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By Global Public Square staff
Senator Rand Paul decided to drone on last week about drones. He employed a rare talking filibuster to stall a confirmation vote for John Brennan as the CIA's director. All told, he went on for 12 hours and 52 minutes, including when he took questions from his Republican colleagues.
Washington also saw some tough questioning for Eric Holder. The attorney general was forced to admit it would unconstitutional to kill an American citizen with drone strikes on U.S. soil unless there was a Pearl Harbor-type imminent threat.
Usually, filibusters can be viewed as a bizarre, quasi-constitutional mechanism that is basically anti-democratic. But it's important to have a serious debate about drones, not just on the legality of whether they can be used to kill an American citizen, but a broader debate about them.
"Fareed Zakaria GPS," Sundays at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. ET on CNN
Fareed speaks with Zanny Minton Beddoes, economics editor of The Economist, David Leonhardt, Washington bureau chief of The New York Times, and former top Treasury official Roger Altman about the likely impact of the forced budget cuts.
The latest GDP numbers, the revised numbers, suggest that the economy is barely growing. So isn't it possible, even though [the sequester] is not a large part of GDP, this could actually have the effect of tipping the United States into something like a second recession.
Minton Beddoes: I don't think it will tip the United States into a second recession because I think there are quite strong parts of the economy, notably housing. But I think it does mean that what could have been a rather more vigorous recovery is going to remain a very lackluster one at best. And overall, it's not as bad as had we gone off the fiscal cliff. But it's still, cumulatively, quite a lot of fiscal tightening coming this year, I think the biggest of any major economy. And so it's really not what the U.S. economy needs, because this doesn't solve any of the real problems, which are medium to long-term problems, particularly in entitlement spending. It cuts stuff that's actually good for the economy. And it weakens a lackluster recovery. So on all counts, it’s dumb.
Altman: One thing, though, that's fascinating is that the financial markets – and you can see it in the stock market, which is off to its biggest and best start in something like 17 years – are looking right through this. It's essentially saying we got through the fiscal cliff, no serious economic effect. All the threats of the debt limit, that's off the table. We're going to get through the sequester and we're going to get through the risk of a government shutdown, and the financial markets are looking ahead to roughly the end of 2013 and seeing a transition toward a stronger economy.
By Patrick Duddy, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Patrick Duddy, a visiting senior lecturer at Duke University, was the U.S. ambassador to Venezuela from 2007-10. The views expressed are his own.
Venezuela’s constitution mandates an election be held within 30 days to pick a successor to Hugo Chavez, but the implications of Chavez’s death for Venezuela and the region will not be clear for some time.
Chavez was a polarizing figure, revered by his supporters and reviled by his critics. It is undeniable that he changed Venezuela, whatever one's views of his leadership. Many of the poor there and elsewhere considered him their champion and will mourn his passing.
But many in the country saw Chavez very differently. His critics felt his effort to change Venezuela’s political culture significantly weakened the country’s democratic institutions. What happens next in Venezuela will, therefore, be followed closely throughout the region and the world, as people wait to see if Chavez's political agenda will survive the man himself.
By Bruce Stokes, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Bruce Stokes is director of global economic attitudes at the Pew Research Center. The views expressed are his own.
The forced budget cuts, known in Washington as sequestration, are now in force in the United States and $85 billion in spending cuts are in the process of being implemented, with about half of them coming out of Washington’s spending on international engagement. The impact on America’s capacity for global leadership will not be felt overnight. But these reductions in defense spending, anti-terrorism activities, foreign aid and the budget for the State Department will shrink the U.S. footprint around the world, with consequences for the projection of both U.S. hard and soft power.
In the wake of the sequester, the questions now heard outside the United States include “what does this say about Americans’ willingness to pay for future global commitments?” “How much of this austerity is driven by Tea Party sentiments and influence?” And, most broadly, “are American fiscal rectitude and isolationism converging?”
The answers are not clear cut – in part because it’s possible that the Obama administration and Congress will rejigger the terms of the spending cuts in the months ahead.
By Fareed Zakaria
The debate over the sequester – the forced budget cuts that went into effect Friday – seems to have generated a lot of heat, but little light. So I have been studying the issue to try to fully understand what is going on.
The first question: how big are these cuts? Although they are not draconian, they are still significant. Why? For a start, you will have to find a year’s worth of savings in about seven or eight months, since that's all that's left of the year. But the big problem is that there are large parts of the budget that are either effectively exempt or where there are limits to how much can be cut. This means that the remaining parts of the budget are facing significant shrinkage.
It’s important to remember when thinking about government spending it has to rise every year even with no additional functions. The American population is growing, plus there is inflation of around 2 percent these days. There is room for discussion on how exactly factors like inflation should be evaluated, but some increase in spending is necessary if we are just to stay even. Of course, there are areas that should actually be cut or eliminated. But politicians rarely specify those and the truth is, the big money is in all the popular middle class programs (social security, Medicare, interest deduction, local tax deduction), most of which actually have relatively little waste and abuse in them.
By Richard Wike, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Richard Wike is associate director of the Pew Research Center’s Global Attitudes Project. The views expressed are his own. You can follow him @RichardWike.
For decades, Hollywood has been a big part of brand America, and U.S. movies continue to break box office records around the world. Over the past year, blockbusters like The Avengers and The Dark Knight Rises have earned over half a billion dollars outside the United States. And this weekend, according to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, viewers in more than 225 countries will tune into the Oscars.
Surveys consistently show that movies – and more broadly, American popular culture – are a strong suit of U.S. soft power. And, while studio executives spend considerably more time thinking about box office returns than public diplomacy, Tinseltown is actually pretty effective at nudging America’s international image in a positive direction. (Certainly, with anti-Americanism still strong in the Middle East and among some other nations, brand America needs all the help it can get).
American culture is especially attractive in Europe. The continent may have a long tradition of intellectuals deriding U.S. culture, but average Europeans embrace it. A 2012 Pew Research Center poll found solid majorities in all eight European Union nations surveyed saying they like American movies, music, and television, including 72 percent in France, home to the Cannes Film Festival, Jean-Luc Godard, and (until recently) Gérard Depardieu. As is the case with nearly all things American, U.S. pop culture is more popular among Europeans in the Obama era than it was during George W. Bush’s presidency, although even during the Bush years, when European anti-Americanism was surging, most still had a favorable opinion of American entertainment. And it’s not just Europe – about seven-in-ten of those surveyed in Japan, Brazil, and Mexico, for example, say they enjoy U.S. movies, music, and television.
"Fareed Zakaria GPS," Sundays at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. ET on CNN
Fareed speaks with former U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers about the state of the U.S. economy. To see this or other interviews, download the show at iTunes
What are the lessons you have learned about how you create jobs?
We've got to make the growth deficit a priority in just the way we've been making the fiscal deficit a priority, because the truth is, we are never going to resolve the fiscal deficit in any ultimate sense in an economy that's growing at 1 or 1.5 percent, or even 2 percent a year. We've got to move to a focus on the growth deficit. And if we do that, I think we'll be surprised at how rapidly we'll see improvement in the fiscal picture. And I think we'll see a variety of other...
Because extra tax revenue...
…because the extra tax revenues will come in, because there will be less need to pay unemployment insurance benefits. And I think we'll also be surprised at, as the economy starts to grow, businesses will be able to invest more in innovation. There’s a tendency, which I think is badly wrong, to argue that we need to stop focusing on the short run and we need to focus on the long run instead. I think when we put the focus on stopping stagnation and having America be a rapid escalator again, what we are doing is the policy that will best prepare us for the long run.
"Fareed Zakaria GPS," Sundays at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. ET on CNN
Fareed speaks with former Australian Prime Minister John Howard about his country’s experience with gun control. To see this or other interviews, download the show at iTunes
What I'm struck by in the debate in the United States is that it takes on a left-right coloration, whereas in the rest of the world, generally speaking, it's conservatives who are in favor of being tough on guns, if you know what I mean. They tend to be the kind of policies that law enforcement officials usually support. You’re a very staunch conservative. You were a 100 percent supporter of George Bush during the Iraq War. You’ve always been a tough guy. Do you find it odd to find yourself on the “left side” of the debate?
This is not a conservative-liberal issues or a left-right issue. We’ve always seen it as being a question of public safety. And, on this issue, our experience was that we did have gains in public safety. We did have great gains in reduction of mass murder through the ban that we produced. Now, I know the history of gun ownership in the United States. I respect it. America has a Bill of Rights, Australia does not. The courts in Australia do not have the same capacity to decide these issues as they do in the United States.
So I acknowledge all of the differences. And, clearly, it is a debate that has to go on in the United States, without people from the outside giving any lectures. And I'm not doing that. I’m simply explaining what we did, what our feelings and emotions were. And there was enormous public support, especially in urban areas, for what we did 17 years ago. There was a lot of resistance inside sections of my own political base. But with the experience of 17 years, even the most cynical skeptical person would acknowledge that we have made a big difference with that prohibition.
By Bruce Stokes, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Bruce Stokes is director of global economic attitudes at the Pew Research Center. The views expressed are his own.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe travels to Washington this week to meet with President Barack Obama. This will be their first meeting since Abe was chosen for the second time to be prime minister and Obama secured a second term at the end of last year. But how do ties stand between the two countries?
Both leaders are riding a wave of relative popularity at home, strengthening their hands in dealing with mutual international challenges. And, unlike the Japan bashing days of the 1980s, when fear and resentment poisoned popular sentiment, Americans and Japanese actually like each other now. But public opinion on specific issues in both countries is likely to shape what Abe and Obama can and cannot accomplish.
By Fareed Zakaria
Arguably the most important and innovative idea proposed by President Obama in his State of the Union address on Tuesday night was his call for high-quality, universal pre-school education.
“Every dollar we invest in high-quality early childhood education can save more than seven dollars later on, by boosting graduation rates, reducing teen pregnancy, even reducing violent crime,” Obama said. “In states that make it a priority to educate our youngest children…studies show students grow up more likely to read and do math at grade level, graduate high school, hold a job, form more stable families of their own.”
He’s right. Most Americans would be surprised to learn that the United States now does worse in terms of social mobility than many European countries – especially those in Scandinavia – as well as Canada. What does this mean in practice? It means that a poor child born in the United States is much more likely to remain poor than one born in Canada or Denmark.
By Andrew R. Morral and Peter Brownell, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Andrew Morral is a senior behavioral scientist and associate director of RAND Justice, Infrastructure, and Environment, and Peter Brownell is an associate social scientist at the nonprofit, nonpartisan RAND Corporation. The views expressed are their own.
As President Obama reiterated in his State of the Union address, immigration reform will likely entail some combination of easing the path to citizenship for the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants, and increasing border control and immigration law enforcement. Given that the U.S. already spends about a quarter more on immigration enforcement and border control than on all other federal law enforcement activities combined, it’s worth considering where the country could improve enforcement without breaking the bank.
A rapid expansion of personnel and technological resources over the past decade has improved border control chiefly by identifying and targeting areas with historically high volumes of illegal crossings. But building this system out further would be costly, and offer progressively lower returns on investment.
By Fareed Zakaria
President Obama’s State of the Union address presented an expanded vision of smart government to create jobs and revive the economy. Yet he lowered his sights on the single policy that would both jump-start the economy in the short term and create the conditions for long-term growth: infrastructure spending. Having tried several times to propose infrastructure bills of around $50 billion — or just 0.3 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) — the president further scaled back, proposing a “fix-it-first” plan that repairs 70,000 bridges falling down nationwide.
This would apply a band-aid on America’s growing cancer of failing infrastructure. A 2009 study of all U.S. infrastructure by the American Society of Civil Engineers concluded that $2.2 trillion should be spent over five years to bring the nation’s roads, bridges, railway tracks, airports and associated systems up to grade.
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