Once, in The U.S....

[muse]

Tourism rises globally, but not to U.S.
With a weak dollar, America is a great buy for foreigners, yet visits are falling.
By Howard LaFranchi | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
from the July 29, 2008 edition

Washington - A recent headline in The Guardian of London – "America – more hassle than it's worth?" – underscores a stubborn global view that the United States is not an easy or a desirable place to visit.

It's a perception reflected in the numbers. The world's long-haul international travelers have jumped by 35 million since 2000, yet America has been largely overlooked by those new travelers, despite favorable exchange rates resulting from a weak dollar and attractions like Disney World and the Grand Canyon. In fact, the annual number of foreign visitors to the US is about 2 million lower than in 2000, leading travel-industry experts to figure that from 2000 to 2007, the US economy took a hit of about $150 billion.

This all comes at a time when the economy could use a little boost from free-spending foreigners.

With the economy anchored as voters' top concern for the fall elections, Congress is taking notice of the foreign-traveler deficit, considering ways to better communicate US entry requirements and to develop a "See America" promotional campaign. But even with that, it could be years before America's welcome recovers its lost luster, say travel experts.

"If you look at international travel as a pie, then the world pie is growing, but the US slice of it is shrinking – and that despite the fact that we are a great bargain," says Roger Dow, president of the Travel Industry Association (TIA), a Washington-based representative of the $740-billion-a-year travel industry.

International travelers toting overflowing shopping bags in Manhattan and those filling Houston's trendy restaurants are exceptions. In all other major US cities and destinations, the numbers of long-haul foreign visitors (which excludes border hoppers from Canada and Mexico) are down – with reasons ranging from perceptions of close scrutiny at airports to the residual impact of a poor US image abroad.

When The Times of London recently suggested that foreigners with a hankering for Mickey and Minnie could save themselves the hassle of US travel by substituting Paris Disneyland, or fill a cowboy craving by visiting France's horse-rich Camargue rather than the American West, it stung in traditional American tourist destinations. Foreign visitors to Orlando, Fla., dropped by one-third from 2000 to 2006; by nearly 40 percent over the same period to Anaheim, Calif. (read Disneyland); and by 22 percent to Las Vegas, a frequent entry point for foreigners to the Southwest.

Some Americans might respond with a jingoistic "Who needs 'em?" But Mr. Dow notes that in all 50 states, travel and tourism figure somewhere among the top four industries by economic impact.

The economic impact is not just on hotels, restaurants, Liberty Island ticket sales, and T-shirt hawkers.

Organizers of the annual international consumer electronics show in Las Vegas cite several reasons for thousands of lost visitors: an arduous visa process for potential show attendees, a perception of an unwelcoming America, and high-profile campaigns to draw visitors by countries with rival electronics shows. The result is lower sales for the mostly US electronics companies that make up the Las Vegas show. "We had 28,000 international visitors to the show this year [in January], but that number is easily off by several thousand from China alone because of our government's efforts to control the flow of visitors," says Gary Shapiro, president of the Consumer Electronics Association in Arlington, Va.

The foreign-visitor issue, he says, is one element of a "three-part problem" that also includes the high hurdles required of foreign students seeking to study in the US and restrictions on the entry of highly skilled workers. "It's a huge issue for our nation," he says.

On a recent trip to China, Mr. Shapiro met the owner of a chain of 1,200 electronics stores who said he'd love to visit the Las Vegas show – but can't get a visa. While Shapiro may not know why that particular visa request was denied, he does know about the process a Chinese businessperson, tourist, or student has to go through to get a visa.

As he describes it, the applicant must first get to the US Embassy or a city with a US consulate, wait in what can be a long line, and pay a $100 application fee, giving a full accounting of all financial assets. The applicant must then return to the embassy or consulate for a two-minute interview that results in approval for a visa or rejection.

"Meanwhile this person, who is wondering why he is putting himself through that, is hearing from the competition in Germany, 'Come to Germany!' " adds Shapiro, noting that Berlin holds a rival consumer electronics show.

The US government has gotten the message to some extent, working with foreign governments to extend visa-waiver programs to more countries and spending millions of dollars on programs to improve the reception of foreign visitors at key arrival airports. In April, the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security announced the expansion of the 2006 Model Ports Initiative to 18 additional airports: The goal is to streamline and make more pleasant the arrival process for foreign visitors.

But the US still does not have a campaign to promote American travel to foreigners, the only developed country not to have one. "As a country we've had this ... arrogance that people will struggle to get here, while other countries have to promote themselves," Shapiro says.

Congress seems convinced that this must change. More than 40 senators and 200 House members are cosponsoring a "travel promotion act" that would create a $200 million program – similar to what other developed countries already have. It would communicate US security and entry policies to foreigners while promoting the US as a travel destination.

The program would not require US tax dollars but would be a public-private partnership financed in part by a new fee on foreigners entering the US from visa-waiver countries and in part by the travel industry.

Still, promoters of the new program say Americans should understand the role they play in improving the climate for foreign visitors.

"People hear about rude treatment getting in here, and there can be some truth to that," says Dow of the TIA. But he also cites surveys showing that three-quarters of foreign visitors go home "feeling very good about America and Americans," he says. "If we had 10 million more people going home somewhere and saying, 'You know, they are pretty darn nice people,' " he adds, "it's pretty good public diplomacy."

 

[muse]

Online registration for visa-free travel to U.S. begins testing phase
The Associated PressPublished: July 28, 2008

BRUSSELS: Europeans and others who travel visa-free to the United States can start registering in August for a new online security screening check that will become mandatory in January, officials said Monday.

The new security measure will replace current paper forms that foreign visitors from the 27 countries that participate in the U.S. visa waiver program have to fill out once they enter U.S. territory at airports and seaports. It will not apply to land border crossings into the United States, where authorities will continue to use the paper forms.

The Electronic System of Travel Authorization - or ESTA - "will help to modernize our pen and ink system and bring it into the 21st century," said Jackie Bednarz from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. "All travelers including children of all ages must have an approved ESTA beginning Jan. 12."

No fee will be charged to fill out the online form, which will be valid for trips to the U.S. over a two-year period or until the traveler's passport expires within that time.

The measure is meant to increase security of the visa-waiver program allowing the government to screen visitors before they travel.

There are 27 countries whose citizens are not required to obtain visas for U.S. entry: 15 European Union countries as well as Andorra, Australia, Brunei, Japan, New Zealand, Iceland, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, San Marino, Norway, Monaco and Singapore. Eight other countries could be admitted to the visa waiver program next year.

The electronic system adds to existing identity and travel checks that Washington has imposed on foreigners since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Visitors already have to provide fingerprints to U.S. border guards when entering the country, and airlines they use forward data including passenger names, addresses, seat numbers, credit card information and travel details.

The new security measure is being studied by the European Union to determine whether it constitutes a new visa restriction.

European Union officials have warned that if the new online travel security document represents a new visa requirement, the EU might introduce countermeasures for American visitors.

The U.S. government has repeatedly reassured the EU that the new system would not amount to a new visa, but would simply replace the current forms Europeans have to fill out when they arrive in the U.S. Those green and white forms require visitors to supply their names, passport details, the address where they will be staying and answer various questions, including whether they have been convicted of war crimes.

Travelers will have to submit their online application at least three days before they head to the U.S. and most should be approved within 24 hours, U.S. officials said. Those who have their online forms rejected will have to apply for a visa or seek further help at their local U.S. embassies.

Bednarz added the online form will be available in more languages like French, German or Spanish as of Oct. 15. The Web site is currently available only in English during its testing phase.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection - Travel[/

 

[muse]

New and Improved



How home became homeland
By Roger Cohen

Wednesday, September 3, 2008
NEW YORK: Oh, it's good to be home.

The threat level has been raised (or was that lowered?) to "orange." I wonder idly what that means - an image of medium-volume jihadist chatter menacing Armonk, New York, comes to mind - but I have no time to get that vision in focus before another cheery message rolls out across the airport.

"Do not make jokes about security. You could be arrested."

O.K., I won't ask the security guy with "TSA" on his shirt if that stands for "Team Standing Around," and I won't say, "Hey, remember how the USA used to be a land without fences and nobody ever called it a homeland," and I won't say, "Arrested? Ha! And then what?"

Nor will I mention the other America before "threat levels" and two wars and renditions and bumper stickers saying "Freedom is not free" - the land where jokes were not yet grounds for arrest and nobody got wrestled to the floor for "looking" suspicious and fear was not yet a coin of the realm.

Oh, but it's good to be home, even if it's a "homeland" now.

Just take a look at our home! A screeching belt in a bunker-like, airless hall (last painted in 1957) turns and turns without bags on it, watched by hundreds, perhaps thousands, of ragged travelers straining to hear inaudible announcements, darting here and there like ants in a panic, blocking their ears against the screech, comforting babies, searching in vain for baggage agents who've all gone home because there was a storm and it's late and, hey, it's summer!

Some of the marooned crowd are on cell phones screaming "Sorry, honey, you cut out, WHAT?" and the chorus rises, "Sorry, honey, you cut out, WHAT?" and I think that's not a bad bumper sticker for this unraveled, disconnected homeland almost eight years into Bush.

Oh, yes, it's good to be home. Even if it's a homeland, at least it's not a fatherland. And how, I wonder, does our home look to others? As Bill Clinton noted at the Democratic national convention in Denver, the United States does better when it leads with "the power of our example" than with "the example of our power."

To think this airport is named after JFK - all that promise, and my Dad weeping at his loss in faraway London. Kennedy who asked us to ask ourselves what we could do for our country. Whatever happened to Lincoln's "last, best hope?"

It got frayed. Let's stop talking about an infrastructure bottleneck, sounds too like something in a Soviet 10-year plan, and start talking about collapsing bridges, crawling trains, dilapidated airports, potholed roads - the great national failure to build a network of public transport worthy of a modern state in the age of $120 oil.

We've been spending too much on fear while others have spent on the future. And now JFK looks like LOTH - Lagos-on-the-Hudson - while Hong Kong airport shimmers the way American promise once did.

Yes, it's good to be home. As Robert Frost noted, "Home is the place where, when you have to go there, They have to take you in."

Unless you make the wrong joke, or knock yourself out on the scaffolding, or have a weird beard.

Speaking of the Democratic national convention, the security there involved police in shades with sub-machine guns riding around on platforms on the backs of vehicles and the image they summoned with their truculent menace was Pinochet's Chile circa 1986, the main difference being the Colorado vehicles still had license plates.

Police dogs combed through the gym and pool area of the Denver Grand Hyatt sniffing goggles and towels as wide-eyed kids gaped.

And there, at the convention, was another Kennedy, Senator Edward Kennedy, rising from his hospital bed with a bull-like courage that nobody who witnessed it will forget, and saying, unbowed: "We are called to a better country and a newer world."

Yes, it can still be good to be home.

Barack Obama put the situation this way: "America, we are better than these last eight years. We are a better country than this."

I reckon everyone - Democrat, Republican or independent - can agree on that. Certainly the rest of the world can. Its thirst to close the Bush chapter is bordering on the feverish.

Winston Churchill said of the United States: "It can be counted on to do the right thing, but only after it has tried every other alternative." As Roger Smith, an acute political observer and blogger, put it in an e-mail: "Well, George W. is every other alternative."

Unless you count Sarah Palin, John McCain's new sidekick, the Republican lady risen from the ice out near Russia. She's certainly alternative.

Yes, it's good to be home. But it sure could be better.

Readers are invited to comment at my blog: Passages Opinion Blog International Herald Tribune

 

[muse]

One had hoped that these posts would be seen as call to awaken the U.S. from the disasterous stupor she has fallen in, because that is what these posts are, a wake up call - Enemies of the U.S. would seek, scheme and propel her in to greater blunder even as she imagines she has succeeded in the effort to secure her peoples, anyway, wake up! it's later than you think.



Neither respected nor feared
By Geoffrey Wheatcroft

Wednesday, September 3, 2008
BATH, England:

In an exalted phrase, the keynote speaker at the Republican convention reviewed the record of the administration, and asked, "When have we rested more secure in friendship with all mankind?" That wasn't in St. Paul, where the Republicans are gathered this week, but at the 1904 Republican convention in Chicago, when the speaker was Elihu Root, a past Secretary of War and future Secretary of State.

His words were sonorous then, and they are haunting now. They will not be repeated this year, because they could not be. A senior American politician might have said something similar in 1920, or 1945 or 1960. But no Republican now - and no Democrat - could utter Root's words without inviting utter derision.

Today there might be a more bitter question: When has America rested less secure in friendship with all mankind?

And that explains the intense interest which this year's presidential election has inspired beyond the shores of the United States. It's not just Obamania - there's no point in denying that Senator Barack Obama is the man most people outside the United States would like to win - but he was one of three potential candidates until Senator Hillary Clinton conceded defeat who were all fascinating simply in personal terms: a septuagenarian war hero, a woman, a black man.

The election absorbs us in Europe - and others in Africa and Asia - because we can see that a general crisis spreading around the globe is directly linked to the follies and failures of American policy. In his new book, "The Much Too Promised Land," about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, in which he used to be engaged as a State Department official, Aaron David Miller puts it with lapidary succinctness.

Having stumbled for eight years under the Clinton administration over how to make peace in the Middle East, and then for eight years under the administration of George Bush the Younger over how to make war there, the United States finds itself "trapped in a region which it cannot fix and it cannot abandon." Still more to the point, throughout that region, for all of her seeming might, America is "not liked, not feared and not respected."

And not only in the Middle East. The theme of these past years has been American arrogance followed by American incompetence leading to American impotence.

From one side of the world to the other the story is the same, whether it's Vladimir Putin being told by Bush to leave Georgia, or Israel being told by Condoleezza Rice to desist from building more settlements on the West Bank, or China being told by Washington to behave better in Tibet, or even the European Union being told by any number of American politicians and pundits to accelerate Turkish membership.

All these American strictures are vaguely listened to. And then, as the late George Brown (a sometime British foreign secretary who shared Bush's verbal infelicity) might have said, the rest of the world treats them with a complete ignoral. After all, they come from a supposed hyperpower which in practice is neither respected not feared.

That is a direct consequence of what Washington has done. President Theodore Roosevelt said that America should speak softly and carry a big stick. President George W. Bush speaks loudly and waves a small stick. Stalin and Khrushchev had limits placed on their actions by awareness of what America might do if those limits were overstepped. Putin can do exactly what he likes in Georgia, since he knows that Washington is powerless to stop him.

One stock response from the bedraggled and diminished band of Bush supporters is that to say that all this is no more than "anti-Americanism." Prejudice against, and resentment of, America is indeed far from an imaginary phenomenon, in Europe or elsewhere, on right as well as left, and for generations past.

But today that stock response quite misses the point. Martin Wolf of the Financial Times (himself no radical extremist) has said very truly that attitudes toward America that were not long ago confined to the hard left in Europe are now found across the political spectrum. "Nous sommes tous Américains," the Monde bravely exclaimed after Sept. 11; seven years later it would be an exaggeration to say "We are all anti-Americans now," but not a wild one.

In any case, the whole-hearted enemy of America is the one who ought to be delighted by the eclipse of American prestige, and drink a toast to the Bush administration for bringing it about. It's those of us who believe that the United States needs to be constructively engaged in the world, and respected by it, who have most cause for dismay.

When Tony Blair said in early 2002 that he was worried about a drift towards American unilateralism, and that he wanted to "keep the United States in the international order," the diagnosis wasn't stupid. What was utterly preposterous was his subsequent reasoning that, in order to achieve this, he had to give unconditional support to every American action, above all the Iraq war a year later. As a result, the United States soon stood further still outside the international order, while in the end American power was gravely weakened.

No one who has followed the election campaign can be confident that there will truly be a new beginning in the new year. Electioneering puts reason and restraint at a discount and invites boastful bluster. John McCain's "we are all Georgians" is a fine example and obviously empty rhetoric. Even he ought to have worked out by now that his fellow-Americans, "Georgians" or otherwise, are not going to fight for South Ossetia, and Putin knows it.

Obama took an almost more damaging misstep when he said that "Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided" - something not even Bush has said. If taken literally his words would mean an end to any imaginable settlement of that bitter and intractable dispute - and they raise once again questions about the fitness of the United States for world leadership, under any president.

Whoever wins in November should pause and take stock. The United States has rarely faced greater challenges with the domestic economy but still more in international affairs. Why does America enjoy so little friendship with all mankind? And is there nothing at all that can be done to restore her standing?

Geoffrey Wheatcroft's books include "Le Tour: A History of the Tour de France 1903-2007," "The Strange Death of Tory England" and "Yo, Blair!"

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

And despite all this, Sarah Palin's mean spirited, condescending speech gets rave reviews and might actually convince the 'workin class' to elect, once again, those subscribing to the ideology that brought the US to the point where the phrase 'once upon a time' could be used to refer to its once unassailable position on so many fronts.

Given the duplicity of the US (specifically the Neo Cons), as I see it, towards Pakistan and other parts of the Muslim world, this fall from grace wouldn't bother me, except that I have no interest in having 'pitbulls' running US policy for another 4 or more years.

 

[muse]

I share your sentiment however; a majority of the peoples have no understanding of the damage done to the U.S., all they know is fear, and the loathing that results from it, they are not at fault.

Or it can be that I have it wrong in that they know and understand and approve of the behaviour of the U.S.neocons, in which case, they are right to fear.

 

[muse]

In the seventh year
By Roger Cohen

Wednesday, September 10, 2008
NEW YORK: And in the seventh year after the fall, the dust and debris of the towers cleared. And it became plain at last what had been wrought.

For the wreckage begat greed; and it came to pass that while America's young men and women fought, other Americans enriched themselves. Beguiling the innocent, they did backdate options and they did package toxic mortgage securities and they did reprice risk on the basis that it no more existed than famine in a fertile land.

Thereby did the masters of the universe prosper, with gold, with silver shekels, with land rich in cattle and fowl, with illegal manservants and maids, with jewels and silk, with Gulfstream V business jets; yet the whole land did not prosper with them. And it came to pass, when the housing bubble burst, that Main Street had to pay for the Wall Street party.

For Bush ruled over the whole nation and so sure was he of his righteousness that he did neglect husbandry.

And he took his nation into desert wars and mountain wars but, Lo, he thought not to impose taxation, not one heifer nor sheep nor ox did Bush demand of the rich. And it came to pass that the nation fell into debt as boundless as the wickedness of Sodom. For everyone was maxed out.

So heavy was the burden of war and of bailing out Fannie Mae and financing debt with China that not one silver shekel remained to build bridges, nor airports, nor high-speed trains, nor roads, nor even to take care of wounded vets; and the warriors returning unto their homes from distant combat thought blight had fallen on the land.

So it was in the seventh year after the fall of the towers. And still Bush did raise his hands to the Lord and proclaim: "I will be proved right in the end!"

And around the whole earth, which had stood with America, there arose a great trouble for it seemed to peoples abroad that a great nation, rich in flocks and herds and land and water, had been cast among thorns and Philistines; its promise betrayed, its light dimmed, its armies stretched, its budget broken, its principles compromised, its dollar diminished.

And it came to pass that this profligate nation, drinking oil with an insatiable thirst, could not cure itself of this addiction, and so its wealth was transferred to other nations that did not always wish it well. Wherefore the balance of power in the world was altered in grievous ways; and new centers of authority arose, and they were no more persuaded by democracy than was the Pharaoh.

For Bush ruled over the whole nation and so sure was he of his righteousness that he did neglect the costs of wanton consumption. And he believed that if the Lord created fossil fuel, fossil fuel must flow without end, as surely as the grape will yield wine.

Therefore, in the seventh year after the fall, with 1,126 of the slain still unidentified, their very beings rendered unto dust, their souls inhabiting the air of New York, it seemed that one nation had become two; and loss, far from unifying the people, had sundered the nation.

For the rich, granted tax breaks more generous than any blessing, grew richer, and incomes in the middle ceased to rise, and workers saw jobs leaving the land for that region called Asia. And some fought wars while others shopped; and some got foreclosed while others got clothes; and still Bush spake but few listened.

Behold, so it was in the seventh year, and it seemed that America was doubly smitten, from without and within. And, Lo, a strange thing did come to pass. For as surely as the seasons do alternate, so the ruler and party that have brought woe to a nation must give way to others who can lead their people to plenty. How can the weary, flogged *** bear honey and balm and almonds and myrrh?

Yet many Americans believed the weary beast could still give them bounty. They did hold that a people called the French was really to blame. They did accuse a thing called the United Nations. They did curse the ungodly folk of Gotham and Hollywood and the sinful city of Chicago; and, Lo, they proclaimed God was Republican, and carried a gun, and understood (white) teenage sex, and almost certainly hailed from Alaska.

For Bush ruled over the whole nation and so sure was he of his righteousness that he did foster division until it raged like a plague.

And in the seventh year after the fall, the dust and debris of the towers cleared. And it became plain at last what had been wrought - but not how the damage would be undone.

Readers are invited to comment at my blog: Passages Opinion Blog International Herald Tribune

 

[muse]

And around the whole earth, which had stood with America, there arose a great trouble for it seemed to peoples abroad that a great nation, rich in flocks and herds and land and water, had been cast among thorns and Philistines; its promise betrayed, its light dimmed, its armies stretched, its budget broken, its principles compromised, its dollar diminished

Beyond Sad

 

[muse]

Lets look at the other side of the coin:


9/11 and the Muslims' crusade



Thursday, September 11, 2008
by Mosharraf Zaidi

Seven years since the atrocities of Sept 11, 2001 and the Muslim world's crusade against itself continues unabated. From Algeria to Indonesia and everywhere in between, colonial residue continues to be used as an excuse for inexcusable governance. In seven years Muslims have still not prepared a case against the hijackers who have mutilated their faith, still not educated the advocates who will take this fight to the misguided, and still not prosecuted those that seek to poison generations of Muslims children with their bloodlustand their quest for an alternative but cynical and depraved political power-structure.

Of course, Muslims are responsible for their own fate, but if the Western world was interested in helping Muslims overcome centuries of debilitating decline, it's gone about it in a way that is, well, typically Muslim. It has wasted every opportunity, clouded its own message and delivered it using the wrong messengers, and owned up to none of its own failures.

Western orthodoxy has fundamentally failed to understand the denial that drives even secular Muslims to float conspiracy theories and question the accepted wisdom of what took place on 9/11. It has consistently obfuscated the language around terrorism to simplify life for itself, creating a new post-9/11 language that is sexy, but hypocritical and offensive. (There is no such thing as a Jihadist, or a Jihadi. If it is Jihad-doers that we seek to define, then the word we are looking for is mujahid.)

The West has done worse than get its grammar and language wrong. It has painted the Muslim world as one divided between moderates and extremists, whereas, not surprisingly, there are extremist moderates, and moderate extremists, and there is everything in between that hazard-pay diplomats cannot possibly be expected to understand from the depressing comfort of bunkers in colour-coded zones of safety.

Perhaps most unforgivably the West has played chicken with the self-perception of Muslims' liberty and dignity. It has sought stability and open access across the Muslim world for itself by making sweetheart deals with dictators, warlords, and criminals. It has had the audacity to call dead children "collateral damage." And yet the question "Why do they hate us?" keeps reappearing. If Predator drones and Hellfire missiles haven't done the trick in the tribal areas of Pakistan, maybe Mullah Jack Straw's fatwas on the hijab explains what is happening in Bradford and Yorkshire. If Haditha and Abu Ghraib didn't quite float the Iraqis' boats in Baghdad and Basra, Senator Obama's unmitigated disgust at being called a Muslim might be leading Southeast Michigan the way of Bradford.

The brutality of children dying from missile attacks should not be difficult to understand for Western governments, and yet somehow it is. This complete blindness to the fate of the children of others, by a Western social order that has come further than any other in human history in protecting and nurturing its children, and "not leaving any of them behind", is incomprehensible.

It is impossible on this seventh anniversary to expect any improvements in the Western prosecution of the war against 9/11's perpetrators. Why? Because even as 9/11 American bloodlust fades, post-9/11 political stupidity does not. Bill O'Reilly and the radical mullahs of the Republican Party, having finally admitted to the stupidity of attacking Iraq in the first place, insist that they cannot now leave without "winning." Democrats, having had their chutzpah handed to them by Karl Rove's brilliant scare tactics for over a decade, have outdone even themselves--committing to leaving Iraq, but also committing to increasing US troops in Afghanistan.

Yet there isn't a credible Muslim voice in the world that is engaging in the discourse required to chart a new and better path in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Instead, it is Rory Stewart, a British diplomat and traveller who is taking the case to the West. There isn't a credible Muslim voice in the world explaining the similarities between Abraham's children (aale Ibrahim), rather than exploiting them. Instead, it is Karen Armstrong, a former nun, who is articulating the real Islam and separating it from the Fox News caricature built by Osama bin Laden. There isn't a credible Muslim voice in the world explaining why it is dangerous to tar and feather the largest Muslim military in the world. Instead, it is Eric Margolis, an American journalist that has to anthropologically dissect why the ISI and Pakistan are genetically insecure in the neighbourhood they occupy.

There is no worse indictment of Muslims than the fact that there are still no credible leaders in the world (save perhaps Tariq Ramadan), whose primary identity is Muslim. Here too the West does its part, exacerbating the decay by confusing second-rate intellectuals and foreign-policy ambulance-chasers for Muslim thought leaders. The resultant vacuum is continually being filled by the mutilated Islam of killers and arsonists. Seven years since the atrocities of Sept 11, 2001, and there is still nothing to celebrate in the Muslim world.

The writer is a Muslim. Email: mosharraf@gmail.com

 

[muse]

A movement awaiting it's political moment?


Ron Paul’s Party
Daniel McCarthy


While twitchy cops and party hacks congregated in St. Paul for the Republican Convention, 12,000 Ron Paul supporters assembled for the Rally for the Republic in Minneapolis. The counter-convention featured a dozen speakers—from libertarian luminaries Bill Kauffman and Lew Rockwell to ex-governors Jesse Ventura and Gary Johnson—plus musical acts Sara Evans and Aimee Allen (the freedom movement’s answer to Avril Levigne, with more talent and less tolerance for the Bilderberg Group). Barry Goldwater Jr. introduced Paul’s keynote.

John McCain’s big tent across the river brought together hawks of all persuasions, from Joe Lieberman to Sarah Palin to Rudy Giuliani. The Connecticut senator, as staunch an advocate for military adventurism as abortion, got a prime-time speaking slot. A certain pro-life, antiwar Texan was persona non grata.

“We offered our services. We would have been glad to have an opportunity, we would have been pleased to participate,” Paul said. But “that wasn’t available to us.” McCain did not want his primary challenger even to be seen. “We had thought we would be able to go over, but my floor privileges have been strictly limited,” Paul revealed. “They’ve given me a pass that is second class.”

That pass required that the congressman enter and leave only by a certain door, be chaperoned by a McCain flack, and not bring any staff. Paul had no intention of attending under those conditions. Yet he didn’t get mad—he got even. “We still have enough freedom in this country to get involved and become the party,” he said, “and that’s been our approach rather than complaining about it.”

“The Republican Party ought to be welcoming me because I appeal to young people,” Paul contended. Indeed, one of the most remarkable things about Paul’s presidential campaign was its ability to energize youth around the unlikeliest of causes: “One of the most exciting issues that we talk about with young people is monetary policy.”

Even more than the Iraq War, the Federal Reserve stokes the passions of Paul’s supporters. During his keynote, the Target Center shook to chants of “End the Fed!” Months earlier, during a Paul appearance at the University of Michigan, students burned Federal Reserve notes—money, or Uncle Sam’s facsimile thereof.

Impressive as the rally was, even more portentous may have been the 600 activists who turned out for training put on by Paul’s new organization, the Campaign for Liberty, in the days before. They sat through ten-and-a-half hours of political boot camp on Aug. 31 and another eight hours the next day. This was a promising start for the Campaign for Liberty, which aims to do for the small-government, antiwar side what the Christian Coalition did for religious conservatives in the early 1990s.

Yet it has tensions at the philosophical level. One activist observed that there seemed to be many “paleoconservatives” in the group’s leadership, while much of the grassroots were “anarcho-capitalists.” Paul recognizes the fault line. “I have many friends in the libertarian movement who look down on those of us who get involved in political activity,” he acknowledged, but “eventually, if you want to bring about changes … what you have to do is participate in political action.”

The Campaign for Liberty’s organizers emphasized that though there might be few candidates Paul supporters can get behind, there are always ballot issues and legislation that the grassroots can organize to stop—tax hikes, gun registration, municipal bonds. Yet the great causes that animate the Paul coalition—war and monetary policy—are national. Paul is 73. If he doesn’t run in 2012, where will his supporters go?

One man eager to take up his banner is former Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura. “I wrote the book Don’t Start the Revolution Without Me. Well, I’m here,” he announced, hinting that “in 2012 we’ll give them a race they’ll never forget.” The former pro-wrestler was charismatic—and kooky. He teased the 9/11 “truther” contingent in the audience by asking why Osama bin Laden had not been formally charged with the attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center. That way lies madness. If Ventura is the future of the Paul movement, it will go the way of the Reform Party.

A better prospect for 2012 might be the rally’s other ex-governor—Gary Johnson of New Mexico. He doesn’t have Ventura’s presence, but he’s witty. Describing his opposition to mandatory-helmet laws for motorcyclists, he said, “We have an organ donor shortage. If you want to ride your motorcycle without a helmet, go ahead.” Johnson is even more of a non-interventionist than his admirers had suspected. “We have a military presence in 155 countries,” he said, “We need to embark on a process of getting those 155 countries unoccupied, à la Ron Paul.”

The Rally for the Republic made plain that Ron Paul Republicans will have no truck with McCain or Obama. But is there any other politician they can support, besides Paul himself? More than just their movement is at stake: Paul’s revolution might be the last chance in a generation for sound money and a non-imperial foreign policy

 

[muse]

The return of soft power?
By Paul Kennedy

Thursday, November 13, 2008
There are many things to say - and are being said - about Barack Obama's historic victory in the U.S. presidential election, and analysts of the fascinating transformations of American society will do a far better job than myself at explaining the outcome.

But as I surveyed the extraordinary non-U.S. response to Obama's undisputed achievement the morning after his victory became clear to the world, I was tempted into a further thought:

Will the sheer appeal of this man across the globe actually make an impact upon America's capacity to persuade other nations to follow its lead and agree to measures that Washington wants but fellow members of the system of states may not initially be so enthusiastic about? Will it convince governments and peoples abroad that policies "made in the U.S.A." are good for humankind as a whole?

For this, after all, is the definition of the term "soft power" as it was first systematically argued by Joseph Nye of Harvard University in a series of books he composed during the early 1990s. For too long, Nye suggested, realist scholars had focused far too heavily upon the hard-knuckled dimensions of military and economic/financial power and ignored the significance of national characteristics that allowed certain countries to "win friends and influence people" better than others.

An attractive way of life, an appealing culture, a capacity to be marching with (or at the head of) world opinion rather than standing against it were thus as potentially useful parts of a nation's toolkit as were clever diplomats, financial solidity or even large aircraft carriers.

It is clear that when Nye developed these ideas he believed that the United States possessed most of the attributes of soft power: That is, he rightly felt that Hollywood, MTV and American youth culture had much greater worldwide appeal than did the collapsed Soviet Union or the lack of freedoms in China.

Moreover, vast parts of the globe were marching in the direction pointed to by the Founding Fathers - democracy, the rule of law, economic liberty and so on. All of this reinforced America's special position in the world. It also confounded scholars who were writing about American decline. The three-legged stool of U.S. military power, economic power and soft power would keep the Republic at the top for generations to come.

Then came George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and the neo-con agendas of military activism, ideological assertiveness, over-riding of some basic human rights, unbalanced stress upon "the war on terror" and John-Bolton-like distaste for multilateralism - a collective bag of prejudices that the efforts of more moderate Republicans such as Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice could only rarely ameliorate.

By all measures of ranking world opinion - for example, the Pew Foundation global polls - the Bush administration became the most unpopular in recent American history. Unsurprisingly, therefore, America's "soft power" collapsed. The capacity of the White House to persuade other countries to do what it deems best was battered; the worldwide empathy that followed the 9/11 attacks steadily evaporated, even among countries traditionally most friendly to, or most reliant upon, the United States.

Last week's collective global rejoicing at the end of the Bush era was testimony to how far the nation of Lincoln, Wilson, FDR and Kennedy had fallen into international dislike over the past eight years.

Yet soft power, perhaps by its very nature, is volatile. And it is surely more easily adjustable and amendable than, say, a long-term relative decline in military-strategic power. So the interesting question remains: Will the electoral victory of Barack Hussein Obama give back to America that third "leg" of the stool, the triple undercarriage that supports its world position, the grand if immeasurable advantage of political and ideological appeal?

Judging from the media reports from far and wide, the answer is an unreserved "yes." Predictably, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France cabled Obama with the message: "Your election raises in France, in Europe and elsewhere in the world, an immense hope," offering a Gallic embrace that the next incumbent of the White House would be wise to accept with care even if the sentiments are sincere.

The jubilation across Africa and Indonesia, both claiming an Obama relationship, is widespread. Regimes that do not permit free and open elections are clearly disturbed at the ripple effects, just as their political opponents are heartened by this amazing example of democratic openness. Even the most purblind Hezbollah or Iranian fundamentalist is going to find it hard to accuse someone called Barack Hussein (descendant of the Prophet) of inherent anti-Muslim prejudice.

To be sure, if Obama attempts to rely upon international goodwill alone that would be like an automobile seeking to run on hot air rather than high-grade gasoline.

What the next president needs to do is recognize clearly what the hopes are that have made him so popular in so many different parts of the world: the African hopes that he will give real help to their troubled continent; the desires across Latin America that he will keep to liberal policies on trade and immigration, offer to ease the impasse with Cuba, and pay their region real respect; the yearnings in Europe, Canada and Australasia that he will take seriously America's obligations toward international institutions and treaties, including environmental and anti-protectionist commitments; and the moderate-Arab hopes that he will offer more than lip service to the Palestinians.

All of these aspirations are much easier stated than realized, and all of them will involve compromises between certain of his campaign promises to American voters and the larger "constituency" he has picked up overseas. Yet if he really wishes to recover America's soft power in the world, he will have to begin by offering the world something of what foreigners yearn for, not the whole stall of course, but items that look good and agreeable and helpful to quelling our many global fears and discontents.

Here a close study of the rhetoric and the actual policies of his predecessors Wilson, FDR and JFK will come in very handy indeed. For, as historians will tell you, none of those great "internationalist" statesmen did anything other than pursue America's "national" interests. What they had in common was the wisdom to see how they could merge what was good for their country with what was good for the world, or at least large parts of it.

They convinced millions of people worldwide to have faith in America's commitment, judgment and leadership, and thus to take more seriously reform proposals that would emanate from the White House. That, in a nutshell, is what soft power is all about.

But because it is "soft," it can dissipate fast. Large parts of an anxious world are waiting with hope for the coming of an Obama presidency, and most are sensible enough not to expect a sort of first-100-days miracle. But they are sitting in judgment, like the voters of Ohio and Florida, and willing to give "the new man" the benefit of the doubt - but not forever, perhaps not for long. Like many other things in life, Obama's bid to restore American soft power has term limits.

Paul Kennedy is the J. Richardson Professor of History and the director of International Security Studies at Yale University. He is currently writing a history of the Second World War. Distributed bye Tribune Media Services.