A NADIR OF LOGICAL ANALYSIS. Here's a strange column ("A Nadir of U.S. Power") by Sebastian Mallaby in which he suggests a connection between domestic absurdities like "the crazy tort system, which consumes more than a dollar in administrative and legal costs for every dollar it transfers to the victims of malpractice" and the inability of the Bush administration to make headway on tough foreign policy problems such as Iran, North Korea, and Darfur. Mallaby is trying to make a Fergusonian link between America's long-term economic health and its ability to project power abroad, but I must admit that I don't see his logic here. The consequences of the Bush administration's fiscal recklessness have yet to be felt, for instance, and our military spending is actually on the rise (though nowhere near Cold War heights in percentage of GDP). Besides, some of the issues that Mallaby identifies -- Russia kicking out Amnesty International and Sudan correctly believing that the horrible things it does in Darfur are ultimately of marginal interest to the rest of the world -- are basically orthagonal to American power. As for Iran and North Korea, that's another story entirely. Mallaby appears to view our difficulties in Iraq as the consequence of this broadband loss of power, yet doesn't want to admit the obvious: that the Iraq disaster itself is a major drain on resources, time, and energy that could be better used elsewhere. I know that pundits have to constantly say new things in order to stay fresh, but a lot of times the straightforward explanation's the right one.
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Blake Hounshell
