I’m really surprised that banker David Hale’s out-of-box solution to Guantanamo – and perhaps to Jihadi terrorism – not to mention Iceland’s financial problems, has not received more attention. In an op-ed in the Financial Times – that could have been published in The Onion — he proposed that the U.S. ship the Guantanamo prisoners from sunny Cuba to freezing Iceland in exchange for saving the island from financial default:
The challenge for Iceland today is to reopen the US base. It would no longer have a military function but could be an ideal solution to President Barack Obama’s problem of where to place the Guantánamo prisoners. The US has offered Palau $200m to accept 13 prisoners. Bermuda accepted a few to protect its status as a tax haven. The US could show its appreciation to Reykjavik for hosting prisoners by allowing its banks to join the troubled asset relief programme. The US Treasury could cover the cost of repaying Iceland’s retail deposits in the UK and the Netherlands with just one-half of the profit it made on its Goldman Sachs shares. As the prisoners come primarily from Afghanistan, they would probably prefer Iceland’s cooler climate to the tropical heat of Cuba.
Rahm Emanuel, White House chief of staff, said in November 2008 that the US should not waste a good financial crisis. He was referring to the opportunity that the crisis created to increase federal spending on long-cherished Democratic programmes. His statement could also apply to foreign policy and Guantá-namo. The American people do not want any suspected terrorists in their backyard. There are less fortunate countries that would accept Guantánamo prisoners in return for cash. Iceland is ideal to play such a role because it was the closure of a US military base that allowed its financial collapse. Iceland could escape from default and depression if the base were to reopen.
An additional benefit provided by the program: Getting these guys to stop dreaming about those 72 virgins they’ll meet in Paradise.
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In an interview with National Journal:
And in earlier Paul family news, on Monday Sarah Palin endorsed Rand Paul. 2010 is shaping up to have a very interesting political environment indeed.
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It was my first night in Okinawa, and for a moment I thought it would be my last. We were in the back of a taxicab, a subcompact unsuited to our well-fed and over-sized American frames; the driver’s calm was in stark contrast to the motion of the vehicle, which resembled nothing so much as panicked flight. We were descending a darkened gully of ramshackle homes and ash-colored concrete eroding in the sea air, the rubber of the tires sounding a muffled, arrhythmic beat against the well-worn paving stones beneath us. Tropical growth bloomed from untended ground, from the cracks and fissures in various structures; nature patiently waiting out the ephemera of human habitation, ever ready to reclaim the ground.
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Evidently a young researcher, in Philadelphia, has uncovered a relatively unknown draft of the U.S. Constitution written by James Wilson of “We the People” fame. I personally hope that the document will be digitally scanned and put online soon, as I don’t think I will be heading up to Philadelphia anytime in the near future. For anyone in that area though, I would recommend checking it out – it would probably provide some great insights into how at least one of the framers viewed the role of government.
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A month after Germany surrendered in May 1945, America’s eyes turned to the Far East, where the bloodiest battle of the Pacific war was joined on the island of Okinawa.
Twelve thousand U.S. soldiers and Marines would die — twice as many dead in 82 days of fighting as have died in all the years of war in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Within weeks of the battle’s end came Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Three weeks later, Gen. MacArthur took the Japanese surrender on the battleship Missouri.
That was 65 years ago, as far away in time from today as the Marines’ arrival at Da Nang was from Teddy Roosevelt’s charge up San Juan Hill.
Yet the Marines are still on Okinawa. But, in 2006, the United States negotiated a $26 billion deal to move 8,000 to Guam and the other Marines from the Futenma air base in the south to the more isolated town of Nago on the northern tip. Okinawans have long protested the crime, noise and pollution at Futenma.
The problem arose last year when the Liberal Democratic Party that negotiated the deal was ousted and the Democratic Party of Japan elected on a promise to pursue a policy more balanced between Beijing and Washington.
The new prime minister, Yukio Hatoyama, indicated his unease with the Futenma deal, and promised to review it and decide by May. Voters in Nago just elected a mayor committed to keeping the new base out. Read more…
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Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced on Monday that, “Iran will deliver a telling blow to global powers on Feb. 11.” What this “blow” will be is anyone’s guess, though it would seem safe to say that it will have something to do with the Iranian nuclear program and their development of an advanced missile armament. Ahmadinejad’s statement comes almost in perfect conjunction with the White House’s decision to deploy Patriot missile shields in the Middle East and to bulk up the naval presence in the Persian Gulf. What this is an example of though, and ultimately a result of, is the American habit of behaving like a bull in a china shop. The projection of American power in the Middle East has set into motion the law of unintended consequences.
If our nation’s leaders were more avid readers of Sun Tzu then perhaps they would better understand the possible repercussions of the actions they have committed to (saber rattling, sanctions, and war). We have misunderstood ourselves and horribly underestimated our enemies. The aggressive actions of the United States has caused a whole slew of new problems, from aggressive reactions from regional powers (Iran), to new nations seeking to project power into the region (Russia), to the dispersal of terrorist groups to other neighboring nations. Greg Scoblete outlines this problem in a post at Real Clear Politics:
But notice what has not happened as a result of the progress to date in Iraq: a diminution of the al Qaeda threat. Instead, that threat is where it always was, tied to a Taliban insurgency in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border and creeping out into Yemen and Somalia.
The net result of the Iraq war from a counter-terrorism perspective has been to give Arab terrorists a first hand seminar in urban warfare, skills they are now delivering to the Taliban to sow death against U.S. and NATO forces. There is not much in the way of evidence that I’m aware of to suggest that progress in creating a democratic regime in Iraq is having any influence over the global terrorist movement. And at the end of the day, wasn’t that the point of the endeavor?
As the years pass from our initial invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, the collection of errors grows, as well as their consequences. The destabilization of Iraq allowed Iran to grow as a regional power and act as proxy to Russian interests in the Middle East. Our nation-building efforts in Afghanistan have pushed Taliban forces into Pakistan causing great instability in both the Pakistani government (a nuclear power I might add) and among the villages that rest along the Afghan-Pakistani border. And now, we have become aware that Iran may be ready to announce membership to the global nuclear club, and Yemen has once again spiraled into becoming a hotbed for terrorists and international criminals. We are a bull in a china shop, or perhaps better, we are the anti-King Midas, everything we touch falls apart.
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You have to hand it to President Obama. Not only was his State of the Union speech early last week warmly received by the public, but it unleashed a wave of bipartisan sentiment in Congress, especially in the U.S. Senate. What had been had World War I-style battlefield of trench warfare between Republicans and Democrats filled with bile, acrimony and petty minded thinking, suddenly transformed itself last Thursday just a couple of days after Obama’s speech. Hands were reaching across the aisle, old enemies became friends, there was lots of loving and hugging each and even the little child lay down peacefully next to the lion, all to renominate Ben Bernanke to another term as the head of the third Bank of the United States, oh excuse me, the Federal Reserve.
Yes the two political parties may have bitter disagreements when it comes to abortion, or climate change, or health care reform, but when it comes to benefiting themselves and the establishment they serve they do know how to come together for a common purpose.
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The Obama Justice Department has apparently decided that, since torture is not a crime (at least not anything deserving of prosecution), then concocting legal doctrines that unleashed torturers around the world is also no offense.
A Justice Department internal investigation has concluded that John Yoo and Jay Bybee were gulity only of “poor judgment” in their memos which brought the Middle Ages into the new Millennium.
The Washington Post notes: “The conclusion is likely to unsettle <strong>interest groups </strong>that have sought a reckoning for lawyers who made possible brutal interrogation, warrantless wiretapping and other Bush counterterrorism strategies.”
Perhaps the Washington Post believes that only special interests oppose torture????
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One must engage in ample amounts of self delusion to defend Republican performance on budget issue in the last few years, but Daniel Foster at NRO’s Corner is up to the task:
Obama is right. Monthly deficits under the recent Democratic Congresses don’t exceed annual deficits under those Republican Congresses. But they come pretty darn close.
Hensarling’s comments likely emerged from a release issued by the Republican Study Committee just yesterday, showing that the total accumulated deficit from Republican-controlled budgets from FY 1996-FY 2007 (and factoring in the substantial surpluses run from 1998-2001) stands at just under $1.246 trillion. The deficit run by Democratic-controlled Congresses in just three years — starting with FY2008 and including the latest CBO projections for FY 2010 — is already $3.222 trillion.(emphasis added)
That means that over twelve years of Republican rule, there was an average annual budget deficit of about $104 billion. Compare that with an average annual deficit since 2008 of $1.074 trillion — or about $90 billion per month.
This would be a powerful argument if the budget was the responsibility of the congress alone, but the president also has a say. Foster parenthetically notes that the country ran surpluses for a time when President Clinton acted as a restraint on Republican budget-busting proclivities. After Bush assumed office in 2001, the restraining factor was gone and Republicans cut taxes while putting two wars and a big new spending program (Medicare part D) on their grandchildren’s credit card.
Of course, no absurd defense of the Republican party’s disastrous rule would be complete without the uncritical link from reliable rightwing booster, Glenn Reynolds.
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