The IOC on 9/11

The IOC on 9/11, Contentions, September 30, 2009. "Does President Obama’s trip to Copenhagen tomorrow to lobby for Chicago’s bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics mean that victory is in the bag for the Windy City? Ramesh Ponnuru, for one, believes so, and quite a few others have echoed his thought that the president would hardly dare to go—especially after he said on September 14 that he was too busy to make the trip—and risk looking foolish if Chicago lost. They may be right, but my take is a little different."

Margaret Thatcher and "A Real Detente"

How Margaret Thatcher Helped to End the Cold War, Heritage Foundation WebMemo #2631, September 28, 2009. "When Margaret Thatcher came to power in 1979, many in the West had come to believe that the Cold War could not and should not be won, that anti-Communism was morally wrong, and that the future lay in détente between the superpowers and the evolution of democracy into ever-deepening state socialism. By the time she left office, the Berlin Wall had fallen and Eastern Europe was liberated. A year later, the Soviet Union crumbled into the dustbin of history. Democracy and freedom were on the advance."

Example #3: Why the U.N.'s Arms Trade Treaty Is a Bad Idea

Why the U.N.’s Arms Trade Treaty Won’t Work, September 18, 2009. "The U.N. wants to negotiate an Arms Trade Treaty. The Heritage Foundation recently published a lengthy study of this proposal. It found that the Treaty, if brought into being as currently projected, will be used not to restrict the access that dictators and terrorists have to conventional arms, but to reduce the ability of democracies like Israel to defend their people against terrorism. This week brought further evidence of the U.N.’s impending failure."

Dr. Liam Fox MP and the UK's NSS

Dr. Liam Fox MP on Afghanistan, Contentions, September 18, 2009. "Liam Fox, the Tory Shadow Defense Secretary, spoke at the Heritage Foundation yesterday. His admirably concise remarks on the “The War in Afghanistan: Why Britain, America and NATO Must Fight to Win” will be available online shortly. They’re well worth your time if you’re interested in Afghanistan, or what the Conservatives are likely to do if they come to power in May, as all the polls indicate they will. The main takeaways are clear, and welcome."

The EU's Constitution, and the American One

Constitutions, Good and Bad, Contentions, September 18, 2009. "The U.S. Constitution was signed 222 years ago yesterday. But for all the reverence with which the Constitution is treated, Constitution Day isn’t one of the higher-visibility federal holidays. Perhaps that’s because, for most Americans, holidays are days on which you don’t have to go to work. Or perhaps it’s because, until 2004, the day was known—to the few who had heard of it—as Citizenship Day."

Why Obama's Losing the Argument

Obama is Losing the Argument Because He’s Being Himself, Yorkshire Post, September 15, 2009. This article was published in my personal capacity. "Barack Obama has hit the skids. Most of his programmes remain stalled in Congress, and what little he has achieved has turned out to be unpopular. Abroad, his supposedly immense influence has not brought moderation to Iran, peace to Afghanistan, or sanity to the Scottish Executive." This op-ed was written in my personal capacity.

Yale: Living Up To My Expectations Since 1991

What the Yale World Fellows Did on 9/11, Contentions, September 11, 2009. "Yale has a World Fellows Program. When launched, it was talked about on campus as a kind of mid-career equivalent of the Rhodes Scholarship: bring the rising thinkers and doers of the world to Yale for a semester (people with careers, unlike newly minted undergraduates, usually can’t afford to take more than four months off), expose them to American higher education and all its wonders, recruit them into the Yale cadre, and toss them back into the lake to fructify and rise to run the world."

Follow the Money

Who Funds European NGOs?, Heritage Foundation Foundry, September 8, 2009. "The answer is simple: the EU does. The TaxPayers’ Alliance, a British group that is genuinely independent of government, points to two recent EU missives that by coincidence arrived in the same package. The first, from the European Economic and Social Committee, was a report on “The external dimension of the EU’s energy policy.” Among much else – such as, no surprise, a greater role for the EU – it recommends “that the social partners as well as environmental organizations and other civil society representatives should be heard and actively involved in defining the external energy strategy. Their capacities to support international dialogue and negotiations should be fully exploited.” All of that is a long-winded way of saying that the EU should use like-minded European NGOs to advance its energy aims at home and abroad, including hectoring the U.S. to sign on to climate change treaties."

The Latest NHS Leak

A False Idol, Heritage Foundation Foundry, September 7, 2009. "The National Health Service is like a deity in Britain. Or so we are told. Irish actor and director, Graham Linehan – a very funny man – has taken to defending the NHS by saying that American criticisms of it are “like if you criticize your parents. You can do it - but if anyone else criticized them you’d murder them.” That’s not going to keep life expectancies up. The Economist, for its part, offers up the plea “God save the NHS.” So much for the Queen, apparently. There is something distinctly off-putting in this worshipful attitude. The NHS is not the English Bill of Rights, or the First Amendment. It is not a statement of eternal truths. It is a bureaucratic organization intended to serve a particular purpose. If it does not serve that purpose well, then it should be changed. The outraged responses to American – and British – criticisms of the NHS have a calculated political purpose: to reject the very thought that the government should not be responsible for running the entire health care system.

The YUP Scandal, Continued

An Update on Yale, Contentions, September 4, 2009. "Last month, the story broke that Yale University Press was censoring one of its own books—by Jytte Klausen on the Danish cartoon controversy—out of fear that if it published the cartoons in question, it would, in the words of John Donatich, the press’s director, put “blood on my hands.” In other words, there would be riots and murders by outraged Islamists. Since then, there have been several developments that are worth following up on. Martin Kramer has done sterling detective work assembling circumstantial—but plausible—evidence that Yale’s decision had at least as much to do with its desire to win a big donation from Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal as it did with cravenness."

Sanity from England

A Revolution Dawns in Doncaster, Heritage Foundation Foundry, September 4, 2009. "The newly-elected Mayor of the English town of Doncaster, Peter Davies, has a very curious idea: the purpose of government is not to propagandize its citizens, not to feather its own nest, and not to raise taxes to fund the non-jobs that are advertised in the liberal Guardian every week. It is to administer public business effectively and efficiently. That may sound obvious, but in Britain – as in many other places – it amounts to a revolution."

Example #2: Why the U.N.'s Arms Trade Treaty Is A Bad Idea

Iran, North Korea, and the U.N.’s Projected Arms Trade Treaty, Contentions, September 4, 2009. "Last week, a colleague and I published a substantial paper on the faults inherent in the U.N.’s efforts to negotiate an arms trade treaty. These faults are many and serious, but they come down, fundamentally, to the fact that too few states enforce their existing laws, or live up to their existing responsibilities, on the import and export of arms. A treaty will do nothing to remedy this disinterest, incapacity, or – in far too many cases – malfeasance. Earlier this week, the Wall Street Journal, and other papers, reported a case that illustrates these faults. In August, the UAE seized a shipment of military hardware from North Korea aboard a vessel bound for Iran. This is, needless to say, a violation of the U.N. Security Council ban on military exports from North Korea, but that did nothing to stop Iran from seeking to import them."

Example #1: Why the U.N.'s Arms Trade Treaty is a Bad Idea

The U.N.'s Arms Trade Treaty and Sanctions On Iran, Heritage Foundation Foundry, August 28, 2009. "Earlier this week, the Heritage Foundation published a lengthy study of the U.N.’s proposed Arms Trade Treaty. The study details numerous problems inherent in this proposal, which is now being considered by a New York-based working group. The campaign behind the treaty is based on faulty premises, and the treaty, if brought into being as currently projected, will facilitate, not curb, the illegal arms trade, while at the same time posing a danger to the Second Amendment, to the ability of the U.S. to resist tyranny around the world, and to U.S. export controls. In a fine article posted on Real Clear World, Michael Jacobson, a senior fellow in The Washington Institute’s Stein Program on Counterterrorism and Intelligence and a former senior advisor in the Treasury Department’s Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, explains part of what is at stake."

After A Stab in the Back, A Slap in the Face

A Slap in the Face to Poland?,, Heritage Foundation Foundry, August 28, 2009. "As we reported yesterday morning, it now seems all but certain that the Obama Administration has abandoned our anti-missile shield in Poland and the Czech Republic. This is a terrible decision that reduces NATO’s security, encourages Iran to proceed full speed ahead with its nuclear program, kowtows to Russian pressure, and stabs our Polish and Czech allies in the back, after they made the difficult decision to support us. And now the administration appears to have added insult to injury. World War II began on September 1, 1939, when Germany attacked Poland. That was seventy years ago."

What Might John Stuart Mill Say About Engagement?

J.S. Mill and Burma, Contentions, August 27, 2009. "Van Jackson, founder and executive editor of Asia Chronicle, has written a column titled 'Principles impede progress for Burma,' attacking those—like a colleague of mine here at the Heritage Foundation—who have the temerity to argue that U.S. policy toward Burma should be based on principles. Jackson, by contrast, prefers the meaningless criterion of effectiveness devoid of any actual objectives. In his pursuit of steely-eyed utilitarianism, Jackson makes the amusing claim that 'British philosopher John Stuart Mill would turn over in his grave at the idea of allowing such a failed policy to continue.' Jackson appears to know just enough about Mill to be dangerous, i.e., that Mill was a utilitarian. True indeed—at least until Mill suffered from a nervous breakdown at the age of 20 and turned to the poetry of the Romantics as a relief from the dust-dry pursuit of utility. Partisans of policy without principle might take a lesson from that."

A Lengthy Update on Britain's Procurement 'Crisis'

Assessing Britain's Procurement Problems, Heritage Foundation Foundry, August 27, 2009. "Last week, we noted that a set of slides summing up an internal report from Britain’s Ministry of Defense on defense procurement that had been leaked to the BBC did not place its serious charges into context. The full report has now been leaked to the Sunday Times, which will presumably publish it in due course. Only then will it be possible to assess the report’s merits and demerits. But even now, the parts that have been produced raise important questions."

Barone on Obama's Faulty Liberalism

The "Lyrical Left", Contentions, August 26, 2009. "Michael Barone has an article in today’s Washington Examiner that is—like all he writes—thought-provoking and worthy of a read. Titled 'Obama’s lyrical Left struggles with liberalism,' it argues that Obama is a member of the 'lyrical Left'—basically, a dove. But it wasn’t a dovish foreign policy that made the state big, argues Barone: it was the undovish liberals like Wilson and FDR who fought wars, because wars grow the state. As Barone concludes, 'A big-government president, Obama is learning, needs to be a war president first.' Well, maybe."

The Case Against the U.N.'s Arms Trade Treaty

The U.N.’s Arms Trade Treaty: A Dangerous Multilateral Mistake in the Making, co-written with Steven Groves, Heritage Foundation Backgrounder #2309, August 21, 2009. "The treaty contemplated by the U.N.’s October 2008 arms trade resolution would be a license to almost all states, no matter how irresponsible, to buy and sell arms. It would endanger U.S. arms export control policy, clash with the Constitution, offer a dangerous justification for dictatorial rule, and make it illegal under international law for the U.S. to support freedom fighters abroad."

The Problem With A Core Curriculum

When ACTA Speaks . . ., Contentions, August 21, 2009. "I hope that everyone listens, though there’s not much chance of that. On Wednesday, the American Council of Trustees and Alumni released a new study—”What Will They Learn?”—accompanied by a very spiffy site of the same name. The study, timed to hit the market as the annual U.S. News and World Report rankings appear, grades colleges and universities not by easily manipulated and subjective criteria but by doing what is most damaging to academia: taking it at its word."

A Tiny Illustration of the Problem with State Ownership

Obama Goes NASCAR, Heritage Foundation Foundry, August 21, 2009. "As part of his on-going effort to reduce carbon emissions – or perhaps in an effort to charm a conservative-leaning audience that’s skeptical of his health care plans – President Obama yesterday honored Jimmie Johnson, the 2008 NASCAR Sprint Cup Champion, and extolled the virtues of this 'uniquely American sport.' It’s not a sport he appears to have much liking for: his jokes were labored and he butchered the name of one of the honorees. Presidents have to do a lot of this sort of thing, of course, and it is hard to blame the President for so evidently finding the job a chore. But he didn’t have to take the next step."

The Health of the System

Britain's Sacred Cow: The NHS and Daniel Hannan, New Ledger, August 21, 2009. "Daniel Hannan is in trouble. The young Tory European MP, who became a YouTube sensation earlier this year for his denunciation of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown as the “devalued prime minister of a devalued government,” has made what can in politics be a serious error: he has challenged orthodoxy in a way that is both substantive and interesting. Boring substantive challenges can be seen off, and soaring rhetoric that says nothing is the stuff of politics, but having a point and knowing how to make it will always raise bellows from the defenders of the gored sacred cow."

Are Islamists Putting Britain First?

Is Britain Target No. 1?, Contentions, August 20, 2009. "Newspapers around the world are reporting that an Islamist Internet site affiliated with supporters of Abdullah al-Faisal—Jamaican-born Trevor William Forest, who was deported from Britain in 2007 after serving a jail sentence for soliciting the murder of Jews, Americans, and Hindus—is promising 'spectacular attacks' in Britain, to be launched by 'home-grown terrorists.'"

What the Latest British Defense Scandal Means

Procuring Problems in Britain's Defenses, Heritage Foundation Foundry, August 18, 2009. "A set of slides summing up an internal report from Britain’s Ministry of Defense on defense procurement have found their way to the BBC. The slides make for damning reading, and though the Ministry denies they are authentic, they accord with Britain’s experiences over the past decade. In a nutshell, the slides conclude that the Ministry “does not really know the price of any kit and project management does not exist in the Department.” The result is pervasive over-optimism about procurement, regular and costly reprofiling of major programs, and a procurement budget that will only come into balance in 2028 – assuming nothing else is ordered in the interim."

Why Islamists Intimidate

Self Censorship Watch, Contentions, August 18, 2009. "I’m not afraid of Islamists. As long as we in the liberal West don’t browbeat ourselves into submission, and as long as we take sensible measures to defend ourselves from the threat of mass terrorism—especially from WMDs—there is no reason for free, modern, and enterprising societies to fear losing to medieval Islamism. What makes me nervous is that there are too few leaders today willing to follow Reagan’s example from the Cold War in saying this, and that there are too many 'opinion leaders' and officials who are eager to split the difference between good and evil."

No Bulldogs in Britain

Brown’s Red Tape is Separating Britain From Its Friends, Yorkshire Post, August 12, 2009. "Yale University is one of the oldest and most prestigious universities in the United States, and is among its most Anglophile. Its Yale Centre for British Art holds the finest such collection outside Britain's borders. Its Political Union is modelled on those of Oxford and Cambridge. And 'Bulldogs in Britain', which brings Yale students to Britain for a summer internship, is among its most popular programmes. Or rather, it was among Yale's most popular programmes. This spring, Yale was forced to suspend 'Bulldogs in Britain'. The reason? Britain's new visa regulations, which came into force in 2008, made it impossible for citizens of most nations outside the EU to take entry-level jobs or internships in Britain."