Author: Frank Schnittger

Cross Posted from the European Tribune

In the last two weeks I have had half a dozen Letters to the Editor published in the Irish Times, the Irish Independent, and the Sunday Tribune on the topics of the South Ossetia crisis and the Irish rejection of the Lisbon Treaty.

The Editors of those papers seem to delight in publishing letters which are sometimes scathingly personal in response.  This is unusual in Ireland as the laws of libel are fairly strict and I am not a public figure.

I don’t have a particular problem with this (as I don’t have much of a reputation to lose) although my family and friends do seem to think this is all evidence of advancing dementia on my part.  Apparently only cranks and serial complainers write Letters to the Editor.

I do have a problem, however, when a paper then refuses me a right of reply to such personalised criticism – as The Irish Times recently did.  Eventually, after a letter suggesting I might seek redress by other means, my response was printed.

Now, however, the Irish Times have printed another personalised critical response from one of my antagonists.  I’m beginning to think the Letters page editor is either very sore at me, or is engaging in the favourite Irish pastime of needling people in the hope of provoking an intemperate outburst.
It’s probably all in a good cause if it provokes a certain amount of discussion of two key issues, and it’s not as if the stances I have taken aren’t likely to be controversial in some quarters. I’m just surprised at the quality of the letters The Irish Times, in particular, often seems to publish. Many of my best letters (it seems to me) never make it into print, and an awful lot of truly awful ones seem to make it through.

I once complained against the rule that no verse was allowed by writing a letter as follows:

Prosaic Instructions to Irish Times Letter Writers

Dear Madam, Editor, Irish Times
You state that within the bounds of taste
And the avoidance of libel crimes
You will wide ranging views embrace
You further advise that we be terse
Lest our efforts should go to waste
But why the statement that no verse
Will ever your letters pages grace?

Needless to say, it wasn’t published.

On another occasion I empathised with another correspondent aggrieved that her letters weren’t being published:

Moving on to bigger things – The Irish Times – Wed, Feb 20, 2008

Madam – Ita McCormack (February 14th) is under the quaint delusion that letters in The Irish Times are published on merit, regardless of the title or prestige of the signatory. From experience, I can share with her the real guidelines which must be followed:

1. Never criticise The Irish Times itself.

2. Do not depart too far from the “dominant narrative” as contained in Irish Times Editorials.

3. Never antagonise the Letters Page editor by demanding a right of reply when you are criticised by name on the Letters page.

4. Sarcastic or silly one-liners have priority.

5. If writing a longer letter on a more serious and necessarily complex subject, always lend your letter some spurious authority by signing it as President of the Lesser Spotted Bumpkins Society or some such worthy organisation, or by claiming to be a “think tank” such as “Libertas”, which is anything but a think tank as a simple perusal of its website will confirm.

Failing the above, write instead on some serious online forum which is not limited to contacts of the small-minded coterie which now runs The Irish Times and seeks to pass itself off as a serious forum for open debate. Most of us have long realised that it is anything but and have moved on the bigger and better things elsewhere. – Yours, etc,

Needless to say, the Irish Times edited out my explicit reference to The European Tribune in the last paragraph of the above letter.  Are they really afraid of competition from The European Tribune?

Previous Letters and responses in the current series of controversies have been published here in Anti-Americans should stop masquerading as anti-war [SECOND UPDATE]
From NO to maybe on Lisbon and   Bringing new users to The European Tribune

For those not yet bored by the South Ossetia controversy, I include the Letter of my latest detractor below:

Aftermath of war in Caucasus – The Irish Times – Mon, Sep 01, 2008

Madam, – Frank Schnittger (August 25th) claims that “evidence indicates” that Georgia’s US lobbyist Randy Scheunemann secretly encouraged Georgia’s actions in South Ossetia.

Well, I haven’t seen a shred of evidence to support his claim about Mr Scheunemann. And the assertion that war may have occurred to help give John McCain a “bounce” in the polls is one of the weirdest things I have yet read on the conflict. The overwhelming evidence available is that Russia has been destabilising and provoking Georgia for years.

Mr Schnittger is right about the considerable interdependence between western and eastern Europe. However, Russia’s intimidation of its tiny neighbours and former colonies has cast a shadow over east-west co-operation.

– Yours, etc,

SEAN STEELE, Kilfenora Road, Kimmage, Dublin 12.

My response, not yet published, is as follows:

Madam, – SEAN STEELE (Letters 1/9/08)  says he hasn’t found “a shred of evidence” to support my contention that John McCain’s principle foreign policy adviser and potential National Security Adviser, Randy Scheunemann, is implicated in the Georgian invasion of South Ossetia.  

Well, if he doesn’t believe me, perhaps he will believe Pat Buchanan, former US Presidential candidate and doyen of US arch-conservatives since Ronald Reagan, who has accused Randy Scheunemann of Treason – see Pat Buchanan – “And None Dare Call it Treason”, Yahoo news, 22 August, http://news.yahoo.com/s/uc/20080822/cm_uc_crpbux/op_337140

He writes there that Scheunemann “..is a dual loyalist, a foreign agent whose assignment is to get America committed to spilling the blood of her sons for client regimes who have made this moral mercenary a rich man”.  

“..Not only did Scheunemann’s two-man lobbying firm receive $730,000 since 2001 to get Georgia a NATO war guarantee, he was paid by Romania and Latvia to do the same. And he succeeded”

“Scheunemann’s resume as a War Party apparatchik is lengthy. He signed the PNAC (Project for the New American Century) letter to President Clinton urging war on Iraq, four years before 9-11. “

“Scheunemann also came close to succeeding with Georgia. “Had he done so, U.S. soldiers and Marines from Idaho and West Virginia would be killing Russians in the Caucasus, and dying to protect Scheunemann’s client, who launched this idiotic war the night of Aug. 7. That people like Scheunemann hire themselves out to put American lives on the line for their clients is a classic corruption of American democracy….”

“U.S. backing for his campaign to retrieve his lost provinces is what Saakashvili paid Scheunemann to produce. But why should Americans fight Russians to force 70,000 South Ossetians back into the custody of a regime they detest? Why not let the South Ossetians decide their own future in free elections?”

Why indeed.  And if it doesn’t make sense for the USA to restart the Cold War (or indeed a hot World War) over South Ossetia, why ever should Europe, Ireland, or indeed Mr. Steele wish to do so?

Perhaps other contributors here might like to share their experiences of writing Letters to the Editor, and whether you think it is worth the effort.  Frankly, I only do so now when I have already written a diary on a topic, and want to put a synopsis of the argument to a wider public.

Is the Mainstream Media a waste of space, or an important means of reaching a wider audience?  Does the message get diluted in a wider forum where you inevitably have to argue your case from within the context of the dominant paradigm if you want to have a good chance of being published?

What are the dos and don’ts of LTE writing?  And are we about to be overtaken by video blogs in any case?

Cross-posted from the European Tribune

At the heart of the Neo-conservative dream has been the contention that the USA is now in command of the World and that it no longer has to play ball with the realities of power as represented by other major nations.  Their mission is to create new realities, not to negotiate with the old.  President Bush’s imperviousness to facts which contradict this vision has been well documented.  His determination to wage war with enemies rather than negotiate with adversaries has been the defining feature of his Presidency.

And so we have McCain nominating Sarah Palin as his Vice Presidential nominee.  By any objective measure she is spectacularly unqualified to act as Commander-in-Chief on day one and  

“strengthen us to confront the transcendent challenge of our time: the threat of radical Islamic terrorism” – John McCain 2008 – John McCain for President

So why is Sarah Palin the ideal pick for the neo-con project?
First, let us recall some words from one of the architects of the neo-con project:New Realities in the Media Age: A Conversation with Donald Rumsfeld [Rush Transcript; Federal News Service, Inc.] – Council on Foreign Relations

The U.S. government will have to develop an institutional capability to anticipate and act within the same news cycle. That will require instituting 24-hour press operation centers, elevating Internet operations and other channels of communication to the equal status with the traditional 20th Century press relations. It will result in much less reliance on the traditional print press, just as the publics of the U.S. and the world are relying less on newspapers as their principal source of information. And it will require attracting more experts in these areas from the private sector to government service. This also will likely mean embracing new institutions to engage people across the world.

In other words, there is a war on, and it is being fought through the media.  And what you need, if you want to win that war is photogenic and telegenic personalities who embody the right values and project the right vision.  The fact that they may have not the slightest qualifications for the Office, and only the flimsiest grasp of the facts is neither here no there.

You have to identify the enemy, define it in your terms, and then sell your product as the solution to the fears you have raised.  Thus “the surge is working”, America is the leader of the free world,  and Democrats don’t understand the nature of the threats that republicans have defined with their mastery of the MSM.

They are right about one thing.  There is a war on.  And Sarah Palin can be presented as innocent of all the victims so far created.  What works in small town Alaska can be presented as the model and symbol for middle America as a whole.  It’s the Democrats who are messing with the American dream by bringing in nasty realities like urban degeneration, energy dependency, economic recession and military defeatism.

You appeal to the values of small town America and let all imagine that the world is just an extension of that worldview.  Then you blame the Democrats for spoiling the party.  Attacking Sarah Palin will be like attacking your next door neighbour.  She is the soccer mom, the local corruption reformer, the beauty queen.

Reduce the world to a scale that “ordinary” people can understand and experience in their daily lives.  And then blame democrats for making it seem so horribly complicated.

And what happens if Sarah Palin actually becomes President?  She will be the perfect front for the Neo-con project pulling the strings assiduously behind. Its the neo-American way.

Cross posted from the The European Tribune

My letter to the Editor on the South Ossetia crisis was published by both the Irish Times (today) and as the featured Letter in Saturday’s Irish Independent, the largest circulation newspaper in Ireland.

It has also drawn a vituperative response in today’s Irish Independent.

Another case of America-bashing – Letters, Opinion – Independent.ie

…the letters by Frank Schnittger and John Gunning attempting to link America to the catastrophe were ludicrous.

The former’s insinuations about a supposed role played by the McCain campaign in fomenting unrest in the region, would be laughable if they weren’t so serious.

Both letters are reproduced in full below.  Perhaps Booman readers might like to suggest an appropriate response.
Firstly, my letter:

Aftermath of war in the Caucasus – The Irish Times – Tue, Aug 19, 2008

Madam, – Randy Scheunemann, Senator John McCain’s senior foreign policy adviser, is a friend of Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili and was for four years a paid lobbyist for the Georgian government. He ended his official lobbying connection only last March, months after starting to work for McCain. He also worked on McCain’s 2000 presidential campaign, after which he headed the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, which championed the US Iraq invasion.

In 2005, while registered as a paid lobbyist for Georgia, Scheunemann worked with McCain to draft a congressional resolution pushing for Georgia’s membership of Nato. A year later, while still on the Georgian payroll, Scheunemann accompanied McCain on a trip to that country, where they met Saakashvili and supported his hard-line views toward Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

Now, at a time when McCain’s presidential election campaign is floundering, Saakashvili launches an attack on South Ossetia, killing hundreds if not thousands of civilians and drawing the inevitable Russian military response. McCain has now recast his entire campaign around “Russian aggression” and the need to return to Cold War vigilance and values — drawing attention to Barack Obama’s lack of experience and grounding in those values in the process.

It is not necessary to be a conspiracy theorist to ask, “Cui bono?” regarding the invasion of South Ossetia and the ensuing deaths. – Yours, etc,

FRANK SCHNITTGER

Secondly, the response in today’s Irish Independent to the same letter published there on Saturday:

Another case of America-bashing – Letters, Opinion – Independent.ie

After a week in which Russia repeatedly violated the sovereignty of a small neighbour, targeted civilian infrastructure, occupied several towns and villages in Georgia proper, ordered their tanks to within 20km of Tbilisi, and topped it all off by threatening a nuclear strike on Poland, the letters by Frank Schnittger and John Gunning attempting to link America to the catastrophe were ludicrous.

The former’s insinuations about a supposed role played by the McCain campaign in fomenting unrest in the region, would be laughable if they weren’t so serious.

For his part, Mr Gunning claims to despise war — a noble sentiment no doubt, yet one that seems in his case to be surpassed by a virulent anti-Americanism.

His assertion that we are witnessing, not a Russian invasion of a sovereign state, but an “American war by proxy” exposes a somewhat casual acquaintance with reality.

It seems that he is concerned, not with the suffering of the people in the region, or with the brutal contempt shown by the Russians for international law, and the sovereignty of its neighbours, but with using the conflict as a means to spread his anti-American innuendo.

Mr Schnittger asks ‘Cui bono from the invasion of South Ossetia?, to which I would answer that both he and Mr Gunning seem determined to spin the appalling situation in an effort to benefit and further their own anti-American agendas.

Indeed, concern or solidarity for the ordinary civilians caught up in the conflict are conspicuous only by their absence in both letters.

While both men are entitled to their opinions, they have very little to do with being anti-war, and I would ask that they, and others who espouse the same views, would cease masquerading as such.

EMMET DUNPHY

LOUGHBOY, KILKENNY

I haven’t been able to locate the letter by John Gunning which also draws Emmett Dunphy’s ire, so I will leave that part of Mr. Dunphy’s response to one side.

In my own defence, I would note the following:

1. My letter drew attention to the close links between the McCain presidential campaign and President of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili – and said nothing, good, bad or indifferent about the US as whole.
2. My letter said nothing about Putin’s intentions or whether the Russian intervention can be construed as over-reaction – that scenario is still unfolding in any case.
3. Given that almost all commentators, from all sides, seem to agree that a Russian response to the Georgian attack on South Ossettia was forseeable, if not inevitable, it seems reasonable to ask why Mikheil Saakashvili would engage in such an adventure.
4. Mr. Dunphy then claims that I am a beneficiary of the invasion of South Ossetia in that it enables me to spin my “anti-American” agenda and that “concern or solidarity for the ordinary civilians caught up in the conflict are conspicuous only by their absence in both letters” and that we should “cease masquerading” as anti-war.  
5. I would have thought that concern for the innocent civilians caught up in this conflict was obviously the primary concern expressed in my letter together with a fear that their misfortune might have been occasioned, at least in part, by the dynamics of the US Presidential campaign.

That is the nub of my letter which Emmett Dunphy dismisses as “ludicrous” and “laughable if they weren’t so serious”.  Yet he does not challenge any of the facts which I listed in support of my argument.

Blanket accusations of anti-Americanism masquerading as anti-war are of course the stock in trade of apologists for the neo-con project of the “New American Century”.  Perhaps I shouldn’t even bother responding.  However I feel that Emmett Dunphy articulates a widely held view – often reflected in, or created by the MSM – and I feel we should challenge it at every opportunity.

For the record I do feel that it seems likely that Putin seized on the opportunity created by Saakashvili’s stupidy or naivity to over-react and lay down a marker for other former Soviet Republics who are seeking membership of Nato or allowing the siting of American bases on their territory.  I would be surprised if that were not the case.  However the reasonableness or otherwise of Russia’s actions in this enfolding tragedy are a different matter entirely, and one not touched on in my letter.

I feel it is important that the causes of this conflict – and particularly any attempts to gain political/economic/personal advantage from a re-kindling of Cold War tensions need to be highlighted and exposed before they are lost in the welter of the usual “tit-for-tat” over-generalised arguments that are characteristic of the neo-con project.

So once again, I feel like asking the question, which has not been addressed by Emmett Dunphy’s response: Did members of McCain’s campaign staff use their connections in Georgia (for which they have been handsomely paid) to foment a crisis that would highlight McCain’s perceived strengths just when NcCain’s campaign seemed to be floundering?

Why can’t we just stick to the facts on this and leave generalised arguments about “anti-Americanism” to the rhetorical dustbin to which they belong?

Perhaps, rather than engaging in defense, I should go on the attack and accuse Mr. Dunphy of mindlessly parroting phrases like “anti-American”, ludicrous, and laughable, whilst not being in a position to rebut any of the facts in my letter?

Your advice would be much appreciated.

Coss posted from the European Tribune

Michael Lillis once ran the Anglo-Irish section of the Department of Foreign and was a central player in the British Irish peace process.  As heavyweight civil servants go, they don’t come much heavier.  Now retired, he has written a Letter to the Editor (below the fold) outlining the consequences, as he sees them, of the Irish No vote in the Lisbon Treaty Referendum.

Basically he sees the Irish No vote as giving the next (Conservative) British Government the opportunity to scupper the Lisbon project altogether.  The rest of the EU will carry on regardless leaving Ireland, trailing in Britain’s wake, in a second tier arrangement almost wholly dependent on Britain once again.

“Where’s your f*cking pride” he asks the Irish people.  We were more independent as full members of the EU than we ever were.  Do we want to go back to a form of neo-colonial dependency?  

No vote campaigners are still in denial that the No vote means anything other than the maintenance of the status quo – as if the democratically elected Governments of 25 countries are going to allow a small island to halt the further enlargement and development of the EU. Many would be glad to be rid of the UK in any case, and Ireland will be lost in its wake.

They have been kind enough to grant us a period of reflection, but do we really think they are going to stop the world for us indefinitely?  
The Lisbon Treaty dilemma – The Irish Times – Thu, Aug 14, 2008

Madam, – I hope the following scenario can and will be avoided, but just now I can’t see how.

It now seems inevitable that the Conservatives will win the next general election in Britain and that the UK will then withdraw from the core project of the European Union.

William Hague, the Conservatives’ spokesman on foreign affairs, confirmed as much to your readers in his article of July 26th: “If Lisbon remains unratified by all EU member states, a Conservative government will put Britain’s ratification of the treaty on ice and hold a referendum, recommending a No vote.”.

The third inevitability (at least from the evidence to date) is that Ireland will not have resolved its Lisbon dilemma before the next British election.

And the fourth seeming inevitability is that Paris and Berlin and their allies will not waver from their determined path. In reality it will be Tory Britain that will push herself out.

It is hard to imagine that, in this set of circumstances, we post-No Irish would have any choice but to hunker down in the new “second tier”, playing third fiddle, not to the EU Mark II, but rather to our old mistress, who will dominate a revived EFTA Mark II and in practice negotiate on its behalf with the future EU. This may not be much noticed outside our shores in the din caused by the “departure” of Britain from the EU.

Some will welcome this dispensation as a liberation from the imagined “fascism” and “militarism” of the future European Union. Some will be relieved to be back “where we belong”. Some will see it as an opportunity to impose their agenda of victimhood and nihilism on our politics. Many will simply sleepwalk through the events. Others will regret a tragic loss of Irish independence.

I had the privilege of working as a civil servant between 1966 and 1988. The overriding memory many citizens retain of those pre-Celtic Tiger years was how Ireland’s energetic membership of the Community transformed and enhanced Irish independence. In 1973 we ignored the accusations of national treason and enthusiastically gave up a substantial measure of sovereignty to join the European Community. Before then Irish independence had been measured and defined, whether constitutionally, politically or economically, only by reference to our suffocating relationship with Britain.

The change in 1973 was volcanic. Government Ministers, TDs of most parties, trade union leaders and members, entrepreneurs, students, journalists, farm leaders and ordinary farmers, as well as officials like myself, were challenged in their hundreds of thousands by the complexities and opportunities of the Community. We responded with a refreshing enthusiasm which astonished the Commission and the European Community at large and even ourselves. There was no more asking: What did or what would the British do? Rather: Where is our interest here and what is the way to win? So our people and our officials mastered the arts of lobbying and indefatigable negotiation, skills that came into their own when the Celtic Tiger began to roar. We discovered that we were after all an independent people, masters of our destiny, and neither ashamed nor reluctant to create prosperity.

In a happy paradox, the new freedom that we won through energetic participation in the European Community and Union served us crucially in a series of difficult negotiations with Britain over Northern Ireland.

It is depressing to foresee the scenario I outlined earlier unfolding with seemingly fatal inevitability. It will – incredibly but inevitably – return us to the dependent status we broke from in 1973. It is depressing to see our future as a subsidiary to Mr Hague’s vision of Little England. The poet would urge:”Muscail do mhisneach, a Bhanba”. Or, as a former Irish rugby captain put it to his team: “Where’s your * pride, Ireland?” – Yours, etc,

MICHAEL LILLIS, Dartmouth Square, Dublin 6.

Whether we like it or not, Ireland doesn’t have a veto on the future development of the EU.  Ironically it is the Nice Treaty’s provisions for “Enhanced Cooperation” which provide the basis for a two tier, two speed Union.

Ireland will remain, with Britain, in the almost empty shell of the “Nice EU” whilst the “Lisbon EU” will expand with Croatia as the first new entrant.  Perhaps Croatia deserves the full benefits of the EU more than us.  They certainly seem to appreciate it more.

RealClearPolitics – Articles – A Cut-and-Paste Foreign Policy

The discovery that John McCain’s remarks on Georgia were derived from Wikipedia, to put it politely, is disturbing and even depressing — but not surprising. Under the tutelage of the neo-conservatives, who revealed their superficial understanding of Iraq both before and after the invasion, he favors bellicose grandstanding over strategic thinking. So why delve deeper than a quick Google search?

Worse still, neither he nor his advisers yet grasp how our misadventure in Mesopotamia has diminished American power and prestige. In fact, the Wikipedia episode — an awful embarrassment that would have devastated the presidential campaign of Barack Obama or any other Democrat — revealed an underlying weakness in Sen. McCain’s vaunted grasp of foreign policy.

Personally I think Wikipedia can be rather good at providing a summary on some arcane subject – one that would take hours to compile from other sources.  Of course it can also get things wrong, but when you read the pages of Op-Ed on the Georgia Crisis in the MSM, you wonder if they can ever get it right.

However the Georgia crises seems tailor made to revive the moribund McCain campaign.  Not only does it revive the Cold War psychology that has been the basis of far-right ascendancy in US politics, but it allows McCain to claim that he was right about Putin all along.
However there are some MSM Op-Ed pieces that cut pretty close to the bone:
RealClearPolitics – Articles – A Cut-and-Paste Foreign Policy

Still enthralled by an exhausted ideology, he (McCain) seems unable to analyze how we can avoid manipulation by allies or adversaries while advancing our own real interests. Those interests include the cultivation of democracy but also the promotion of regional stability and international security. Pretending to confront Russia from a position of weakness doesn’t help.

Frankly, the Arizona Republican’s latest foray onto the world stage suggested that he is not quite ready for the responsibilities of the presidency. When he emphasized that Georgia was “one of the world’s first nations to adopt Christianity as an official religion,” he sounded like a politician who will gladly damage our global influence merely for the sake of pandering to his partisan base.

Certainly the propagandists of Al Qaeda must have been pleased to hear an ally of President Bush confirm that the United States is engaged in a worldwide crusade, for that is how such words are interpreted by Muslims. (And since when does American policy prefer nations for adopting any “official religion,” Christian or otherwise?) This was rhetorical blundering worthy of the Bush White House.

Now, Sen. McCain is not alone among politicians and pundits in exploiting the Georgian crisis to promote an exhausted ideology. Nor is he alone in ignoring the impact of Iraq on our ability to defend our allies by means of diplomacy or force. From the editorial page of The Washington Post to the office of the vice president, much sound and fury has emanated, signifying very little except a shared determination to ignore reality. When Dick Cheney threatens the Russians with “serious consequences,” what is he talking about? What would the Bush administration or its cheerleaders actually have done if the Russians had pushed on toward the Georgian capital?

Without any prejudice to the cause of Georgia’s sovereignty or its democratic aspirations, the true answer is not much, despite the illusions that our policy evidently encouraged among the Georgian leadership and people. Blustering aside, there was never the slightest chance that Europe or the United States would come to their assistance with military force against Russian troops. There are many reasons to avoid such a disaster, notably the enormous Russian nuclear arsenal, the European dependence on Russian energy supplies and the cataclysmic effect on the world economy.

Even if we contemplated the use of force, we scarcely have the capacity after squandering our power in Iraq. We can hardly bring effective diplomatic force to bear, either, beyond the tinny echo of White House blustering. The Russians must have laughed as they watched Georgian troops depart in haste from Iraq — and cackled when the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations accused them of seeking “regime change” in Tbilisi. Are we telling them they cannot just invade a country they dislike, without international sanction, because they feel threatened?

There can be no doubt that Vladimir Putin’s Russia poses a challenge to the West, and to the next administration. It can be argued that Russian ambitions must be checked now to discourage its bullying imperialism. It can also be argued that bringing the former Soviet republics into NATO only provokes the Russians into resisting encirclement by their Cold War enemies, and that we must engage Russia to cope with existential threats like nuclear proliferation and Islamist extremism. What can no longer be sanely argued is that reflexive ideology and confrontational bluster will secure our future.

We desperately need a new foreign policy that combines idealism with realism. And a president who doesn’t lift his talking points from Wikipedia.

However the more immediate question is how will this “reflexive ideology and confrontational bluster” play with the US electorate.  McCain has grasped the opportunity to play the “hard man” President who will be tough with the Ruskies like it was manna from heaven.  Most Americans don’t know where Georgia is (have the Ruskies invaded the deep South?) but they sure like to know which side their President is on.  McCain makes his position very clear in the title of his piece in the WSJ – the house magazine of Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili:

We Are All Georgians – WSJ.com

For anyone who thought that stark international aggression was a thing of the past, the last week must have come as a startling wake-up call. After clashes in the Georgian region of South Ossetia, Russia invaded its neighbor, launching attacks that threaten its very existence. Some Americans may wonder why events in this part of the world are any concern of ours. After all, Georgia is a small, remote and obscure place. But history is often made in remote, obscure places.

As Russian tanks and troops moved through the Roki Tunnel and across the internationally recognized border into Georgia, the Russian government stated that it was acting only to protect Ossetians. Yet regime change in Georgia appears to be the true Russian objective.

Two years ago, I traveled to South Ossetia. As soon as we arrived at its self-proclaimed capital — now occupied by Russian troops — I saw an enormous billboard that read, “Vladimir Putin, Our President.” This was on sovereign Georgian territory.

Russian claims of humanitarian motives were further belied by a bombing campaign that encompassed the whole of Georgia, destroying military bases, apartment buildings and other infrastructure, and leaving innocent civilians wounded and killed. As the Russian Black Sea Fleet began concentrating off of the Georgian coast and Russian troops advanced on one city after another, there could be no doubt about the nature of their aggression.

Despite a French-brokered cease-fire — which worryingly does not refer to Georgia’s territorial integrity — Russian attacks have continued. There are credible reports of civilian killings and even ethnic cleansing as Russian troops move deeper into Georgian territory.

Moscow’s foreign minister revealed at least part of his government’s aim when he stated that “Mr. Saakashvili” — the democratically elected president of Georgia — “can no longer be our partner. It would be better if he went.” Russia thereby demonstrated why its neighbors so ardently seek NATO membership.

In the wake of this crisis, there are the stirrings of a new trans-Atlantic consensus about the way we should approach Russia and its neighbors. The leaders of Poland, Estonia, Lithuania, Ukraine and Latvia flew to Tbilisi to demonstrate their support for Georgia, and to condemn Russian aggression. The French president traveled to Moscow in an attempt to end the fighting. The British foreign minister hinted of a G-8 without Russia, and the British opposition leader explicitly called for Russia to be suspended from the grouping.

So has Obama been seriously wrong-footed on this issue, and is it time he returned from his holiday to show how he would act as President?  Will the US electorate also buy into this re-enactment of Cold War politics or will it re-enforce their determination to vote for Change and a new kind of politics?

It may seem preposterous to claim that Georgia’s action was driven by the US Presidential campaign, but consider the following:

Georgia War: A Neocon Election Ploy?

Is it possible that this time the October surprise was tried in August, and that the garbage issue of brave little Georgia struggling for its survival from the grasp of the Russian bear was stoked to influence the US presidential election?

—

Before you dismiss that possibility, consider the role of one Randy Scheunemann, for four years a paid lobbyist for the Georgian government, ending his official lobbying connection only in March, months after he became Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain’s senior foreign policy adviser.

Previously, Scheunemann was best known as one of the neoconservatives who engineered the war in Iraq when he was a director of the Project for a New American Century. It was Scheunemann who, after working on the McCain 2000 presidential campaign, headed the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, which championed the US Iraq invasion.

There are telltale signs that he played a similar role in the recent Georgia flare-up. How else to explain the folly of his close friend and former employer, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili, in ordering an invasion of the breakaway region of South Ossetia, which clearly was expected to produce a Russian counter-reaction. It is inconceivable that Saakashvili would have triggered this dangerous escalation without some assurance from influential Americans he trusted, like Scheunemann, that the United States would have his back. Scheunemann long guided McCain in these matters, even before he was officially running foreign policy for McCain’s presidential campaign.

In 2005, while registered as a paid lobbyist for Georgia, Scheunemann worked with McCain to draft a congressional resolution pushing for Georgia’s membership in NATO. A year later, while still on the Georgian payroll, Scheunemann accompanied McCain on a trip to that country, where they met with Saakashvili and supported his bellicose views toward Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

Scheunemann is at the center of the neoconservative cabal that has come to dominate the Republican candidate’s foreign policy stance in a replay of the run-up to the war against Iraq. These folks are always looking for a foreign enemy on which to base a new cold war, and with the collapse of Saddam Hussein’s regime, it was Putin’s Russia that came increasingly to fit the bill.

Yes, it sounds diabolical, but that may be the most accurate way to assess the designs of the McCain campaign in matters of war and peace. There is every indication that the candidate’s demonization of Putin is an even grander plan than the previous use of Hussein to fuel American militarism with the fearsome enemy that it desperately needs.

McCain gets to look tough with a new cold war to fight while Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama, scrambling to make sense of a more measured foreign policy posture, will seem weak in comparison. Meanwhile, the dire consequences of the Bush legacy McCain has inherited, from the disaster of Iraq to the economic meltdown, conveniently will be ignored. But it will provide the military-industrial complex, which has helped bankroll the neoconservatives, with an excuse for ramping up a military budget that is already bigger than that of the rest of the world combined.

What is at work here is a neoconservative, self-fulfilling prophecy in which Russia is turned into an enemy that ramps up its largely reduced military, and Putin is cast as the new Joseph Stalin bogeyman, evoking images of the old Soviet Union. McCain has condemned a “revanchist Russia” that should once again be contained. Although Putin has been the enormously popular elected leader of post-Communist Russia, it is assumed that imperialism is always lurking, not only in his DNA but in that of the Russian people.

What seems clear is that the Geogia issue is a Godsend for the previously becalmed McCain campaign.  What better issue to show up the “inexperience” of Barak Obama?  Never mind that the narrative has little to do with the realities on the Ground in Georgia, South Ossetia or, for that matter, in Russia.  McCain finally has a stick to beat Obama with.

Sven Triloqvist:

It might be that the USA is lost. It might be that the USA should be sacrificed to save the planet. There is a lot to be said for saving the planet – I haven’t heard too many reasons for saving the USA.

Would someone like to offer me some arguments as to why we NEED the USA? I have never heard any cogent arguments, except entitlement.

When one country – using 25% of the world’s energy – the cuckoo in the nest – claims to be in trouble, I say “Are you worth saving? Give me some reasons that you should be helped!

The above comment on European Tribune – TIME Magazine: Oh, Come the fuck ON
could have provoked a lot of indignant defenses of the USA or tit-for-tat comments by US contributors querying what Europe is good for.  We could have had an orgy of mutual finger pointing to the tune of “my country is better than yours”.  To ET’s credit, this didn’t happen, other than some mildly snarky repartee.

But Sven never got much of an answer to his question, and there may be those (not here, of course!) who revel in a certain Schadenfreude as the Neo-con “New American Century” bites the dust in a welter of military stalemate, financial meltdown, and the huge loss of political influence and prestige which has characterised the Bush Presidency.

Personally, I don’t find such nationalistically framed arguments very helpful, but my attempt to frame the debate in a more global and historical context didn’t provoke much debate even if it was kindly rated.  So I am repeating it here, below the fold, in the hope that we can arrive at a more systematic and deeper understanding of how the current global political system works – or doesn’t – as the case may be.

Just what contribution has the US been making to the current world order, and how might that contribution be improved?
Prior to WW1 there was a multi-polar world order – made up of competing European based empires – Britain, France, Germany, Spain, Austria Hungary, Russia etc. – plus the US. This system was unstable because empires kept building alliances to try and defeat other empires.  WW1 was so horrible it was supposed to be the war to end all wars and the League of Nations was set up to end this system of imperial competition.

In practice the outcome of WW1 was to mutually impoverish the all the European based empires – with Britain/France as the nominal winners – but with the USA as the real winner by default.  Germany didn’t  accept its planned impoverishment – and Japan wanted to get into the game – and so we had WW2.  The USA rather cleverly let the direct combatants exhaust each other somewhat before it came in and cleaned up the remainder.  The UN and the EU emerged to try and prevent a repeat.

The Soviet Union, having suffered horrendously at the hands of Nazism and fearful of invasion wasn’t prepared to accept US hegemony, and so we had the Cold War –  effectively a bi-polar world order where all other nations had to choose which side they were on as more or less client states.  Governments which resisted incorporation into one empire or the other were subverted or toppled – by economic, clandestine, or overtly military leans – with major regional conflicts in Korea, and Vietnam.

Remarkably this arrangement proved reasonably stable at a global level: Nuclear war was averted and the conflict largely exported to third world theaters.  Europe and the US thrived, but the Soviet Union couldn’t stand the strain of being the sole countervailing power.  So the Soviet Union collapsed and we had Pax Americana –  a Unipolar world order where the US was dominant militarily, economically, politically and culturally/ideologically.

Again a reasonably stable arrangement except that some in the US elite became increasingly arrogant.  The Neo-conservative “New American Century” project basically treated everyone else as a vassal state to be subordinated to US political, military and economic interests.  The end of the threat of socialist revolution meant that the ruling elites could abandon the social democratic/New Deal compromise with the middle/working classes which had provided the basis for post war stability within Europe and the USA. Raw capitalism, red in tooth and claw, once again became the order of the day.

The trouble was that it is very hard to maintain internal stability in an increasingly unequal society without some external bogeyman to scare the populace into conformity with ruling elite interests and norms.  Gorbachev famously commented that “We have taken your enemy away from you – what will you do now?”   So the war against communism was replaced by the war on terror, on drugs, on civil liberties, and on any convenient dictator who could be mustered up to play the bad guy.

Some, like Israel, and perhaps the UK and Saudi Arabia managed to secure a favoured place in this new dispensation – and were very happy to play along.  But others in Europe sought to create a countervailing force through the EU and some states like Russia, China, India, and Iran are beginning to challenge US hegemony.  The US is too thinly spread to control the entire global system on its own, but has been inept at creating alliances whereby other client states do much of the controlling work for it at a regional level.

So we are in danger of reverting to a multi-polar system with all the dangers of inter-imperial competition we had prior to WW1.  However much we might dislike many aspects of US hegemony, American dominance since WW2 has coincided with a period of RELATIVE peace and prosperity around the world (ok – the Vietnamese, Palestinians, Iraqis etc. might not agree).  However this phenomenon may not have all that much to do with American exceptionalism or any particular innate characteristic of the American people, and more to do with the characteristics of a Unipolar rather than a multi-polar world order.

We REALLY don’t want to go back to a pre-WW1 type system of international relations with competing Empires creating alliances and waging war on each other. It is a pity the US (under Bush) hasn’t shown more foresight and sought to build up the UN and other world organisations to create a system of genuine global governance which can more equally and fairly represent and express the differing interests  within that global world order.  

We need better systems to control war crimes, human rights, regional conflicts, local despots,  global warming, trade, currency exchange, financial services etc. – but having acquired a world empire, the US has been too unwilling to let go of some of that power and allow a more genuinely democratic and balanced world order to emerge.  Critical to the Neo-con project was the destruction of the UN and any attempts to develop a coherent and enforcible body of International Law to which all would be subject as equals.  Even the re-introduction of Government sponsored torture may have had more to do with undermining all international law and conventions than with gaining any actionable intelligence on the ground.

It was to be US rule and with everyone else having to play by the US rules.  Consequently the US is engaged in a series of wars to try and maintain this dominance – and is being weakened in the process.   China, India, Japan, the EU etc. – are not carrying much of the costs of these wars, and thus are growing more economically powerful vis a vis the US all the time.  Sooner or later the US elite need to learn that military/hard power on its own is costly and ineffectual, and that if it wants its values to prevail it will have to cede many of its imperial powers to genuinely global governance agencies.  The tragedy for the US is that Bush has wasted the last 8 years doing the exact opposite.  In the meantime economic and political power is gradually slipping away from the US.

The 50 year era of US dominance post WW2 has been relatively peaceful and prosperous, and although obviously unjust in many ways, it is hardly comparable to the old Imperial looters and Hitler and Stalin in their rapaciousness and evil.  There is no guarantee the next 50 years are going to be as stable – especially if we have a serious of resource wars over diminishing oil, food, and water resources.

So we may yet come to appreciate the era of Pax Americana as a relatively benign era – not because the American people are innately morally superior, but because a Unipolar world order worked reasonably well for a time until the arrogance and hubris of the few destroyed it.

The real question is whether we can create a better, fairer and more stable world order as the American empire declines.  Smaller countries like Finland, and Ireland can have a role in this – as they are experienced in the diplomatic skills needed to survive in the shadow of imperial powers.  But the much bigger question is whether the emerging bigger powers can have the vision and leadership to cede enough power to Global bodies which makes a system of international law more robust and enforcible.

If it is to succeed all the major players have to be brought on board.  That is the vision and skill set the US has not, in recent times, demonstrated, even as the unipolar world order has become ever more unstable.  We can criticise the US for this failure, but we in Europe have little to be smug about either, and petty nationalistic finger pointing is hardly the way forward for any of us.

Cross posted from
the European Tribune and other follies.

Oh no!  Not another Obama diary I hear you say.  ET has been a relatively Obama free zone in recent times despite some commentary on his European tour and his Irish roots.  And yet the outcome of the US Presidential election could have very profound implications for Europe indeed.

Obama is almost universally applauded for running a very professional election campaign machine – in sharp contrast to McCain’s relatively inept performance.  And yet Obama has consistently failed to achieve a clear lead over McCain in opinion polls – the   Real Clear Politics  average of polls shows him only a few percentage points ahead – and his favourable/unfavourable ratings are hardly better than McCain’s.

His triumphant Middle Eastern and European tour didn’t yield the expected bounce, and even the most ridiculous McCain attempts to target his “celebrity” status are not widening the gap in Obama’s favour.  Maybe   Paris Hilton  set the right tone by targeting the white haired wrinkly guy and making a better fist of articulating an energy policy…

Incredible as in may seem to many in Europe, an Obama victory is anything but a foregone conclusion.  Much greater swings in opinion polls occur regularly in US politics (witness Hillary Clinton’s demise after earlier 30 point leads).  So what is wrong with the Obama candidacy, and why might McCain still win?
Beats me!

Ok, but here are some theories.

Firstly, however much Obama might wish to transcend race, to many he is still the black candidate.  For the McCain attacks at his being “elitist”, read an “uppity” black who upsets the residual natural status hierarchy of small town US society in many states.

Secondly, despite Hilary’s active endorsement and support, many Clintonistas still bitterly resent her defeat and see it as part of the sexism endemic in US society.  They may only be huffing and puffing and come round by November, but as yet many pumas have not transfered their support to Obama.

Thirdly, despite almost unprecedented economic collapse, almost no one, including Obama, is challenging the dominant MSM and political paradigm of free markets, less regulation, lower taxes, and greater inequality to get America moving again.  In this paradigm he is an inexperienced left-winger who will do the opposite of what “America” “needs” to get the economy back on track.  The greater the economic or national security anxiety, the more some Americans will run to the father figure.

Fourthly, xenophobia.  Many Americans don’t know where Yurp is, and Obama’s popularity here smacks of a lack of patriotism and a potential betrayal of American interests rather than of a positive movement towards a more cooperative and consensual world order.  If you think your security depends on having a strong military, you’re not going to be too happy with a conciliator, are you?

Fifthly, no one is effectively challenging “the surge is working” narrative, which makes Iraq – the original basis for Obama’s campaign – much less of an issue going forward, despite the fact that Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki effectively endorsed Obama’s withdrawal timetable proposal.

—-

So what can Obama do to address these issues and sharpen the campaign focus on his areas of strength?

Firstly he needs to soften and blur his “black” identity.  I have already suggested a stop off in Ireland to highlight his Irish roots would do him no harm at all.  Obama ancestor opposed corruption in Dublin – The Irish Times – Thu, Aug 07, 2008

BARACK OBAMA had a distant Irish cousin who went on to become provost of Trinity College and later bishop of Ossory, new research shows.

It has also been revealed that an Irish ancestor opposed political corruption in Dublin.

The Democratic nominee for the US presidential election is directly descended from the Kearneys of Shinrone and Moneygall, Co Offaly, the research has revealed. His ancestry had already been traced back to a shoemaker in Moneygall on the Offaly-Tipperary border. Further research shows a Tipperary connection.

—

 The Kearneys prospered in the 18th century, with John Kearney, a distant cousin, becoming provost of Trinity College and later bishop of Ossory.

Michael Kearney, described as Obama’s sixth great granduncle, entered the guild of barber surgeons and periwigmakers in 1717, and was enrolled as a hairdresser in the freemen’s rolls in 1718. He had the right to vote in elections to the city council in Dublin.

In the 1750s, “when the aristocracy tried to gerrymander elections in Dublin city council, to put in their own candidates”, Michael Kearney was prominent among guildsmen in opposing them.

After the 1780s, the fortunes of this line of the Kearneys declined because of economic changes after the Act of Union and a downturn in the fashion of wig-making.

A genealogy which includes a Bishop, a Provost of Trinity College, a fighter against aristocracy, and a family which experienced the brunt of British imperialism cannot be a bad heritage for Obama to highlight.  Why should his African roots be allowed to dominate all discource?

Secondly, Obama needs to stop McCain setting the policy agenda on energy and the economy.  Arguing that people should ensure that their tyres are correctly inflated may be technically correct, but hardly the best way to inspire the electorate.  Is Gore really so politically toxic that Obama can’t embrace at least some of his sustainable energy proposals?  Hell, Paris Hilton would make a better energy spokeperson that McCain, so this issue should be a big plus for Obama.

Thirdly, the vexed issue of his VP choice.  He needs to diffuse the Hillary factor.  McCain is actively targeting the predominantly older, less educated, male white vote she courted so effectively.  Perhaps Obama should swallow his pride and give her the VEEP spot.  His more hysterical supporters will go ballistic – but they’ll get over it come November.  A VEEP has almost no effective role in the US political system unless the President gives him/her one – and Obama can effectively sideline Hillary later if she isn’t singing from the same hymn sheet.

But finally, Obama needs to take a real stand on some policy issues – and argue his case.  His headlong rush to the the current political centre marks him out as a lightweight who can’t stand his ground and who will be easy meat when the Washington establishment gets to work on him.  It isn’t all about getting to the White House first and then deciding what the political and economic realities of the day allow you to do. You also have to prepare the ground for a radical policy departure by “selling” it to the US electorate first.

By taking the road of least resistance now Obama also risks being seen as a weak President later – with no mandate for radical action and no means of managing a restless Democratic majority in congress.  He needs to take a stand on a few issues now:

e.g.

1. Adopt most of Gore’s sustainable energy plan
2. No more bail-outs for banks.  If they need money they pay for it with equity which can be sold (hopefully at a profit) for the taxpayers benefit later.  Hell it could fund the Social security system if the Government had large shareholdings in many banks.  That’s what pension funds do – they invest, and expect a return.
3. Hire Paris Hilton to respond to “the white wrinkled ones'” more ridiculous attack ads.  Gentle mockery and a sense of humour is the most appropriate response.  Obama doesn’t need to go there.

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Presidents Kennedy, Nixon, Reagan and Clinton all had Irish roots and were not slow to exploit those roots in their attempts to court the American-Irish vote in America.  All took the trouble to visit Ireland on a sentimental journey intended to play well with the Irish American population in the US.  In fairness, President Clinton also made a substantial contribution to the Peace process, but the other visits were mostly for domestic US consumption.

Given that Obama’s image has just been struck a serious blow by the publication, on the New Yorker Magazine cover, of a cartoon depicting him as a Muslim, and his wife as a terrorist, perhaps it is time for him to emphasize, however subliminally, that he has white, American, European and Irish roots as well.
There are reports that he is planning a trip to Iraq and Europe to bolster his national security, foreign policy, and global leadership credentials – the main areas where McCain still out-scores him in opinion polls.  

Perhaps a little trip to dear ol’ Ireland will also help break down the stereotype the GOP image machine is starting to build for him: that of a hard left, black, possibly white hating, possibly Muslim, and certainly not patriotic enough to have worn his nation’s uniform or flag pin, and that his wife has only recently become ‘proud to be an American’.

And lest anyone think that the New Yorker Cover is just a tasteless joke and a storm in a teacup, consider the following:

New Yorker Obama Cover: Pictures Speak Louder Than Words | Newsweek Voices – Jonathan Alter | Newsweek.com

To explain why it is harmful, consider Lesley Stahl and my cousin Paul.

Lesley Stahl covered the Reagan White House for CBS News. One day in 1984 she broadcast a five-minute (extremely long for TV news) blistering report on how President Reagan was cutting funding for public health and for children with disabilities. After it aired, the late Richard Darman, a top Reagan aide, called and said, “Congratulations! We loved it!”

Stahl was dumbfounded. The piece had been a hatchet job.

“Nobody heard what you said,” Darman told her. The pictures Stahl had used to “cover” her story were of Reagan cutting ribbons at hospitals and speaking at the Special Olympics. The White House knew that these warm images spoke a lot louder than anything Stahl was reporting.

So if Obama has an image problem, what better way to counteract the New Yorker image by showing TV images of him checking out some tumble down cottage in some godforsaken part of rural Ireland?

The British Daily Telegraph has its doubts about the benefit of such ancestry:

Obama’s Irish roots found to be Protestant – Telegraph

When it was discovered recently that Barack Obama had Irish forbears, it was presumed that America’s Irish Catholic population would boost his campaign to become the first black president.

But further research into his family tree has revealed that unlike John F Kennedy and Ronald Reagan, Mr Obama’s ancestors came from the other side of the religious divide.

As the descendant of an Irish Protestant family, Mr Obama should not rely on the sort of support automatically enjoyed by Mr Kennedy, whose presidency marked the political arrival of Irish American Catholics.

New research has traced Mr Obama’s maternal family tree back to his great-great-great-great grandfather Joseph Kearney, a well-to-do shoemaker from Moneygall, Co Offaly, who lived from 1794 to 1861. Mr Obama’s roots were uncovered by Canon Stephen Neill, a Church of Ireland rector, who found baptismal and marriage records in the house of a late parishioner, Elizabeth Short.

The presidential candidate, the son of a Kenyan goatherd, comes from an Irish Anglican family, many of whom emigrated to the New World at the time of Ireland’s potato famine in the 1840s.

However, in this The Telegraph is sadly out of touch – at least as far as Ireland is concerned.  The fact that his Irish ancestor were protestant will matter not one whit to the Irish in Ireland, and may in fact be helpful in gaining the support of the Protestant majority Christian population in the US.

Of course, in terms of real politique, any such lineage is absolutely irrelevant.  However in this era of image politics, any trip emphasising Obama’s Irish roots and associating him with leading figures in the peace process, cannot but be a good antidote to the sort of virulent hate politics currently being developed in the US – to the effect that Obama is a Muslim, went to a Madrassa, supports anti-white Black clerics, refuses to wear a flag pin and has an America hating wife.  Coverage of his humble roots will also help to offset the arrogant elitist meme currently being retailed by Conservative media outlets.

Perhaps Obama should give Samantha Power, his Dublin born former Foreign Policy advisor a call.  She resigned to prevent her unguarded “Hillary is a monster” comment from becoming a distraction to his campaign.  Organising a successful Irish visit could be a good way of rehabilitating her – and his commitment to human rights – as well.

In general, Obama, needs to get out more – from the hothouse of incestuous gossip that passes for politics in the Presidential campaign bubbles.  He needs Americans to see him traveling abroad, hobnobbing with world leaders, and making grave and measured statements about the issues which the world must confront.

What better way for him to eat into McCain’s advantage on National Security and Foreign policy?  Obama would be greeted by cheering crowds almost anywhere he went.  McCain would be demonstrated against, or at best politely ignored.  If Americans want America to be looked up to by the rest of the World again, they couldn’t be presented with a clearer choice.  

Many will not care, of course, believing that “they hate us for our freedom”.  But any video images meeting the great and the good on a world stage, greeted by cheering crowds cannot help but act as a subliminal preparation for Americans to see him as “ready” for the White House.  He will already have begun the visual transition from candidate to President.

Barry O’Bama for President!  (And Samantha Power for National Security advisor).

President Sarkozy is reported as having told French Politicians at a lunch in the Elysee Palace today that “the Irish will have to vote again” on the Lisbon (EU reform) Treaty.  This runs directly in the face of the Irish Government’s request at the EU Council that:

1. The Irish people’s vote be respected
2. That the Irish Government be given time to analyse the result and come forward with proposals to address the issues raised by the campaign at the next Council meeting in September or December.

The timing is particularly unfortunate in that Sarkozy is due to visit Dublin on Monday and it was hoped that he would do so in “listening mode”.

The Irish Minister for External Affairs has been on Irish national radio engaging in damage limitation and supporting the right of our European partners to have their own view on the matter.  

In an attempt to mollify irate callers to the programme he insisted that the Irish Government would listen to all views and then make its own decision on the matter in it’s own time, that no decisions had been made to date, and that any final decision would be up to the Irish electorate.  Some callers to the programme claimed to be Yes voters who would vote no if a second referendum were held at the behest of the French President. “What part on ‘NO’ does ne not understand?” seems to be the most popular response

The Irish Times’ Paris based journalist Lara Marlowe stated that the President had probably spoken in an unguarded moment at a private meeting but allowed that it was also possible that he was expressing some frustration and seeking to put pressure on the Irish Government.

Given the sensitivity of the “national identity”, “European Elite”, “respect for democracy”, and big countries dictating to smaller countries memes in the referendum campaign, Sarkozy’s intervention can best be described as unhelpful and ill-timed.

Ireland has to hold second referendum – Sarkozy – The Irish Times – Tue, Jul 15, 2008

Sinn Féin described Mr Sarkozy’s comment as “deeply insulting to the Irish people”.

Spokesman Aengus Ó Snodaigh said: “In the month since the Irish people voted overwhelmingly to reject the Lisbon treaty, we have listened to a succession of EU leaders lining up to try and bully and coerce us into doing what they want.”

He said: “The fact is that the people have spoken and the Lisbon Treaty is dead. The ratification process should stop and the leaders of the EU must negotiate a new treaty.

“There can be no question of rehashing the Lisbon treaty and putting it to the people again. EU leaders need to listen to what the people of Ireland, France and the Netherlands have said about the contents of this Treaty,” he added.

Declan Ganly of Libertas suggested on the radio that An Taoiseach should ask Sarkozy to hold a second referendum in France given that the Lisbon Treaty is substantially the same as the defunct EU Constitution.  He noted that Sarkozy has himself said that a second referendum in France would be defeated and that his attitude exemplified the anti-democratic nature of the EU project.

However in the longer term I doubt whether this spat will have any influence one way or the other.  Sarkozy is treated with some bemusement in Ireland and Carla Bruni will probably be the bigger attraction on his visit.

Le Monde is reported as floating the possibility that the Treaty will be amended to allow each country retain a Commissioner and that additional protocols could be added to give assurances on the (in any case largely irrelevant) issues raised in the referendum campaign.

Meanwhile Ireland has to hold second referendum – Sarkozy – The Irish Times – Tue, Jul 15, 2008

Earlier today, European Commission President José Manuel Barroso said he did not expect any more countries to reject the Lisbon treaty after the Irish No vote.

Addressing the Italian parliament, Mr Barroso said Polish president Lech Kaczynski had reassured him his country would not block the ratification of the treaty. Mr Barroso also said the Czech Republic would also be no obstacle.

“There has only been one No to the ratification of the treaty, and I do not expect any more,” Mr Barroso said.

Perhaps it is all part of a pincer movement to let the Irish know they are alone on this issue. However it sounds much more like inept diplomacy.

Nothing has been quite as sudden, or as rapid, as the fall from grace of the Celtic Tiger. Economic forecasters have been falling over each other with ever more gloomy revisions of previous forecasts – often made only a few months ago. An Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister) has complained that we are in danger of “talking ourselves into a recession”.  One wit in the Irish Times retorted by suggesting that on this logic we can therefore talk ourselves out of a recession as well.
Of course forecasters have also been saying that they knew all along that our building boom was unsustainable, that house prices had to fall, and that a correction was inevitable.  The problem is that they have been saying this for years and the economy just kept motoring on at rates in excess of 5% growth per annum.  The fall from grace has been a bit like the cartoon character who races over a cliff and only starts to fall when he realises he has been threading on thin air for some time.

The problem was partly that there were a lot of vested interests tied into this growth in the building industry, in particular.  Ireland was building up to 90,000 new houses a year (half the total for the whole of Britain – with a population only 7% that of Britain).  The leading political party, Fianna Fail, has close ties to the Building industry and the Government became ever more dependent on huge windfall tax gains from Stamp Duty and VAT on houses.  The Banks and Mortgage providers were also major beneficiaries and it was mostly their economists who had been talking up the economy.

The halving of housing output this year – to perhaps 45,000 will knock 4-5% off GDP alone.  Had this occurred at a time of general wellbeing, it would have been a mere temporary blip on the radar – reducing growth for one year from perhaps 6% to 2% on a once off basis and affecting only those employed in the building and associated materials and finance industries.

But the timing couldn’t have been worse.  The US sub-prime crisis, which has now become a full world-wide credit crunch has resulted in the Irish banks losing 75% of their value in the last year – despite still being very profitable and relatively cash rich enterprises.  Interests rates are going up just as we need them to go down because Ireland doesn’t register on the European Central bank radar.  Oil and commodity prices – the real causes of inflation – are hardly likely to be significantly effected by the rise in interest rates which will however help to choke off domestic economic activity.

Consumer confidence has fallen through the floor and Retail sales fell 4.8% in May – CSO – The Irish Times – Tue, Jul 15, 2008

The volume of retail sales declined by 4.8 per cent in the year to May, the fastest rate of decline in over 20 years figures released by the Central Statistics Office today showed.

A 13.9 per cent annual drop in electrical goods sales dragged down retail activity in May, contributing to a fourth consecutive month of decline, according to the CSO. Sale of furniture and lighting fell 11.1 per cent during the 12 months to May.

A recession is usually defined as two succeeding quarters of negative growth, but it looks, on these figures, that we are looking at a full scale depression.  One firm of stockbrokers put it as follows:

Goodbody Stockbrokers – News and Comment – Monday’s Thoughts

The Irish economy is facing its first contraction in GDP since 1983. GDP is now expected to contract by 2.2% in 2008 (2.1% GNP). Sharply declining construction output, a weakening labour market and decreasing consumer spending have all contributed to this decline. Internationally, higher food and energy costs, appreciating currency and interest rate hikes are also adversely affecting the economy. With construction expected to contract further and continuing labour market weakness, recovery is not expected until 2010.

Property values have dropped by 25% and are expected to drop another 15% by 2010 – a drop of perhaps 45% drop from peak to trough.  The stock market is down over 50% since the start of the year and is currently in free fall – dropping by as much as 5% on some days (including today).

May saw the largest rise in unemployment in many years and redundancies are now spreading beyond the building sector and Davy stockbrokers have just announced 75 job cuts because of a drop in private clients business.  

The Government – initially distracted by the resignation of Bertie Ahern and the Lisbon Referendum has belated begun to respond – announcing €440M of public spending cuts this year and a plan to cut €1Billion next year.  However beyond cutting overseas development aid by €45Million and belatedly seeking to put a cap on lawyers fees for the Tribunals (estimated to cost €1 Billion!!) there have been few specifics.

The National Social Partnership talks are currently in progress and there have been the usual calls for wage restraint and even one (from the Small Firms Association) for a cut in the minimum wage of €8.65 per hour.  There seems to be a consensus that the National Capital Development Plan which is focused on infrastructural development should not be touched – although it is to be hoped that there will be a better focus on value for money and project management controls on overspends.

It is 20 years since Ireland faced a similar crisis and the National Partnership Process (and EU aid) were instrumental in overcoming the problems the last time around.  However it should also be born in mind that Ireland is in an immeasurably stronger position this time around.  GDP/GNP has more than trebled in that time, living standards have risen to close to the highest in the world and the debt/GNP ratio has fallen from c. 100% to 25%.  Unemployment is forecast to rise to 6% which is still well below the EU average and there are also some positive signs on the horizon.

Firstly the Northern Irish Peace process continues to pay a peace dividend with Bombardier investing €624m in its Belfast manufacturing plant (for wings for a new generation of jet aircraft). Ireland tops the latest statistics for EU Industrial growth for May (+13% compared to an EU average of -2%).  Ireland has an abundance of wind energy, some natural gas has been found off the west coast and the largest find of Gold in the UK and Ireland has just been announced in the small border village of Clontibret which doesn’t has much else going for it!

However there are also some major structural problems which need to be addressed.  The Irish public health service still has unacceptable waiting lists and gaps in services despite a doubling of Government funding – much of which seems to have been squandered on a huge management bureaucracy and some of the highest salaries in Europe.

The lack of accountability and a culture of efficiency and value for money in the public sector needs to be addressed.  Many recent house buyers are sitting on negative equity largely because of a building bubble which was promoted by the Government, building and financial services industries.  Insurance costs make many marginal businesses unviable and there are many quasi monopolies in both the public and private sectors who can charge more or less what they like for indifferent services because of a lack of competition or choice in a small market.

Overall, I am confident that Ireland will come good again in the next few years, but that can be a long time if you are young, looking for a job, sitting on negative equity or having to pay still exorbitant rents.  A lot of people have done very well over the past few years and a lot of waste has been allowed to prosper within the system.  It’s going to be a lot tougher for the next few years but the level of societal cohesion still evident in Irish society combined with the national partnership process should see us through.