The Senate Banking Committee welcomes Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) to testify on the first anniversary of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. The financial regulation bill has contributed to higher unemployment by imposing needless regulation on small and large financial institutions. It has deterred investment by imposing ill-defined restrictions on those who want to invest in the economy. The law has recently been under increased scrutiny. Today also marks the opening of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, created by Dodd-Frank. Heritage’s Diane Katz called it an “unchecked regulatory …
Two days ago a mail bomb exploded at the office of an Islamic group in Jakarta, injuring four people including two police officers who tried to defuse it. The package was addressed to Ulil Abshar Abdalla, a liberal Islamic scholar and activist known for his criticism against radical Islamist groups in Indonesia. Ulil, as he is widely known in the media, is the founder and former director of The Liberal Islam Network (JIL), whose office was the package’s destination. He is also a member of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s (SBY) …
In the last few days in Indonesia, inter-communal ugliness has reared its head in way that is major cause for concern. That concern is lighting up mobile phones, Twitter, and Facebook accounts across Indonesia. Indonesians – particularly its middle and professional classes – are outraged to an extent unseen since June 2008 when Islamist militants descended on Jakartans peacefully commemorating Pancasila, Indonesia’s democratic, non-sectarian state creed. The most recent incidents themselves are terrible. In Banten on Sunday, a mob numbering as many as 1,500 attacked an Ahmadi congregation, resulting in …
The President’s national security team prepared a solid speech for him to deliver at the University of Indonesia yesterday. The speech, intended as a follow up to his 2009 Cairo speech to the “Muslim world,” was first posted on the State Department’s America.gov website in its “as prepared for delivery” form. It was well-tailored to an Indonesian audience and avoided all the ill-advised religious language of the Cairo speech. Unfortunately, the President had some of ideas of his own. Judging by the changes posted in the revised speech he ad-libbed.
So America’s first “Asia-Pacific President” who brought America “back” to Asia after eight years of supposed neglect under the Bush Administration has canceled his Indonesia-Australia-Guam trip yet again. That makes an unprecedented four cancellations (“postponements”) for this particular Presidential trip. Indonesians fully expected him there in November of last year at the end of his visit to South Korea, Japan, China, and Singapore (APEC host). The expectation was strong enough that Obama had to personally tell Indonesian President Yudhoyono that he couldn’t make it. And the drama over the March trip is well known. Two cancellations …
The economic world for good reason is focused intently on Greece and the potential for financial contagion in Europe. But there’s been another interesting development on America’s Pacific-side. One of the of most talented public servants in Indonesia, Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati – by some accounts, the world’s best finance minister – has resigned her cabinet post to take a position with the World Bank. It’s always necessary to put Indonesia in some context. For the record, it is the fourth largest country in the world by population. It is …
Now that that the massive healthcare bill has been signed into law, President Obama can no longer make excuses for neglecting foreign affairs. Just last week, he postponed an upcoming trip to Indonesia and Australia for one final push to pass Obamacare—a trip he had already pushed off a year ago for the same reason. Australians are among many foreign publics complaining that Obama is taking their support of the U.S. “for granted” and wonder if they are still on Obama’s foreign policy radar. For the recent Iranian new year, …
Most Americans do not know Abdurrahman Wahid (more affectionately known as Gus Dur) – Indonesia’s fourth President. To American eyes, his appearance alone could be a bit disorienting and difficult to rationalize with his towering influence. Even as President of one of the world’s largest, most consequential countries, Gus Dur dressed in casual clothes and often slipped his sandals off in conversations with visiting dignitaries. At the time, 1999-2001, his informality was slightly absurd – a symbol for what seemed like a chaotic presidential administration. Certainly President Wahid made some …
The Chief of the Indonesian Police has confirmed that murderer Noordin Top, Indonesia’s and Southeast Asia’s most wanted terrorist, was killed yesterday during a police raid in Central Java, Indonesia. Noordin was the mastermind behind the July 17 attacks on the Jakarta JW Marriott and Ritz-Carlton that killed 7 people and wounded 53. He has also been implicated in every major terrorist attack in Indonesia beginning with the first Bali bombing in 2002 that killed 202 innocents. The Islamist terrorist network in Indonesia will be severely damaged by this loss. …
Friday’s terrorist bombing of Jakarta’s JW-Marriott and Ritz-Carlton is truly a reminder not just to Indonesia, but to the world, that however well we may be preventing terrorist attacks, there is another team on the field. Terrorists can adjust tactics, morph organizations, and strike in unexpected ways at unexpected times. Details are not yet sifted in Jakarta, but indications are that the July 17 attacks were the work of Al Qaeda-linked Southeast Asian terror group Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), or splinter groups thereof. Police are focused on the possibility that suicide …
