Ireland Rejects Treaty of Lisbon

It’s received precious little notice here in the States but Irish voters have rejected the Treaty of Lisbon, the EU’s latest move towards reform and greater consolidation of power in Brussels:

DUBLIN, Ireland - Ireland’s voters have rejected the European Union reform treaty, a blueprint for modernizing the 27-nation bloc that cannot become law without Irish approval, electoral officials said Friday.

In a major blow to the EU, 53.4 percent of Irish voters said no to the treaty. Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen now will join other EU leaders at a summit next week to try to negotiate a new way forward.

Anti-treaty groups from the far left and right mobilized “no” voters by claiming that the treaty would empower EU chiefs in Brussels, Belgium, to force Ireland to change core policies — including its low business tax rates, its military neutrality and its ban on abortion.

“This is a very clear and loud voice that has been sent yet again by citizens of Europe rejecting the anti-democratic nature of Brussels governance,” said Declan Ganley, leader of Libertas, the most prominent anti-treaty campaign group in Ireland.

The euro common currency fell to a one-month low on the news.

Ireland, one of the greatest beneficiaries of EU largesse, is hardly hostile to the EU. With generous EU grants Ireland has been transformed from one of Europe’s poorest countries to one of the most prosperous countries in the world. Rejection of the treaty was probably due to some combination of a reassertion of Ireland’s pride in its own distinctive institutions and the failure of proponents of the treaty to produce a convincing plain language explanation of the benefits of approving the treaty. The opaque bureaucratese of the treaty certainly made it impossible for the treaty’s text to speak for itself.

I’ve put additional thoughts on the implications of the rejection at The Glittering Eye.

UPDATE (James Joyner): Given that I’m now professionally an Atlanticist, I’m a bit torn on this. I am, however, unreservedly amused at David Kopel’s headline, “How the Irish Saved Civilization, Again.” And I agree with him on this point:

Treaty proponents lamented that Ireland, with only 1% of the EU population, could derail a 27-nation treaty. But the very fact that only 1% of the EU’s population was allowed to vote on a treaty which would massively reduce national sovereignty and democratic accountability was itself an illustration of the enormous “democratic deficit” of the EU in general, and the Lisbon Treaty in particular. According to French President Nicolas Sarkozy, the Lisbon Treaty would be defeated in every EU nation if referenda were allowed.

I never liked the heavy-handed workaround of the Lisbon model, thinking that if the EU member states are going to cede significant sovereignty they ought at least do it in an open, transparent process.

The EU continues its eastward expansion, which I believe mostly good, partly by holding out the economic carrots of membership but partly, at least, by touting its “shared Western values.” It requires would-be members to jump through substantial hoops in order to get in accord. It’s only fitting, then, that it should abide by those same shared values in such an important process.

UPDATE (Dave Schuler)

I’ve found the complaints about how un-democratic the treaty being defeated by the Irish is being floated by supporters of the treaty enormously amusing. The reason that Ireland was the only country to vote the treaty down was that Ireland was the only country to hold a popular vote on the matter. The probability that a direct popular vote in all 27 EU countries would have resulted in the treaty being approved is, was, and always has been zero. Indeed, the only way the measure proceeded as far as it did was that the other EU countries’ governments avoided a popular vote.

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Is Time on the Iranians’ Side?

That’s the central claim of David Ignatius’s column in the Washington Post this morning:

So imagine that you are Qassem Soleimani, commander of a covert Iranian army deployed across the Middle East: You doubt the Bush administration would run the risk of a military strike against Iran, but you can’t be sure. You think America can’t afford to play chicken in an election year, but you can’t be certain of that, either. You think Iran is on a roll, but you know how quickly that advantage can be squandered by unwise choices. You know that Arabs, even in Iraq, have become peeved at what they see as meddling and overreaching by Tehran.

So you watch and wait. You give ground where necessary, but you prepare to strike back, as devastatingly as possible — and on your own terms, not those of your adversary.

Over the last five years events certainly seem to have been going their way. To its west Iraq, previously dominated by a regime with which the Iranians had fought a punishing war, is now led by a “political party” the Iranians were instrumental in creating. To its east the Taliban, with whom they’d been at daggers drawn (that’s the reason the Iranians were happy to cooperate with us against the Taliban), are no longer in control in Afghanistan. U. S. forces are largely occupied with keeping the fires in Iraq and Afghanistan tamped down to the extent that in the short term to deploy more troops anywhere we’d need to take them from one place or the other.

Rising oil prices have given the Iranian economy an enormous shot in the arm.

Iranian-supported Hezbollah influence in Lebanon is rising.

Whatever the Iranian’s nuclear weapons development program, their efforts at stymieing the IAEA in its attempts to monitor their nuclear development activities have been successful and that, combined with the recent NIE’s findings on the Iranians, makes further sanctions against the Iranians unlikely.

But is time really on their side? I don’t believe so.

Iraq is a thorny problem for the Iranians just as it is for us. Our best interests in Iraq lie in a strong central government or at least a solid, cohesive federation taking hold there. Iranian interests are for a weak federation or something just short of chaos. How likely is that to happen?

Sunni Arabs, correctly, don’t see such a weak federation as being in their interests. It leaves them largely without resources, unless the oil in Anbar province can be developed.

The Kurds in the north are being harried by the Turks on the west and the Iranians on the east (I suspect the Turks and Iranians would say that they’re pushing back). The harder the Turks and Iranians react, the better a strong Iraqi federation may look to the Kurds.

The Iranians’ greatest strength in Iraq has long been assumed to be Iraq’s southern Shi’ites but I think it’s possible to evaluate that relationship incorrectly for several reasons. First, Iraqi Shi’ism and Khomeinist Iranian Shi’ism are not identical, Iraqi Shi’ites, taking the most senior of all Shi’ite clerics, Ali Sistani’s lead, have avoided the direct participation of its clerics in government thus far.

Will the Maliki government (or its successor, if any) be a reliable puppet for the Iranians? An agenda of its own could be even more dangerous for the Iranians than it would be for us.

Iran’s economy is struggling. It is overly dependent on oil and the Iranians aren’t investing in the improvements to their production necessary to maximize yields, electing instead to spend the money on nuclear development and subsidies on the price of gasoline, especially vexing since Iran refines relatively little of its own gasoline.

Outside of oil Iran’s economy is nearly feudal, dominated by a handful of huge monopolistic companies. These monopolies are mostly untaxed and unregulated and are monstrously inefficient. They survive because the Iranian business climate, with its masses of red tape and endemic corruption, renders starting new businesses so difficult.

Two thirds of the country’s population is below the age of 25. Iran’s economy is incapable of producing jobs for them, the new Iranians don’t remember the Shah, and modern communications makes it difficult to close Iran off from the rest of the world. These young people know what people elsewhere in the world have that they don’t. Will Iran’s younger generation support the older generation’s Iranian Revolution indefinitely?

The imprudent and heedless behavior of the Bush Administration is frequently identified as a source of Iran’s ascendance over the last half dozen years but I think that the mentality that informed the Bush Administration, thinking only as far ahead as the next election cycle, is even more problematic. Rather than thinking in terms of weeks or months we should be thinking in terms of years and decades. I believe that time is on our side.

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Blogger Conference Call With Peter Robertson

I just got off the phone on a blogger conference call with Peter Robertson, Vice Chairman of Chevron, hosted by the American Petroleum Institute in anticipation of Mr. Robertson’s testimony before Congress tomorrow. He made quite a number of very interesting points.

First, practically all of the growth in oil consumption is in countries where oil consumption is subsidized, e.g. China, India. Oil consumption in the US is actually going down. Second, our energy future has more than a single aspect. We need to achieve greater efficiencies, make sensible use of renewables, and do more development of domestic oil. I agree with all of those. Third, last year Chevron had profits of $72 billion and investments in renewables, efficiency, and new oil sources of $73 billion. Much of that $73 billion was spent outside the U. S. and the reason that more wasn’t spent in the U. S. was what he referred to as “barriers to investment”—mostly government regulation.

The issue of government regulation is particularly thorny in the U. S. due to multiple overlapping jurisdictions. Not only is the federal government involved but there are state, county, city, and other local governments involved.

A propos of the discussion going on here if a top oil company executive tells me that efficiency and conservation are as or more important for reducing oil prices than developing new sources of oil (and more important in the near term), who am I to disagree?

I’ll post a link to the transcript when it becomes available.

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Reasons the Saudis Refused

Blogospheric commentary on President Bush’s failure to persuade the Saudis to pump more oil in an attempt to lower prices has largely centered on glee at the president’s discomfiture or outrage at the temerity of the Saudis (depending on which side of the political fence you sit on) and, as John Burgess notes, Saudi-bashing. There hasn’t been nearly enough analysis of the Saudis’ reasons.

The Reason They Gave

The State Department release (hat tip: John Burgess) gives the official explanation:

The Saudi oil minister, Ali al-Naimi, announced that the kingdom decided on May 10 to raise production by 300,000 barrels at the request of customers, including the United States. He said that increase was sufficient.

“Supply and demand are in balance today,” he told a news conference. “How much does Saudi Arabia need to do to satisfy people who are questioning our oil practices and policies?”

As the oil minister is undoubtedly aware, that’s double-talk. Supply and demand are in balance at any equilibrium price. That’s the definition of an equilibrium price. If the supply were to increase, supply and demand would be in balance at the new equilibrium price. Presumably, the Saudis are happy with current prices and don’t have a great deal of interest in the price of oil falling.

Sticking One in Bush’s Eye

That’s Pat Lang’s explanation:

It is most unusual for the Saudis, always the most polite of men, to act like this. It is the measure of their unhappiness with Bush and his policies that they can bring themselves to act in so boorish a way. It must make them uncomfortable to do so.

It used to be prattled in the media that the Saudis loved the Bushies (and the Bushes) and would always do what could be done to help them in the matter of oil production. It should have been clear then, and it is very clear now that this was never so. The Saudis are, like all people, concerned with their own wants and desires.

A continuing war in Iraq in which American policy has placed the despised Shia in control of the country is not among the things the Saudis would have hoped for. An unremitting hostility towards Iran which demands Saudi acquiescence in a policy likely to involve Saudi Arabia in war with Iran is not among the things the Saudis would have hoped for. The Saudis believe in dealing with problems like Iranian expansiveness with; some subtlety of negotiation, minimal but effective violence, and strategically useful bribery.

While there may be some truth in what Col. Lang has to say, once the Twin Pillars policy collapsed after the Iranian Revolution of 1979 some degree of confrontation between the KSA and Iran, the pillars, was inevitable.

They Can’t

Is it possible that the Saudis are unable to produce significantly more oil and are turning necessity into a virtue? From the Financial Times:

The fact that Russia’s oil production declined almost half a percentage point in April, the first drop in a decade, was shocking enough news from the world’s second biggest oil producer, whose output was growing at a rate of 12 per cent just five years ago. But Russian oil executives have gone a step further: Leonid Fedun, vice-president of Lukoil, told the Financial Times the country’s production may have already reached its peak.

Just days later Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil producer and by far the largest exporter, confirmed it had put on hold plans to increase the kingdom’s production capacity. Ali Naimi, Saudi energy minister, said the demand forecasts he was reading did not warrant an expansion past the 12.5m b/d capacity Saudi Arabia’s fields will reach next year, following a laborious investment of more than $20bn (£10.3bn, €12.9bn). King Abdullah, the country’s ruler, put it more bluntly: “I keep no secret from you that, when there were some new finds, I told them, ‘No, leave it in the ground, with grace from God, our children need it’.’’

Most other forecasts show the world will need Saudi Arabia’s oil. Thus the kingdom’s reluctance to invest further in its fields has led some to ask whether Saudi Arabia can boost production or whether, after 75 years, the world’s biggest oil deposit has been cashed.

Friday’s announcement by Mr Naimi that Saudi Arabia would pump slightly more oil did little to ease prices because it failed to reduce concerns over supply: when the kingdom produces more oil, it eats into its cushion of spare supply. This means such measures sometimes backfire, driving prices higher – the opposite of what US President George W. Bush, who requested the increased output, had in mind.

One problem is that nobody really knows what is going on inside Saudi Arabia’s oil industry. Riyadh is so guarded that analysts from Sanford Bernstein, the financial services company, took to spying on its activity via satellite. They spent nine months monitoring the country’s drilling activities and measuring whether Ghawar, the world’s biggest oil­field, had subsided. Their conclusion: Saudi Arabia is having to work harder than the country’s engineers and geologists expected in 2004 to squeeze more out of the northern part of the ageing Ghawar field.

Also, see this lengthy, highly technical article at The Oil Drum which suggests that Saudi reserves might be a lot less than they’re claiming.

It Doesn’t Make Sense for Them

In the final analysis it doesn’t make a great deal of sense for the Saudis to pump more in order to drive prices down:

In the 1990s the OPEC cartel was eager to pump more oil in a grab for cash as prices — like today — were going up, passing what then was viewed as a healthy sum in the $20-plus range. But then the Asia economic crisis struck and oil prices plummeted to below $10 a barrel.

Saudi Arabia and other producers got burned.

“They remember that and they’re not going have that happen again,” says Robert Ebel, an international energy expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “They understand the market just as well as we do.”

• The Glittering Eye  linked with  Eye on the Watcher’s Council

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Watcher Wanted

It genuinely saddens me to report that Rick Moran has decided to relinquish his position on the Watcher’s Council and, consequently, there’s now an empty seat to fill. If you have a blog, considering applying for it—the current rules are here.

Not long ago a scholar at Carnegie-Mellon produced a network analysis of the blogosphere that suggested that you could get a pretty good idea of what was going on by reading just 100 blogs. Present or emeritus Watcher’s Council members were heavily represented in that 100.

The Watcher’s Council is a great way to find new readers, make a difference, and to punch above your weight class.

If you’ve applied before and failed to get a seat, please apply again. I know precisely who my preferences would be for new Watchers. You know who you are.

Separating Friend from Foe

It’s my understanding that there’s a certain ambiguity to the Arabic word, jihad. It can mean either violent, physical struggle or it can mean internalized struggle, as in the struggle between one’s own good and evil impulses. There’s a similar ambiguity to the English word, crusade. It can mean raising an army to invade Palestine or it can mean something a lot more spiritual as in the evangelist Billy Graham’s famous Crusades. However it sounds to Muslim ears I doubt that many Americans believe that the Rev. Graham is attempting to raise an army to forcibly eject Muslims from Palestine with his crusades. I’m sure my fellow asociate blogger here at OTB, John Burgess, who’s fluent in Arabic, can speak more authoritatively on the subject than I.

And, again, it’s my understanding that to many Muslims jihad, in the sense of spiritual struggle, is a religious obligation. It has a largely positive, benign connotation.

That’s why I agree with David Kilcullen, as James noted not too long ago, that we would be much better off using the words irhabis (terrorists) or mufsiduun (evildoers) in referring to violent radical Islamists. At the very least it is a way of separating potential friends and allies in the Muslim world from our foes in that world. I definitely do not believe that the official change of diction constitutes a “strategic collapse”.

Not everybody agrees with that idea.

In the post cited above Joseph Myers argues the contrary, declaiming:

I submit the people advocating this line of argument are either unstudied as to what they are saying, or if the sourcing for these lines of argument can be traced to their original roots, then I would wager those roots are in the strategic disinformation of the “global Islamic movement.”

One must also question if those recommending and making these decisions have a doctrinal understanding of any of the original lexicon, much less intellectual preparation to change it to something else. Has anyone considered that maybe our perceptions are being shaped by the jihadists as much as we think we are shaping foreign perceptions?

Caution reminds us that to the extent we outsource our knowledge base we outsource our decisions. To the extent we do this with our knowledge of Islam and Islamic jihad we do so at risk.

This lexicon change represents systemic organizational failure: a professional failure and the failure to know is a failure of leadership.

I agree that we’re on the brink of a strategic failure but I don’t think that failure resides in the words we use to describe our enemies. In the presidential primaries precious little has been said about our grand strategy in the War on Terror (or whatever we’re calling it now). Is the problem strictly an incidental one as was demonstrably believed during the Clinton Administration? Or is it something more systemic? If the former, how will they improve on the approach of that administration which manifestly failed? If the latter will they continue the Bush Administration’s off again, on again emphasis on liberalization and democratization, a strategy which I doubt can succeed in a time frame short enough to avoid catastrophe? Is the grand strategy to be something entirely different? I’d like to hear some of this stuff spelled out but serious, life and death policy issues are being drowned out in the scandals du jour and gotchas of the campaign.

Before I leave the subject, the site linked above, American Thinker, could use some help. It’s generally a thoughtful site, my blog-friend Rick Moran of Right Wing Nut House, one of the most reasonable guys in the Right Blogosphere, is a contributor there, and I favor supporting the reasonable even if I don’t alway agree with their point of view. If you’re so inclined, drop by and give them a hand.

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Racism (or Sexism) At the Margins

I don’t know if 15% of the electorate will vote against Sen. Obama because of the color his skin, as some have asserted. Or, for that matter, if a similar proportion of the total electorate would vote against Sen. Clinton because of her gender. It wouldn’t need to be that high to make this a close election.

In 2004 John Kerry carried the following states by less than 5% of the vote: Wisconsin (.38%), New Hampshire (1.37%), Pennsylvania (2.50%), Michigan (3.42%), Minnesota (3.48%), Oregon (4.16%). He also carried the following states by less than 10% of the vote: New Jersey (6.68%), Washington (7.18%), Delaware (7.60%), Hawaii (8.75%), Maine (8.99%), California (9.95%).

Consequently, if John McCain can carry the states that George W. Bush did in 2004 and if just 5% of the voters in any of the six states that Kerry carried by less than 5% or 10% of the voters in any the six states that Kerry carried by less than 10% vote against Sen. Obama because of his black African Kenyan father or Sen. Clinton because of her gender, it will provide a safety margin for a McCain victory in November.

My point is not that Obama can’t win or that Clinton can’t win. I think that each of them could conceivably win in November and, all other things being equal, matters like the situation in Iraq, the economy, the Bush record, and a Republican having held the White House for the last 8 years all point to a Democrat being elected in November. But, barring unforeseen circumstances, I believe it will be very close and a quick look at the numbers tells you why. What happens at the margins will matter.

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Pennsylvania Democratic Primary Prediction

Tomorrow the long-awaited Pennsylvania primary will have arrived and I thought it might be a good time to launch fecklessly into a few predictions. As of this morning the polls are showing Sen. Clinton leading Sen. Obama by anything from six points (Zogby) to ten points (Suffolk). Sen. Obama’s strongest support is in eastern Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia and its environs, while Sen. Clinton’s is in western Pennsylvania. A lot will depend on turnout and in this I believe that Sen. Obama has a distinct advantage. His supporters certainly seem to be more enthusiastic than Sen. Clinton’s.

I think the greatest likelihood is a narrow victory for Sen. Clinton. Anything less than five points will be construed as a victory for them by the Obama campaign and they’ll be right since Pennsylvania will not have arrived at a decisive choice. That’s very much the way this entire primary season has gone—despite the impressions you may be receiving, Sen. Obama’s delegate lead over Sen. Clinton isn’t overwhelming.

In the unlikely event that Sen. Clinton wins Pennsylvania by double digits it will bolster the view that Sen. Obama can’t win big states and make the remaining superdelegates even wobblier.

In any event I don’t really expect Sen. Clinton to concede or withdraw. She’ll take her fight to the convention and maybe beyond. There is no next year.

Say, fellow OTB contributors, anybody care to play?

Update (Alex Knapp): I’d say that I expect a sizable, but not double digit lead for Hillary Clinton in PA–probably in the 7-9 point range. This will be followed two weeks later by a double digit Obama win in North Carolina and another, albeit smaller, Obama win in Indiana. I suspect that after the Indiana win, enough superdelegates will have come out for Obama that Clinton won’t have a choice but to concede, but I could be mistaken. (And, in fact, probably am.)

Update (Chris Lawrence): My gut feeling is that Clinton wins the popular vote by a smaller margin than Alex expects; my internal dartboard says 5 points, ±1. She probably nets narrow win in terms of pledged delegates too (netting a gain of 5–10). This should be enough of a win for her to fight on to North Carolina and Indiana, although her upcoming victory in Pennsylvania seems likely to be sufficiently Pyhrric to bleed her campaign coffers to the point she won’t be able to afford to campaign effectively in Indiana.

• The Art of the Possible  linked with  Penn’s Woulds

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The Decision to Invade Iraq and Its Aftermath

I strongly urge you to read the study with the above sub-title, mentioned in this post, a study which I think has been widely misinterpreted in the media and by the blogosphere. IMO the author of the paper, Joseph Collins, does an excellent job of laying out the institutional failures that have brought us to where we are now. Here’s a snippet that caught my eye:

In May 2003, war A was ending, but war B was about to begin. We had a complex, flexible plan for war A but no such plan for war B. War A was a rapid, high-tech, conventional battle, war American style, but war B was a protracted conflict, an insurgency with high levels of criminality and sustained sectarian violence, just the sort of ambiguous, asymmetric conflict that the American public finds hard to understand and even harder to endure. The military had not prepared for insurgency and took more than a year to adjust well in the field. From 2005 on, although short of troops, our Soldiers and Marines did a much better job in dealing with the insurgency and laid the security groundwork for successful nationwide elections and the further development of Iraqi security forces. The flare in sectarian violence in 2006 cast a pall over military efforts until the start of the surge in spring 2007. Political development and progress continue to lag behind military efforts.

which jibes nicely with Rusty Shackleford’s observations about “two wars”.

There’s plenty of criticism for specific individuals including then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Bremer but I think the study’s focus is that institutional failures have been the primary source of problems. Among those institutions I’d include not only the White House and the Pentagon but the Congress.

I also wonder if others will read the study as I have? I think that Gen. Jay Garner comes off very well in the description of the aftermath of the invasion, in fact something of a hero.

While we’re on the subject of Iraq, you might want to read Col. Pat Lang’s status report on Iraq, which I humbly note dovetails pretty closely with my own. He concludes his summary:

Bottom line, “there will be blood,” but not as much as there used to be.

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Not So Fast With That “Pentagon Study”

This morning the Miami Herald published a story quoting a “Pentagon study” that found the situation in Iraq “a major debacle” with the “outcome in doubt”. The story is also being carried by McClatchy, the Herald’s parent company. Obviously, quite a few in the blogosphere have made substantial hay out of the piece.

The excellent SWJ Blog contacted the author of the study and found that not only were the findings of the study misrepresented but that the study was about the period from 2002 to 2004 and not about current events at all. The meat of their quote from Joseph Collins, author of the study is this:

It was not an NDU study, nor was it a Pentagon study. Indeed, the implication of the Herald story was that this study was mostly about current events. Such is not the case. It was mainly about the period 2002-04. The story also hypes a number of paragraphs, many of which are quoted out of context. The study does not “lay much of the blame” on Secretary Rumsfeld for problems in the conduct of the war, nor does it say that he “bypassed the Joint Chiefs of Staff.” It does not single out “Condoleeza Rice and Stephen Hadley” for criticism.

This is followed by a summary of the actual contents and findings of the study.

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The Price of Rice

When I read this post by one of the associate bloggers at Joe Gandelman’s The Moderate Voice, it piqued my interest. The post quotes briefly from this New York Times article about possible unrest from the sharp rise in the price of rice that’s gone on recently:

HANOI — Rising prices and a growing fear of scarcity have prompted some of the world’s largest rice producers to announce drastic limits on the amount of rice they export.

The price of rice, a staple in the diets of nearly half the world’s population, has almost doubled on international markets in the last three months. That has pinched the budgets of millions of poor Asians and raised fears of civil unrest.

Shortages and high prices for all kinds of food have caused tensions and even violence around the world in recent months. Since January, thousands of troops have been deployed in Pakistan to guard trucks carrying wheat and flour. Protests have erupted in Indonesia over soybean shortages, and China has put price controls on cooking oil, grain, meat, milk and eggs.

Food riots have erupted in recent months in Guinea, Mauritania, Mexico, Morocco, Senegal, Uzbekistan and Yemen. But the moves by rice-exporting nations over the last two days — meant to ensure scarce supplies will meet domestic needs — drove prices on the world market even higher this week.

Reports of the increases in prices are various. The graph on the right, gleaned from the WSJ, reports a more than 30% increase in rice futures in 2007. This article reports a whopping 60% increase in the price of rice on world markets from March of 2007 to March of 2008.

What could cause such a sharp increase?

• BitsBlog linked with The price of food, and what drives it
• Chinatown Eats  linked with  Rice Shortage?

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What Will We Do About Tibet?

The Chinese government continues to put down anti-government demonstrations by Tibetans both in Tibet and in China proper:

The flagship newspaper of China’s ruling Communist Party called Saturday for efforts to “resolutely crush” anti-government demonstrations by Tibetans, while Beijing urged people to turn in those on a “Most Wanted” list of 21 protesters.

As Chinese troops smothered Tibetan-heavy areas to avert additional unrest, U.S. presidential hopeful John McCain, a Republican, and House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, joined a growing international chorus of criticism against the crackdown.

The protests, which started in Lhasa on the March 10 anniversary of a failed uprising against Chinese rule, turned violent four days later and touched off demonstrations among Tibetans in three other provinces.

What will we do about Tibet? The answer, in a word, is nothing:

WASHINGTON (AFP) — The United States Wednesday called any potential dialogue between China and the Dalai Lama on Tibet “very positive.”

State Department Spokesman Tom Casey said the United States would “certainly encourage and call on the Chinese to engage directly in discussions with the Dalai Lama or his representatives.”

The position of the U. S. is that Tibet is a part of China and disturbances of any kind there are a purely internal matter. A closer relationship with China has been a bipartisan policy of the U. S. for thirty years.

I couldn’t find any mention of China on either Hillary Clinton’s web page or Barack Obama’s (although a year ago Hillary Clinton was talking about the danger of excessive reliance on Chinese investors). John McCain’s web site mentions China only as a possible “strategic competitor”.

We’ve already relinquished most of the things we could have used as leverage on China, notably most favored nation trading status and WTO membership. We won’t go to war with China over Tibet or place tariffs on their exports or cut off travel there. We won’t boycott the Olympics since the last time we tried that 25 years ago the most it achieved was denying a few American athletes their medals.

In the light of that reality I think that airy promises of symbolic “support” are unhelpful:

DHARAMSALA, India — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, visiting the Dalai Lama’s headquarters here on Friday, described recent protests in Tibet as “a challenge to conscience of the world” and pressed for an investigation into whether the Dalai Lama masterminded that unrest as the Chinese government has alleged.

[…]

The visit by Ms. Pelosi, accompanied by nine members of Congress, most of them Democrats, had been scheduled previously as part of a visit to India. It was unclear what her visit would yield for Tibetans, except a symbolic shot in the arm. For the Americans, the timing could not have been better.

Namely, photo ops and sound bites for the folks back home.

Realistically, there’s only one thing we can do with respect to the Chinese: embarrass them. I honestly suspect they’ll give us plenty of opportunities.

• The Glittering Eye  linked with  Nothing Will Come of Nothing

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Watchers Wanted

Dafydd ab Hugh has decided to relinguish his position on the Watcher’s Council and, consequently, there’s now an empty seat to fill. If you have a blog, considering applying for it—the current rules are here.

Not long ago a scholar at Carnegie-Mellon produced a network analysis of the blogosphere that suggested that you could get a pretty good idea of what was going on by reading just 100 blogs. Present or emeritus Watcher’s Council members were heavily represented in that 100.

The Watcher’s Council is a great way to find new readers, make a difference, and to punch above your weight class.

• Watcher of Weasels linked with The Old Switcheroo...

Early Returns Suggest Obama’s Still in Trouble

The polls and other indications since his “More Perfect Union” speech suggest that the speech has not gotten Sen. Barack Obama out of the troubles dug for him by Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s remarks:

PRINCETON, NJ — New Gallup Poll Daily tracking finds Hillary Clinton with a 49% to 42% lead over Barack Obama in national Democratic voters’ presidential nomination preference.

This is the first time Clinton has held a statistically significant lead in over a month. She last led Obama in Feb. 7-9 polling, just after the Super Tuesday primaries. Since then, the two candidates have usually been in a statistical tie, but Obama has held a lead in several of the polls, most recently in March 11-13 polling.

Obama’s campaign has been plagued by controversial remarks made by his former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Obama delivered a major speech on race Tuesday to try to move beyond the controversy. The initial indications are that the speech has not halted Clinton’s gaining momentum, as she led by a similar margin in Tuesday night’s polling as compared to Monday night’s polling.

Gallup, cited above, isn’t the only polling organization that’s reporting this result. Rasmussen observes similarly:

In the race for the Democratic Presidential Nomination, Obama now leads Clinton 47% to 42%. Yesterday, Obama led 45% to 44% (see recent daily results). These results are based nightly telephone surveys and reported on a four-day rolling average basis. Just one night of polling is included since Obama’s speech and that single night result is not much different from the four-day average. The reason for today’s Obama bounce is that Friday night’s results have rolled out of the four-day sample. Following the initial media frenzy over Pastor Wright, Friday’s results were the single worst night of polling for Obama since the Primary Season began.

While the full impact of Obama’s speech will not be known for some time, early indications are that it may have helped Obama more in the Democratic Primary competition than in a potential General Election match-up. Obama is currently seen as having a 43.6 % chance of becoming the next President while expectations for McCain are at 39.7 %.

Rasmussen Markets data showed that Obama was given a 75% chance of winning the Democratic nomination just before the furor erupted over Wright’s comments. They fell to 71% on the eve of his speech but bounced back to close at 75% yesterday (current pricing: 73.6 %). However, following the speech, there was virtually no change in the expectations of which party will ultimately win the White House this fall.