How "Moderate" Has Changed Its Meaning

I was rather shocked to hear a cable news discussion of Senator Hillary Clinton’s pledge to “totally obliterate them” if the Iranian government were to launch an attack on Israel. One pundit pointed out that that remark was a part of her campaign to appeal to “moderate voters.” The others all nodded sagely.

How is it “moderate” to pledge to “totally obliterate” a nation of over seventy million people? How did “moderate” change its meaning so drastically?

Showing How Millions of People Were Duped

The New York Times: “Behind Analysts, the Pentagon’s Hidden Hand”

“It was them saying, ‘We need to stick our hands up your back and move your mouth for you,’ ” Robert S. Bevelacqua, a retired Green Beret and former Fox News analyst, said.

Inspiring News from Zimbabwe

Opposition wins Zimbabwe assembly

Commentary from Rejoice Ngwenya here.

Azeri Libertarianism

I’m very pleased that my colleagues have unveiled to the world a new initiative to carry libertarian ideas to the crossroads of Europe and Asia: AzadliqCiragi.org. That’s “Lamp of Liberty” in Azeri (also known as Azerbaijani), a language spoken by tens of millions of people in Azerbaijan, Iran, Russia, and other countries. It is a joint project of the Cato Institute’s Center for Promotion of Human Rights and the Free Minds Association of Azerbaijan. It joins three other “Lamps of Liberty,” in Arabic, Persian, and Kurdish.

Democracy, Liberty, Limited Government, Foreign Policy

The Northwestern University Law Review (Issue 102:1 (Winter 2008) has published my oral remarks during the 2006 Federalist Society panel/debate on “Limited Government and Spreading Democracy: Uneasy Cousins?” Judge A. William Randolph, Weekly Standard editor William Kristol, National Democratic Institute president Kenneth Wollack, and French lawyer François-Henri Briard were the other participants. (Complete journal here.)

The remarks got a bit sharp at times.

Wasted Aid

“Foreign aid is flowing in in large amounts, but it’s not reaching the people,” by Thompson Ayodele, The Sowetan, March 5, 2008

Thompson is a great fighter for liberty whom I met in Nairobi at the Mont Pelerin Society meeting in 2006 and then last year at the African Resource Bank meeting in Dar Es Salaam. He is executive director of the Initiative for Public Policy Analysis in Nigeria and a regular contributor to AfricanLiberty.org.

Mediation and Peace

Civilized politics is not about “finding the true will of the people,” a project that is merely a totalitarian conceit,* but about fashioning tolerable regimes based on peaceful relations. Kenya has taken a great step in that direction, thanks to the efforts of Mr. Kofi Annan and the willingness of the leaders of the two major camps to step back from the abyss. According to the BBC,

Mr Odinga said the agreement was “just a piece of paper” - the most important thing was the will behind it.

“It means we recognise Mr Kibaki as president and he recognises that there were some flaws in the elections,” he told the BBC.

Of course, a world without criminal gangs competing for power would be preferable, but in the existing world of criminal gangs, getting them to interact more peacefully among themselves and with respect to their prey is preferable to conflict.

*The invocation of “will” is a dangerous foundation for a political order, unless by will one refers to the constitutional order as the “enduring will of the people,” in which case it may have some value. It is, however, not very enlightening to refer to a set of rules or procedures as “the will of the people” on analogy with the “will” of this or that person to do this or that act.

A New World Map

Here

What a Novel Principle; Turning Power Over to Your Brother

Fidel Castro announces retirement

The National Assembly is widely expected to elect 76-year-old Raul Castro as his successor, although analysts say there is speculation about a possible generational jump with Vice-President Carlos Lage Davila, 56, a leading contender.”>The National Assembly is widely expected to elect 76-year-old Raul Castro as his successor, although analysts say there is speculation about a possible generational jump with Vice-President Carlos Lage Davila, 56, a leading contender.

No mention of the term “dictatorship” in any of the news coverage…..

(The good news is that with Fidel substantially out of the picture, Cuba may begin to move peacefully toward a post-communist future. Raul, on the other hand, may begin by eliminating potential threats to consolidate his hold on power, so things could get nasty.)

Oh, one more thing: maybe now the US will get rid of the largely symbolic embargo (largely symbolic because the Cuban government can trade with all the rest of the world; they just don’t produce much that anyone else wants) that has helped to keep the dictator in power for so long.

Let's See If They Can Create Both a "Free Country" and a Country of Freedom

Kosovo MPs proclaim independence

The fact that the EU will be running things from afar gives little cause for hope that the Kosovars will generate their own independent judiciary and respect for the rule of law, a productive market economy, or accountability in government. But we’ll see.

Turning Their Backs on Destructive Nationalism

First Poland, now Serbia (“Serbia election victory for Tadic”). Bravo.

Cudjoe v. Clooney

My friend and colleague Franklin Cudjoe, the leader of the IMANI think tank in Ghana and editor of the joint IMANI/Cato project AfricanLiberty.org, takes on the appointment of George Clooney as a “peace ambassador” in Africa in a debate with a “Friend of the Earth.” The debate is in the last quarter of this BBC segment.

UPDATE: It turns out that the link expired and I cannot now find the item on the BBC website. Franklin made some very good points. (I have an audio file made from a microphone held up to the radio, but the quality is poor and I don’t know how to post such a file. I am hoping to help Franklin and his colleagues get some better recording equipment so that they can post such items.)

New Resource for Afghanistan

AfghanPress.org

(Readers of Persian can also visit the Persian Lamp of Liberty, Cheragheazadi.org)

Capitalism, Free Trade, and Democracy

The quotes in this Washington Post story (“Shanghai’s Middle Class Launches Quiet, Meticulous Revolt”) tell a lot:

“They can’t arrest everybody,” said Yao, a 58-year-old protester who asked that his full name not be used because he is a manager at a state-owned enterprise.

“We haven’t done anything wrong,” said Wang Guowei, 51, a manager in a Chinese-Japanese plastics venture whose family lives near the planned extension. “We always follow the Chinese constitution, we never violate the law. And in our many contacts with the police, they say we are within the law.”

John Githongo on Kenya's Crisis

The Kenyan former anti-corruption official interviewed on the BBC.

He wrote “Kenya’s Fight against Corruption: An Uneven Path to Political Accountability” for the Cato Institute last year and gave his account of being an official whistleblower in a corrupt regime in March, available in video and audio.

A View from Zimbabwe

My friend Rejoice Ngwenya of Zimbabwe has an insightful column that was syndicated to the African print media by AfricanLiberty.org: “The Irony of a Jacob Zuma Presidency.”

Kenya's Agony

My colleagues at AfricanLiberty.org and UnMondeLibre.org have been busy covering the crisis in Kenya and offering to African public opinion some rational solutions to avoid another Rwanda.

A Little Good News

“Economics in many lessons: A better brew for Rwanda,” by Karol and Don Boudreaux

Zimbabwe notoriously excepted, the trend in much of Africa is positive. They’ve tried virtually everything else…..it’s time for something that works: “the obvious and simple system of natural liberty.”

Freedom as an Option for Pakistan

“A Charter of Liberty,” from the Alternate Solutions Institute. I’m a fan of the work done by the ASI, which is one of the few in the region to reject collectivist and statist extremism of all kinds and to stand for individual liberty and the rule of law. Dr. Ahmad’s articles make the case for freedom very eloquently and intelligently.

Let Us Hope Wider War Is Avoided, but the Turks Did Provide a Lesson in Constitutionalism, If Nothing Else

The likelihood of military action between Iraq and Turkey is quite frightening. I hope that cooler heads prevail and that the Iraqi Kurdish leadership makes it clear that they do not support at all the fanatical campaign of the PKK, regardless of the injustices to which Turkish Kurds have been subjected. There are other solutions than terrorism against innocent people, of which the PKK is guilty. I hope that the various parties find a solution to the PKK problem, as well as to the issue of the rights of Kurds to their own language, without igniting the region in a wider war.

That said, the Turkish government has at least shown the strength of their parliamentary system, in contrast to those who argue for unlimited powers of the US president to make war: “Turkish MPs today gave the green light to military operations in northern Iraq…”

Imagine that. They actually had a parliamentary debate before approving military action. How novel.

Andrew Mwenda on Foreign Aid

The Ugandan journalist Andrew Mwenda tells it like it is: “Andrew Mwenda: Let’s take a new look at African aid.”

I met Andrew in Nairobi earlier this year; he’s a great spokesman for classical liberalism and an inspiring person.

Straight Talk on Iran

Evil? Sure. Reason for War? No way.

Fareed Zakaria offers some rational thought on relations with Iran: “Stalin, Mao And … Ahmadinejad? Conservatives have become surprisingly charitable about two of history’s greatest mass murderers.”

A nuke in Iran is cause for concern, but not for preemptive war. Let us hope and pray that the drive to go to war with Iran fails. It’s definitely underway. The war drums are rumbling. Before it’s too late, it’s important for rational people to plot the non-end of the world.

Poles at the Polls!

I have Polish friends who see politics in their country differently, and I understand why, but….I am really pleased by the defeat of Kaczynski’s Law and Justice Party and the victory of Tusk’s Civic Platform Party. The morally intolerant, belligerent, anti-market, populistic policies of the current government were leading Poland in the wrong direction.

Neatly Skewered

The soi disant deep thinker Naomi Klein has her deep thoughts brought up for a little sunlight by Tyler Cowen, “Shock Jock.”

(I read her book No Logo years ago. Lots of elegant sentences, but they don’t add up to a coherent picture of how anything works.)

A Positive Step in Turkey

Turkey could rethink insult law: Turkish President Abdullah Gul has called for changes to a law that has allowed writers to face trial for insulting Turkish identity.

I know one person who has suffered prosecution for quite innocent remarks, Dr. Attila Yayla, president of the Association for Liberal Thinking.

Belgium in Crisis!!!

Pieter Cleppe explains it all*: “Belgium on the edge of splitting up? Let’s hope so. Freedom thrives with decentralisation.”

*Well, not really all. What happens to the small German-speaking region of Belgium in the event of a Flemish-Walloon divorce?

Evidence of Bizarre New Forms of Nationalism .... with an Old Odor

A young scientist has been charged with “smuggling” for buying at a Russian flea market and then trying to leave Russia with some old bank notes, coins, and medals:

The growth of bizarre nationalism in Russia is very worrisome. (It’s worrisome everywhere, the US certainly not excepted, but it’s been taking an exceptionally aggressive tone in Russia lately.)

Presidency or Dictatorship?

George Will poses some excellent “Questions for Mukasey.”

The first is especially good:

The Bush administration says “the long war” — the war on terrorism — is a perpetual emergency that will last for generations. Waged against us largely by non-state actors, it will not end with a legally clarifying and definitive surrender. The administration regards America as a battlefield, on which even an American citizen can be seized as an “enemy combatant” and detained indefinitely. You ruled that presidents have this power, but you were reversed on appeal. What do you think was the flaw in the reasoning of the court that reversed you?

Belarussian Classical Liberal Website

Economy.by*

*In Russian and in English.

Siloviki Statism

A very useful introduction to the political economy of the new Siloviki State: “The making of a neo-KGB state.”

European Activities

I’m giving the opening talk (after the welcoming remarks from the European Union Ambassador) at the European Resource Bank tonight in Bucharest, so I’m still doing a little polishing. (I’ll also be speaking tomorrow morning on “Constitutional Choice: Harmony or Conflict” and on Saturday on “Is a Think-Tank a Business?”) The Cato Institute is an Organizing Partner and Sponsor of this year’s meeting.

The banner above is for our new European activities to promote libertarian thought, individual liberty, and limited government. We will be partnering with the IES-Europe to organize seminars in French and in English in Europe, to complement our seminars in Russian in Ukraine, in Chinese in China, and in English and in French in Africa. (We will be launching our Africa initiative in Tanzania in November at the African Resource Bank meeting, where we will be assembling our various teams for training, strategizing, and planning.)

Russia's New Elite

Felix Dzerzhinsky: His Influence Is Still Felt

This BBC story helps to understand just what is happening in the Russian Federation today: “Russian ex-spies flex their muscles.” The only thing left out is the sense of entitlement that the KGB had developed during the Soviet time, when the highly educated, well trained, and well traveled KGB officers had to take orders from the party, which was dominated by former managers of tractor factories from the Urals and similar un-worldly people. The party is gone, so now is the time for the KGB to take the power and the wealth that they think is by right theirs. It’s no longer communism they’re defending; it’s their own power and wealth.

Ukraine and the Benefits of Divided Power

I’ve talked with some Ukrainian economists who told me that the economy here is booming, not in spite of, but because of the political deadlock, in which no grouping can exercise complete power and expropriate the other. Although Ukraine is “split” politically (roughly on an east/west axis), there is no real desire to be gobbled up by Russia, even on the part of the leaders of Yanukovych’s Party of Regions. The wealthy backers of that party know that they’re much better off in an independent Ukraine than in a region of Russia.

I got this morning an email from my thoughtful friend John Welborn with a link to this fascinating article from Business Week on the topic, which confirms what I’ve learned here: “Ukraine: What Crisis?: Despite political turmoil, economic growth is roaring.”

The experience of divided government turns out to be fairly similar to the experience of divided government in the US, as Cato scholar William Niskanen argues.

A Disturbing Picture of What's to Come?

What Does This Suggest?: “[Stalin] is considered one of the most successful leaders of the U.S.S.R. During his leadership the territory of the country was expanded and reached the boundaries of the former Russian Empire (in some areas even surpassed it).”

According to today’s New York Times, Russian state textbooks are now portraying the mass murderer Ioseb Besarionis Dze Jughashvili (aka Joseph Stalin) as a source of Russian greatness, rather than as a source of murder, backwardness, poverty, stagnation, and misery:

On the one hand, he is considered one of the most successful leaders of the U.S.S.R. During his leadership the territory of the country was expanded and reached the boundaries of the former Russian Empire (in some areas even surpassed it). A victory in one of the greatest wars was won; industrialization of the economy and cultural revolution were carried out successfully, resulting not only in the great number of educated people but also in creating the best educational system in the world. The U.S.S.R. joined the leading countries in the field of science; unemployment was practically defeated.

But there was a different side to Stalin’s rule. The successes — many Stalin opponents point it out — were achieved through cruel exploitation of the population. The country lived through several waves of major repressions during his rule. Stalin himself was the initiator and theoretician of such “aggravation of class struggle.” Entire social groups were eliminated: well-off peasantry, urban middle class, clergy and old intelligentsia. In addition, masses of people quite loyal to the authorities suffered from the severe laws.

The current trend toward rehabilitating Stalin (emphasizing his accomplishments, from finally contributing to defeating the Hitler regime with which he had earlier eagerly divided up Eastern Europe to the utterly absurd claims of scientific and educational advance) has been going on for some time under the impetus of the current leadership.

This is a part of the current “Post-Empire Syndrome” that is gripping Russia; I have been told by more than one aggrieved Russian nationalist (in the US, as well) that there may have been problems under the USSR, but “the whole world feared us.”

(The connection of Stalin’s “severe” rule with post-9/11 America is also interesting; the American government sometimes seems to specialize in giving foreign strong-men and dictators excuses for their unjust acts.)

A Presumption in Favor of Prudence?

Stephen Bainbridge has an interesting essay up about foreign policy over at Andrewsullivan.com, “On Non-Interventionism.” It´s a helpful dose of wisdom, but…. a presumption in favor of prudence suggests that other principles, which are to be applied prudently, need not be articulated. That seems quite wrong-headed to me. A general presumption in favor of non-intervention is itself prudent; it´s not the alternative to prudence. A prudent approach will know when to resort to war (very, very rarely, if ever), but the presumption should be for non-intervention. That would by itself be prudent.

Score One for the Rule of Law!

Pakistan’s top judge reinstated

Danish Decency

Danish army evacuates 200 Iraqis

Now Online...

The Center for Promotion of Human Rights

African Libertarianism

The Imani Center in Ghana is organizing a seminar in Accra on Inspiring African Transformation. I’m listed on the program, although sadly I won’t be able to be there this year. I am so happy to see my African libertarian friends doing so well. And I’m thrilled that the Cato Institute and Cato University* could co-sponsor this summer university with them.

Anyone who would like to contribute financially to the spread of peace and freedom and prosperity throughout Africa should drop me a note. I’ve got lots of contacts and plenty of ideas. They’ve tried everything else in Africa and now people are turning to something that actually delivers positive results: classical liberalism. Now is the time to help African friends of liberty to replace war and civil strife, statist dictatorship, and socialist impoverishment with peace, freedom, and prosperity.

*Cato U this year is set to have over 170 participants. It’s going to be a blast.

The New York Times Intones

I Look Forward to a News Conference Announcing U.S. Disengagement

A bit of hard-headed thinking seems to have reached the upper levels of the commentariat. Today’s New York Times has a long editorial calling for U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, “The Road Home.” The writers have the courage to admit that there are no really attractive options, or at least no options without costs. The civil war is underway; withdrawal itself has costs (moving hundreds of thousands of people and millions of tons of stuff is difficult, costly, time-consuming, and dangerous); it’s impossible to control the outcome; there may be no happy ending.

A central bit of wisdom is the recognition that the prospect of indefinite U.S. military occupation makes it virtually impossible for the various warring parties to come to their own accommodation, for the simple reason that they all know that any local agreement can be upset if it’s not pleasing to the White House (or other regional players, such as Iran). Moreover, there is no way to know for sure that they will reach any stable peaceful agreement.

Americans should hang their heads in shame for the way that the U.S. government treats people from Iraq. The Times put it neatly, albeit without as much indignation as the subject deserves:

The United States has the greatest responsibilities, including the admission of many more refugees for permanent resettlement. The most compelling obligation is to the tens of thousands of Iraqis of courage and good will — translators, embassy employees, reconstruction workers — whose lives will be in danger because they believed the promises and cooperated with the Americans.

Those who eagerly supported the decision to go to war should, whether loudly or quietly, lobby Congress and the Administration to allow entry to the U.S. for translators, elected mayors, cooks, clothes washers, and others who worked with the Americans and who staked their future on the promises of the American government. It’s the least they could do.

Finaly, there is a major lesson to be learned, one that the Times editorialists did not draw: a policy of non-intervention is recommended by both morality and interest.

(When I was in Iraqi Kurdistan I was asked whether the U.S. would stand by the Kurds. I explained that American government has substantial popular input into policymaking and that it’s difficult for such systems to sustain costly military commitments — especially involving combat and death — for long. I told them to be ready for the day that the U.S. would leave. I hope that they listened.)

The Bottom Billion

This review by Niall Ferguson (combined with my knowledge of other work by Collier that I’ve read) spurred me to order Paul Collier’s new book, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It. The proposal for ten-year military occupations and administration sounds remarkably unappealing and even foolish, but Collier is a very smart fellow and I’m looking forward to his insights into the sources of dysfunctionality in poor nations.

I met Paul Collier, formerly research director of the Development Research Group at the World Bank and now professor of economics at Oxford University, at a conference in Athens in 2006, after which I got and read some of his articles on ethnic diversity and civil conflict, the effect of monopolizable resource rents on political and economic development, and other topics. If you’re interested in African issues (and issues of legal, political, and economic development generally), you should know Collier’s work.

One of Many Reasons Why the Invasion of Iraq Was a Mistake

It provided other states in the region with a relatively low-cost way to bleed America, both in the literal sense and in the financial sense: “Coalition raids target flow of Iranian aid to insurgents.” Indeed, the Bush administration managed to take out the two main neighboring enemies of the Iranian state (Saddam and the Taliban) and at the same time to provide a wealth of opportunities to attack U.S. forces with impunity. What more could the radical mullahs in Tehran have wanted?

My Interview in a Tunisian Paper

I was interviewed by a Tunisian journalist whom I met at a conference Cato co-sponsored in Morocco. Here’s the interview in Mouwatinoun. (The name of the paper means “Citizens.” You have to scroll down to page 10 of the PDF.) The interview in English is in the rest of this blog entry.

Question 1 : The Middle Eastern countries have in common their economic wealth on the one hand, and their democratic “poverty”, what are the reason for that according to you?

That is one of the most important questions that political scientists and economists face today. First, however, it’s worth a moment to clarify some issues. Average per capita income in most middle eastern countries is not high. It’s much lower than even poor Eastern European countries. Because some countries have oil, many people think that those countries or the people in those countries are rich. That’s a mistake. The existence of natural resources is not the primary cause of a nation’s wealth, as Adam Smith explained so long ago in his famous book “An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.” A natural resource, if it is monopolized by the state — and oil is a very good example — can make your country very poor. If a country enjoyed the rule of law and well defined and legally secure property rights before oil was discovered, the oil becomes a source of prosperity. Consider the USA, Canada, Great Britain, and Norway as examples. But if the rule of law and legally secure property rights were not well established and then oil was discovered, it turned out to be a curse, because it was monopolized by the state or by ruiling dynasties and that source of wealth to the rulers obstructed the evolution to democracy. When the state depends on income from a resource, such as oil, and not on the support of the people through broad-based taxes, then people become dependent on the state, and that is not a good recipe for democracy.

The causes of the relative economic decline of most middle eastern countries are complex, but mainly they center on the lack of the rule of law and accountable government. The reasons for that lack are harder to explain. One scholar who has addressed the issue is Professor Timur Kuran, a professor of law and economics and the King Faisal Professor of Islamic Thought and Culture at the University of Southern California. His article “Why the Middle East is Economically Underdeveloped: Historical Mechanisms of Institutional Stagnation” is helpful to understanding the complex root causes. [The Essay is available on Misbahalhurriyya.org.]

Russia is an example of a country that is losing its hard won democracy because of the influx of oil revenues to the state, which is strengthening itself against civil society. Much the same process is going on in Venezuela. There is a short-term increase in wealth, but the long-term conditions of prosperity — democracy and limited government — are undermined, with terrible consequences for the medium to long term.

Question 2: Why do internal reform movements fail in influencing the nature and form of government in the region?

You do like to pose very difficult problems! If I knew the definitive answer, I would be sure to share it with everyone. I think that there is probably not just one reason and that the situations of countries differ enough to make a general answer of little value. The biggest problem is that the core ruling groups have managed to create forms of dependency on them from other groups in society. That process was well described in the 17th Century by the French writer Etienne de la Boetie in his “Discourse of Voluntary Servitude.” Generally speaking, some degree of economic freedom and security for property are conditions for the emergence of successful democratic transitions. A middle class that is secure in the possession of property and that has the means to promote an open political system will be more likely to succeed in dislodging entrenched ruling groups. That was the case with the transition of South Korea and Taiwan from dictatorships to rather stable democracies. One thing bears remembering: transitions that are violent almost never result in democratic outcomes, even if that’s the desired outcome. Violent transitions set the precedent for yet more violent transitions and typically result in government by coup d’etat, rather than democracy.

Question 3: While it was proven that democratization through foreign military intervention has negative consequences as in the Iraqi case, do you think that the American intervention under the premise of reforming the region had the opposite results?

It’s probably too early to give a definitive answer to this question. I am generally skeptical that democracy can be injected into a country from outside. The normal rule is that it has to be generated from within. The U.S. could, I think, do a better job of promoting democracy simply by setting an example, rather than by intervening in the political processes of other countries. Such intervention has rarely resulted in democratic outcomes and is better avoided. I think that the Americans are learning that. I hope so.

Question 4: The American administration under George Walker Bush in that direction (sic.) is trying to contain political islamist movements and to create “moderate” groups while pressuring Arab governments to integrate those in their political processes, do you think that this policy would empty democratic [reform] from its substance?

I’ll be direct and honest. I don’t think that the officials of the U.S. government generally know enough about Arab political systems to exert positive influence. Many of them — maybe most or even all of them — may have good motivations, but good motivations are certainly not enough. You also have to have understanding and wisdom and they seem to lack that and often find themselves merely being manipulated by governments and factions. Some governments have suppressed moderate opposition in various ways and that has left a choice of either the governing regime or people who offer a very radical and intolerant alternative. That has proven useful at manipulating the population and also at manipulating foreign governments.

Question 6: on another topic, American media speaks rarely of Tunisia, and American political and human right organizations have little interest in Tunisia, what is the reason for that in your opinion?

There are many countries that are not discussed much in the American media and many of them offer much more dire human rights problems than Tunisia. They tend to get more attention from human rights organizations to the extent that they are engaged in widespread acts of killing or genocide, such as in Sudan or Rwanda, and to the extent that they are considered by the government to be strategically significant. Tunisia, as a result, gets less attention than many other countries.

Question 6: you wrote “By attempting to rob from some to give to others, a state merely creates universal poverty, except, of course, for those who manage to gain supreme power, and who never lack for palaces and expensive cars. The defense of justice against aggression and violence must be the primary concern of the state. When the state itself becomes an instrument of aggression and violence, democracy itself is in danger.” How can this equation be inverted by turning the state from a means by which one would get rich and accumulate wealth to a tool guaranteeing justice for all?

Now you’ve asked the hardest question of all! We now know very well what policies produce prosperity and a healthy society: the rule of law that is enforced through an independent judiciary; well defined and legally secure property rights; freedom of trade; a free press; limited government and a tax system that is low and relatively simple. As Adam Smith said in 1755, “Little else is requisite to carry a state to the highest degree of opulence from the lowest barbarism but peace, easy taxes, and a tolerable administration of justice: all the rest being brought about by the natural course of things.” The evidence that Smith was right is well established in the studies of the “Economic Freedom of the World Report” (www.misbahalhurriyya.org/efw). But what we don’t know, or at least we do not have a good understanding of, is how to produce the policies that produce good results. The Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto addressed that question in his book “The Mystery of Capital” (De Soto’s work is also available on Misbahalhurriyya.org), which offered some insights, but more thinking is needed to understand how we move from lack of the rule of law and lack of property rights to the rule of law and security of rights.

One thing we do know is that a liberal mentality is a part of the transition; by that I mean a desire for freedom and justice but without revenge. Successful transitions to freedom almost always happen by changing minds, not merely by changing rulers. If we want to live in freedom, justice, and prosperity, we must change minds.

Thank you for this delightful opportunity to chat. You posed some very, very difficult problems.

New American Dictatorship

Not just the one that the Bush administration has tried (and so far largely failed) to create, but another one: “Caracas rallies over TV closure.”

Revealing Quotes:

Pro-Chavez supporters held a party outside the ministry of communication, celebrating the end of the station’s national reach. “I agree with what’s happening,” one woman told the BBC. “We have to support our president. They went too far and they showed him no respect. It was too much.”

And, from the mouth of the dictator himself

“That television station became a threat to the country so I decided not to renew the licence because it’s my responsibility,” Mr Chavez was quoted as saying by the Associated Press.

The Direction is Clear

Moscow police detain gay activists.

Eggs and punches at Russia gay march.

Notably, it was the peaceful gay activists who were arrested, not the people who assaulted them. This is what happened to people who peacefully asked at the Arbat police station what had happened to friends who had been arrested for peacefully calling for legalization of pot.

An Eloquent Indictment from a Chastened Former Interventionist

Andrew Sullivan (“Al Qaeda’s Enabler”) has come a long way, admitting his error in supporting the invasion of Iraq and offering an intelligent diagnosis of the disaster of US foreign policy, especially under this especially disastrous administration.

Yet Another Slander on the KGB

What must the Fever Swamp be thinking now? (A Russian former KGB officer should be charged with the murder by poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko, the UK’s director of public prosecutions has recommended.) How will they save their heroic Eurasian political leader from such slander? Stay tuned…..

A Chinese Model?

Middle Kingdom, Middle Path?

James Mann has an interesting article in today’s Washington Post, “A Shining Model of Wealth Without Liberty,” which asks whether China presents a new model political/economic system. China raises issues that are not applicable to other models, such as Venezuela, Russia, and (in their day) Iraq and Saudi Arabia, which accumulate wealth through exploitation of rent-producing resources (oil), rather than through production and exchange facilitated by well defined and legally secure rights and a rule-governed legal system.

The topic certainly deserves a lot more study and thought. How much prosperity are the Chinese sacrificing by maintaining such controls, or is the enormous increase in prosperity (enjoyed very, very unevenly throughout the country, as are measures of the rule of law and marketization) sufficient in comparison to what preceded it to generate sufficient legitimacy for the system to persist indefinitely? Or is the system itself responsible for a net increase in prosperity over what a more democratic regime might have produced, given that it might well have proven to be unstable, chaotic, and prey to potentially even worse forms of tyranny? These are hard questions, but they urgently need to be asked.

An Intelligent Podcast Discussion

An interesting discussion of American foreign policy, Bush administration disregard for the rule of law, from America’s Future Foundation, and immigration: “Rudy Giuliani vs. Ron Paul, the Gonzales saga, and the immigration bill.”

How It's Done

Theft on a truly astounding scale.

Aggression against Estonia, a formerly occupied but now independent nation.

Politically motivated trade embargoes against formerly occupied but now independent nations, Poland, Georgia, and Moldova (the latter two still partly occupied).

An Occasion for Thought (at least a little...)

Now that Paul Wolfowitz has announced his resignation from the World Bank, so pundits are sharing their views on the World Bank, Wolfowitz, Neo-Cons, and more. Sebastian Mallaby of the Washington Post has one such essay, “Finishing What Wolfowitz Started,” which is generally more thought-provoking than the others. Maybe we should just finish the World Bank, which has had very little positive impact on the world and a great deal of negative impact.

For another view, see William Easterly’s essay, “Does He Hear the World’s Poor? Don’t Bank on It,” which I have arranged to publish in Russian, Arabic, Chinese, Spanish, and other languages.

The UN Commission on UN-Sustainable UN-Development

I’ll Develop You, Alright….Right in the Face!

After destroying economic, social, and political life in Zimbabwe, the government of that ruined country has been chosen to chair the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development. The downward spiral toward death initiated by Robert Mugabe simply is not sustainable. Starvation is an unsustainable form of undevelopment.

Clear Thinking on Turkish Politics