The Foundry

The election of Laura Chinchilla of the National Liberation Party on February 7 to the presidency of Costa Rica is an important milestone for Central America. President-elect Chinchilla has become Costa Rica’s first female president and the fifth woman elected president of a Latin America state since 1990. Her election represents a further blunting of the populist Left’s mythical invincibility in the region, and offers a pleasing counterpoise to the likes of anti-American machismo of Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez. In Panama, Honduras, Chile, and now Costa Rica, leaders of the center or center-right are winning elections, helping curb the march toward the radical Left.

President-elect Chinchilla, a former vice president, considers herself a staunch democrat and will likely continue Costa Rica’s leadership in advancing democracy, respect for human rights, a free press, and economic opportunity in the region. Continue reading...

Given Iran’s well established pattern of behavior (and Russia’s, and China’s) we were highly skeptical about President Barack Obama’s “Reset Button” approach to U.S. diplomacy.

And now it seems that the failure of Obama administration’s Iranian engagement strategy is about to shift the focus of U.S. diplomacy from “reset” to “panic.” Reuters reports:

The United States wants the U.N. Security Council to approve a resolution within weeks, not months, laying the ground for new sanctions against Iran over its nuclear programme, the Pentagon said on Tuesday.

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates spoke to leaders in Turkey, Italy and France about the “urgent need” to move forward on sanctions as soon as possible, Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell told reporters.

It seems the President’s spending habits have finally caught up with him, threatening to kill a government overhaul of health care. Though President Obama and congressional Democrats continue to insist that health care reform is on the horizon, the increasing national concern over the rising public debt presents an undeniable obstacle.

James Capretta, a Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, outlines why this is the case in a recent article for Kaiser Health News. First of all, President Obama is responsible for raising the debt to unprecedented levels. Capretta explains, “From 1789 through 2008, the U.S. government borrowed a total of $5.8 trillion. In 2009, the federal budget deficit exceeded $1.4 trillion. The administration now expects the 2010 deficit to break that record, topping $1.6 trillion. And in 2011, it would only fall to about $1.3 trillion. Thus, in just three years, the debt will have jumped an astonishing $4.2 trillion.”

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We can see the t-shirt slogan already: I paid $58,000 for solar panels and all I got was a $21 carbon credit that bought me this t-shirt. It’s not very catchy, but that’s the story of a Harrisburg couple, Tami and Randy Wilson, who installed solar panels in their home to reduce their electricity bill:

The Pennsylvania couple has sold the world’s first carbon credit awarded for a reduction in personal carbon emissions. About 1,800 others have signed up to follow suit – underlining the US public’s readiness to press ahead on the issue. The Wilsons began by getting rid of their son’s heated water bed, turning off power to computers and televisions when not in use, changing to energy-efficient light bulbs, hang-drying their laundry and, finally, investing $58,000 in a solar panel system – until they reduced their electricity bill to zero.

Then they signed up on the MyEmissionsExchange.com site to have their energy savings calculated. They found that they had already saved one tonne of carbon, which earned them a carbon credit. The exchange sold the credit for $21.50 to Molten Metal Equipment Innovations of Ohio, taking a 20 per cent commission.”

Make that $17.20 for the t-shirt after subtracting the exchange’s take. But if we wanted to have some truth to a t-shirt for the Wilsons, it would read: Thank you taxpayers for paying for $36,000 of our investment and thanks federal government for creating an artificial market for carbon dioxide credits. The Wilsons received an $18,000 federal tax credit and an $18,000 rebate check from Pennsylvania’s state government and also expect to collect $2,700 in renewable energy certificates. Continue reading...

Earlier this weekend, former Alaska governor Sarah Palin told Chris Wallace in a Fox News interview that the Obama administration’s position on dissent is that detractors should “sit down and shut up.” The Huffington Post crowd immediately jumped on the statement, saying it couldn’t be supported.

Well, 24 hours later, White House homeland-security adviser John Brennan put this argument to rest by publishing a blog in USA Today that not only tells Americans to sit down and shut up but also accuses them of “serv[ing] the goals of al-Qaeda” if they question the president’s national-security strategy — as if two-sided political discourse is al-Qaeda’s ultimate goal.

In fewer than 400 words, Brennan embarrasses himself with half-truths, selective omissions, and name-calling hysteria. But more importantly, he identifies one of the major problems facing the Obama White House: They lack a credible leader on homeland security that the American people fully trust. This problem clearly began when DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano came out days after Christmas saying “the system worked.” Continue reading...

In USA Today this morning, Obama’s top counter-terrorism advisor lashes out at those criticizing the administration’s bungling of the Christmas Day bomber interrogation.  Brennan accuses critics of “[p]olitically motivated criticism and unfounded fear-mongering” which he declares “only serve the goals of al-Qaeda.”

My goodness.

Only one problem for Brennan.  The criticism to which he refers is not from Dick Cheney and commentators on the right.  His op-ed was a reply to an editorial from USA Today, published side by side with his own, which is entitled: “Our view on war on terror: National security team fails to inspire confidence. Officials’ handling of Christmas Day attack looks like amateur hour.” Continue reading...

The Washington Post reports that The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has proposed to create a new climate service and website that would provide the public with information and predictions about the impact of global warming. If this turns out to be yet one more source of apocalyptic government press releases and other such hype, it’s the last thing we need. Just look at the cover of NOAA’s already-existing National Climate Data Center report showing a photoshopped house under water to get a sense of how much are tax dollars are already being wasted on NOAA scares, not to mention those from NASA, EPA and other bureaucracies with a piece of the climate action.

What we really need is more scrutiny of such scary claims. Climategate – the release of emails showing exaggerated temperature increases and other misconduct among key contributors to the UN’s major global warming report, may well implicate some of NOAA’s work. But don’t expect to hear too much of that on the new website. Recent revelations show that claims of Himayalan glaciers melting and hurricane damage increasing due to global warming are also suspect, but again this is the kind of thing federal global warming researchers are busy trying to ignore. Rather than focus on bringing truth and transparency to the scientific debate on climate change, the government officials continually push that the science is settled and to save the planet we need resembling the actions of Audi’s “Green Police” commercial.

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One common assertion among the left is that other industrialized nations, such as Canada, achieved great success in health care within their collectivist framework. This, then, begs the question: why is the head of an east coast Canadian province coming to the United States for medical treatment?

Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams is seeking heart surgery in the United States, drawing criticism from “local bloggers and people calling in to the province’s immensely popular open-line radio shows.” Yet his actions are hardly unusual for world leaders. Saudi Arabian King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz is known to have his checkups at the prestigious Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi had heart surgery at the Cleveland Clinic in 2006 . Even middle-class Canadians are utilizing their proximity to the United States to seek treatment here.

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On February 25th, the White House has proposed a bipartisan, half-day televised summit on health care. It is unclear as to whether this is a publicity stunt by the Obama Administration or a good faith effort to negotiate with Republicans to come up with a bipartisan health care reform bill. The Washington Post reports today many Republicans are pushing back and urging the White House to scrap Obamacare as a precondition to any negotiation. House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) and Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) sent a letter to White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel objecting to the House and Senate versions of Obamacare being the base line bills of the negotiations. Hopefully, this summit meeting is more than the President checking off a campaign promise to have all health care negotiations on C-SPAN.

If this summit is a genuine start to bipartisan negotiations, then a few issues need to be settled before the meeting: Continue reading...

A recent Washington Post article reports that several faith leaders are sensing a new tone from President Barack Obama’s office on faith-based initiatives. According to Stanley Carlson-Thies, who has worked closely with the office under both Presidents Bush and Obama, rather than creating a fair playing field for the good works of faith-based groups, the attitude now is: “We’re the government, doing wonderful things, YOU can come join US.”

Attitudes and expectations about government are important. They shape how citizens respond to poverty and injustice.

That’s why we’d propose a different view of government’s role in meeting people’s needs: the government protects what civil society provides.

A new resource from The Heritage Foundation called Seek Social Justice: Transforming Lives in Need explains this perspective. This innovative DVD small group study guide articulates a framework for understanding the roots of human need and social breakdown and what to do about them. Effective assistance tends to come not from the federal government but from those closest to the problem. Continue reading...