Agreeing with The Nation

I find myself in the uncomfortable position of finding more and more articles on the left quite reasonable, at least in some of the major points they raise with respect to Iraq. In a column entitled Iraq's Iranian Lovefest, Robert Scheer points out the obvious that many seem to have missed:

Are the media dumb or just out to lunch? Sorry to be intemperate, but how else can one explain the meager attention paid to the truly historic visit of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Iraq? Not only is he the first Mideast head of state to visit the country since its alleged liberation, but the very warm official welcome offered by the Iraqi government to the most vociferous critic of the United States speaks volumes to the abject failure of the Bush doctrine.

He is of course quite right. He asks "...what leverage does the United States have over Iran when, as the image of Ahmadinejad holding hands with the top leaders of Iraq demonstrated to the world, we have put the disciples of the Iranian ayatollahs in power in Baghdad?" A reasonable question. This goes back to the Bush administration's pushing for democratic elections which given the nature of the Iraqi people brought to power precisely the kinds of people we ought to be opposing.

Scheer's next point is particularly instructive:

How interesting that Ahmadinejad, unlike a US President who has to be airlifted unannounced into ultra-secure bases, was able to convoy in from the airport in broad daylight on a road that US dignitaries fear to travel. His love fest with Iraq President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd who fought on Iran's side against Iraq and who speaks Farsi, even took place outside of the safety of the Green Zone, adding emphasis to Ahmadinejad's claim that while he is welcome in Iraq, the Americans are not.

Ahmadinejad's confidence in his safety could mean one of two things: Either he assumes his enemies are too afraid of the consequences of an attempt on his life, or he doesn't really have any enemies among the various insurgent groups since, as has been documented, Iran has helped them with supplies and training. I suspect these are non-exclusive alternatives, i.e., both are true. Much like the Soviets during the Cold War, very few incidents of terrorism occurred which involved Russian or Soviet personnel as victims both because most terrorists were Soviet sponsored and in the few exceptional cases in which Russians were the victims of terrorists, the Soviet response was immediate and harsh so that there was no mistake as who would terrorize whom.

Scheer continues:

Saddam Hussein went to war with Iran, but George W. Bush has given his Iranian foes a Shiite-run ally. Iran is now a major trading partner of Iraq that has offered a $1 billion loan, the border is increasingly porous as religious pilgrimages have become the norm, and many investment projects supervised by Iranians are in the works. Instead of isolating the "rogue regime" of Iran, the Bush Administration has catapulted the theocrats of Tehran into the center of Mideast political power.

Well put. Of course, I do disagree with Scheer about one thing. He argues that as a result of the Bush administration incompetence, "peace" requires the "cooperation of the ayatollahs of Iran," I would say we should first and foremost be interested in victory, and only subsequently a real peace.

The Nation and the Contract Rights of Farmers

I don't not expect to find opposition to government regulations in The Nation, so I was pleasantly surprised to see the article Old McDonald Had a Farm...and He Got Arrested? by David E. Gumpert. This is in a somewhat similar vein as Rational Jenn's recent post about regulatory opposition to raw milk in Georgia, but here the issue is meat at "Greg Niewendorp's 160-acre farm outside East Jordan, in the north of Michigan's lower peninsula":

Last February, he refused to subject his cattle to a mandatory state program to test cattle in his region of Michigan for bovine tuberculosis--a program he argues, among other things, is unnecessary because he distributes his beef privately to people who trust his animal-raising techniques, but which the state insists is essential to ensure the beef isn't tainted.

The state immediately slapped a quarantine on his farm, prohibiting the movement of animals onto or off the property. Then, in August, an MDA inspector arrived, escorted by two Michigan State Police officers, and attempted to convince Niewendorp to have his cattle tested by a vet waiting down the road. Niewendorp angrily ordered the inspector and police off his property, telling them that, without a search warrant, they were trespassers.

Finally, in early October, a team of MDA inspectors and vets arrived again, this time with a search warrant and two sheriff's deputies--and backed up by a half-dozen state trooper SWAT team members and three emergency medical vehicles down the road.

Niewendorp is convinced that "they would have liked to have killed me," but this time he didn't resist, so the vets did their deed and left. All the tests came back negative and the state lifted its quarantine last month.

Of course, the article later explains the motivations of the regulators as partly wishing to protect "corporate interests." Regardless, the point made is valid. As long as no force or fraud is involved, producers and consumers should be free to contract on such sales.

Gillespie on Al Jazeera

There is an interesting article in the Nation on The New Face of Al Jazeera by Kristen Gillespie. Gillespie writes:

When Al Jazeera was first launched in 1996, it offered the kind of freewheeling, uncensored debate never publicly seen on Arab televisions, and Arabic speakers couldn't get enough of it. The talk shows brought in guests from across the political spectrum, and the channel featured smartly produced news bulletins and correspondents stationed seemingly everywhere. But 9-11 brought a new anti-imperialist and, many argue, a pro-Sunni Islamist bent to the network. (The observations and reporting in this article apply only to Arabic-language Jazeera; in November 2006 the network opened an English-language counterpart, now called Al Jazeera English, which gives no evidence of sectarian tendencies.)

Also, there has been a purge of more secular people at the station:

After the March 2003 US invasion of Iraq, Al Jazeera replaced its longtime secular bureau chief in Baghdad, Faisal Yasiri, with Wadah Khanfar, who had reported from Afghanistan after the American invasion in 2001 and then Kurdish-controlled territory as the war with Iraq was launched in 2003. Shortly thereafter, the secular head of Al Jazeera, Mohammed Jassem Ali, was ousted and replaced by Khanfar, whom more than a dozen current and former employees of the station interviewed for this article characterize as an Islamist.

It's worth reading the whole article.

Private Disaster Response

In an article entitled Rapture Rescue 911: Disaster Response for the Chosen on TheNation.com, Naomi Klein solves a problem I've been thinking about during every recent natural disaster, and in particular the recent Southern California fires. Is it realistic to expect that in laissez-faire capitalism there will be private fire companies and emergency response companies that will be able to help people during natural disasters? It seems as there should be, since people ought to be willing to pay for these kinds of services just as they pay for insurance, but I tend to prefer to see at least some evidence for these assumptions. I had previously heard of occasional privatized fire departments in small towns but nothing larger than that. I had not heard of this:

Members of the company's Private Client Group pay an average of $19,000 to have their homes sprayed with fire retardant. During the wildfires, the "mobile units"--racing around in red firetrucks--even extinguished fires for their clients.
...
During last year's hurricane season, Florida homeowners were offered similarly high-priced salvation by HelpJet, a travel agency launched with promises to turn "a hurricane evacuation into a jet-setter vacation." For an annual fee, a company concierge takes care of everything: transport to the air terminal, luxurious travel, bookings at five-star resorts. Most of all, HelpJet is an escape hatch from the kind of government failure on display during Katrina. "No standing in lines, no hassle with crowds, just a first class experience."

HelpJet is about to get some serious competition from some much larger players. In northern Michigan, during the same week that the California fires raged, the rural community of Pellston was in the grip of an intense public debate. The village is about to become the headquarters for the first fully privatized national disaster response center. The plan is the brainchild of Sovereign Deed, a little-known start-up with links to the mercenary firm Triple Canopy. Like HelpJet, Sovereign Deed works on a "country-club type membership fee," according to the company's vice president, retired Brig. Gen. Richard Mills. In exchange for a one-time fee of $50,000 followed by annual dues of $15,000, members receive "comprehensive catastrophe response services" should their city be hit by a manmade disaster that can "cause severe threats to public health and/or well-being" (read: a terrorist attack), a disease outbreak or a natural disaster. Basic membership includes access to medicine, water and food, while those who pay for "premium tiered services" will be eligible for VIP rescue missions.

Ms. Klein, of course, sneers at all this and apparently takes for granted that people have a right to equal disaster assistance that should be provided free of charge. But leaving aside the sneers, I really think this is an awesome demonstration of the power of the market, hampered though it is, to provide services that people are willing to pay for, including services typically assumed to be the exclusive domain of the government.