ScaifeNet because we can't let Soros have all the fun...

Across the country, college students are starting classes, but that does not mean they are receiving an education.

The American Council for Trustees and Alumni’s latest report and website What Will They Learn reveals that most colleges and universities are not providing students a well-rounded education. Of the 719 colleges and universities analyzed in this report, only 16 institutions of higher education (that is, 2% of colleges) provide a coherent, content-rich general education or core curriculum. These few “A” rated  schools require students to take courses in composition, literature, a foreign language, U.S. government or history, economics, mathematics, and natural or physical science. The course most ignored in core curriculum is the US government/history requirement: only 19% of the 700 require it (compared to science, which 85% of colleges require).

Just because a college is expensive or elite, does not mean that a content-rich education is available. Of the 178 colleges who charge more than $30,000, only two colleges receive an “A.” In contrast, the average cost of an “A” ranked school is $16,000. And, interestingly, six of the highest ranked schools are located not in the Northeast but in Texas.

As What Will They Learn describes, a coherent, content-rich core curriculum is not achieved by simply amassing 120 credit hours over eight semesters. A core curriculum exposes students to subjects they might otherwise avoid and builds the analytical and critical-thinking skills that are essential to being an educated person. Moreover, a good core curriculum fosters an “intellectual community in which students share the focus and excitement of discovery and learning.” Beyond the university, an education founded upon a solid core curriculum better prepares young men and women for the ever-changing challenges and needs of the modern workforce.

Before enrolling in “Amphibious Warfare” or “Philosophy and History of Recreation,” check out the benefits of a core curriculum. And for the 81% of current students who lack a good education in U.S. government or history, may I recommend a book or two?

Obamacare requires insurers to meet a federally-specified medical loss ratio.  That is, they must spend a certain percentage of premiums on medical expenses.  The remainder can be used to cover administrative costs and, if there’s anything left, profits.  But if insurers don’t shell out enough in medical losses to meet the requirement, they’ll have to rebate the difference to policyholders

The idea is to limit insurers’ profits and create incentives to reduce administrative costs.  But it’s not as clear cut as it sounds.  After all, what exactly counts as a medical expense?

“Is giving patients access to a team of nurses to discuss and monitor their health really an administrative function?” Newt Gingrich and David Merritt ask. “What about a fraud-prevention program that targets criminal providers who endanger patient care?” How Obamacare answers these kinds of questions is vitally important.  If it labels many initiatives like these “administrative costs,” insurers will find it increasingly difficult to stay in business.

The National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) has been tasked with defining what is and is not a medical cost.  Jennifer Haberkorn reports for Politico that “top House and Senate chairmen want to include as many items as possible on the administrative side of the ledger, which would make the quota harder to reach.”  But “The NAIC has signaled that it’s not likely to side with the Democrats over where to count federal taxes in the calculation, among other issues.”

The decision ultimately rests with Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.  If she adheres to the recommendations from NAIC, she could face the discontent of congressional leadership.  But following them loosely would risk being seen as “playing politics on a highly controversial piece of legislation.”

A broad definition of administrative expenses could be disastrous for private insurance.  Heritage’s Robert Book writes, “By putting an inflexible ceiling on how much insurers can spend on medical costs and how much they can charge in premiums—without any limit on what cost they could be required to incur—this legislation opens the door to the complete elimination of people’s ability to choose private health plans.”

If private insurers are forced out of the market, what would be left?  The answer should come as no surprise.  Obamacare includes a placeholder for a public option: health plans offered through the exchanges by private insurers, but ultimately defined by the federal Office of Personnel Management.  It appears that these plans won’t be held to the same rules applied to other :”private” plans—including the rules governing medical loss ratios.

There’s a lot riding on NAIC’s recommendations and the extent to which Secretary Sebelius follows them.  To learn more, click here.

Eric Holder’s Justice Department really seems to believe that its primary responsibility is to help aliens who violate federal law as opposed to tax-paying citizens of the United States. What else can one say about the latest action filed by the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division against Arizona community colleges claiming they violated federal law when they asked noncitizens applying for jobs to produce their green cards? According to news reports, the complaint was filed with the Executive Office for Immigration Review, an administrative office within the Justice Department that handles immigration cases.

Every employer has to fill out a federal form on all new employees, the I-9, which verifies that they are citizens or noncitizens who are legally in the United States and entitled to work. The I-9 form specifies what documents employers can ask for from prospective employees. They range from primary documents like passports and permanent resident alien cards to secondary documents like driver’s licenses, social security cards, and birth certificates.

As part of the Immigration Control and Reform Act of 1986, liberals insisted on the insertion of a provision that makes it a violation of federal law for an employer to demand any documents other than those listed in the I-9 form or “refusing to honor documents tendered that on their face reasonably appear to be genuine.” 8 U.S.C. § 1324b. There actually is an office within the Civil Rights Division called the “Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices” whose only job is to look for violations of this statute and other supposedly discriminatory practices against noncitizens. This provision puts employers in a confusing Catch-22 since they can be found in violation of federal law for hiring noncitizens yet they can also be found in violation of federal law for questioning the authenticity of documents presented by applicants like social security cards, probably the most easily and commonly forged identification documents issued by the federal government.

What is also completely unfair about this provision is that federal law requires noncitizens who are here legally to “at all times carry with him and have in his personal possession any certificate of alien registration” issued by the federal government. 8 U.S.C. § 1304. So essentially, the Justice Department is suing these community colleges for asking job applicants who are not citizens to show them a federally-issued document that they are supposed to carry with them “at all times.”

The suit was filed at the direction of Thomas Perez, the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, who said that DOJ “is acting now to remedy this pattern or practice of discrimination.” Prior to his confirmation, Perez was the president of Casa de Maryland, an extreme Left-wing advocacy organization that opposes the enforcement of our immigration laws and encourages illegal aliens to evade federal law. So according to Perez, a “pattern or practice of discrimination” is for state authorities to ask a noncitizen to show them a federally-issued alien identification card that they must have in their possession when they are sitting across from the state official and filling out the paperwork required for a new job at a community college.

While Perez may have a technical basis for this lawsuit, this particular provision of federal law and how it is being interpreted is, quite frankly, ridiculous. It is a good example of the inane contradictions inherent in some aspects of our immigration law and this administration’s misplaced enforcement priorities. It also demonstrates the misuse of Justice Department resources, which are being used to attack Arizona in federal district court and now in a federal immigration court, while hundreds of thousands of outstanding deportation orders pending at Justice go unenforced and ignored. The administration’s abuse of its law enforcement powers to achieve political ends is both disturbing and very damaging to the best interests of the country.

Aside from the wooden performance, there was nothing particularly noteworthy about President Barack Obama’s Oval Office address on Iraq last night. The President again evinced the impression that he viewed Iraq as a distraction, and he twice said he wanted to “turn the page” to other issues. As forgettable as the address was however, once placed into the broader context of foreign policy speeches and actions, a clear Obama Doctrine can now be defined, as James Carafano and Kim Holmes do in a new paper released today.

Downplaying American Sovereignty: The Administration is pursuing an ambitious agenda on international treaties. An incomplete list includes: the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) with Russia; the U.N. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT); the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (LOST); the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW); and the Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space (PAROS). The ideals behind many of these treaties are admirable. But in every case the onus is on the Administration to ensure that the treaty does not compromise America’s security or the rights and freedoms established in the U.S. Constitution. International institutions work best when they manage affairs between nations; they falter and become harmful when they reach into the domestic affairs of nations.

But that is exactly what the Obama administration has been doing. Just last week the White House submitted its  “Report of the United States of America” to the U.N. Human Rights Council (HRC), a body that includes such human rights exemplars as Cuba, Russia and Saudi Arabia. In the report, the Obama administration attacks Arizona’s recent immigration enforcement law and portrays its law suit against it as a defense of human rights. Is there a better example of what little interest this Administration has in upholding American sovereignty? There is no universal right to violate a country’s immigration laws with impunity. It is no violation of human rights to enforce border security and basic immigration requirements. When the Obama administration engages international institutions, it appears that E Pluribus Unum gets thrown under the bus.

Soft-Pedaling American Power: The belief that the United States over-utilized hard power in Iraq and Afghanistan has shaken President Obama’s confidence in the application of hard power at all. Instead, the President intends to use soft power so as to appear more equal at the negotiating table. Shortly after taking office in January 2009, President Barack Obama said “[if] countries like Iran are willing to unclench their fist, they will find an extended hand from us.” And how has this soft-power approach fared? French President Nicolas Sarkozy recently said: “We live in the real world, not a virtual one… President Obama himself has said that he dreams of a world without nuclear weapons. Before our very eyes, two countries are doing exactly the opposite at this very moment… I support America’s ‘extended hand.’ But what have these proposals for dialogue produced for the international community? Nothing but more enriched uranium and more centrifuges.”

The reality is that soft power only works as an adjunct to hard power. Saddam Hussein’s removal from power eliminated any possibility of a major threat from Iraq for the foreseeable future. And while Afghanistan remains an open question, only the anti-war left believes the Taliban can be persuaded to lay down their arms with promises of aid and diplomacy. Any time an American leader believes soft power is a substitute for hard power, he is bound to fail.

A More Restrained America: President Obama has made no secret of his ambivalence toward American military power. At his nuclear summit in Washington, he said: “Whether we like it or not, we remain a dominant military superpower.” The President’s take-it-or-leave-it attitude toward America’s defenses has been reflected in his spending priorities. He cut funding for the F-22 fighter jet and key missile defense programs. His defense procurement budget is anemic, he has refused to modernize our nuclear deterrent, and his Administration even proposed terminating the development of the next generation Navy Cruiser with missile defense capabilities. The force structure Obama is projecting simply cannot sustain existing U.S. security commitments. Military power is not only about fighting wars; it is also about others’ perception of whether you have the means and will to defeat aggression. The perception of American weakness is a destabilizing force throughout the world.

A More Humble America: Since his first month in office, President Obama has embarked on a whirlwind Apology Tour casting himself as the redemptive vessel for the entirety of America’s past sins. Apologizing for things that happened in the past may gain popularity abroad, but so far, it has done little to change minds about our policies. If anything, it has portrayed a weaker United States not only to our allies, but to adversaries striving to gain any advantage over us. The repercussions could be grave—and here, history also provides an example. Not long after President Jimmy Carter apologized for America’s supposedly excessive fear of Communism, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan and the hard-liners revolted in Iran, taking Americans hostage.

Carter is not the only past president whom Obama is emulating on foreign policy. President Obama’s true foreign policy predecessor is President Woodrow Wilson, who also sought a more “ethical” foreign policy and sought to rely on a “concert of nations” to keep the peace. Wilson’s idealistic approach failed to stem the tide of World War I and helped to foster the isolationism of the 1920s and 1930s that inadvertently eased the road into World War II.

There is a better foreign policy vision. It is a vision that is grounded in George Washington’s first State of the Union address reminder that: “To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.” It’s a vision that is consistent with the Monroe Doctrine ideal that America is committed to the principles on which republican self-government is based. It’s a vision that embodies the Truman Doctrine’s support for peoples threatened with Communist aggression. And it’s a vision that continues the Reagan Doctrine’s “peace through strength” strategy of revitalizing the U.S. military while promoting economic growth at home and increasing support for oppressed people around the world. What all these lines of thought have in common is that America is an indispensable nation in the defense of liberty around the world.

The Obama Doctrine points us in the opposite direction. It will force friendly nations to look elsewhere, not to Washington, for arrangements that bring them greater security. And that will make this a far more dangerous world indeed.

Quick Hits:

• Federal domestic spending increased by a record 16 percent to $3.2 trillion in 2009, the largest increase ever recorded by the Census Bureau.
• Heritage Foundation analyst James Carafano explains why catching immigration ‘criminals’ is not enough.
• U.S. auto sales in August were the slowest for the month in 28 years.
• Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R) made Minnesota the first state to formally restrict itself from taking some federal dollars under Obamacare.
• The Wall Street Journal reports that Docs4PatientCare is encouraging physicians to leave a letter in their office explaining how Obamacare is “badly exacerbating the current doctor shortage” and will bring “major cost increases, rising insurance premiums, higher taxes.”

President Barack Obama has said that America would reach out to other countries as “an equal partner” rather than as the “exceptional” nation that many before him had embraced; that “any world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another will inevitably fail”; and that “[o]ur problems must be dealt with through partnership” and “progress must be shared.” He has laid out in his public statements the tenets of a doctrine that, if enacted, would enable his Administration to remake America as one nation among many, with no singular claim either to responsibility or exceptionalism: (1) America will ratify more treaties and turn to international organizations more often to deal with global crises and security concerns like nuclear weapons, often before turning to our traditional friends and allies; (2) America will emphasize diplomacy and “soft power” instruments such as summits and foreign aid to promote its aims and downplay military might; (3) America will adopt a more humble attitude in state-to-state relations; and (4) America will play a more restrained role on the international stage. These tenets, however well-intentioned, will make America and the world far more insecure. Examining President Obama’s doctrinal statements and actions more closely demonstrates why reasserting American leadership on behalf of liberty would be the wiser course.

President Obama’s wooden speech tonight, ostensibly focused on Iraq, actually gave short shrift to the war in Iraq and failed to convincingly articulate a vision of Iraq’s future, his own Iraq policy, or America’s role in the world. The President talked about ending the war, but not of victory. Apparently in a rush to put the war in the past, he gave little attention to why the war was fought, what was at stake, or how the war related to broader U.S. goals in the Middle East.

Instead, Obama maintained that “now it is time to turn the page,” and focus on restoring the economy—“my central responsibility as President.” Clearly more at ease acting as the “Economist-in-Chief” rather than the Commander-in-Chief, the President then devoted a surprisingly large portion of the speech, only his second from the Oval Office, to vague rhetoric about fixing the economy. But protecting America’s security and leading the nation in war should be his highest priorities as President, not to mention the paramount focus of a speech about Iraq.

Unfortunately, the televised address sounded more like a campaign speech from a politician rather than a message from the Commander-in-Chief of a nation at war. He said that “Our combat mission is ending, but our commitment to Iraq’s future is not.” But he gave no inkling of what that commitment entails, why America has a vital interest in Iraq’s future, or his Administration’s vision of Iraq’s future.

Unfortunately, President Obama missed a golden opportunity to reassure anxious Iraqis and nervous U.S. allies elsewhere that the United States is a dependable friend that is determined to consolidate the long-term security of Iraq—not merely make a rush for the exit.

While the speech may have helped him with Democratic voters, it is likely to undermine confidence in American leadership not only in Iraq and the broader Middle East, but in many other areas of the world. President Obama’s proclamation of his “central responsibility” for economic matters, shoe-horned into a major speech about Iraq—one of the world’s most important international security issues—will only encourage foreign doubts about his Administration’s commitment to finishing the job in Afghanistan, winning the struggle against Islamist extremism, and protecting U.S. allies around the world.

For more on what the speech should have covered, see:

Obama’s Iraq Speech Should Stress a Resolute U.S. Security Commitment

It is not clear what the President meant when he said, “Ending the war was in our interest.”

First, wars just don’t end. They are a win, a loss, or a draw. By implying that he simply “ended” the war by just following a plan – as if he were imposing a managerial solution over a public policy problem – Obama gave the American people a very a simplistic and wrongheaded notion of war.

No plan survives contact with the enemy. Obama ought to understand this better than anyone. After all, he bitterly opposed the surge which helped break the cycle of violence and made the withdrawal of U.S. troops – without Iraq collapsing into civil war – possible.

Indeed Obama’s opposition to the surge was the centerpiece of his 2008 presidential campaign. And he was dead wrong too. Arguably, if we had followed the plan he advocated as a Senator today’s speech might never had happened.

It was not his plan that turned the war. It was fighting and defeating the insurgency. To suggest anything else is hubris.

Nor is it clear that the war has “ended”—The enemy still gets a vote. There may be more fighting ahead. And there is a war in Afghanistan that still must be won.

Second, the President’s rhetoric seems to suggest that fulfilling a campaign promise to “end the war” is the measure of defending U.S. vital national interests.

It is not.

If defending U.S. interests in Iraq requires additional combat, then we expect the President will fulfill his responsibility to lead the fight and protect our national interests.

The President’s opposition to the war was shrewd political calculation that helped him get elected.

After hearing how he talked about “ending” the war in tonight’s speech he may just be making another one.

This speech, to be frank, smacks too much of politics at the expense of presidential leadership. This is no small thing, and frankly it has tremendous policy implications (not just political ones). Obama is sending signals that “ending” the fight is more important than protecting America’s interests, just as he did when he opposed the Iraq war to appease the Left wing of his party, the same Left wing now trying to drive him out of Afghanistan. This manner of framing U.S. interests does not bode well for U.S. policy in Afghanistan. If the fighting does not go well there the President could begin focusing on the bogus interest of ending the conflict rather than the real mission in Afghanistan: protecting vital U.S. national interests.

Unfortunately, President Obama missed a valuable opportunity tonight to demonstrate that he is fully committed to success in Afghanistan. Instead he stubbornly reiterated his July 2011 withdrawal date.

Obama rightly said Americans should not lose sight of what is at stake in Afghanistan and that the U.S. must prevent the country from again becoming a terrorist safe haven. But his subsequent declarations that U.S. forces will only be in place for a limited time and that “wars cannot go on forever” revealed his impatience with the current counterinsurgency strategy and undermined everything else he said about the war in Afghanistan.

His emphatic “make no mistake” line came before his statement about his commitment to withdrawing troops next summer. But it should have come before his pledge to “break the Taliban’s momentum.”

In other words, he came across as more committed to withdrawing troops next July than prevailing over the Taliban. This is not how a Commander-in-Chief should lead his troops in war.

For those who hoped President Obama had finally seen the light about the ill-conceived July 2011 deadline and would use tonight’s speech to walk it back, they have been sorely disappointed.

It is understandable that the President wanted to mention the sorry state of the domestic economy in his address to the nation. More Americans are out of work now than when Obama took office. Recent economic news has not been good.

Just as the President said, fixing the economy is indeed an “urgent” task.” But that does not mean he now has the luxury to neglect his most urgent task, the one assigned to him by the U.S. Constitution: to “Provide for the Common Defense.”

While there might be some debate over the best way to stimulate the economy, no one is arguing that the President can outsource his responsibilities as Commander-in-Chief.

It would be wrong to suggest that the best way to build-up the economy is to cut back on defense or shy away from America’s responsibilities: protecting its interests throughout the world. Looking at all the challenges we face—from finishing the job in Afghanistan and Iraq, to responding to a rising China, to dealing with North Korea and Iran, and fighting the war on terror—now is not the time to turn our back on our responsibilities to defend this nation by cutting defense spending.

The military has not been modernized since the Reagan Era. We can’t take another peace dividend on what is essentially a peacetime military with aging equipment.

Nor is neglecting the defense going to solve the nation’s fiscal crisis. Defense spending is less than one-fifth of the federal budget. Even with the cost of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. military spending is near historic lows (as a percentage of GDP less, than what we averaged during the Cold War).

The President would have better served Americans if he had told them the honest truth: Protecting our freedoms and ensuring that no power can humiliate America or kill our citizens in their beds requires both guns and butter. If America wants to remain America it does not have the choice of opting for one or the other.

Hurricane Katrina destroyed more than just buildings. Left with scarce resources and personnel, local government in New Orleans became weak and ineffective in the aftermath of the flooding. Five years later, the rebuilding of New Orleans is far from complete, but reformers can point to at least one major accomplishment: a new school system built around charter schools and parental choice.

As a recent Newsweek article explains in some detail, Louisiana established the Recovery School District (RSD) to replace the old school system in New Orleans. Eschewing centralized control, RSD officials created a plethora of charter schools throughout the city, offering far more choices to parents than they had pre-Katrina.

Charter schools receive public funding but are allowed to operate without the regulatory burden faced by ordinary public schools. They have more leeway to experiment with different teaching methods, curriculum content, disciplinary procedures, and levels of parental involvement. If enrollment is any indication, New Orleans parents appreciate the choices. Over 60 percent of the city’s students attended a charter school last year.

A rigorous evaluation of charter school impacts has yet to be conducted in New Orleans, but a recent report by the U.S. Department of Education gives us a good idea of how charter schools perform nationally. To ensure a fair evaluation, the report’s authors used a natural experiment: They compared students who attended oversubscribed charter schools through a lottery with students who lost the lottery and were denied entrance. (This method is the “gold standard” for school evaluation.)

The results are unambiguous. By large margins, parents are more satisfied with charter schools—and with the academic and social development of their children who attend—than are public school parents. For example, charter schools were rated “excellent” by 85 percent of parents, while non-charter schools received the “excellent” rating by just 37 percent of parents.

The people of New Orleans are the latest to benefit from an extensive system of charter schools, but it should not take a natural disaster to make that option available. As more states and localities nationwide adopt school choice, the more satisfied parents will be.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Chicken Littles warned that Japan was buying up America. The biggest symbol that our country couldn’t keep up with Japan’s managed-trade policies was the 1989 purchase of New York’s Rockefeller Center by Mitsubishi.

Even though the sky didn’t fall, protectionist Chicken Littles are at it again. Only today it’s China that Americans are supposed to fear. According to one writer, Getting tough with China is not protectionist, it’s self defense. Don’t stand up and Beijing will end up owning the National Mall along with the Parthenon.

That doesn’t make any sense. There are no Chinese invaders parachuting onto the White House lawn and forcing the U.S. government to borrow hundreds of billions of dollars from them at gunpoint. Deficit-spending U.S. politicians are more than happy to borrow money from China and elsewhere. It’s our own politicians and their reckless spending that Americans need to get tough with.

Remember the Chicken Littles who warned about Japanese companies buying the Rockefeller Center in 1989? A few short years later, The New York Times headline read: Japanese Scrap $2 Billion Stake in Rockefeller as Mitsubishi abandoned its bankrupt investment. Today Chicken Little is clucking about China instead of Japan, but the sky still isn’t falling.

We're looking forward to this film: Jim Van Eerden, the producer of the film, told a group of bloggers at The Heritage Foundation today that he wants the film to help promote a national conversation about the importance of getting government...

Josh Rogin took note when a major Tea Party group rallied against New START, the arms control treaty Obama signed with the Russians.

He was right to pay attention. The Tea Parties have said little on defense issues. Some on the left had high hopes, even as they trashed the Tea Parties, that the latter might actually join them in an effort to cut defense spending; bail on Afghanistan; and scale back on America’s overseas footprint.

The arms-control left was also probably hoping that Tea Party followers would become part of the “anti-military” arms-control coalition from the right.

This hope appears dashed. Indeed, Liberty Central’s decision to oppose New START points to their joining the “peace through strength” coalition. In a related development, the First Coast Tea Party in Florida is hosting a screening of the pro-missile defense documentary “33 Minutes” on Sept. 7. These developments are big news.

If Rogin had stuck to the story, rather try to play arms-control expert, his piece may have been more accurate. He went on, however, to ridicule the anti-New Start argument, suggesting that the Tea Parties are out of their league and don’t know what they are talking about. The problem is, most of his “gotchas” are misleading or just plain wrong.

The Tea Parties are more right than Rogin.

Rogin asserts that missile defense was never about defeating a Soviet/Russian nuclear strike. This is not quite right. The Reagan administration sought to couple missile defense and arms control to end U.S. vulnerability to such a strike. While missile defense alone would not end this vulnerability, it was an essential part of Reagan’s “peace through strength” policy. New START seeks minimizes the importance of missile defense and resurrects the old “Mutual Assured Destruction,” or MAD, balance of terror — a policy that leaves the U.S. intentionally vulnerable to Russian missile strikes.

Next, Rogin wrongly asserts that there is no withdrawal provision in the treaty for missile defense. The general withdrawal clause is in Article XIV and the Russian unilateral statement, as bolstered by the anti-missile-defense paragraph in the preamble, links opting out of the treaty to missile defense. In other words, if a future president decides Obama’s missile-defense plans are insufficient and elects to build much more robust defenses, then the Russians can just walk away from the treaty (after, oh, we’ve already cut our warheads and delivery systems).

Rogin is also wrong when he argues that the withdrawal of the Third Site missile-defense proposal in Europe was a separate decision from pursuing New START. It most certainly was not. President Obama withdrew Third Site to “reset” relations with Russia, which was to facilitate New START negotiations. Ultimately, both the withdrawal of Third Site and New START then became key steps in the White House push for the broader reset policy. In other words, this is all about making Russia happy.

Finally, Rogin points out that the change in declaratory policy regarding the use of nuclear weapons, which narrows U.S. strategic options, came in the Nuclear Posture Review or NPR (released before the treaty was signed) and not in New START. This is true as far as it goes. But Rogin is flat wrong to suggest that it is wrong to criticize New START on the basis of the negative consequences of the NPR. Together, the change in declaratory policy in the NPR and New START serve to reinforce each other in weakening the U.S. strategic posture.

Rogin wants Americans to ignore the broader, troubling implications of New START. The Tea Parties are dead right when they argue to link the two issues together.

Cross-posted at The Daily Caller.

In the ongoing discussion on how best to address the nation’s out-of-control deficit spending, one proposal would increase taxes by adding a value-added tax (VAT) on top of the current tax system. Proponents argue that a new tax on consumption would raise the needed revenues to close the deficit gap without the negative economic effects of raising the income tax.

However, rather than putting Washington’s fiscal house back in order, a VAT is more likely to grow the size of government and encourage growth in spending—effects that would be counterproductive to its intended purpose.

Recent analysis by Douglas Holtz-Eakin and Cameron Smith finds that in addition to the existence of a “strong, indisputable, positive relationship between use of a VAT and government spending as a fraction of GDP,” evidence points to a causal relationship between the creation of a VAT and growth in government.

Existing evidence already supports a correlation between the VAT and growth in spending in countries around the world. Holtz-Eakin and Smith sought to uncover whether it was the significant revenues a VAT raises that cause spending to increase or whether “the adoption of a VAT is evidence of the desire for a larger government so that the causal arrow runs from a taste for Leviathan to a VAT, and not the reverse.”

Their findings show that it’s the former: a VAT enables bigger government and fuels “increases in the size of the public sector.”

The VAT is currently discussed within the context of deficit reduction. But a VAT encourages increases in spending and growth in government; thus, far from achieving its goal of heightened fiscal responsibility, using this mechanism to increase taxes for Americans could instead have the opposite effect. In Politico, Holtz-Eakin and Smith discuss the feasibility of using a VAT to replace the current tax system as sweeping tax reform. Though the VAT could be an improvement over the current tax code—so long as it replaced it entirely—when pursued as a means to close the deficit as an add-on to the current tax system, it would create a new and dangerous set of issues.

Instead, to reduce the deficit, Congress should focus on the real problem at hand: spending. As Holtz-Eakin and Smith write, “The deficit problem is excessive spending—not inadequate revenues. In 2010, outlays are projected to be 25.2 percent of gross domestic product—about $1.2 trillion higher than the typical 20 percent of GDP in the postwar era. Coincidentally, that’s about the size of the projected deficit in 2020.”

Entitlement spending—especially on Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security—is growing on autopilot at an alarming rate. These three programs alone, excluding net interest, comprise 56 percent of all federal expenditures. A reduction in spending, especially within these programs, is the right course to take to reduce federal deficits.

By now it’s obvious that the government’s “stimulus” spending spree has failed to achieve its intended results—just as critics of Keynesian economic theory predicted. Compounding the policy blunder is the failure of officials to properly vet some of the costly public works projects.

Case in point is the $7.2 billion broadband deployment scheme: Federal officials failed to determine whether targeted communities actually lack Internet service options. In a number of cases, in fact, the government subsidies will put existing private service providers at a competitive disadvantage.

Some $2.2 billion has already been allocated by the Departments of Commerce (DOC) and Agriculture (DOA) to enhance broadband services in “unserved” and “underserved” areas. (The balance of funding is scheduled to be awarded by September 30.) But according to a newly released report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), program officials “lack detailed data on the availability of broadband service throughout the country, making it difficult to determine whether a proposed service area is unserved or underserved.”

Up to $350 million of the broadband funding is earmarked for developing a nationwide map of broadband service availability. However, the mapping project will not be finalized until at least 2011. And, given the dynamics of the broadband market, with customers constantly moving between various technologies, the map will likely be obsolete by the time it is completed.

In processing grant applications, both DOC and DOA solicited public comments on the availability of service to determine whether a subsidized project would constitute an “overbuild.” But according to GAO investigators, the process was “cumbersome,” and the resulting analysis “inconclusive” at times. During its review, in fact, the GAO found several instances of projects that compete with existing providers.

That helps to clarify why Texas, with some 161 existing providers of high-speed broadband service, was granted a whopping $184 million in deployment subsidies—more than any other state in the first round of funding. Kansas, with 96 existing service providers, was granted more than $121 million, while Pennsylvania received $135 million despite a total of 87 services providers statewide.

It turns out that the program rules allow up to 25 percent of a government-financed deployment project to compete with an existing service provider. Consequently, the subsidized projects could very well squeeze out the jobs and investment that stimulus funds are intended to promote. GAO investigators noted that “funding projects … where there may already be existing providers could potentially discourage further private investment in the area and undermine the viability of both the incumbents’ investment and the broadband stimulus project.”

This disregard for the private sector is all too reminiscent of the municipal broadband craze that swept the country earlier this decade. Dozens of local governments hatched plans to build and operate broadband networks or develop broadband infrastructure for wholesale lease to commercial service providers. But as they lacked the expertise and flexibility of the private sector, the results weren’t pretty. Many of the projects were never completed, while others saddled taxpayers with unwelcome debt.

Proponents contend that the broadband subsidies will stimulate economic growth, create jobs, and alleviate computer illiteracy. But that won’t happen if, in the process, the subsidized services undermine private sector investment. If public officials are so intent on promoting broadband, the far better alternative is to reduce the tax and regulatory barriers that inhibit universal deployment.

A flawed civil nuclear liability law may cast a pall over the historic U.S.–India civil nuclear deal.

Yesterday, President Obama insisted that a coalition of Senate Republican legislators is playing partisan politics yet again. He told Americans that he knows exactly what small businesses need in order to start productively hiring, and that’s the Small Jobs Act, which is currently before the Senate.

The business community does not need President Obama to lecture to them about partisan politics, and they certainly do not need him to do the same about legislation that replaces the private sector with agencies of the federal government to “promote” entrepreneurship, exporting, and so on.

Businesses have witnessed an onslaught of federal legislation with the economy only sputtering along and a net negative balance for overall employment. The President fails to note that the health care reform legislation passed earlier this year includes crippling mandates and fees on small- and medium-size businesses. (Those testy Republicans would like to see at least one of these provisions, the new requirement that all businesses file a 1099 for every business transaction exceeding $600, repealed in any “jobs bill.”)

No one questions that business owners want to begin productively hiring. This is highly unlikely to happen, however, when burdensome components of Obamacare, expiration of the Bush tax cuts, permanent extension of the estate tax, and possible new energy taxes all still loom.

Cross-posted at The Corner.

In his latest column, Richard Epstein observes: The unemployment rate is higher now than it was when the stimulus program began. The secret of our success, evidently, is that the number of unemployed did not go higher still. By dumbing...

President Obama has submitted his administration’s legal dispute with Arizona over immigration to the U.N.’s Human Rights Council. Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer called that move “downright offensive.” Her characterization is correct, albeit somewhat mild.

It is highly offensive that the administration would submit a constitutional argument over federalism and federal preemption to an international body for review – especially when that body includes dictatorial tyrannies such as Cuba and China that violate human rights routinely and with prejudice. It is another sign that President Obama holds our constitutional system of government in low regard and has little interest in upholding American sovereignty.

There is no universal right to violate a country’s immigration laws with impunity. It is no violation of human rights to enforce border security and basic immigration requirements. Indeed, the United States has some of the most open and permissive immigration laws in the world. Many of those criticizing Arizona, including Mexico, have much stricter and harsher immigration laws; their treatment of immigrants may justify human rights claims, but ours certainly do not.

The Justice Department’s lawsuit against Arizona makes no human rights claims. It is insulting and provocative to include this dubious legal filing in the official “Report of the United States” to the United Nations. But it is certainly no surprise, given the administration’s implementation of a de facto amnesty for the vast majority of illegal aliens in our country, and its reluctance to enforce deportation orders and take other steps needed to get this situation under control.

In the Universal Periodic Review, the administration asserts that “President Obama remains firmly committed to fixing our broken immigration system.” Yet the only “fixes” he seems committed to are not enforcing federal laws he disagrees with; preventing states from enforcing their laws if it brings attention to his administration’s failure to enforce federal law; and extending amnesty to those who have broken our laws and thereby shown utter contempt for the basic principle that guarantees all our rights and freedoms: adherence to the rule of law.

Cross-posted at Politico.

On Monday evening, Dutch authorities detained Ahmed Mohamed Nasser al Soofi (of Detroit) and Hezem al Murisi when their United Airlines flight from Chicago landed in Amsterdam. It’s always a big mistake to jump to “instant analysis” based on preliminary press reports. But it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise if these two men turn out to have had bad intent.

Al Soofi and al Murisi are suspected of making a dry run for a future terrorist attack. Dry runs are common in the terrorism trade. Terrorists are a relatively scarce asset. They like predictability. They like to know the security they’ll be facing and the likelihood they can pull off a successful operation.

Nor is it surprising to find terrorists departing from the United States rather than heading to it. It has been all the fashion lately. David Coleman Headley, a Chicago-based Pakistani-American, was dispatched from the U.S. to scout out terrorist targets in Mumbai. In June, two New Jersey men — Mohamed Mahmood Alessa and Carlos Eduardo Almont — were arrested at JFK as they were allegedly heading to join al Shabaab, an al-Qaeda affiliate in Somalia.

According to news reports, one of al Soofi’s neighbors says he was from Yemen. Apparently, he had booked to a flight to Yemen as well. A Yemeni connection wouldn’t be surprising. Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, a group based in Yemen, dispatched the Detroit-bound Christmas bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab. Not only is this group affiliated with al-Qaeda, they have a network in the U.S. and have openly declared their intent to attack America and American interests.

It would surprise no one to find a terrorist attack aimed at killing Americans. Since 9/11, authorities have thwarted at least 31 terrorist attacks and plots aimed at U.S. citizens. Some of those involved attacking commercial aviation. In addition to Abdulmutallab’s aborted attempt, a foiled 2006 plot aimed to blow up international flights bound for the U.S. using liquid explosives.

With today’s arrest, speculation will focus on just what the two suspects were really up to and why they were allowed to board an international flight to begin with. TSA agents had deemed the pair “suspicious.” Al Soofi was even stopped and searched in Birmingham, Alabama, where the flight originated.

The stop is a good thing. Authorities pulled him aside because he wore suspiciously bulky clothing — a trademark of a mule (i.e., someone secretly bringing aboard something they shouldn’t). Oh, and baggage searches revealed a “mobile phone taped to a Pepto-Bismol bottle, three mobile phones taped together and several watches taped together.” That’s a tad out of the ordinary, too. More curious still, al Soofi booked his luggage on a flight to Dulles and then on to Dubai and Yemen, while himself on a flight to Amsterdam. That will raise a few eyebrows among thesecurity-conscious.

Perhaps officials had reason to let them continue to travel. Perhaps, the feds made sure there was an air marshal — or two, or three — aboard the flight with the two “suspicious” travelers.

At this point, it’s too soon to criticize aviation security or to ship the suspect off to prison. More facts are needed.

But this incident should remind us of three indisputable facts: 1) There are terrorists out there; 2) they are trying to kill us; and 3) if we don’t work proactively to stop them, one day they will succeed again.

Cross-posted at The Corner.