There’s a reason why I haven’t issued any forecasts for 2010 as yet. I have the luxury of waiting until the last possible minute to do so and days like Friday make things even more difficult for me. Never have I been more confused on the future. For starters, I know that at any moment geopolitics can, and will, shock the system. It’s one thing to have a national dialogue on the war in Afghanistan, it would be quite another for Israel to launch a strike on Iran’s Natanz uranium enrichment plant, which is more inevitable by the day.
So while Friday’s jobs report for November, showing a loss of just 11,000 when a decline in the neighborhood of 120,000 was forecast, was great news, as was a tick down in the official unemployment rate to 10.0% from 10.2%, especially when coupled with downward revisions on losses for September and October, and while figures on manufacturing, factory and construction orders were also better than expected, with a lone important negative being the November reading on service sector activity, there are all kinds of reasons why it’s not quite time to whip out your freshest Korbel, it still being a ‘domestic over premium’ economy.
Like in the case of retail sales this holiday shopping season, as in for the most part they’re less than healthy, like downright putrid unless you work on Wall Street, have had a Tiger Woods moment, and to prevent your significant other from taking a 3-iron to your head, or prized car, rush to Tiffany’s for that “Kobe rock” before she starts dialing all the numbers on your cellphone.
This is not going to be a good Christmas season for retailers, period. For example, for the month of November we’ve learned that sales at our leading box stores were down, not up. And forget what you heard about Black Friday or Cyber Monday; any figures emerging from those two days are irrelevant when looking at the entire season as a whole.
On the commercial real estate front, the default rate is at a 16-year high, bad news for banks, with CRE values down 37% over the past year, according to one survey I saw. But remember, this has had zero impact on the stock market, as I’ve correctly predicted the second half of this year, but because the banks have ongoing losses to deal with it impedes lending, especially to small business, and thus inhibits the strength of any recovery, which in 2010 could indeed limit any further upside in stocks, but that’s a prediction for later.
Say what you will about Donald Trump, but I love the guy’s blunt talk and when he was on CNBC this week and was asked whether the banks are lending, The Donald said they aren’t making any loans, except to the largest corporations, and to hear otherwise (such as from J.P. Morgan’s Jamie Dimon…this bit is me, not Trump) is a bunch of bull.
Back to good news the Fed’s monthly look at economic activity through its 12 regions showed 8 of them reporting improved conditions, while the other 4 were mixed. This is decidedly better than, say, six months ago. And it would appear the situation with Dubai World, while far from stabilized, is not going to cause too much pain, except for homebuyers on those palm fronds and various banks that don’t recognize real estate bubbles that others do. But I just don’t see a strong economy for the coming year, nor do I see a resounding recovery in the labor market, let alone wages. Nor do I see a rousing recovery in residential housing, though I maintain I will have been right that we bottomed in terms of median home prices last April-May. I told you a year ago that when we hit the bottom, we’d just sit there, and that’s exactly what’s happening.
So why don’t I then come out and give a forecast for 2010? Because I’m still questioning myself.
For now, here’s part of the problem. My office is in Summit, N.J., a popular spot to live for many of Wall Street’s elite and thus one of the wealthier communities in America. There are many individuals here, including some of my friends, who are doing just as well as they were before the Crash.
But there is the other side, and as I’ve told you the town’s small business owners are getting killed. At least 25 of them…gone. I grew up in this town and to state the obvious, never has there been such a divide between rich and poor, or to put it more accurately, between rich and middle class. It’s what makes it more difficult to sift through what’s fact, and fiction. What’s truly improving, and what’s getting worse. Bottom line, for most around here there is little to be merry about this Christmas season, save for one fact.
MY HIGH SCHOOL ALMA MATER, SUMMIT, WON A STATE FOOTBALL CHAMPIONSHIP THIS WEEK!!!!
Very cool…and a nice little shot in the arm; the kind that only sports can provide.
Whipping around the world…various indices on manufacturing in China came in at their strongest since April 2004, while in Japan, the central bank took aggressive measures to encourage more bank lending, which was well-received as the Tokyo Nikkei index climbed back over the 10000 level.
[But on Friday, the Japanese government announced it was scrapping next year’s long-planned sale of shares in Japan Post Holdings Co., a $3.4 trillion in assets combination of mail delivery, banking and insurance services. The problem is Japan Post was long thought to be a stifling bureaucracy and its privatization was going to be a boon for free markets and an opening of Japan’s financial sector. What is depressing about the move by the new Hatoyama government is it sees the country’s 24,500 post offices as vehicles for social policy. Said the Postal Services minister, “We could use them as bases for elderly care or places to pay out pensions.” But as the Wall Street Journal points out, the reversal means private financial institutions could be squeezed out by “market-distorting competition from a government-backed rival.” More next week as warranted.]
India’s GDP in the third quarter rose 7.9%, better than expected, as manufacturing climbed 9.2% over the same period. Inflation is an issue here, though, as food prices have been soaring.
Speaking of inflation, in Australia the central bank is so optimistic on future growth that it raised interest rates a third consecutive month in order to beat back any threat of higher prices.
In Europe, the 16-nation eurozone’s purchasing managers index hit a 2-year high in November, while retail sales were up in Germany as unemployment there fell to 8.1%. The U.K.’s manufacturing index, however, while above the 50 dividing line between growth and contraction, was disappointing.
And in Canada, third quarter GDP rose just 0.4%, which while breaking the recession there was on the light side vs. expectations. The central bank issued a tepid forecast for 2010.
A UN report taking a look at the global economy as a whole next year sees growth of 2.4%, or a very fragile recovery, with China (up 8.8%) and India (up 6.5%) leading the way.
Debate in the Senate on healthcare got off to a rip-roaring start as Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma said that if the Senate proposal was passed as is, “I have a message for you: You’re going to die sooner.” Well, we already know we’re going to die on Dec. 21, 2012, or so says the Mayan calendar, so it’s time to pack this debate in, don’t you think?
Then again, most folks don’t believe the Mayans, and, as noted in a Thomson-Reuters survey, 60% want a public option as part of any reform plan, with 86% of Democrats favoring it and 33% of Republicans. As for the timing of a vote on any final legislation in the Senate, it’s still touch-and-go whether or not Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid can ram it through before yearend.
One move that had me scratching my head was Sen. John McCain’s attempt to prevent any cuts in Medicare spending. Yeah, I know. It’s the politically expedient thing for McCain and others to do, Medicare being a sacred cow among seniors, but for crying out loud, there has to be something we can cut out of it. Reducing Medicare at some level is a must. Ergo, McCain and the 41 others who voted for the defeated amendment are hypocrites like everyone else.
Lastly, Iran. Even Art Cashin, the UBS veteran who reports from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange and is as respected as they come, began this week to talk of an Israeli strike on Iran, which means it’s finally bubbling to the surface.
The problem is President Obama has said he would give Iran until yearend to come around to his way of thinking, i.e., give up their enriched uranium, let alone halt construction of new plants as well as further enrichment per various UN Security Council resolutions, before pressuring the other members of the P5+1 to initiate additional sanctions.
Which means we could be facing the same situation we are today; further intransigence on the part of Iran, in March, April and May. Israel can not afford to wait that long, especially in light of Iran’s belligerent remarks of the past week where it threatened to enrich its existing uranium to a higher level, thus taking another major step towards mass producing weapons grade material, while at the same time announcing plans for 10 more uranium plants.
Talks with the P5+1 have totally broken down and President Ahmadinejad said of his nation’s nuclear program, “The Zionist regime [Israel] and its [western] backers cannot do a damn thing to stop Iran’s nuclear work.”
“ ‘Time is running out for Iran to address the international community’s growing concerns about its nuclear program,’ White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said yesterday, but the West has said this many times before. Earlier this year, Mr. Obama said Iran had a deadline of September.
“The regime scoffed at Mr. Obama after he delivered a conciliating message for the Persian New Year in March, scoffed again after he mildly criticized its post-election crackdown and killing spree in June (following days of silence), and scoffed a third time by rejecting the West’s offer last month to enrich Iran’s uranium for it. Yet the Administration insists the enrichment deal is still Iran’s for the taking. ‘A few years ago [the West] said we had to completely stop all our nuclear activities,’ Ahmadinejad said last month. ‘Now look where we are today.’
“Those are the words of a man who believes he has Mr. Obama’s number. And until the president, his advisers and the Europeans realize that only punitive sanctions or military strikes will force it to reconsider its nuclear ambitions, an emboldened Islamic Republic will continue to march confidently toward a bomb over the wreckage of Mohamed ElBaradei’s – and Barack Obama’s – best intentions.”
The Journal doesn’t add that Israel understands this, and Israel will act. I’ve also been saying for months now that rather than worrying about 120 or 130 different suspected weapons sites, as many reports put it, there is only one that matters, Natanz. The Financial Times on Monday ran an editorial wherein it said “Iran appears to have one uranium enrichment plant at Natanz – working well below its potential capacity after eight years.” Israel’s leaders can’t rely on intelligence to pinpoint the “capacity” and a timetable for Iran’s nuclear progression. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, specifically, knows time is rapidly running out.
I can not envision Israel waiting for Russia and China to come around on the sanctions front and join the U.S., Britain, France and Germany, if they do at all. And as the Washington Post reported on Thursday, more and more evidence is unveiled each week that Iran is ramping up efforts to arm itself, as well as Hamas and Hizbullah. Five ships have been caught this year carrying large, secret weapons caches intended for those wishing to destroy Israel and western interests.
Meanwhile in Iran itself, the crackdown on dissent is being carried out, and our president does nothing to support the reformers. Obama’s performance in this regard has been disgraceful.
–Stocks resumed their rally on the mostly solid economic news, as the Dow Jones tacked on 0.8% to 10388, the S&P 500 added 1.3% and Nasdaq gained 2.6%. The action on Friday, though, was dominated by a big rally in the dollar on the November jobs figure as traders bet the Fed would be forced to raise interest rates much sooner than they’ve been intimating. Gold and other commodities tied to the short dollar trade plummeted in response, with the precious metal falling to $1162 from a Thursday intraday record of $1226.
–U.S. Treasury Yields
Yields rose at week’s end on the employment report, while Ben Bernanke’s confirmation hearing in the Senate was largely a nonevent and he’ll win a second term. But the bigger issue is the future oversight role of the Fed as the existing regulatory regime is overhauled, including just who controls monetary policy and the Fed’s independence in that regard, with talk of Congressional audits of the Fed’s books. Some of the proposals are downright dangerous. Some in Congress also just don’t like Bernanke. I’m ambivalent, having documented in this space his many policy errors and grossly inaccurate forecasts before he got his act together and saved the system.
“We say this not because of Mr. Bernanke’s performance during the financial panic of 2008, for which he has been widely and often deservedly praised. Like others in the regulatory cockpit at the time, he had to make difficult choices with imperfect information and when the markets were shooting with real bullets….
“The real problem is Mr. Bernanke’s record before the panic, with its troubling implications for a second four years. [The mess Bernanke inherited from Alan Greenspan] turned out to be bigger than even we thought, but we also didn’t know then how complicit Mr. Bernanke was in Mr. Greenspan’s monetary decisions.
“Now we do, thanks to the release of the Federal Open Market Committee transcripts from 2003. They show that Mr. Bernanke was the intellectual architect of the decision to keep monetary policy exceptionally easy for far too long as the economy grew rapidly from 2003-2005. He imagined a ‘deflation’ that never occurred, ignored the asset bubbles in commodities and housing, dismissed concerns about dollar weakness, and in the process stoked the credit mania that led to the financial panic….
“We are now in another period of extraordinary monetary ease. Mr. Bernanke is assuring the world that, this time, he knows how and when to start removing this stimulus, even as he also promises that the Fed will remain easy for months to come….
“At this monetary moment more than any since the late 1970s, the Fed needs a hard-money chairman with the courage and credibility to resist the temptation to escape from the consequences of the last bubble by floating another one.”
–Economist David Malpass, on the plight of the U.S. economy and the dollar, in an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal.
“Already countries with higher interest rates, Australia for one, are viewed as less risky because they have room to cut rates if there’s another emergency. This wins them capital and jobs that might otherwise be ours.
“According to the International Monetary Fund data, U.S. GDP has fallen to 24% of world GDP from 32% in 2001. And as U.S. capital escapes the weak dollar and high tax rates, the U.S. share of world equity market capitalization has fallen to 30% from 45%. This leaves the U.S. alone with Japan at the bottom of the monetary heap, with rate expectations so low they repel investment.
“Yet the Fed’s not nearly as trapped as it seems. Much of its current stimulus is being diverted to commodities and foreign economies – hence Asia’s complaint about bubbles. Under emergency stimulus, corporations are borrowing dollars hand-over-fist, pleasing Wall Street while using the proceeds to expand their foreign businesses. If that stimulus could be retained here, the Fed could stand down gradually from the emergency yet still assure appropriate policy accommodation….
“Since U.S. inflation is relatively low, even a Fed nod toward normalcy on monetary policy…should cause a dramatic improvement in the dollar and the magnitude of capital flows.
“The fed-funds rate can stay near zero for a while longer, but the Fed can’t keep promising ‘exceptionally low rates for an extended period,’ as it did last month. The sooner the Fed moves off its policy extreme, the sooner markets can resume their job of allocating capital and assessing relative value. In a more market-oriented allocation of global capital, the U.S. will be a big winner, especially for jobs and small businesses.”
–According to Toluna Research, and Barron’s, small business bankruptcies rose 44% in the third quarter this year over the same period in 2008.
–Bank of America is planning to pay back its $45 billion in TARP funds in order to free it from government oversight and pay restraints, which should aid its efforts to find new management talent, including a successor to Ken Lewis at CEO. As part of the process, BofA raised $19.3 billion in equity, the biggest single capital raise by a U.S. bank in history. It will then use $26 billion of its own cash to repay the government.
The move places more pressure on Wells Fargo and Citigroup to do the same and get out from under the government’s clutches, neither of which should be expected to do so soon because of ongoing loan losses. [Citi has received $45 billion in aid, Wells $25 billion.]
Fed Chairman Bernanke, when questioned by Congress as to the status of TARP and funds being returned said, “Unlike some of the scare stories about $700 billion being thrown away, I do believe…in the end that there’ll be something close to a break-even there.” Others still say, however, that TARP will end up as much as $150 billion in the red.
–GM CEO Fritz Henderson resigned suddenly on Tuesday under pressure from the board. Ed Whitacre Jr., the former CEO at AT&T who was appointed by the government as board chairman earlier this year, assumed the role of interim chief executive. “While momentum has been building over the past several months, all involved agree that changes needed to be made.” Whitacre refused to take any questions upon announcing the move. The Obama administration evidently had nothing to do with it, even as it owns 61% after investing $50 billion to rescue GM.
But the problem was clearly the collapse of the deals to sell the Saturn and Saab brands, as well as confusion over what to do with the Opel division.
[On Friday, GM did, however, announce it was giving up control of its main China joint venture as a way to raise cash (though it’s not known if this is indeed the case), while reinforcing ongoing efforts into the Indian market, including the sale now of Chinese-made vehicles. The Shanghai Automotive Industries Corp will own 51% of the joint venture with GM.]
–Meanwhile, auto sales in the month of November were basically unchanged over year ago levels at Ford, GM, Toyota and Honda, while Chrysler’s fell 26%, Hyundai’s rose 46%, and Nissan’s increased 21%. The annualized sales rate for the month was 11 million, slightly better than the 10.5 million rate in October. GM and Ford are raising production 75% and 58%, respectively, after slashing production since mid-2008. This is good.
–Mitsubishi Motors is in talks with France’s PSA Peugeot-Citroen on a possible merger of some sorts, which helped the shares in other automakers on hopes of further consolidation in the industry. Remember when you were growing up, say the 1960s, and you first saw a Citroen, the ugliest car in the world? [OK, anything made behind the Iron Curtain was even uglier, but Citroen was the pits.]
–GE formalized its sale of a 51% stake in NBC Universal, the TV, cable, film and theme-park operator to Comcast Corp. GE nets out about $8 billion after merger costs and a buyout of partner Vivendi’s 20% stake, and the deal is structured in a way where GE is slated to exit its remaining interest by year 7. So now everyone wants to know what GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt’s strategy for growth is as the company focuses on its industrial roots while continuing to shrink GE Capital. As for Comcast, the largest U.S. cable-TV provider, it’s all about content and CEO Brian Roberts’ long-held ambition to become a major television and movie producer.
–I have to admit I forgot China had become the world’s largest gold producer, surpassing South Africa, and now it threatens to pass India as the biggest consumer of it. In China, gold demand may exceed 450 metric tons this year, up from 395 in 2008, while output climbs to 310 tons from 282 tons a year earlier. While jewelry demand has been lackluster in India, it will climb at a double-digit pace this year amidst record household savings.
–Similar to the case of Bernie Madoff, it appears federal prosecutors investigated hedge-fund king Raj Rajaratnam on suspicions of insider trading back in the 1990s, but they were unable to prove it, according to the Wall Street Journal.
–ConocoPhillips is reducing capital spending by 10% in 2010 as it tries to shore up the balance sheet and increase profits.
–Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman said he plans on reducing his personal exposure to Brazil on concerns there are asset bubbles there amid record inflows. “People seem to be loving it too much,” Krugman said. [I’m doing super with my Brazilian airliner, however.]
–Hotel loans are falling faster into delinquency than any other kind of commercial real estate debt. Five times more loans are delinquent than one year ago, according to mortgage data firm Trepp LLC. In October, 8.7% were distressed, compared with 1.5% last year, which is almost double the 4.8% rate for commercial property and 4.5% for stores.
Most of the 1,231 U.S. hotels and casinos in trouble are, however, remaining open, which means consumers can expect to see ongoing deals on rooms.
[Related to the above, I read a story in the Irish Independent on how hotel guests in Ireland are stocking up on food and drink to eat in their rooms rather than the hotel restaurants, a trend undoubtedly in place worldwide and another blow to hotel profits.]
–The UN suspended approvals for dozens of Chinese wind farms over the country’s use of industrial policy to obtain money for the projects. As reported by the Financial Times:
“China has been by far the biggest beneficiary of the so-called Clean Development Mechanism, a carbon trading system designed to direct funds from wealthy countries to developing nations to cut greenhouse gases.
“China has earned 153m carbon credits, worth more than $1 billion and making up almost half of the total issued under the UN-run program in the past five years….
“Projects only qualify for credits if the applicants prove they would not have been built anyway.”
So now some 50 wind power projects in China are on hold, as utilities also hold off on further investments into the sector. This should be a major issue at the Copenhagen conference, which starts Monday.
–In an update on sudden acceleration in some Toyota and Lexus models, the L.A. Times says the culprit is “the electronic throttles that have replaced mechanical systems in recent years.” As reported by Ken Bensinger and Ralph Vartabedian:
“The Times found that complaints of sudden acceleration…shot up almost immediately after the automaker adopted the so-called drive-by-wire system over the last decade. That system uses sensors, microprocessors and electric motors to connect the driver’s foot to the engine, rather than a traditional link such as a steel cable.”
With the electronic system, drivers aren’t really in control.
–According to a study in the New England Journal of Medicine, because of obesity, by 2020 the future life expectancy of a typical 18-year-old would be shortened 8 months. To put it another way, we would thus wipe out all the gains from declining numbers of smokers since 1970. Smoking rates have been reduced from 37% in 1970 to 21% today.
–Miami attorney Scott Rothstein was arrested on federal racketeering and fraud charges for alleging running a $1 billion Ponzi scheme. Rothstein promised huge returns in legal settlements he claimed would pay over time. One investor evidently lost more than $100 million, while Rothstein was acquiring an 87-foot yacht and 20 luxury cars, along with a share in the Miami Beach mansion formerly owned by Gianni Versace as well as 21 other properties in Florida, New York and Rhode Island.
–After catching all kinds of heat from traders and his viewers, CNBC’s Jim Cramer backed off his support for a congressional proposal to tax stock trading as a way to pay down the deficit. Cramer’s performance was really quite pitiful, as he now wants everyone to believe he never supported it in the first place.
–Paul Tharp of the New York Post, in commenting on the sliding ratings of Jay Leno, said that equally distressing is the trend for consumers to use his 10 p.m. time slot to catch up on shows they’ve recorded. DVR usage is up big then, while NBC has lost a sizable audience compared to fall 2008. But NBC chief honcho Jeff Zucker somehow survives despite a disastrous track record.
–My portfolio: For those who are wondering what I’m doing with my China holding, which continues to drift lower after a mediocre Q3 earnings report, I have consistently said this is a story for the next two years, not today. I’m also looking to mid-May, when we should have a full quarter of results in which to gauge the early success, or failure, of the new plant. Additionally, this story is largely about the fate of the China economy overall. I have said countless times that if the economy here grows at 8-9%, our company will get its fair share. If growth is tepid, say 6%, which is basically recession in these parts, the company will struggle. There is also no doubt that when it comes to the PR game, my Chinese friends are sorely lacking.
Afghanistan:
So what is the mantra around here? Wait 24 hours. As it turns out, when it came to President Obama’s uninspiring speech on Afghanistan Tuesday night, it was a matter of waiting 18 hours when examining the most contentious part of the 30,000 man troop surge Obama is now proceeding with; that being the establishment of a July 2011 timetable for getting out.
As reported by the Washington Post’s Dana Milbank, the next morning, at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, the major players couldn’t wait to distance themselves from talk of an early departure.
“First, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates offered this qualifier to Sen. John McCain: ‘Our current plan is that we will begin the transition in local areas in July of 2011. We will evaluate in December 2010 whether we believe we will be able to meet that objective.
“Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman shot more holes in the July 2011 deadline when he asked Gates whether the deadline ‘may not include immediately a withdrawal of our forces from Afghanistan.’
“ ‘That is correct,’ Gates said, adding that ‘we’re not just going to throw these guys into the swimming pool and walk away.’
“The 18-month deadline was all but done. Sen. Lindsey O. Graham delivered the coup de grace.
“ ‘Is it possible, in December 2010, to reach the conclusion it is not wise to withdraw anyone in July 2011?’
“ ‘The president, as commander in chief, always has the option to adjust his decisions,’ answered Gates.
“ ‘Admiral Mullen, is it your understanding that it’s possible…not to begin to withdraw in 2011?’
“ ‘The president has choices,’ answered Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
“ ‘Have we locked ourselves into leaving, Secretary Clinton, in July 2011?’
“ ‘I do not believe we have locked ourselves into leaving,’ Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton answered.”
For his part, Sen. McCain said, overall, he was pleased. The mission was clearly defined, it is the proper strategy and it’s properly resourced. He disagrees with the timetable but that issue is now dispelled.
Obama faces opposition, though, from his own party and how to fund the effort. Democratic Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate Armed Service Committee, said the “key is an Afghan surge, not an American surge,” yet no one believes the U.S. can adequately train the preferred Afghan force of 240,000 soldiers and 160,000 police by Oct. 2013, let alone Levin’s preferred date for this part of the mission of Oct. 2012.
And what of the allies? Italy has pledged another 1,000 troops (bless you, Silvio, and all your girls), while Britain is adding an already announced 500, and Poland 600, but France and Germany want to wait until an end of January conference on Afghanistan before doing more themselves.
Then there’s Pakistan. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown pressured the Pakistani government to do more to “take out” Osama bin Laden, blaming the leadership for not doing enough over 8 years, but Pakistan would argue they don’t know how committed NATO is to Pakistan’s well-being.
As for Afghan President Hamid Karzai, actions will speak louder than words and no one is optimistic he will improve governance and battle corruption. Karzai also continues to say he is willing to negotiate with Taliban leader Mullah Omar.
The American people, meanwhile, favor the Obama plan as outlined by a 51-40 margin, according to a post-speech USA TODAY/Gallup survey.
Some opinion follows, pro and con, recognizing some of the pieces were written before further clarification on a timetable.
“We support Mr. Obama’s decision, and this national effort, notwithstanding our concerns about the determination of the President and his party to see it through. Now that he’s committed, so is the country, and one of our abiding principles is that nations should never start (much less escalate) wars they don’t intend to win….
“[But] the President’s emphasis on an early exit underscores our larger concern about his own war diffidence. When Mr. Obama announced his initial troop surge in March, he gave a single speech and dropped the subject. That won’t do this time – not with half of his own party already doubting the surge and demanding a new, economically damaging ‘surtax’ to pay for it. The Democratic left’s assault on Mr. Bush and later on Hillary Clinton helped Mr. Obama win the Presidency, but now he must rebut that same anti-terror left if he wants to succeed.
“As for Republicans, some will be tempted to do to Mr. Obama what he did to Mr. Bush and oppose a war that is increasingly unpopular. We hope they do not. Whatever their doubts about Mr. Obama as a Commander-in-Chief, they should let Democrats be the defeatists. If the strategy succeeds, Republicans will get credit for helping in the national interest; and if it fails, the public will feel comfortable turning to them for national security leadership.
“Mr. Obama could also help himself with Republicans on the war if he governed with less partisanship on domestic policy. Last night’s attempt to once again blame the Bush Administration for every Afghan setback hardly sends a bipartisan message.
“Above all, as a war President, Mr. Obama will have to spend more of his own political capital persuading the American public that the Afghan campaign is worth the price. One speech at storied West Point isn’t enough. The President needs his own political surge.”
“President Barack Obama’s new Afghanistan strategy represents a significant gamble, the success of which will turn on two key assumptions about the main characters in the Afghan drama.
“The first assumption is that President Hamid Karzai can be made stronger than is often supposed. The second is that the Taliban enemy is weaker than is often imagined.
“Both propositions underlie Mr. Obama’s calculation that a surge of 30,000 new American troops can be both mounted quickly and ended quickly….
“If the U.S. can help Mr. Karzai create just a reasonable level of confidence in the government, Mr. Obama argued, ‘I think that implicit hostility toward Taliban rule becomes more explicit.’
“In other words, Mr. Obama’s gamble is that the U.S. doesn’t have to make Mr. Karzai into another Nelson Mandela, or his security forces into a minor version of the American military, to succeed. They merely need to be good enough. Even that won’t be easy, though, for Afghan history is full of foreigners who found good enough to be a lofty goal in that troubled land.”
“President Barack Obama’s speech on Tuesday night deserves to be cheered. Over the objections of his vice president and despite opposition from his political base, the president is sending an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan to fight terrorists.
“But praise for Mr. Obama’s decision needs to be qualified. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, had said he could use as many as 40,000 troops, a figure he arrived at after carefully evaluating what would be needed to accomplish the mission Mr. Obama assigned him in June….
“The president’s tone was defensive as he implausibly argued that his lengthy review hadn’t delayed anything, because all the options he considered included sending new troops next year. But because of the inaction over the past three months the military will now be put under extra stress in order to deploy troops before the spring fighting season….
“Mr. Obama missed a chance for a grace note when, while finally acknowledging the success of the Iraq surge, he couldn’t admit he was wrong to oppose it or bring himself to praise President George W. Bush for ordering it….
“Still, Tuesday’s speech should improve Mr. Obama’s standing at home. It wasn’t just former Vice President Dick Cheney who disapproved of what he called the president’s dithering on Afghanistan. So did the American people: Mr. Obama’s job approval on Afghanistan slid to 35% immediately before his speech this week, from 56% in July.
“Yet the American people seem poised to accept Mr. Obama’s action. In late November, 47% told Gallup they supported a troop increase in Afghanistan, while only 39% backed a reduction. This was up from…about two weeks earlier….
“Fortunately, the antiwar left has little power to stop the president from making good on his commitments….
“Only a failure of presidential nerve or an unwillingness to make further midcourse corrections as the need arises will keep Mr. Obama from achieving the goals he has spelled out.
“Victory can still be won. It won’t be quick and it won’t be easy, and it will take active leadership from Mr. Obama. But it is now within his grasp.”
Editorial / New York Post
“Funny thing…While [Obama] stressed that America’s ‘security is at stake in Afghanistan’ – and it most surely is – not once during his 4,580-word speech could he bring himself to utter the world ‘win.’ Not once.
“Indeed, even as Obama announced his surge, he also laid down a withdrawal date – July 2011 – when he’ll be starting to move all troops out, thus bizarrely tipping his hand to the enemy….
“For now, though, Americans should support the president – his decision, the troops and their mission. The surge in Iraq worked. Dare we say it? We won. Perhaps in a few years, the same will be said about this one.”
“It tells us something about the difficulty of the issue that no matter who decided what, he’d be derided.
“That said, it appears we’re seeing some things we’ve not seen before. The president of the United States gave a war speech, and the next day the nation didn’t seem to rally around him. This is not the way it’s gone in the past. Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard Nixon, George W. Bush – when they addressed the nation about the wars they led, they received immediate support.
“This is also the first time we’ve seen an American president declaring, or rather redeclaring a war without a political base. Again, LBJ, Nixon, George W. Bush – they always had a base that would support them, on which they could rely and from which they could maneuver. But Mr. Obama’s base is not with him on this decision.
“Can a president fight a war without a base? Will the American people, on this issue, decide to become his base? In the end what they decide will likely determine the ultimate outcome in Afghanistan.”
Charles Krauthammer / Washington Post
“We shall fight in the air, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields, we shall fight in the hills – for 18 months. Then we start packing for home.
“We shall never surrender – unless the war gets too expensive, in which case, we shall quote Eisenhower on ‘the need to maintain balance in and among national programs’ and then insist that ‘we can’t simply afford to ignore the price of these wars.’
“The quotes are from President Obama’s West Point speech announcing the Afghanistan troop surge. What a strange speech it was – a call to arms so ambivalent, so tentative, so defensive….
“[But] despite my personal misgivings about the possibility of lasting success against Taliban insurgencies in both Afghanistan and the borderlands of Pakistan, I have deep confidence that Petraeus and McChrystal would not recommend a strategy that will be costly in lives without their having a firm belief in the possibility of success.
“I would therefore defer to their judgment and support their recommended policy. But the fate of this war depends not just on them. It depends also on the president. We cannot prevail without a commander in chief committed to success.
“And this commander in chief defended his exit date thusly: ‘because the nation that I’m most interested in building is our own.’
“Remarkable. Go and fight, he tells his cadets – some of whom may not return alive – but I may have to cut your mission short because my real priorities are domestic.
“Has there ever been a call to arms more dispiriting, a trumpet more uncertain.”
George Will / Washington Post
“Barack Obama, who asked to be president, nevertheless deserves sympathy for having to start where America is in Afghanistan.
“But after 11 months of graceless disparagements of the 43rd president, the 44th acts as though he is the first president whose predecessor bequeathed a problematic world. And Obama’s second new Afghanistan policy in less than nine months strikingly resembles his predecessor’s plan for Iraq, which was: As Iraq’s security forces stand up, U.S. forces will stand down.
“Having vowed to ‘finish the job,’ Obama revealed Tuesday that he thinks the job in Afghanistan is to get out of Afghanistan. This is an unserious policy….
“Although the war is in its 98th month, Obama’s ‘Mission Accomplished’ banner will be unfurled 19 months from now – when Afghanistan’s security forces supposedly will be self-sufficient. He must know this will not happen….
“George Orwell said that the quickest way to end a war is to lose it. But Obama’s halfhearted embrace of a half-baked nonstrategy – briefly feinting toward the Taliban (or al-Qaeda, or a ‘syndicate of terror’) while lunging for the exit ramp – makes a protracted loss probable.”
Ralph Peters / New York Post
“Just plain nuts: That’s the only possible characterization for last night’s presidential declaration of surrender in advance of a renewed campaign in Afghanistan.
“President Obama will send 30,000 more troops – but he’ll ‘begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011.’ Then why send them?
“If you’re going to tell the Taliban to be patient because we’re leaving, what’s the point in upping the blood ante? For what will come down to a single year by the time the troops hit the ground?
“Does Obama really expect to achieve in one year what we haven’t been able to do in more than eight?
“Adding to the confusion, Obama qualified his timeline by insisting that ‘we will execute this transition responsibly, taking into account conditions on the ground.’
“If conditions on the ground are key, why announce a pullout date?….
“Our president is setting up our military to fail – but he’ll be able to claim that he gave the generals what they wanted. Failure will be their fault….
“Obama’s right about one thing, though: The Afghans ‘will ultimately be responsible for their own country.’ So why undercut them with an arbitrary timeline that doesn’t begin to allow adequate time to expand and train sufficient Afghan forces? Does he really believe that young Afghans are going to line up to join the army and police knowing that we plan to abandon them in mid-2011?
“What messages did our president’s bait-and-switch speech just send?
“To our troops: Risk your lives for a mission I’ve written off.
“To the Taliban: Allah is merciful, your prayers will soon be answered.
“To Afghan leaders: Get your stolen wealth out of the country.
“To Pakistan: Renew your Taliban friendships now (and be nice to al Qaeda).
“This isn’t just stupid: It’s immoral. No American president has ever espoused such a worthless, self-absorbed non-strategy for his own political gratification….
“Mr. President, how can you send our troops to war without backing them all the way? How could you pull the strategic rug out from under them in advance? Why did you reassure the Taliban that we’ve already fixed a sell-by date? What’s the bloody point?
“At West Point last night, President Obama’s delivery was superb. But what he was delivering was a funeral oration for his promised strategy.”
Blackwatch Company (2nd Battalion, 1st Infantry Regiment) entered the village of Hutal.
“The locals welcomed the soldiers warmly and seemed to speak freely. It was basic population-centric counterinsurgency, designed to help the troops fill gaps in their knowledge of the area while disrupting Taliban operations. But one important ingredient that most experts deem essential to a successful counterinsurgency campaign was largely missing: Afghan security forces.
“Afghan National Army troops were supposed to play a role in the Nov. 17 mission, but they failed to show up by the time Blackwatch’s Stryker vehicles rolled out of Combat Outpost Rath a little after 5 a.m., a situation that soldiers here say is not entirely out of character for the ANA. Eighteen of their Afghan National Police counterparts had at least turned up, but, typically, they showed almost no interest in participating in – or even listening to – the conversations with the locals.
“The situation captured in a microcosm what U.S. officers here say is their greatest challenge: In a war in which they are trying to build popular support for the Afghan government, that government is almost totally absent from the lives of the population here in Mayward district, at the western edge of Kandahar province.
“ ‘The Afghan government does nothing for me or for the village,’ said Sher Mohammed, a 22-year-old mechanic, through an interpreter. Asked what services he would like to see the government provide, he ticked off a list: fixing the irrigation systems for the fields, installing electricity, providing more schools and establishing security.
“Like other villagers, Zia Khan, a 46-year-old teacher, responded with a dismissive wave of his hand when asked what benefit he and his neighbors derived from the Afghan government.
“ ‘None,’ he said, via an interpreter. He remarked pointedly on the absence of the ANA and the ANP from the village, especially at night, when ‘the Taliban come and demand food.’ The villagers had little choice but to comply with the Taliban’s demands, Khan said. ‘They have weapons; we don’t.’”
As for my own opinion on the Obama plan, I’m fully in favor, now that the timetable issue has been cleared up, and I expect we’ll see solid signs of success, militarily, by June. But beyond that, success or failure is largely going to depend on President Karzai’s leadership and given his track record, there is little cause for optimism on that front.
Pakistan: In a disturbing move, President Zardari ceded his control of Pakistan’s nuclear command structure to the prime minister, part of an attempt to head off domestic political pressure amid a court’s ruling that Zardari and his allies could face new corruption and criminal charges from the times prior to his taking office. While the move in and of itself doesn’t make Pakistan’s nuclear weapons less secure, it is another sign of political instability and gives more control to the military, thus increasing the risk of a coup on this front.
Pakistan also suffered another horrific terror attack on Friday as four militants stormed a mosque in Rawalpindi, leaving at least 40 dead. The mosque was frequented by army officers and at least two were among the victims.
Separately, India is increasingly concerned over growing military ties between Pakistan and China. Last week, Indian Prime Minister Singh told the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations that China had become more “assertive” in the region. His defense minister, A.K. Antony, told a separate forum, “The increasing nexus between China and Pakistan in the military sphere remains an area of serious concern.”
India: Speaking of the world’s largest democracy, authorities here arrested 15 suspected of placing radioactive tritium in a water cooler at one of the nation’s nuclear plants. None of the employees who were exposed were found to have dangerous radiation levels in their system. The episode is important because it draws attention to lax security at India’s nuclear facilities, including the screening of potential hires. Plus, this particular site had been placed on high alert beforehand. As one expert told The Australian, “If this is what happens during the high alert, I don’t know what they are doing in normal times.”
Israel: Prime Minister Netanyahu faced fierce criticism from his own Israeli right for his decision to impose a partial moratorium on Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank. There were violent clashes between settlers and Israeli police. These are the same extremists, far to the right of Netanyahu’s Likud Party, that were responsible for the assassination of then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin back in 1995.
On the prisoner exchange front and the negotiations for Israeli soldier Gilad Schalit, imprisoned Palestinian leader Marwan Barghouti said he would not allow himself to be part of any deal if he was then deported upon release. He insists on staying in Palestine.
Lebanon: The new government unanimously endorsed Hizbullah’s right to keep its weapons. Sheikh Nasrallah admitted to having 30,000 rockets. The Israeli Defense Force says the total is closer to 40,000.
North Korea: What a tragedy. On Tuesday, the government of Kim Jong Il revalued the nation’s currency, restricting how much of the old could be traded for new bills and, in effect, wiping out personal savings. By most reports the old currency would appear to be worthless.
Why would the government do this? It’s a crackdown on private markets, which had become a mini-success story here and an essential element in the food supply chain. Some of the market participants had become wealthy and the government was frustrated it couldn’t easily control them. But now, unless the wealth was held in euros, dollars or Chinese yuan, it just disappears.
Imagine. The government actually limited the amount that could be exchanged to $60 in cash and $120 in bank savings. That’s it. But millions were depending on the local markets for food. Last month, South Korean officials said the North appears on the verge of another severe crisis, which Kim’s actions now make a certainty.
On Friday, authorities in Pyongyang threatened “merciless punishment” for citizens defying the new currency rules. This is bound to be a growing story.
Russia: In his annual marathon call-in extravaganza, four hours, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said he was determined to “break the spine” of terrorism in light of the train bombing that killed 26. Chechen Islamists have claimed responsibility. [The head of Russia’s Orthodox Church issued a statement that he expected a “powerful reply” to those behind the attack. “We believe the reply will be effective and powerful enough to show these shameful, terrible people that…when the hand of an enemy is lifted against our lives, we are able to defend our citizens.” ]
Putin’s popularity is at an 8-month low of 65%, down from 72% in mid-October, and when questioned about his political future said he “will think about” taking part in the 2012 presidential election.
Putin had harsh words for Russia’s new rich, saying the way they flaunted their wealth was wrong. [I missed a high-profile incident in Switzerland recently where some of Russia’s elite crashed their Lamborghinis and Bugattis, something that Putin commented on.]
“The nouveau riche all of a sudden got rich very quickly but cannot manage their wealth without showing it off all the time. Yes this is our problem.”
And, in a highly significant comment, Putin said it was “impossible to make a judgment in general” about Joseph Stalin, signaling his rehabilitation is near, even as President Medvedev recently said there was zero excuse for Stalin’s reign of terror. Putin went on to say that Stalin’s legacy was being “actively discussed.”
Your editor told you awhile back upon his second trip to Moscow that it was striking how when you went to the Russian military museum (not for tourists since everything is in Russian) just how many pictures there were of both Stalin and Putin. It is no surprise to me Stalin is being rehabilitated, and obviously speaks volumes about Russia’s future.
[On Friday, a nightclub fire that was started by pyrotechnics, not terrorism, claimed the lives at least 100 in the Russian city of Perm; shades of our own Rhode Island nightclub disaster, 2003, in West Warwick, which is why when I see pyrotechnics at something like the American Music Awards I cringe. Outdoors is one thing. Inside the practice should be banned across the world. But then many of us are idiots.]
Somalia: Remember last time how I talked of the Somali-Americans in Minneapolis that were being recruited for an al-Qaeda arm in Somalia? That very group, al Shabaab, was responsible for a dreadful attack on a university graduation in Mogadishu that killed 22, including three Somali ministers of the U.S.-backed government.
Venezuela: Not quite on the scale of North Korea, but just as disconcerting, is a banking crisis here where President Hugo Chavez liquidated two banks owned by a rival once thought to be a close ally, billionaire businessman Ricardo Fernandez, while temporarily shutting at least five others. Chavez later added that he had “spent nearly 10 hours studying” the private banking system and “You can be sure that if I have to nationalize all of Venezuela’s private banks, I will.” For now, Venezuela’s 10 largest banks, which hold 70% of the deposits, are said to be in good shape but investors await Chavez’s next move.
Honduras: By a 111-14 margin, the Congress voted to deny Manuel Zelaya the possibility of any return to power, this after the former president was forcibly removed from office on June 28. Honduras has a new president, Porfirio Lobo (no relation to Rebecca or Sherriff Lobo), but only Panama and Colombia have officially recognized him, with the U.S. offering ‘qualified’ support.
Philippines: The tally in the mass killings of a leading politician’s family, supporters, and journalists was 57 (30 from the media at last word). The army then moved against the rival clan responsible, though as of this writing only one has been arrested, with another twelve being prevented from fleeing the country.
Switzerland: Political leaders here faced a chorus of criticism for a referendum that passed overwhelmingly banning construction of minarets. The leading establishment newspaper, Le Temps, called the result “a brutal sign of hostility” to Muslims that was “inspired by fear, fantasy and ignorance.” But the country’s justice minister said the vote reflected fears among the population, as right-wing parties talk of “creeping Islamization.”
[Meanwhile, many in the region are rightfully concerned of authentic “creeping Islamization” in Turkey.]
–Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano issued a stark warning the other day.
“Home-based terrorism is here. And like violent extremism abroad, it will be part of the threat picture that we must now confront. Individuals sympathetic to al-Qaeda and its affiliates, as well as those inspired by the group’s ideology, are present in the U.S., and would like to attack the homeland or plot overseas attacks.”
Napolitano was referring to cases such as that of Najibullah Zazi, the Denver-based terror suspect who was preparing an attack on the New York transit system. She could now just as easily be referring to Somali-Americans being recruited for al-Qaeda overseas who could then return here and wreak havoc.
Editorial / New York Post
“It was one of the most egregious security breaches in memory, but the Secret Service was quick to assert that President and Mrs. Obama were never in any danger during Tuesday’s White House gate-crashing by a pair of pathetic publicity seekers.
“Maybe. No thanks to the Secret Service.
“The gate-crashers – Michaele and Tareq Salahi – got face time with the president, having waited their turn in a receiving line during a state-dinner reception for Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
“That is to say, they got close enough to do some life-threatening damage to Obama – with, say, a ceramic knife or other non-metallic weapon.
“Says Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan: ‘[The agency] is deeply concerned and embarrassed.’
“Not concerned and embarrassed enough for Sullivan to resign for having humiliated the president before the leader of an allied nation of 1.1 billion people – to say nothing of having endangered the lives of both Singh and Obama.
“And no doubt Sullivan will still have his job after the smoke clears – and some gate-guard types have been canned.
“The fact is, nobody of a certain rank in Washington is ever fired, no matter how egregious the nonfeasance of underlings….
“Sullivan of the Secret Service, of course, is the fellow who ties Manhattan into gridlock knots whenever the president comes to town – and nobody really begrudges him that.
“But now it turns out that Sullivan can’t even keep Obama safe – in his own home.
“He has to go. For starters.”
On Michaele and Tareq Salahi, and Desiree Rogers, White House social secretary, the New York Times’ Maureen Dowd had some of the following comments:
“Sneaking past the White House gates with the slippery Salahis, we catch a rare glimpse of a Secret Service, a social office and a Pentagon with glaring – and chilling – vulnerabilities and liabilities.
“ ‘The Washington Post reported the Secret Service guard waved in the Salahis, breaking the rules, because he ‘was persuaded by the couple’s manner and insistence as well as the pressure of keeping lines moving on a rainy evening.’….
“Desiree Rogers, who has also been asked to testify Thursday, has been cruising for a bruising since telling the Wall Street Journal in April: ‘We have the best brand on Earth: the Obama brand. Our possibilities are endless.’ She wanted to pose for the Journal in an Oscar de la Renta gown in the first lady’s garden, but the press secretary, Robert Gibbs, vetoed that.
“The statuesque social secretary brandishing a Harvard M.B.A. and animal-print designer shoes is not any mere party planner. The old friend of the first couple from Chicago has the exalted and uncommon title of social secretary and special assistant to the president.
“Instead of standing outside with a clipboard, eyeballing guests as Anne Hathaway did in ‘The Devil Wears Prada,’ Desiree was a guest at the dinner, the center of her own table of guests, just like the president and first lady.
“As Michael Isikoff wrote in Newsweek, Rogers sidelined Cathy Hargraves, the East Wing staffer whose job it was to go to the East Gate portico and check off the names of each guest from a printout….
“Rogers also conjured up a White House closing ranks on itself, allowing far too many West Wing staffers, mid-level political aides, press flacks and speechwriters to attend the prestigious premiere state dinner, rather than people more relevant to the Indian guests of honor. The Obama team always talks of making the White House ‘the People’s House,’ so why let it look like the White House Mess?
“Even before the Salahis swept in preening, the Obama staffers were there preening, standing around celebrating themselves. And of course, savoring the wonder of the Obama brand.”
On Thursday, Desiree Rogers declined a Senate committee’s invitation to appear at an investigation into the incident.
As for the Salahis, pure con-artists and dirtballs, Michaele, it was learned, recently attended a reunion of 150 former Redskins cheerleaders at the halftime of a Skins game, only Michaele was never a cheerleader. She had a TV crew in tow, of course.
“Several former cheerleaders said in interviews that Michaele Salahi’s presence at a rehearsal drew attention…because no one seemed to remember her as a cheerleader for the team.
“Their doubts were heightened when Salahi couldn’t perform some of the basic cheerleader routines, including the standard choreography for the team’s fight song, ‘Hail to the Redskins.’”
Lastly, check this out, from the AP’s Larry Margasak and the Nuclear Threat Initiative newswire:
“The U.S. Secret Service would not comment on whether anyone at last week’s state dinner, including an uninvited couple, were screened for radiological or biological weapons….
“The agency does not discuss the levels of security screening at the White House….
“ ‘While the couple did pass through a magnetometer to detect weapons, they could have assassinated the president or vice president using other means – anthrax, for example,’ said Ronald Kessler, author of ‘In the President’s Secret Service.’ He added that the security system would not identify concealed biological weapons.”
If I’m President Obama, I call the Secret Service and Ms. Rogers into the Oval Office and go totally ballistic until everyone is crying for their mother. Then I’d walk out and send in Michelle for round two.
If you are optimistic about the future of America, which I’m not, just remember this case.
–And this one….Former Army Maj. John Cockerham was sentenced to 17 ½ years in prison on corruption charges related to defense contracts in Iraq and Kuwait, in a sweeping case that has led to the indictment of five U.S. military officers, with another dozen expected to follow, according to the Wall Street Journal. As an indication of the massive scope of the fraud, Cockerham was ordered to pay $9.6 million in restitution. He was the ringleader in a scheme that involved other officers serving as bag men. In all seriousness, capital punishment would be appropriate in cases of this kind. We’re talking the military, after all.
–I just have to make note of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s report on the failure to kill or capture Osama bin Laden at Tora Bora. The report blames then Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and General Tommy Franks. Your editor appropriately called Rumsfeld a liar by mid-2003 and long recognized, during the course of the war, that Franks was far from the hero portrayed by the likes of Sean Hannity. In fact I pointed out how Franks was more concerned with his golf game years ago when attending the Army War College.
Editorial / New York Post
“Some things can be counted on in Washington – like finding the Federal Bureau of Investigation in the middle of a major intelligence screwup.
“The bureau’s latest embarrassment involves Maj. Nidal Hasan, the accused murderer of 13 soldiers at Fort Hood.
“The gunman’s extremism was so obvious that the FBI had identified e-mails between Hasan and Anwar al-Aulaqi, a radical Muslim cleric with apparent ties to Osama bin Laden – yet decided against a full investigation.
“While Army intelligence also didn’t follow up, the FBI’s the one with the track record of missteps going back years, including:
“Having completely missed signs of terrorist activity prior to 9/11.
“Misidentifying scientist Stephen Hatfill as the culprit behind the October 2001 anthrax attacks, then publicly harassing him – resulting in the U.S. paying Hatfill $5.8 million in damages.
“This occurred even though new measures were supposedly put in place after the Bureau:
“Misidentified Richard Jewell in 1996 as the person responsible for the Olympic Park bombing in Atlanta.
“And mistakenly accused scientist Wen Ho Lee of selling classified technology to China.
“That list omits more recent FBI embarrassments, like this year’s shutdown of its New York office because of a snowstorm and its computer system being crippled for nine days by a cyber-virus.
“And so, news that the bureau has launched an internal investigation into its handling of Hasan prior to the shooting is hardly reassuring.
“The Obama administration announced a separate review to see what warning signs might have been missed.
“But, going back to the mid-90s, three consecutive presidents have had to contend with the consequences of ‘missed signals,’ bungled investigations and other such errors. What reason is there to believe that this ‘review’ will produce positive results?
“If President Obama can surpass his predecessors in cleaning up a clearly dysfunctional agency, more power to him. Alas, we aren’t optimistic.”
–It’s climate summit time in Copenhagen. A new report by the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research says global sea levels will rise by an estimated 4 feet 7 inches by 2100, or about 65 years after your editor writes his last “Week in Review,” God willing; not that it’s all about me.
But a bigger issue these days is the loss of key data from a study underpinning the global warming theory, as espoused by British scientists at the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit (CRU). As in the researchers there said it was lost, thrown out, when the CRU moved to new digs.
Michael Barone / New York Post
“The CRU has been a major source of data on global temperatures, relied on by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. But (newly discovered, ‘hacked’ e-mails) suggest that CRU scientists have been suppressing and misstating data and working to prevent the publication of conflicting views in peer-reviewed science periodicals. Some of the more pungent e-mails:
“ ‘Can you delete any e-mails you may have had with Keith re AR4?’
“ ‘I’ve just completed Mike’s Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (i.e. from 1981 onwards) and from 1961 for Keith’s to hide the decline.’
“ ‘The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty we can’t.’….
“You get the idea. The most charitable plausible explanation I have seen comes from The Atlantic’s Megan McArdle. ‘The CRU’s main computer model may be, to put it bluntly, complete rubbish.’….
“Copenhagen seems sure to be a bust: There will be no agreement on mandatory limits on carbon emissions. Even if there were, it would probably turn out to be no more effective than the limits others agreed to in Kyoto in 1997. In any case, China and India aren’t going to choke off their economic growth to please Western global-warming alarmists.
“The more interesting question going forward is whether European and U.S. governmental, academic and corporate elites, having embraced global-warming alarmism with religious fervor, will be shaken by the scandalous CRU e-mails. They should be.”
Meanwhile, James Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies and the “grandfather” of global warming, told the London Times he was boycotting the Copenhagen summit, even as he publishes a book that warns “our planet, with its remarkable array of life, is in imminent danger of crashing” and declaring, “It is our last chance.”
As reported in the LT by James Bone, “(Hansen) decries the cap and trade system envisaged by governments trying to ‘seal the deal’ at Copenhagen as ineffective in stemming carbon emissions. Under such systems, governments set limits on overall emissions and polluters trade quotas among themselves.
“ ‘The fundamental problem is that fossil fuels are the cheapest form of energy. As long as they are, they are going to be used,’ he said. ‘It’s remarkable. They refuse to recognize and address the fundamental problem and the obvious solution.’”
Hansen advocates an increasing “carbon tax,” not “cap and trade” as the way to move beyond fossil fuels, which is inevitable, with the collected taxes returned directly to the public in the form of a dividend.
–The Star-Ledger’s Paul Mulshine had a great observation as he was out west trying to find Dick Cheney’s old house in Wyoming. Mulshine compared driving through Illinois and signs directing you to Ronald Reagan’s childhood home vs. the lack of same directing you to Cheney’s place in Casper.
“Nothing could be more symbolic of the difference between Reagan and Cheney than the issue President Obama will be addressing today, Afghanistan. Reagan managed to get the Soviet Union bogged down there for years. As for Cheney, he managed to get the United States bogged down there for years. He got us bogged down in Iraq, too, also with no strategic advantage for the United States.
–I feel for former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, whose 2012 presidential aspirations may have been derailed by the killing of four police officers near Tacoma, Wash., at the hands of a man (later killed by police) that Huckabee had pardoned years earlier.
Huckabee told Bill O’Reilly, “If I could have known nine years ago this guy was capable of something of this magnitude, obviously I would never have granted a commutation,” but Maurice Clemmons, who was convicted in 1989 of robbery and theft, was sentenced to a 108-year term when Huckabee commuted it to 47 years in 2000, thus making Clemmons eligible for parole.
As Huckabee then described it to Joe Scarborough, critics need to know that when the governor made the decision, “They would have seen a 16-year-old kid commit crimes of which normally, there would have been a few years. And if he’d been white and middle-class with a good lawyer he’d have gotten probation, a fine and some counseling. But because he was a young black kid, he got 108 years! People don’t go to prison for murder with that sort of sentence,” he said.
The bigger issue is the fact two Washington judges let Clemmons run free despite crimes he committed in that state. It’s also incredibly distressing that the killer received help from at least three individuals following the execution of the four officers.
–Crain’s New York Business reports that former Tennessee Rep. Harold Ford Jr. is exploring a run for the U.S. Senate in New York, thus going up against Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, who succeeded Hillary Clinton. The White House and Sen. Charles Schumer support Gillibrand, but Ford could still go for it.
–Fans of the great HBO series “The Wire” had to smile at news Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon was convicted Tuesday of improperly taking gifts from a developer, hundreds of dollars in gift cards that she used to buy electronics at Best Buy and other items at Target. It’s not known whether the conviction will cost Dixon her job, the mayor having been acquitted of more serious charges. “The Wire” was one of the two or three best cop shows of all time and took place in Baltimore.
–According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, nearly 6,000 died last year, with 500,000 injured, in crashes involving distracted drivers. I contend the best thing President Obama has done while in office (next to the surge in Afghanistan, assuming it works) is his ban on texting by federal employees, which is a rather sad commentary.
–In an effort to prevent the Asian carp from entering Lake Michigan, and thus the other Great Lakes, officials dumped fish poison into the Chicago Shipping and Sanitary Canal, which leads into Lake Michigan, and within hours, tens of thousands of pounds of dead and dying fish were being scooped out. The fear is the carp, which have been taking over vast sections of the Mississippi River, could devastate the recreational fishing industry of the lakes. The carp escaped from holding pens during floods in the 1990s and have been wreaking havoc ever since.
–The person with the most write-in votes, 25, in the recent New York City mayoral contest was one C. Montgomery Burns of “The Simpsons.” Bill Clinton received three votes, and Rodney Dangerfield and Abraham Lincoln one apiece.
–Finally, I’ve been covering the Tiger Woods debacle extensively elsewhere on the site, but suffice it to say I feel those of us who heretofore respected the man have been played as chumps. That said, it’s sure going to be one helluva human interest story when he returns to the links. In the meantime we all get to learn more about those rather sexy women who focus on their “bottle-service customers.”
As for Tiger himself, one can only imagine what father Earl would do to his son were he alive today; the hurt and anger Earl would feel over how the kid he groomed to be truly special, above the sport of golf, turned out to be your run of the mill dirtball.
We’ve also learned that whereas we were always told that Tiger had a poster of Jack Nicklaus and his record in the majors above his bed while growing up, it now seems apparent Tiger also had one of Pamela Anderson right next to the Golden Bear.
Pray for the men and women of our armed forces, and all the fallen.
Gold closed at $1169
Oil, $75.80
Returns for the week 11/30-12/4
Dow Jones +0.8% [10388]
S&P 500 +1.3% [1105]
S&P MidCap +2.7%
Russell 2000 +4.4%
Nasdaq +2.6% [2194]
Returns for the period 1/1/09-12/4/09
Russell 2000 +20.7%
Nasdaq +39.1%
Bears 16.7 [Source: Chartcraft / Investors Intelligence…bear figure in Oct. ’08, 54.4]
NOTE: Next week’s review might be brief and I’m not sure when I’ll post as I’ll be coming to you from Kiawah, S.C., where I’m running in a little race and doing other things beforehand, but I’ll shoot for Saturday morning.
Happy Birthday, Mom!
