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Urgent Voice Overs

by Patricia Lee Sharpe

Rule one for young writers is this: whenever possible, use the active, not the passive voice. For example, which of the following is more powerful? (Or, if we’re talking about a fictional character, which version makes the character seem more interesting?)

1. She was given the opportunity to excel.

2. She grasped the opportunity to excel.

Most readers will care more about the girl who takes her future into her own hands. Wow! What’s she going to do? Above all, readers will probably respect her. She’s got character and determination. And so the reader reads on.

I was reminded of this active/passive admonition when I began to notice the use of the term “enslaved people” for those who, until recently, were called “slaves” in America. What a powerful transformation! People aren’t born as slaves. They’re forced into servitude. When it comes to the lives of such unfortunates, the passive voice clearly applies.  They're compelled to do what they do.  It's also true, however, that enslaved people manage to subvert their masters by various sorts of non-compliance. In essence, a “lazy slave” is actually a very smart person, slyly acting while acted upon.

Which brings me to a sleight of language that might make a difference as we contemplate the plight of coal miners and other workers in dead end industries. They can languish in victimhood or learn accessible new skills. Servicing wind turbines, perhaps. Or installing solar panels. Or, with a lot more education, learning to make them.

Economists and well-meaning social workers tend to think, in such cases, of retraining. This poor guy needs to be retrained, they say, making him the object of the verb not the subject. So, I ask you, which of the following formulations would give him more dignity, dignity being a critical human need?

1. This guy was retrained in courses at the community college.

2. This guy retrained himself by attending courses at the community college.

In short, maybe change (and retraining) would be more palatable to technologically redundant workers if they were characterized as adults acting with intentionality and not as losers to be pushed passively into the future.

But this is even more vital: real jobs must be available once the retraining has been accomplished.  Continued unemployment leads to desperation, alienation, susceptibility to Trrump-like authoritarian promises.

LET’S MUTE THE TRUMPET

By Patricia Lee Sharpe

            Joe Biden was inaugurated less than a month ago.  Donald J. Trump is a private citizen with lots of law suits pending.  The historic odds of a one term president’s returning to the White House or controlling his political party after a big defeat are very very unfavorable. 

            Why then are we constantly bombarded with speculations about his influence on midterm elections in 2022 and by polls gauging his chances for the presidency in 2024?  Why must citizen Trump, soundly defeated candidate still licking his wounds, be headlined day after day—and I’m not talking about the impeachment trial?

            The supporters of Trump the loser are, not surprisingly, still clinging to their man.  Mourning takes time—and the first stage, as everyone should know, is denial.  Trump stoked their egos—and inflamed their ids.  He raised their hopes to such extremes that they run the risk of looking stupid should they publicly  repudiate him.  If we want to dilute their Trumpism,  we must not pile on the humiliation.    

            We got into the Trump mess partly because of the snobbery of those who called a  good share of the U.S. mere “flyover country,” territory not worth a visit or a thought.  It didn’t help that Democrats supported a presidential candidate who labeled a good number of her fellow Americans as “deplorables.” Donald Trump stoked the resulting, wholly justified anger and resentment to his advantage.   

            American is supposedly the land of opportunity, but two groups of people have largely missed the elevator: Black people everywhere and rural white people.  Both elements have erupted in anger over the past year, and both eruptions have been accompanied by criminally opportunistic violence at the margins.  I’m talking here of white nationalists of all stripes and also of the anarchistic elements who too frequently disfigure protest on the left.

            This is not a time for those with a superiority complex to wallow in an electoral victory whose tender underside is the fear that Trump’s followers can’t be weaned from their hero.  It’s time to take a page from the Biden playbook.  Concentrate on policies that will help working class America .  Jobs.  Jobs.  Jobs.  And respect.  Real jobs in the real world for fellow Americans—and policies that actually produce them.  Good solid work well publicized. 

            And quelling the covid monster. 

                        Above all, this is no time for keeping Trumpism alive by  speculating endlessly on how Republicans who didn’t buy his lies will be punished by his followers.  It’s much too early to say anything durable.                                  

January 6, 2021: More questions than answers

By Patricia H Kushlis

What did Trump know and when did he know it?  Why was Trump reportedly passively watching on television the events unfold on Capitol Hill yet refusing to order the DC, Maryland and Virginia National Guards to help the overrun Capitol and DC police forces stop the violence as his angry and deluded mob attacked Congress? 

Why didn’t he accompany the people on their march to the Hill as he had promised?

And why is Trump so desperate to remain in office when he makes it so obvious that he doesn’t like the job, that he is in way over his head and his performance has been an abject failure? 

Who were the primary organizers?

What role did certain members of Congress play?

What role did Moscow play in promoting and instigating the insurrection at the Capitol? 

Why weren’t the DC National Guard allowed to defend the Capitol and reinforce the vastly outnumbered Capitol and DC Metropolitan police until almost too late? Why and how were calls from Pence, Pelosi and other Congressional leaders finally able to get the Pentagon to release the National Guard? 

Why did the Pentagon refuse to allow Maryland Governor Larry Hogan to respond to calls to send the Maryland National Guard in to help deal with the Trump incited angry mob on January 6 as they attacked the Capitol?  Why did the Pentagon only allow the DC National Guard to direct traffic for hours after the attack had begun?

Did a few Capitol police allow rioters to breach the barricades or were the policy so outnumbered they had no choice?  Who spread the false rumor to the mostly white insurrectionists that the police were on their side? When this failed to transpire, the mob became sorely disappointed and turned on them.  One policeman was brutally killed and others injured as a result. 

Why did Trump’s GOP Congressional supporters object to the results particularly for states other than their own after those results had been recounted, verified and adjudicated in multiple courts? 

Could this, perhaps, have been a delaying tactic to give time for Trump’s mob to disrupt Congress to stop the vote  count so that Trump could enact emergency powers, retain control, establish a dictatorship and nullify the election of Joe Biden as the next president?

Why did Trump fire his chosen Secretary of Defense Doug Esper and others in line of succession at the Pentagon  as well as the Defense advisory board just last fall and replace them with his cronies who he thought would support him regardless of what he said or did?

Where was Secretary of State Pompeo during all of this. What did he know - or does it matter?  He had tried to be out of the country when this occurred so its possible he knew something was up but  his European trip to Brussels and Luxembourg was cancelled because the Europeans refused to meet with him. 

Why has it taken the social media companies so long to ban Trump from Tweeting lie after lie with little or no attempt to stop the spread of his malicious  and unfounded claims?  Freedom of speech is one thing in this country.  Shouting fire in a crowded room is illegal and must be stopped immediately.

US-Africa Trade Relations: Time for a Reset

By Joan Wadelton, Guest Contributor

The African Continental Free Trade Agreement is a Game Changer

Key Points:

• The new African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) will bring economic development across the continent, as well as significant opportunities for American companies looking to do business there.

 

• The United States should negotiate a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Africa.

 

• As African countries integrate under the AfCFTA, their economies will prosper and they will be eligible to graduate from the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) program. Eventually, AGOA will be folded into the US-AfCFTA Free Trade Agreement.

 

• The US government should aggressively support American companies hoping to access African markets.

The advent of the AfCFTA completely transforms trade between Africa and rest of the world.  The United States must now forge an innovative and robust business relationship with Africa, with the goal of an eventual FTA.  The new AfCFTA offers immeasurable development opportunities for Africa -- an upsurge of American companies will mean increased capital flows, technology transfer, employment opportunities and access to the US market, and much more for Africans.  And, it will open markets for American companies across the continent that were previously too difficult to access.  In so doing, it will create US jobs, augment US overseas markets and boost revenue flowing back to the United States.

The African Continental Free Trade Agreement

The AfCFTA will develop Africa’s economies and offers tremendous opportunities to American companies  

 The AfCFTA is a remarkable achievement.  It launches on January 1, 2021, with selective tariff reductions.  It builds on harmonization and integration work done in Africa’s regional economic entities in recent decades.  Under the AfCFTA, countries across Africa will unite their economies into an enormous continent-wide trading block – estimated to comprise anywhere from $2-4 trillion in consumption and investment.  A Secretariat has been established in Ghana and work to harmonize regulations, reduce tariffs, eliminate non-tariff barriers, promote free movement of persons across the continent and more -- has begun.  The eventual goal is a continent-wide, single trading entity.

The first task of the AfCFTA will be focused inward – to merge the economies of the continent. Benefits to African countries will include broadening and integrating supply chains, increased innovation, enhanced competition and productivity and more.  Smaller countries will be given opportunities to catch up with their larger, richer and more economically diversified neighbors.  

The AfCFTA’s second task will be outward focused -- the eventual establishment of economic relations with the rest of the world as a single, continent-wide entity.  The economic potential of a unified Africa will be considerable, and its desire to negotiate trade agreements of intense interest to trading partners.

The US goal should be a Free Trade Agreement with Africa

The United States should make a US-AfCFTA Free Trade Agreement its goal (the European Union is already referencing a continent-to-continent FTA in the future).  The AfCFTA will bring significant opportunities for foreign companies looking to do business with Africa; American firms will be able to establish in one country and expand operations across national borders.

The AfCFTA will take time to be implemented, the United States should along the way:

• Refrain from negotiating bilateral agreements with individual African countries – they undermine the objective of a unified Africa and risk alienating the rest of the continent;
• Seek assurances from the Africans that the US will not be disadvantaged by the European Union’s (EU) Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs). (Indeed, it is not clear whether the EPAs will benefit the EU and Africa given the greater potential of the AfCFTA; in any case few of them have been implemented);
• Ensure that American companies will be able to take full advantage of the provisions of the AfCFTA as they are implemented; and
• Offer to work with the new AfCFTA Secretariat at the technical level as tariffs are reduced and the Agreement itself is deepened to include additional trade-related disciplines.

The African Growth and Opportunity Act

AGOA addresses one half of our trade with Africa – exports from the continent to the United States

No discussion of US-Africa trade would be complete without a discussion of AGOA.  AGOA is a 20-year-old program created by Congress that has enjoyed broad bipartisan support and is in place until 2025.  AGOA grants duty free entry for 6500 products into the United States from Africa.  To qualify for AGOA benefits, countries must adhere to standards for worker rights, free and fair elections, anti-corruption efforts and more.  An annual internal US government review determines whether AGOA beneficiaries are abiding by their commitments to these standards, and if countries should be added to, or dropped from, the AGOA program. 

AGOA has long been referred to as “the cornerstone of US-Africa trade policy.”   However, AGOA addresses only one half of the trade equation – exports from Africa to the United States.  It was intended to allow African countries to develop their export sectors by making the entry of their goods into the United States duty free.  AGOA was never equipped to assist US businesses looking to invest in, or trade with, Africa.  That must be done through other means.

As the AfCFTA stands up, AGOA will wind down

Countries “graduate” out of AGOA (that is, they no longer are eligible to receive benefits) if they are determined to be “high income economies” as defined by the World Bank.  Seychelles achieved this status and was graduated from AGOA in 2017; Mauritius was recently determined to have met this benchmark and presumably will be graduated as well. 

As countries begin to prosper from measures undertaken through the AfCFTA, more of them will reach “high income status” and therefore be graduated out of the AGOA program.  Over time, the number of beneficiary countries should steadily decline.

When the US-AfCFTA FTA is signed, AGOA will cease to exist

FTAs are designed to reduce and/or eliminate tariff and non-tariff barriers between (or among) countries.  By eliminating the duty on many African products coming into the US, the US has provided benefits normally associated with an FTA.  However, US goods are still subject to duties when entering African countries – and reducing or eliminating those would be a critical part of the FTA negotiations. As is the norm, an FTA with the AfCFTA would set all policy with respect to tariffs, resulting in AGOA being superseded and disappearing.

US Trade and Investment Going to Africa – the Other Half of the Equation

The US Government should take an aggressive, multi-faceted approach to supporting American companies looking to do business with Africa

The United States government has a broad array of programs designed to train Africans in business and to assist American companies entering African markets.  Programs through the Department of Commerce, USAID, the State Department and more, can be strengthened with additional resources and new programs can be created.  Below are a few of my suggestions – there are certainly many more.

• Emphasize that increasing the US business presence in Africa is a top priority. Name a Special Envoy for US Business in Africa.
• Reinstall Foreign Commercial Service Attaches (including virtually) in US Embassies across Africa.
• Fully staff and fund the existing USAID Trade Hubs in Africa; establish more as needed in areas that are geographically distant from the current hubs.
• Ensure that the intent of Prosper Africa to link up US government agencies helping American companies enter African markets is met, and that “deal teams” in US missions in Africa have the staff, funding and flexibility to perform their duties.
• Ensure that the US International Development and Finance Corporation (DFC) is fully funded and has maximum flexibility to provide the financing and support that American companies entering the African market need.
• Focus on the continent’s businesswomen – they form the backbone of Africa’s economies. Expand funding and resources for the African Women’s Entrepreneurship Program (AWEP) that brings the continent’s elite businesswomen to the United States for business training and matchmaking.
• Focus on Africa’s young people. Increase resources and funding for the Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI).  Ensure that each program curriculum contains a robust business training segment.  

Above all, consult closely and constantly with US business to see what they need and suggest. 

It is imperative that the absence of American companies in Africa be reversed.  The continent is replete with old friends and allies; a strong American business presence there would be welcome and benefit both sides.

Joan Wadelton negotiated trade and investment treaties at the US Department of State and the Office of the US Trade Representative.

 

It is the 21st Century; Organize State Department Administrative Functions to Reflect That

by Joan Wadelton, Guest Contributor

INTRODUCTION

The State Department has been poorly managed for decades.  Scandals, failures and irregularities across the spectrum of administrative functions (that is, the operational side of the agency – security, personnel, procurement, embassy construction, technology etc.) have harmed US foreign policy in multiple ways.  These shortcomings undermine the implementation of US foreign policy and waste the American taxpayer’s money.  Significant reforms, Congressional oversight and time will be needed to correct this.  The first step must be to rationalize the outdated and chaotic structure of administrative functions.

Today’s Structure:  An Overly Large and Incoherent Grouping of Functions Under One Under Secretary for Management

The State Department’s administrative responsibilities are neither structured to maximize efficiency and effectiveness, nor to promote fiscal responsibility.  The current organizational chart groups the institution’s numerous and diverse administrative functions into a single bureaucratic unit (“the M family”), under a sole senior official (the Under Secretary for Management). 

 

The make-up of the M family neither reflects the creation of new Bureaus in State in recent years, nor the increasing importance of security and information technology.  Functions of a more recent vintage – such as information technology – are located organizationally with longstanding and unrelated offices such as medical services.  Quite inappropriately, Consular Affairs – a non-management Bureau and once an independent entity – is included in the M family.

Grouping together such a broad collection of unrelated, high-budget and critical functions ensures that no single person in the role of Under Secretary for Management will have the expertise or time to administer everything competently.  Moreover, placement of decision-making in the hands of a single individual prevents healthy competition for resources among senior management staff, who should be obliged to defend their requests for funding and programs against the requests of other Bureaus and offices.

Most seriously, the grouping of so many functions under one decision-maker leaves the door open to cronyism and corruption; closing off competing voices can discourage legitimate dissent. 

SUGGESTIONS FOR THE MODERNIZATION OF STATE’S MANAGEMENT PORTFOLIO

 

1)  The First Step Must Be to Reinstate the Position of Deputy Secretary for Management

The State Department exists to formulate and implement the foreign policy of the United States; management has always been an afterthought.  But foreign policy cannot be implemented without a firm grounding in a healthy, smoothly running and efficient administrative support structure.

There must be a connection between the administrative and policy sides -- they must be fully integrated and administrative functions must be treated as critically important.  A Deputy Secretary for Management would ensure that this happens. 

HOW ABOUT A VIRTUAL PEACE CORPS?

By Guest Contributor Joan Wadelton

(WV editor - Patricia H Kushlis' comment:  It seems to me that many returned Peace Corps volunteers would be delighted to have the opportunity to teach and engage again with people in their countries of service over the Internet whether they be recently returned PCVs whose stays were abruptly cut short because of the COVID-19 pandemic or others who returned years ago.  Joan Wadelton's proposal below is creative, innovative and would be cost effective.  I would hope that the Peace Corps leadership would consider it seriously. )  

The Peace Corps is a wonderful organization that has sent 230,000 Americans as volunteers all over the world since 1961.  I was fortunate to spend three years in Niger as a health worker, in a village away from the capital many years ago.  My Peace Corps service prompted my life-long love of Africa.

The Peace Corps mission is:

• To help the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.
• To help promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.
• To help promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.

Although countries with a Peace Corps presence have changed over the years, and the number of volunteers has fluctuated, this mission is as valid today as it was in 1961.

Generally, volunteers have been young adults just beginning their careers and not yet encumbered by family responsibilities.  Indeed, a look at the official Peace Corps website shows a skew toward this demographic.  A demographic that brings enthusiasm and a willingness to live in new places, get the job done, learn about a new culture and actively engage local populations.

This traditional model – with volunteers living and working in other countries -- has been productive and successful.  It has been refined over decades and should be retained.

But is there another way to accomplish the capacity building that is at the heart of the Peace Corps mission?

Yes, and that is remotely, through the internet.  In this approach, volunteers would remain in the United States and conduct their training and teaching activities online.

The Peace Corps would conduct its overseas and virtual volunteer programs side-by-side. 

How would the virtual volunteer program work?

Virtual volunteers would be hired under the same terms and conditions as the overseas volunteers (taking into account the fact that they would not be working overseas).   That is, they would be expected to work on a regular basis -- but not be paid.  They would need access to the internet and the ability to manage Skype, Zoom or similar programs as teaching tools. 

What would virtual volunteers bring to the table?

A virtual Peace Corps would draw from a broader universe of potential volunteers than the existing in-country programs.  For example:

• People who are older and more advanced in their careers – with more knowledge and experience to share – who would not normally move to another country;
• People whose family commitments prevent them from traveling, but who have a passion for sharing their knowledge;
• People who cannot easily travel, but who have always wanted to teach and learn about other countries and cultures.

Would the virtual program be consistent with the core Peace Corps mission?

Yes, a virtual program would reinforce and amplify the key Peace Corps’ mission goals, noted above.  It would also build collaborative working relationships, drawing on wide ranging expertise.

• Greater numbers of more experienced volunteers would add to the capacity building potential of the Peace Corps.
• A virtual program would widen the pool of Americans who would be interacting with people in other countries, thereby promoting greater understanding of the United States and its values abroad.
• And, exposing more Americans to diverse cultures, situations and peoples would strengthen US understanding of the world and enhance our interactions with it.

How would the virtual program be managed?

The virtual programs would be managed alongside existing in-country programs.  Just as with the in-country programs, Peace Corps offices overseas would work with host country officials to identify programmatic and training needs.  Peace Corps recruiters in Washington – dedicated specifically to the virtual program – would identify appropriate candidates to address those needs. 

What would be the administrative and logistical issues?

To implement a virtual Peace Corps program, Congress would need to appropriate additional funding and staff.  However, as a virtual program would not require volunteer travel and housing expenses, a large amount of new money might not be necessary.

The host countries would be responsible for providing adequate internet access and classroom facilities to support the virtual volunteers’ teaching needs.  They would not be able to charge for any training provided by the US government and would have to absorb all the associated costs.  Host countries would also be responsible for identifying gaps in local capacity that virtual volunteers could fill.

What would the host country get out of the virtual program? 

The universe of volunteers available on a virtual basis is likely to be larger and more experienced than the number of Americans willing to relocate to another country.  Host countries would therefore be able to provide a broader array of training programs to their citizens.  It would also be an opportunity for host countries to forge closer, long-term ties with a wide range of US business, educationa,l civil society and technological entities.

Conclusion

The Peace Corps should transform into a two-track organization.  Peace Corps missions overseas would administer both the in-country and virtual programs.  Peace Corps headquarters in Washington would recruit for, and support, both programs.  In this way, a venerable institution could continue on its successful and traditional path, while simultaneously moving into the 21^st century.

HUMANITARIAN AID IS NOT JUST CHARITY

By Guest Contributors Susan Fine, former USAID Senior Deputy Assistant Administrator and Director for Senegal and the Sahel, and Rebecca Black, former USAID Director in Cambodia and Mali. The authors serve on the Board of RAIN for the Sahel and Sahara. Rebecca Black now lives in New Mexico

Across the African continent, there are an estimated 20,000 ICU beds - that’s fewer than 2 per 100,000 people. All sub-Saharan Africa, with over 1 billion people, will need to make do with as few as 3,500 ventilators. The United States has 29 ICU beds per 100,000 people and 160,000 ventilators for its 328 million people. While the COVID-19 pandemic is global, the experience of it is not the same and the ability to respond isn’t either.

Although there are huge disparities within our own country, the differences with Sub-Saharan Africa are even greater. American students who don’t have a computer or internet at home will lose educational ground; many African students will simply never return to school. While too many Americans are now depending on food banks, millions of Africans could face starvation if food markets and supply chains shut down. Now is the time for the U.S. government and caring Americans to step in to provide early and significant help.

Landlocked Niger has seen 648 cases in less than a month, and with few doctors and little equipment to treat sick patients, the country is rightly focused on limiting the spread of the virus. The severe travel restrictions, however, are preventing food, medicine, and necessities like soap from reaching rural villages. Food prices are skyrocketing just as remittances from relatives working outside the country are drying up. The World Bank warns of recession and a “severe food security crisis” in Sub-Saharan Africa. And there is no safety net as we have in the U.S.

Boube Aw - the Director of Programs for a small non-profit organization - Rain for the Sahel and Sahara—is worried. His team is working rapidly to shift from supporting education and skills training to promoting basic hygiene and distributing emergency food aid. He shared with us a Nigerien saying, ‘an empty stomach doesn’t have ears’. If the rural people RAIN serves can’t find food, they can’t heed the guidance to shelter at home, increasing the likelihood that the virus will spread.

Helping the most marginalized is a moral imperative - in our interconnected world it is also in our self-interest. Providing help now will avoid a far more expensive humanitarian disaster and more desperate migrant flows while earning good will and greater cooperation on matters that affect U.S. national security and prosperity, like countering terrorism.

We have seen firsthand what a difference it makes for the U.S. to provide early and substantial aid in a crisis. It enables responders to mobilize quickly and creates momentum for others to join the effort. Bold U.S. action in response to the 2014 Ebola crisis in West Africa brought the United Kingdom and France on board to help stop the disease and forestalled a more severe food security and economic shock.

We also know that government aid agencies such as the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), large and small non-profit organizations (NGOs) and, increasingly, the private sector, all have a crucial role in reinforcing the efforts of developing countries and their citizens to survive. All actors in the aid ecosystem must work together and leverage their comparative advantages. In Mali, international organizations funded by the U.S. and European allies successfully drove back a potential famine in 2012 by working closely with the Malian government and local NGOs that knew how to reach communities with what they needed most.

We call on America - and Americans - to stand with countries less able than ours, even as we continue to fight the pandemic here at home. The Trump Administration should request and Congress should provide immediate and robust humanitarian funding to USAID for the best chance of curbing the virus and preventing hunger and economic devastation. Individual Americans who are able to give should support organizations with global logistical reach as well as small, locally-connected non-profits with the relationships and structure to reach remote communities directly. As Boube reminds us, people everywhere are striving to stay healthy and maintain their livelihoods; it is in the interest of those fortunate enough to have more to bolster those with less so we all survive.

Trump, Tripwires and the Rubicon: Has It Finally been Crossed?

By Patricia H Kushlis

Did Trump, his henchmen and his acolytes finally cross the Rubicon?  

He’s made one colossal mistake after another since he assumed the office of the presidency January 20, 2016. But his July 25 phone call with the recently installed president of Ukraine, the stonewalling and coverup that has followed, not to mention his fatal and ill-considered decision to stand down and then remove the small number of American troops who had been providing the cover – the tripwire preventing a Turkish invasion of Kurdish territory in Syria along the Turkish border acting in response to a nudge in an over the weekend phone call from Turkish strongman Recep Tayyip Erdogan should demonstrate to even the most vociferous Trump enablers that their hero in the red MAGA cap should not be in charge – let alone ever again touch with a single small pinky - US foreign policy. 

In an excellent article today in Foreign Affairs, for decades the moderate, if not conservative, voice of the US foreign policy community, William Burns, author of The Back Channel and former Deputy Secretary of State, decries the current disheveled state of the State Department, questions its ability to function under this administration and the ability to rebuild it in Trump's wake.

Cracks into Canyons

Burns should know.  He was a career Foreign Service Officer with assignments in the Middle East and as Ambassador to Russia as a part of his lengthy and distinguished State Department career.  My only quibble with his observation about the state of State is that the cracks in its edifice were showing three decades before and had been papered over by previous administrations.  This current administration has just turned those cracks into deep canyons.   

I wonder how many people raise similar questions about the Pentagon's effectiveness:  how effective can the US military be in the face of a president who has undermined its expertise and authority.  It’s clear no one there had an inkling of Trump’s single handed or should I say ham-handed brain dead decision to order a withdrawal of support for the Kurds.  Pentagon officials knew the implications - as State officers knowledgeable of Middle East affairs would have too - and had warned the White House of the consequences - but they too were left out of the calculus and in the cold.

So who is in charge of an American foreign policy that has gone off the deep-end?  How is it that a single, half-witted megalomaniac is able to make such momentous decisions for this country at perilous times like this?  Why is no one in the GOP Senatorial leadership or even among its rank and file, not to mention the cabinet, concerned about where this man is taking the country?   Or are they all bought off by Moscow as is their fearless leader?   

Tripwires

Tripwires are there for a reason as the weekend events have demonstrated.  The US never had enough forces in Berlin or in West Germany to stop a Soviet invasion even in concert with West Germany’s own.  But those US and alliance troops had a function:  they served to warn Moscow that a crossing of the then Rubicon – otherwise known as the Fulda Gap -  would trigger a much larger and determined US and NATO defense against a Soviet invasion of Western Europe.  The tripwire worked then; and it had worked in Syria until last weekend.  Until that is Trump’s ill-considered decision to revoke it.  

 I shudder to think what would have happened had a Trump been President of the US or for that matter a Boris Johnson or a Jeremy Corbyn been Prime Minister of the UK prior to 1991.

I also think, however, the Presidency especially in conjunction with a feckless Senatorial majority, should not have the kind of power that Trump has fecklessly usurped. This is particularly true in the life and death, split second arena of foreign affairs.  No individual should single handedly have – or be able to usurp such power.

So my question is not just how can the state of State be righted but also how can the disheveled state of the union be restored once mad King Lear is out of the White House by whatever way it occurs.