buddenblog

"When Weakness is Strength" Stephen S. Roach

An investment banker's view on the possible virtues of the decline of the value of the dollar. November 26, 2004OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR When Weakness Is a Strength By STEPHEN S. ROACH uddenly all eyes are on a weakening dollar. In recent days, the American currency has fallen against the euro, the yen and most other currencies around the world. The renminbi is a notable exception; China has kept its currency firmly pegged to the dollar for a decade. The fall of the dollar is not a surprise. It is the logical outgrowth of an unbalanced world economy, and America's gaping current account deficit - the difference between foreign trade and investment in the United States and American trade and investment abroad - is just the most visible manifestation of these imbalances. The deficit ran at a record annual rate of $665 billion, or 5.7 percent of gross domestic product, in the second quarter of 2004. While a decline in the dollar is not a cure-all for what ails the world, it should go a long way toward bringing about a sorely needed rebalancing. With a weaker dollar, economic and even political tensions among nations would be relieved, helping to promote more sustainable growth in the global economy. Still, a debate persists as to the wisdom of allowing the dollar to decline. The Bush administration seems to have given its tacit assent, and Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Federal Reserve, is finally on board. But outside the United States, where policymakers have long been vocal in their displeasure over America's deficits, officials are now objecting to America's cure. Europeans have referred to the dollar's recent decline as brutal. The Japanese have threatened to intervene again in foreign exchange markets. And Chinese officials have argued that global imbalances are "made in America." In this blame game, it's always the other guy. Yet global imbalances are a shared responsibility. America is guilty of excess consumption, whereas the rest of the world suffers from insufficient consumption. Consumer demand in the United States grew at an average of 3.9 percent (in real terms) from 1995 to 2003, nearly double the 2.2 percent average elsewhere in the industrial world. Meanwhile, Americans fail to save enough - whereas the rest of the world saves too much. American consumers have borrowed against the future by squandering their savings. The personal savings rate was just 0.2 percent of disposable personal income in September - down from 7.7 percent as recently as 1992. Moreover, large federal budget deficits mean the government's savings rate is negative. Lacking in domestic savings, the United States must import foreign savings to finance the growth of its economy. And it runs huge current-account and trade deficits to attract such capital from overseas. America's consumption binge has its mirror image in excess savings elsewhere in the world - especially in Asia and Europe. For now, America draws freely on this reservoir, absorbing about 80 percent of the world's surplus savings. Just as the United States has moved production and labor offshore in recent years, it is now outsourcing its savings. This is a dangerous arrangement. The day could come when foreign investors demand better terms for financing America's spending spree (and savings shortfall). That is the day the dollar will collapse, interest rates will soar and the stock market will plunge. In such a crisis, a United States recession would be a near certainty. And the rest of an America-centric world would be quick to follow. The only way to avoid this unhappy future is for the world's major central banks to carefully manage a gradual but significant depreciation of the dollar over the next several years. America, and the world, would gain in several ways. First, there would be a gradual rise in interest rates in the United States - compensating foreign investors for financing the biggest debtor in the world. That would suppress growth in those sectors of the American economy that are most sensitive to interest rates, like housing, consumer durables like cars and appliances, and business capital spending. The result: a higher domestic savings rate and a reduced need for foreign capital - a classic current-account adjustment. Second, when the dollar falls, other currencies rise. So far, the euro has borne a disproportionate share of the change. That puts increased pressure on Asian nations - including China - to share in the adjustment by allowing their currencies to strengthen. Most currencies in Asia are now rising, but the renminbi has remained conspicuously unmoved. Third, as the currencies of Asia and Europe strengthen, their exports will become less attractive to American consumers. This will force Asia and Europe to work to stimulate domestic demand to compensate - resulting in a reduction of both excess savings and current-account surpluses. This is easier said than done, especially since it may require painful structural reforms, like a loosening of domestic labor markets, to unshackle internal demand. Fourth, a weaker dollar might defuse global trade tensions. Dollar depreciation will support American exports, and higher interest rates should slow domestic demand and reduce imports. That means the United States trade deficit should narrow - tempering protectionist risks. And with Asian countries allowing their currencies to fluctuate, Europe gets some relief and may be less tempted to resort to protectionist remedies. What's certain is that a lopsided world needs to be put back into balance. The dollar is the world's most widely used currency, but its fall affects more than just foreign-exchange rates. A weakening dollar is an encouraging sign that the world's relative price structure - essentially the value of one economy versus another - is becoming more sensible. If the world can manage the dollar's decline wisely, there is more reason for hope than despair. Stephen S. Roach is chief economist for Morgan Stanley. Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

Creationism in Pennsylvania public schools

November 21, 2004 School District Challenges Darwin's Theory By REUTERS HILADELPHIA, Nov. 20 - A Pennsylvania school district Friday defended its decision to discount Charles Darwin's theory of evolution and teach what critics say is a version of creationism. The district, the Dover Area School District in south-central Pennsylvania, is believed to be the first in the country to approve the teaching of a new theory called intelligent design, the National Center for Science Education said. Proponents of the theory argue that the complexity of nature is such that it could not have occurred by chance, as Darwin held, and so must have been created by some all-powerful force. The National Center for Science Education, an organization based in Oakland, Calif., that defends the teaching of evolution, said the district's board approved the policy change last month after a debate that began more than a year ago when a board member objected to a biology textbook because it focused on Darwinism. The move prompted at least two members of the school board to resign. On Friday, the district defended its decision by issuing a statement saying it intends to present a balanced view and not to teach religious beliefs. Officials will "make sure no one is promoting but also not inhibiting religion," the statement, which was posted on the district's Web site, says. It also says, "Because Darwin's theory is a theory, it is still being tested as new evidence is discovered." Many educators, however, see intelligent design as a thinly veiled version of creationism, whose supporters believe the earth was made by God as described in the Book of Genesis. "Intelligent design is creationism in a cheap tuxedo," said Nick Matzke, a spokesman for the science education group. "If there was a court case, it would not be found constitutional." Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

Bush-Fox Meeting on immigration en inglés

washingtonpost.com

Bush Renews Support for Immigration Reform

By JENNIFER LOVEN
The Associated Press
Sunday, November 21, 2004; 9:47 AM

SANTIAGO, Chile - President Bush renewed his support Sunday for changes to U.S. immigration law that would allow undocumented laborers to work legally, but stopped short of pledging to Mexican President Vicente Fox that he would push for enaction of the nearly year-old proposal.

Bush made plain that terrorism was his top concern when it came to immigration issues.

"I explained to the president that we share a mutual concern to make sure our border is secure," Bush said after meeting with Fox on the sidelines of an economic summit here. "One way to make sure the border is secure is to have reasonable immigration policies. I assured him that we want people from Mexico treated with respect and dignity."

Sitting next to Fox for brief remarks to reporters, Bush did not say how he would press for the reforms, which he first proposed in January. The Republican-controlled Congress did not move on his proposal this year.

"I told President Fox that I had campaigned on this issue," Bush said, although he gave the proposal - unpopular with his conservative base - a very low profile in his re-election campaign. He mentioned it infrequently, mostly early on in the race, in Southwestern border states or before Hispanic audiences where advisers believed it could give him a boost.

In the session with journalists, Fox did not raise the immigration reform issue specifically, instead talking about his commitment to create jobs in Mexico that would help solve the problem from his side of the border. He did suggest further talks in Washington, hinting he would seek "some form of agreement between the two countries" on the matter.

Fox said afterward he expected meet with Bush in Washington this February or March to discuss migration and trade.

Asked on CNN whether Bush had promised to move the immigration legislation forward, Fox said: "What I got, and very firmly, is his will, his will to attend this issue."

While the administration said the temporary worker initiative would be a legislative priority next year, Bush did not set a deadline for getting it passed.

Bush's plan would allow undocumented workers to get visas to work legally, but the visas would be only temporary and provide no path to citizenship - an approach that Mexican officials have signaled they would embrace, even if reluctantly.

Bush and Fox avoided talking about subjects where they differ, such as Iraq and Cuba, administration officials said.

With the meeting with Fox, followed by a state visit with Chilean President Ricardo Lagos later Sunday and a brief stop in Colombia on Monday, Bush is aiming to dispel the perception of U.S. neglect of Latin America and burnish an American reputation damaged by the Iraq war. It's a second-term diplomatic offensive in the region akin to his recent courting of Europe.

The high-profile meetings with the Chilean leader are Bush's Exhibit A for how free trade can benefit two countries, said a senior administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity. The two countries signed a free-trade pact last year. That could be helpful as Bush pushes for forward movement on a hemisphere-wide accord, resisted by countries such as Brazil and Venezuela.

The Colombia visit, and a brief "pull-aside" conversation with Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo during the 21-nation Asian-Pacific economic summit, also could help the president focus on lowering trade barriers. The United States is in the process of negotiating an Andean free-trade pact covering those two nations as well as Ecuador.

Mostly, the several hours of meetings Monday with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, a conservative whose war against narcoterrorists and leftist rebels has received major funding from the United States, allows Bush to make a very visible statement about the U.S. commitment to fighting terrorism. It also was meant to highlight American contributions that have helped to bring some stability to a country ravaged by decades of guerrilla war, the official said.

"We put a lot of political support into Uribe," the official said. "We want to underscore that commitment and show that this is something that, number one, is paying big dividends for the American people, it's paying big dividends for the Colombian people."

But turning around the U.S. reputation in South America will not be easy.

The Iraq war is deeply unpopular in Latin America. The administration's commitment to open, freer economies is viewed by some as an unwelcome dictate from Washington. And there is a feeling that the needs of the Western Hemisphere have been neglected by the Bush administration.

© 2004 The Associated Press

Bush y Fox en Chile sobre inimigracion. El Universal del 21 de noviembre 2004

(Hay dos artículos)

Fox se reunirá en Chile con cuatro mandatarios 
José Luis Ruiz/Enviado
El Universal
Domingo 21 de noviembre de 2004

Encuentros bilaterales con Bush, Putin, Lagos y Hu Jin Tao en la cumbre de APEC
Cobertura especial...

Santiago.- Los presidentes de México, Vicente Fox, y de Estados Unidos, George W. Bush, se reunirán hoy en esta capital en el marco del Foro de Cooperación Económica Asia-Pacífico (APEC), cuya celebración se ve afectada por fuertes protestas callejeras en contra de la presencia del mandatario estadounidense.
De acuerdo con el presidente Vicente Fox, esta reunión será de gran importancia para "reiniciar" la relación bilateral, y aseveró que ni el tema de Irak ni otros han afectado el diálogo político, porque los "buenos amigos y buenos socios acostumbran hablarse con la verdad y decirse las cosas".

Sobre el encuentro, en el que se retomarán los temas torales de la agenda bilateral, incluyendo migración, seguridad, comercio y agua, Fox calificó la relación con Bush "tan fuerte como siempre".

Durante la cumbre, también se reunirá con sus homólogos de Rusia, Vladimir Putin; Chile, Ricardo Lagos, y China, Hu Jin Tao.

Con cada uno de sus colegas buscará intensificar la relación política y comercial y discutirán temas de las agendas bilaterales.

Hablan Fox y Bush sobre tema migratorio 
José Luis Ruiz / Enviado
El Universal
Santiago de Chile
Domingo 21 de noviembre de 2004

Vicente Fox explica las prioridades de crear oportunidades de trabajo para los mexicanos en Estados Unidos mientras que George W. Bush habla sobre la necesidad de emplear a connacionales con la oferta laboral estadounidense

08:06 
Los presidentes de México, Vicente Fox, y de Estados Unidos, George W. Bush, sostuvieron aquí un encuentro de más de treinta minutos, tiempo en el que ambos mandatarios trabajaron en los diversos temas de la agenda bilateral, con especial énfasis en el asunto migratorio.

A decir por el propio mandatario estadounidense, esta conversación fue “muy constructiva y abierta” y se dijo complacido por escuchar del presidente Fox que la economía mexicana está creciendo y generando empleos, particularmente en la frontera, y que eso es una "muy buena noticia para Estados Unidos".

Ambos mandatarios abrieron un espacio posterior a su encuentro para comentar con la prensa algunos de los pormenores de la conversación que sostuvieron, y en este tenor el presidente Bush aseveró que el tema migratorio fue el que demandó mayor tiempo en esta reunión bilateral, la primera que se da tras la reelección de Bush.

Mientras, el presidente Fox explicó que una de las prioridades de su gobierno es la de crear las oportunidades de trabajo para los mexicanos, el mandatario estadounidense se refirió a la importancia de conciliar la necesidad de emplear a trabajadores mexicanos con la oferta laboral en Estados Unidos, con la meta de tener un flujo migratorio ordenado, seguro y legal.

Por su parte, el presidente Fox destacó la idea de sostener un nuevo encuentro con Bush en Washington –lo que se prevé suceda en el mes de febrero próximo- y ahí “ojalá poder ir cerrando algunos de estos asuntos con acuerdos firmes”.

“En la reunión hemos felicitado al presidente Bush por su reelección, por su triunfo electoral y los dos tenemos una gran disposición en construir más en estos dos próximos años del gobierno de Fox y en estos cuatro años del gobierno de Bush” , comentó el mandatario mexicano.

Tras la reunión, el canciller, Luis Ernesto Derbez, afirmó que la relación bilateral con Estados Unidos “está en su mejor momento”, lo que derivó en un encuentro cordial en el que los temas bilaterales se trataron de manera abierta y con buen ánimo.

goc

© 2004 Copyright El Universal-El Universal Online 

New Border Deportation Procedures

One of a series of articles on immigration policies, procedures, politics, and incidents which retain their currency.  If the article is originally in Spanish, the English will follow

Rumbo Texas, August 10, 2004
Deportarán a ilegales sin poder defenderse

El Departamento de Seguridad Interior anunció que planea dar a los agentes de la patrulla fronteriza nuevos y amplios poderes para deportar a inmigrantes ilegales en la frontera con México y Canadá sin ofrecerles la oportunidad de presentar sus casos a un juez de inmigración.

La medida, que entrará en vigor este mismo mes, es una amplia expansión de la autoridad de miles de agentes que patrullan las fronteras del país. Hasta ahora, los patrulleros fronterizos se limitaban a entregar a los indocumentados detenidos a los tribunales de inmigración, donde los jueces determinaban si procedía la deportación o podían permanecer en el país.

La nueva norma se aplicará sólo a los inmigrantes ilegales detenidos en un radio de 100 millas de la frontera con México y Canadá que hayan sido aprehendidos durante sus primeros 14 días en territorio estadounidense, según un comunicado de prensa del Departamento.

Las autoridades explicaron que los agentes se concentrarán en inmigrantes que no sean de México o de Canadá, sino de otras nacionalidades. En 2003, unos 37,000 inmigrantes, en particular de Centroamérica, fueron arrestados a lo largo de la frontera en la región suroeste de Estados Unidos.

Illegals will be deported without being able to make an appeal

The Department of Homeland Security announced that it plans to give border patrol agents new and fuller powers to deport illegal immigrants on the borders with Mexico and Canada without providing the immigrants with the opportunity to present their cases to an immigration judge.

The measure, which will come into full force this month is a large expansion of the authority of the thousands of agents who patrol the country's frontiers.  Until now, border patrol agents were limited to presenting detained undocumented immigrants to immigration courts where judges determined if they would be deported or if they could remain in the country.

The new procedure will apply only to immigrants detained within a radius of 100 miles of the borders with Mexico and Canada who have been apprehended within fourteen days of arrival in United States territory.  Authorities explained that the agents will concentrate on immigrants who are not Mexican or Canadian but are other nationalities.  In 2003 some 3700 immigrants, in particular from Central America, have been arrested along the U.S. border in the Southwest.

Gap between rich and poor -- yet again

Health Care, Gap Between Rich and Poor Persists, W.H.O. Says

November 11, 2004
By ELISABETH MALKIN

 

MEXICO CITY, Nov. 10 - Despite significant gains in medical
science, disparities in public health persist between rich
and poor countries, the World Health Organization said in a
report released here on Wednesday.

The report, released in advance of a W.H.O. meeting here
next week of health ministers from 30 countries, called for
more research into how health care is delivered. .

"Half of the world's deaths could be prevented with simple
and cost-effective interventions," said the report. "But
not enough is known about how to make these more widely
available to the people who need them," it continued.

The study said that inadequate health systems in developing
countries had been a constraint in global programs to
fights AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. "Countries with few
resources struggle with creaking infrastructure, inadequate
financing, migrating doctors and nurses and lack of basic
information on health indicators," the study's authors
concluded.

The study pointed to market reforms in the health sector,
promoted by the World Bank in the 1980's, as one reason for
steadily weakening public health systems in developing
countries. The push toward privatization might have
accentuated disparities in the health care available to
rich and poor, the report said.

It also pointed to "gross inequities in the research
process at both global and national levels" and said
treatments in the developing world must be tailored to
local conditions.

For example, the report cited a study in Haiti that found
that babies born to mothers treated with antiretroviral
drugs to prevent the transmission of H.I.V. might then die
of congenital syphilis.

A second report released here on Wednesday, by the Global
Forum for Health Research, a Geneva-based nonprofit group,
found that spending on health research rose from $84.9
billion in 1998 to $105.9 billion in 2001.

Despite this, there has been little headway in closing the
gap between rich and poor countries in financing for
research into the infectious diseases that
disproportionately affect developing countries, like
malaria and tuberculosis, the report said.

The Global Forum, which will hold its own meeting parallel
to the W.H.O. conference, said that less than 10 percent of
spending on health research goes to study 90 percent of the
world's diseases.

"Very few infectious diseases are getting sufficient
attention," said Stephen Matlin, the group's executive
director. "They remain neglected diseases."

Pharmaceutical companies account for 48 percent of the
spending for medical research, reflecting in part the
increased cost of bringing a drug to market. The public
sector, led by rising budgets at the National Institutes of
Health in the United States, spends 44 percent of all
research funds. Private foundations and universities
account for the other 8 percent.

Pharmaceutical companies are reluctant to release
information about their research, Mr. Matlin said, but the
evidence is that much of their spending goes to developing
therapies for noncommunicable diseases prevalent in
wealthier countries.

Mr. Matlin pointed to mergers that have left the industry
in the hands of a few companies and speculated that "it may
be that larger companies are getting less innovative."

"Our direct concern is to see an increase in spending on
infectious diseases in low- and middle-income countries and
to change priorities," he said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/11/health/11health.html?

Raising the federal debt limit

When you read this article, remember that the hopes of the Administration for reducing the deficit lie at least in part in the value of the dollar falling against the Euro (and maybe at some point, the Chinese currency, if they ever value it correctly) because a lower dollar means our goods are cheaper for people to buy overseas and exports become more expensive for us to buy.  This is certainly a questionable approach to a gigantic and growing debt.  Also remember that China and Japan hold a large amount of our debt and that U.S. companies increasingly buy their stuff from China to sell here.  China seems to be able to sell stuff at lower and lower prices...an unlimited, exploitable labor pool has something to do with this...so the chances that the balance of trade will be reversed are iffy.

Draft the Boys at 65

Draft the Boys at Sixty-Five
Clarence Jordan

      -- from http://bruderhof.org

As a new generation faces the prospect of serving overseas,

Clarence Jordan's tongue-in-cheek essay on the military draft

has gained a currency that is hard to ignore.

There’s a lot of talk going on today about how we don’t need

peacetime conscription in a nation like this. But we might as

well just face up to the fact that we’ve got to have the draft.

In the first place, we’ve gotten too civilized to go to war

voluntarily. We’ve just got to be made to fight. And then,

automation has taken all the sport out of killing. Time was

when an honest man could go to battle against an honest man,

and there was a lot of sport in that; there was a lot of fun, a

lot of challenge. You don’t have to be drafted for that kind of

sport. But who wants to operate a computer to kill scads of

women and children? We’re just not going to war and do that

kind of thing unless we’re drafted.

Look at it this way—a very peace-loving nation like ours has

the responsibility to keep the peace, all over the world, even

if we have to do it by ourselves. And even if we have to kill

off everybody else in the world to keep the peace in the world.

We got to do it. It’s our responsibility. Peace is that

important—we’ve got to have it. The trouble is, some people

think you can have it without plenty of guns and planes and

napalm and bombs and men. Well, you can’t. You’ve got to have

these things. And when too many folks get to arguing about

this, the only thing you can do with folks who are arguing is

just draft them.

Without the draft, there’d be entirely too much talk about

peace and too little real fighting for peace. So until people

quit thinking and talking, we’re gonna have to have the draft,

that’s it. Now, I admit we might have to occasionally make a

few changes in the draft law. For instance, at the present,

we’re drafting kids from eighteen to twenty-six. We shouldn’t

be drafting those kids. They’re too young; they’re too flighty;

they’re too sexy; they’re too immature. They’re not even

represented in Congress. They don’t have any say-so about this

decision. Besides, those kids need to stay at home and get

married and get into their vocation and start raising a family

and all those kinds of things. Then too when you send these

kids off, you got to have such a long veterans’ program. They

come back veterans eighteen, nineteen years old, you know. You

gotta keep ’em on the rolls for another forty to sixty years.

Now, it could be that we could draft middle-aged folks, but,

you know, they’re too productive. We got to have them to make

the bombs and the planes and the napalm, without which there

can be no peace. We need them to run our big banks and our big

corporations, to keep the economy booming. We gotta keep ‘em in

Congress, to pass draft laws and tax laws and laws against

draft-card burning and all like that. We got to keep these

middle-aged folks at home, to make committees in Congress, to

investigate people who ain’t peace loving. And then we got to

keep ‘em at home to teach their sons the glory and the beauty

of killing off men, women, and children that they’ve never seen

before. We can’t have peace in the world without our

middle-aged folks staying at home.

Well, that only leaves our senior citizens, but they’re

too—well, now wait a minute, what about our senior citizens?

Yea, what about our senior citizens? How about starting the

draft at sixty-five? Looky here, at that age they’re getting

ready to retire and they could go at their own expense. We

wouldn’t have to pay ‘em—they’re on Social Security, and

old-age security, and all like that. They’re on their

pensions….

And then another thing, and I noticed this, that the older a

man gets, the more belligerent he gets. You listen to these

guys talk in Congress. There isn’t anybody who’s more anxious

to give the Communists hell than a man who’s too old to deliver

it. Now anybody that’s as anxious to deliver some loads to the

nether regions as our senior citizens ought not to be denied

the privilege of delivering them in person. They wouldn’t even

have to be drafted to do it. If given the opportunity, they’d

volunteer in droves.

And too, by the time a man reaches sixty-five and had to be

drafted, he usually wouldn’t leave at home a sweetheart or

somebody like that weeping for him. This would definitely cut

down on hasty marriages. And when he was given his two-week

leave before being shipped abroad, his wife probably wouldn’t

get pregnant, and that would cut down on the war boom of babies

and help the population explosion.

But I think his wife ought to be drafted too. We ought to draft

them all—men and women that are sixty-five years old—so she

could go along with him to do his cooking and cleaning and see

that he comes home at night like a good soldier should. With

their wives along, these elderly GI’s would not be liable to

turn these foreign cities into brothels and burden its

citizenry with illegitimacy.

It’s also obvious from the traffic on our toll roads that

senior citizens love to travel. You get on Interstate 75, and

you see one camper trailer after another going up and down,

going to Florida. Most of our senior citizens, by the time

they’re sixty-five, have seen practically every tourist place

in the United States. Let’s give ’em a chance to see the rest

of the world. All we’d have to do with this new army would be

to equip ’em with a camper trailer and let ’em get on the road.

Now you would have to have in these foreign countries adequate

tourist places with adequate rest stops and so forth. This

might be a real nasty problem in backward countries with

outdoor privies. But we might be able to even get around that.

This army would be highly mobile with their camper trailers.

Perhaps they could be even more mobile than in helicopters, and

we could do away with the expensive helicopters.

Now I think the uniforms for this new army should be usual

tourist shorts—both the men and the women should be equipped

with the usual shorts that these senior citizens wear when they

are touring the country. Now the reason I prescribe shorts is

that if you were to get all of our senior citizens with their

knobby knees and their varicose veins descending on a country,

the psychological effect on that country would be such that

they would capitulate immediately.

This army would have other psychological advantages also.

Practically all of the elderly GI’s would be grandparents, with

the standard ailments and aches and pains. It’s doubtful that

any enemy, no matter how fierce or determined he might be,

could long resist a vast invasion of grandparents talking about

their grandchildren and their aches and pains. No tonnage of

bombs could produce a greater stampede to the conference table.

Now the morale of this army would just be superb. It would be

boundless, because when a man’s sixty-five years old he’s had

forty, fifty years to reflect on the bliss of private

enterprise and the gross evil of Communism, and without

hesitation, he would be so committed to his superlative ideals

that he would gladly and eagerly spill his iron-poor blood. Who

would want to fade away in boredom at a retirement center, when

he can go down in a burst of glory for his superlative ideals

on a foreign shuffleboard court?

Another boost to morale would be that some of the troops would

be the directors and chairmen of the boards of huge

corporations with war contracts. Given the opportunity to

execute the wars that they helped plan, and that have made them

rich, their zeal would just be boundless. Well may it be said

of these rich men who plan the wars, “His strength is as the

strength of ten, because his heart’s corrupt.”

But to provide the greatest morale stimulus, the law to draft

at sixty-five would have to allow for some exceptions. For

instance, the president as commander-in-chief of the Army and

Navy, even though he may not yet be sixty-five, should not be

denied the privilege of volunteering, donning his shorts, and

leading his shorted army in this great expeditionary force. We

should give the commander-in-chief the privilege of

accompanying this senior army.

In the next place, I think we should make exceptions for the

Armed Services Committee, and also for the House Appropriations

Committee. If you’re going to make laws for appropriations and

all like that, certainly you need some field experience. And

these men, even though not sixty-five, should be given the

privilege of joining the army.

Now, let’s consider some more of the economic aspects of the

draft at sixty-five. The first big thing I see would be in the

cost of recruitment. You wouldn’t need but two recruitment

centers for these elderly GI’s –one in Florida and one on

California. And you wouldn’t have to have any pre-induction

physicals, in view of the fact of universal disability. Now

there might be one or two physically fit men, but the number of

fit would be so small that you could just go ahead and dispense

entirely with the examinations and conscript them all. It could

be too that there would be a tremendous savings to Medicare,

provided we could have rather high casualties, because most of

these guys are just beginning Medicare and if we could arrange

to have a casualty rate pretty high, think of the savings it

would be to that program.

Another thing is that by drafting only those over sixty-five,

we could almost eliminate the enormously expensive Veterans

Administration. A maimed man of this age would hardly consider

it worth the effort to learn how to use artificial arms and

legs. Nor would he likely want to go to college, or to buy a

twenty-year house on a forty-year mortgage. Even his meager

needs wouldn’t last too long, and because the crop of veterans

would disappear so rapidly, we could afford to have twice as

many of ’em. And by raising the draft age to sixty-five, we

could completely bypass the astronomically extravagant training

centers and camps. When a man’s that old, he’s just about as

trained as he’s gonna get. The government not only would be

spared the considerable expense of training him, but would

profit immensely from his long years of experience. Overnight,

we would have, not a band of immature amateurs, but an army of

decrepit professionals.

Besides the savings in money, though, there would be the

greater savings in manpower. For instance, when you kill a man

off at eighteen, nineteen, twenty years old, you’re killing off

a guy that’s got twenty, thirty, forty, fifty years of

productive life left in him. Now these folks that make

automobiles up here in Detroit, they wouldn’t catch an

automobile right off the assembly line and junk it. They would

expect to get some mileage out of it. You wouldn’t take a kid

right out of college and junk him on the battlefield. You want

to get some mileage out of him.

Now, another thing is that when you kill off a boy that’s maybe

eighteen, nineteen years old, you don’t know but that maybe

you’re killing a future Einstein, or a future Abraham Lincoln,

or a future George Washington. You don’t know, you might be

killing some great genius of some kind. But when you kill off a

guy sixty-five years old, you know what you’re killing.

There’s one final thing that might be said. This army would

really have no equal in the art of pacification. Its ranks

would be filled up with retired bankers and insurance company

executives. They could completely rebuild the crude economic

structure of a foreign country. The elderly newspaper and radio

editors and managers could supply a whole lot of American

intellectual trash for the foreign people. The enlisted

personnel who in private life were captains of American

industry could have a whole foreign country on cigarettes and

wheels in no time at all. And these are the foundation of any

civilization. The conscripted politicians could teach the

foreign hopefuls all the ins and outs of, well, you know,

under-the-table deals and how to conduct a successful candidacy

and all like that. In a matter of weeks, after storming the

beaches, all these mighty architects of the American dream,

these wrinkled but wise GI’s, would transform alien lands into

prosperous territories begging for statehood. With prospects of

such affluent bliss, most countries would actually invite us to

invade them. And we’ve never needed any pretext other than an

invitation from a corrupt regime.

But if this calls for more senior citizens than we could

supply, it might be necessary to have a war waiting list. Some

countries that are fairly well off might just have to be told

plainly that we wouldn’t invade ’em under any circumstances. So

the only thing then that stands between us and world peace and

plenty is one little minor change in the draft law.

Clarence Jordan (1912-1969) founded Koinonia, an interracial

farming cooperative in Americus, Georgia, in 1942. A Bible

scholar, he is the author The Cottonpatch Gospel, a translation

of the New Testament from Greek into colloquial southern

English.   

  © 2004 Bruderhof Communities.

Immigration: What Reform Will Bring to Our Nation: A Call to Action. A panel discussion

Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico en San Antonio and First Data Corporation presented a panel discussion yesterday, November 15, at UNAM.  Two panels presented, the first from Mexico, the second from the United States.  While both groups stressed the critical need for immigration reform, and while both supported (Samuel P. Huntington be damned) continuing and reformed immigration, it was clear that there are two sets of interests which are not entirely simpatico at this point.  I will return to this topic soon, but would like to say now that it looks likely that we will have immigration reform in the U.S. in the next couple of years because now U.S. business is openly advocating for it.  This is not a bad thing.  What it means is that pro-immigrant advocates have a powerful ally which they should deal with warily but which they should deal with.  Let me stress warily.  Many of the businesses that want Mexican immigrants are low-pay, low to no benefit tourist and service industries.  They must be held to their word that they want Mexican workers to receive same benefits, salary, social security, etc. as U.S. workers.  I don't ever see that many U.S. workers cleaning hotel rooms when I travel so I wonder what they would consider equivalent to  U.S. worker treatment.

The Mexican panel pointed out quite clearly the problems immigration presents to Mexico: the disruption of the social fabric of pueblos where there are no men; the loss of potential labor, etc.  But even more fundamental, they pointed out, were the problems in the Mexican economy which led to emigration.  Some of these are problems within Mexico, but many have to do with the marginalized place of Mexico in the U.S. economic picture: we attract their workers to work in our industries because we actually, with some of our policies, severely discourage the development of Mexican industry.  The "we" includes not only US production beneficiaries of NAFTA but, for instance Citicorp which owns one of the two major banks in Mexico and does not make available loans for the development of local small business.  The other major bank is owned by a Spanish company and if I understood correctly, follows similar practices.

Under Critical Issues: Mexico/La Frontera/Immigration I have put links for some of the U.S. participants in this panel.  They are definitely worth checking out.

The dangers of the religious-industrial-academic-think tank complex

In our country today, there is a growing web of money and influence that is catching not just ordinary people looking for solace in a church but also government agencies, elected officials, respected academic institutions and social services in its net.  The seed money comes from foundations funded by  corporations and the wealth of individuals.  The religious manifestation of this web, of course, is the Christian right, that part of the evangelical movement which aligns itself with the Republican party and which reacts in a knee-jerk fashion to anti-gay, anti-pro-choice, anti-realistic sex education, pro-"family-values" propaganda.  But this web also encompasses academic institutions at respected universities including Harvard as well as, I would guess, dozens of think tanks.  It is influential not only in private schools but in public school boards.  It works openly to influence legal processes and the news. Interestingly, while we on the left are caught up in amazement at the ability of the religious right to convince people that evolution doesn't happen, similar tools are used successfully to affect thinking in more secular institutions.  Most of those involved in all these efforts may think they are acting in good faith.  But their efforts are dangerous, to say the least.  They succeed in keeping people from being able to see and evaluate what is happening in the real world. 

We, too, have an obligation to see and evaluate what is happening in the real world.  We cannot turn our backs and withdraw into self-righteousness or into our own circles.  We can take hope from the fact that a huge number of people voted for Kerry and are clearly not taken in by the propaganda, but we need to be aware that the power of these groups is growing and will continue to grow unless we are more vigilant and active.  We will need to make links in our minds between  environmental problems, social problems, economic problems, the power of corporations and our own lives and we will have to act on what we learn.  We will have to understand that in fact Christian Right churches offer something besides religion which can be hard to find elsewhere in our country: community, companionship, meaning, caring.  It builds on sturdy American traditions that are woven into the patterns of people's lives: church allegiances that some have had for generations. Maybe for needy people it seems a small price to give up the right to think independently.