http://sites.duke.edu/sjpp/2011/does-a-nuclear-iran-call-for-a-change-in-policy/

The most recent of these attempts was the healthcare reform effort of 2010.  Obamacare, as some people call it, is a failure, and, though it will increase access to health care for some people, it will only increase bureaucracy and raise costs to consumers and to the government.  The other major attempt at entitlement reform was targeted at Social Security in 2004.  This effort to restructure Social Security was championed by the Bush administration but was fought by congressional republicans and democrats.  Nonetheless, Bush’s attempt to reform Social Security was a well-formed idea that would have ultimately been accepted by the people of this country (just as most of the desires of health care reform would be if they weren’t in such a horrible package).

Social Security reform (specifically the inclusion of privately managed accounts) has been conducted in such countries as Chilé, Sweden and Mongolia.  In every country that has introduced these reforms, the public cost of social insurance programs has declined while the average amount saved by recipients has increased.  An example we could stand to emulate is that of Chilé.

The reason I am mentioning Social Security relates back to efforts to cut these benefits.  After many people spent their lives paying into this system, planning to rely on it to meet their needs in old age, we now have people eagerly demanding that their benefits be cut, and this during economic hard times.  Though the republicans are vehemently demanding cuts in these benefits, they have failed to resurrect the issue of Social Security Reform.  If they truly cared for the well being of US citizens, they would demand a restructuring of this system for our personal and collective benefit.  Instead, they call for a maintenance of tax rates with a decrease in benefits.  This is not a tenable position.  Furthermore, they could come forward with a health care system alternative (something they should have done years ago now).  But entitlement reform is not on their agenda.  Rather, they simply call for entitlement cuts.  What is chilling about such a policy is the position it will put so many people in.  What will be the recourse for all those people who no longer have the services they paid for?  If they do not receive that Social Security check or Medicaid insurance, what will they do?  They will have to borrow, and then they will be indebted to the banks, and as I’ve pointed out before, we have politicians who owe a lot to the banks.  But I digress.

It is true that Federal and State budgets are out of wack.  In the states, a dependence on property taxes and sales taxes created a handicap that cannot be easily remedied at this point.  At the federal level, excessive debt has been created in an interesting way: federal debt was purchased (T-bonds) with social security revenue.  So, though social security still pays for itself, the federal government now owes interest to social security.  That is our problem.  All that money collected for social security could have been used to buy foreign debt, thus sending the bill somewhere else, but that was not done.  So now the people must bear the burden of poor past planning.  We can stop making this problem worse.  All future investment of social security funds can be directed toward stable, foreign debt.  Or, each person can be given options for investing their SS payments themselves, as in Chile and many other countries.  Plans for a transition can be found at the Heritage Foundation, the CATO Institute, here, the GAO, and many other places.  Sadly, the democrats seem to oppose Social Security reform, as do many republicans, perhaps simply because they do not think they can make a political case for it.  But the evidence is there, the cost savings and increases in personal saving and spending are real.  Cutting entitlements is not the answer, rebuilding the system is.

You could expand that idea to the entire federal system, but we’ll have to tackle that later.

The most recent development in this transition has been the appointment of General David Petraeus to the position of Head of the CIA.  Petraeus was confirmed by congress on July 1st for this position based on the belief that he would bring a lot to the CIA.  However, what does a four star general have to bring to the CIA?  Obviously a lot of military experience.  Is this something the CIA needs?  Initially the answer should be ‘no’, given the stated mission of the CIA as opposed to the mission of the military.  Now, I’m not saying that Petraeus is unqualified for the position, rather, I’m questioning why him?

Only days before the announcement of Petraeus’ nomination for this position, the Obama administration announced planned tactical changes for future DOD controlled military actions.  These changes call for fewer troops on the ground while increasing the use of drone attacks and special forces operations, not to mention transferring more responsibilities to the agencies that perform the bulk of these missions: the CIA and the Joint Special Operations Command.  Obvious tactical benefits are clear in such a move, but I’ll touch on those later.

In late 2009, ABC News reported on an alarming increase in the use and deployment of “contractors,” or mercenaries in US military operations.  Reporter Matthew Cole writes:

In Iraq, a high-ranking U.S. Army officer told ABC News, Blackwater personnel have been used in military operations that “are supposed to include U.S. soldiers but often end up with the Blackwater people on their own.”

The New York Times reported Friday that such raids against Iraqi insurgents were conducted “almost nightly” between 2004 and 2006, and it quoted several Blackwater guards as saying “the operations became so routine that the lines supposedly dividing the Central Intelligence Agency, the military and Blackwater became blurred.”

The report of this increased reliance on ‘hired help’ in US military operations is further exacerbated by Petraeus’s own comments, as cited in the International Business Times:

The move underscores the CIA taking on a greater role in counter-terrorism activities as clandestine strikes assume a more prominent role. At his Senate confirmation hearings, Petraeus referenced a broad U.S. network of interlocking counterterrorism operations.

“One of the major developments since 9/11 has been the establishment of this network, in many cases led by the Joint Special Operations Command of the military, but with very, very good partnering with elements of the Central Intelligence Agency, other elements of the intelligence community,” Petraeus said.

Petraeus told congress that he “wanted this job,” in reference to the CIA position.  He clearly understands how these organizations are intertwined.  Given that intimate knowledge of the system, he has decided that the CIA position would be better for him.  Why?

As I’ve already outlined, a clear shift in military tactics and martial operations is underway in the United States.  What are the benefits of such a transition?  The first obvious reason is the absence of oversight.  The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been heavily covered by the media, and thus the world.  Generals frequently sit before congress to answer for their actions while taking commands from the president.  Such oversight really prohibits the freedom of military action.  However, covert operations provide a shroud of secrecy that many war fighters surely find necessary.  JSOC operations were behind the operation to capture bin Laden or to rescue US POWs in Iraq.  CIA operations have been behind the bombing of targets in Pakistan.  Though there is the idea that all of these actions have been permitted by higher powers, they only represent the highest profile actions.  These entities perform numerous other actions with little oversight, relying on notions of state security for their justification.  The increased use of mercenaries to conduct such missions only further reinforces this conclusion.

Another reason for this transition from highly visible military actions to covert strikes and mercenary deployments is the fact that it allows for international law to be ignored.  US statements claim that “contractors” are not mercenaries and thus are not covered by the Geneva Convention, giving them much more leeway in military actions.  Futhermore, CIA operations are often considered “black” and thus free of oversight.  Such considerations are hardly given to DOD actions.  Furthermore, at this point, the Head of the CIA does not answer directly to the President, rather this figure answers to the Director of National Intelligence.  This structure, devised in the past ten years, provides another layer of plausible deniability between the CIA and the Commander in Chief.

The increased use of contractors, as reported by ABC News, has a simple financial benefit: there is no pension obligations between the US and its mercenaries.  Those benefits are the concern of their parent company.

Finally, though this is the most tenuous of reasons, decoupling military operations from public and executive oversight creates a situation that can be viewed as cooler.  Let me explain.  The ability to command strikes and various actions without clearance from an overseeing body is cooler.  You come closer to the fiction of James Bond or any other spy movie under such a structure than you could when military actions were carried out by US Army infantry.  Think of James Bond: Quantum of Solace, when Bond meets the CIA operative in the bar in La Paz.  A black ops strike team is magically on hand to storm the bar and to try and take Bond.  This doesn’t happen in a world where such an action would require tons of clearance.  But it is possible in a system where covert operations are the status quo, a martial regime the news of the past few years is outlining.

If my conclusions are a bit grand, I’m sorry, but look back on the reporting of the past decade, starting with the links I’ve provided here.  Their intentions have been outlined.  Their actions in the War on Terror further concrete these conclusions.  Hell, the current fighting over budget cuts does not even touch defense and intelligence spending!  These are not sacred cows.  Rather, they are the elements of the US government that have become untouchable due to the power they have accumulated.  It reminds me of a short story/essay I’ve shared with you before.  Keep your eyes open.

Below you’ll find the first three paragraphs of the article.

For a nation that prides itself on “firsts,” America’s 2011 is shaping up pretty poorly. Two American firsts will experience their lasts this year: the space shuttles, the first and only reusable space vehicles of their kind, will retire this week, and Fermilab’s Tevatron–once the world’s most powerful particle collider–will cease smashing in September. While all good things must come to an end, neither of these world-beating technologies has a homegrown successor to pick up where its predecessor left off. With regularity, the “firsts” are happening elsewhere these days.

For those of us who grew up on Big Science–where big projects regularly hit big milestones that were a big deal–these are strange days. I want to see Americans build the first fusion reactor. Actually, I want to see American robots build it, and I want them do it on the moon. Or maybe Mars. Whichever the robots prefer, really.

As a popular science writer, I’m naturally inclined toward this kind of Big Science. I like things that are superlative, that are preceded by descriptors like “most powerful,” “first ever,” and “biggest” (and possibly followed by the nouns “laser” or “stealth” or “rocketship/rocketsled/rocketbike”). These things are important not only because they are inherently awesome, but because they inspire the brightest minds in the world to rally around them, they inspire our own young people to engage with science and engineering, and they sometimes spawn entirely new industries. They even “create jobs.”

If you want to read more, click here.

So, if home construction lessens, that means fewer people are buying new homes, which means less money is flowing through the cycle, which ultimately means an economy is contracting in some manner.  Furthermore, in many states, the taxes paid for property constitute a major portion of funding for local schools.  This is beneficial in good times but becomes a major problem when real estate prices sag.  If property values go down, taxes paid go down and the funds a school receives drop, meaning quality of education declines.  Without quality education, the whole cycle is bound to repeat because those who experience the lower level of education will be less likely to escape menial employment and lower social position.

The housing bubble bust of the past few years was the result of the deregulation of banks and lenders over the past decade, there is no doubt about that.  (For more info, check out the documentary Inside Job)  Some people in power realize that the regulation of the financial markets exists to protect consumers from predatory financial institutions and thus seek to strengthen them and maintain them.  However they are missing the greater lessen in the Great Recession: an economy dependent on home construction and ownership is not a stable economy.  Regulating or deregulating the financial system will produce very different results, but neither option can change the fact that as long as our economy depends on new home construction for its lifeblood, we will never be safe.

If this is true then what are the alternatives?  For one: manufacturing.  The United States was at its strongest in the twentieth century when it was a grand industrial power.  Manufacturing provided many jobs, both in resource extraction and output.  However, as our industrial output has slackened, so has our inflation adjusted wages, our health and retirement benefits, our overall wealth, and our position in the world.  Expanding our industrial base would also fuel new home construction and public and private investment by adding another layer to the economy.  Our industrial capacity has declined with the rise of the Free Trade Agreement.  Though it is pointed out that U.S. exporters do more business with countries that have FTAs with the U.S., we consequently do less business with other nations, not to mention that many manufacturing jobs are exported to the FTA countries because their labor costs are so much cheaper.  So, protecting our industrial capacity is one step to breaking our reliance on construction.  What else?

I see 6 major areas that can be changed or modified to reorganize our economic structure: education, research, energy, information, manufacturing, and agriculture.  I list education first because it is the most important aspect of our society.  An under-educated populace cannot strive for freedom; they have fewer opportunities for work or recourse.  A highly educated populace makes change in the other areas listed possible.  Research can expand as an aspect of overall employment with a higher level of education in this country.  Let china manufacture happy meal toys, we will seek cures to disease and answers to our social problems.  A highly educated populace will provide more people to develop the renewable, alternative and clean energy solutions we need to interact responsibly with the world we live on.  The promise of the clean energy sector is demonstrated by the facts present in this article on the ever expanding solar industry.  Well educated people will expand the knowledge economy as well.  But the old staples of manufacturing and agriculture will benefit when an intelligent populace exists to improve and defend them.

I know the above paragraph is lacking in logical defense but this is getting too long.  Ultimately we see that changing the emphasis of our economy provides myriad new opportunities to ensure each citizens financial and personal security.  Home ownership, while a dream for some, is not the key to stabilizing the United States, education  and a strong industrial foundation are.  These are changes that can come about not through revolution but through political will.  If only there was a party out there with the strength to represent the people rather than the special interests.

People in general do consider the deficit to be a serious problem. In fact 51% would like to see cuts in spending and say they are considering voting Republican in November because of this. But when the poll is broken down into separate issues it becomes clear that these people don’t actually support Republican initiatives — just the Republican idea that cuts must be made.

The blog post continues to break down the responses of a very bipartisan group and found that most people agree with positions currently defended by the democratic party.  This is in contrast to the current political divisions projected by the media.  I encourage you to read the whole posting at jobsanger.  What do you think about these results?

You can download the research poll here.