The Clinton China Connection - Paw Family Donates $45K

Per Drudge linking to WSJ:

"Six members of the Paw family, each listing the house at 41 Shelbourne Ave. as their residence, have donated a combined $45,000 to the Democratic senator from New York since 2005, for her presidential campaign, her Senate re-election last year and her political action committee. In all, the six Paws have donated a total of $200,000 to Democratic candidates since 2005, election records show."

"William Paw, the 64-year-old head of the household, is a mail carrier with the U.S. Postal Service who earns about $49,000 a year, according to a union representative. Alice Paw, also 64, is a homemaker. The couple's grown children have jobs ranging from account manager at a software company to "attendance liaison" at a local public high school. One is listed on campaign records as an executive at a mutual fund."

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“I deserve what you Americans have, but won’t ever become like you to get it.”

Victor Davis Hanson at NRO this morning has some eye-opening and thought provoking words regarding the latest “Pew poll of June 2007.”

The popularity poll consists of what the world thinks of the U.S.:

“No doubt when the Bush administration leaves office, and should a Democratic one replace it, our approval ratings will rise with our present detractors. But they may also decline among our friends who will learn that U.S. open markets, free trade, and reliable military support in times of crisis are now objects of left-wing criticism. Note in this regard that world opinion toward both China and Russia is turning unfavorable. That distrust will only increase as both begin to flex their muscles — the former gobbling up oil contracts from the most murderous regimes, the latter selling the same rogues anything they need to foment unrest.”

After reading the essay, give some serious thought to the final paragraph, not just for the sake of tit for tat, but perhaps just to let them all know that we don’t think so highly of them very often either. Isolationism isn’t the answer, but they wouldn’t care much for the ways of the world without us.

“In that regard, such polls continue to be mostly one-sided. What we need now are new comprehensive surveys of what Americans themselves think of the United Nations, the Islamic world, and Western Europe — so that they can try to square the results with our present foreign policy of aid, friendship, or military assistance to those who apparently don’t want or appreciate what they receive.”

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North Korea No Show on first Deadline

Odd that. North Korea is late or has missed its first deadline in the newest deal to with the U.S. and its multi-lateral negotiating party. According to The NY Times:

“The first deadline for North Korea to shut down and seal its main facility for manufacturing nuclear weapons fuel expired Saturday with no apparent action by the North to fulfill its commitments.”

China has asked the U.S. for patience. Ok, not like we have any other choice right? The Times get a dig in, with (italics mine):

“The inaction leaves President Bush vulnerable to attacks from hawks in his own party, who have argued that it was a mistake to return $25 million in frozen funds to the North Koreans — much of it believed to be from illicit sales of counterfeit currency and missiles — and who doubt that the North Koreans will stop producing bomb fuel as well as give up all of its existing weapons.”

Damned if he does and damned if he doesn’t. But that said, allowing the release of the Kim Jong-il obsessed over, $25 million in frozen accounts strikes me as incredibly stupid. According to Claudia Rosett these funds were part of the estimated $500 million to $1 billion earned per year:

“via illicit deals in narcotics, counterfeit cigarettes, counterfeit U.S. currency and other scams, as well as weapons deals. Some of the players and money trails overlapped and intertwined with targets of two major inter-agency sting operations carried out in the U.S. in 2005, dubbed “Royal Charm” and “Smoking Dragon,” aimed at cleaning up alleged North-Korean-related criminal networks with tentacles reaching into the U.S.”

Former Ambassador to the U.N., John Bolton prior to and in anticipation of a missed deadline said:

“One sign of whether we are in trouble is whether the administration will call this a ‘violation’ or use words like “noncompliance.”

Now would one call that prescience or war mongering? How about the common sense of previous actions or statements are a good indicator of future action? Good thing this Bolton guy didn’t bother going through the difficulties inherent in a partisan up or down vote to return to the U.N.; we wouldn’t want anyone like that there would we?

Even South Korea is “threatening” the stopping food aid that had been promised to N.K. to take the steps necessary in shutting down its reactor and nuclear advancement activities. Those mean South Koreans, of all the blustering and “threatening” that has the potential of derailing “business as usual.” Let’s not throw any monkey wrenches into the works that may confuse the great Kim il.

According to a TIME Magazine “piece,” Robert Einhorn who worked for almost 30 years with the State Department on North Korean nukes said:

"The North Koreans don't seem to realize that it is not in their interest to keep undermining and embarrassing those in the Bush Administration who want to find a negotiated solution. In for a penny, in for a pound. The Administration has no choice at this stage but to be patient a few days longer and see if the North Koreans will comply."

No they don’t seem to realize it or perhaps they do, but common sense does point toward waiting a few days to see what happens. Einhorn adds, predicting:

"The Chinese will now be more inclined to come down hard on the North Koreans for further foot-dragging."

Will the Chinese actually come down hard on N.K. or will it just be more diplomatic appearances….I see appearances in the future, if only because “diplomacy” is business as usual.

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China, North Korea, Iran, Iraq, Anyone else and the 4% for Freedom Solution

Via the NY Times I read this morning that:

A spokesman for the National People’s Congress, Jiang Enzhu said regarding China’s military buildup:

“We must increase our military budget, as it is important to national security. China’s military must modernize. Our overall defenses are weak.”

American and European military analysts add:

“China’s public military budget actually reflects only a fraction of its overall defense spending, and that the real figure is likely to be two to four times higher. Most defense analysts agree that China’s military focus is to build a force that would prevail in any conflict with Taiwan, which it regards as a renegade province, and also to be capable of creating a deterrent to American military intervention.”

Of the Chinese revelation, Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte said:

“I think the point we would make with respect to military spending and military acquisition of various types would be the point about transparency.”

Setting aside the fact that this remark was made by the deputy in Beijing; I would like us to be a bit more realistic. Mr. Negroponte represents our nation’s diplomatic corps, which with all due respect does not concern itself so much with outcome as much as with process; this to me earns them their name (in a) foggy bottom.

I am not a negotiator or diplomat in my wildest "Walter Mitty" dreams, but asking for more transparency guarantees a little bit more of that which is contingent upon much, much more from us. We give them the farm and they just take the farm, continuing on with business as usual.

Like North Korea, of which John Bolton said this morning in an OpinionJournal piece:

“In any arms-control negotiation, the need for verification is directly correlated to the propensity of the other side to lie, cheat and conceal its undesirable activities.”

In contradiction to that, diplomats will hail any increase in “transparency,” regardless of the actual decrease in its level of opacity. Think 1994’s “Agreed Framework,” then flash to the present. It’s not the Bush administration that caused NK to ignore its obligations under this agreement before the ink was dry, nor was it the administrations fault that it was revealed NK was going about their research and development in secret; this just happened to be the administration in charge during this discovery.

Any naiveté and high hopes aside, diplomats wish to do the very same thing today in regards to NK. Why, because that’s what they do. They revel in and bow down to the intellectual elitism inherent in the “process.” Stick with “process” and you cannot go wrong; you can actually walk away with an extra hop in your step, oblivious to the fact you are dislocating your shoulder as you pat your own back.

Bolton closed with the very good point of questioning where the president’s support will come from. Will it be from “liberal editorialists enthusing about his newfound foreign policy "pragmatism"?” Pragmatism of the kind recognized by “foreign policy experts, administration critics on Capitol Hill and former diplomats.”

Rather than consuming ourselves with only the “diplomatic” need for more “transparency,” how about we not concern ourselves with this too much and ratchet up our “intelligence.” This way we don’t have to ask the Chinese for all their secrets as a “favor” in the interest of “transparency.”

We also might consider the approach as suggested by Jim Talent at The Heritage Foundation; which he refers to as the "4% for Freedom Solution." This solution calls for defense spending at no less than 4% of GDP, regardless of whether we are living a “peaceful” existence as we did in the 1990’s.

Friends, sometimes friends and enemies might take this into consideration when trying to make trouble. At the least, our military would remain the more capable force on the planet. Rather than cut funding and slip back into complacency as we and most others have done in the past after military actions; we would remain up to date and not have to play catch up. This is imperative in this day and age, when “intelligence,” doesn’t appear to know its *ss from a hole in the ground.

Jim Talent believes:

“This program -- called the "4% for Freedom Solution" by the Heritage Foundation -- would send the clearest possible message to America's friends and enemies that, whatever happens in Iraq, America will remain a force to be reckoned with. For some purposes, defense policy is foreign policy. Imagine the impact on China and North Korea, for example, of realizing that the U.S., by using only a small fraction of its economic resources, can guarantee an increased and highly capable naval presence in the Western Pacific for years to come.”

I tend to agree, at the least it is very worthwhile looking into.

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