us an ‘A’ for effort.”
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