-
Why the U.S. Is Not Like the Rest of the World on Gun Control
Tweet Share on Facebook December 31, 2012 CommentDaniel Gallington is the Senior Policy and Program Adviser at the George C. Marshall Institute in Arlington, Va. He served in senior national security policy positions in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Department of Justice, and as bipartisan general counsel for the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
America is not the only place in the world with violence perpetrated by people with serious mental illness. It happens everywhere—and comparing incidents serves primarily to highlight the reality and ever increasing severity of those with untreated mental illness in modern society. And, they do their twisted violence with guns, knives, bombs, arson, and vehicles driven into crowds of innocent people. However, what Americans can or will actually do about gun violence from the mentally ill is a far more complex issue than it is for the rest of the world—this for a number of reasons not understood by most foreigners and some Americans.
-
Mario Monti Should Be Italian Prime Minister Again
Tweet Share on Facebook December 31, 2012 CommentScheherazade S. Rehman is a professor of international finance/business and international affairs at The George Washington University. You can visit her homepage here and follow her on Twitter @Prof_Rehman.
Most of us (non-Italians) believed, or at least prayed, that the outgoing Prime Minister Mario Monti would lead Italy in 2013 in some capacity. Most of us hope that it will be in the capacity of prime minister again. Although this seemed difficult on the surface as Mario Monti is a "senator for life" and cannot technically stand for election, he is allowed to participate in the campaign. If the centrist parties form a coalition large enough to win the election they can invite Mario Monti to be the leader of that coalition, i.e. prime minister. This past Sunday, Monti finally indicated his willingness to be "named leader of a future Italian centrist coalition." But he has made it clear that he is not affiliated with either the left or the right, and not even the center parties. Monti offered his advice to all during the elections and agreed to lead a coalition that will continue to follow his reform/austerity agenda. This enables him to keep his distance from dirty political battles and keep his economist/technocrat/professorial nonpolitical status and image. It also allows him to focus on the reform agenda if he is brought back into office. Professor Monti is playing it very smart, almost like a shrewd politician. Thus the race for Italy's future is on.
-
A Way Out of the Greek Financial Crisis
Tweet Share on Facebook December 31, 2012 CommentAndrew S. Natsios is an executive professor at the George H.W. Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, and the author of Sudan, South Sudan and Darfur: What Everyone Needs to Know. Natsios served as administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development and as President George W. Bush's special envoy to Sudan.
On December 13 the European negotiators finally approved a long-awaited $57 billion bailout to the Greek government to deal with its sovereign debt crisis which has shaken the foundations of the European Union and the euro. Without economic growth however, these bailout plans simply prolong the suffering of the Greek people, many of whom see no way out of the economic crisis facing the country. The loans will provide sufficient funds for the government to operate for two and a half years, but require further controversial cuts in public sector spending. Since the world economic crisis of 2008, the Greek economy has contracted by 20 percent, driving up unemployment to 23 percent, a rate comparable to U.S. unemployment at the peak of the Great Depression in 1932.
-
Nigerian Terrorist Group Boko Haram Must Be Contained
Tweet Share on Facebook December 31, 2012 CommentStephen Hayes is president and CEO of the Corporate Council on Africa.
Boko Haram, a major language and tribe of northern Nigeria, which loosely means "Western education is forbidden" in Hausa, has emerged as a major threat to the stability and unity of Nigeria. Because of Boko Haram it is no coincidence that the Pentagon has announced that U.S. troop engagement in Africa, albeit largely for training purposes, will increase in number and projects in Africa. This was widely predicted but originally denied when AFRICOM was created by the U.S. Department of Defense a few years ago. Whatever the original purpose of AFRICOM, growing terrorism in Africa has altered the original stated intent of AFRICOM. Its major purpose now is to fight terrorism.
-
Big Defense Cuts Are Coming, Regardless of the Fiscal Cliff
Tweet Share on Facebook December 27, 2012 CommentStuart Johnson and Irv Blickstein are senior policy researchers at the nonprofit, nonpartisan RAND Corporation.
Regardless of the final resolution of "fiscal cliff" negotiations between President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner, the Department of Defense is likely to end up facing major budget reductions beyond the $487 billion announced last January.
-
Don't Believe the Left--America's Still Number One
Tweet Share on Facebook December 27, 2012 CommentDr. Lamont Colucci is an associate professor of politics at Ripon College, recent Fulbright Scholar to the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna, and author of The National Security Doctrines of the American Presidency: How they Shape our Present and Future, among other books. You can find out more at lamontcolucci.com.
The time in between Christmas and New Year's is always a bit strange. The second greatest Christian holiday is over and the most over indulgent secular holiday is about to commence. New Year celebrations have become excuses for excess and are in many ways the polar opposite of the story of Christmas. It is in this vein that this column will slightly deviate from foreign affairs and address a trend that clearly affects national security, namely, the glee that some feel in the denigration of America, especially religious America. A symptom of this trend appears (and due to the internet has gone viral) in HBO's attempt to resurrect respect for the mainstream media with its show Newsroom. In the first episode the struggling news anchor, Will McAvoy rants about America no longer being number one in the world:
-
The Economy and al Qaeda Among the Biggest Threats of 2013
Tweet Share on Facebook December 26, 2012 CommentMichael P. Noonan is the director of the Program on National Security at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
As we approach the end of the year, I offer up the four biggest threats for the United States internationally in 2013. The four biggest opportunities will follow in a separate blog post.
-
The Budget, Afghanistan, and Syria Among Top 2013 U.S. Opportunities
Tweet Share on Facebook December 26, 2012 CommentMichael P. Noonan is the director of the Program on National Security at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Earlier, I offered what I see as the four biggest international threats to the United States in 2013. As promised, here are the four biggest opportunities in that arena:
-
Fracking, OPEC, and Violence in the Middle East
Tweet Share on Facebook December 24, 2012 CommentDaniel Gallington is the Senior Policy and Program Adviser at the George C. Marshall Institute in Arlington, Va. He served in senior national security policy positions in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Department of Justice, and as bipartisan general counsel for the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
In the news a lot recently is "fracking," the shorthand for "fracturing". It's an oil-drilling technique that's becoming increasingly effective for recovering lots of oil and gas from rock formations—and is undergoing widening application in the United States.
-
Egypt's Constitutional Referendum Was an Opportunity Lost
Tweet Share on Facebook December 21, 2012 CommentLaurel E. Miller is a senior policy analyst at the nonprofit, nonpartisan RAND Corporation. She is the lead co-author of Democratization in the Arab World: Prospects and Lessons From Around the Globe and editor of Framing the State in Times of Transition: Case Studies in Constitution Making.
Egyptians go to the polls Saturday for a second day of voting in a referendum on a draft constitution. Fifty-seven percent of voters in the parts of Egypt where polling was conducted last Saturday approved the draft, and when all is said and done, the yes votes probably will outpace the no votes by a larger margin than that.
