Why Monopolies are by their Nature Government Controlled Economies

I constantly find myself in debates in which the words "free markets" are thrown at me like holy water at a vampire. The conception of many seems to be that 1) free market capitalism means captialism without serous interference from government, and 2) that monopolies are some sort of fluke of the market that only occurs when something goes wrong.

First, let me define a free market. I conceive a market to be free when it meets the following characteristsics:

1) The market is accessible to all who wish to participate.
2)The market is not under positive control of a political entity.
3)There are no negative controls placed on entry into the market.

Thus, by my definition, the USSR was not a free market (criterion 2), nor is the NYSE (criterion 3).

Secondly let me define a monopoly. I believe that an industry has become monopolized when:

1)One company controls enough of the market in a region, a particular industry, an infrastructure as to generate a collapse in competitiveness between companies. This begins to occur at around 30% of the market.
2)One company controls physical infrastructure that relates to products it sells that use that infrastructure, such as an airline that owns airports or a telephone company that owns an ISP.
3) One company controls a means of production from raw material to retail, giving it a huge advantage in terms of pricing, such as an oil company that pumps oil, refines it, wholesales it, and owns gas stations.

These are rough and working definitions that are somewhat open to revision, but what I would like to focus on is how monopolies meeting these criterea cause markets to become unfree. The monopolization of an industry, infrastructure, or region is an inherently political act. Markets can be thought of as a form of territory, and in fact most companies view market share as turf. Every company's aim is to control as much market share as possible, but at a certain point their control ceases to be economic and becomes political in nature. For example, when a Telco finds that it is losing revenue because Vonage and Skype are taking away traditional telephone consumers using infrastructure that they control (whether they actually paid for it or not is another question) their first response is to infringe on the use of VoIP. The infrastructure has become territory, and the traditional proprieter of the territory has become a political actor seeking to manipulate the market in conflict with all three criteria for market freedom. Simply being an economic entity does not prevent one from becoming a political entity as well.

It is in these situations that it is the responsibility of the duly elected government to consider that there are non-democratic political entities operating inside of its borders and dispense of them appropriately. The most viable method seems to be trustbusting, de-politicizing the industry by removing the monopoly. With regard to infrastructural monopolies this becomes more complex, because breaking the companies up does not ensure competion as they simply become regional monopolies. The answer in that situation could be as extreme as repatriation/annexation of the territory/infrastructure in question as government administered, or to ensure that the infrastructural monopoly remains entirely neutral through regulation of its activites outside of building, selling, and administering the infrastructure.

Hmm... I'm sounding Sweedish again.

Redefining Freedom

I've been reading the work of Dr. Amartya Sen, Nobel Prize winner for Economics, as of late, and his work has enabled me to verbalize something that I've been trying to put my finger on for some time now. My problem with traditional libertarians and neo-liberals has been a constant focus on the economic sphere when that always seemed to me a focus on a means rather than an end. Beyond that, I've always found that while using traditional economic indicators makes measuring progress and development very easy, it doesn't really define what it is measuring in substantive terms. What does a per captia income of $20,000 in an area with a median income of $40,000 mean? In some places, places like Sweeden, it means that your house is smaller and you drive a VW Beetle rather than a Saab, but in most parts of the U.S. it means that you are unable to raise a family in a manner consistent with good childrearing methods, that you can't get good healthcare, and that you are probably in debt simply to pay the bills.

What I have discovered is that we Americans have traditionally defined our freedoms neagtively. That is to say that we deal in terms of what we are free from rather than what we are free to do. We are free from government interference in our speech, but we are not free to communicate by the most common and widely accepted means unless we posess the wealth to purchase the needed communications technology.

It seems that in the begining of our country's life we did not define freedom this way. We wrote our definitions this way as a group of people who remembered being interfered with by a foreign government, but we also sought to expand the real freedoms of people by establishing public libraries and a postal system with standardized postage. As time passes, though, private systems have far outstripped the public ones. There are obvious market related reasons for this, but in certain areas, especially health care, communications and utility infrastructure, and security and emergency response it seems to me that we must begin to reconceive of these freedoms positively. The right to life should mean a right to health. The right to liberty should mean the right to have access to all of the same markets and information available to anyone else, and the right to the pursuit of happiness should mean that the opportunity to gain an education free of economic burden should be present for any member of society.

Many will argue, I'm sure, that this is leftist, bleeding-heart nonsense. It is, but it's leftist, bleeding-heart nonsense that will generate a more productive (not to mention meaningful) economy worldwide, raising the standard of living of all human beings and lowering crime rates and violence worldwide.

Been Away too Long (And We Got the Bombs!)

I've been away from this far too long. I doubt anyone has actually noticed, but I blog more for myself than as a means of editorial journalism.

What could bring me back? What nightmare of policy faux pas could make me vent my rage on the unsuspecting surfers who skim over my blog? How about the increased threat of nuclear war? That one might just do it.

Under the stormy cloudcover of Katrina the Joint Chiefs decided to release the revised US Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations. In short: it sucks. Why on earth would anyone want to ensure that it was clearly stated that pre-emption was a pillar of our nuclear arms policy. Whose idea was this? Next thing you're going to tell me is that they've already undertaken a study with regard to the possibility of a "mine shaft gap" resultant from the loss of a "doomsday" event brought on by the use of the pre-emption strategy.

Technically, this document makes it clear that if Iran (What other state does this really have anything to do with?) gets the bomb before or after we begin some form of open hostilities we can go ahead and engage in the most destructive game of rock/paper/scissors in history. God I hope Rummy approves of this one, and I can't wait until W is actually asked for permission to use them. I'm always curious when Tom Barnett compares W to Truman. Perhaps there's to be an analogy for the history books after all.

Give peace (and life unmutated by nuclear radiation) a chance.

Michael Jackson to Keep America Safe

From an official DHS press release:

“I congratulate Michael Jackson for being confirmed with unanimous consent by the U.S. Senate as Deputy Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. His management experience in public and private service will be extremely valuable to the Department and its vital mission. I thank Congress for acting quickly during the confirmation process and look forward to working closely with Deputy Secretary Jackson in the months ahead as the Department strives to enhance our capabilities and strengthen our nation’s security.” -Sec. Michael Chertoff

Let the jokes begin....

Connectivity is a Right

Currently pending a hearing in both chambers of the Tennessee congress is a bill (HB 1403 in the house and SB 1760 in the Senate) which will make it unlawful for municipal governments to provide broadband internet access to their citizens. The goal here is to prevent municipalites from becoming potential competition for Verizon, Comcast, Time Warner, and the like, and though one could make an excellent case for major cities providing this service, I'm not even going to touch that one. Instead I'm going to tell you the story of the tiny town of Scottsburg, Indiana.

Just like numerous small towns all over Tennessee, Scottsburg hadn't had (or really needed) broadband Internet access until recently. It was a town that survived without email. If you needed to buy something you went to the local store, and if you wanted to talk to the mayor about a potholed road you just asked him about it when he said hello to you at the local cafe. The librarian would get books for you, and business agreements were transacted the old fashioned way, through the mail. Life in Scottsburg moved along just fine without Wi-Fi, Broadband, or anything of the sort, until life outside Scottsburg moved right along past it. Suddenly, businesses in Scottsburg were unable to compete with similar businesses in areas served by broadband. Mailing contracts and blueprints was simply too time consuming in a world where everyone is digital, and so, as is the case in this modern world, where there is demand, supply would arrive, right? Wrong. The town was simply too small, too far away from the primary broadband grids of Verizon and Comcast to be profitable. The town was in a catch 22. Without broadband the town couldn't grow, and would probably shrink as it lost jobs to connected areas, but until the town was larger broadband providers considered it a sinkhole for investment.

In steps the town's mayor, Bill Graham. Bill and the city council put together a plan to provide broadband Wi-Fi access to the entire community, beaming it right into the homes of every citizen with a computer. Businesses stayed, and things were looking up when suddenly, those very companies who'd showed no interest in Scottsburg before were up in arms. It wasn't long before lobbyists for the telecom industry were spouting all kinds of nonsense about unfair competition and misapropriation of tax dollars. How do I know that it's not unfair? Well, because these very companies are subsidized heavily by the federal government to expand access to communities just like Scottsburg. Hmm, that sounds like a misapropriation of federal tax dollars in itself. The bill they drafted to kill Scottsburg's municipal broadband project died in the Indiana legislature after Bill Graham told this same story in their house chamber.

Our own bill of this nature is even more subversive because it places a moratorium on services explicitly described as legal under Tennessee law. This bill is nothing but an attempt to protect the interests of massive, federally subsidized corporations from the horrible risk of people pulling together to serve themselves. Connectivity is the mortar between the bricks of society. The Roman empire was held together by a road network unlike any ever seen. The British fielded a navy that was unmatched by any in the world, and the United States has become this nation through various forms of connectivity from the railroad to the telegraph, the telephone to the Internet. To deny the right to provide this service to themselves to a city is to tell them the modern equivalent of no roads, no rail, no telephones.

Why Guest Worker Visas are Unethical

President Bush has been gearing up for the campaign to create a guest worker visa. For those of you who aren't aware, this is entirely different from a green card or citizenship. The idea is that the visa would have a number of months for which it is valid (open to extension of course), and at the end of that period the "guest worker" goes back to his/her country of origin. This program is a clear response to population pressure from Latin America. Everyone is aware of the huge numbers of illegal immigrants that come to work in the U.S. every year, and any reasonable person is aware of the huge amounts of manpower wasted on trying to prevent it, manpower better devoted to stopping terrorists and drug trafficking. The administration seeks to relieve that pressure through means of the guest worker visa. Here's the catch: Guest worker visas are an old European scheme to allow cheap labor to flow in while still preventing it from integrating culturally and economically into the society. And the real kicker is that you can simply stop visa extensions when you need to pull an Ebeneezer Scrooge and "decrease the surplus population." Problem: Preventing integration with the society creates a socio-economic underclass (usually hostile to their hosts), deports GDP by means of remittances (cash immigrants send home), and (by means of the slums that these immigrants live in) creates areas prone to crime. The other nasty problem is that you can't deport this problem any more effectively than you can stop illegal immigrants from entering the country. In fact, it's harder because they're already here, living in urban slums with offline economies and surrounded by people in a similar plight. The trend in these cases has never been for families and friends to reunite back in their country of origin, but to reunite in the host nation. The creation of a disenfranchised sub-citizenry might relieve population pressure to some extent, but in the end it will only import a new set of problems. Given the choice between waging a futile border war now, a futile internal war later, or allowing working men and women living in America to be part of our multi-cultural fabric I choose the latter option.

Joke of the Day

Earlier today, Donald Rumsfeld found a good use for the Powell Doctrine as applied to relations within NATO. After what was generally smooth going at a press conference in Nice, France, the Secretary looked to top aide Lawrence di Rita saying, "Are we getting close to the end, Larry? I'd like to get out of here before I make a mistake."

Maybe he should teach Condi this tactic before her next hardline chat about Iran.

The Moral High Ground

After commenting on our own social welfare situation, this just makes my day. Apparently Germany, by legalizing prostitution, has created a situation in which brothels must be treated in the same manner as any other employer, meaning that if a person recieving unemployment benefits turns down a job as a prostitute, they risk having their benefits terminated. Oh, feel free to take all the moral high ground on Iraq you'd like, Gerhardt. Or, should I say, O.G. Pimp Daddy Schroder. I'm going to get SOOOO much mileage out of that at parties.

When Idealism is in our Self-Interest

William Saffire put the president's inauguration speech in the top ten second term inaugural in history. I haven't read all the second term speeches, but I might've been inclined to give it even more prominence than that on the grounds of the singular statement:

We are led, by events and common sense, to one conclusion: The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world.

It would seem that the Bush administration has grasped that policy is most successful when idealism and self-interest intersect, or, rather, that they have grasped this with regard to foreign policy. While this rather subtle nuance of politics (frequently lost on academics) seems to have become the core idea of Bush's foreign policy, the president seems to have failed to comprehend that old adage: "What's good for the goose is good for the gander."

Over the past weeks innumerable editorials have been published regarding the budgetary evisceration of social welfare programs, and, clearly, this is in keeping with ideas popular among Republicans since Reagan, but it is in direct opposition to both our ideals and our interests. As we pour money and manpower into the Iraqi reconstruction, even going so far as to daily sacrifice America's sons and daughters on the altar of freedom and global community, the administration would have us believe that our own disconnected areas are somehow fundamentally different from Sadr City, that our freedom and security are connected to slums in Baghdad, but not to slums in Detroit.

Allow me to put this into perspective. If the Bush doctrine, or some revised form of it, is successful, by 2020 there will be a functioning economy, a middle class, and prosperity in the Middle East. Iraq, Afghanistan, and Palestine will no longer be fruitful recruiting ground for Jihadists. Indigenous populations, focused on building a future, riding steadily forward on a sense of possibility and increased expectations will shun Jihad in favor of moderate forms of Political Islam, geared toward building a better future for the Islamic world. However, as can already be seen in Western Europe, Islamic communities abroad will face discrimination, finding themselves in squalor amid the prosperous. Imagine the Black Panthers emboldened with Jihadist ideology and a lot of Simtex.

The very social programs that are designed to prevent indigenous Americans from sliding into crushing poverty are America's first line of defense against the Jihadists of tomorrow. While most Americans don't realize it, America's Islamic population is surging. In Dearborne, Michigan 30% of the population is of Arab ancestry, more than 60,000 people, most of them living in disconnected and impoverished communities. Already anti-American demonstrations have had a chilling effect.

In the coming years the survival of liberty in our land will depend increasingly on the survival of our commitment to opportunity for all Americans. Social welfare is our first line of defense against the Jihadists of tomorrow. Isn't it in our interests then, to ensure it's survival?

Rule Set Reset

The first issue of Rule Set Reset: A Journal of News and What's Next will be available free of charge, and, given the wonderful articles by Thomas P. M. Barnett, TM Lutas, Mark Safranski, and yours truly I highly recomend that you all download it.

How Little We Understand Ourselves

- 'Land grab' fears for Jerusalem, BBC World News, Jan. 24, 2005

It has been broadly accepted that the root cause of terrorism is "a sense of diminished expectations," and economist Hernando de Soto, President of the Institute for Liberty and Democracy, has done extensive work connecting that feeling to what he refers to as property "meta-rights," or the right to have property rights. With Ariel Sharon molting his hawk's feathers it seems strange that his new government should be assaulting these rights shown to be most connected to that sense of diminished expectations. That's exactly what they're doing, however, when Palestinians, living in the West Bank who can actually prove their ownership of property in East Jerusalem, are losing property to the government under an absentee landlord law not in active use for fifty years. Sharon's political life has been bet on one hand of poker with the Palestinians. Is he really stupid enough to trade in a pair of jacks in hopes of a flush? For the peace process to succeed the Palestinians have to have hope. This marks two serious strikes against him (the first being the early shut down of communications with the Abbas government). Let's hope that he and his new government can get their act together and comprehend that a mutually beneficial agreement doesn't mean that they get all the land, power, and prosperity alongside the peace.

A Citizen Of Mosul

A Citizen Of Mosul has decided to give us some perspective on Iraqi history. I rarely blog links to other blogs, but this one's worth it.

Jazz and Policy

The fundamental difference between be-bop jazz and most forms of music that preceded it is that be-bop leaves room for dissonance and improvisation. In be-bop a trumpet player can go off melody and beat, creating wildly dissonant patterns. I love be-bop... as a form of music. Be-bop, however, is not a bureaucratic or political style that goes over too terribly well. That, according to an article in The Nation, hasn't stopped it from being tried as we struggle to create a future for Iraq.

I'll spare you the particulars of the article. Andrew Ackerman already wrote them, so I'll simply give you the necessary bits. According to Ackerman the Pentagon has awarded a nearly $3M contract for the protection of diplomats in Iraq to Aegis Defence Services, a London-based mercenary firm headed by the notorious Tim Spicer. Spicer is widely known in military circles as one of the most scandalous and disreputable men in a field that is hardly overburdened by ethics. The reason he is "widely known" is that he has, historically, been less than discreet while engaging in very questionable activities. He has previously violated international and British law by trafficking arms into Sierra Leone, accidentally triggered a coup in Paupa New Guinea, and, while commanding a Scots Guard unit in Belfast, allowed men guilty of murder to return to duty.

Five senators, led by Ted Kennedy, have lodged a protest with the Department of Defense to no avail. Protests raised by competitors to the GAO have had similar results. Simply put, Spicer's company meets all the bureaucratic requirements to be awarded the contract, and, frankly, were this a traditional war zone, I would think this a perfectly reasonable situation. War zones, however, are no longer traditional. The United States is, for better or worse, trying to build a free and modern state where once there was a despotism. This task must be taken personally. Every leader involved must share, or at least comprehend, the vision of a free Iraq. For the Department of Defense to outsource security duties to conflict-prone mercenaries is tantamount to the conductor of an orchestra allowing a trumpet player to go off melody during an Aaron Copeland symphony. Be-bop, it turns out, simply doesn't sound good as policy.

Sorry for the Absence

My apologies for the long absence. I'd like to blame it on the holidays, and I suppose I can to an extent. I get terribly depressed around this time of year, and (combined with a nasty case of the flu) that kept me down for a couple of weeks. It was all I could manage to finish my article for Rule Set Reset (the monthly journal of the New Rule Sets Project). I'm quite happy about that. I consider having a 1000 word article next to articles by Thomas P.M. Barnett, TM Lutas, and Mark Safranski (Zenpundit) to be an honor. I'm still trying to figure out exactly why Tom asked me to write for them, but, hey, I'll take the exposure without asking too many questions.

Tom and Critt, thanks for asking me to be involved. Bob Jacobson, thanks for the outstanding coaching and editing. I'm proud to have worked with you.

If it's quite all right with the NRSP kids I'll post the article here when the Feb. issue of RSR comes out. Assuming that I keep getting a soap box in RSR, I'll try to publish the articles here as the following issues come out.

Esther Dyson and Jeff Jarvis on NPR

I hope at least some of you managed to listen to Esther Dyson and Jeff Jarvis on NPR this morning. There was some really serious insight into how the Internet (and blogs in particular) are changing everything from disaster relief to the media. It was all the guff that bloggers already know, but it demonstrated that NPR has really begun to get globalization. I also particularly like that a major media outlet is giving play to serious blogs, and that Wonkette's flirtation with a certain Capitol Hill hussy will no longer be the way that outsiders remember blogs.

The New Year

The calender insists that this is a new year, but I view time as a series of events rather than just a series of dates. So, by my reckoning it's New Year's Eve. About three hours ago the Palestinians started voting. Since I count the Tsunami (and the initial flow of aid) as the final event of 2004, I'm counting the Palestinian elections, or rather their completion, as the first major event of 2005. When the votes are in and a successor to Yassir Arafat has been declared, I'll call it '05. Get ready for a high bit rate for the next few weeks. The Tsunami pulled the vast majority of media and policy attention for a couple of weeks, but this election and the begining of this session of Congress are going to start a massive flow of pent up political energy. I'll save my immediate predictions as they're all fairly obvious, but I suppose I'll make a few big ones for '05.

1) Sharon's shaky government will collapse and the Palestinian peace process will require the intervention of an outside negotiator. Sharon will survive politically, but he probably won't be the PM. This will all happen after the settlement pullouts are largely complete, and the trigger will be budgetary in nature.

2) The attention that the Tsunami has brought to the Tamil Tigers will draw a third party negotiator to help bring about an end to that conflict. The Tigers will gain enough legitimacy in international eyes to become more of a political party and less of an insurgency.

3) Costal areas hit by the Tsunami will rebuild rapidly. By 2006 they will contribute at least double their previous percentages of their respective GDPs on average. These regions will attract massive investment due to the restructuring of local property laws and the creation of new physical infrastructure.

4) Iraq will be headed for trifurcation, though it will remain Iraq. The national government will exist, but it will serve as little more than a political battleground for the three regions to argue over oil rights. While the Shiites continue to stabilize and prosper the Sunnis will wage an undeclared civil war. We will, in response, train a largely Shiite military which will further alienate the Sunnis. The end result will be a bloody conflict management which will not improve until the peacekeeping force is made significantly more multi-lateral. The violent conflict in Iraq will only improve when continental Europe gets off its high horse and helps. That in turn will only happen when the Bush and Blair administrations ask politely. We might be waiting until 2007 for that. Another possibility is that the Islamic world, led by Turkey and Iran, will stage a serious effort to bring about peace in Iraq, but that sort of help will be linked (indirectly) to Turkey's EU ambitions and Iran's bomb.

5) The European Union will deal with more homegrown Islamic terrorism than ever before, prompting leaders to involve Europe more deeply in the Global War on Terror. This could prompt reconcilliation between the US and Europe over Iraq if Bush plays his cards right. As Europe will find itself the new home of massive terror networks, the epicenter of this reconcilliation will likely be interagency cooperation between US and European intel agencies. This one's an outside bet, but I'll still throw some cash on it.

6) This will be a weak year for national domestic policy due to massive partisan debate in Congress. The Hill will be full of sound and fury signifying nothing, but state governments will use the chance to seize the limelight, starting a decentralization of power. The rising stars of both parties will come from state governments, dashing the hopes of more than a few members of the House for political advancement.

That's all I'll predict for'05. This is going to be a tedious year in a lot of ways. Very little will come to fruition, but we'll see the emergence of quite a few patterns. Oh, one last one, North Korea will implode with less fanfare than expected. China will deal with that handily enough that the US barely gets involved until after the dice for the future of the country are already thrown.
Well, we'll just put that on to simmer for a year, and we'll see how well my crystal ball works later. Time for me to crawl back into my bottle of NyQuil. See you all after the votes are counted in Palestine.

Rugby V. Football: The Future of War

When I was in the army my battalion commander was from a West Texas football town. If you've ever seen Varsity Blues then you know that Football is everything in West Texas. Conveniently for my BC football has been everything for the Army for some time, as well. The concept of rushing troops across terrain, making an end-run for Baghdad, is simply appealing. Throw in a complex series of rules, a pile of armor, and... wait, I'm confused. Are we talking about football or war?

It's easy to see how this model for warfare came to be. It's the 1980's, fourth quarter of the Cold War, and the Eagles are up on the Bears by a field goal. Both teams line up along the line of scrimmage (a.k.a. Iron Curtain), and Pentagon commanders call plays. The bad news is that the Bears conceded victory on that one, so we never got to see the mother of all superbowls. Instead we had to settle for Iraq I, but that's okay because Stormin' Norman was even good enough to name his strategies after football plays. Between that and CNN cum ESPN (of war) the first Iraq war was better than watching the UT Vols during the Peyton Manning years.

Fast forward a decade. Same basic strategy. Roll 'em up across the desert. Baghdad's the goal line. Woohoo! Touchdown! Wait, why aren't they running off the field? Oops. This is a rugby match. If you've ever clicked over to ESPN 2 at 1 AM then you've seen rugby. It's what football was during the Precambrian period, back when the other popular sport was dinosaur jousting. The basic idea is that the ball stays in play. Forward passes are against the rules, so no gaining ground quick. You've gotta run the ball. There are no downs, no field goals, no punts, just a bunch of guys playing offense and defense at the same time, constantly trying to adjust to the other team and passing backwards in order to get a shot at a few steps forward. Sound like fourth generation warfare? Oh, and these guys don't wear helmets.

Any further comparison would be pointless. The last thing I want to do here is convince anyone that rugby is the way to think about war. What I do want to do is to make the point that in order to prevail in this conflict we must shake ourselves of the mindset that there are periods of down time, that we could conceivably call a time out, and that running the ball to the goal line warrants a silly dance. Like rugby, this game is constantly in play, and there is no easy way to get to the other end of the field.

A Full Stocking a Day Late

I just wrote a massive post on a host of good news, but my computer crashed. So, in lieu of rewriting the entire thing I'll hit the main points and call it a night.

Palestine is looking good to go on elections with Israel pulling out troops to ensure that polling is seen as fair. So long as Hammas the political party can either reign in or divorce itself from Hammas the suicide bombers the new government stands a good chance of being seen as legitimate by both the Palestinians and the international community. Let's see if it can leap the bureaucratic and legislative hurdles that all new governments face.

Go Yuschenko!!! Get ready to see a more European Ukraine.

Afghanistan is pulling together a new opposition party by internationally normal methods. I call that a big win. Who was it at Foreign Policy Magazine that decided to run that title "Why Democracy Won't Save the Middle East?" Howsabout "Why Pessimism Won't Save the Middle East?"

If I can get gifts like this I'll wait until the 26th every year!

How Fleixible is Asia?

One of the major defining characteristics of a functional, decentralized network is its flexibility. South Asia has just suffered a catastrophic loss of human life and property. Over the coming weeks the predictible aid will flow in from the EU, US, and NGOs, but I predict that India may be more able to deal with this crisis than they are being given credit for. A truly amazing turn of events would be a massive Chinese aid response, though I won't be holding my breath. If those two nations want to flex some international muscle this is the time. They're undisputed powers in numerous areas. Now it's time to see how they respond to crisis management in their own backyard.

Happy Holidays

Okay, so I've been accused of having a heart three sizes too small this time of year. I generally don't do too well with Christmas, but I just wanted to wish all of our servicemen and women overseas, in combat zones, on ships, and pulling guard duty all night in the cold a safe and uneventful holiday weekend. It's never a Merry Christmas when you're standing in a guard tower for 12 hours and you're scared to look at your thermometer, but I just want to remind everyone to think of those men and women. The desert gets cold at night, and even colder when you're ten thousand miles from home.

Speak Plainly

I have at various times in the last three years stood by several very different opinions with regard to America's attempt to police the Middle East. Let's go ahead and call a spade a spade. That's what we're doing. We're policing a bad neighborhood. In Iraq today there are innumerable factions divided between Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds, theocrats, technocrats, tribalists, Baathists, Islamists, and probably at least one political satirist. What I'd like to point out is that if America stands for anything, if we want the lives of our dead soldiers to mean anything we must ensure that we leave Iraq with these groups, nay, these individuals, represented in some form of democratically elected government.

We, have sent our men and women in uniform into harms way to eliminate a totalitarian regime, and have found ourselves involved in a prolonged conflict. My patience for hearing ivory tower academics denounce the war in its entirety is exhausted. Certainly criticism of officials managing the war strategy, both military and political, is appropriate, even patriotic, however it is unpatriotic in the highest order to insinuate that a pullout from Iraq, after having destabilized that region, is appropriate. I call it cowardly. I call it cowardly because it is irresponsible, shortsighted, and because those prominent columnists who insinuate that we should execute such a "strategy" do so under the guise of bold criticism for the administration. We now owe it to the people of Iraq, Sunnis, Shiites, Kurds, and all, to leave them with at least more stability and security than they had when we came.

I propose a new code for op-ed journalism, a very simple rule to follow: If you don't like it, offer a solution. Simply stating that something is evil, dangerous or ineffectual after the fact simply doesn't cut the mustard for quality journalism. Maureen Dowd, someone whose writing I have hithertofore admired, has, among widely circulated columnists, been most guilty of breaking this rule. Maureen, like it or not, we're in a war. If you can't offer solutions then give your rather prominent space in the Times to someone who can. I wonder if after rear-ending someone you would feel the need to give a twenty minute denouncement of traffic patterns and your own driving before exchanging insurance information. It strikes me that Ms. Dowd would be willing to leave Iraq in the hands of Baathist militants, a group who, as her counterpart Thomas Friedman points out, have been begged to come to the table of democracy and declined in favor of what amounts to gang violence. I'm afraid, Maureen, that two wrongs don't make a right. Leaving Iraq in its present state would definitely constitute a second wrong.

Congratulations!

Congrats to Tom Barnett and Critt Jarvis on their new consulting firm The New Rule Sets Project! The Project will also have a monthly journal based around Tom's stellar foreign policy work called Rule Set Reset to which Tom's asked me to contribute. I have to say, I can't imagine what they're thinking (must be all the stress from the new business), but I'll give them whatever I've got. If we're in a war of ideas, these guys are the Delta Force of network-oriented thought, moving heaven and earth for a future worth creating. Cheers, boys!

The News Matrix

Critt Jarvis and I have been discussing a "News Matrix," or a way to graphically represent the data we collect every day. I'm sure that some of you are already familiar with the concept of pattern recognition, or noticing trends in news and society that let you know what's going to happen. It's a useful skill, but one that's difficult to teach because it requires a worldview paradaigm and an intuitive grasp of data analysis. We feel that a graphic aid would be helpful in explaining our ideas to others, perhaps even providing a piece of software that would allow people without the intuitive grasp to perform the analysis.

There's a discussion going on Critt's blog about this.

Surprise!

Well, everybody said that the Kremlin was going to end up in control of Yukos. Everybody said that Baikal was a front. Surprise! Everybody was right, but nobody expected it to go down this quick.

Damn, Vladamir, you puttin' the smackdown on that free trade bullshit WWF style!
Score one for the bad guys.

A Certain Breed of Arrogance

This morning I'm feeling saucy, so, having just spent the evening defending my globalist viewpoints against an assault of Kaplan and Huntington quotes, I'd like to make a very broad and very firm statement. Simply put, it takes a certain breed of arrogance to firmly believe that within one's own lifetime some massive, tectonic shift in the function of the world will occur. This is why Huntington's "Clash of Civilizations" and Kaplan's "Coming Anarchy" are tantamount to Chicken Little's "The Sky is Falling," with their implications of a radically altered world, shaped by the ravaging forces of chaos and the imperial might of the U.S. military (and dollar).

The world is an ever more complex place than that. There will be no titanic struggle between Good and Evil for the fate of the world fought on pay-per-view. My apologies to the cable networks. I know you were banking on that one. Instead of a "clash" I think we can expect more of a "mild friction" as two imperfectly matched networks try to aggregate. The struggle between Good and Evil? I'm afraid it will be somewhat Biblical. Oh, I mean Biblical like Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John Biblical, not Revelation. Biblical as in personal, interpersonal, and very, very human. I'm afraid that the images of John Wayne singlehandedly taking down Osama, thus bringing about peace on Earth will have to wait for the DVD edition of the 21st century. For now, we'll have to content ourselves with slowly, haltingly working towards "a future worth creating."

Good Will Gestures for the Holiday Season

Well Santa Claus sure just hit up the Palestinians and the Chinese. Sharon (the bionic man of Israeli politics) and his new buddies at Labor are putting their new deal on paper, so the pullout is looking good. The Israeli's are tossing in 170 Palestinian prisoners (the non-violent type) to sweeten the deal, and Hammas' Gaza faction is even backing peace talks. Christmas is looking good for the Arab-Israeli conflict, a little too good. I'd be ready for the hiccups to start early in the new year. Hammas' other factions aren't so ready to deal as Gaza is, and they'll be likely to voice their opinion with semtex. There's still a lot of budgetary stress in the Israeli government, so I'm still standing by my theory that that'll be the weak link on Israel's side of the fence. Sharon's driving this bus right now, and he's got a lot of support, but there should definitely be some third party structure going on. Mr. President, get in or get somebody else in! Somebody's gotta sweeten the deal for everyone involved, just like the trade deal for Egyptian-Israeli cooperative products.

In China there's yet another carefully worded change of policy on free expresion. Now, according to the Chinese government, you can believe whatever you want and people can't discriminate against you for your beliefs! Careful about how you exercise them, though, that's still regulated. The moral here, though, is that China is testing the waters about freedom of religion. This move is going to spark religious activity (or rather, did spark), and how that activity progresses will determine Beijing's future actions, a Sun Tzu approach to domestic policy.

Hmm... maybe that'll be good for article fodder... yes... excellent... my plans for world domination are coming along nicely.

Irony in Buenos Aires

There's some irony in the fact that global warming talks are being held in B.A. That said, this round of talks may have more impact than Kyoto could've ever hoped to have. The Bush administration has been wildly criticized for not signing Kyoto, and I'll admit that I was on that bandwagon. However, there may be some boons for the future in the rejection of that particular treaty. Bush's main objection is that it didn't constrain the "developing nations" of China and India, creating an unfair trade advantage. While China and India are emerging economies, their frail attempt to hide behind the "developing nation" title is absurd. Yes, they're in the middle of their respective industrial revolutions and tech revolutions. Yes, they will have to operate under looser rule sets than we do to continue their development. No, they're not under that "developing nations" umbrella with Pakistan and Ghana.

Now, at the moment, imposing a massive rule-set on those two nations would be disasterous, but at the rate they're trying to connect up to the global network, they'll be needing those rules very soon. In order to be effective any global treaty on pollution is going to have to include the two largest populations on earth. As usual, a graduated shift is in order, but, as governments are wont to do, it's an all or nothing deal. 2012 is the slated date for the expiration of the Kyoto Accord, and that's probably about the time we'll want to put pressure on those states to adopt more stringent rules regarding pollutants. China's not too far behind the power curve already. It's rules on cars are quite strict, but while the rules in place are apropriate, the rules don't encompass enough of their polluters. I imagine that much of this situation will be remedied internally by 2012, paving the way for more globally relavent agreements.

Softly With A Big Stick

Today's NY Times article on the Iran nuke situation carried some interesting connotations. The most eye catching was in a comparison to the Iraqi nuclear program at Osirak, destroyed by Israel in 1981. It reads:

"Iran takes great care to protect its technology and production/storage capability with multiple layers of security, hardening and dispersal," said one Air Force general with experience in the Middle East. "All this complicates identification, targeting and execution."

What's fascinating about this analysis is that these are not characteristics of an unstable R&D program. The level of coordination required to pull off this kind of decentralized effort signals two very important things. The first is a highly functional bureaucracy, necessary for prolonged operation of a decentralized network. Rogue elements like terrorist organizations can operate on a network-oriented model by utilizing infrastructure that is already extant (phones and internet) and because they are driven by the zeal of their members, requiring little bureaucracy to function. Government R&D programs require complex bureaucratic structures in order to transfer information, pay staff, and coordinate operations. "Multiple layers of security, hardening and dispersal..." are not something that can be accomplished without a stable, functional bureaucracy. I'll say more on this later.

The second point to be made by this analysis is that Iran hardly presents a major threat to global nuclear security. Any government (be it a democracy or a theocracy) going to these lengths to secure a program isn't going to be inclined to distribute its secrets to the highest bidder. Iran's main concern is Iranian security and stability. Distributing nuclear technology to terrorist groups or unstable regimes would seriously undermine both, almost assuring economic, political, and military backlash.

The really good news in this is that Iran is sporting a functional, and probably fairly massive, political bureaucracy. Couple that with a fairly well-educated population and an economy that swings some lumber regionally, and you're looking at a lot of network infrastructure in the making. Networking means connectivity, and connectivity inevitably leads to communication. This in turn leads to a free-market for ideas, and once you've got that truly representative government is on the way.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not suggesting that we should just let Iran have the nukes and expect them to become a democracy afterwards. That's absurd. What I am suggesting is that because of Iran's capacity to develop an extensive nuclear program that we can't readily eliminate (or even cripple) Iran is probably further down the road to being a democracy than even they know. Insofar as the nukes go, keeping international political pressure on them is definitely the best route, but avoiding economic sanctions is probably wise. That would do little but stifle those aspects of Iranian civil society and government that we would most like to foster. A stable Middle East requires a regional power that can be both feared and respected by its neighbors. Excluding EU bound Turkey, Iran is the only Middle Eastern nation that can be expected to be both by 2020. An Iranian nuke is a big stick to look at, but it's that soft, steady walk that should be drawing our eye.

Where Do I Sign?

The November 3rd Theses

This pretty much rounds out what I've been saying about the Dems. Wonder why I didn't see this earlier.

Gay for Pay?

New Zeland's parliament just passed a controversial bill to legalize same-sex marriage. Ever since this debate heated up in the U.S. it's been on the rise in other countries as well. (See: Canada 'Can Permit Gay Marriage' BBC News UK Ed.) Most notable among states legislating protections for same-sex couples (and unmarried straight couples) is Singapore. Notorious for its intolerance of personal freedoms, Singapore's push for GLBT legislation is, well, strange.

The reason is that Singapore (and several of these other nations I imagine) is interested in capitalizing on America's strangely hostile climate for homosexuals. Depending on who you cite anywhere between 2 and 10 percent of the American population is gay. (Kinsey pulls out the top end at 10, but 6 is a more reasonable figure.) Avoiding all of the traditional stereotypes about homosexuals (even the one about good taste in shoes), what that means for NZ, Singapore, and possibly Canada is that those homosexuals with the means, especially couples, will be inclined to consider moving to and working in those nations. Singapore's GLBT movement outright admits that it wasn't a human rights victory, but a free enterprise victory.

Tighter top-down controls on a population isn't conducive to the free spread of ideas, which isn't conducive to capitalism. I'm not suggesting that all of America's gay population is going to move to Singapore. What I am suggesting is that the most creative, most adventurous, and possibly wealthiest of the GLBT population in the United States will find themselves with a decision to make about where they want to make their home. That decision will become decidedly easier as U.S. states pass gay marriage bans and lovely little Pacific islands attach pink triangles to their flags.

Not Until You're Older

- "South America Creates Single Market,"
BBC News UK Ed. Thursday, 9 December, 2004, 03:13 GMT

More connectivity. More international agreement. Less focus on dealing with their individual lack of infrastructure. This is only good if South America can, as a whole, integrate the massive extralegal economies that exist in its individual states. Brazil is making good strides, and I'm sure that Argentina and Chile are trying as well. But, really, does anyone delude themselves into thinking that because Bolivia is managing its first peaceful (and legitimate) election and Colombia is begining to have great connectivity to the U.S. where extradition of drug lords is concerned that they'll be ready to join a union of states akin to the EU or US by the time that Argentina or Brazil will be? The loosening of trade restrictions in South America has far too many smuggling ramifications at present to be reasonable. Argentina, Brazil, and Chile are fighting to be part of the global economy. They won't be ready to serve as three pillars of a South American currency by 2020. One passport? Do you want Brazilians and Colombians to have equal access worldwide?

This is a giant step that the South American governments are taking, and they're taking it in their dad's oversized shoes. There's gonna be some slipage and maybe a fall or two. Is it overall bad? No. But it's definitely too soon to call this a success. This greater network that's being created won't be worth anything until the smaller networks beneath it are fully functional and able to go online. That said, it will be good for there to be a network structure there when these smaller networks are able to start the aggregation process, though I imagine it will be somewhat tired and defunct by then. Think "League of Nations" tired and defunct.

Doing Things the Hard Way

Should we promote connectivity at any cost?

Thomas Barnett, a man whose opinion and insight I value greatly, posits that the Middle East's connection to the functional world through oil and natural gas provides a slender strand of connectivity on which to build, but I find this to be an imperfect linkage, destined to break. While I recognize the value of fossil fuel as an impetus to have some manner of connection with the source, I do not see that connecting an oil field to a major consumer requires the consent of the local populace or their participation. A global network must consist of innumerable tiny networks, networks of neighbors, networks based on common need. The connection of the Middle East to the more developed sectors of the world is flawed because there need be no real exchange, especially on the local level , only an extraction.

When dealing with many areas of the economic network there is an impetus to create stability. That impetus is "the long term," but with non-reneweable resources it is less of a factor for the simple fact that there is a forseeable end to the resources themselves, at least in a given form and geographic location. Certainly, the Middle East as a whole may have massive fossil fuel resources, however the long term stability of the entire region is not required to extract them, and it may in fact be less expensive to maintain the stability of a few oil platforms and buy concessions from "big man" type governments than to transform the region as a whole in "the long term."

It is for this reason that I believe that the Middle East will not likely be transformed by the intervention of nations largely interested in its natural resources, but by its more natural route of connectivity, Turkey. While we are clearly not intervening in Iraq for control of its oil reserves, our interest in the region as a whole is based on two things: oil and terrorism, or, more bluntly, greed and fear. I do not suppose to have an over-arching answer to the questions that this raises. I only wish to pose the question: "Should we build along the flawed link, or tear it down to create new, stronger ones? Can we do both at the same time?"

Balancing Act

Of course, networks are balancing acts of internal structuring and external forces, so while Turkey (hopefully as an EU member) provides the external connectivity to the developed world, Iran, I expect, will provide the internal structure to support that connectivity. Personally I do not forsee the obliteration of the Islamist regime in Iran the way many do. Instead I note that economic forces are forcing Iran to flirt with free-trade zones. Turkey's new government of moderate Islamists will provide a unique bridge between the Middle East and Europe as many policy analysts have noted. However, it is worth pointing out that the overthrow of the Ayatollahs is not really relavent to whether or not this bridge is functional. In fact, the functionality of that bridge is something that the West (note I do not say "developed world") should likely observe from a distance. That connectivity will be fostered through Islamists, not through secular capitalists. Being Islamist, after all, does not preclude being capitalist or interested in building a better future.

Our attempt to unilateraly create stability in Iraq is doomed. Our method of repairing the region resembles a man with a mallot striking a broken television in hopes that the picture will clear. This may work on the first or second attempt but after that... well... you know the old saying: "The definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over expecting different results." As the dust settles from Fallujah and we near the promised deadline for elections we shall see if the striking has worked or if it is time for us to change tactics dramatically.

I believe that should we hope to stabilize the Middle East, the link provided by oil is irrelavent at best. Should we wish to bolster it we will take more resources, and energy (read: blood and treasure) than would be necessary to push the solution of a Turkish bridge between Europe and the Middle East. Dr. Barnett is fond of noting that no oil = no impetus. As usual, he's right, but the statement is somewhat misleading. The oil will continue to be the impetus for someone for a long time to come, whether it is China, India, or another nation going through its industrial revolution. To suggest that the West should maintain its dependence on Middle Eastern oil (something I believe Dr. Barnett does inadvertently) is somewhat strange. The developing world will increase its rate of consumption faster than we can decrease ours. If demand increases, the focus on oil as the link between the global network and the Middle East will increase as well, and it will not likely serve to bolster is so much as to draw focus away from other, more lasting links. No decent network engineer would design a global computer network with a huge portion linked only by one massive fiber. That doesn't support network stability.

The Illusion

The problem with thinking of oil as the first in a series of linkages, is that the link is really an illusion. There is no extant network to connect to, so the network cannot naturally aggregate. By pushing the "Turkish Bridge" scenario we grow connectivity at the same rate as the local networks. By insisting on maintaining our own independent link to the Middle East, we are struggling to create an artificial network with which to connect ourselves.

Removing Saddam Hussein was not a flawed concept. It was merely the execution (for reasons to oft discussed to repeat here) that was horrific. Now it is time that we accept that failure and move towards a natural trifurcation of Iraq. Turkey will be best suited to steward the North. Iran will naturally gain influence in the South. In the former case we should do all we can to foster this. In the latter, we should be prepared to cut deals and involve as many moderating forces as possible. If executed with deftness this could even serve as an oportunity to create another bridge into Iran, a more moderate statelet of similar makeup. If executed poorly, this could serve as a propaganda victory for extremists. The Sunni Triangle presents a challenge, and it will likely come in the form of a military one. The most important thing is to prevent it from doing damage to the two more stable regions.

The network will grow. Of this I am certain, but beware the flawed links and the urge to press forward when a step sideways is more productive. Even network-oriented thinkers are susceptible to tunnel vision sometimes.