Comments (0)

By Gregory Taggart, February 4, 2011 9:44 am

Journalists covering the revolt against President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt have found themselves the targets of widespread anger and suspicion in an apparently coordinated campaign that is intended to stifle the flow of news that could further undermine the government.

Comments (0)

By Gregory Taggart, February 3, 2011 10:16 am

Mubarak is a bumbling fool, but his bumbling will–or should–help Obama out of his box. Mubarak’s jackboot on the neck of foreign press and human rights workers will–or should–give Present Obama reason to finally choose sides in this mess.

We’ll see.

Comments (0)

By Gregory Taggart, February 1, 2011 5:25 pm

I’ve been following the crisis in Egypt, and I realize that options are few. Nevertheless, there are options–three of them actually–that stand out: support the protestors, support Mubarak, or vote present.

Guess which one the President Obama chose?

Comments (0)

By Gregory Taggart, January 31, 2011 11:43 am

Two paragraphs from The New York Times capture the conundrum that is the U.S.’s current policy in Egypt, a policy advocated by realist foreign policy experts. The first quotes an Egyptian with dual citizenship:

“I brought my American passport today in case I die today,” said Marwan Mossaad, 33, a graduate student of architecture with dual Egyptian-American citizenship. “I want the American people to know that they are supporting one of the most oppressive regimes in the world and Americans are also dying for it.”

The second refers to a report in Haaretz, an Israeli daily:

Jerusalem was also reported to have called on the United States and a number of European countries over the weekend to mute criticism of Mr. Mubarak to preserve stability in the region, the Israeli daily Haaretz reported.

The Times follows that with a rejoinder from a unnamed Israeli official, a rejoinder that essentially–though maybe unintentionally–supported the Haaretz report:

But an Israeli government official, speaking on condition of anonymity following diplomatic protocol, said that the Haaretz report did not reflect the position of the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. Mr. Netanyahu spoke cautiously in his first public remarks on the situation in Egypt, telling his cabinet that the Israeli government’s efforts were “designed to continue and maintain stability and security in our region.”

“I remind you that the peace between Israel and Egypt has endured for over three decades, and our goal is to ensure that these relations continue,” the prime minister said on Sunday as Egypt’s powerful Muslim Brotherhood and the secular opposition united around a prominent government critic in hopes of negotiating with the Army for Mr. Mubarak’s departure.

And there you have it: The U.S. has been supporting a very oppressive regime, and that regime is supposedly essential to stability in the region. My question for the realists is and always has been: In the long run, is supporting oppressive regimes in the pursuit of stability the best way to achieve stability? I think not; to wit: the Philippines (Marcos), Iran (the Shah), Iraq (Saddam), and now Egypt (Mubarak)–and that’s just off the top of my head.

There is no long-term stability without freedom, and there is no freedom without democracy. The people must be sovereign.

Comments (0)

By Gregory Taggart, January 29, 2011 8:04 pm

The Working Group on Egypt, a group of foreign policy experts brought together by Robert Kagan of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, sent a letter to Secretary Clinton April 7, 2010, encouraging her to promote democratic reform in Egypt “in advance of the upcoming . . . parliamentary elections [in 2010] and a presidential election in 2011 . . .”

To me the nut paragraph–the paragraph that virtually jumped off the page–was this one and especially the first sentence (bolded emphasis mine):

The choice is not between a stable and predictable but undemocratic Egypt on the one hand, and dangerous instability and extremism on the other. There is now an opportunity to support gradual, responsible democratic reform. But the longer the United States and the world wait to support democratic institutions and responsible political change in Egypt, the longer the public voice will be stifled and the harder it will be to reverse a dangerous trend. Already there are signs that the Egyptian government plans to restrict opposition candidacies and civil society monitoring of the elections.

Secretary Clinton quickly responded. In a letter dated April 10, 2010, she wrote:

The United States supports free, fair, and transparent elections in Egypt as in any part of the world. Although the decision of who will run in or win the elections belongs to the Egyptian people alone, we have consistently encouraged the Egyptian government to adopt further political reforms to open political processes to wider participation and representation. We also believe it is important for Egypt to expand public discourse and relax restrictions on NGOs, political parties, journalists, and bloggers. Such action would increase the space for greater political participation and lead to greater transparency in Egypt’s electoral process.

Senior Administration officials have engaged with the Government of Egypt in an ongoing, important dialogue with Egyptian civil society representatives and NGOs who share the desire for political reform and expanded democratic participation in Egypt. This Administration values its dialogue on these issues.

A month later, the Working Group wrote again, emphasizing the need to act now and to persuade Mubarak to “lift the state of emergency now, as the critical election period begins.”

That was then, now is now. Egypt is in an uproar, many of its citizens having taken to the streets. Today the Working Group issued a statement that, among other things, asked the Obama administration to press the Egyptian government to “publicly declare that Hosni Mubarak will agree not to run for re-election,” and for the administration to “suspend all economic and military assistance to Egypt until “the government accepts and implements these [and other] measures.”

According Laura Rozen at Politico, Kagan, has not been impressed with the Obama administration’s efforts:

“We are paying the price for the fact that the administration has been at least of two minds on this stuff, and we should have seen it coming,” said Robert Kagan, co-chair of the bipartisan Egypt working group, regarding what many analysts now say is the inevitable end of Hosni Mubarak’s thirty year reign as Egypt’s president.

Though the Obama administration has tried to look like it’s not picking sides in urging restraint from violence amid five days of Egyptian unrest calling for Mubarak to step down, “the U.S. can’t be seen as neutral when it’s giving a billion and a half dollars” to prop up the Mubarak regime, Kagan said.

I’m just getting up to speed on what’s happening in Egypt. In any case, I am not an expert on Egypt–or even the Middle East. Nevertheless, I’ve been concerned about Mubarak for a long time. I’ve been equally concerned that the Realists don’t get it: long term, guys like Mubarak are not good for their people–a given–and not good for the United States. We should have been encouraging him to retire a long time ago. We shouldn’t be supporting him now.

Comments (0)

By Gregory Taggart, January 28, 2011 5:26 pm

The problem isn’t the Egyptian government–though it’s certainly part of the problem. The problem is Mubarak and has been for 30 years. Just guessing here, but his people don’t want him to appoint another government, they would like a hand in the appointing. Legitimate governments govern by the consent of the people. Point. Game. Set. Match.

Comments (0)

By Gregory Taggart, January 21, 2011 11:24 am

This morning, as I drove to meet my brother and sister-in-law for breakfast, NPR’s Morning Edition treated me to a teaser lead-in to a story that taxpayers were soon going to get back all the money the government had invested in AIG during the bailout. The actual story (which I cannot find online) confirmed the headline, though it sort of hedged with words like “depending on stock performance” and such.

I own shares in AIG. Prior to the bailout, I owned 20 Xs more shares–but that’s another story. Point is, I watch the stock and news about the stock. And I watched recently as the share price climbed above $52 a share on January 7 (I bought those shares at the reverse split-adjusted price of $43.60 on 9/18/08). Since that high, the share price has fallen precipitously to just over $42.00 as I write, almost a 20% decline in two weeks. In other words, I’m worse off than when I bought the shares over three years ago. So exactly how are the taxpayers getting paid back–soon–if the market value of AIG has decreased? I understand that the government and/or AIG may sell off operating companies and repay the debt from the proceeds. Do the value of the parts exceed the value of the whole?

Or is this more Prava-like reporting of the sort that the Seattle Times debunked this morning? Referring to the White House’s recent announcement of $19 billion in new Boeing jet orders, an announcement timed to coincide with the visit of Chinese President Hu Jintao, reporter Dominic Gates writes,

The deal President Hu signed does not include any new jet orders.

Delivering the formal approval during Hu’s visit is designed to make the Chinese government appear responsive to U.S. concerns about the balance of trade.

However, all of the airplanes in the sale were announced and booked by Boeing as firm orders over the past four years. Chinese airlines had already paid nonrefundable deposits and signed contracts for the jets, most of them as far back as 2007.

Gates continues,

The White House announcement said the total value of the orders was $19 billion.

But that’s the list price, which airline customers never pay.

Based on market data from aircraft-valuation consultancy Avitas, the actual price for those 200 planes is about $11 billion.

To be fair, Gates points out that Boeing says that the Chinese government’s approval is important, but . . .

Summing up the deal, Gates closes with,

Our verdict: The Chinese orders are real and will help keep Boeing workers busy here through 2013. Still, the White House announcement, while technically true, left a completely false impression.

The orders weren’t new. They weren’t really worth $19 billion. And Boeing isn’t soaring ahead of its big global rival with this deal.

An accurate headline for the news might have said: Hu finally signs off on old orders for U.S. jets, but Boeing still lags Airbus in China.

Likewise, an accurate lead-in for the AIG story on NPR might have said: Taxpayers will recoup their investment in AIG if the stars align and the stock price ever gets high enough, but that’s far off in the future.

Update: I found a Reuters story that I think the NPR story was based on. The three nut paragraphs:

In its third report on the bailout of AIG, the GAO said U.S. taxpayers’ risk exposure to the insurer increasingly is expected to be tied to the success of AIG and its value as seen by investors in the company’s common stock.

“The government’s ability to fully recoup the federal assistance will be determined by the long-term health of AIG,” the report said.

A Treasury official said taxpayers were in a strong position to recover “every dollar put into AIG.” (emphasis supplied)

I’m virtually certain the two quotes appeared in the NPR story. The second quote resembles the NPR headline. Alert readers will notice that the first quote basically takes all the zing out of the second, and thus the headline of the NPR story.

Comments (0)

By Gregory Taggart, January 18, 2011 9:46 am

Like maybe standing up straight and looking Hu in the eye, for example?

This was too easy.

Comments (0)

By Gregory Taggart, November 4, 2010 5:06 pm

Mumbai Mirror columnist Cyrus Dastur reports that his city is putting on the shine for President Obama’s visit.

And now, as India gets ready for Obama’s visit, we’re once again scrambling around to make our cities look good even when they’re a far cry from being liveable. Certain roads will be hastily repaired, areas will be cleaned, and security will be completely in shape, et al. Basically, everything that makes us cast a good impression will be done. So what if all this crumbles down like a pack of cards the moment Obama’s flight leaves India.

Seems like wherever he goes, the President is a job-creating machine. Except here.

(Courtesy of Bureau of Labor Statistics)

And if that graph isn’t disappointing enough, try this one, which shows the median duration of unemployment year-by-year over the last 50 years: