Nothing Aside

Hamas Takes Over

The recent Palestinian election has everyone predicting gloom and doom for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for the foreseeable future, but is it really as bad as everyone says?  Hamas, the militant terrorist organization/charity anchor of social life in the West Bank, won 76 of 132 seats in the Palestinian parliament.  In the short term this is no doubt a bad thing for peace prospects.  With Ariel Sharon out of the picture in Israel and his considerable political weight now unable to move the pile towards a peaceful solution, the election of Hamas could indeed be seen as threatening. 

But long term, what does the Hamas victory lead to?  Here are a few possibilities we might see:

• Now that Hamas will actually have to govern, will Palestinians continue to support it's most radical elements?  Nothing moderates a party quite like having to put up results (though as a friend of mine pointed out, that's what Germany said about the Nazis as well).  Will Hamas be able to govern successfully?  They have been a strong part of Palestinian society for years, but they have had the luxury of criticizing from afar.  Do they have the goods?
• Fatah has finally been forced to shape up and stop being a corrupt, do-nothing governing element.  Are they better than Hamas?  No doubt.  But they have never had strong enough support from the Palestinian people to crack down on terrorism in a real way.  Not that Hamas will be better at this since they are the problem in the first place, but Fatah has gotten its wake-up call.  Will they answer it and make some real changes so that a legitimate challenge to what will inevitably be shaky leadership by Hamas can be made next time around?
• In the ironic world of politics and peace, is it at all possible that Hamas could be the Palestinian party that brings peace to the conflict?  Don't laugh.  Could a yet-to-be-named Hamas leader pull a Nixon-to-China and be the hawk that brings about a softening of relations, if not outright peace?  On the Israeli side Yitzak Rabin was able to use his reputation as a hawk to bring (albeit temporary) peace in 1994, and Ariel Sharon seemed on his way to doing something similar in the coming months and years.  Is there a Hamas leader who can pull the group in from the cold and find a settlement (sorry, wrong word) to the never-ending dispute?

I think there could be something to each of these possibilities, but it will take time.  Israeli leadership is uncertain (I'm pulling for a Kadima win) and a group largely seen as a terrorist organization is set to rule in the Palestinian territories.  In the short term things look bad.

Bin Laden Returns

After 13 months without an public presence, Osama bin Laden has again made an appearance in a tape in which he says that al-Qaeda is winning in Iraq and, oddly, offers a "truce" to the United States.  According to bin Laden, the lack of attacks in the United States is not because of anything we are doing to beef up security, but because they just haven't chosen to attack at this time.  To which I say, "yeah, right."  Terrorists don't sit on operations that could be successful.  The risk of being caught before the attack could be carried out would be too great.  Essentially bin Laden is trying to keep up the appearance that he could order an attack at will.  He would have done so by now (assuming he has any contact with anyone at this point), so we know this argument is nonsense.

On the "truce" comment, again, what is he getting at?  Is it a sign of weakness that he wants the U.S. to leave Iraq and Afghanistan and everything will be just fine and he'll leave us alone?  Does he really think we're that stupid? 

We don't mind offering you a long-term truce on fair conditions that we adhere to. We are a nation that God has forbidden to lie and cheat. So both sides can enjoy security and stability under this truce so we can build Iraq and Afghanistan, which have been destroyed in this war. There is no shame in this solution, which prevents the wasting of billions of dollars that have gone to those with influence and merchants of war in America who have supported Bush's election campaign with billions of dollars -- which lets us understand the insistence by Bush and his gang to carry on with war.

For someone who has in the past said that victory will only come when the "crusaders and zionists" are gone for good, the suggestion of co-existance is totally absurd.  And he should know this much. 

Apparently bin Laden's voice was weaker and less dominant, perhaps as a result of living in the border regions of Pakistan while on dialysis.  One way or another, bin Laden is on the decline.  And that is always a good thing.

#2 Down? Dr. Evil Is Next

ABCNews is reporting that Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda's second in command and its most vocal representative these days, may have been killed by a CIA drone in the border region of Pakistan.  Let's hope that these reports turn out to be true.  We haven't seen a video from bin Laden in more than a year and instead have seen al-Zawahiri taking the lead.  No one really knows why this is - bin Laden may be too remote to really lead al-Qaeda, he may be dead, or something else - but it seems that a dead al-Zawahiri would be a boon to the war on terrorism.  Certainly al-Qaeda has moved on to become more than just its leaders, but if the reports of his death prove accurate, this would be a huge step forward against terrorism - unlike our current efforts in the terrorist factory that is Iraq.

**UPDATE**: It seems that we may not have gotten al-Zawahiri.  Drat.  Pakistan of course is declaring its outrage for this attack on Pakistani territory, but they knew this was going on.  Hopefully we'll get him, and bin Laden, next time.

Doing It The Hard Way

Today Kevin Drum raises a good point about this NSA-wiretapping-ignoring-Congress story.  The reason so many Democrats and a good number of reasonable Republicans are upset about this is not the program itself.  Yes, the public is extremely nervous about the word "wiretapping" but that's not totally what this is about because that's not the best term for it.  The program itself is filling a gap where a gap needed to be filled as far as I can tell.  Ultimately, the problem here then, is that the President didn't attempt to get the law changed by what was a pliable Congress in the days and months after 9-11 so that this program would be legal and legitimate.  Instead he dodged Congress.  That is the real story here.

Politically, I think Democrats should make it absolutely clear that what they're attacking isn't necessarily the program itself, but the fact that the president unilaterally decided that he could approve the program without congressional authorization. In the world of 10-second sound bites, that might end up being a difficult distinction to make, but it's worth making it over and over anyway. We're not opposed to cranking up our intelligence efforts, but we are opposed to a president who thinks that a vague and indefinite state of war gives him the authority to do anything he wants.

I hope this distinction can be made.  The White House would like nothing better than to make this another "Democrats are weak on defense and security" story, but it's not about that.  It's about the Bush administration purposely sidestepping Congress in an effort to exert presidential powers that only it believes it has.  There was an easy way to get approval for this program.  The White House instead chose to bull rush Congress in a push for imperial powers in an unending war.

Ignoring Congress

What is happening to our Constitution?  There is clearly a massive fight over power between the branches of government that seemingly only the executive branch is aware of and actively engaged in. Congress needs to stand up for its Constitutionally-mandated role and ensure that the laws that it passes, and the president signs, are actually carried out.  On Friday the President signed the Defense Appropriations Bill that includes the so-called McCain Amendment that reiterates the standards for interrogation that are already in the rules of conduct in the Army field manual.  The White House, and specifically the Vice President's office, have fought this simple declaration of America's rules on interrogation practices as an encroachment on the President's duties to defend America and other grrr!, roar!, patriotic macho stuff.

However, after the Senate voted 90-9, the writing was on the wall and the White House had to back down.  It seemed that McCain had prevailed, what with a huge majority of the public backing his view that torture is wrong and should not be used in interrogations.

But take a look at what the President wrote when he signed the Defense Appropriations Bill on Friday.

The executive branch shall construe Title X in Division A of the Act, relating to detainees, in a manner consistent with the constitutional authority of the President to supervise the unitary executive branch and as Commander in Chief and consistent with the constitutional limitations on the judicial power, which will assist in achieving the shared objective of the Congress and the President, evidenced in Title X, of protecting the American people from further terrorist attacks.

Essentially the President is saying that the McCain Amendment isn't worth the paper it is written on since he plans to ignore it anyway.  He will cite his wartime powers and say that the rules do not apply since he is just acting within his authority to protect Americans.  Anyone who stands in his way is weak and doesn't care about the security of our nation.

But when does the war end?  The answer, of course, is that it doesn't.  The war against terrorism is one without any endpoint. We don’t live in a time when war is openly declared and when peace treaties signal the end of hostilities. That will never happen again and the President knows it.  As such he is confident that he can use his war powers indefinitely, thereby ignoring the stipulations of the McCain Amendment.

So what will McCain's response be to the President's boldfaced dismissal of Congress' wishes?  We will have to wait and see on that one.  But I think Congress needs to recognize how much it is getting hosed here.  I'm not a huge fan of the petty, mind-numbing nonsense that goes on in the House of Representatives, but it serves a purpose.  One of its duties is to balance the power of the Executive.  It is time for Congress, and the Judiciary while we're at it, to do their job and look at where we are headed.  It's not a pretty picture.