By Fester:
Paul Krugman in his column today notes that the Bush administration tax cuts and squanderous fiscal policy has produced a political poison pill that greatly reduces future option space:
I realized that the tax cuts enacted by the Bush administration are, in effect, a fiscal poison pill aimed at future administrations. True, the tax cuts won�t prevent a change in management � the Constitution sees to that. But they will make it hard for the next president to change the country�s direction.... Anyway, back to my main theme: looking at the tax proposals of the two presidential candidates, it�s remarkable and disheartening to see how effective President Bush�s fiscal poison pill has been in restricting the terms of debate.
And why be shocked at this realization. It is the same pattern of behavior that is driving the negoatiations for the Status of Forces agreement in Iraq --- lock the next admininstration into Bush's prefered course of action by creating institutional inertia behind a horrendous policy set.
And why be shocked at the SOFA --- it is the same pattern of behavior that we have seen with the changing criteria of Republican judges since the Reagan Era --- find reaonably pliant and pliable young judges without a whole lot of paper trail but the right right wing credentials and seat them on the court for thirty to forty years.
All of these steps are attempts to create gatekeepers and to charge economic, political and military rents even after the policy's support has collapsed. And it is a pattern of behavior that is to be expected.
The relevant question is how to deal with these rent seeking opportunities? I have little faith in the Democratic Congress to stand for its prerogatives by insisting that the SOFA as a full fledged security guarantee is and should be voted upon as a treaty in the Senate. I have little faith in the Congress in standing for the Constitution as Glenn Greenwald so ably demonstrates today.
I have little faith that these poison pills will be spat out and crushed in time's dust.
I wish you'd stop referring to the Bush propsal for indefinite occupation of Iraq as a 'Status of Forces agreement in Iraq'. As I've pointed out here before, and as Newshoggers' own coverage of the issue makes clear, the current proposal is nothing like actual SOFAs that the U.S. govt has with a hundred other governments. No current SOFA provides for complete freedom of U.S. troops to conduct military operations, detain citizens of the host country, attack other countries, and complete immunity of troops and private contractors from the laws of the host country.
ReplyDeleteHence, this is not a SOFA, but a proposal that the government of Iraq agree to indefinite military occupation. So please stop calling it a SOFA.
Another equally serious objection is that actual SOFAs can be negotiated between the U.S. executive branch and that of another government, without need for approval by the U.S. Senate. However, many provisions of the IMOA, particularly those authorizing military operations, are those of a treaty, which does require Senate ratification. So please stop calling the Bush proposal a SOFA.