Today, GOP chairman Reince Priebus released a statement in response to the party’s year-end report, which revealed it had over $725,000 in cash-on-hand and more than $21 million in debt.

Promising greater transparency with donors, Priebus vowed to get the committee back in the black. “We have reduced staff from 124 positions to 82, frozen all major contracts until they can be evaluated, and assembled an incredibly strong finance transition team,” Priebus said of his first few weeks in office. “These moves alone have resulted in payroll savings of $500,000 a month and we exceeded the RNC’s major donor goals by over 30 percent in January with only half the execution time.”

Read the full statement here.

Politico reports:

Jon M. Huntsman Jr., the U.S. ambassador to China, sent a resignation letter to President Barack Obama on Monday and now is likely to explore a Republican presidential bid, a close associate told POLITICO. In a letter hand-delivered to the White House, the former Utah governor said that he wants to return to the United States by May, the associate said. If Huntsman won the GOP nomination, he would be challenging the reelection of his former boss. 

An administration official confirms that Huntsman has resigned, but tells Sam Stein that it’s effective April 30.

Thanks to the generosity of Rich Lowry, the advocacy of Jack Fowler, and the sagacity of K-Lo, my colleague David Kahane and I will be taking a more active role in the life of the conservative mind that is National Review and NRO. Starting today, I’ll be contributing to the Corner on a daily basis and will write four pieces a year for the dead-tree edition, while Dave will contribute his peerless, if idiotic, insights into the workings of the liberal mind on a weekly basis right here at NRO.  I’ll try my best to control him and his Lefty Sneer^TM, but a humble Amanuensis can only do so much.

It’s both a pleasure and privilege to be able to join my esteemed colleagues and good friends here at NR, and I look forward to a lively and spirited discussion of the future of our nation as we head into the crucial election of 2012. Let the fun begin — because this time, it really is personal.

The Obama administration failed to release a report today on how Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae could be reformed, despite being required to do so by the Dodd-Frank law passed last summer.

Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R., Texas), who chairs the House Republican Conference, said in a statement that the White House’s failure to meet the deadline made it “crystal clear that the President is not serious about reforming Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.”

“The Obama Administration’s repeated inability to propose a plan to reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac calls into question their commitment to taxpayer protection and their ability to effectively govern on this issue,” Hensarling added. “After more than $150 billion in Fannie and Freddie bailouts, we can no longer afford to allow the Administration to kick the can down the road.”

Financial Services Committee chairman Spencer Baucus (R., Ala.) also criticized the administration, saying in a statement that “the Democrats always offer an excuse for not meeting deadlines, even those they themselves impose.”

Baucus, who will be holding hearings on GSE reform in the upcoming weeks, stated that “GSE reform is a top priority for Republicans in this Congress.”

A Treasury Department spokesman told Dow Jones Newswires that the administration hoped to release a report in February.

If and when the Obama administration accepts Victor Davis Hanson’s sound counsel and makes publicly clear that what America wishes for Egypt is a “non-Islamist constitutional state,” the administration ought to add that any such state should be one that is safe for Coptic and other Christians.

While the current upheaval in Egypt cannot be traced to recent assaults on the Copts there, the safety of this ancient Christian community, which played a major role in the country’s cultural life centuries before Islam (and almost two millennia before Mohammad el-Baradei), would be one important test of whether post-Mubarak Egypt has moved beyond one of the little-remarked but nonetheless odious aspects of Mubarak’s rule: namely, his appeasement of those Muslims who insist that there is no room in their country’s culture or public life for Coptic Christianity or indeed any other form of Christianity.

Three weeks ago, the Egyptian government withdrew its ambassador from the Vatican after the Muslim leadership at al-Azhar, usually described as the “intellectual center of Sunni Islam,” pitched a hissy fit at Pope Benedict XVI, who had dared criticize the brutal murder of Copts during his annual address to the diplomatic corps accredited to the Holy See — a criticism that al-Azhar deemed a gross interference in “internal affairs.” The government caved to the Muslim clerisy and withdrew its diplomatic representation.

When that kind of nonsense stops, we’ll know that a corner has been turned in Egypt. Meanwhile, here is an opportunity for the administration, which has been whittling away at the idea of religious freedom by reducing it to “freedom of worship,” to regain the ground it has supinely lost in the global struggle to defend religious freedom in full.

— George Weigel is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and biographer of John Paul II.

It’s official. Sen. Jim DeMint (R., S.C.) says he has all 47 Republican Senators on board as cosponsors of his bill to repeal Obamacare.

In this good Reuters opinion piece, Jonathan Wright argues that the Ikhwan’s influence in the present uprising has been greater than most observers think. He quotes Michael Collins Dunn of the Middle East Institute, who downplayed the Muslim Brotherhood’s role in the current protests by noting the paucity of beards among the demonstrators, and the fact that even those with beards also had mustaches, “not the beard-without-mustache ‘uniform’ we associate with the Muslim brothers.”

Wright responds that the Brothers come in all shapes and sizes — many clean-shaven, with suits and ties — something that conforms to my own experience. He also notes that the Brothers, from bitter experience, do not rely on street protests, do not want to spook foreign observers, and are wary of taking power on their own since they do not feel ready to govern

For another good take on the protests and the Muslim Brotherhood, see Jeffrey Fleishman in the LA Times. Note the Brother who says that neither a Coptic Christian nor a woman can be president of Egypt.

— Paul Marshall is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute’s Center for Religious Freedom.

From Friday night’s Fox News All-Stars.

On President Obama’s statement on Egypt:

The United States is saying to the president of Egypt if you try to tough it out, we’ll stay with you if you bring in secular reformers in the government, if you begin a transition, and ultimately if you leave, but it would be not immediately — in the middle of the riots, [with your departure being] a rout and a surrender — but in transition in the months [ahead] to a democratic regime. …

That history [of the Iranian Revolution] is exactly what is guiding the policy of the administration today and that speech that the president just gave. On the one hand, the Mubarak era is going to end eventually, rather soon. He’s 82. [The regime is] not going to have a future. It has to be succeeded.

[On] the other hand we remember in the late ’70s, when the Shah began to weaken, the United States kicked away the stool under him and abandoned him. And at that point, it was over, and as we know, the Islamists took over … the Islamic revolution from which we suffer even today. That’s why the president was not ready to abandon Mubarak, but he is insisting that the transition start. And that’s going to start with the new government.

Our objective here is to make sure the Muslim Brotherhood, which is the Sunni equivalent of the mullahs in Iran, Islamist, anti-American and would make the region — put the region aflame, has to not achieve power. That’s our ultimate objective. And arranging for a transition to a secular moderate regime is our number one priority.

Among the opposition in the streets is a very widespread, strong, democratic secular opposition. Our job is to make sure it isn’t crushed by the more organized disciplined Islamists as happened in Tehran in that revolution.

Federal District Court judge Roger Vinson has ruled that the entire Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is unconstitutional. The ruling does not — as some hoped — halt the implementation of the law, but it is the widest invalidation of Obamacare to yet emerge from the courts.

The ruling is here. More as I — and far abler minds — read it.

UPDATE: Vinson’s opinion is a summary judgment, meaning there are no disputes on matters of fact between the states and individuals comprising the plaintiffs and the federal government. At issue are pure matters of law: the constitutionality of the individual mandate under the Commerce Clause, and of the unfunded Medicaid expansion under the Spending Clause, Ninth, and Tenth Amendments. Indeed, early in the decision Vinson signals he sees the case as one about federalism:

“I emphasized once before, but it bears repeating again: this case is not about whether the Act is wise or unwise legislation, or whether it will solve or exacerbate the myriad problems in our health care system. In fact, it is not really about our health care system at all. It is principally about our federalist system, and it raises very important issues regarding the Constitutional role of the federal government.”

On the Commerce Clause piece, the focus is on whether the individual mandate goes beyond Congress’s power to regulate Congress’ authority to regulate “those activities having a substantial relation to interstate commerce, i.e., those activities that substantially affect interstate commerce” (United States v. Lopez 1995). Vinson cites eminent conservative legal minds like Robert Bork and Randy Barnett en route to a determination that yes, it does.

In the key passage, from page 42, Vinson concludes that there is no legal basis for regulation of inactivity (pay attention for the (original) tea party shoutout!):

It would be a radical departure from existing case law to hold that Congress can regulate inactivity under the Commerce Clause. If it has the power to compel an otherwise passive individual into a commercial transaction with a third party merely by asserting — as was done in the Act — that compelling the actual transaction is itself “commercial and economic in nature, and substantially affects interstate commerce” [see Act § 1501(a)(1)], it is not hyperbolizing to suggest that Congress could do almost anything it wanted. It is difficult to imagine that a nation which began, at least in part, as the result of opposition to a British mandate giving the East India Company a monopoly and imposing a nominal tax on all tea sold in America would have set out to create a government with the power to force people to buy tea in the first place. If Congress can penalize a passive individual for failing to engage in commerce, the enumeration of powers in the Constitution would have been in vain for it would be “difficult to perceive any limitation on federal power” [Lopez, supra, 514 U.S. at 564], and we would have a Constitution in name only.

The news was different on the Medicaid expansion count. Here, Vinson cites South Dakota v. Dole (1987) as the controlling case. (And that’s Elizabeth Dole, then Secretary of Transportation; the case concerned the constitutionality of the feds withholding tax revenue from states for having drinking ages below 21.) :

Under Dole, there are four restrictions on Congress’ Constitutional spending power: (1) the spending must be for the general welfare; (2) the conditions must be stated clearly and unambiguously; (3) the conditions must bear a relationship to the purpose of the program; and 4) the conditions imposed may not require states “to engage in activities that would themselves be unconstitutional.” Supra, 483 U.S. at207-10. In addition, a spending condition cannot be “coercive.” This conceptional requirement is also from Dole, where the Supreme Court speculated (in dicta at the end of that opinion) that  “in some circumstances the financial inducement offered by Congress might be so coercive as to pass the point at which ‘pressure turns into compulsion.’” See id. at 211 (citation omitted). If that line is crossed, the Spending Clause is violated.

The states argued that the Medicaid expansion runs afoul of the coercion provision, facing them with an untenable Hobson’s Choice.

They must either (1) accept the Act’s transformed Medicaid program with its new costs and obligations, which they cannot afford, or (2) exit the program altogether and lose the federal matching funds that arenecessary and essential to provide health care coverage to their neediest citizens (along with other Medicaid-linked federal funds).

Crucially, Vinson did not find for the states here, ruling that the states’ participation in Medicaid is purely voluntary, and that their argument that the expansion of the program under the ACA will eventually break their budgets is based on highly disputable economic assumptions. But even in dismissing the Medicaid piece, Vinson closed this section of the opinion expressing sympathy for the federalist spirit of the states’ argument:

I appreciate the difficult situation in which the states find themselves. It is a matter of historical fact that at the time the Constitution was drafted and ratified, the Founders did not expect that the federal government would be able to provide sizeable funding to the states and, consequently, be able to exert power over the states to the extent that it currently does. To the contrary, it was expected that the federal government would have limited sources of tax and tariff revenue, and might have to be supported by the states. This reversal of roles makes any state-federal partnership somewhat precarious given the federal government’s enormous economic advantage. Some have suggested that, in the interest of federalism, the Supreme Court should revisit and reconsider its Spending Clause cases. See Lynn A. Baker, The Spending Power and the Federalist Revival, 4 Chap. L. Rev. 195-96(2001) (maintaining the “greatest threat to state autonomy is, and has long been, Congress’s spending power” and “the states will be at the mercy of Congress so long as there are no meaningful limits on its spending power”). However, unless and until that happens, the states have little recourse to remaining the very junior partner in this partnership.

Keep reading this post . . .

In May 2006, I was in Sharm El Sheikh, at a conference on the Middle East. I would like to recall a conversation that Robert Zoellick had with a group of journalists. Zoellick was then deputy secretary of state. I wrote up that conversation in a journal, here. May I do a little quoting (or a lot)? I think you’ll find it worthwhile.

Zoellick “says that he senses that the old order is breaking down in the Middle East — he had the same kind of feeling in the last years of the Cold War. Not that the two situations are the same. He provides a nice paraphrase of Mark Twain: ‘History doesn’t repeat itself, but sometimes it rhymes.’

“He can see that the region’s political systems are ‘under stress.’ People are changing, rapidly or slowly. The Gulf states ‘are trying to be little Singapores.’ (Come to think of it, Singapore is a little Singapore.) Zoellick has just been in Tunisia, and they are shaking things up there, too. Everyone wants to get into the act.

“Zoellick makes a point about political Islam, which I’ve heard from others as well. Many people are joining Islamist groups because they’re true believers, of course: They want darkest theocratic rule. But others have joined merely because they want to express their opposition — their opposition to the existing order. So it was with the Communists, says Zoellick: Many were true believers, natch; but others joined them because the Communists were seen as outsiders, dissenters, challengers.

“Egypt, Zoellick maintains, is in a ‘transitional phase.’ In addition to the good, the government has made some ‘mistakes’ recently. Like what? Like ‘beatin’ people up,’ for one thing! (That’s exactly how he says it.) And these mistakes are in conflict with the government’s own stated desires, says Zoellick: toward openness, toward liberalization.

Keep reading this post . . .

Jay: We are at odds on Lang Lang: You here (and earlier posts linked therefrom) and me here.

In the matter of Lang Lang–watching, I must defer to you. You have, as you said, been writing about him for years.

Still, the strongest statement by him that anyone has yet unearthed, to my knowledge, is:

Playing this song praising China to heads of state from around the world seems to tell them that our China is formidable, that our Chinese people are united. I feel deeply honored and proud.

Very few Chinese people — less than one percent, would be my guess — would find anything exceptionable in that statement. It is the normal kind of thing that a patriotic, apolitical 28-year-old citizen of the People’s Republic would say.

You might say that given his prominence as a public figure, Lang Lang ought to be better informed about the nature of the Chinese regime. Perhaps he ought. Don’t underestimate the depth of ignorance in which younger Chinese are raised, though. Try talking to someone — anyone — of Lang Lang’s generation about the Mao famines, for instance. (Concerning which, by the way, a new book is out, upping the death toll from the formerly-consensus 25-30 million to 40-45 million). If lucky, you’ll get a puzzled look, followed by some dimly remembered version of the Party line. (Which is, that the famines were a consequence of (a) bad weather and (b) the USSR withdrawing aid.) If not lucky, you’ll get an indignant denial.

Lang Lang loves his country, as a human being should. Like most apolitical people — for which you can read “most Chinese people,” or for that matter “most people everywhere,” a thing we political types too easily forget — he has been easy bait for the Communist Party line that they are the nation. I have yet to find a Chinese person who knows the words to “My Motherland” but everybody knows the old standard “Without the Communist Party There Would Be No New China,” with which I once entertained a National Review fundraiser.

I know scores of Chinese people from Lang Lang’s generation and the previous one. None of the quotes I’ve seen attributed to Lang Lang is egregious. Any of them could have been made by wellnigh any 28-year-old raised in China, and most 38- and 48-year-olds, too. (Beyond that you get into deeper waters.) If I am to find Lang Lang objectionable, I shall have to find most of the Chinese people I know likewise, which of course I am not about to do. No, I don’t like it either, and I do what I can by way of patient enlightenment, but that’s how it is.

The proper point of attack here is not Lang Lang but the Obama apparatus, who had no business calling in a Chinese citizen to entertain Hu & Co. At functions like this the host nation should showcase the cultural achievements of its own citizens. When Nixon went to China they made him sit through the “revolutionary ballet” Red Detachment of Women. (Radio Derb suggested we should have offered Hu & Co. a performance of The Vagina Monologues to let them know what we’re capable of.)

The question here is not “Why is Lang Lang so keen to promote his country at every opportunity?” — why wouldn’t he be? — but “Why did the Obamarrhoids give him this particular opportunity?” The answer is at the end of my column.

And on an incidental minor point, I get a twinge of irritation at hearing people (including the ChiComs of course) referring to the Korean War as being China and the Norks vs. America and the ROK. It is true that the U.S.A. and ROK took by far the brunt of the fighting on the allied side, but other countries in the U.N. expeditionary force suffered casualties, too. There is a list of figures for the combat deaths by nationality here. Some of the numbers seem to be doubtful, but the figures for Britain at least:

British casualties were 1,078 killed in action, 2,674 wounded and 1,060 missing or taken prisoner …

 … seem to have been assembled with care. Heck, the Brits even made a movie about that war. (It contained a segment about using a loose round to open the gas valve of a bren that was shown to 1950s British squaddies for instructional purposes. It also contained footage of British troops being bombed in error by the USAF … but hey, bygones.)

Amid all today’s grim uncertainty, here, via the Daily Telegraph, is a spot of light relief — some splendid news about France‘s highly decorative First Lady:

France’s first lady, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, has confessed to no “longer feeling left-wing” after three years of marriage to the country’s conservative president, Nicolas Sarkozy….Only two years ago Mrs Bruni-Sarkozy had claimed that she was “instinctively left-wing” after at one stage supporting her husband’s Socialist rival in the 2007 presidential elections…But in Monday’s interview with Le Parisien newspaper, she said her previous political persuasion was only due to her belonging to a “community of artists.” “We were bobo (bourgeois bohemians), we were left-wing but at that time I voted in Italy (her native country).” I have never voted for the Left in France and I can tell you, I’m not about to start now. I don’t really feel left-wing anymore,” she said. Mrs Bruni-Sarkozy has French nationality and can thus vote in next year’s presidential elections, when her husband is expected to stand for a second five-year term…

A recent poll suggested that 66 per cent of the French approved of Mrs Bruni-Sarkozy as France‘s first lady. She has notably been credited with improving her husband’s cultural credentials. Last week, Mr Sarkozy rattled off a string of obscure, highbrow films and books he claimed to have recently watched or read. “I am not joking,” he told a throng of incredulous journalists.

From the Des Moines Register:

Former Gov. Tim Pawlenty said in Iowa Sunday that fellow Minnesota Republican Michele Bachmann would be a strong presidential candidate, but that having two prospects from one state would not complicate his candidacy, if both of them run.

“Congresswoman Bachmann is someone I have a cordial and positive relationship with,” Pawlenty said before signing copies of his new memoir at Family Christian bookstore in Ankeny. “I don’t know if she’s going to run for president. If she does run, she’ll be a strong candidate.”

More here.

Back in the 1980s, the media never ceased exploiting the open dissent of Reagan’s two younger children, Patti and Ron. Patti especially went out of her way to embarrass her parents and undermine her father’s political position. Ron Reagan was more discreet; in fact, he was the only one of Reagan’s children who did not write a book or memoir, despite what must have been many tempting opportunities for a young, struggling ballet dancer.

Now, with the publication of My Father at 100: A Memoir, the wait is over. Two general things should be said. First, it is not easy to be the child of a very famous person. Franklin Roosevelt’s kids hated him; Nixon’s two daughters haven’t been on speaking terms for years; Randolph Churchill alternately worshiped and feuded with his father, along the way acquiring many of Winston Churchill’s shortcomings and little of his greatness. Family dysfunction seems to be the rule, not the exception. An anguished Nancy Reagan once told William F. Buckley, “I love my children, but sometimes I don’t like them.” So these books should not surprise us. Even Michael Reagan, now the chief family defender of Ronald Reagan’s legacy, called his 1980s-era memoir On the Outside Looking In.

The second thing that should be noted is that Ron inherited much of his father’s grace with language (so did Patti). I don’t begrudge him his personal grievances, but it is a shame that he has used his literary talent to besmirch his father’s memory with the risible charge that his Alzheimer’s disease was already evident in his second term. This simply doesn’t square with the evidence, and ignores a huge problem for Ron: the fact that Reagan’s greatest achievement — ending the Cold War — occurred in his second term when he supposedly was losing his mind.

Equally risible is the comment he made during his book tour that Ronald Reagan couldn’t win the Republican nomination today because the Republican party has become too extreme. The snort-worthy irony here is that everybody in the late 1970s, especially the Republican establishment, said that Reagan couldn’t win the presidency because he was too extreme. This reveals not just a lack of perspective, but a cynical lashing-out at his political opponents.

Overall, My Father at 100 looks like a lost opportunity for a talented person to give a serious account of why he disagreed with his father.

— Steven F. Hayward is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and author of The Age of Reagan: The Conservative Counterrevolution, 1980–1989.

My graduate-school professor Alan Blinder took to the pages of the Wall Street Journal today to extol the job-creation virtues of a carbon tax: “The ‘bang for the buck’ from a phased-in carbon tax would be infinite at first: lots of jobs at zero cost to the federal budget.”

Wow, that sure sounds good. Unfortunately, it ignores some Economics 101.

Only in a government-centric view of the universe would something be “free” because it has no budgetary impact. It is costly — very costly — to change from one energy portfolio (and the infrastructure that supports it) to another. Period. Nobody should pretend otherwise. A principled argument would acknowledge this cost and provide convincing evidence of compensating benefits , and certainly any argument should propose keeping the costs as low as possible. So it is curious by omission that Professor Blinder does not mention the need for complete pre-emption of provisions of the Clean Air Act (and Clean Water Act, and Endangered Species Act…) that lead to draconian command-and-control outcomes. Why argue for markets and then chain them to regulatory anchors?

Worse, Professor Blinder’s argument is a classic Politics 101 bait-and-switch. He pays lip service to the need to cut spending in the future (“lower spending as shares of GDP”) but argues for passing a tax increase right now. This would inevitably reduce pressure for needed spending discipline over the near term, lead to a permanently higher level of spending and taxes, and harm U.S. growth and competitiveness.

Professor Blinder could have solved this probably by arguing that any carbon-tax revenues should be deposited into a trust fund that could be used for a single purpose: cutting payroll and corporation taxes. That way, the carbon tax would not cause government to grow, and would in a single stroke address the competitiveness and fairness issues usually associated with a carbon tax. Low-income workers would get a tax cut to offset higher traditional-energy costs, and U.S. corporations would get agreed-upon relief from the onerous U.S. corporation income tax.

In fairness, three of Professor Blinder’s points are spot on. First, the notion that raising taxes right now is a good idea was firmly put to rest by the actions of the president and the lame-duck Congress in December. Those legislative actions codified “policy as usual” in Washington. The good news is that taxes remained low; the bad news is that there has been no tangible progress on cutting spending to change the current policy of enormous deficits.

Next, there can be little doubt that bringing certainty to the policy outlook would benefit businesses. Utilities, in particular, have to make five-decade investment decisions. The more that can be done to reduce their uncertainty, the better. The same argument applies to every business structure investment, equipment choice, or long-term fuel contract. Other things being the same, knowing what is coming out of Washington is better than not.

Finally, it is indisputable that market-based policies are preferable. This lesson goes back at least as far as 1989–90, when the first Bush White House had to dragoon John Dingell and a Democratic Congress into using a permit-trading system to address acid rain. The result? Acid rain is no longer a daily topic of conversation in the Northeast, and the program came in way below its project economic cost.

In the bad old days, Democrats bad-mouthed trading systems and price mechanisms; Republicans opposed rifle-shot subsidies and mandates. Weirdly, conservatives have a need to relearn these lessons. Republicans need to swear off targeted subsidies (ethanol credits, wind and solar production tax credits, loan guarantees) and regulations (“renewable energy standards” and the like) and get back on the market train.

If you want to do something about carbon pollution, a carbon tax and a cap-and-trade system are the same policy. Set a carbon tax at $10 a ton and you will get a certain level of emissions. Set a cap at that level of emissions and permits will trade for $10 a ton.

Now, you may not want to engage in a carbon policy. Fair enough. But if one decides to move in that direction for political, business-certainty, or pollution reasons, there is no excuse for returning to the bad old days of subsidies and command-and-control regulation. Conservatives bashing their intellectual offspring is simply mystifying.

So, let’s summarize a complete argument: Nothing is free, don’t raise taxes now or grow the government, and use market forces.

— Douglas Holtz-Eakin is president of the American Action Forum.

Rep. Fred Upton argues for replacing Obamacare with a patient-centered approach.

Wendell Cox finds that the only thing high-speed rail will hasten is our budget crisis.

Andy McCarthy rebuts Bruce Riedel’s essay “Don’t fear Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood.”

Michael Novak reports from Ave Maria University.

Ramesh Ponnuru argues that Democrats share in the blame for our lack of bipartisanship.

Michael Barone runs the numbers and predicts bankruptcy for the Democrats in 2012.

Kathryn Jean Lopez welcomes a more authentic civil-rights conversation.

Sen. Jim DeMint (R., S.C.) announced today that his bill to repeal Obamacare now has 43 Republican cosponsors (including DeMint himself). A recent addition to the list is Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R., Alaska), who must be having seconds thoughts after suggesting that a Senate vote on repeal would be a waste of time.

That leaves the following four GOP Senators who have yet to sign on to the bill:

Lamar Alexander (R., Tenn.), Thad Cochran (R., Miss.), Susan Collins (R., Maine) and Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa).

UPDATE:  Sen. Alexander is officially on board, his spokesman tells NRO.

UPDATE II: DeMint now says all 47 GOP Senators have signed on.

The Obama administration’s deer-in-the headlights policy toward Egypt will probably change if and when Mubarak & Co. leave and thereby introduce the risk of a Czar–Kerensky–Lenin or Estates-General–Paris Commune–Committee of Public Safety scenario — i.e., the better organized and militantly non-democratic forces coming to the fore amid loosely organized protest against prior oppression. 

Any “unity” government with the anti-democratic Muslim Brotherhood as a member is de facto a route to an Islamic Republic and a hostile Egypt for years to come — a veritable Libya, Syria, or Iran on steroids. We should remember just how much Nasser and, later, a pro-Soviet early Sadat stymied U.S. interests. Certainly Mubarak’s Egypt is no more Western or modern than was the Shah’s Iran, where the unlikely return to the pre-modern world soon became accepted. The thing that stopped Iraq from going the way of Iran (e.g., Saddam–Allawi–Zarqawi, like Shah–Banisadr–Khomeini) was, in large part, constant and vocal support for constitutional government and nothing but — and the skill of the U.S. military. 

I suppose the West currently feels like someone watching a train approaching an abyss without much insight into how to prevent the train from going over the cliff. Our daily-evolving strategy apparently hinges on proper triangulation, shifting from prodding Mubarak to reform to calling on protesters to form a democratic government as Mubarak appears to weaken, all while allowing some leeway should he make a remarkable recovery.

I hope we are saving our condemnation and diplomatic powder for even the hint of an Islamic manipulation of the chaos. However, after the president’s Al Arabiya interview, his silence over Tehran in spring 2009, and the Cairo speech — the constant themes being U.S. culpability for Iraq, generic apologies for purported past sins, and America’s under-appreciation of past Islamic brilliance — I fear that far too many in and outside the Middle East are unsure how America would react to an Islamist absorption of the currently popular protest. ‘Oh well, America probably sees these guys as the inheritors of Cordoba, once again doing their part to create another Western Renaissance or Enlightenment.’

In short, at some point soon, we are going to have to come out and express our support for a non-Islamist constitutional state, period — without any Carter-esque talk of “moderate” Islamists.

The dynamic of the protests in Egypt has changed rapidly in the last several days, and not for the better. What started out as a genuine pro-freedom movement is being steadily coopted by the Muslim Brotherhood and other violent and extremist forces. The risk is now growing that the overthrow of the Mubarak regime could lead to an authoritarian military regime or a radical Islamist one; in either case, the people of Egypt would be further oppressed and the U.S., Israel, and the West would be endangered. Bottom line: This is a very complex and fast-moving crisis, and it could get much worse.

Let me put the situation in some context.

In Inside the Revolution, I used three categories to outline the range of players in the region, who they are and what they want:

● The Radicals are extremist Muslims who want to overthrow every regime from North Africa to the Middle East to Central Asia and replace them with Islamist dictatorships who believe that “Islam is the answer and jihad is the way.” These include groups such as al-Qaeda, Iranian Twelvers, the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, and Hezbollah.

● The Reformers are moderate Muslims who say that “Islam is the answer, but jihad is not the way; we need more freedom, more openness, more protection of human rights and civil rights, free elections, free markets, and the creation of full-blown Jeffersonian democracies, if at all possible.” This category would include Kemal Ataturk; Anwar Sadat; Jordanian kings Hussein and Abdullah II; Moroccan king Mohammed VI; Jalal Talabani and Nouri al-Maliki in Iraq; and the popular pro-democracy movement in Iran.

● The Revivalists are former Muslims who say that “Islam is not the answer, jihad is not the way, Jesus is the way — and the only way for our part of the world to move forward and make real and lasting social, economic and spiritual progress is to skip back in our history before Islam and revive what we once had: first-century, New Testament Christianity.” These tend to be apolitical and are focused on evangelism, discipleship, church planting, pastor training, and spiritual renewal. Their numbers have swelled into the millions since 1979, despite widespread (and recently intensifying) persecution.

These are the revolutionary forces in the region, people and movements who push for dramatic, sweeping change. Then there is another set of important players:

● The Resisters tend to be secular Arab-nationalist leaders who oppose significant change of almost any kind. They may be Muslims, but they don’t want to build an Islamic empire. They want to build their own empires. They want to hold onto the power, wealth, and prestige that they currently have, and gain more if they can. They strongly oppose revolutionary movements. Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak is a classic Resister; so are Syrian president Bashar Assad, Libyan leader Moammar Ghadaffi, the leaders of Saudi Arabia, and, in his time, Saddam Hussein.

● The Reticent tend to be weak-willed Arab leaders who seem constantly pulled in opposite directions. They don’t have strong convictions. At times they appear to want peace with Israel or a modicum of political or social reform, but then other forces push back at them and they waffle or change their tune. At the moment, Mahmoud Abbas is the best example of a Reticent leader.

● Finally, and most importantly, are the Rank-and-File — these are the billion-plus everyday Muslims citizens who work hard, play by the rules,  and try to find decent jobs so they can feed and educate their families. They long for more freedom and opportunity, but mainly they keep their heads down and try not to be interfered with. They are the audience to which the revolutionaries are playing. They are watching the battle between the Radicals and the Reformers, and they are increasingly curious about the message of the Revivalists. And some of them are making their move and joining one of the revolutionary movements. 

So, with that in mind, let’s focus on the crisis at hand.

What we are witnessing in Egypt is a clash between true Reformers who want free elections and free markets and Radicals who want to use the protests to overthrow the Mubarak regime and install a violent Islamist government. (The Revivalists in Egypt are, for the most part, staying underground.)

For the first few days of last week, most of the protesters on the streets were peaceful, respectful, somewhat educated, and poor to middle class. I believe they were genuinely calling for an end to the Mubarak regime’s corrupt rule in order to achieve more freedom, more and better jobs, and a democratic government that would protect their human and civil rights.

The leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood (which began in Egypt in the 1920s) were initially caught off guard by the sudden and intense rise of the protests. Then, sensing an opportunity, they moved decisively to coopt the movement for their own purposes. They mobilized their followers throughout the country and told them to take to the streets. That’s when the complexion of the protests took a turn for the worse, characterized by:

● Violent attacks directed at the police: AFP reported on Saturday that an estimated 60 percent of Egyptian police stations have been set on fire.
● Rioting.
● The emergence of gangs on the streets wielding machetes and knives.
● Government office buildings and cars being set on fire.
● The looting of the Egyptian Museum, with vandals ripping the heads off of two ancient mummies.
● The looting of shops, businesses, and homes.
● Muslim Brotherhood members escaping from prison.
● A rising civilian death toll — as of Sunday, there were more than 100 people dead and more than 2,000 wounded.

Almost none of these things happened last summer when millions of Iranians took to the streets to protest the fraudulent reelection of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. To the contrary, the Iranian people initiated what was overwhelmingly a nonviolent, principled protest movement against a Radical regime.

So I find myself in a quandary.

Keep reading this post . . .

I have been a fan. But if he thought he might want to run against Obama, he shouldn’t have accepted a job from him. It’s especially unseemly for him to be strategizing about a run against his boss when he is serving him in such an important capacity. It’s not as though he’s the ambassador to Nepal.

That’s what former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty called the president of the United States on Fox and Friends this morning, for not addressing entitlement spending and other “real issues” in his State of the Union address last week. “Soaring rhetoric” alone does not a leader make was Pawenty’s message. 

St. Martin’s Press is selling Barack Obama’s Tucson speech as an e-book. 

There is a debate raging right now about whether Congress should create legislation giving states the option to file for bankruptcy, something along the lines of the existing law allowing for Chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy. To be sure, states are in big trouble: Total state debt is estimated at over $1 trillion, and that’s in addition to unfunded liabilities (from pensions and other obligations), which are estimated at over $3 trillion. Given the federal government’s $9 trillion in existing debt — which, according to a recent CBO report, will double in the next ten years — taxpayers cannot afford to bail out the states. Nor can we afford the precedent it would set. Federal bailouts should be off the table.

In light of this looming problem, many people have argued for state-bankruptcy legislation — most recently, Newt Gingrich, writing with Jeb Bush at the Los Angeles Times. Gingrich and Bush argue that this legislation would

allow states in default or in danger of default to reorganize their finances free from their union contractual obligations. In such a reorganization, a state could propose to terminate some, all or none of its government employee union contracts and establish new compensation rates, work rules, etc. The new law could also allow states an opportunity to reform their bloated, broken and underfunded pension systems for current and future workers. The lucrative pay and benefits packages that government employee unions have received from obliging politicians over the years are perhaps the most significant hurdles for many states trying to restore fiscal health.

It would also

allow for the restructuring of a state’s debt and other contractual obligations. In a voluntary bankruptcy scenario, states, like municipalities, will have every incentive to file a reorganization plan that protects state bondholder claims and their ultimate recovery.

The bankruptcy idea is definitely appealing, but after reviewing arguments from both sides, I think that state bankruptcy could create more problems that it would solve.

For instance, critics of the plan contend that bankruptcy will only make states’ problems worse by jeopardizing their ability to continue to borrow and finance their debt. In the New York Times, Paul Maco summarized this concern:

The mere introduction of a state bankruptcy bill could lead to “some kind of market penalty,” even if it never passed. That “penalty” might be higher borrowing costs for a state and downward pressure on the value of its bonds. Individual bondholders would not realize any losses unless they sold. […] A deeply troubled state could eventually be priced out of the capital markets.

Interestingly, Standard and Poor’s believes that the potential “market penalty” of bankruptcy would be so large that it would discourage states from even considering bankruptcy as a real option:

We believe the financial implications, in terms of increased borrowing costs and reduced market access, of a bankruptcy filing typically outweigh the benefits of restructuring debt service, which on average represents only 4 percent of expenditures for states.

To that argument Bush and Gingrich respond that states would “consider their long-term lending potential and credit worthiness” in restructuring, thus minimizing the market penalty.

Now, unlike some critics of state bankruptcy, I am in favor of states being priced accurately by the bond market for the risk they truly represent, even if it means default and inability to borrow more money for some of them. It beats the current situation, where investors are under the illusion that giving more money to nearly bankrupt cities and states is a profitable investment. However, I am not sure that this readjustment in interest rates should be brought about by introducing legislation to allow states to go bankrupt. One reason is that such legislation would rattle the bond markets for the states as a bloc; the spread would be wider for the most troubled states, but it would likely raise the cost of borrowing for all states. Not every state is in the same financial situation; the interest rates they face should be tailored to their position and their willingness to improve it. However, with the introduction of state-bankruptcy legislation, the most troubled states could cause serious negative externalities for relatively less troubled states.

Besides, as the Manhattan Institute’s Nicole Gelinas explained in this Boston Globe piece, “Bond-market brinkmanship and bankruptcy threats can’t save the states from themselves.”

A more damning argument against state-bankruptcy legislation is it that it may forestall needed reforms. Think about it this way: Constitutionally, states cannot be forced into bankruptcy by their creditors. That means that any bankruptcy proceeding would have to be voluntarily initiated by state legislatures. But what makes us think that they would do that? Writing in the Wall Street Journal last week, E. J. McMahon explains:

Keep reading this post . . .

Thanks for the update, Kathryn. To learn more about Huntsman, check out this lengthy Charlie Rose interview from December. In it, the former Utah governor explains why he took a post in Obama administration:

ROSE: You’re a man often mentioned as having a very bright political future. So President Obama comes to you and says: “I want you to be my ambassador to China.” Why? And why did you say yes?

HUNTSMAN: I like to think he did it because he cares about the relationship in the sense that bipartisan management matters. In 31 years of our diplomatic relationship, it hasn’t given away to political extremes. It’s been managed in a bipartisan fashion. And I accepted it because the President asked. If you can make a unique contribution, hardship though it might be, you stand up and serve.

ABC News republishes items from Mother Jones? That is what appears to have happened here:

The Sunday edition of the New York Times featured a shrill house editorial complaining about ongoing efforts to enact state level pro-life laws.  Pro-life proposals to regulate abortion clinics and protect unborn children were deemed “ominous”  “big brother measures” and “outrageous government intrusions.”  Both the timing and tone of this editorial are puzzling. Just last week Philadelphia abortionist Kermit Gosnell was charged with eight counts of murder for using scissors to kill babies delivered alive in his abortion mill. His clinic was described by regulators as a “filthy, foul smelling house of horrors.” In light of this, the New York Times must be the only newspaper in the country which believes that abortion clinics are somehow overunder-regulated.

More puzzling is the fact that the Times has a poor grasp of pro-life legislative strategies in the various states.  The editorial cites two areas where anti-abortion forces will be active in 2011.  The first area they mention is the fight over health insurance. This is odd because the key battles over abortion funding will likely take place, not in the states, but rather at the federal level. Two bills have already been introduced that will receive serious consideration. Congressman Chris Smith  has introduced  H.R. 3 “The No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act” which would create a permanent ban on federal taxpayer funding of abortion.  Additionally, Congressman Joe Pitts has introduced H.R. 358 “The Protect Life Act.” would rewrite multiple provisions of Obamacare in order to prohibit federal subsidies for abortion.

The second area mentioned by the Times are state-level efforts to ban late-term abortions. Here the Times fails to provide the whole story.  The editorial mentions a Nebraska law which went into effect in October which “bans abortions 20 weeks after conception” and “includes a very narrow exception for a woman’s life and physical health.”  However, what the Times fails to mention is that bill was called the “Pain Capable Unborn Child Protection Act.” This piece of legislation was introduced because there is a growing scientific consensus that the unborn can feel pain 20 weeks into gestation.  Pro-lifers hope the Supreme Court will take seriously Nebraska’s assertion that they have a compelling state interest in protecting the life of  those unborn children who, according to substantial medical evidence,  are able to feel pain.

Overall, state pro-life strategies will be far more varied than the Times realizes. In Alabama, Republicans won control of both chambers of the state legislature for the first time since 1874.  Even though the state legislature has often contained a pro-life majority in the past, hostile Democratic committee chairs have often succeeded in blocking pro-life bills. A Republican majority may give Alabama pro-lifers the opportunity to strengthen our parental-consent and informed consent bills. In Mississippi, pro-lifers have almost run out of legislation to pass and have succeeded in placing a personhood amendment on the ballot this November — a strategy that is controversial in pro-life circles.

The New York Times, however, is right about one thing. Most of the important gains made by the pro-life movement are taking place in the states.  This has been the case since the 1990s.  The pro-life movement was stalemated at the federal level by having Bill Clinton in the White House. However, the Supreme Court’s 1992 Planned Parenthood v. Casey decision gave pro-lifers some more legislative options at the state level.  Buoyed Republican gains in many state legislatures during the 1994 election, the number of states with parental involvement laws, informed consent laws, and waiting periods all increased dramatically during the 1990s.  These laws have helped reduce the number of abortions performed in the United States by over 20 percent since 1990. Furthermore, pro-lifers should hope that the gains made in the 2010 elections result in a similar surge in pro-life legislation across the 50 states.

 – Michael New is an assistant professor at the University of Alabama and a fellow at the Witherspoon Institute in Princeton, NJ.

Today on Uncommon Knowledge, Stanley Kurtz shares his surprise at what he discovered in Obama’s past.

Aaron Marcus of the Student Free Press Association describes how some political activists at Rutgers chose to commemorate International Holocaust Remembrance Day:

A mixture of anti-Zionist, socialist and pro-Palestinian groups descended on Rutgers University for the third stop of the “Never Again for Anyone” tour on Saturday. The month long tour is traveling across the United States with one particular and deplorable message, comparing Israeli acts of self-defense to the systematic murder of over 11 million men, women and children at the hands of the Nazis.

U.S. Ambassador to China, Jon Huntsman, a Republican, is expected to resign in the spring to launch a bid for president. 

At an off-the-record dinner over the weekend, White House chief of staff William Daley made light of the former Utah governor’s chief liability: “I want Jon to know that the president has no hard feelings. In fact, he just did an interview with the Tea Party Express saying how integral he has been to the success of the Obama administration.” 

He said it. Truth be told, having worked in the Obama administration probably isn’t a plus in either the Republican or Democratic primary. 

Last week, while in Iowa, Newt Gingrich endorsed broad government mandates on automakers to promote greater use of ethanol. In the process, he lambasted “big city” critics and the WSJ editorial page and dismissed concerns that ethanol mandates increase the cost of food and fuel. This morning the WSJ fires back, chiding the former professor for his cornpone pandering and “support for Mr. Obama’s brand of green-energy welfare.” Gingrich may think cuddling up to the corn lobby will enhance his presidential prospects, but his extreme endorsement of ethanol mandates won’t reassure those who already doubt his fealty to free enterprise and limited government.  

Veterans of the environmental reform battles waged while Gingrich was speaker will recall his behind-the-scenes efforts to kill Endangered Species Act reforms that would have protected private property rights and, incidentally, eliminated the biggest obstacles to species conservation on private land. Given the choice, Gingrich stood with the environmental establishment against private property owners. Now he’s picking the corn lobby over American consumers (and supporting policies that undermine habitat protection and threaten groundwater to boot). 

Marco Rubio, the star of last year’s Conservative Political Action Conference, isn’t going this year. Not because of his judgment on any particular controversy, but because he’s got a job to do. This has been his message since arriving in Washington. Not a bad way to start out as a senator.

Economic failure is not, of course, the sole explanation for the Egyptian revolution, but looking at the horrific rate of unemployment amongst Egypt’s 18-30year olds (a very significant part of the population thanks to the country’s disastrous population explosion) is a pretty good place to start when trying to understand what is going on.

And so is the surge in food prices.

Writing over at the Daily Telegraph, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard takes a closer look: 

The surge in global food prices since the summer – since Ben Bernanke signalled a fresh dollar blitz, as it happens – is not the underlying cause of Arab revolt, any more than bad harvests in 1788 were the cause of the French Revolution. Yet they are the trigger, and have set off a vicious circle. Vulnerable governments are scrambling to lock up world supplies of grain while they can. Algeria bought 800,000 tonnes of wheat last week, and Indonesia has ordered 800,000 tonnes of rice, both greatly exceeding their normal pace of purchases. Saudi Arabia, Libya, and Bangladesh, are trying to secure extra grain supplies.

 

The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said its global food index has surpassed the all-time high of 2008, both in nominal and real terms. The cereals index has risen 39pc in the last year, the oil and fats index 55pc. The FAO implored goverments to avoid panic responses that “aggravate the situation”. If you are Hosni Mubarak hanging on in Cairo’s presidential palace, do care about such niceties?

 

France’s Nicolas Sarkozy blames the commodity spike on hedge funds, speculators, and the derivatives market (largely in London). He vowed to use his G20 presidency to smash the racket, but then Mr Sarkozy has a penchant for witchhunts against easy targets.

 

The European Commission has been hunting for proof to support his claims, without success. Its draft report – to be released last Wednesday, but withdrawn under pressure from Paris – reached exactly the same conclusion as investigators from the IMF, and US and British regulators

 

The immediate cause of this food spike was the worst drought in Russia and the Black Sea region for 130 years, lasting long enough to damage winter planting as well as the summer harvest. Russia imposed an export ban on grains. This was compounded by late rains in Canada, Nina disruptions in Argentina, and a series of acreage downgrades in the US. The world’s stocks-to-use ratio for corn is nearing a 30-year low of 12.8pc, according to Rabobank.

 

The deeper causes are well-known: an annual rise in global population by 73m; the “exhaustion” of the Green Revolution as the gains in crop yields fade, to cite the World Bank; diet shifts in Asia as the rising middle class switch to animal-protein diets, requiring 3-5 kilos of grain feed for every kilo of meat produced; the biofuel mandates that have diverted a third of the US corn crop into ethanol for cars.

 

Add the loss of farmland to Asia’s urban sprawl, and the depletion of the non-renewable acquivers for irrigation of North China’s plains, and the geopolitics of global food supply starts to look neuralgic.  

And yet still there are those who claim that the real problems are faced by those countries fortunate enough to enjoy the benefits of stable or falling populations. Amazing.

Via the Economist’s Democracy in America blog:

We should all be warily celebrating the possible fall of the Mubarak regime, not bemoaning it. Not because it will lead to any near-term benefits for us, but because it stands a chance of making Egyptians freer.

 Well, it also stands a chance of making Egyptians even less free than they already are.

Even if we do accept that a change in government it might really help Egyptians to greater freedom, this next comment sounds like one more chorus of Kumbaya:

That doesn’t mean that such freedom will be in the interests of the United States, in the near term or really in any term we can envision. We should be cheered when other nations start to “find their voice”, not because it is in our interests, but despite the fact that it may not be.

 I rather think that ought to depend on what that voice turns out to be.

 Over at the (London) Spectator, Alex Massie takes a less starry-eyed, but still somewhat optimistic view:

 What we can, I think, say is that the thirst for reform is vastly greater than it was 20 years ago and there really is a much greater sense across the muslim world that legitimacy is conferred by the ballot box. Voting isn’t enough to build civil society on its own but it’s a necessary part of that process. And it is a process that, even if it sometimes means terribly objectionable parties might sometimes win, offers a better long-term future for the region than does a failed status quo.

 Maybe, but against that there is the suspicion that if Islamists seize the levers of power, Egyptians could, as the saying goes, be allowed one man, one vote, one time.

To say that South Sudan will have a hard row to hoe is an understatement, to say the least, but the news that its people have voted for independence may with luck represent some sort of progress for their troubled region while, unfortunately, helping the Islamists in the North of the once united Sudan. They will now be able to operate unburdened by the need to acknowledge, however slightly, the sensitivities of the animist and Christian south.

Next on the list, Somaliland, a nascent, but, it seems, relatively well-run nation trying to emerge from the hulk that is Somalia. It has had to struggle for any sort of international recognition. Why?

Meanwhile, the Economist’s Charlemagne takes a look at Belgium, another country ripe for division, finding time to include the story of the great library partition of 1968:

In 1968, though, it was the Belgians themselves who cleft the book collection during their language wars. To Flemish students’ cries of Walen Buiten (“Walloons Out”), the French-speaking bit of the university was ejected. [Leuven University] library’s 1.6m books were divided, often by the crude expedient of keeping odd-numbered tomes in Leuven and sending even-numbered ones to the new campus of Louvain-la-Neuve, in French-speaking Wallonia.

Campus legend perhaps, but attending the (Francophone) Université Libre de Bruxelles not much more than a decade later I was told the same thing had happened in Brussels. On that occasion the Flemish (a distinct minority within the Belgian capital) students were exiled to what was in my day the rather grim campus of the new Vrije Universiteit Brussel,

In any event, the country’s divisions have sharpened still further since then. As Charlemagne recounts, after over 230 days, Belgium is still without a government and…

…Today’s blockage is unlike previous ones in that an avowedly separatist party, the New Flemish Alliance (N-VA), has for the first time become dominant in Flanders. Led by Bart de Wever, a charismatic bruiser, the N-VA’s appeal stems precisely from popular exasperation with the messy, unsatisfying compromises of the older political groups. It wants a decisive shift of powers to Flanders, and makes little secret of its wish to see Belgium “evaporate” within the EU. Danny Pieters, the N-VA president of the Belgian Senate, says he sees no need for a Flemish army: one day Belgian forces will be part of a European one. For the N-VA, Europe is the acid that will help to dissolve Belgium.

Let’s hope.

Barry Rubin, director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, and author of books including The Muslim Brotherhood: The Organization and Policies of a Global Islamist Movement, took some questions Sunday from National Review Online on the situation in Egypt.

Kathryn Jean Lopez: Why all this optimism in the media vis-à-vis Egypt? Why do you believe it’s so wrong?

Barry Rubin: Everybody likes the idea of the oppressed and repressed masses rising up against a dictatorship. Both conservatives and liberals find this appealing. And because America is a democratic country and the current wisdom is that everyone all over the world is alike, the assumption is that Egyptians want to have civil rights and freedom. This is reinforced by the Bush-era support for democratic change in the Middle East based on the idea that the dictatorships have indoctrinated the people to be anti-American. That view is true as far as it goes, but one reason why the dictatorships have pushed the political line they do is precisely because they know it will be popular.

But what if this bipartisan preconception is wrong? What if the most likely alternatives are either an Arab-nationalist dictatorship or an Islamist dictatorship? First, the moderate democratic forces are weak, disorganized, and few in number compared with their two rivals. Second, in Egypt especially, many of the “moderate democrats” are quite extremist, even if they are leftist or radical-nationalist rather than Islamist in doctrine.

We also have some precedents: Iran’s revolution (Islamism); Palestinian elections (Hamas); Lebanese democracy (Hezbollah); Algerian free elections (bloody civil war); Turkish democracy (Islamist regime at present). This pattern cannot be ignored, there are reasons for it.

Lopez: You’ve compared U.S. policy in response to what’s going on in Egypt with its policy on recent uprisings in Iran. Why is this an important point?

Rubin: In Iran, the Obama administration generally remained silent and the stolen election, mass opposition movement, and repression had no effect on U.S. policy. Now, as Arab newspapers have noted, the administration is taking a tough line against the Egyptian regime. Why be so lenient when an Islamist enemy of the United States is challenged by democratic dissidents and so tough when a U.S. ally faces a revolt?

Lopez: What would you advise reporters as they watch what is going on?

Rubin: There are three key decisions.

First, will the army and elite push out Mubarak in order to make the regime’s survival more likely?

Second, will the army stick together and step in to restore order? Is it waiting to force Mubarak’s resignation? To wait until people are sick of disruptions and yearn for an end to anarchy? Or because the army is divided and isn’t sure that the troops will obey orders, including firing on civilians? If it is the third, the regime is doomed.

Third, will the Muslim Brotherhood decide that a revolutionary situation is at hand and stake everything on pushing for the regime’s end? The leaders know that if they are wrong they will end up dead or in concentration camps.

Lopez: If a Muslim Brotherhood government rises, what might the repercussions be regionally?

Rubin: If I believed that Egypt would become a moderate, stable, democratic state I would be quite happy. Yet there are many reasons that the possible result — and that’s a strong possibility — is that a new regime would be anti-American, either Islamist or Islamist-radical nationalist, threaten regional stability, stop opposing the Iran-Syria bloc, and go back to war with Israel. Those are pretty high stakes!

Lopez: Why is the Muslim street so anti-American?

Rubin: That is a long answer. Of course, some will say it is purely because of Israel but that’s nonsense. The shortest answer is this: On one hand, they have been indoctrinated by schools (where it is still taught that the United States attacked Egypt in 1967 and destroyed its air force), mosques, and media into anti-Americanism for decades. But it is not all passive, of course. As Arab nationalists, their worldview says America is the enemy, and as Islamists the same point applies. They blame the United States for the existing order — including the current regime — yet they were also anti-American when, before the mid-1970s, the government was also anti-American. The United States is an all-purpose scapegoat.   

Lopez: What is the fate of Coptic Christians if there is a dramatic political change in Egypt?

Rubin: Again, it would be nice to imagine that everyone will be brothers in the new Egypt. But one can remember how the Young Turk revolution in the Ottoman Empire began with everyone embracing each other in the streets and ended in the massacre of Armenians. They have a hard time now and will be far worse off in an Islamist state. Even if Egypt became democratic they would keep a low profile, fearing attack from an Islamist opposition.

Lopez: What should we most be paying attention to as we watch events unfold? What should we be encouraging?

Rubin: I explained the three key things to watch above. For me, what would be encouraging is if the army and leadership got rid of Mubarak and his son, took firm hold of the situation, and made some changes to win popular support. But in that context the regime would survive even if the current ruler did not.

Saying these things doesn’t make me happy. I know many Arab reformers, I respect them, and I’d like to see them triumphant. This might happen in Tunisia, but the situation is very different in Egypt. Wishful thinking is neither a good analysis nor a good policy.

When President Obama called Saudi King Abdullah to discuss events in Egypt last night, he must have gotten a don’t-go-wobbly earful.  The Saudi Press Agency, according to Stratfor.com, is reporting today that the king “affirmed the importance of Egypt’s stability, safety and security.” And, as the SPA put it, “the events in Egypt are accompanied by chaos, looting, intimidation of innocents, exploitation of freedom and expression as well as attempts to ignite chaos to achieve suspicious goals which are unapproved by either Saudi Arabia or the United States.” Abdullah would not look kindly on Mohammed ElBaradei as the next Egyptian president, of course. Far from cutting off the head of the snake, as IAEA inspector, ElBaradei was seen as overly accomodating and protective of Iran and its nuclear efforts.  The king views Egypt as “integral” to the Arab and Islamic nations, as SPA explains, and thus within his sphere of influence. A rise to power of the Muslim Brotherhood, with or without ElBaradei, would pose a threat to this.  Since the Saudi monarchy has been the go-to authority for nearly all matters Islamic and Arabic (Iraq was a glaring exception to this rule) for both Democrat and Republican administrations, I suspect we won’t see any immediate suspension of U.S. military aid to Egypt as is recommended by the Working Group on Egypt.

Former National Security Adviser to President Carter, Zbigniew Brzezinski, appeared on ABC’s This Week to express his worried fear that the failure of Mubarak to depart the scene may exact a high cost. Recommending that outside forces need to begin the difficult and unglamorous work of shaping a post-Mubarak future, he outlined the alternative scenario: a brutal crackdown by Egyptian security forces that perpetuates a corrupt and lawless status quo. Echoing this concern, Senator McCain appeared on CNN’s State of the Union invoking the “lessons of history.” He sketched these as follows. “Autocratic, repressive regimes cannot last forever, and the longer they last, the more explosive the results.” Despite the long, cruel reign of Mubarak, McCain considers fears of an Islamist takeover somewhat overblown. “There is a real [democratic] awakening,” he said, declaring his “confidence” in the judgment of the Egyptian people if properly channeled in the democratic process. The most important focus presently, he advised, must be to take “the right side of history” and stand “strenuously for human rights.” The conclusions drawn by these political opposites seems oddly aligned: The world, to say nothing of Egypt, would pay dearly for maintaining this dictatorship — if Vice President Biden will forgive the expression — instead of hastening a transition to democracy.

In a post yesterday, I mentioned that Lang Lang, the Chinese pianist, is a vice president of the All China Youth Federation. Hu Jintao himself — now the CCP number one — was once president of this organization. For more, read Matthew Robertson, here.

I have a letter from a woman in Australia, who says, “Because I grew up in China, and was once a CCP member, I know too well that the All China Youth Federation is a 100 percent political organization under the CCP. Therefore, to me, it is nonsense for Lang Lang to proclaim that ‘art is outside politics’ while he holds a prominent position in such an important political organization.”

My hunch is that Lang Lang doesn’t have a political thought in his head. That he is instead thinking about Mozart, Debussy, and girls (which is good). I believe he simply confuses Chinese patriotism, or a national feeling, with loyalty to the CCP. That’s the way the CCP wants it, of course: There is no difference between the CCP and China. I further suspect the following: The fact that Lang Lang lives abroad means that he thinks he must be all the more loyal to the CCP. That he has to be more “Chinese” than those living in China. There may be a speck of guilt at play.

Anyway: The lady — the exile in Australia — has a point.

One more thing: Is there anyone more vexing than the person who stands with a dictatorship while himself living in conditions of freedom? Someone else always has to pay the price. Lang Lang never feels the lash of the CCP’s dictatorship. He merely receives decorations from them. I don’t begrudge this pianist’s glorious career in the West. It has been a pleasure to have a front-row seat at it, so to speak. As I mentioned yesterday, I think I’ve written as much about him as I have about any musician over the last ten years. I just wish he’d think now and then of his countrymen in the gulag, laogai. And if he can’t do that — maybe be a little less ardent and effusive in his solidarity with the masters of that gulag.

Wei Jingsheng, Gao Zhisheng, Wang Dan, Liu Xiaobo, Jianli Yang, Harry Wu — those men, to me, are the real patriots of China. If patriotism means caring about and loving your country — and the people in it.

P.S. Lang Lang, who played at Barack Obama’s Nobel ceremony in 2009, sure as hell wouldn’t have played at Liu Xiaobo’s ceremony, in 2010.

From Samuel Huntington’s 1996 book, The Clash of Civilizations:

As the relative power of other civilizations increases, the appeal of Western culture fades and non-Western people’s have increasing confidence in and commitment to their indigenous cultures. The central problem in the relations between the West and the rest is, consequently, the discordance between the West’s–particularly America’s–efforts to promote a universal Western culture and its declining ability to do so. (183)

During the 1970′s and 1980′s over thirty countries shifted from authoritarian to democratic political systems….Democratization was most successful in countries where Christian and Western influences were strong….These transitions and the collapse of the Soviet Union generated in the West, particularly in the United States, the belief that a global democratic revolution was underway and that in short order Western concepts of human rights and Western forms of political democracy would prevail throughout the world. Promoting this spread of democracy hence became a high priority goal for Westerners….The greatest resistance to Western democratization efforts, however, came from Islam and Asia. This resistance was rooted in the broader movements of cultural assertiveness embodied in the Islamic Resurgence and the Asian affirmation. (193)

In the post-Cold War world the choice can be the more difficult one between the friendly tyrant and an unfriendly democracy. The West’s easy assumption that democratically elected governments will be cooperative and pro-Western need not hold true in non-Western societies where electoral competition can bring anti-Western nationalists and fundamentalists to power….As Western leaders realize that democratic processes in non-Western societies often produce governments unfriendly to the West, they both attempt to influence those elections and lose their enthusiasm for promoting democracy in those societies. (198)

While Huntington worried about civilizational conflict, he did not believe we were in the midst of a full-scale clash with the Muslim world in 1996, or even after September 11, 2001. Huntington’s fear was that overly-ambitious efforts to promote democracy and Western culture abroad would actually help to create such a clash.

The Bush administration’s retreat from democracy promotion after 2005 can be seen as an example of the loss of enthusiasm for this policy, as predicted by Huntington. The strength of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, the electoral victory of Hamas, and other similar prospects scared the Bush administration off of its policy, for good reason. Of course, many see Bush’s retreat on democratization as a mistake that has helped to force us into our current unpalatable choice between a dictator and Islamists. As I see it, however, the forces militating against authentic liberal democracy in Egyptian society are too deeply rooted to have been overcome through a continuation of Bush’s democratization policy. That argument will undoubtedly continue.

The revolution in Egypt has launched a new American wave of enthusiasm for democracy abroad. I predict this enthusiasm will cool over the coming months and years as we see what the change has wrought. Recent developments in Turkey and Pakistan, each of which sparked earlier waves of optimism in the West, have not been encouraging. These things evolve slowly, but the direction seems clearly to be along the lines predicted by Huntington. Think of Lebanon as well.

Egypt may hold for now. The best resolution would be a good amount of de facto control by the miliary mixed with a bit of slow-motion democratic reform. Yet the door is now open to the gradual expansion of Islamist power in Egypt. A fairly rapid and total Islamist takeover with knock-on effects throughout the region is at least a possibility. That really would mean a full-scale civilizational clash. With luck and care, we’ll avert that worst-case outcome for a time. Yet the medium-term prospects are not encouraging.

Broadly speaking, I’m sympathetic with Huntington, although I think that over the very long term, authentic democratization is more possible than Huntington would have granted. I gave my take on the Huntington-Fukuyama debate post-9/11 in “The Future of History.” If Egypt falls to the Islamists, it will be time for another assessment.

Imagine Elliot Abrams on Hardball Monday. His Washington Post piece today: “Egypt protests show George W. Bush was right about freedom in the Arab world.”

In a long and interesting post over at the London Spectator Alex Massie thinks aloud over where the Egyptian revolution might be going. Agree or disagree, it’s all worth reading, but this caught my eye:

 

At the moment the protests and the grievances do not seem to show any support for turning Egypt into a religious state. Rather it’s a matter of economics and opportunity.

“Any” is too strong a word. Nevertheless while Alex is surely right that it is “economics” that are the underlying cause of the current uprising, that is no reason for those concerned about the rise of another Islamic republic to relax. History tells us that economic failure (compounded in this region by a massive increase in the population) can often open a door through which fanatics can come pouring in.  In 1917 Lenin’s most effective slogan was “peace, land and bread”. That whole dictatorship of the proletariat thing was for (a little) later…

As far as I’m concerned, Barry Rubin has got the situation in Egypt correctly pegged. He rightly notes that at this point almost any policy may turn out badly. Nonetheless, Rubin’s general approach is the best of the lot, in my view. Be warned. Rubin’s take is a minority position among both liberals and conservatives. I’ve already linked one of his pieces, and others have appeared in the blogosphere. But you can read all three of his recent contributions, beginning with the most important, here, here, and here.

From his Fox News Sunday interview this morning: 

Our Administration so far has handled this tense situation pretty well. Clearly reforms need to occur in Egypt. And frankly, anyplace around the world where people are calling out for freedom and democracy I think we have a responsibility to respond. I think listening to the Egyptian people, working with the government, to bring more democratic reforms is all in the right direction. … What we don’t want are radical ideologies to take control of a very large and important country in the Middle East.  …  There are legitimate grievances that the Egyptian people have. And they need to be addressed. Whether that is through free and fair elections, whether it’s through more democratic reforms in the short-term, I think all of these again are moving in the right direction.

The Obama administration’s response to the rapidly developing situation in Egypt has been, like its response to the protests that rocked Iran in June 2009, constantly evolving.  The administration initially was behind the curve, appearing to believe that Hosni Mubarak’s government was stable.  Even once their statements began to swing in the opposite direction, there were still discordant notes.  As he has often been known to do, Vice President Joe Biden raised eyebrows at home and abroad when he refused to call Mubarak a “dictator” and seemed to question whether the concerns of the protesters were “legitimate.”

The administration now appears to be distancing itself from Hosni Mubarak, even as the Egyptian President has made a pathetic last minute attempt to remain in power by firing his cabinet and naming the intelligence chief, Omar Suleiman, as his vice president.  These efforts will do nothing to calm the situation.  Omar Suleiman represents everything that is wrong with Mubarak’s Egypt.  It is now only a matter of time before the government collapses and Mubarak is swept aside. 

Recognizing this, the Bipartisan Working Group on Egypt released a statement on Saturday outlining a sensible list of recommendations that represent a reasonable way forward.

President Obama’s reluctance to firmly put the moral weight of the United States behind the protesters will not be remembered kindly, just as his failure to support democratic opposition groups during his first two years in office will be recalled by the Egyptian democrats who may soon take power.  President Obama tried to use Cairo as a prop in his efforts to engage the Muslim world, but he and leading administration officials refused to talk of democracy and refused, despite their desperate efforts now to rewrite history, to seriously pressure Mubarak to reform. 

It is worth remembering that less than one month ago, President Obama appointed former U.S. ambassador to Egypt Frank Riccardone, to be the new U.S. ambassador to Turkey over the opposition of a number of Republican senators.  Riccardone was infamous for his statements about supposed freedoms in Egypt and the wisdom and greatness of Hosni Mubarak, who he once said at an event with Egyptian students, “could win elections in the United States as a leader who is a giant on the world stage.” 

Riccardone was the messenger for an amoral U.S. policy toward Egypt pursued for decades by administrations of both parties.  But the Obama administration was particularly egregious.  After seeds of progress were planted during the Bush administration, the Obama administration’s approach became “anything but Bush.”  During a trip to Egypt in November 2009 to attend a conference with democracy activists, I heard firsthand how these activists’ initial hopes about the young, articulate Barack Obama had been quashed as their U.S. funding and moral support disappeared.  The signs of U.S. disengagement were so clear that a security service minder taunted one of my activist friends, “If you need U.S. funding, let me know, we are close to the Americans.”

There will be much handwringing in the days to come about what type of Egypt will emerge after Mubarak.  Concerns about a militant Islamist regime are likely exaggerated.  There are moderate forces that will compete for political space with the Muslim Brotherhood.  Regardless, it is in the interest of the United States that the Egyptian people finally be free. 

The Obama administration will have an opportunity in the coming days to recover from its disastrous handling of this crisis over the last week and assist the transition of power away from Mubarak.  Let’s hope that this will be the moment when they finally end their habitual reluctance to stand up for freedom irrespective of where it manifests itself.  If they fail to do so, history will judge them harshly, for history is on the side of the young Egyptians taking to the streets.

 – Jamie M. Fly is executive director of the Foreign Policy Initiative.

On This Week (I know, I know… ), Mohamed ElBaradei told Christiane Amanpour: “The Muslim Brotherhood is in no way extremist.” He went on to explain how having the Brotherhood in charge is no different than having a large group of Christians in a country, having Orthodox Jews in Israel … 

Jay could not be more correct that Mohammed ElBaradei is a menace. He is more responsible than any non-Iranian for the progress the mullahs have made on their nuke program (with dishonorable mention to China and Russia) — although I think another Egyptian, Yasser Arafat, may have been a worse Nobel choice. I also agree that, under the circumstances, Egypt could do worse than having ElBaradei running its government. Some perspective: the guy I convicted in 1995,  Omar Abdel Rahman — the Blind Sheikh who issued the fatwa approving the murder of Anwar Sadat and tried energetically to have his successor, Hosni Mubarak, killed — was a great admirer of Ayatollah Khomeini Islamist revolution in Iran and hoped to replicate it (a Sunni version of it) in Egypt, with himself recognized as the top Islamic authority advising the sharia government.

We are beginning to see take shape, though, the something that could be worse than ElBaradei: ElBaradei in collusion with the Muslim Brotherhood.

Assuming the ouster of Mubarak, the Brotherhood has just announced its official support for the establishment of a transitional government under the direction of ElBaradei. In hearing Fox News report this, I was astonished to hear a correspondent opine that just because the Brotherhood is offering its support does not mean ElBaradei would want it. 

A few days ago, ElBaradei gave an interview to Der Spiegel — Aaron Klein reported on it at WND yesterday. As Klein noted, ElBaradei is widely seen as a staunch ally of the Brotherhood (surprise!) and gave a spirited defense of them that was about as honest as his disclosures about the Iranian nuclear program used to be: “We should stop demonizing the Muslim Brotherhood,” he insisted. According to ElBaradei, the Brothers “have not committed any acts of violence in five decades.” [ACM note: the Brotherhood killed Sadat in 1981; Hamas kills people everyday.] ElBaradei, who also admires President Obama ardently, said that the Brothers just “want change.” Thus, he concludes, “If we want democracy and freedom, we have to include them instead of marginalizing them.” [ACM: Yeah, just like we did with Hamas -- and how's that workin' out?]

For its part, the Obama administration — which has made outreach to the Muslim Brotherhood and its American affiliates a policy priority — reciprocates ElBaradei’s admiration. Robert Gibbs said Friday that the president knows ElBaradei well and has worked closely with him. 

By the way, ElBaradei also says “Israel is the number one threat to the Middle East,” and has expressed strong support for the Palestinian “resistance,” particularly in Hamas-controlled Gaza (which he calls “the world’s largest prison”), because, in his opinion, “the Israeli occupation only understands the language of violence.”

Makes you wonder how ElBaradei and the Muslim Brotherhood managed to find each other — they’re so very different. Amazing to see the forces that “change” brings together.

Here’s how Chris Matthews began his broadcast Friday night:

Good evening. I`m Chris Matthews in Washington.Leading off tonight: Unrest in Egypt. Proving the Iraq war wasn`t needed, these protests in Egypt, as well as in Yemen and Tunisia, are all aimed at dictators supported by the U.S. The demonstrations have not yet turned anti-American, but they could. These are the events the Bush administration hoped to encourage by lying about weapons of mass destruction and invading Iraq.

John Hinderaker does the close-in knife work.

. . . the first of which is the least important, but perhaps interesting. Three years ago, I moderated a panel in Jordan featuring Naguib Sawiris, head of Orascom, the telecommunications giant. It was Sawiris who made it so. He was described to me as maybe the richest man in Egypt. Everyone knew him as a go-getter who dreamed of the modernization of the Middle East: not merely dreamed of it, but did something about it (all the while making money for himself and his many thousands of employees). He went beyond the Middle East: He was placing cellphones into the hands of Pakistanis, even poor ones. (Who isn’t poor?) He was also the first telecommunications man into North Korea.

I asked him when Middle Easterners would have laptops. He said, “Far too expensive. Beyond the reach of Middle Easterners. Cellphones for now.”

Anyway, according to a news report yesterday, he has fled Egypt.

2) Mohamed ElBaradei’s tenure at the IAEA was disastrous. I could get into chapter and verse, as I have in the past. He spent much of his time protecting Iran from sanctions and, of course, military attack. He was reluctant — he was open about this — to report Iranian violations to the Security Council, because he knew such reporting would trigger sanctions. I believe that a serious case can be made that the 2005 Nobel peace prize to the IAEA and ElBaradei was the worst, most misguided ever given (in the 110-year history of the award).

In any case, Egypt could do worse than to have ElBaradei at its head, now.

3) The Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty has been in place since 1979. Since that time, only one other nation has made peace with Israel: Jordan (in 1994). Those are the only two Arab nations to have entered into treaties with Israel: Egypt and Jordan. There have been only two leaders in Egypt since the signing of the Egyptian-Israeli treaty: Sadat (assassinated in 1981) and Mubarak. (For that matter, there have been only two leaders in Jordan — Hussein and his son Abdullah.)

Question: Will the government that replaces Mubarak abide by the treaty? Or renounce it? In renouncing the treaty, the next government might say, “It was always a mistake to make peace with the Zionists. It was even a shame and a crime, a mark on our national honor. We will now remove that mark. We are rejoining the Arab fold, assuming our natural leadership role in the fight against the alien entity in our midst.”

Remember, there was an unholy furor over Sadat’s signing of the treaty. The Arab League expelled Egypt, and moved League headquarters from Cairo to Tunis. (Egypt was readmitted ten years later, and the League returned to Cairo.) The peace between Egypt and Israel has sometimes been very cold. For example, the Egyptians have withheld an ambassador from Israel. But it has stuck. That treaty has stuck. And that has been hugely important in the Middle East.

Treaties are not forever, as we know. De Gaulle said they were like girls: They come and go. (Sorry to introduce a flippancy into a grave discussion.)

4) Here is a question I have asked many times — have asked the smartest Middle Easterners and Middle East analysts I know: Is Mubarak a dictator, keeping a great nation, Egypt, from democratic progress? Or is he a patriot, keeping Egypt out of the clutches of the Islamists? The answer is: He is some mixture of those. And maybe his greatest offense has been to stifle democratic elements, people who say no to both “presidential dictatorship,” of a secular nature, and Islamism.

But then, you knew that . . .

Andy’s right that Hamas has its roots in the Muslim Brotherhood.  So does Sudan’s President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, Egypt’s neighbor to the south, who came to power in a coup and ruled as the head of the National Islamic Front until the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement when an interim constitution was adopted.  In December, Bashir announced to supporters, “If south Sudan secedes, we will change the constitution and at that time there will be no time to speak of diversity of culture and ethnicity… Sharia and Islam will be the main source for the constitution, Islam the official religion and Arabic the official language.”  This, of course, follows Muslim Brotherhood principles. This month, the south did apparently vote for secession (official results due in a week or so).  This means Egypt could eventually be part of a vast new Ikwan Islamic state from Gaza to the northern border of the new Republic of South Sudan.