Climate Change--The Cesspool That Won't Empty

Yvo de Boer, the Czar of All Anthropogenic Climate Change at the UN, and the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which might better be known as The End Justifies the Means Panel are is still nattering, blustering, and attempting to explain some very unpleasant truths. The blustering and nattering is the specialty of Mr de Boer. The IPCC is in charge of smoothing over the hills and valleys of lies with the soft butter of good intentions.

The UN Climate Change Czar has taken the position that the US is somehow "bound" by the rhetorical promises at Copenhagen made by the master of lofty talk, President Obama. The Austrian born Dutch citizen, who is accountable to none outside of the carnival by the Hudson, blew off the reluctance of the Senate to act favorably on the potentially economically crippling "cap and trade" proposal put forward by the ever-so-green Obama administration.

With a serene detachment of the sort which might accompany another proclamation from Mount Sinai, the UN factotum told the press that Americans were slavering and drooling after "green" jobs (as opposed to any job of any color) and would not tolerate a failure to deliver on the Obama promise. Mr de Boer also opined that the Environmental Protection Agency could pick up the ball should the Senate be so ill-advised as to drop it.

In making this Olympian declaration Mr de Boer demonstrated the sublime ignorance of American political realities which only a member of the UN bureaucracy--or a True Believer in the Progressive Agenda--could essay. The "Czar" left aside such bagatelles as the possibility that the Congress might, in the face of an electorate less than thrilled with the current state of play on the Hill and in the Oval, legislatively remove the power to regulate carbon dioxide from the EPA's portfolio. He also ignored both the incompetence of the EPA and the net effect upon informed public opinion of the IPCC's extreme economy with the truth.

Additionally, the detached Mr de Boer overlooked the impact of an increasing awareness on the part of Americans that further sacrifices on its part can be more than offset by the actions of other nations. This is a critical matter which has also eluded the EPA.

To highlight this ground truth and its implications, the Geek invites you to consider the matter of ground level ozone. This noxious form of oxygen is responsible in large measure for the unpleasant phenomenon known as smog. To control the emission of ozone the EPA has not only put in place stringent limits on human activities (such as operating motor vehicles) which result in the production of ozone but is in the process of increasing the limitations.

The EPA also monitors ground level ozone. It is this part of the agency's mission which detains us at the moment. Let's focus on two areas of the United States. One is small and remote. The other is both large and important in all facets of American life.

The small one first. In southern New Mexico there are three counties. They extend from the border between New Mexico, Texas, and Mexico to the northwest. In order they are the El Paso bordering county of Dona Ana, Luna county, and Grant County. With the exception of Dona Ana which centers on the 100,000 person (more or less) city of Las Cruces, the counties are small in population, feature large expanses of either high desert (Luna) or pinion forested mountains (Grant.) None are noted for industry although Grant county still hosts a Phelps Dodge copper smelter currently engaged in reprocessing ancient tailings dumps.

Ground ozone monitoring shows that over the past three years each of these counties have been out of compliance with the current standards. They would be even more non-compliant under the proposed new standards. Dona Ana is the worst "offender," with Luna in second place, and distant Grant country bringing up the rear of the "law breakers." The EPA has already made the usual threatening noises of fines and loss of federal highway money should the counties and their municipalities not bring the areas into compliance beaucoup schnell!

There is only one difficulty with the EPA's findings, conclusions, and dark hints of penalties to come. None of the counties are responsible for the elevated ozone levels. No. As anyone with access to a map showing prevailing winds could discover in a matter of seconds, these three counties lie downwind of Cuidad Juarez. This Mexican city currently best known for a level of violence exceeded in very few war zones is usually noted for its level of air pollution.

There are no, repeat, NO, effective, enforceable limits on the production of ozone, particulate matter, or any other ingredient of air pollution in Juarez. And, if there were, a little bit of money changing hands ends the "violation."

The EPA with the supreme confidence of a totally out of touch with reality bureaucracy has chosen to ignore the real source of the ozone, instead flexing its muscles on a triad of totally inoffensive American counties. The worthies of the EPA appear completely indifferent to the underlying reality that no amount of American sacrifice, no degree of penalty, no amount of economic deprivation will solve the problem.

Now for the bigger problem. Ground level ozone monitoring shows that there has been a significant increase in the evil chemical despite the severe restrictions which have been in place in California, Washington, and Oregon. To the surprise (and dismay) of all, the level of ozone has increased even as the costs of restriction have elevated. Obviously more costs, tighter standards, more monitoring will not have any effect on the steadily worsening situation.

That gloomy conclusion results from the simple and easily demonstrated fact that the ozone levels rise and fall in tandem with the direction of the prevailing winds. When the winds come from the general direction of Asia (read China) the levels increase, when the winds blow from some other direction, the ozone slips away to the happy low levels resulting from the efforts of the past forty years.

Perhaps because California and its neighbors have a lot more voters than the three miscreant New Mexico counties, the EPA will have to acknowledge its powerlessness in the face of made-in-China ozone. Then again, perhaps not. Perhaps EPA will demand admission to the US foreign policy community.

Not that the foreign policy community of the US is currently underpopulated. Nearly every cabinet department has a seat. The new, expanded National Security Council has a (very large) seat. Then the Congress is amply if usually parochially represented. With so many oars of varying sizes in the murky, choppy waters of foreign affairs it is no wonder that the ship of state so often is in peril of foundering on the rocks of one overseas "crisis" or another.

The introduction of the EPA, or the current administration's climate "czar(s)" will in no way improve our capacity to address any realities which might reside behind the scrim of distortions, junk science, special pleading, and drives-for-power created by the climate change Warriors of the Good Cause. The mere mouthing of "pledges" by the US government or the government of any other country without both a sound basis to justify the needs underlying the "pledges" and a verifiable mechanism of unquestionably reliability and disinterestedness is an exercise in feel-good meaninglessness.

The best that might be adduced in support of making pledges and similar exercises in political masturbation is that such an exercise does far less damage than does invoking the bureaucratic force of some remote, out of touch agency to impose counterproductive sanctions on an innocent public. It is just this that Mr de Boer and his ilk both inside and without the UN desire to do.

Pace Mr de Boer, but the only effective, authentic way to address whatever (if anything) which might reside within and under the term of "anthropogenic climate change" is the slow, messy means of political give and take. This means not only the political process of diplomacy but also, at least in those few countries where democracy reigns in a relatively untrammeled form, the even more messy process of achieving a domestic consensus on what should be done, what might be done, and how to do it.

In turn this requires that folks like Mr de Boer abandon their automatic love affair with top down fiats and diktats. It demands that Mr de Boer and company surrender their reflexive reliance upon central commands. It means there is finally no substitute for trusting the self-organizing, decentralized capacities of an informed public.

An informed public means a public which is not lied to by "scientists" who believe with the terrible sincerity of an al-Qaeda leader in the justice of their desired ends allows for the employment of any means. The perversion and prostitution of the methods of science--including constant testing, constant criticism, constant doubt--cannot be allowed to stand. There can be no more well-intended lies, no more silencing of critics, no more running roughshod over doubts.

A good start in this direction would be the disestablishment of the IPCC. It has no more credibility. It has surrendered all rights to be heard. It must be replaced by an open body which includes all the doubters, the sceptics, the agnostics. True beliefs, compelling agendas, needs for power and prestige will only assure that no informed public can or will exist.

Mr de Boer and others who share his perspective must also go. They do not and cannot accept that bureaucracies do not have all the answers, that central commands are not likely to result in long term success. And, worst of all, they distrust, perhaps even despise the good sense, intelligence, and capacity for effective self-organization of the hoi polloi.

As the soldiers of Cromwell said to the Long Parliament, "You have sat here too long to do any good. Get hence!"

From The Sky-Is-Blue Department

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has finally gone public on an elephant in the john which has been present but unacknowledged all too long. On the road in India the SecDef made a long overdue reference to the strategy of al-Qaeda. Quite specifically he commented to the reporters present that al-Qaeda is working with Taliban of Afghanistan, Taliban of Pakistan, and the gang behind last year's Mumbai attack, Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), to provoke war between Pakistan and India.

This option is both too obvious and too attractive not to have captured the attention of the leadership echelon of al-Qaeda. Not only have India and Pakistan gone to war several times before, both countries (Pakistan far more than India under its present government) are willing to stage another rematch. All that is needed is a proper inciting incident or maybe two if the Indians are in a particularly cautious mood.

Had it not been for India's "restraint" and "statesmanlike" behavior, as Gates correctly characterized matters, the attack on Mumbai would have been sufficient. The lack of a robust response by India undoubtedly perturbed both the heavyweights of Lashkar-e-Taiba and al-Qaeda. Even the foot dragging and irresolute response on the part of Pakistan's government to the Indian demands that Islamabad haul its freight in both investigating and prosecuting the LeT leaders down home in Pakistan did not end India's policy of restraint.

A year ago some outside observers (including the Geek) expected an Islamist "second strike." It was unimportant just which group of the many available undertook the second attack as long as one occurred. No Indian government could have survived politically had it not taken strong retaliatory measures.

Gates observed that Indian patience and restraint was not unlimited in the face of future attacks on a scale rivaling the one on Mumbai. The Secretary's words were both diplomatic and quite blunt.

Their bluntness implies that the Indian government had made it abundantly clear that the next attack would not pass by unanswered. A further implication is that the Indians would be unwilling (or politically unable) to accept any US counsel to the effect that they be patient, that they show restraint, that they turn the other cheek in the event of another outrage committed by Islamist jihadists with a documented or even probable connection to Pakistan.

The Indian military has a wide range of retaliatory capabilities at its disposal. In highest probability the use of the most circumspect method would recommend itself. The most probable response would be carried out by Indian domestic manufacture cruise missiles against known terrorist training centers in Pakistan. This approach would limit collateral damage while allowing for an escalation should such prove necessary for either legitimate security reasons or compelling domestic political requirements.

Any Indian response even one as low profile as a single cruise missile strike on remotely located camps would carry risks. Additionally, it would have to be very carefully calibrated. The Indians would need to consider--and to avoid if at all possible--stimulating either of two probable Pakistani reactions. There is no desire in India for Pakistan's population to rally monolithically behind its government let alone the Islamists of LeT and Taliban. Neither would the Indian government (or the US) hope to see a Pakistan further weakened internally so as to assure an Islamist victory in that country.

Whether the Indian government and military are capable of so perfectly calibrating any hypothetical retaliatory strike is questionable at best. What Gates said hints strongly at the reality that the Indians are less concerned about that aspect of life than they are about motivating the Pakistani government to get off the dime and work far more sedulously at the task of eradicating both Taliban in Pakistan and the leader of the "syndicate of terror," al-Qaeda.

The US is just as interested in motivating Pakistan to do more in the war for its government's survival. Gates correctly called the conflict with al-Qaeda and Taliban in Pakistan "existential" in nature. Regardless of the hopes and delusions of those Islamists in the government, military, and Directorate of Inter-Services Intelligence, the contest between Taliban et al and the current regime is a zero sum game. There is only room at the top for one winner be it the status quo or the Islamist jihadists.

For just over two decades now the Pakistani military and ISI have fostered, nurtured, supported, guided, and protected both Taliban and al-Qaeda. Throughout this long period and process it has been the hope of ISI and others in the power elite that someday in someway the Islamist jihadists would provide the winning element in the future war with India. Whether through the provision of strategic depth in Afghanistan or the means of creating a fifth column in Kashmir and elsewhere in India, the Pakistanis have seen Islamist jihadists as a key weapon for future success against the hated Hindu rival.

In a set of very real ways India has already won the future war. Not only is the Indian military far more competent than its Pakistani rival, the Indian decision to invest heavily in human capital has given the country a vast advantage economically and in terms of social coherence. In addition the landmass of India compared to that of Pakistan implies strongly that the former country can survive a limited nuclear attack far better than the latter.

The great equalizer of nuclear weapons does not exist as regards the Indian-Pakistani calculus. The population and economic infrastructure of Pakistan is simply too concentrated to survive even a very limited (one to five weapons of twenty kilotons yield) nuclear attack. Sheer geographic propinquity assures that even a conscientiously counter-force strike would be a major counter-value attack.

The same situation does not apply to nearly the same extent in India. The country could survive a mid-sized attack (twenty to fifty weapons of up to fifty kiloton yield) without being existentially impaired.

In short, reality behooves Islamabad even more than it does New Delhi to take firm, effective, and rapid action to end the "syndicate of terror" before the syndicate can bring its strategic vision into effect. Should the syndicate succeed, the results will be far more disastrous for Pakistan than India.

And that, bucko, was the crucial sub-text of Secretary Gates' remarks to the press. One can only hope they read the papers in Islamabad.

We Don't Need No Education--Or Freedom

Taking a look at the most recent UN Development Program Report on the state of knowledge and freedom in Arab (and other Muslim) states gives the impression that Arabs neither have nor want much in the way of education and its necessary twin, freedom. To summarize the many metrics employed in making this report: Arab and other Muslim states rank at the bottom of the human heap in education, knowledge production, human capital development, economic freedom and, last but far from least, personal and political freedom.

This harsh judgement obtains even though some gains have been made in primary education such that illiteracy has declined among both men and women in the region. Still, the majority of people in the Arab countries remain unable to read or write at even the most basic level.

Overall the quality of education in Arab states--particularly that at the secondary and post-secondary level--is questionable at best. Putting the matter bluntly, the achievement of students in the hard and life sciences is very unimpressive as is that in mathematics and the higher technologies. The very fields of human knowledge most critical for success in the world today and into the foreseeable futures are those most under served in the Arab-Muslim states.

No one should be surprised by the gloomy assessment offered by the high priests of cultural relativism at the UN. Alone among the major religions of the world Islam looks only in its collective rearview mirror. Just as Islam holds that there was no history before the birth of the Prophet, it holds that the time and place of Mohammad, the Perfect Man, constitutes the halcyon of the human condition.

Nor can the constant linking between the "Will of Allah" and the outcome of any scientific experiment be discounted in appreciating the inherently reactionary nature of Islam and all educational systems under its sway. To put the matter simply but accurately, if the supernatural must be invoked to explain even the most trivial and commonplace of scientific matters, then, no science is possible.

(In this context recall that a textbook on chemistry approved by the Pakistani government not that many years back had the phrase "if Allah wills" inserted in an explanation of how two atoms of hydrogen and one of oxygen combine to make water.)

Overall the report makes clear that while Arab-Muslim states can and do exploit the science and technology developed elsewhere, there is little if any indigenous capacity to add to the sum total of either technology or science now or in the near term future. The corollary of this is that the states and people of the Arab-Muslim world will continue to be dependent upon others for any and all improvements in their quality of material life. It also implies that any Muslim who somehow escapes the stultifying atmosphere of Muslim education must leave the Muslim world in order to put talents and abilities to work.

There are other implications as well. Implications that the UN folks did not bother to consider.

One implication is the appeal of Islamism to members of the better educated segment of the Arab-Muslim population. There is little if any real, meaningful future open to a young man with a first class education and a better than simply mediocre mind in the Arab-Muslim environment of today. At the same time there is a strong probability that such an individual would perceive himself to be alienated from and unwelcome in the Western countries where his education, talents, and character might find ample reward.

Most, if not all, of the "martyrdom seekers" in recent years have been young men adrift between the promises of the West and the seductive certainties of Islam. They have been individuals of good education, economically comfortable backgrounds, and seemingly of a promising future. At the same time they have seen themselves as having been estranged from the cultural heritage of Islam.

This gap, particularly the loss of the reassuring certainties which so fill the pages of Islam, provided the easily exploited vulnerability of these men to the blandishments of radical clerics. These men of the Koran could and did easily promise the rewards of total uniting with Allah in the gardens of paradise. Given the uncertainties of life which presented themselves to these men of both sensitivity and belief, it is scarcely surprising that they resolved their internal dilemmas in favor of immortality through suicide, paradise by way of murder.

Another implication concerns the stability of states such as Pakistan. To consider this critical country, it is necessary to take a good, hard look at its public education system. Or, to err on the side of accuracy, the lack of a respectable, effective public educational system available to the majority of Pakistani citizens.

Space prevents a detailed account of the failed Pakistani public school system. (Also, the Geek, unlike most Americans, is bored by statistics and considers them to be a bane.) There are three educational systems in Pakistan: the private schools (many of them world class) which are available to the elite only, the madrases which provide much indoctrination in Islamic ideology but little else, and the public schools.

The public schools are the option preferred by the majority of Pakistani families. These do provide somewhat more of an education than do the exclusively religious institutes. The problem comes in the simple fact that the majority of public schools either do not exist (locally they are known as "ghost" schools) or are ineptly staffed, or starved of equipment and supplies.

(Along this line consider the remarkable absence of casualties amidst all the school bombings conducted by Taliban. Lots of buildings destroyed, but no one killed. What is this, Taliban is suddenly concerned with conducting humane, low fatality war? Since when? No, most of the buildings hit are "ghost" schools. This impression is borne out by close examination of images of the damage. No desks, no blackboards, none of the usual impedimenta common to schools everywhere, even the Third World.)

India made the choice years ago to invest heavily in human capital development with a real heavy emphasis on education. Pakistan chose instead to invest heavily in military capital. The strategic impact of these diverse choices is quite evident today as one compares the Indian and Pakistani economies.

The current maldistribution of educational potential in Pakistan serves the needs of the indigenous elite. It serves their short term requirements for stability and regime maintenance. It has assured that the children of today's elite is guaranteed to be the elite of tomorrow. At the same time the use of "ghost" schools assures sufficient graft, corruption, and bribery to secure support in the hinterlands while placating the Islamists by making sure there are sufficient students for the madrases.

Short term, this approach has been win-win for the elite of the country. It has been tacitly approved by the US. We have been aware for years of the inherently destabilizing potential of the educational system, but have held our peace. We have poured money into Pakistan's military capital development without any more than pro forma hints that human capital development is the better option.

Long term stability in Pakistan will come if and only if the country puts an effort into genuine education. The US must support this seismic shift in Pakistani policy. It is in our interests as well as theirs that the money, manpower, and brainpower be shifted increasingly from gun toting to intellect building.

Gun toting buys short term order. It does not and cannot buy long term stability. Education brings little if any short-term benefits, but it does result in long-term improvements. The problem lies in that education takes years, decades, even generations to bear fruit. And, governments live by days, weeks, or, sometimes, months. They demand results right, bloody now!

It may be too late already for Pakistan as it is for Afghanistan, Yemen, and other Islamist jihadist hot zones. The question that must be asked--and answered--is it too late for the rest of the Arab-Muslim world?

The Geek would like to be an optimist. It was his optimism which drove him from the government to academia. But, he is first and foremost a realist. So, his hot wash answer is a resounding, "Yes!" Yes, it is too late for any of the Arab-Muslim states and the majority of their populations.

The reason is simple, blunt and (to Islamists) unpleasant. Islam is both anti-education and anti-freedom. Islam has little if any use for the real world of human beings, their lives, loves, hopes, fears. It focuses instead on two unrealities: paradise after the Day of Judgement, and, the presumed Utopia of the Arabian Peninsula nearly fifteen hundred years ago.

Education and freedom both insist on the importance of life now. Both also see that the human condition has far more potential than that which existed among a flea bitten collection of semi-nomadic herdsmen and occasional traders in a remote area of the Earth far in our past.

Failure Breeds Catastrophe

A ground truth about Haiti: It was a failed state long before the earthquake hit. Arguably, it was the failed nature of the Haitian state--and the well-meaning but totally ineffectual efforts on the part of the UN--which assured the earthquake became a sizable catastrophe.

The Geek is well aware that he is out of step with the journalists, politicos, academics, and always concerned folks of the world by not seeing the earthquake and its human cost as a tragedy of world historical proportions. The Geek may be a cold dude, but he has a grip on the realities of Haiti which seem to elude all too many.

Haiti has been a failed state since the moment of its creation in a welter of war, disease, and bloodshed. Not because, as the always-terminally-out-to-lunch Reverend Pat Robertson averred in one more mind-boggling rush of total asininity, of a "pact with the devil," but because of the deep seated internal conflicts which have riven Haitian social, political, and economic life for the past two centuries. These divisions have made their existence manifest not only in the simple fact that very few Haitian heads-of-state have died in bed with their boots off, but also in the endemic corruption, governmental inefficiency, structural poverty, and environmental rapine which have marked Haitian history since the giddy-up.

It is a pathetic and telling indictment of a society, a polity, a culture, when the twenty best, most peaceful, most productive years of its existence occurred during a period of foreign (US) military occupation and rule. It is an even more pathetic and harsh indictment of Haitian life when it is realized that some (elderly) Haitians look back fondly on the brutally repressive rule of Papa Doc and his scion, Baby Doc.

The US ended the last great Haitian adventure in authoritarian rule during the early years of the Clinton administration by some tough talk on the part of Colin Powell and the credible threat of the Marines landing one more time. As was often the case with exercises in more muscular diplomacy (see, inter alia, Somalia), the Clinton boys and girls declared victory too soon and drew back in favor of collective efforts by the Organization of American States and (of course) the UN.

Several elections, coups, counter-coups, and rumors of coups later, Haiti has been under the effective tutelage of the UN for the past half decade or so. Internal security has been provided, such as it is, by a UN peacekeeping force while UN and assorted non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have provided the backup for the locally elected government at all levels from the national on down. A very great deal of well-intentioned efforts, money, charitable donations, and peacekeeping services have poured into Haiti. Poured in without any noticeable improvement in the economy, the quality of social life, the efficiency and accountability of government, or the security of physical existence.

Under the beneficent UN/NGO regime, Haiti has remained what it has always been--a social, political, and economic basketcase. It has retained its lamentable status in all these areas for the same, long standing, historically well-rooted reasons of internal divisions, systemic and endemic corruption, and a culture of perpetual violence. To these the years of external support and assistance have grafted a firm belief on the part of Haitians generally that the outside world owes them.

The several seconds of earthshaking have resulted in highlighting these pre-existent dynamics in a dramatic and quite unmistakable fashion. The ramshackle facsimile of a Haitian government has collapsed even more completely than the shoddy built structures on the sides of deforested hills covered by soil subject to liquefaction with less of a stimulus than that provided by a 7.0 temblor. The UN and its NGO accomplices have shown the usual frictions, institutional egos, inability to coordinate effectively which have existed all along. The Haitians--or at least a significant portion of them--have acted out their "frustration" resulting from the perceived failure of the world to provide food, water, medical supplies, housing, and ipods fast enough.

As an overlay to the realities on the ground in Haiti--realities which could be overcome quickly and efficiently if control of the relief and rescue efforts would be vested in one command structure possessing the relevant skills, equipment, and systems--everyone and his/her brother from President Obama to the UN to the usual crew of NGOs is now clamoring for cash money. Not supplies, not services, not expert personnel, not communications and control systems. No. Just send cash. And lots of it.

The UN Secretary General, whose organization is yet to account for the money received and allegedly expended in the wake of the Indian Ocean tsunami, insists that without beaucoup bucks, the humanitarian disaster in Haiti will know no limits. President Obama has dragooned his two immediate predecessors into ramrodding an all-American cash raising effort. The same will be or already is happening elsewhere in the world, particularly Western Europe.

In Haiti, or, more accurately, in Port-au-Prince, there are people raising merry hell in their expression of the effects of starvation, dehydration, post-traumatic stress disorder, and simple frustration. It is of interest that the vast majority of images from the streets of PaP show young men in good health, men who are, in medical terms, "well nourished," going about the business of looting and pillaging.

Presumably these young, well nourished, well muscled men are those who have been constructing roadblocks of corpses whenever and wherever a relief supply convoy is spotted on the road. The assorted media accounts never state where the hijacked supplies might be taken after seizure, but would it be too cynical, too politically incorrect to bet that whatever is taken is later sold--for cash to those with that most prized of commodities?

Apparently all the UN heavyweights in country are too preoccupied finding a journalist who will pass on their tales of devastation and death without precedent in the UN's history to notice that the UN peacekeeping forces are both too minimal on the ground and too prudent to actually protect the supply convoys. The same spokespersons like their colleagues from the legion of NGOs are too involved with demanding more money to have noticed that supplies already piled up at the one and only airport are not being moved to those who, it is alleged, need them so desperately.

In one of those little ironies which throw the realities on the ground in Haiti into sharp relief, the US aircraft carrier Carl Vinson is just off shore. It has a number of medium lift helicopters just perfect for moving supplies from the airport to those who need them. But, the worthy and ever-so-concerned humanitarians who own and control those supplies are unwilling to allow the US Navy to move them.

Now, the Navy has its downsides as do all the American military services. But, the Navy and the others are very, very good at moving vast mountains of material very quickly and efficiently from central depots to users in the field. The US military has the expertise, the equipment, the systems to move men and material from where they are to where they are needed. Thus, it seems logical that the US military be given the task of moving stuff.

But, that sort of narrow minded logic does not meet the needs of either the UN or the assorted NGOs in their Quest For Bucks. It is that sort of narrow minded logic with an emphasis on results, on getting the job done, which would violate the institutional egos, the personal careers, the heart and soul of humanitarian relief organizations both public and private.

The US military is also very good now at providing security in the context of humanitarian relief and political stability operations. The US military have been undergoing the most rigorous sort of on-the-job training in this sort of operation for some years now. So, it is only logical (there's that icky-poo word again) that the UN and its clones give the responsibility for protecting as well as moving the relief supplies over to the US military.

That won't happen. Not in this world. Even if the movers and shakers of the UN, the OAS, the assorted NGOs, had an attack of honest self-evaluation, the notion of allowing the US military services to move material, save lives, and provide security is simply unacceptable to the high minded, internationalist, post-modernist, multi-culturalists of the aforementioned entities.

As an unfortunate but seemingly necessary consequence of the institutional agendas, histories, and values of the UN and the NGOs alike it will be more of the same in Haiti. Just as the assorted well-meaning but totally ineffectual groups have been screwing the pooch in Haiti for some years now, they will continue to do the same in the days and months to come.

Just as has been the case elsewhere in recent years, the UN and its co-conspirators in doing good will use emotionally laden propaganda, outright deception, and never-ending wails and warnings to keep their collective paws in our pockets. We will continue to have the privilege of paying for their collective failures.

Say it once more, with feeling, "May you live in interesting times."

Beyond (Un)Reasonable Doubt

Google can be--and is--both loved and hated. At the moment one has to love the search engine company since it and it alone has had the courage and savvy to tell it like it is. To let the world and its brother know that the Chinese government is executing major, very sophisticated cyber-espionage attacks against not only Google but thirty some other major companies as well.

Google placed the cyber attacks on top of the Beijing demands for search engine self-censorship as a reason to consider withdrawing entirely from the enormous Chinese marketplace. While analysts have debated the long and short-term economic impact of this threat, the reality is that someone, sometime, has to take the toughest of tough lines against the hostile Chinese government.

In the normal course of affairs it is governments which take the hardline, make the threats, issue ultimata, but when the steward of international affairs is lacking in will or capacity to do the right thing, then it is necessary that a private enterprise step up and take a whack at the problem. This is what Google is doing. It may be acting in its own best interests but in doing so it is acting in the best interests of the US as well.

"Engine Charley" Wilson may have been wrong when he stated, "What is good for General Motors is good for the country." back when he was Eisenhower's Secretary of Defense. If today the panjandrums of Google were to make a similar comment, they would be right on.

Reputedly the US State Department will issue a "demarche" in the next week or so on the Chinese matter. If it is keeping with past Notes, the US will express "concern" perhaps even "grave concern" over the allegations. It will request that the Beijing government investigate the situation. It might even be so bold as to allude to unspecified "consequences" if the Chinese do not cease and desist in their wholesale efforts to steal everything not nailed down in cyberspace.

If the past is the reliable guide it normally is, the Chinese government will reject the demarche. The rejection will contain all the usual rhetoric about "Cold War thinking" and US "backsliding." Chinese foreign ministry spokespeople will invoke the sacred totem of "Chinese sovereignty" and Chinese "internal affairs" along with the new fetish of the supremacy and perfection of the Chinese legal and judicial systems.

The ball will be hit back over the net by the half-hearted folks of Foggy Bottom. They (and quite possibly SecState Clinton) will "deplore" the Chinese attitude but otherwise will let the matter slide away into diplomatic oblivion.

The three step model which has characterized Sino-American relations for some years now typifies what the Secretary of State described a few days ago as she started off on her Asian jaunt as a "mature" relationship between the US and China. Apparently Ms Clinton sees a "mature" relation as being inherently asymmetrical, that is, a relationship in which one party lies, cheats, steals, and engages in a general sort of Adolescent Oppositional Defiance Disorder and the other party is endlessly patient, understanding, willing to compromise, and quite willing to ignore manifestations of hostile behavior.

In all probability the neat, lawyerly minds of Secretary Clinton, President Obama, and other legal types in the administration are greatly perturbed by the inability to prove the Chinese culpability in this as well as other instances of cyber-espionage to the criminal justice standard of "beyond a reasonable doubt." Lawyers apparently have such tidy little minds that it is difficult or even impossible for them to get a grip on the messy realities of normal international discourse such as espionage (whether cyber or the old fashioned sort) and the use of terror tactics by both non-state and state actors.

The reality of cyber based espionage is that it is nearly impossible to prove to the standards demanded by an American court of law. That ground truth has been reemphasized by such non-techno-wonks as the National Security Council as well as by legions of highly competent techies.

Even if it can be demonstrated that the attacks originated in China using a server located in Taiwan that in no way proves the Beijing regime either executed, authorized, or knew about the attacks. While the sophistication of the effort in its exploitation of a small flaw in the software for pre-Internet Explorer 8 can be best (and perhaps only) explained by direct governmental and military involvement, it does not in and of itself prove the Trolls of Beijing masterminded the operation.

Without the highest standard of proof, the lawyers of the Obama administration cannot bring themselves to do more than issue pro forma expressions of concern, of minor irritation. Without the sort of incontrovertible evidence which would make for a slam-dunk conviction in Federal Court, the pettifoggers of the administration cannot do more than wring their hands over the theft of billions of dollars in US intellectual property or even the penetration of critical defense establishment systems.

This orientation, this narrowness of both mind and vision, assures that President Obama and presumably others in his administration will take a far more vigorous position with the violations of human rights executed by the Beijing authorities in their (successful) efforts to censor searches and sites. Human rights is a far more attractive mast on which to nail the colors of indignation then is the fundamental reality that the Chinese government and military are engaged in wholesale theft of American property and defense secrets. After all there is no real need to prove anything in the realm of human rights abridgement. The allegation is enough.

Then, of course, there is the other inhibition operating on the Obama administration. Not only do the Trolls of Beijing hold a trillion dollars more or less of US government notes, the administration and the "Progressive Caucus" in Congress need the same Trolls to pick up a few tens of billions more in order that the "Transformational Agenda" can be executed in full.

Perhaps these less-than-reality oriented, agenda driven, multi-cultural advocates of the post-modern era are totally unconcerned with Chinese espionage. In their mental calculus the theft of intellectual property from mere corporations or the undercutting of US national security and defense capacities is of little moment compared to the pressing need to put the Transformational Agenda into full effect.

After all, which is more important, the present and future security and economic strength of the nation or the bringing of the blessings of True Belief to the benighted multitude of Americans? It seems the Obama administration has made the choice.

Now, perhaps, the founders of Google are regretting their full-throated support of Mr Obama. That would be a nice wrinkle to the current imbroglio.

Freedom Is Still An Endangered Species

Freedom House has issued its preliminary report on the state of freedom in the world for the year 2010. For the fourth successive year the number of folks living in free social, political, economic, and cultural venues has declined.

This means, quite simply, that the number of free states has declined as well. While not as "unfree" today as, say, twenty years ago, the state of play for freedom (and those who relish in the confusion, messiness, and uncertainty which comes with being free) remains parlous in the extreme.

It is a quick--and very sobering--process to take a dekko at the report's regional maps. They tell a lot in one fast view.

Consider the map of the Middle East and North Africa. There is only one country--Israel--which meets the criteria for freedom. In comparison there are fourteen states with a total population of nearly 325 million which are categorized as "not free." Three states with a population of thirty eight million are "partly free." It is of more than passing interest that the only non-Muslim country in the regions--Israel--is also the only "free" one.

The map of Central Asia, Eastern Europe, and the former Soviet Union shows a similar picture when one looks at the coexistence of Islam and populations which are "not free." The solidly Muslim Central Asian republics are solidly "not free." In Eastern Europe it is of interest that Serbia is "free," while the Muslim plurality state of Bosnia is "not free."

A quick look at the world map indicates that very few Muslim majority countries are in the "free" classification. Indonesia makes the cut, but it is fair to argue with that conclusion given recent waves of anti-"Infidel" violence in the island state. Mali makes the list of "free" states which is a credit to it given that most of Africa is in one of the two lesser categories as well as it is ninety percent Muslim.

Both Turkey and Pakistan are considered by Freedom House to be "partly free." How well merited this designation is and how long it might be applicable are both open to debate. The increasingly Islamist leaning Turkish government of the AKP as well as the rapid growth of Islamism among recent arrivals in Ankara and Istanbul from the hinterlands seem to show a negative trajectory for Turkey's overall freedom. Pakistan is torn between pure Islamist jihadists, supporters of Islamism, those who hope to use and control Islamist jihadism for reasons of state, and a diminishing number of more or less nominal Muslims who see a place for religion but hope to keep religion in its place. This dynamic does not bode well for either the continued freedoms in or the stability of Pakistan.

To look at the "free" side of the world map is to see the tracery of both the Enlightenment and the Christian worldview which gave rise to that often maligned intellectual, social, and political movement of the Seventeenth and succeeding centuries. Western Europe, North America, most of South America as well as such offshoot states as Australia, India, South Africa are on the "A" list. Japan and South Korea appear among the blessed as well. (As does, rather surprisingly, that distant, desert country of Mongolia, a place untouched by the referenced phenomena.)

South America is primarily "free." Some of "partly free" are members of the Bolavarian Revolutionary group. Others such are experiencing internal political unrest including that driven by narcotraffickers. The only "not free" state in the hemisphere is the old standby, Cuba. The number of "free" countries is quite encouraging compared to a couple of decades back, but it is disturbing that the Bolivarian movement has used the mechanism of elections to come to freedom limiting conclusions.

Freedom brings some necessary consequences. Among these are uncertainties, inequities, imperfect justice, and and very imperfect outcomes. Freedom equals political messiness, slow solutions to complex problems, frustration, and other less than fun-filled concomitants of the human condition such as disorder and insecurity.

People crave security and certainty in life. Most also want fair even if imperfect outcomes, equity of reward and sacrifice, and other forms of ameliorating the many vicissitudes to which life is automatically heir.

Freedom limiting regimes, be they secular or religious in their ideological roots, promise to overcome insecurity, defeat disorder, insure equity and justice, and generally banish the icky-poo aspects of life. Therein lies the fatally seductive appeal of limiting liberty in the interest of greater goods. It matters not in the least that history has demonstrated repeatedly that the promises as well as the greater goods of the freedom annullers is on a par with the visions induced by LSD. People will continue to fall for the scam, to sell their freedom for the hallucination of security and predictability.

Only the graveyard possesses perfect tranquility, complete peace, absolute certainty, and utter predictability. People need desperately to get a firm grip on that reality. They also need to get a grip on a companion truth: Life, real, real authentic life, is as an unending exercise in risk, a constant career of sticking one's face in a fan until finally the graveyard can no longer be escaped.

We are all going to end up there. Thus there is no reason to hasten the process which is what has happened in all those many countries where freedom has been buried by a pile of false promises.

Looking For The "Perfect Weapon"

In a perfect world we would fight "perfect wars" using "perfect weapons." A "perfect weapon" would be one which killed only hostile combatants while not inflicting any collateral damage on civilians or civilian property. A "perfect weapon" would have a combination of accuracy and constrained lethality so as to assure that only those in need of killing received its attentions.

As an added benefit the hypothetical "perfect weapon" could be employed without putting a single friendly soldier in harm's way. It would protect the "good guys" while terminating with the most extreme prejudice each and every "bad guy" until the survivors within the second group gave up the war as a very bad idea.

The US has pursued the still elusive "perfect weapon" with a high degree of persistence over the years. And, its persistence has paid off--to an extent.

The closest approximation to the "perfect weapon" we possess currently is found in the often maligned unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) typified by the Predator and Reaper craft. These systems can and do kill specific, targeted individuals of high value within the ranks of the Islamist jihadist ranks without extreme collateral damage. And, without risk to the Americans operating the systems.

It is the latter reality--the absence of risk to Americans--which has aroused the ire of Code Pink and similar anti-war organizations. While one might think that reducing the body count in war would be a goal agreeable to those opposed to even the most legitimate of wars, it is not. Code Pink and company have engaged in a campaign of great vitriol and little realism to end the use of armed UAVs in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and elsewhere.

This campaign has been enhanced by the position taken by the UN Special Rapporteur on miscellaneous asininities connected with wars undertaken by the US. (OK, that isn't the man's actual job title, but it conveys the flavor of his position.) This worthy has hinted darkly that the use of UAVs might constitute a species of war crime. Why this might be the case is at best murky and leaves unexamined why dropping iron bombs on a village containing armed combatants along with civilians would not be a "crime" as well.

There is no doubt but that the use of armed UAVs in both Afghanistan and Pakistan have been effective. The Long War Journal keeps very close track on the UAV employment in the AfPak region and parses the claims of civilian as opposed to combatant fatalities and injuries very carefully. A quick perusal of the record over the past two years shows that fifteen senior and sixteen mid-level al-Qaeda personnel have been taken off the board by UAVs. The numbers concerning Taliban are equally good.

The UAVs not only perturb the organizational integrity of the Islamist jihad groups by eliminating key personnel, they disrupt movement, enervate morale, lower combat efficiency of the hostile trigger pullers and bomb makers generally. The various statements by Taliban figures in particular as well as the results of interrogations show the overall effectiveness of the Predator and Reaper attacks cannot be overstated easily.

Perhaps the chief limitation on the possibility of the UAVs being considered "perfect weapons" is the size, lethality, and radius of destruction of the munitions they deliver. Neither the Hellfire missile (initially developed and deployed over thirty years ago as an air delivered anti-armor weapon) nor five hundred pound precision guided bombs can be considered constrained lethality devices. The size of the bursting charge as well as the nature of the fragments created combine to assure that these weapons are more area than point in their effect.

Either Hellfire or the five hundred pound bomb will and have destroyed vehicles, structures, or sizable open air assemblies. This state of affairs is fine provided all of those downrange are sure enough combatants. In this context it must be noted carefully that neither al-Qaeda nor Taliban nor any other groups of this ilk are notably scrupulous about separating civilians including women and children from the combatant types.

While there will be targeting errors regardless of the layers of review and approval, the primary responsibility for collateral damage rests with the Islamist jihadis. As long as these Glorious And (Self) Righteous Goons of the One True Faith are unwilling or unable to sequester their martyrdom seeking trigger pullers, bomb makers, and the like from non-combatants, collateral damage will occur.

(A parenthetical thought: Quite possibly, given the belief system of the good Muslims who constitute the jihadist groups, it is believed that a favor is being done for the women, children, and other non-combatants in that should the Hellfire hit, all hands will go to Paradise.)

In time technology will produce the necessary refinements that will result in lower area lethality without impairing the capacity of the UAV delivered munitions to kill selected individuals. The Israelis have been making strides in this direction with the development and deployment of ever smaller but still highly accurate air-delivered munitions which kill the target but, absent a secondary explosion from the target's own explosives, leave those standing around unhurt. As senior US commanders well appreciate the need to reduce the perception of collateral damage among civilians, one can be reasonably sure the US is proceeding in the same direction as the Israelis.

A "perfect weapon" might also be characterized by an absence of diplomatic complaints over its usage. By this standard the Predator and Reaper are most imperfect weapons. The government and military of Pakistan as well as any number of Pakistani journalists, academics, and "strategic thinkers" have made many mighty moans over the dire consequences which will necessarily attend the use of UAVs. With tones and words suitable to an announcement of the-end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it, these Pakistani patriots warn that the UAVs are driving an infinite number of peaceful people into the camp and arms of al-Qaeda, Taliban, and Associates.

The Greek chorus of Islamabad also thunders against the horrid violations of that most precious of commodities--Pakistani sovereignty. Of course the great claque of opposition from Pakistani politicians and generals is not motivated by fear over the actual effect of the UAVs (except in so far as they hurt the Islamist jihadis supported by the Pakistani Army, Inter-Services Intelligence, or members of the political structure.)

Rather the Pakistanis see the UAVs as a "perfect enough weapon" that they want to possess it themselves. Not for service in the air over the FATA but for duty on the only "frontline" which matters--the common border with India.

It is safe to put the self-serving whines of the Pakistanis in the same category as the hopelessly misguided simpering of Code Pink. Both are irrelevant to the continued successful employment of Predators and Reapers in theater. Both are testaments of a backhanded sort.

The sniveling of Code Pink and the plaints of Islamabad are both actually powerful attestations to the fact that the US is coming ever closer to the development of the "perfect weapon."

Well, bucko, we can be grateful for that. And, we can only hope that we get closer to perfection very, very soon.