Roundup: Media's Take

Alan Blinder: The Case Against a CEO in the Oval Office

Mr. Blinder, a professor of economics and public affairs at Princeton University, is a former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve.Mitt Romney bases his case for being president on his evident success in business, where he made a fortune as CEO of Bain Capital. But are business achievements important, or even relevant, to the presidency? Probably not. Presidential history teaches us that the abilities, character traits and attitudes it takes to succeed in business have little in common with what it takes to succeed in government. In some respects, they are antithetical. Think of our greatest presidents. Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and the two Roosevelts didn't have any business accomplishments to their credit. (Well, maybe Washington did, a little.) Neither, by the way, did Republican icon Ronald Reagan, who was once a union leader. Harry Truman sold a few hats, and Woodrow Wilson was a professor. On the other hand, the two truly successful businessmen to win the presidency were Herbert Hoover and George H.W. Bush. This negative correlation between business success and political success is probably not a coincidence...

Richard Cohen: Muffling the Drums of War with Iran

Richard Cohen is Opinion Writer at the Washington Post.

Jeremy Warner: Not Even the Great Economists of History Can Get Us Out of this Fix

Jeremy Warner is assistant editor of The Daily Telegraph.

Clifford D. May: Irish Peace No Model for Middle East

Clifford D. May is president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a policy institute focusing on national security....George Will, the venerable columnist, once cited Northern Ireland as one of the world’s two “intractable” conflicts. The other was what was then known as the Arab–Israeli conflict, today more usually called the Palestinian–Israeli conflict, though in reality it is now Islamist regimes and movements that are most seriously waging what they call a jihad against Israel....On a brief return to Northern Ireland this week, it was apparent that there are still tensions, still segregated neighborhoods, still pubs where Protestants and Catholics do not mix. But the Troubles ended when most people on both sides accepted the idea of an imperfect peace, when they came to see compromise as preferable to more killing and dying, and when they tired of the poverty and degradation that chronic carnage brings in its wake....Should that give us hope that peace in the Middle East also is possible and perhaps even imminent? Absolutely not.At its worst, the IRA never sought the destruction of Britain and never vowed to wipe Protestants off the Irish map. The most extreme Protestant paramilitaries did not argue that southern Catholics had no right to self-determination....

Rebecca Solnit: Why the Radical Left Just Needs to Chill Out

As in 2004 and 2008, Rebecca Solnit and her blue-state henchwomen and men will probably invade northern Nevada on election week to swing with one of the most swinging states in the union. She is, however, much more excited about 350.org’s anti-oil-company campaign and the ten thousand faces of Occupy now changing the world. Also, she wrote some books. Dear Allies,Forgive me if I briefly take my eyes off the prize to brush away some flies, but the buzzing has gone on for some time. I have a grand goal, and that is to counter the Republican right with its deep desire to annihilate everything I love and to move toward far more radical goals than the Democrats ever truly support. In the course of pursuing that, however, I’ve come up against the habits of my presumed allies again and again.

Robert Skidelsky: Small Wars Can Down Big Countries, World Affairs Teach Us

Robert Skidelsky, a member of the British House of Lords, is professor emeritus of political economy at Warwick University.U.S. President Barack Obama has vowed to avenge the murder of J. Christopher Stevens, America’s former ambassador to Libya. How he proposes to do this is unclear – historical precedent is of little use. In 1864, the Emperor of Abyssinia took hostage the British consul with some missionaries in the country’s then-capital, Magdala. Three years later, with Emperor Tewodros still refusing to release them, the British dispatched an expeditionary force of 13,000 troops, 26,000 camp followers and 44 elephants. In his book “The Blue Nile,” Alan Moorehead described the expedition thus: “It proceeds first to last with the decorum and heavy inevitability of a Victorian state banquet, complete with ponderous speeches.” Yet it was a fearsome undertaking. After a three-month journey through the mountains, the British reached Magdala, released the hostages, and burned the capital to the ground. Emperor Tewodros committed suicide, the British withdrew, and their commander, Lt. Gen. Sir Robert Napier, was made Baron Napier of Magdala.Today’s great powers have relied on similar methods, also heavy with rhetoric, against puny opponents, but with far less convincing results...

Peter Tasker: Lessons for Tokyo from 1980s Britain

The writer is a Tokyo-based analyst at Arcus Research.The situation feels familiar. The casus belli is a little-known group of islands. The country in possession is perceived, not least by itself, as being in long-term economic decline. The claimant considers the islands to be a symbol of national humiliation stretching back into the 19th century. Like Argentina in 1982, China is ruled by an unelected cabal at the apex of an organisation designed for a bygone era. Like Britain, Japan is an ally of the US and unsure how much support to expect from its superpower friend. There are clear differences too. Even at its 1970s low point, Britain’s economy was much larger than Argentina’s, whereas China has recently displaced Japan as the world’s second-biggest economy. Moreover, Japan’s armed forces have not fired a shot in anger in 60 years and the defence budget has rarely topped 1 per cent of output. China is a nuclear power with military expenditure at least double Japan’s...

Steve Inskeep: Tolerance, Up in Flames

Steve Inskeep is a host of NPR’s “Morning Edition” and the author of “Instant City: Life and Death in Karachi.”FOR 65 years, the Nishat cinema stood in Karachi, Pakistan. A giant screen showed blockbuster films from around the world, reflecting Pakistan’s relative openness compared with neighboring Muslim nations. Vast billboards over the door featured handsome movie stars flanked by young women with revealing clothes and long, luxurious hair.The cinema also symbolized the country’s resilience. Opened in 1947, the year of Pakistan’s independence, the Nishat became a landmark in a lively district of theaters, nightclubs and cafes. An Islamist dictator closed the bars and many theaters after 1977, but the Nishat survived. Crowds attended movies even though boys and girls who sat together risked harassment by religious conservatives.

Clive Stafford Smith: The West's New Terror Campaign

 

Yuri Yarim-Agaev: How to Win an Ideological War

Mr. Yarim-Agaev is a scientist and human-rights activist who was a leading dissident in the Soviet Union in the 1970s. He is currently a distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution.On Nov. 9, 1938, thousands of German storm troopers, acting under direct orders, launched the Jewish pogrom known as Kristallnacht. The attacks left approximately 100 Jews dead and 7,500 Jewish businesses damaged. Hundreds of homes and synagogues were vandalized. The mastermind of the pogrom, Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, explained it to the world as a "spontaneous" reaction to the murder of German diplomat by Herschel Grynszpan, a 17-year-old Jew. Goebbels said the pogrom showed the "healthy instincts" of the German people. Some Jewish organizations, while strongly condemning German actions, expressed concern about the pogrom's alleged cause. The World Jewish Congress stated that it "deplored the fatal shooting of an official of the German Embassy by a young Polish Jew." These displays of contrition did not help. Kristallnacht was soon followed by the Holocaust, in which more than six million European Jews died. What can we learn from that tragic history?..

Robert Reich: Why Romney is Different than the Roosevelts

Robert Reich, Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley, was Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration. ...America has had hugely wealthy presidents before — think of Teddy Roosevelt and his distant cousin, Franklin D. Roosevelt; or John F. Kennedy, beneficiary of father Joe’s fortune.But here’s the difference. These men were champions of the working class and the poor, and were considered traitors to their own class. Teddy Roosevelt railed against the “malefactors of great wealth,” and he busted up the oil and railroad trusts.FDR thundered against the “economic royalists,” raised taxes on the wealthy, and gave average working people the right to form unions — along with Social Security, unemployment insurance, a minimum wage, and a 40-hour workweek.But Mitt Romney is not a traitor to his class. He is a sponsor of his class. He wants to cut their taxes by $3.7 trillion over the next decade, and hasn’t even specified what “loopholes” he’d close to make up for this gigantic giveaway....

J.T. Young: Romney and Democrats' Own Past

J.T. Young served in the Department of Treasury and the Office of Management and Budget from 2001 to 2004 and as a Congressional staff member from 1987 to 2000.Since when have Democrats had a problem with wealthy presidential candidates? Democrats' two most revered presidents, FDR and Kennedy, were extraordinarily wealthy. Interestingly, the contrast between Democrats' past history and their current attacks on Romney is never acknowledged -- either by Democrats or the media. The Obama campaign has used Romney's wealth to caricature him. To hear them tell it, he was born Richie Rich and became Gordon Gecko. Of course, such a sketch serves many purposes -- from the politics of division to the economics of redistribution. The problem is it neither fits Romney nor Democrats' own self-cherished past.Despite the recent resurrection of Bill Clinton -- really a factor of limited choices (it's either Clinton or Carter), the modern Democratic party rests on the twin pillars of Roosevelt and Kennedy. And those pillars' political careers rested on great wealth.FDR built today's Democratic Party, and along with it the modern all-encompassing presidency. Democrats idolize both.

Jeffrey Lord: How Carter Beat Reagan

Jeffrey Lord is a former Reagan White House political director and author. He writes from Pennsylvania at jlpa1@aol.com.Dick Morris is right.Here's his column on "Why the Polls Understate the Romney Vote."Here's something Dick Morris doesn't mention. And he's charitable.Remember when Jimmy Carter beat Ronald Reagan in 1980?That's right. Jimmy Carter beat Ronald Reagan in 1980.In a series of nine stories in 1980 on "Crucial States" -- battleground states as they are known today -- the New York Times repeatedly told readers then-President Carter was in a close and decidedly winnable race with the former California governor. And used polling data from the New York Times/CBS polls to back up its stories....

Andrew Sullivan: President Obama: The Democrats' Ronald Reagan

Andrew Sullivan, former editor of The New Republic, weekly columnist for the Sunday Times of London, brought his hugely popular blog, The Dish, to the Daily Beast in 2011. He's the author of several books, including "Virtually Normal," "Love Undetectable," and "The Conservative Soul."As the fall has turned crisper, a second term for Barack Obama has gotten likelier. This may, of course, change: the debates, the Middle East, the unemployment numbers could still blow up the race. At this point in 2004, one recalls, George W. Bush was about to see a near eight-point lead shrivel to a one-state nail-biter by Election Day. But one thing that has so far, in my view, been underestimated is the potential impact of a solid Obama win, and perhaps a Democratic retention of the Senate and some progress in the House. This is now a perfectly plausible outcome. It would also be a transformational moment in modern American politics.

Christian Caryl: Islamist Déjà Vu: The Lessons of 1979

Christian Caryl is a Senior Fellow at the Legatum Institute and the editor of Foreign Policy’s Democracy Lab website.
The year 1979—when Iranian student revolutionaries stormed the US Embassy in Tehran and took dozens of American diplomats hostage, and Muslim radicals in Saudi Arabia, a staunch US ally, brazenly laid siege to the Grand Mosque in Mecca—marked the debut of a new political phenomenon known as “Islamism.” To be sure, the theorists and advocates of political Islam had been around for a while, and there was an extraordinary explosion of Islamic activism around the Muslim world in the 1970s; in some countries there was even talk of a sahwa, an “awakening” of Islamic political consciousness. But few people outside of the ummah, the global community of Muslim believers, were paying any attention, and the US was caught flatfooted as Ayatollah Khomeini proceeded to transform his theory of “Islamic government” into reality. “Political Islam” was no longer a theory. It had become an active, practical force in global politics.

David Brooks: The Conservative Mind

David Brooks is a columnist for the New York Times.When I joined the staff of National Review as a lowly associate in 1984, the magazine, and the conservative movement itself, was a fusion of two different mentalities.On the one side, there were the economic conservatives. These were people that anybody following contemporary Republican politics would be familiar with. They spent a lot of time worrying about the way government intrudes upon economic liberty. They upheld freedom as their highest political value. They admired risk-takers. They worried that excessive government would create a sclerotic nation with a dependent populace.But there was another sort of conservative, who would be less familiar now. This was the traditional conservative, intellectual heir to Edmund Burke, Russell Kirk, Clinton Rossiter and Catholic social teaching. This sort of conservative didn’t see society as a battleground between government and the private sector. Instead, the traditionalist wanted to preserve a society that functioned as a harmonious ecosystem, in which the different layers were nestled upon each other: individual, family, company, neighborhood, religion, city government and national government....

Garrett Epps: Voting: Right or Privilege?

Garrett Epps, a former reporter for The Washington Post, is a novelist and legal scholar.  He teaches courses in constitutional law and creative writing for law students at the University of Baltimore. He lives in Washington, D.C.Scholars and courts often note that the Constitution nowhere says, "All individuals have the right to vote." It simply rules out specific limitations on "the right to vote." A right not guaranteed in affirmative terms isn't really a "right" in a fundamental sense, this reading suggests.But if the Constitution has to say "here is a specific right and we now guarantee that right to every person," there are almost no rights in the Constitution. Linguistically, our Constitution is more in the rights-preserving than in the right-proclaiming business. The First Amendment doesn't say "every person has the right to free speech and free exercise of religion." In the Second, the right to "keep and bear arms" isn't defined, but rather shall not be "abridged." In the Fourth, "[t]he right of the people to be secure ... against unreasonable searches and seizures" isn't defined, but instead "shall not be violated." In the Seventh, "the right of (civil) trial by jury" -- whatever that is -- "shall be preserved." And so on....

Andrew Sullivan: President Obama ... The Democrats' Ronald Reagan

Andrew Sullivan, former editor of The New Republic, weekly columnist for the Sunday Times of London, brought his hugely popular blog, The Dish, to the Daily Beast in 2011. He's the author of several books, including Virtually Normal, Love Undetectable, and The Conservative Soul. As the fall has turned crisper, a second term for Barack Obama has gotten likelier. This may, of course, change: the debates, the Middle East, the unemployment numbers could still blow up the race. At this point in 2004, one recalls, George W. Bush was about to see a near eight-point lead shrivel to a one-state nail-biter by Election Day. But one thing that has so far, in my view, been underestimated is the potential impact of a solid Obama win, and perhaps a Democratic retention of the Senate and some progress in the House. This is now a perfectly plausible outcome. It would also be a transformational moment in modern American politics. If Obama wins, to put it bluntly, he will become the Democrats’ Reagan. The narrative writes itself.

Michael R. Gordon: In U.S. Exit From Iraq, Failed Efforts and Challenges

This article is adapted from “The Endgame: The Inside Story of the Struggle for Iraq, from George W. Bush to Barack Obama,” by Michael R. Gordon and retired Lt. Gen. Bernard E. Trainor, to be published by Pantheon Books, an imprint of Random House, on Tuesday. ...The attempt by Mr. Obama and his senior aides to fashion an extraordinary power-sharing arrangement between Mr. Maliki and Mr. Allawi never materialized. Neither did an agreement that would have kept a small American force in Iraq to train the Iraqi military and patrol the country’s skies. A plan to use American civilians to train the Iraqi police has been severely cut back. The result is an Iraq that is less stable domestically and less reliable internationally than the United States had envisioned. The story of these efforts has received little attention in a nation weary of the conflict in Iraq, and administration officials have rarely talked about them. This account is based on interviews with many of the principals, in Washington and Baghdad.

Bill Keller: The Satanic Video

Bill Keller is an Op-Ed columnist for The New York Times and former executive editor for the newspaper....It’s not really over for Salman Rushdie, whose new memoir recounts a decade under a clerical death sentence for the publication of his novel “The Satanic Verses.” That fatwa, if not precisely the starting point in our modern confrontation with Islamic extremism, was a major landmark. The fatwa was dropped in 1998 and Rushdie is out of hiding, but he is still careful. His book tour for “Joseph Anton” (entitled for the pseudonym he used in his clandestine life) won’t be taking him to Islamabad or Cairo.Rushdie grew up in a secular Muslim family, the son of an Islam scholar. His relationship to Islam was academic, then literary, before it became excruciatingly personal. His memoir is not a handbook on how America should deal with the Muslim world. But he brings to that subject a certain moral authority and the wisdom of an unusually motivated thinker. I invited him to help me draw some lessons from the stormy Arab Summer.The first and most important thing Rushdie will tell you is, it’s not about religion. Not then, not now...