Your Iraq questions answered
September 15, 2007 | By Nathaniel Ward
Featured videoPat Fagan explains the benefits of traditional values to classroom success. |
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On Tuesday, I asked members to submit questions about the surge strategy to Heritage expert Kirk Johnson, who recently returned from a year-long stint at the U.S. embassy in Baghdad.
Here are his answers to the most popular member questions:
Is MoveOn.org correct that Gen. Petraeus’s surge strategy has failed and that violence and civilian deaths have actually increased?
How does foreign interference, by Iran in particular, impact the effectiveness of the surge strategy?
Political reconciliation among Iraq’s various tribal and religious factions has been frustratingly slow to develop. Will continuing Gen. Petraeus’ strategy allow this reconciliation to occur?
Why has it cost so much time and so many lives to defeat what is on paper an insurgent force that lags behind American forces in weapons, supplies, training, mobility and so forth?
Has the surge strategy changed Iraqi perceptions of American troops and the United States in general?
Where next in Iraq?
While Gen. David Petraeus’ surge strategy in Iraq has been successful overall, much remains to be done to improve the political climate in the country, a panel of experts said Thursday at The Heritage Foundation.
Violence has decreased throughout Iraq since the beginning of the surge in January, said Heritage expert Kirk Johnson, who served more than a year as a statistical analyst at the U.S. embassy in Iraq.
Iraqis and Americans share frustration at the slow progress of political reform, he continued, a process hampered by Iran’s attempts to destabilize the region and incite sectarian violence. But he cautioned that a hasty withdrawal could complicate the problem and exacerbate current difficulties.
Johnson outlined many of these points in his new paper on Gen. Petraeus’ testimony.
Find out what experts like Frederick Kagan had to say.
—Colin Gowan
Do voter ID rules depress turnout? No.
Voter identification rules are a measure designed to ensure the integrity of the electoral system. But liberals argue that requiring citizens to identify themselves when voting depresses voter turnout, especially among racial minorities. They point to a recent study, cited by The New York Times and other left-leaning media, concluding that more stringent ID rules reduce turnout.
But the study used faulty procedures that distorted its findings, according to an analysis from Heritage’s Center for Data Analysis.
Researcher David Muhlhausen carefully re-analyzed the data and found “that voter identification requirements… have virtually no suppressive effect on reported voter turnout.”
In short, “respondents in photo identification and non-identification state are just as likely (regardless of ethnicity or social status) to report voting compared to respondents from states that only required voters to state their name.”
—Colin Gowan
Returning ‘Power to the People’
“Decent Americans across the country are so disgusted by a culture that doesn’t reflect their values, a society that trashes the family, and a government gone wild,” writes Heritage Vice President Rebecca Hagelin, “that they often feel helpless and hopeless about the future of our nation.”
“So I think they’ll join me in saying: Thank goodness for Laura Ingraham’s latest book, Power to the People.”
Ingraham will be the keynote speaker at the Executive Committee luncheon, part of The Heritage Foundation’s November 12 President’s Club meeting in Washington, D.C. To receive your invitation to the luncheon, join the Executive Committee today
Responding to the Left on health care
Liberal economist Paul Krugman recently used his New York Times column to call for a government-run health care system. Heritage expert Bob Moffit summarizes Krugman’s argument: “Since we already enroll millions of middle- and upper-class children in government schools, we should enroll them in government health programs as well.”
But Krugman “failed to finish his homework,” Moffit writes in a letter he sent to the editor of the Times.
The director of Heritage’s Center for Health Policy Studies explains that there exist several problems with big-government health care proposals. But a conservative approach like that promoted by Heritage “respects personal freedom and promises access to American private medicine, a system far more responsive to individual patient needs.”
Will Congress uphold the Constitution?
The Senate will vote as soon as next week on a measure that violates explicit and plain provisions in the Constitution. The plan, which already passed the House, is this: to grant the District of Columbia a vote in the House of Representatives even though it is not a state.
As I argued in a recent paper, a long history (and, more importantly, the text of the Constitution) supports “the long-accepted notion that only through a constitutional amendment can the nation’s capital be treated as a state.” There is a legitimate case for resolving the Constitutional dilemma facing District residents, who lack representation in Congress, but any solution should remain within the clear bounds of the Constitution.
In other news
- President Bush spoke Thursday night to the American people about Iraq policy. Heritage Middle East expert James Phillips reviews his address.
- Japan’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, resigned on Wenesday after just a year in office. This raises the fear, Asia expert Bruce Klinger writes, that Japan may suffer a series of ineffective short-term leaders. Such a development “would raise questions in Washington over Japan's role as an ally.”
- When the radical left-wing antiwar group MoveOn.org purchased a full-page advertisement in The New York Times on Monday calling Gen. David Petraeus “General Betray Us,” they didn’t pay full price. According to a report in The New York Post, “the liberal activist group had paid only $65,000 for the ad—a reduction of more than $116,000 from the stated rate.”
- New Jersey’s governor has said the state will continue to offer a federal health care plan for low-income children even to those in families well above the poverty line. New federal guidelines limit funding to the program’s intended recipients, but many on the Left see this as a violation of the “right” to health care.
- Russia’s parliament confirmed Viktor Zubkov as prime minister. President Vladimir Putin fired the previous prime minister earlier this week.
Coming up at Heritage
To attend these or any other Heritage Foundation events, RSVP at Heritage’s events website. Or you can watch these events live online at Heritage.org. All times are Eastern.
- On Monday, September 17 at 11:30 a.m., Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez will inaugurate a series of lectures on the possibilities for post-Castro Cuba.
- On Wednesday, September 19 at 11:00 a.m., Alan Leong, a former candidate for chief executive of Hong Kong, will discuss the prospects for creating a civil society in the former British colony.
- On Thursday, September 20 at noon, a panel of experts looks at the role of strategic communication in diplomacy.
- On Tuesday, September 25 at 10:00 a.m., screenwriter Steve Finefrock will relate his experiences as a conservative in Hollywood.
- On Thursday, September 27 at noon, a panel of ambassadors will discuss the implications of Ukraine’s upcoming elections.
Nathaniel Ward is the Editor of MyHeritage.org—a website for members and supporters of The Heritage Foundation. Colin Gowan contributed to this report.
