Error: Unable to create directory /home/demockra/public_html/wp-content/uploads/2010/09. Is its parent directory writable by the server? If Republicans Won’t Play Along on Health Care, Who Cares?

The Republicans bluffed and lost in February when they complained that the stimulus bill wasn’t “bi-partisan” enough. Okay, so House and Senate Democrats acquiesced to some of their demands, including tax cuts for businesses and removing provisions for “family planning” (the euphemism that refers to things like abortion and contraception). The Republicans responded to these concessions by voting against the bill.

Not a single House or Senate Republican voted in favor of the stimulus bill. They apparently believed that this would demonstrate to the American people their opposition to wasteful spending and fiscal irresponsibility. Trouble is, the American people didn’t much care what the Republicans thought; they’re in the midst of a financial crisis, where hundreds of thousands of jobs are being lost each month. Hell, yes, they want a stimulus!

Republicans were using a two-pronged approach to sway the public: (1) tax cuts are superior to government spending when it comes to stimulating the economy; and (2) the government is spending way too much. I won’t go into the merits of the arguments here, but suffice it to say that those were the counter-arguments to the Democratic spending bill (yes, “stimulus” = “spending.” Recall President Obama’s statement: “What do you think a stimulus bill is?”).

The public doesn’t much care for tax cuts when those tax cuts would benefit only the top earners in the country. Now, what does look like a good idea is investment in public works projects that have been long-neglected by Reaganites who believe that the government shouldn’t spend any money on anything that isn’t national defense.

Those four paragraphs were a flashback.

Interior — White House, Present Day.

President Obama is meeting with GOP leaders, reminding them that when they clamored for “bi-partisanship,” they abandoned it just as much as they accused Democrats of abandoning it. Between 2003 and 2009, Republicans were used to getting their way every time. Sure, Democrats have controlled Congress since 2007, but for some reason, Democrats spent those two years perfecting the fine arts of cowering and acquiescing. Whenever Republicans talked about “bi-partisanship,” they meant, “Give us everything we want or we’ll call you names. We’ll say you’re soft on terrorism. We’ll say you’re engaging in pork-barrel spending. And if that doesn’t work, then we’ll call you socialists and say that you hate America and want the terrorists to win. So you’d better give us all the things we demand, and if you ever try to put your own agenda forward, we’ll slap you down so hard you’d think Mike Tyson had taken Trent Lott’s seat.”

Well, the tables have certainly turned. And I’m pleased that Obama is prepared to shut Republicans out if they refuse to play ball. Hypocrisy? Not at all. I believe in universal health care. I think it’s absolutely necessary and I think it’s nothing but good. If Democrats are willing to embrace it and make it law, then I support them. When Republicans tried to stop SCHIP, I disagreed with them. It’s a matter of not only agreement and disagreement, but also of what’s good for this country. Quite honestly, the Republicans are not interested in governance. They’re interested in stalling until 2010. They want the wheels of government to grind to a halt so that they can then go back to their constituents in November, 2010 and say, “Look at what the Democrats have done for you! Nothing, that’s what! Aren’t you sorry that you voted them into office?”

And therein lies the fundamental difference: Democrats, including President Obama, are interested in doing something constructive. I will frequently disagree with the methods they use, but I largely agree with their philosophy that the government is going to need to spend money to improve the country. I agree that the wealthy should pay for the impoverished. And I agree that health care should be our right not only as citizens, but as human beings. I think the Democrats’ approach is superior to the Republicans’ approach, and that is why I believe that if Republicans are unwilling to reach an actual compromise with the Democrats, then they should be left behind. It is not the Democrats who should have to bend to appease the Republicans; the Democrats won, their ideas are better, and if the Republicans don’t want to go along with them, then it’s their own funeral. Congress doesn’t even need the Republicans.

I’m not the only one who believes this. The American people would rather the Democrats get on with their agenda instead of watering it down to please Republicans whose sanction they don’t need and whose contempt they will get in return for their efforts. In the New York Times/CBS poll referenced above, 56% of those surveyed said that they thought Democrats should stick to their policies, but 79% thought that it was Republicans who should be bi-partisan. That says a lot: not only do Americans want Democrats to do whatever it is Democrats want to do, but they simultaneously think that Republicans should do whatever it is the Democrats want to do.

Health care reform is way too important for Democrats to be chicken about. The last significant health care reform we had in this country was the prescription drug bill from 2005, which funneled a lot of money directly from the government into the hands of prescription drug companies. Sure, the bill could have included a provision for the government to use its significant bargaining power to get better deals on drugs — but then, that would hurt the drug companies’ revenue, wouldn’t it? At approximately the same time, Congress passed a bankruptcy bill that offered terrific terms for banks, credit card companies, and the very wealthy, but left middle- and low-income people in the dark.

The relationship between bankruptcy and health care is quite close; President Bush declared, in 2005, that we needed the bankruptcy bill so as to stop people from gaming the system and trying to get the rest of us to pay off their debts. To listen to him, you’d think Americans were going bankrupt after buying too many Faberge eggs. At the time he said that, though, fully half of bankruptcies in American were being caused not by frivolous over-spending, but by health-care spending. People were — and still are! — spending themselves into tremendous debt in order to stay healthy and alive. And since our health care system discourages regular check-ups, people are guaranteed to see a doctor only when the condition is serious, which means that it will cost more money to fix than it would have if a doctor had caught the condition earlier, during a regular check-up.

It shouldn’t be surprising that Republicans see health care as a political issue instead of a humanitarian one. In 1993, Bill Kristol wrote that Republicans couldn’t afford to let the Clinton health care plan survive; if it did, then the Republicans would be finished. Let me re-iterate that: to Bill Kristol, it was more important that heath care get defeated so the Democrats wouldn’t win re-election in 1994 than it was for people to have universal access to health care.

That’s what we’re up against. And that’s why I support the Democrats. And if Republicans don’t want to join, who cares? Let them explain to their constituents in 2010 about how they didn’t want those same constituents to have universal health care, all so that the free market could survive.

Error: Unable to create directory /home/demockra/public_html/wp-content/uploads/2010/09. Is its parent directory writable by the server? North Korea: An Uncertain Future

Last week North Korea conducted a test launch of what it claimed to be a satellite, now successfully orbiting the globe and beaming patriotic, revolutionary music to the masses. South Korea, Japan, the US, and many others assert this was no peaceful satellite launch but a provocative and threatening intercontinental ballistic missile test in violation of UN Resolution 1718, and have found no evidence of a singing revolutionary satellite in orbit. So either this test appears to have been, in actuality, a missile test or it was a failed attempt to put a North Korean satellite into orbit – both scenarios that contradict North Korea’s version of events.

President Obama, South Korea, and Japan quickly came out with withering condemnations of the launch, describing it as “provocative” and “reckless,” and calling for sharp, immediate action from the UN, possibly including further economic sanctions. China and Russia, the other two participants in the Six-Party Talks and closer to North Korea, cautioned against “an emotional knee-jerk reaction” to the test, reminding all parties to remain focused on the main goal of the Six-Party Talks – the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.

Regardless of what happens in response to this immediate crisis, one has to wonder: What is going on in North Korea? Often described as reclusive and one of the world’s most closed societies, North Korea is something of an enigma – especially to Americans. Of course there was the Korean War of the early 1950s, but fewer and fewer Americans remember it, know much about it, or care about it. And to be honest, it is hard to see how that conflict – over 50 years ago – has much relevance as a way of explaining what is going on today. However, it does frame the current situation, and for that reason I will provide a brief history of the Korean peninsula and the complex and usually vitriol US-North Korean relationship since 1945.

The Cold War

In August of 1945, World War II ended, and Korea was granted independence from its Japanese colonizers. This independence came with a price however. Korea, like Germany, would be split in two – one part, essentially, to be a US puppet state, and the other to be a Soviet one. Exiles Syngman Rhee (who had been living in the US) and Kim Il-Sung (who had been in the USSR) returned to Korea to rule the South and North, respectively. Within five years, North Korea invaded the South in an effort to unify the peninsula under its own rule. Much of South Korea, including its capital Seoul, was captured by the North, prompting a massive military response from the UN – led by the US and South Korea. By the end of the conflict, at least 3 million Koreans, almost 1 million Chinese, and over 50,000 Americans had died. After the conflict was over, Korea remained divided almost exactly as it had been before 1950. Relations between the North and South have remained uneasy ever since, and tens of thousands of US troops and (until 1991) thousands of nuclear warheads have been based in the South. Over the years, clashes along the 4 km wide Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) dividing the two countries have not been uncommon. US spy ships and airplanes have been captured or shot down by the North, the North has often threateningly tunneled beneath the DMZ, and the North was responsible for the hijacking and downing of Korean Airlines flight 858 in 1987. At the same time, for 50 years after the Korean War, the US vigorously supported harsh economic sanctions against the North.

Post-Cold War

With the fall of the USSR in 1991, North Korea lost a significant supporter and has struggled with food shortages and a collapsing economy ever since. Since that time, there has been constant speculation about the North’s developing of a military nuclear program and its sharing of military knowledge and technology with nations such as Pakistan and Syria. In 1993 the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was disallowed from inspecting North Korean nuclear sites, and the North withdrew from the IAEA the next year. In 1994 Kim Il-Sung died and was replaced as North Korea’s head of state by his son, Kim Jong-Il. While the US and North Korea signed the 1994 Agreed Framework to improve relations, its implementation has been rocky, with both sides failing to fully follow through on their commitments. In 1998 the South’s new president Kim Dae-Jung introduced his sweeping new “Sunshine Policy,” a policy of engagement aimed at spurring improved North-South relations and increased cross-border trade and cooperation. The North continued developing its missile program, but largely within the guidelines agreed upon with the US and the South. At the same time, the US played a role in militarily strengthening Japan and South Korea against the North.

Efforts continued to normalize North-South and North-US relations until 2001. At that time new US President George Bush took a much more hawkish position toward the North than President Clinton had, and famously included North Korea in his “Axis of Evil” along with Iran and Iraq. This stance worsened US-North Korean relations considerably, and over the next few years North Korea defiantly expanded its nuclear program and withdrew from the Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2003. New governments in South Korea and Japan treated the North more coolly. Bogged down in Iraq, the Bush administration was compelled to try negotiation through the Six Party Talks – which involved the US, North Korea, South Korea, China, Russia, and Japan. Further bellicose statements by President Bush and disagreements over the terms of the Agreed Framework gave the North excuses to withdraw from the talks, and in October of 2006 North Korea tested a nuclear weapon. Incredibly, talks continued after this test, and were successful enough that some foresaw a breakthrough in US-North Korean relations in 2007; yet by late 2008 talks broke down again. Complicating matters was the reported stroke of North Korea’s “Dear Leader” Kim Jong-Il in August of 2008, creating fears about the North’s immediate future – including the stability of its political system and the fate of its nuclear weapons. However,  the US and the North worked cooperatively during this time to alleviate the effects of famines in the North and to find the remains of American servicemen killed since 1950 in the North, and war was in fact averted through diplomatic channels on many occasions.

Prelude to a Transition?

To the average American observer – myself included – North Korea’s actions are perplexing. Why exactly are they test firing rockets over Japan? Why now? What are their motivations? And more generally, why has North Korea spent so much money and risked so much global animosity on developing its nuclear weapons program? Why has it remained such a closed country? With the fall of the USSR and China’s transformation to free market heavyweight, why has it clung to its rigid form of communism? And this is just the beginning.

Here are a few thoughts, first concerning the immediate situation. Despite Kim Jong-Il’s very public appreciation for the launch, it was the first time since August that he has appeared in public, probably due to his questionable health. If he is in fact in poor health, the North may be facing a rocky transition of power and this launch may be a way of declaring North Korea’s continued military strength and its intention to proceed with a space and military program regardless of whether he continues to rule or not. Indeed, after considerable diplomatic progress in 2008, in recent months the North has been more hostile toward Japan and South Korea, has kicked out US humanitarian aid teams, and has detained two American journalists, indicating an unpredictable government possibly undergoing a significant change.

A Negotiation Tactic?

On the other hand, North Korea has used provocative military tests in the past to extract concessions from the US during the Six-Party Talks, such as having its name dropped from the US’s state sponsors of terrorism list or to procure humanitarian and development aid. So, this week’s action could be a signal that the North’s political regime is weak and in need of assistance, for which it would like to use this test as a bargaining chip.

That the North’s military activities are mainly a tactic to drive a harder bargain with the US is the accepted explanation for North Korean motives. While this is certainly part of the picture, it is hard to believe that this is North Korea’s sole purpose for developing such a large military program. Nearly a quarter of the North’s GNP is devoted to military spending, and it has 1.2 million active duty military personnel, nearly double the South’s standing military. This makes North Korea’s military one of the largest in the world, despite the fact that it is a nation of just 23 million people. So, long before the Six Party Talks, the North has been building a formidable military for its own sake, not just as a bargaining chip. The large and threatening US presence in northeast Asia since 1950 is surely a factor, as is the significant drop in military support from Russia and China in recent decades. It is not surprising that the North feels vulnerable, and its massive military is surely one reason that its government has endured and that it continues to exist at all as a nation.

Game Theory with Obama?

The US is experiencing a transition of power as well, and this launch was perhaps directed at a young, inexperienced President Obama. Before the launch, Obama’s administration indicated a willingness to pursue high-level bilateral talks with North Korea and received no answer from Pyongyang. Perhaps, the launch was an effort by North Korea to get the attention of the new administration, and to engage the US on its own terms. It could also have been, in part, a test just to see what reaction the launch would prompt from the US. Over the past few decades, the North has seemed interested in engaging with the US and the South when given the chance. Some also have argued that the recent launch does not explicitly violate UN Resolution 1718, indicating that the North wants attention, but not to actually break its obligations under 1718. This test may have been a way of gauging the sincerity of the Obama administration’s overtures to the North. If Obama can keep a cool head and avoid Bush’s war-mongering rhetoric even in a sticky situation, the North may take Obama’s offers to engage more seriously. Obama declined to use the US missile defense system to shoot down the North’s rocket, and instead sharply denounced the launch and steered the issue to the UN while working with other members of the Six-Party Talks to come up with a constructive response. Time will tell how much Obama’s strategy will differ from that of former Presidents Bush or Clinton.

Why Isolation?

As for North Korea’s more general isolation from the global community, there seem to be a few compelling explanations. The most obvious and simplistic reason is the desire of a small circle of political and military North Korean elites to retain power at any cost. Life in North Korea is hard, stifling, and unforgiving. The North’s particularly harsh interpretation of communism has propped up a family dynasty and benefited a small group at the expense of most for over 50 years. Yet today’s rulers are not as “beloved” as Kim Il-Sung and the North’s focus on military success seems to be a way of demonstrating its power and bestowing legitimacy on a regime that has few other successes to point to.

Demonizing the North Korean leadership is the easy way to explain its actions, but other factors are in play as well.  As mentioned above, the North received substantial economic and military support from both the Soviet Union and China during the Cold War. With the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 however, much of the North’s support gave way. In contrast to much of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet republics, North Korea’s leadership has adjusted poorly to a post-Cold War world, prioritizing its own survival over a more holistic concern for North Korea’s people and place in this new world. It has remained largely isolated economically and politically and has suffered devastating famines since the early 1990s. Legitimate and imagined fears have resulted in disproportionate military spending that certainly prevents the North from investing in economic development, improving government services and infrastructure, or providing humanitarian aid to the extent necessary. This inability to adjust effectively to a new world has led to economic and political weakness that military strength has attempted to compensate for.

Additionally, as mentioned above, between 1950 and 2000 the US enforced an economic embargo on the North that isolated it from the capitalist world. That was not much of a problem during the Cold War when the North could count on support from the USSR and China, but afterward the North suffered tremendously. Economic sanctions in various forms have often been the response to the North’s more recent military activities. Intended to punish North Korea’s defiant leaders, limiting trade and aid to the North since the 1950s has contributed to the small country’s international isolation and have been an obstacle to normalized relations with other nations.

What’s Next?

What the future holds for North Korea is anybody’s guess, especially if Kim Jong-Il’s health deteriorates further. Will he remain in power, engaging with the international community in his characteristically bold and theatrical way? Will a smooth transition of power take place? Or does the country face a political upheaval with unpredictable and potentially frightening consequences in the near future? And what of denuclearizing and even reunifying the Korean peninsula? Both the North and the US show signs of wanting to increase engagement and economic cooperation, and this would certainly be preferable to the prickly and potentially disastrous path they are on now. Yet both must work hard to overcome their mutual distrust of one another while saving face and appearing not to give up too much to the other, long-feared side of the 38th parallel.

Springtime for the Taliban: Afghanistan Needs a New Model

Perhaps the biggest disappointment to come out of eight years of American intervention in Afghanistan is the apparent inability of the Afghans themselves to decide what they want to be when they grow up.  Sure, that sounds like an average dose of lip service in this climate unless you consider the UN definition of “a failed state.” Afghanistan currently ranks seventh on the Failed State Index (FSI), a sort of Unfortunate 500 for dysfunctional nations. Somalia and its happy band of pirates is number one. For the purpose of perspective – out of a total of 177 UN recognized countries.

Previous US administrations somehow came upon the idea that the American model of a democratically elected government in a highly secular and tribal chunk of real estate was just the thing “to bring peace and stability to the region.”  Where have we heard this wistful speech before?  Probably somewhere between “winning the hearts and minds,” and if all else fails we’ll carpet bomb the daylights out of them until they come to their senses.  How does a country with a little more than 250 years of civility conclude that one system fits all, that it is the right system, or if it is even that useful of a system?  More importantly, is it exportable?

The US has spent more time in Afghanistan than was invested in all of World War II and Korea combined. To date, the Afghan government has made little progress toward establishing anything close to a stable government.  The country continues along the same path of sectional violence, the US led coalition now morphed into the role of neighborhood cop.  A great unifying tactic if it wasn’t for the body count.  The State Department meanwhile pushes the importance of elections and parliamentary process, which totally ignores the traditional power structures of Afghan society; those that encompass family ties, community obligation, and whichever interpretation of Islam that gets practiced in the neighborhood.   All eyes are told to look to the West.  Perhaps a better answer lies much closer to home:

Today the Turkish nation is called to defend its capacity for civilization, its right to life and independence – its entire future.

–Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, 1920.

Kemal (Ataturk was added later – something like ‘Father of the Turks’) had just made a pretty remarkable set of announcements.  They included:

• The end of the Ottoman Empire.  Well, it was almost dead before World War I anyway.
• The abolishment of the Caliphate.  (Political authority under Islam.)
• The formation of the secular Republic of Turkey.
• The unacceptable state surrounding British occupation.

And the need for the Armenians in the east and the Greeks in the west to relocate elsewhere. There was no place for Orthodox Christianity in the new Republic.

About the Man

Mustafa Kemal was born in Salonika (now part of Greece) in 1881.  Most of his early history has been revised so often that most versions lack credibility. Raised in the Muslim faith, a product of military schools, he later served with great distinction as a Lt. Colonel and division commander at the battle of Gallipoli, orchestrating one of the greater defeats the allied forces suffered in the First World War.  A great fan of the West and particularly The Enlightenment (having been assigned to Paris and the Balkans at varying points), he also fully embraced the potential power of the media, using newspapers (often his own creations) extensively in his nationalist pursuits.  Above all, he believed that the only way to save Turkey from complete partition by the allied powers was to establish a modern, secular republic.  In his words, “Islam and civilization are a contradiction in terms.”

The Background

Things were going badly on the western front for the British and French in World War I.  Russia was taken out by both the Nationalist and Bolshevik revolutions.  Britain’s attack at Gallipoli, (Australian and New Zealand forces, ANZAC) was aimed at knocking the Ottoman Empire out of the war.  Instead it turned into a rout.  Britain then tried to turn the Arabs (with T.E. Lawrence’s deft assistance) against the Turks, promising them an Arab state for their trouble.  Naturally that was a lie, the one apparent constant in British colonial policy.  The Allies won the war, the Ottoman Empire was partitioned by the Treaty of Sevres creating what today are known as Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and of course, Iraq.  The Sultan was left in Istanbul as a British puppet and Kemal fled to Ankara with plans to turn Anatolia into his new republic. He was able to deceive the British and the Arab world just long enough to consolidate his forces in Anatolia, a process pushed along by his creation of opposing media outlets.  The Arab world believed he was fighting to preserve the Sultan and the Caliphate, the British assumed that his services were already on the colonial payroll.  By the time the British realized his intentions, they were already outgunned, out-manned and out maneuvered. In 1923, they signed the Treaty of Lausanne ending hostilities.  The Republic of Turkey was born.

Much of the internal struggle dividing Islam and adding fuel to sectarian violence seems to surround the Caliphate, which is best described as both a person and a thing. One of the chief splits in Islam, the chasm separating Sunni and Shi’a communities is based on the interpretation of Muhammad’s successor as sole authority on Islamic law. Each side accuses the other of being usurpers in a centuries long dispute over who has the right to read the mind of a dead prophet.  Many political and social issues in Islam today fail to achieve any real clarity while the two camps continue to hold on to conflicting interpretations of religious doctrine.  This is further complicated (or exasperated) by the very notion of Islamic Law, a shadowy domain where the words of the prophet Mohammad somehow hold credence with something as innocuous as the local traffic code. By all accounts it is an archaic system, one reminiscent of The Inquisition, but accepted in many quarters of the Muslim world.  Judging its validity is not the point, accepting its existence is, for the idea of belief is not validated by the structural framework of a society, though it is that very framework that accelerates the rift.  Kemal argued that Islamic Law was part of the “nomadic Bedouin custom,” totally unsuitable in the development of a complex, modern society.  That is difficult to argue against given the global interaction of nations today.  Countries like Egypt and Israel have both found it necessary to operate parallel courts to accommodate issues of marriage and personal conduct, but not civil law.  Religious law as the fundamental tenet of a nation is little more than locking the door and keeping the key.  All social, educational, and political exchange stops. No common ground is allowed to exist on this dogmatic, unilateral dead-end street.  America was founded on the premise of religious persecution elsewhere, that in turn, sanctioned by the state.  The road to modernity through democratic ideals couldn’t traverse the murky ground of theological interpretation. Noted historians, Will and Ariel Durant once stated that “the Bible is a great book, a great tale, but if you had to live by it, you’d go crazy.” Then again, modernity may be our point, not the point.

Constantinople (Istanbul) had been the official seat of the Caliphate since about 1514.  The last recognized Caliph was Abd al Majid II who with his family was exiled to Paris following the establishment of the Republic of Turkey.  Kemal found this action necessary in order to create an Islamic republic based on civil law, not theology.  This was naturally viewed as an extreme form of heresy, particularly in the Sunni Arab world, complicated further by the establishment of language laws that reverted Arabic to second class status in both government and religious proceedings, though some laws were moderated later. In itself, this was an offshoot of his policies on nationalization, but it also played into his desire to create a literate, inclusive society.  Again, in opposition to fundamentalism which he saw as “a way of promoting intellectual stagnation” by authorizing religion to define social progress, including the very function of government itself.  Oddly, the Caliphate seemed to end there.  Saudi Arabia did not attempt to re-establish it at Mecca, undoubtedly since it would threaten their position as an absolute monarchy, and it was only briefly claimed by the Taliban following the Soviet departure from Afghanistan.

Kemal was brilliant in many ways, but he was no saint.  His orchestration of the Armenian exodus was as brutal as any forced deportation.  He stacked the military with believers in his own cause and seemed more than willing to arbitrate disputes at the gallows.  Within Turkey he was seen as both savior and despot; in the fundamentalist world, a Doenmeh (a closet Jew), an alcoholic, a homosexual, a womanizer and a heretic – personal attacks that continue long after his death.  The real truth is as clouded as the newspapers Kemal himself used to create.  Yet today, Turkey remains a somewhat stable republic in the middle of one of the most volatile regions on earth.  Not perfect, but functional.

Lessons for Afghanistan

The opportunity for a more progressive society in Afghanistan was probably lost shortly after the Soviet withdrawal in 1989. In the vacuum that followed, the same Mujahedeen we once funded became the Taliban we now hunt.  Instead of rebuilding schools and infrastructure, promoting education and a sense of inclusion, we simply walked away, leaving the task largely to under-funded NGO’s and a lot of wishful thinking. The Taliban, falsely claiming the right to the Caliphate sought to force an Islamic state on the people of Afghanistan as an alternative to both communist autocracy and western indifference – two models of what they saw as a similar dysfunction.  The United States supplied much of the fodder for the Taliban position by reinforcing beliefs that Islam alone would see to the needs of the Afghan people, faith having been the sole unifying factor over ten years of Soviet occupation.  Education should have been the tool of choice to defeat a return to fundamentalism, not merely the establishment of a western leaning central government, manufactured primarily as a base for US influence in the region. No one seemed interested in the greater investment in literacy, the real slayer of despotism, secular or political, and the one indispensable ingredient in democracy. Afghanistan claims a 28% literacy rate among men, women an even more dismal 12%; Turkey, 87% overall.  The Taliban know this and they fear a literate populous far more than anything our armories can ever produce.  But we can’t export a system if nobody can understand the instructions.

Turkey’s example may be a harsh one by American standards, but it allowed the time necessary to go from a shooting war to the process of nation building in a realistic time frame. That element of time is probably what has always hampered American foreign policy, the impatience inherent in the very system we seek to sell.  Any parent will tell you that it takes twenty years or so to educate and develop a child into an adult.  Americans tire of foreign intrigue as quickly as they tire of presidents.  This lack of continuity is not only a result of the fickle nature of American politics in general, but the bad decisions orchestrated by a system in constant flux.  We don’t even bother to apologize since the person that set the policy is never around to finish it anyway.  When Kemal died in 1938 from chronic liver disease, he left behind a far more literate society than he inherited.  Right or wrong in his methodology, he did bequeath them the tools necessary for choice, the one thing the fundamentalist camp can never accept.

The question for Americans is whether we can endure a long-haul assignment, one that begins with security and ends with an informed society, one that just might decide that our model isn’t their model.  That’s the risk of intervention.  If US policy is confined to simply destroying the Taliban, then we’ve already lost this one.  If something else is on the table, this would be a pretty good time for a new President and a revamped State Department to explain just what that might be.