Editor's Cut

Wealth for the Common Good

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

At a moment when conservative Democrats are holding real healthcare reform hostage under the guise of "fiscal discipline"--fighting against a robust public option, promoting a regressive taxation of health benefits, and opposing a surtax on the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans--a network of business leaders and high net worth individuals has emerged as a powerful and sane voice in this debate: Wealth for the Common Good.

Recognizing that the Bush tax cuts allowed households with incomes over $250,000 to save more than $700 billion during a time of war-- and that the economic policies of the past thirty years have disproportionately benefited top earners--Wealth for the Common Good has called on the Obama administration and Congress to immediately repeal the Bush cuts for households earning over $235,000 before they expire in 2011. That would raise an estimated $43 billion in revenues and help address this nation's public investment deficit--in healthcare, schools, infrastructure and other areas vital to our nation's health and wealth. Over 200 individuals (including me) who would pay these taxes have now signed onto the petition which will be delivered to President Obama, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and (for what it's worth) House Republican Leader John Boehner.

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July 30, 2009

Congress Shouldn't Skip Town

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

This isn't a healthcare crisis, this is a state of emergency. 14,000 Americans are losing their coverage every day, and 17,000 are forced into bankruptcy every week because they can't pay their medical bills.

So what's Congress doing?

Going on vacation.

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July 28, 2009

Around The Nation

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

Last summer, just hours after President Bush continued his dangerous expansion of executive powers and signed the "FISA Amendments Act of 2008," legislation that needlessly expanded the government's ability to spy on it's own citizens, The Nation joined with the ACLU in a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the act. (Read our original post here.) We sued on behalf of ourself and two of our contributing writers--Naomi Klein and Chris Hedges--arguing vigorously that as journalists, FISA inhibited our reporting, and put at grave risk brave whistleblowers who seek to come forward and challenge authority.

Our lawsuit--which has been led by a remarkable legal team at the ACLU --is a coalition effort. We're suing along with Amnesty International USA, Human Rights Watch, Global Fund for Women, PEN American Center, the Washington Office on Latin America, Service Employees International Union and several private attorneys. The plaintiffs have one thing in common: We all challenge the constitutionality of FISA, arguing that it is an illegal--and wholly unnecessary--act that makes us less safe, not more, and erodes our basic values.

Last week, we got our day in court.

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July 27, 2009

Ain't Nothing Centrist About Them

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

At this moment -- when 72 percent of the nation supports a public plan option and 14,000 people lose their healthcare every day -- the House Blue Dogs and conservative Democratic Senators are doing just about everything they can to cripple real health care reform.

So why does the media keep ceding them the label of "centrist" or "moderate" as if they are the guardians of mainstream values?

In a recent profile on reform slayer Max Baucus -- Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee and creator of his majority Republican "Coalition of the Willing" -- Washington Post reporter Dan Eggen refers to Baucus as "a longtime centrist in the Democratic caucus." Even Harold Meyerson -- who along with E.J. Dionne and Ruth Marcus keeps the Washington Post op-ed page from being neocon central and is one of the best in the business at understanding the ideologies at play in Washington -- in a recent op-ed repeatedly decries the "centrist Democrats" such as the Blue Dogs who fight against taxing the richest 1 percent of Americans and promote a "can't-do" view of government.

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July 24, 2009

A Better Way for Afghan Women than War

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

Earlier this year, I challenged the notion put forth by some feminists and human rights groups that a US military presence in Afghanistan is both justified and necessary in order to protect Afghan women and girls. I interviewed Kavita Ramdas, President of the Global Fund for Women, who discussed how the women of Afghanistan are hardly united on the need for the US military in their country, and many make a strong case that the war in Afghanistan and US occupation in fact exacerbates the plight of women.

The crucial question of how best to help Afghan women and girls is once again being raised within the peace movement and the media. The Feminist Majority Foundation (FMF)--an invaluable organization dedicated to women's equality, reproductive health, and non-violence-- has made the decision to essentially support the Obama administration's escalation as necessary in order to protect women and girls from the Taliban and enable a "significant redevelopment effort." (Coincidentally, columnist Tom Friedman, who has opposed escalation, is also rethinking his position based on the idea that our presence will create greater opportunities and protection for women and girls.)

While I admire FMF for much of its work, including its fight against the oppression of Afghan women and girls since 1996--and I acknowledge that these are complex and emotional issues--I disagree with the organization's position here. I also take issue with an op-ed by FMF president Eleanor Smeal and board member Helen Cho that characterizes those who advocate for a US withdrawal as wanting to "just walk away", or "abandon the women and girls of Afghanistan." These criticisms are reminiscent of the "cut and run" accusations against a peace and justice movement that wisely opposed the disastrous occupation of Iraq (and FMF was a part of that movement).

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July 21, 2009

Eric Cantor's Cant

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

Virginia congressman Eric Cantor may be a GOP rising star, but he sure is a hypocrite. How else to describe someone who's a leading critic of President Obama's Recovery Act and joins his congressional colleagues to urge Virginia's Department of Transportation to apply for stimulus money for high-speed rail? If that isn't two-faced, what is ?

He's also a demagogue: "Millions of jobs will be crushed by the Administration's policies." Say what? The stimulus may have been too small and overemphasized tax cuts, but it's helped states, including his own, with longer unemployment benefits, expanded food stamps and subsidies for people who've lost jobs to extend their health insurance. It's also kept teachers in the classroom, cops on the street and got workers rehired. Hours after Cantor delivered the GOP's weekly radio address blasting the stimulus, Vice-President Biden announced that $1.5 million of the bill's money would go to the Richmond Police Department to retain officers. And $20 million is going to Chesterfield County, a suburb of Richmond, to help 275 teachers from being fired. Virginia's working men and women should remember that Cantor fought hard to cut a provision in the stimulus bill that was designed to help low-income workers.

As Obama marks his sixth month in office, his Presidency will be judged by its laser-like focus on creating jobs, good jobs, and many of them. Double-digit unemployment is a ticking time bomb and his economic team needs to work quickly to defuse it. But Cantor & crew don't care about creating jobs. They want to spin the debate about the economy so their party, which has absolutely nothing to offer working people, games the 2010 midterm elections.

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July 19, 2009

The Courage of Natalya Estemirova

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

In October 2007, Russian human rights activist Natalya Estemirova wrote for us about the assassination of the crusading investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya.

Today, Estemirova was assassinated.
Her body, dumped near the capital city of Ingushetia, was discovered with two close-range bullet wounds in the head.

A woman who courageously investigated kidnappings, killings and other rights abuses in Chechnya, a single mother in her early 40s, a leading member of the esteemed human rights group Memorial, Estemirova received the first annual award from the international human rights group RAW in WAR (Reach all Women in War) in October 2007.

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July 15, 2009

Around The Nation

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

Last week The Nation, and our friends at Campus Progress, hosted the Fourth Annual National Youth Student Journalism conference, a gathering of students and award-winning journalists. Much of the conversation focused on the survival of journalism. But more than any panel, it was the old-fashioned shoe-leather reporting of Michael Tracey, a 20-year-old conference attendee from West Caldwell, New Jersey, that made the case for continued faith in journalism and reporting.

Tracey found himself face to face with former President Bill Clinton at the Campus Progress National Conference, held the day before our student symposium. With an opportunity in front of him, Tracey did what any good, veteran journalist would do. He spoke up and asked a good question. Did the former President personally support same sex marriage? With a brief "Yeah" from President Clinton, Tracey had a big story: Bill Clinton supports same-sex marriage. The story has been leading The Nation's website, and picked up everywhere from Politico and the San Francisco Chronicle to Queerty, Towleroad and a host of gay-focused blogs.

It was dogged, tireless reporting by A.C. Thompson that pushed another story forward this week, as local television stations into New Orleans launched an investigation into alleged vigilante shootings in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, prodded by Thompson's report from The Nation in December. Thompson, now reporting for the non-profit Pro Publica, filed a followup on his investigation: Television news reports are uncovering new evidence in the case, building on Thompson's original reporting and keeping the pressure on local law enforcement. The TV reports, and Thompson's continuing work, hold out the promise of justice for victims of these disturbing incidents.

Three more items to note in this week's Around the Nation:

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July 15, 2009

Criticism of Afghan War is on Rise in Britain

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

In a brilliant essay in a recent issue of the London Review of Books ("The Irresistible Illusion, July 9), Rory Stewart, the Director of the Carr Center on Human Rights Policy at Harvard, writes that "Afghanistan..is the graveyard of predictions." I'd add that is is also the graveyard of empires. Stewart is critical of President Obama's "new policy," which he explains "has a very narrow focus--counter-terrorism--and a very broad definition of how to achieve it: no less than the fixing of the Afghan state."

Alternatives, for the moment, have been excluded. Yet too few are asking the tough questions that need to be asked about how we might better provide security -- in the region and for the US -- through a non-military regional strategy to stabilize Afghanistan. Why are too few pointing out that it is crazy to pour billions into a war whose mission we're still unable to clearly define when the U.S. economy is in crisis and millions (here and globally) face joblessness?

While the newly arrived top commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McCrystal, champions a 21st century counterinsurgency (COIN) strategy, few in Congress have bothered to question the Administration about the fact that while this COIN strategy calls for a ratio of 80 percent political and 20 percent military, 90 percent of the recent war supplemental goes towards military expenses. And just last week, according to the Washington Post, McCrystal concluded that Afghan security forces will have to expand far beyond currently planned levels. Such an expansion would require additional billions beyond the $7.5 billion the administration has budgeted annually to build up the Afghan army and police over the next several years; it will also mean the deployment of 1000s of more US troops as trainers and advisers.

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July 12, 2009

Real Health, Real Reform

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

With both the House and Senate looking to pass health care bills prior to the summer recess which begins August 8, now is the moment of truth for Democrats: will they offer a real public plan option to compete with private plans and drive down costs? Or will they cater to the healthcare industry which is now spending $1.4 million per day on lobbyists to protect their profits?

Throughout this debate, one Senator who has been willing to tell it like it is, with the people's interest at heart, is Bernie Sanders. This week he will publish The Health Care Crisis: Letters from Vermont and America--a collection of healthcare stories sent to him from across the nation.

"In early June we sent out a letter to our email list--and we said two things," Sen. Sanders told me in an interview this week. "Number one, please sign a petition calling for a single-payer system; and two, give us some of your experiences with the private health insurance and your experience in terms of health care in general. Well, in a few weeks, we got 40,000 signatures on a single-payer petition. But, as important, we received well over 4,000 responses--from Vermont and all over the country--people telling us what's going on in their lives with regard to healthcare."

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July 8, 2009