President Obama in Asia – What was accomplished?

White House Photograph

Presidential trips like the one President Obama finished up this week aren’t necessarily commonplace. But they aren’t out of the ordinary either.

They offer the U.S. President the opportunity to build personal relationships with foreign heads of state, hammer out important diplomatic compromises and build goodwill around the world. Did President Obama do any of this on his swing through Asia?

An honest answer would be yes, no and maybe. President Obama has developed a working relationship with the President of South Korea, which they both acknowledged in a press conference late Wednesday. The President, however, accomplished very little in the way of details, especially regarding the presence of U.S. troops in Japan, which was taken off the agenda all together because lower-level staffers couldn’t come to terms. Lastly, President Obama was greeted with a mixed reception around the region – cheers in Singapore, censorship in China.

The fruit from a trip like this may take some time to bear out, so it’s hard to say in the end what he really accomplished.

Is the President committed to free trade with Asia?

President Obama has become a vocal supporter of a free trade deal between the United States and South Korea. In his trip to Asia, and in an interview with Fox News (*gasp*), the President said he is committed to the deal and will push for its ratification in the Senate.

U.S. President Barack Obama pledged Thursday morning to ratify a free-trade agreement with South Korea that has been stuck for two years, challenging the U.S. Congress to separate South Korea from other Asian nations enjoying vast trade surpluses with the U.S.

“In the United States, there is a misperception that the [free-trade agreement] once passed will only benefit Korea and will be detrimental to American consumers, which is not true,” Mr. Lee said.

Mr. Lee characterized as “minuscule” the trade surplus that South Korea has with the U.S., a characterization Mr. Obama agreed with. The U.S. president challenged Congress, which is run by his own party, to show more sophistication on trade issues.

“There’s a tendency to lump all of Asia together when Congress looks at trade agreements and says it appears this is a one-way street,” Mr. Obama said.

South Korea’s trade surplus with the U.S. last year was $13.3 billion out of total trade of $81.5 billion, according to U.S. figures.

The free-trade agreement, the largest the U.S. has negotiated since the North American Free Trade Agreement with Canada and Mexico in the early 1990s, is expected to boost that more than $80 billion in annual two-way trade between South Korea and the U.S. by $10 billion to $20 billion about five years after ratification.

Free trade is a good thing. A deal with South Korea will do a lot for the U.S. in a region where they are rapidly falling behind when it comes to trade liberalization.

Economic liberalization has been at the heart of U.S. foreign policy since 1918. We’ve promoted the idea of open markets across the world for almost a century because they bring prosperity and wealth to the masses. It has long been conventional wisdom that the U.S. would prosper most in a world economy where free trade is possible.

Labor unions and protectionist thought has taken over and so instead of prosperity, we’re falling behind at our own game.

Despite the rhetoric, I still question if the President is serious about trade liberalization with Asia. The tariff on Chinese tires earlier this year says a lot about who has his ear.

A thought on nuclear peace

Unfortunately, we didn’t discuss this in either of my International Relations classes this semseter, but the concept of “nuclear peace” is very interesting to me.

I would advance the argument that nuclear weapons have been a greater force for peace and stability than anything else i the history of mankind.

This is not an original idea at all and I don’t have time to detail it in-depth, but I did want to put the thought out there. Nuclear weapons stabilize relations between countries. In fact, since their development, no two nuclear powers have fought each other directly on the battlefield.

Countries seek nuclear weapons as a deterrent for war. North Korea and Iran are two examples. I’m not necessarily sold on the idea that more is better, as Kenneth Waltz might argue, but it too is a thought to be considered.

Exactly What We Don’t Need

People, especially well-known Governors, spouting off at the mouth about socialism. This is the level of conversation we’re trying to avoid in this country.

We can discuss the merits of issues without being so simple and naive as berating someone as a socialist.

On the legality of the death penalty

Later tonight, John Allen Muhammad will be executed for murder. Muhammad was the mastermind of the Washington DC area sniper attacks in 2002.

The Supreme Court and Virginia Governor Tim Kaine have refused clemency for Muhammad.

The man behind the 2002 sniper attacks in and around Washington DC will be put to death later, after a last-ditch appeal was thrown out.
John Allen Muhammad’s lawyers say he is mentally ill, but Virginia Governor Tim Kaine rejected a plea for clemency.

On Monday, the US Supreme Court quashed an appeal for a stay of execution.
Muhammad, 48, will face a lethal injection for the murder of Dean Harold Meyers, one of 10 people killed during the attacks.

There is much contemporary debate over the death penalty – both on its legality and morality. I will touch merely on the legality of the death penalty and leave morality for another day.

The death penalty has long had a presence in the American system of law. Traitors during the American revolution were tried and executed. In the 19th century, felons were hanged for their crimes. Today, the federal government, as well as states, executes criminals for certain crimes.

Regardless, some are opposed and call the death penalty a violation of one’s protection from cruel and unusual punishment via the 8th Amendment of the United States Constitution.

This is clear contradiction of the text itself. The proponents of a ban implicitly admit this and instead rely on an evolving interpretation of the Constitution as a basis for their argument. Writing in Roper v. Simmons, Justice Kennedy and the court decided to ban the death penalty for minors based on the “evolving standards of decency.”

As not to digress to much on this type of interpretation of our Constitution, I will merely leave off at saying I abhor the practice. It leaves our Constitution and the entire framework of law beneath it at the mercy of the conscience of men, or in the case of the Supreme Court, five unelected officers with lifetime appointments. The society has the free will and means to implement their evolving standards of decency in law and needs not the help of an unelected legislature.

The Constitution is to be read as it was written and should mean today what it meant upon its adoption. This is a safe standard by which the liberty of all can be guarded, but it leaves open the opportunity for a sufficient number of people, over the due course of time, to make the changes it feels necessary.

When the Constitution was adopted, the Death Penalty was not only permitted, but also written in to the document itself. If there is an issue where the intention of our framers is more clear, than I have yet to find it. The death penalty for the punishment of crimes committed against liberty and society is permitted by the very document that we recognize as the supreme law of our land.

*As a note, much of the logic of my argument and general thoughts are derived from an article written by Justice Antonin Scalia. Titled “God’s Justice and Ours,” the article appeared in the Christian Law Review, No. 156.

A Note on Financial Regulation

U.S. Rules Revamp Gains as Frank Sets Vote, Senate Bill ReadiedHealth care has overshadowed most other news out of Washington DC in the past several weeks, er, months. That means, financial regulation has slipped through the cracks.

Representative Barney Frank and Senator Chris Dodd, Democrats of Massachusetts and Connecticut, respectively, are working on massive new legislation that will serious overhaul how our financial markets are needed.

On the surface, many people won’t object, especially after the turmoil we’ve been through over the last year, but if you dig a little deeper, you’ll see what the problem is.

Essentially, we’re going to give the federal government  TARP 4 Ever. In other words, dramatic, game-changing regulation and resuscitation of financial institutions banks could become the every day norm in America.

Resources

• Bloomberg | U.S. Rules Revamp Gains as Frank Sets Vote, Senate Bill Readied
• WSJ | Clash Looms on Banks
• WSJ | Bank Crackdown Draws Criticism
• Marketwatch | Critics take Frank ‘too-big-to-fail’ bill to task