Finally an Opinion to leave the Middle East Alone

My response to Thomas Friedman's Contain and Amplify editorial:

Finally an opinion to leave the Middle East alone to a long dose of benign neglect. ISIS uses terrorism as a tool for its Sunni rebellion in Shia dominated Syria and Iraq. Its a civil war and we squander our blood and treasure believing it to be anything other. Much better to for us to look inward and work on our pressing needs which have better prospects from our attention.

English is Liberty

My response to David Brooks' Talent Loves English :

English is Liberty.  Magna Carta, Common Law, Rule of Law and Adam Smith is a framework that brings talent to the fore.  The Napoleonic Code on the other hand is a legacy of the Roman Empire and mercurial authoritarian rule that holds talent back.

A Beautiful Authoritarian

Rule by Velvet Fist by New York Times Op Editors Sergei Guriev and Daniel Treisman brings up an interesting subject, Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore. Authoritarian rule goes badly when it tries to manage the market economy in the same manner it manages its politics, with an iron fist.  Singapore flourished because it welcomed a free market economy and with it an eventual development into a democracy.  Lee Kuan Yew was a beautiful authoritarian.

I’ll get hate mail for this but the second inline is Pinochet of Chile, a hateful political authoritarian who was advised to bring in the Chicago Boys after his coup d’etat to develop Chile’s moribund economy. The economic flourish lead to a return to a successful  democracy in Chile.

There is no such a prognosis for General Sisi’s coup d’etat in Egypt because the military fosters a crony capitalist paradise of insider deal making.  Its a capitalism which does nothing to generate prosperity and therefore forget about an eventual turn to democracy. Other strongmen who reject capitalism, such as Castro in Cuba and Chavez in Venezuela, reject prosperity and its democratizing influence as well.

No Will to Fight

Iraqi Forces are Blamed in ISIS Rout, well yeaaaah!  Okay imagine it's 1864 and Abraham Lincoln was able to gather a volunteer force of Southerners to fight for the Union.  They fight in Virginia and are garrisoned as a unit in a town in the Shenandoah valley.  The locals call them traitors.  All of them have family fighting against the Union and themselves as well. Doubtful there is much will to fight in that unit.  How is it different than in Iraq and its civil war to split itself into Shia and Sunni regions?

Now for a real laugh.  Imagine President Lindsey Graham petitioning the Congress for authorization to commit American boots on the ground to fight Iraq's Civil War.

ISIS is nothing more than a Rebel Group

My response to Roth Douthat's editorial "Can the Islamic State Survive" :

If we consider ISIS as a media savvy rebellion in a region of governmental dysfunction then logic might prevail in our current inept analysis, especially this one likening ISIS to the Soviet takeover of Czarist Russia. Syria and Iraq are splitting into Sunni, Shia and Kurdish sectarian regions. Don’t fight this civil war with worse then useless military aid to reconquer towns and cities which are then left desolate and without a community from which to regroup.  Just let the divisions happen and support only those political unions that govern and protect their people, for example the Kurds of Kurdistan in Iraq.

Premature Conquest of Tikrit

The May 9th article “After Wrestling Tikrit From ISIS, Iraqis face Sectarian and Tribal Tensions” mentions the Jabours of Alam, just north of Tikrit as the essential Sunni moderates that allied itself with the Baghdad government.  Now that all attention is focused in Anbar and the Ramadi loss to ISIS expect Baghdad to ignore Tikrit.  Pity the Jabours because ISIS will return and annihilate the tribe as an example to those Sunnis considering allying themselves with Shia Iraq.

To battle ISIS the allies are required to be somewhat effective political unions.  Among the the players in the Middle East only the Kurdish regional government of Kurdistan is one. We should support their effort to unify their people as part of our pacifying strategy in the region that includes Syria, Iran and Turkey as well.  The remainder of Iraq and Syria is in the middle of a civil war and must be abandoned to benign neglect because there is no fixing it.  Our military aid only makes it worse as the last of the Jabours will undoubtedly recount in some future telling of our inept foreign policy.

Its not time to Double Down in Iraq

Iraq's Sunni Strategy Collapses in Ramadi Rout by ISIS illustrates the uselessness of supporting a unified Iraq as part of the grand strategy to pacify the region.  Its a civil war.  Stand down and let Iraq break apart while supporting he Kurdish, the only people that have a solid political union to work with.

DemoSclerosis, Why Washington Stopped Working

“One of the reasons Washington is suffocating under the swarm of client groups is that Washington is an irresistible target.  You can go there for almost any kind of benefit you want, and it is the only game in town. There are no other federal governments that might undercut you or favor your competitors behind your back.  Washington is one-stop shopping for the parasite economy.”

Jonathan Rauch Government’s End

And Rauch is a liberal!  He laments that the sclerosis dampens activism that was possible in FDR’s era and now suffocates it at the hands of the various interest groups formed by activism because there is no way to kill off the failures.  Unlike with a free market where failed enterprises are cleared away government programs live on and grow to suck away increasing resources.  Grover Norquist’s starve the beast campaign of demanding no tax increase pledges makes sense now.

Marco Rubio Briefed by Necons

Marco Rubio on Charlie Rose yesterday appeared to be an articulate candidate with no original thought.  The criticisms of Obama fell on the side of doing more of the same earlier, like that would of made a difference, and regarding Cuba a backward and irrelevant perspective that we got over with Vietnam.  

Mike Morrell's Seal the Pressure Cooker Vision

Mike Morrell’s hours on Charlie Rose shows a foreign policy dependent on containing the middle eastern pressure cooker rather than exploring paths to relieve some points.  I need to read his new book and critique that which appears obvious, such as where he laments the loss of Gaddafi’s stabilizing influence in Libya and welcomes Egypt’s recent military coup d'etat.

Tuesday May 19th

Just saw "Secrets, Politics and Torture" on Frontline and my opinion of Mike Morrell dropped like a stone. Don't want to bother reading his book and when he is on Charlie Rose I'll turn it off since my doubts about the CIA torture program are affirmed and its determination to cover up its ineffectiveness just makes Morrell a shill for a fraud.

More Cart before Horse

After Wrestling Tikrit from ISIS, Iraqis Face Sectarian and Tribal Tensions shows how conquering is the easy part of pacifying a city or region.  Its leaving behind a functioning political unity that polices and administrates somewhat effectively that is the really hard part.  Tikrit is far from "Job Done" and no thought about conquering Mosul should be contemplated until it really is, especially for the lessons learned on how to re-occupy with something lasting.

May 22nd:

ISIS just routed Iraq's military in a take over of Ramadi in the Anbar region of Iraq.  This leaves the Jabour Tribe, a pro Iraq moderate Sunni group,  in Alam just north of Tikrit in a very vunerable position for having backed Baghdad in the reconquest.  With Baghdad's attention now focused on Anbar ISIS is sure to reconquer Tikrit and kill off the Jabours as a lesson to would be Sunni moderates.

Voluminous, Conflicting and Incomprehensible Laws

David Boaz’s The Libertarian Mind reminds us of James Madison Federalist paper #62 “It will be of little avail to the people if the laws be so voluminous that they can not be read , so incoherent that they can not be understood and so changing that they can not be known.”

Authoritarians dependent on edicts, commands and orders without an underlying principle are tripped up by the result: lawlessness. “Where there is no law, there is no Freedom” as John Locke warned.  

Cart Before the Horse

U. S. Trains Syrian Rebels in Jordan to Fight ISIS doesn't mention any political unity behind this militia made up apparently by our CIA.  "Vetting is an important part of the program." According to Department of Defense Secretary Carter. Without a local moderate political union to keep these guys in line there is no way to figure which way they will turn once they are asked to fight.  For who? For What?  The pesh merga works for the Kurdish, the strongest political union in Iraq.  Something like that needs to be encouraged and developed among the moderate Syrians in the refugee camps in Jordan, but apparently that effort has gone in the wrong direction where these camps have been emptied and moderates dispersed.

Oil Rich Alberta Swings Left, Can Texas be Far Behind ?

What comes around goes around and my prediction for Texas is that with Latino growth the Republican stronghold will reach a tipping point and then suddenly switch over to Democrat just like in Alberta, Canada.  Why?  Evangelical meddlesomeness in government.

Europe's Antitrust Look at Google

In tech it appears that once an antitrust suit is filed that a turning point has been reached and not because of government but because the market has moved one.  Search Start Ups See Opening to Challenge Google in Mobile Apps is an example of Europe's irrelevance.

Bitcoin in Argentina

"Quick Change" in today's New York Times Magazine is a fascinating look at how Liberty outs the dysfunctional state.

Chris Christie Blowhard into the Sunset

Yesterday's indictments don't connect him directly to the politically motivated Washington Bridge traffic jam but the link to his office over the scandal is a lot clearer than Hillary is to Bengahzi.  No love lost here for either Authoritarian.