Some of the exchanges I've most enjoyed at the café took place four or five years ago.   They took place among some of the early regulars at the café among us ordinary denizens, on the topic, broadly, of what a useful, functional US foreign policy might look like.  More specifically, what sorts of policy changes, including institutional reforms on a post WWII or even broader scale, might serve to jumpstart flagging global efforts to address transnational threats such as climate change, nuclear weapons proliferation, lack of sustainable energy supplies, threat of pandemic, development/poverty reduction, terrorism, and genocide prevention? 

I recall cafe denizen DanK as among those offering notably penetrating comments.   

Conceptually there seemed to be a lot of agreement among the participants that the major security threats of our day are transnational in scope (or should be, if the people who are aching to bring on another Cold War can be prevented from doing that).  They cannot be solved by any one country.  Nor can they be solved without widespread international cooperation.

Since that time I've tried to keep an eye out for reports or books or really just arguments in any form that offered specific conceptual and practical policy recommendations for the kind of foreign policy reorientation needed for our era. 

I think I've come upon one that is most worthy of receiving attention from policymakers at the highest levels as well as from interested and engaged citizens at the café and elsewhere.    

It's called Power and Responsibility: Building International Order in an Era of Transnational Threats, by Bruce Jones, Carlos Pascual, and Stephen Stedman.  Stedman was special advisor to Kofi Annan at the UN circa 2005; Jones was his deputy, tasked especially to assist negotiations over a new Peacebuilding Commission and Peacebuilding Support Office at the UN.  Pascual was their American counterpart for most of that time as coordinator for reconstruction and stabilization at the State Department.  The book was published by the Brookings Institution a couple of months ago. 

Early chapters outline a concept of "responsible sovereignty" and their argument for it. 

The bulk of the book consists of six chapters, each devoted to proposals for international governance reforms and policies the authors believes they can facilitate, to address what they see as the six most critical transnational threats: climate change, nuclear proliferation, security from biological threats (principally ones that can lead to pandemics and those stemming from misuse of biotechnology); civil violence/regional conflict; transnational terrorism; and economic instability on account of financial instability and poverty in particular (this was the weakest of the six by far).  Each of these chapters identifies and assesses major threats, the current performance of the international community in addressing them, and the structural and policy gaps that inhibit effectiveness and need to be overcome, before offering the authors' own recommendations for how to do so.   

The penultimate chapter seeks to sketch out how the ideas and proposals might be put together to form an agenda for addressing major security threats arising from the Middle East, as the toughest case. 

A few highlights:

*The single most important structural change they recommend is the creation of a G16 as the smallest grouping possible that still includes the leading economies and most populous countries, regionally (and, they don't say, religiously) balanced.  It would replace the G8.  The 16 would be the current G8 (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, UK, US) plus China, Mexico, India, Brazil, South Africa, Indonesia, Turkey and a second African nation, most likely Egypt or Nigeria.  Its major purposes would be to prenegotiate agreements on basic parameters of responses to major global challenges, often as a precursor to UN General Assembly refinement and hopefully adoption, and to serve as a mechanism for building knowledge, trust and patterns of cooperative behavior among the most powerful countries. 

*They offer recommendations for UN Security Council and other UN reforms, the former to come after the G16 is formed.  (as any effort to lead with Security Council membership reform would be DOA)

*The formation of several new multilateral institutions is recommended in the six chapters addressing the various transnational security threats.

*They argue against seeking a concert of democracies organizing framework (recommended by G. John Ikenberry, Anne-Marie Slaughter, Ivo Daalder, James Lindsay, and John McCain, among others), using pretty much the arguments that were used to argue against it here at the café a few years back.  It would be likely to increase international tensions by actually encouraging a hard bipolarity between democracies and non-democracies ("...the attempt to pit democracies against nondemocracies will provoke conflict, mistrust and hostility in the short term, and risk triggering a second cold war at a time when international cooperation is essential for mitigating transnational threats").  It is not clear what problems it would help to solve.  And most eligible members would not want to join, based on the authors' consultations. 

Jackets blurbs are from Kofi Annan, Brent Scowcroft, Madeleine Albright, Chuck Hagel, former Clinton Sec Def William Perry, and, yes, Anne-Marie Slaughter.  I believe the authors could have gotten many other folks not part of the DC foreign policy establishment to write positive blurbs.  The fact that they have support from this group I take as an encouraging sign that many others in addition to these establishment figures are probably also thinking much more boldly about the current situation than might be assumed, or at any rate might well be receptive to bold new initiatives if the Obama Administration decides to pursue some.

Certainly there is plenty of room for disagreement with their argument and specific suggestions.  But this is major intellectual work on what US foreign policy reflecting true global leadership should be moving towards, pronto.  The authors have done a great service.  If the Obama Administration were to embrace something close to this agenda and move to implement it aggressively I for one would feel a hell of a lot better about our country and world's prospects.  

Much of the economic policy discussion over the next few months will be about how to stop the bleeding in the financial sector, and then, how to prevent it from happening again.  Understandably so.

Paul Krugman is not alone, however, among respected economists who believe the size of the stimulus bill was, while helpful, not large enough.  Depending on what the situation looks like a few months down the road, we may be looking at a need for more stimulus.

The Washington Post's lead story following passage of the stimulus bill last month contained a serious factual error on its size relative to that of the New Deal.  I sent their Corrections department the following email on February 14:

The Post's February 14 lead story, "Congress Passes Stimulus Package" appears to contain a factual error about the relative size of the current stimulus package compared to federal spending during the New Deal. On page A10 it states: "The New Deal of the 1930s equaled no more than 2 percent of the nation's gross domestic product.  The new legislation represents over 5 percent..." 

(my name and contact information)

I received no acknowledgement from the Post indicating they had received this email.  Of course there has been no correction issued.

I have followed up with the Post's new ombudsman, Andy Alexander, to try to get the Post to respond.  He has no direct authority to make them do anything.  He can "only" make suggestions, in his Sunday column and more privately.  I have now spoken a few times with Andy, who has been in the newspaper business for some 40 years, and have found him to be smart and committed.  I also know he completely "gets" the bigger picture concerning the perilous fate of the newspaper industry.  Hopefully his efforts to bring about marked and rapid improvements in the Post's corrections process will meet with some success.  

However, the prospects for any somewhat longer-term process improvements aside, the chances of the Post either issuing a correction on the substantive matter I raised with them in the letter, or printing the letter as a Letter to the Editor, are at this point nil.  Thus this post, which is what comes to mind as perhaps the best option this Joe Citizen has at this point to try to counter, albeit in a small way, the inaccurate information in the Post's article.   

<a href="http://www.pnhp.org/blog/2009/02/26/nobel-laureate-joseph-stiglitz-on-single-payer/">Reluctantly</a>.  And it's not his specialty.  But still.  Go Joe!

Lots of distinguished names on this list of signatories endorsing the Employee Free Choice Act (scroll down below the article for the full list).  Notable for their absence are Krugman and Stiglitz--perhaps a fellow denizen knows the stories there. 

The Employee Free Choice Act is Needed to Restore Balance in the Labor Market

by Richard B. Freeman, Frank Levy, Lawrence Mishel

Although its collapse has dominated recent media coverage, the financial sector is not the only segment of the U.S. economy running into serious trouble. The institutions that govern the labor market have also failed, producing the unusual and unhealthy situation in which hourly compensation for American workers has stagnated even as their productivity soared.

Indeed, from 2000 to 2007, the income of the median working-age household fell by $2,000- an unprecedented decline. In that time, virtually all of the nation's economic growth went to a small number of wealthy Americans. An important reason for the shift from broadly-shared prosperity to growing inequality is the erosion of workers' ability to form unions and bargain collectively.

A natural response of workers unable to improve their economic situation is to form unions to negotiate a fair share of the economy, and that desire is borne out by recent surveys. Millions of American workers - more than half of non-managers - have said they want a union at their work place. Yet only 7.5% of private sector workers are now represented by a union. And in all of 2007, fewer than 60,000 workers won union status through government-sanctioned elections. What explains this disconnect?

The problem is that the election process overseen by the National Labor Relations Board has become drawn out and acrimonious, with management campaigning fiercely to deter unionization, sometimes to the extent of violating labor laws. Union sympathizers are routinely threatened or even fired, and they have little effective recourse under the law. Even when workers overcome this pressure and vote for a union, they are unable to obtain contracts one-third of the time due to management resistance.

To remedy this situation, the Congress is considering the Employee Free Choice Act. This act would accomplish three things: It would give workers the choice of using majority sign-up--a simple, established procedure in which workers sign cards to indicate their support for a union - or staging an NLRB election; it triples damages for employers who fire union supporters or break other labor laws; and it creates a process to ensure that newly unionized employees have a fair shot at obtaining a first contract by calling for arbitration after 120 days of unsuccessful bargaining.

The Employee Free Choice Act will better reflect worker desires than the current "war over representation." The Act will also lower the level of acrimony and distrust that often accompanies union elections in our current system.

A rising tide lifts all boats only when labor and management bargain on relatively equal terms. In recent decades, most bargaining power has resided with management. The current recession will further weaken the ability of workers to bargain individually. More than ever, workers will need to act together.

The Employee Free Choice Act is not a panacea, but it would restore some balance to our labor markets.  As economists, we believe this is a critically important step in rebuilding our economy and strengthening our democracy by enhancing the voice of working people in the workplace.

Statement Endorsers

Henry J. Aaron, Brookings Institution

Katharine Abraham, University of Maryland

Philippe Aghion, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Eileen Appelbaum, Rutgers University

Kenneth Arrow, Stanford University

Dean Baker, Center for Economic and Policy Research

Jagdish Bhagwati, Columbia University

Rebecca Blank, Brookings Institution

Joseph Blasi, Rutgers University

Alan S. Blinder, Princeton University

William A. Darity, Duke University

Brad DeLong, University of California/Berkeley

John DiNardo, University of Michigan

Henry Farber, Princeton University

Robert H. Frank, Cornell University

Richard Freeman, Harvard University

James K. Galbraith, University of Texas

Robert J. Gordon, Northwestern University

Heidi Hartmann, Institute for Women's Policy Research

Lawrence Katz, Harvard University

Robert Lawrence, Harvard University

David Lee, Princeton University

Frank Levy, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Lisa Lynch, Brandeis University

Ray Marshall, University of Texas

Lawrence Mishel, Economic Policy Institute

Robert Pollin, University of Massachusetts

William Rodgers, Rutgers University

Dani Rodrik, Harvard University

Jeffrey D. Sachs, Columbia University

Robert M. Solow, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

William Spriggs, Howard University

Peter Temin, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Mark Thoma, University of Oregon

Lester C. Thurow, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Laura Tyson, University of California/Berkeley

Paula B. Voos, Rutgers University

David Weil, Boston University

Edward Wolff, New York University

I'd like to see this book get as widespread attention as possible. 

It is an engagingly reported look at working conditions in the south China industrial factories, which appears to be balanced and should help to ground discussion about our and other countries' policies towards China on a better factual foundation.  The book is subtitled "The True Cost of Chinese Competitive Advantage".  Harney, who freelances now, was the Financial Times' south China correspondent between 2003 and 2006 and speaks Mandarin Chinese.

I'll share a few things I learned from it below.  I'd be most interested if denizens have come across contrary information and points of view that seem credible.   

But before doing that, I'd like to recommend that those of you who are interested in what is going on in China should definitely check out recent blog posts from our fellow veteran cafe denizen, Tom Wright, at his <a href="http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/tom_wright/">blog page</a>  Tom has been traveling about China of late (and may still be there, not sure about that) and has, as he typically does, lots of interesting observations.

A few things I learned from Harney's book:

*the labor laws on China's books passed by its central government are far more substantial than I would have thought. The problem is that law enforcement efforts, which are localized, are paltry--and everyone knows it.

*There is growing consciousness and unhappiness among Chinese workers dissatisfied with their working conditions and lack of say on workplace issues, which a number of NGOs in Hong Kong have built on to stimulate interest in various forms of worker representation.

*the central government, at least in the abstract (minus real resources to enforce the laws they enact they don't appear to be that serious about it, however--it may be more for international show), appears interested in improving working conditions and workers' opportunities for some say in what goes on in the workplaces. A fundamental tension is that local governments depend for their revenues on development-maximizing policies, which runs headlong into enforcing the labor and environmental laws on the books because doing the latter worsen the (in this case, primarily foreign) investment climate in particular. Sound familiar? Non-unionized, low wage US states pursued this race to the bottom strategy only to see the jobs go to Mexico and then East Asia.

*India, Pakistan, and Vietnam are among the countries with lower wages than China which multinationals (mostly, for now) talk about moving to if the Chinese "weaken the investment climate" (i.e., address labor and environmental problems with laws and policies that are actually enforced). China retains some competitive advantages vis a vis these countries--including clustering of supply chains. Vietnam has independent labor unions which reduce its attractiveness to multinationals contemplating jumping off the China ship.

*Harney believes that when the Chinese government sets its mind to an objective, it is usually pretty successful at achieving it. There is considerable unrest--expressed in the form of large numbers of public protests--in the country over major, major environmental problems, air quality and contamination of drinking water supplies in particular, that are destroying the health and lives of growing numbers of Chinese citizens. This is the most immediate source of pressure on the government re environmental problems, and it appears to be growing.

*The one-child family policy adopted in the late 1970s is just now starting to contribute to labor shortages which could put workers in a somewhat more favorable position to bring about positive workplace change. The second generation of migrant workers shows signs of the sorts of cultural changes seen in Japan and other once-poor countries which experienced dramatic economic growth--rising and more demanding expectations in terms of what they want out of their lives in particular.

Some good comments in the book club discussion this week on Andrew Bacevich's book, both by invited contributors and cafe denizens.  

It could be so much better if Michael Klare, Bacevich, and others would engage with us riffraff.  Evidently they can't be bothered. 

I've been at this place for awhile and a couple of years ago some of the denizens were, I thought, obnoxious to many of the invited contributors.  It left me at least somewhat sympathetic towards those who opted not to engage.  Anne-Marie Slaughter, I recall, took a heap of abuse, yet to her great credit she did engage frequently and civilly, with a degree of equanimity and class I suspect few of us in her position likely would have been able to muster.  Ikenberry rarely if ever replied to comments or questions.  Daalder--infrequently--and he treated very poorly by some.  Michael Lind would sometimes give at least as good as he got where he took umbrage. Lindsay I thought could at times be just as obnoxious as some of the disrespectful denizens.  Steve Clemons was, and is, a gentleman through and through, a class act. 

I don't see any nastiness coming from denizens in book club threads this week, nor lately in book club discussions.  So I am considerably less sympathetic than I once was to the invited contributors who do not engage, which frankly is most of them. 

I get the sense that the folks invited to contribute think of the folks who frequent this site as spectators at a sporting event--permitted to watch and listen in on the "real" action, but not as citizens who might possibly have a worthwhile thought or question worth their time.   

Maybe some time back we cafe denizens got a collective rep for too much bad behavior that at one time may have been justified but no longer seems to be, but that we're having trouble shaking.    

At the cafe we are fortunate enough to be able to read Dean Baker regularly.  But if you are looking for a nice summary, for others as well as yourself, of his explanations of the stock market and housing bubble bursts, and how we could avoid them in the future, his new paperback book Plunder and Blunder, is very short, clear and accessible. 

It's so good to have him at the cafe.  He deserves a much wider public audience than he has.  Hopefully, things are moving in that direction.  He can write--and he's been right repeatedly, early, on big things.  Surely there ought to be a more prominent place for him in the public sphere than for others of whom one or both of those things cannot be said.   

Other stuff I've been reading lately:

Jonathan Alter's The Defining Moment: FDR's Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope was a lively, journalistic-style read not deep on analysis of the New Deal but insightful about FDR's character and approach.  

Alan Lawson's A Commonwealth of Hope: The New Deal Response to Crisis was somewhat less lively but more informative as a programmatic overview of the New Deal.   

I note that one of the Very Short Introduction books, The Great Depression and the New Deal, by Eric Rauchway, is in the queue for a cafe discussion soon.  I've not read that one yet.

What I'm hearing is Bonior declines when people push him, saying it's time for a younger generation to lead the labor movement charge for the feds.  He has reportedly been pushing Mary Beth Maxwell, about whom I know very little.  Maybe she'd be terrific.  I've heard some speculation that Jennifer Granholm is now more likely to be nominated for the job as a result of some of the other Cabinet picks to date.

I appreciate the sentiment coming from Bonior.  But he is forceful and the cause of building the labor movement is very much in his gut.  And I would really, really like at least one person in the Cabinet meetings of whom both things are true, notwithstanding our President-elect's reassurances that the vision and the final calls are his. 

Maybe he could commit to giving Obama a couple of years, at the outset, all the while grooming a successor?  This is a golden opportunity coming up and it can't be frittered away on account of Washington newbie mistakes. 

I like Granholm very much and think there's got to be an important role for her to play in moving things in Washington.  But I'm not sure that building a useful labor movement in this country is a cause that is in her gut.

Andy Stern, whose name has popped up as well, is certainly interesting, passionate, and committed.  But he may have burned too many bridges in past fights to be able to be effective in that role, I don't know.

Overheard in downtown DC this morning:

"They should just put Obama's likeness on the dollar bill and get it over with."  (spoken during a conversation in which the ubiquitous presence of his likeness these days was alluded to.) 

There were <a href="http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/2008/12/the-note-120508.html">rumors</a> floating around earlier today that Caroline Kennedy might be selected to replace Hillary Clinton as New York's next Senator.  I am among the many who have a really high opinion of Caroline Kennedy and would be delighted to see her get the nod. 

When Hillary first ran for the Senate, one of New York's longstanding US representatives, Nita Lowey, also very sharp, more or less was elbowed out of the way according to the accounts I've seen.  She'd be an outstanding choice as well.

Turnout is very high.  We have about 2500 registered in our precinct, which has been trending Dem and went about 60-40 for Kerry.  700 voted prior to today, either absentee or early voting. 

At 6 am the line extended another 100 feet beyond the 100+ feet line inside the elementary school polling place.  An opscan vote tabulator broke down and the line barely moved during the 45 minutes or so it took to get a tech in to fix it.  I was outside more than I was inside during that time and did not see anyone leave the line.  Once the problem was fixed the line moved well and by late AM folks were smiling as they left, pleasantly surprised at how short the wait was at that point. 

By 10 am roughly 1600 votes had been cast, total, about 65% turnout already.  The word from our poll watcher was that we were doing very well with our folks turning out.  Someone speculated we could see 90% turnout.  There is ongoing targeted, well organized activity to try to get as many as possible of the rest of our folks out.

Levels of incivility towards those of us offering sample ballots were low, consisting entirely of semi-obnoxious body language from a minority of Republican voters.  I'd estimate 90% of it came from white men ages 35 and up.

I try to make a point of engaging Republican counterparts when I do this work.  Two years ago, during a lightly trafficked shift, I met a 55-ish Republican attorney from Kansas whose brother lives in the precinct.  He was peddling the anti-evolution line to me.  Very civil, pleasant gentleman.

Two of our counterparts for part of my shift were 18 and 15 year old boys.  Out of curiosity I asked them if they had some serious concern re whether Obama was really patriotic or not.  The 18 year old said no, he didn't buy into that rhetoric.  The 15 year old answered by saying he was not going to answer because his experience has taught him that if he answers truthfully he will be called a racist.  I chose not to further engage the 15 year old on the matter. If I honestly believed that someone with a chance to win a presidential election might have terrorist inclinations I'd be seriously alarmed.     

An elderly white woman with limited mobility declined to have her ballot brought to her outside the polling place for casting and witnessing by an election official.  She said she was afraid her vote would not be counted if that happened and insisted on making her way inside instead.  She said she just wasn't going to let anything get in the way of her casting a vote that counted on this historic day which she said she never thought she would live to see.   

Only slept about 3 hours last night as a result of being much too wound up.  At least the SNL 2-hour special last night helped me let go of the worry a little and do some laughing. 

I had a minor "incident" while doing doorhangers today in suburban northern Virginia.

A mid-40s male was doing yardwork out front as I approached the driveway in the early evening darkness.  The mid-40s female listed as also living at the address--previously identified as at least a "gettable" voter--was the person to whom the doorhanger was addressed.  She was nowhere in sight.

Upon his recognizing the Obama/Biden sticker on my chest we had the following exchange:

Him, very non-jocularly, tight-lipped, no trace of a smile: So are you going to reimburse me for the $20,000 tax increase I'm going to have?

Me: (not thinking clearly): Not gonna happen.

Him (seeing the doorhanger I was walking up his driveway to deliver, again very non-jocularly): Don't deliver trash on my property.

Me (opting to forego trying to deliver the doorhanger): Do you speak for your wife, sir?

Suffice it to say we were not enamored of one another as we parted ways. 

I hadn't known either the guy or his (presumably) SO.  They live half a mile away from us.  We didn't get far enough for me to inform him that I am a neighbor. 

He was dressed casually as one would expect someone doing yardwork would be.  With my unthinking reply to his tax comment I was being presumptuous, for indeed he might have earned enough money to have a $20K tax hike looking at him if Obama does win and succeeds in getting through Congress the tax policy he's been saying he'll push.

I would have done far better had I responded to his question simply: "No."  (someone feeling as strongly as he appeared to is not someone it was going to be productive for me to try to engage in a discussion.)

When I got back to our precinct captain's home to drop off the sheets recording the houses I'd done, I let the coordinator know that it was an uneventful shift, except for this one incident.  I explained what had happened, verbally reinforcing the notation I'd made on my sheet for the next person this time around not to engage the male of the house.  I also vented that I hate it when men speak for their SO female partners.

There were three middle-aged and over women taking this in.  One of them, her face lit up, said "We need more men who think like you!"  One of the other women, also smiling, said, "Yeah, well, it's getting tense."  (Obama leads narrowly as Dems seek to win Virginia in the presidential race for the first time since 1964.) Indeed I did feel royally cheesed off at the guy for denying me permission to deliver the doorhanger intended for his SO.  But my hasty, careless reply on the tax comment may have (inadvertently--I was just stupid and careless, not intentionally mean-spirited) insulted or irritated him.

I am wondering for those denizens still reading this who went door-to-door for Kerry and/or Gore as well: how does your experience this time compare with the earlier ones in terms of the level of civility of exchanges with members of the public with whom you've interacted FTF or on the phone?