Obama inaugurated! - So What Now?

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NOG, that's just silly. Why don't you take a look at the whole thing in context? It covers quite a lot, but there are a few situations that could arise where an Obama official may need to participate in a matter on which he lobbied within the 2 years before the date of his appointment or, more likely, a specific issue area in which that particular matter falls. Any exceptions will be made on a case-by-case basis and only when they are approved by the Director of the Office of Management and Budget in consultation with the Counsel to the President. In other words, if an exception is made, Obama will know about it. In fact, it's likely that we'll all know about it since Obama has also strengthened the Freedom of Information Act.

On a side note, it's kind of funny seeing loyal Bushies complaining that Obama's freedom of information and ethics rules aren't sweeping enough. Were you not paying attention at all during the last 8 years?

 

Good point, Drew. For the record, the document looks pretty sweet and I actually have some faith that Obama will adhere to the spirit of the thing as well as the letter.

That said, I think what some of the Bushies are saying is along the lines of "he said he would be different (read that, superior) than the last guy who he vilified, but odds are that he won't be any different. In other words, we're not blasting Obama for doing what Bush did, we're blasting Obama for the hypocracy of condemning Bush for doing something that Obama is still doing."

I would say that said Bushies are jumping the gun a little on that one, but the proof will be in the pudding over the next 4 years. I believe he will be different (read that, superior) to the Bush administration, at the very least in terms of openness, honesty, and respect for the rule of law.

 

Sorry drew but you are just being silly. Do you really expect this politicion to be any different than all the others we have had?
If so, boy do i have a bridge to sell you.

 

What are you? Moping?

Read carefully: Bush. Broke. International. Law. Repeatedly. That is so. That is the reality. Face it. That is no insult to the US as a country. It's a factual statement on a reality, that you perhaps might not want to accept, but which is as unshakable as reality characteristically tends to be.

As for the US isolating themselves - of course people would be annoyed if the US were to play Princess and the Pea and withdrew all aid and so forth. Big surprise there. We once had the French trying the same and doing politics of the empty chair in Bruxelles. It weakened them, as de Gaulle had to accept to his chagrin. Guess what, the EU still lives, the world is still turning and the French are back. Just like the French then, people like you still have to learn that the US from their foreign relations, their aid even, benefits big time. This world is interconnected - not engaging it and it's actors means you'll be left out and behind, because, no matter what you do, the world will keep turning.

According to the current OECD aid statistics - in 2007 the EU (as an supranational entity) and Germany (as an individual nation) alone put together provided more aid ($ 23 billion) than the US ($ 21 billion). That should give you pause. Put France and the UK in and they again give as much as the US (while also donating to the EU aid funds). And Japan, Italy, Spain and Switzerland again give again as much as the US. That is not to say that the US is not giving enough. It's about putting the US contribution into context.

It's gets even clearer when you look at the amount of aid donated for each $100 earned in the country. While the US contributions still are a good thing and add up to a sizeable sum, thanks to a large population and large economy, it isn't exactly so as if it is just US generosity that runs the UN or aid worldwide. I may err, but that's a tacit assumption I read out of your post. Add to that a decided emphasis on arms aid over development aid. In 2007 Israel alone received $ 30 billion in military aid from the US (which they then duly spent on US arms), dwarfing the entire annual budget for development aid - and Israel is merely the largest recipient of US military aid.

As for the UN budget, the current operating budget is estimated at $4.19 billion. Of that the US give 22% (about one billion), Japan 16,6%, Germany 8,6%, UK and France ~6% each and so forth. The national contribution reflects the size of the economy.

 

Heh. Since your argument failed on factual merits, you have moved to the old stand-by "he's got to be terrible! He's a politician." How lazy.

 

Oh, Drew, I'm not actually trying to rail on him, I'm just saying what was put forth doesn't actually sound any different than the past. And I'm no talking about the past 8 years, either. I'm talking decades and decades. I fully expect Obama would know about any exceptions, I'm not saying any differently. I'm just saying we should wait and see how common those exceptions are (since it is possible for just about anyone right now, given the right arguements) before we say he's done anything different.

As to Ragusa, I'm again talking more than 8 years. I remember back between Bush I and Clinton, when the US would get accussed of international policing if we did go in anywhere (even if asked for), and accussed of abandoning them if we didn't go in, even if we weren't invited. As to sums donated, I don't know that much, but I do know we donate a lot. As you said, all of the EU (as a supernational entity) AND Germany put together were about the same as the US alone. And that's just our donations to the UN, I believe. I'm not going to say the US bankrolls everything, but we are major contributors both in cash and in troops.

Edit:
Just to be clear, the reason I'm talking about pulling back on UN support is because a lot of Americans look at the UN and say it's harming us more than helping us these days, and that we spend a lot of resources on it and really get little return. Most Americans look at our involvement in the UN as little more than charity for this reason. I don't know how accurate that is.

 

NOG, I think you greatly misunderstood Ragusa. EU the organisation, together with Germany donated more than the US. Then France donate on their own, and the UK so it isn't all the donations from the EU. Just the aid that goes through the EU organisation. I must admit though, Ragusa was very unclear there I also had quite some problems understanding that post. Focus Ragusa!

 

No. The US contribution to the UN was about one billion dollar in 2007. Those high numbers were about development aid being given directly from the US (or the EU or Germany) to other countries, not through the UN. For clarification about the EU: The EU member states give money to the EU for development aid. They also retain their own development aid funds, so, in a sense, EU member states that give development aid, also fund the EU aid. That means, in reality their total contribution is greater than the simple national numbers.

True, not so much for cash but certainly for troops. Generally, the US role, in particular as far as the UN is concerned, tends to me to be greatly overstated by the isolationist part of the US spectrum. IMO mostly because they are ill informed.

As far as peacekeeping is concerned, the US are notably absent. With a grain of salt, the great peacekeepers are Norwegians, Danes, Swedes and the Dutch. They are good at that, because unlike the US, as non-superpowers and without global ambitions, they usually don't have or pick a dog in the respective fight they're peacekeeping. Arguably that is because they don't go out searching for monsters to destroy and good guys to support and countries to shape. Iirc Hillary Clinton said something about how hard it was to find a successor after Bhutto had been assassinated (can't find a link on that atm). Just to be intentionally dense, isn't that supposed to be an internal Pakistani matter?

Where it is about combat it comes to peacemaking and there UN mandates usually coincide with US national interest (largely that's even true for Clinton's humanitarianism). That said, it can be put that the US in those cases want to implement/impose their policies and to do so smoothly (and legally), they get themselves a UN mandate, too. The US are not only willing to use military force to achieve policy objectives, the quality and size of US armed forces and their technological superiority allows them to do that at comparatively little cost in US lives. That's why Madeleine Albright said her famous line: "What's the point of having this superb military you're always talking about if we can't use it?" International policing is a US choice.

The argument can be made that we Euros ought to develop capabilities of our own. When we did and created a European Rapid Reaction Force it got us hysterical howls from the neo-con crowd of 'creating a parallel NATO' and 'undermining the Alliance' (maybe because those units were unlike NATO forces out of the chain of command headed by a US four star general?). In any case, the US stance towards the development of rival (from the point of view of a global benevolent hegemon?) capabilities is ambivalent, at times turning into paranoid.

It is incorrect.

Overstated, think of the UN as an outsourced arm of the State Department, where the US has control through veto. At the cost of 1 billion a year, it's cheap. The state department budget is 9,5 billion. Included in US funding to the UN are contributions to institutions regulating internationally, among other things, the work of international post and airline traffic, trade law standardisation, disease prevention and so forth. That are things the US not only benefits greatly from, they are things the US are incapable to do themselves because they involve the sovereignty of other countries. Through the UN these countries have a vessel that allows them to work effectively with everyone, the US included, for the mutual interest.

 

Ragusa, I'm not sure where you got the 1 billion, but I'm pretty sure we gave more than that just to the UN World Hunger Fund (or whatever their food relief effort fund was). Again, I may be getting things confused, so if this isn't actually part of the UN, please correct me, or if you were talking about contributions for military action, or operations, or something else that didn't include that, please tell me.

As to the US role and benefit in the UN, I do certainly see that a lot of Americans (apparently myself included to a greater degree than I had thought), don't pay much attention to international matters. Remember, though, that I wasn't talking about a complete pull-out from the UN, but just restricted activity (and I didn't say it, but I was mostly talking about troops, supplies, and food donations, as those were the things on my mind at the time). I'm talking comparative isolationism, not true isolationism.

As to troop contributions, the real question at hand is, what would happen if the US weren't there? If these are actions that the US is taking because they help us, but no one else really would have cared about or suffered from the lack of, then I'll agree that the US is doing all this by nothing more than choice. On the other hand, if other UN members get riled up about these things happening (as I remember happening under Clinton, I think) or these are things that everyone says need to be done anyway, and the US supplies 50% of the troops, and Great Britain supplies another 30%, and Germany another 19%, and everyone else combined contributes the last 1%, the US is taking the bulk of the job, basically, because no one else seems to be willing to do it. This is what I would like to see change. If the US pulls out most of our troops for a few years, and one of these crises comes up, either we'll see that this is only a crisis for the US, we'll see that the rest of the international community really can handle it and we can step back, or we'll show everyone just how many holes we've been filling. I'd be happy with any one of those outcomes, really.

 

Please Ragusa -- credit where credit is due.... The only nations to provide peacekeeping forces for every UN peacekeeping operation is France. You should have included them on your list.

It might also be useful if you looked up the numbers for foreign aid to other countries by the US -- rather than just the money given to the UN. While the UN is noble in intent, it is often lacking in execution and money funneled through the UN is often ... shifted to purposes the US does not which to fund.

 

Government foriegn aid will always be just a drop in the bucket compared to private individual aid.

So 1 in 5 live in the US & they send $70-$130 Billion dollars a year back to mostly developing countries.
Now we, as a country, can take pride in the fact that we have a good enough economic base to allow these people to come here & be able to help those they care about back in their home countries.
Of course, there is the question about how much this hurts the local economy by the massive outflow of capital.


OH BTW Drew
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2009/01/two-days-after.html#comments

Yep drew, sure took him a LLOOONNNGGG time to ask for a waiver didn't it?

 

Yawn. When exactly did I say that Obama would issue no waivers? What I said was we'd know about it and 2) that it wouldn't be abused to, say, allow people who have left the Obama administration to lobby it after they leave since 1) we'd know about it. This is exactly what these waivers exist for, and I have no problem with it. After all, Lynn will not be lobbying during this period. The waiver merely allows him to serve, and the committee will still "continue to insist that Mr. Lynn comply with a strict set of ethics rules... including the requirement to recuse himself, for a period of one year, from any decisions involving his prior employer, unless specifically authorized to participate by an appropriate ethics official."

In other words, if he has any dealings with Ratheon, we'll know about it.

 

Nope, sorry Drew, But the Waiver specifically exempts him from

So he WILL be able to issue contracts to Raytheon(you know, the company he owns a fairly significant amount of stock in) as soon as they are up for one.

 

Well, the current operating budget is estimated at $ 4.19 billion. From that I roughly subtracted what the US 22% amount to - which is $ 1 billion (a little less actually). That's the UN budget, and what the US pay for the UN itself. You can look it up on Wiki under 'Funding' if you like.

What other monies countries give to additional funds like the hunger fund is another matter. I don't know how much that is exactly. What I do have, and that will interest you T2, is the OECD data (check 'Aid at a Glance Chart') about how much the US, the EU Germany etc. give in total aid annually. I guess that's the data you seek T2. It is likely that the money going to said funds is included in those numbers.

As for the French you're correct. The French are very active in peacekeeping, and they don't hesitate deploying military power where they see their interests endangered.

And there I get back to NOG,
where the in the past US have invoked humanitarian needs and UN mandates, as in the case of Iraq, actual US motives have usually not been properly reflected in the official explanation. That is, US use of armed forces has almost without exception served US strategic interests, no matter what the 'official label'. 'Kindness of heart' operations like disaster relief or referee type peacekeeping roles along armistice lines have been the exception, not the rule.

 

Really. The following part of my last my last post was in quotation marks for a reason, martaug:

They weren't my words (hence, the quotation marks). Those words came from the Obama administration. For a period of one year, Lynn will be required to recuse himself from any matters involving Raytheon unless specifically authorized to participate by an appropriate ethics official...and if that happens, we'll all know about it, just as we knew about this exception.

* Are you continuing the prior sentence or starting a new one? If the former, you have incorrectly capitalized. If the latter, you have made a grammatical error. Since I am unsure of your intent, I won't be correcting this one for you. I hope you understand.

** By the way, until you've learned how to capitalize correctly, use punctuation, and spell correctly yourself, don't ever correct my spelling again. You should especially avoid doing so in posts where you've made spelling errors of your own.

 

Ahh, did poor little drewsy get a hurt feelings? I will correct whatever i feel like & if you don't like it, too bad.
You seem a little tense, maybe if you went & had a nice hamburger you might feel better.

 

If you read my post dmc, i actually didn't correct him just underlined the missing letter in my post. He justs happens to have taken offense at it.

 

My feelings are just fine, and I'm far more amused than offended. I was simply giving you fair warning that I won't be pulling punches when someone who makes multiple spelling errors in nearly every post he makes and seems unable to even capitalize correctly tries to correct my spelling.

 

Ha ha ha ha! You are just so funny.