Afghanistan and unpleasant diplomacy

Reform Party of California

Afghanistan, unpleasant diplomacy and an uncertain future

It is good that there are at least some people with the self-control, talent and amazing patience to skilfully practice the black art of diplomacy. It is better to at least keep talking than to back away from the table and not talk. That is true even if it is obvious that talks are not going to accomplish anything in the short or medium term. Maybe in the long run something good, e.g., an unnecessary war avoided, will come of it. However, there are times when the people that diplomats have to deal with are so profoundly corrupt, odious and offensive that one would think that human patience would simply run out.

On October 9, 2013, page A6, the New York Times (NYT) published an article discussing "a stinging critique of the American-led campaign" in Afghanistan.[1] Afghan president Hamid Karzai made comments in an interview with the BBC where he criticized the U.S. for "causing harm to the Afghan people" in its quest to find Al Qaeda operatives in Afghanistan. At the moment, American and Afghan negotiators are unable to agree on terms of relations once the U.S. withdraws its troops from Afghanistan at the end of 2014. As president Karzai delicately put it: "If the agreement doesn't suit us, then, of course, they can leave." President Obama has hinted that if there is no agreement, the U.S. may have to withdraw all troops from Afghanistan. The U.S. had hoped to keep about 10,000 troops for training Afghan troops and hunting terrorists.

An insult was that, although Karzai conceded that his own government was "weak and ineffective" and that it had not been able to tackle rampant corruption within its own ranks, the blame for the corruption fell on the U.S. and its allies. It is true that the U.S. cannot account for the aid it sends to Afghanistan[2] and U.S. aid is likely a major source of funds to terrorists and corrupt officials.[3] Despite that, massive corruption and vote fraud is closely linked to Karzai himself and his close allies.[4] As early as 2001, the year the U.S. put Karzai in power, Afghanistan was referred to as a kleptocracy and he has done nothing to change it since.[5] The Afghan government admits to internal corruption, but insists that they can deal with it.[6] That is pure nonsense. The Afghan government is capable of dealing with essentially nothing. Mr. Karzai's allegation that the U.S. caused corruption in Afghanistan is pure mendacious hypocrisy.

As far as the future goes, the odds unfortunately look good for a Taliban resurgence, a massive economic collapse[7] and the sad slide of a well-armed Afghan society back into the Taliban dark ages. That is despite Karzai's insistence that "The return of the Taliban will not undermine progress. . . . . there will be more Afghan women studying and getting higher education . . . . Even if the Taliban comes, that will not slow down." Amazingly, it appears inevitable that the Taliban will re-enter Afghan politics. The U.S. and Karzai are at cross purposes. U.S. forces in Afghanistan recently captured Latif Mehsud, a leader of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, which is the group that claimed responsibility for the attempted bombing of Times Square in 2010.[8] Karzai has criticized the U.S. action as an affront to Afghan sovereignty. The prospects for Afghan-U.S. cooperation do not look promising to say the least. Odioius people of Meshud's ilk are what Karzai is looking to bring back into Afghan government and "civil" society. We will sorely need our diplomats.

It is getting worse

The evidence says that the Taliban will return to power and that their tactics have not changed. A recent Wall Street Journal article[9] reports that about 590,000 Afghans out of a total population of 30 million are internally displaced by fighting between Taliban and Afghan forces. The pace of displacement is sharply increasing. Overall security continues to deteriorate and many Afghan citizens are desperate to leave the country. A UN expert on Afghan refugees said that refugee's "desperation is incredible" and as many as 200,000 Afghans could flee to Pakistan next year as U.S. troops withdraw. Discouraging and sad as it is to say, this looks much like the end of the Vietnam war all over again. It is time to begin to ask who is responsible for this impending disaster. It is easy to argue that our flawed two-party system and inept U.S. political leadership had more than a little to do with this disaster.

Given the poor and worsening situation in Afghanistan, one can only wonder why the delightful Mr. Karzai thinks he can do anything about the Taliban if they regain power. Common sense suggests that if the Taliban does gain power, Karzai will slip out of the country in the dead of night, taking billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars with him. It would be either that, or he stays in the country and the Taliban slits his throat.

Finally, it is worth note that tucked into the NYT article about Karzai, was a little box called "Names of the Dead". It stated that to date 2,269 American service members have died in the Afghan war and related operations. It stated that DOD confirmed the deaths (presumably in Afghanistan) of five U.S. service members with ages ranging from 19 to 25. To date, the U.S. has spent about $665 billion in Afghanistan. In the coming decades, hundreds of billions more will be spent caring for our wounded service members.[10]

Hard questions need to be asked

If the Taliban does come back into power and Afghanistan will likely slip quietly back into the dark ages. If that does happen, the question the American people should consider is how well did the two-party system serve or not serve the public interest. How effective was nation building? The original promise was a total cost of about $50-60 billion for Afghanistan, but that now looks like an outright fabrication or staggering incompetence. Who is responsible? What difference would there have been if the U.S. had simply gone into Afghanistan and captured or killed Osama Bin Ladn when it had the chance to do so and then simply left, with the Taliban returning to continue as it did before the invasion. There are many questions that need to be asked and answered.

Unfortunately, those questions are unlikely to be asked in mainstream two-party politics. The politicians from both parties are responsible and if the outcome is truly sour, neither side will want to discuss it. In that case, the American people will, yet again, have been misled by their government and there will be no accountability for the failures. Taxpayers simply have to pay the price and the two-party status quo will carry on with its self-serving business as usual. All things considered, it is hard to assess who or what is less odious - Karzai or an intractably incompetent two-party system.

Footnotes:
1. Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/09/world/asia/karzai-lashes-out-at-united-states-for-its-role-in-afghanistan.html?_r=0.
2. Link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-11641964. An astonishing inability of some U.S. agencies to account for how they spend money is a topic the RPCA has raised before (http://reformparty.org/reform-party-of-california-commentary-dods-unacceptable-accounting-practices/). This is a serious, chronic problem that is simply beyond the capacity of two-party politics to address.
4. Links: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/27/world/asia/kabul-bank-audit-details-extent-of-fraud.html?pagewanted=1&hp; http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/08/world/asia/corruption-remains-intractable-in-afghanistan-under-karzai-government.html?ref=asia; http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/12/world/asia/12afghan.html; http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/09/17/afghan.election/. 5. Link: http://articles.latimes.com/2001/nov/26/news/mn-8452; http://www.theglobeandmail.com/commentary/is-corruption-the-cost-of-saving-afghanistan/article4403844/.
6. Link: http://www.khaama.com/afghanistan-dismiss-us-audit-watchdogs-remarks-2195.
7. Although the NYT article says that Afghanistan itself generates 20% of its government budget with the rest coming from foreign aid and military spending, that is hard to reconcile with other reports asserting that over 90% of the country's budget comes from the outside (http://articles.latimes.com/2011/aug/19/world/la-fg-afghan-economy-20110819). Even if the NYT 20% figure is accurate, common sense says that Afghanistan will collapse once we leave (http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/02/16/will_afghanistan_collapse_after_us_troops_leave_maybe_but_not_why_you_think; http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/23/world/asia/world-bank-issues-alert-on-afghanistan-economy.html). With any luck, all of that doom and gloom will turn out to be wrong. One can only hope for the best.
8. Link: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=232015007.  
9. Wall Street Journal, October 15, 2013, pages A1, A16; online at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303382004579127432990605714.html.
10. Link: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/29/us-usa-war-idUSTRE75S25320110629.

debt ceiling debate and confirmation bias

Reform Party of California

The debt ceiling debate and biased thinking

Context

Treasury Secretary has warned that "nothing good" will come if congress does not raise the debt ceiling, which is projected to be breached on or about October 17, 2013. Secretary Lew asserts that if Congress does not pass a debt-ceiling increase, the U.S. will be “dangerously low” on cash and risk defaulting on its debts.[1] Governments and business groups worldwide are very nervous about this and they mostly urge congress to increase the debt ceiling. PIMCO, a major holder of U.S. bond debt, holds no U.S. bonds that come due from now until December because they did not want to take any chance whatever of holding any U.S. bond that is anywhere near a default.[2] That is how sensitive at least some investors are to risk. They have a hair trigger and are willing to take no more investment risk than is absolutely necessary in view of projected returns on their investment.

From a non-ideological pragmatic point of view, i.e., the Reform Party of California's (RPCA's) point of view, an urgent question is exactly what would happen if the debt ceiling is not raised. The question is urgent because many republicans in congress now believe that the the effect of not raising the debt ceiling would not create significant problems for the U.S. or world economy. The thinking is that there is sufficient incoming tax revenue to service existing debt obligations and any income shortfall would be addressed by spending cuts and/or late payment on various debt obligations as they come due. Obviously, many people outside of congress disagree either by words or by action, e.g., PIMCO's exit from risk.

A complication to assessing the options and predicting outcomes is in innate biases attached to ideology. Even the very best and brightest experts have a very hard time in consistently predicting outcomes from policy choices in their fields of expertise.[3] The adverse effects of ideology on clear, logical thinking can sometimes be powerful and painfully obvious to unbiased observers but almost impossible to see in the ideologue's own mind.[4] Acknowledging and seeing internal bias in one's own thinking is difficult and it can be very unpleasant. That is especially if a person is an ideologue, because reality just does not care about any one's ideology and the two often collide, leaving a mess behind.[4] Most people may not be aware of this normal human trait at all, but the phenomenon known as confirmation bias has been well known for decades in the social sciences.[5]

Confirmation bias or confirmatory bias is a tendency of people to favor information that confirms their beliefs or faith (ideology). The phenomenon is manifest by selective memory and biased interpretation of information. The effect is more powerful for deeply entrenched beliefs or ideology, which tends to irrational emotional bias into issues. Another adverse effect of confirmation bias is that it tends to lead a person to interpret ambiguous evidence as supporting their existing ideology or belief.

Biased memory and interpretation of information have been invoked to explain several bad outcomes on thinking. One bad outcome is attitude polarization, the phenomenon of disagreements becoming more extreme in the face of the same data or evidence. Another bad outcome is the phenomenon of belief perseverance, which is persistence of beliefs after the evidence supporting the belief is shown to be false.[4] There are other bad effects, but the point is obvious - ideology influences thinking in ways that are usually counterproductive for smart, efficient politics (and most everything else).

One observer had this comment: "Smart people believe weird things because they are skilled at defending beliefs they arrived at for non-smart reasons."[6] A corollary to that might be that if you do not have beliefs to defend when going into a debate or issue, then that neutrality ought to reduce the ill-effects of normal human biases on thinking that comes from ideology.

 

What happens if we do not raise the debt ceiling?

The RPCA simply cannot predict what effects, for better or worse, there would be from doing nothing and allowing the chips to fall where they will. The RPCA's instinct is to oppose endless raising of the debt ceiling. In the long run, continuing to do that positively will ruin the economy and wreck our standard of living. There is no question about that ultimate outcome if we do not change the way we handle our financial affairs. The question is how long the debt party can go on. The counterpoint to that ideology, is the fact that the two parties are highly polarized, very antagonistic and, if a default of some sort did occur, it is unclear that they could cooperate to take actions that experts might argue would be needed. The grip of ideology and the polarization it engenders makes prospects of intelligent, fast action by congress appear to be very, very unlikely. Gridlock appears to be the new norm in two-party governance.

 

What about the broader context?

The intelligent approach to this is to set instinct or ideology aside and look objectively at everything. It is obvious that there are vastly differing versions of what would happen if the debt ceiling is not raised and/or we default on some or all U.S. debt. Most expert opinion argues that the effects would be bad to catastrophic for the U.S. and probably the rest of the world's economy. They do not want to come anywhere close to a default. Minority opinion, coming mostly from conservative republican and/or libertarian ideologues, is that things would go on just fine or with only modest problems at worst. U.S. public opinion appears to support raising the debt ceiling and not defaulting on any debt.[7] For the minority, outcomes other than debt service default would occur and thing would stay more or less normal.

 

As with global warming, this issue is not simply political. The voices of economists should carry some real weight. Most politicians are not economists, much less economic experts. In global warming, the RPCA has argued that the voices of the majority of climate scientists need to be heard and accorded proper weight.[8] What politicians have to say about it is secondary at best. There has to be one or more reasons for the disconnect between the minority who argue that the debt ceiling does not need to be raised and those who argue the opposite. The RPCA's concern here is that minority opinion is largely ideologically-driven and heavily influenced by some sort of confirmation bias associated with conservative, anti-government ideology. Other than the authority that comes with majority expert opinion, the RPCA is aware of no basis for the confident predictions of either side because America has never defaulted on its debt.

Under the circumstances, what would happen to investor confidence and to the U.S. and foreign economies simply cannot be predicted. We are approaching blindingly complex but uncharted waters. Given congressional polarization and dysfunction and the fickle nature of investor confidence coupled with the size of U.S. debt and a frail economic recovery, the RPCA reluctantly concludes that the intelligent thing to do is to raise the debt ceiling and continue trying to address our chronic fiscal problems. That opinion comes with the full recognition that the spending urge in congress is very powerful and has not been restrained by either democrats or republicans in recent decades. Very good arguments can be made that neither side in this impending train wreck is anywhere near to being serious about dealing with fiscal and budget matters.[9] It also recognizes that what appears to be the most intelligent and compassionate approach, such as that advocated by the Simpson-Bowles commission, is ideologically unacceptable to both sides in this endless, self-serving debate.

 

The choices that the two-party system have given us, and the position they have put us in, are simply bad and awful. What we are getting from the two sides is a blitherfest of nonsense.

Footnotes:
1. Link: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-3460_162-57606229/treasury-secretary-warns-congress-nothing-good-will-come-of-failure-to-raise-debt-ceiling/; http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-10-06/u-s-to-default-if-debt-ceiling-not-raised-lew-says.html.

2. Link: http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2013/10/10/230914894/what-a-u-s-default-would-mean-for-pensions-china-and-social-security.
3. Link: http://reformparty.org/reform-party-commentary-injecting-rationality-into-irrational-politics/.
4. Link: http://reformparty.org/reform-party-of-california-commentary-why-ideology-is-bad-for-politics/.
5. Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias.
6. Kida, Thomas E. (2006), Don't believe everything you think: the 6 basic mistakes we make in thinking, Amherst, New York: Prometheus Books, page 157. Kida attributes the quote to the same individual, Michael Shermer, that authored the commentary discussed at footnote 4.
7. Disapproval with republicans in congress is increasing (http://www.gallup.com/poll/165317/republican-party-favorability-sinks-record-low.aspx?utm_source=WWW&utm_medium=csm&utm_campaign=syndication). Presumably that disapproval is driven at least in part by unhappiness with the prospect of a default or other side-effect of not raising the debt ceiling.
8. Link: http://reformparty.org/reform-party-of-california-essays-6-what-is-the-public-interest-and-how-is-it-best-served/. 
9. Link: http://reformparty.org/the-tax-gap/.

The government shutdown

Reform Party of California Commentary

How legitimate is the government shutdown over the ACA?

A few weeks ago, the Reform Party of California (RPCA) observed that the rhetoric in the House of representatives showed that the two parties were far apart with no basis for compromise on much of anything in evidence.[1] The disputes included disagreement over the Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as Obamacare. Now that a partial government shutdown is in effect, republican rhetoric relies heavily on assertions of public support for the legitimacy of House republican's position. The democrats are curiously quiet on this point. Given the penchant for both parties to spin facts and reality any way they wish, it is fair to ask exactly how much public support for the shutdown there is in unspun reality.

A poll released on October 1, 2013 indicated that about 72% of Americans opposed a government shutdown for failure to pass budgets, with 64% opposing a shutdown over the debt ceiling.[2] Assuming that data is real, a solid majority of Americans oppose a shutdown. Republican claims of legitimacy based on widespread public support are false. Some republicans shade their rhetoric by saying that most of their constituents in their voting districts are urging no compromise on blocking the ACA. Assuming that is true, and it could be, how does that fit into the larger context of how the federal government works and does that legitimize the shutdown?

The larger context includes the following. The republicans lost the presidential race in 2012. They lost senate seats in 2012. Republicans retained control of the House. Senators are elected by voters statewide, while many representatives are elected by voters in gerrymandered districts. The point of gerrymandering is to reduce political competition, which favors the party that draws congressional districts. Not surprisingly, the net effect of gerrymandering was protection of House incumbents in 2012.[3] That is exactly what gerrymandering is supposed to do in the two-party system.[4] Given that context, House republican claims to legitimacy are, on balance, not particularly credible. That claim from U.S. senators carries more weight - their voting districts are not gerrymandered.

The larger context also includes the state of people's knowledge of what the ACA really is. In terms of what the public knows, there is confusion with opinions varying widely. One recent poll found that 30% of Americans believe that the impact of the ACA would be negative, while 50% felt it would be neutral and 12% felt it would be positive.[5] Another poll indicated that 25% of Americans believed they understood the ACA well and 33% felt they had little or no understanding.[6] Opinion can vary depending on whether one refers to the healthcare law as the ACA or Obamacare, but that evidence is anecdotal.[7] It is fair to say that at the least, there is widespread confusion or disagreement about what the ACA is and what its impact will be.

It is also fair to say that there are no obvious reasons to know what impacts the ACA will have because, e.g., until a few days ago the insurance rates and coverages for the myriad of competing plans were not even known. Thus, when democratic talking heads wax eloquent about affordable health care for all with no adverse impacts, they cannot know what they are talking about. Similarly, when the republican talking heads wax eloquent about the awful disaster the "failed" ACA will be, they cannot know what they are talking about.[8] It is too soon to draw any firm conclusions.

When all things are considered as a whole, it is fair to say that pointing to public support as a justification for shutting the government down over the ACA is not persuasive. The public doesn't want it. House republicans are not making a compelling case for legitimacy in the face of outright public opposition to a shutdown, widespread confusion about what the ACA actually is and a rigged electoral system that favors the very people who claim legitimacy of "the American people". Those claiming legitimacy represent a minority, not the majority. Where is the legitimacy in this?

Footnotes:
1. Link: http://reformparty.org/reform-party-of-california-commentary-colloquies-in-venom/.

2. Link: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-10-01/americans-by-72-oppose-shutdown-tied-to-health-care-cuts.html.
3. Link: http://www.governing.com/blogs/by-the-numbers/redistricting-gerrymandering-effect-2012-congressional-elections.html.
4. If the RPCA had its way, House and state voting districts would be gerrymandered to either increase competition or to be neutral or geographically compact. The fact that both parties gerrymander to dilute the power of political opposition and/or minorities is evidence that neither party is willing to compete head on in elections. They don't want the competition. In turn, that is evidence that both parties put their own well-being and grip on power ahead of service to the public interest.
5. Link: http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2013/09/18/polls-give-both-sides-ammunition-in-shutdown-fight/.
6. Link: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/09/16/usa-today-pew-poll-health-care-law-opposition/2817169/.
7. Link: http://www.latimes.com/business/money/la-fi-mo-jimmy-kimmel-obamacare-affordable-care-act-20131001,0,1174482.story. Although anecdotal, this does fit with data showing that when individual key provisions of the ACA are explained, people tend to like those provisions, but when the law as a whole is discussed, approval decreases.
8. There may be credible evidence that health care costs for most people will increase significantly as part of the cost to insure millions of currently uninsured people (http://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2013/09/23/its-official-obamacare-will-increase-health-spending-by-7450-for-a-typical-family-of-four/; the author of this piece is very hostile to the ACA and thus it is unclear if unspun data or the author's ideology is speaking; the author is associated with the American Enterprise Institute, a hard core conservative, anti-government ideologue think tank). If costs do increase as right wing ideologues argue, an honest debate would be focused on whether Americans want to pay the price for that kind of social service for fellow citizens. Public opinion on that point is unclear. However, it would be fair to say that if the promises of lower healthcare costs that accompanied the passage of the ACA law turn out to be wrong, millions of Americans could feel misled, betrayed and/or angry. Absent some very good reasons, those reactions would be justified.