Page 30 - Flathead Beacon // 5.20.2015

30 | MAY 20, 2015
LIKE I WAS SAYIN’ Kellyn Brown
OPINION FLATHEADBEACON.COM
TWO FOR THOUGHT
Local Topics, Opposing Views
Was the Iraq War a Mistake?
By Joe Carbonari
Today, Iraq looks like a mess – one that we helped make. Jeb Bush has had a hard time defending his brother’s actions. Was the decision to overthrow Saddam Hussein a mistake? Would Jeb have made the same decision, knowing what he knows now? Essentially, his answer is “no, but ... we didn’t know then what we know now.” Really?
George W. Bush, and his advisors, led by Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz chose to believe, and sell to the American public, questionable “intelligence” that supported what they wanted to do – remove Saddam and make- over Iraq. The country was sold a questionable bill of goods, and we are still paying for it. Some people were just plain misled, others were disappointedly acquiescent. Colin Powell was fed a lie, regurgitat- ed it, and was left hanging out to dry.
Supposed stocks of poison gases were functionally non-existent. Internationally lead investigators were discounted when they couldn’t find anything significant. A supposed nuclear program was also a mirage. The same is true of what were touted as ballistic missile assemblies. Dissenting intelligence reports, as disclosed even then, called these claims questionable. Responsible people turned their heads.
Many other countries didn’t believe and said so. We were warned of the disorder and dislike that would be engendered. We cowboy-ed on.
The Mideast is a tinderbox. We need calmer minds, deeper thinking and fewer cowboys.
By Tim Baldwin
President hopefuls mostly agree: the Iraq war was a mistake. Notably, Ron Paul said this 12 years ago, but hardly any politician listened to him and media scoffed at him. Rand Paul has a similar phi- losophy on foreign policy as Ron, so admitting that the Iraq war was a mistake is easy for Rand. On the other hand, Marco Rubio avoids admitting that the war was a mistake and blames not being able to see the future as justification for America’s intrusion. Like Rubio, presidential hopeful Lind- sey Graham is using the war drum to advance his campaign.
War is the most serious decision any nation can make. War affects other nations and citizens beyond measure. What is worse, at large, people have very little knowledge on war issues and little power to stop government from engaging in war. Given the United States’ history of engaging in undeclared and secret wars, it is critically important that citizens be leery of politicians who favor aggressive and loose foreign policies.
Beyond politicians, private interests are at work to advance war. Unquestionably, international and domestic corporate interests can prosper during war. They can influence politicians to advance war. Such an unholy union of corporations and government works against liberty and constitutional government. Media rarely covers such stories, but they are real.
War is not a game. Politicians who treat war as such should never be elected to office.
GUESTCOLUMN | DougKary
Those Other
Elections
AS THE U.S. PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARY BEGINS in earnest, with campaigning underway and the first debate scheduled for August, it’s easy to become insular as an American voter. But a couple recent elections in other countries featuring major upsets are worth talking about.
First, across the pond in the United Kingdom, where pundits had predicted British Prime Minister David Cameron and his Conservative Party were in for a long night on May 7. But as the election results began rolling in, it turned out the pundits and, to give the former some credit, pollsters were wildly wrong.
Cameron and his party earned an outright majority in Parliament. There is now a debate simmering among members of the Conservatives’ chief rival, Labour, over whether it had moved too far left. Often, but not always, British and U.S. politics move in unison. So what does it mean for our presidential elections?
Closer to home, north of the border in Alberta, Canada, an entirely different result materialized the same week. There, for the first time in 43 years, the Conservative Party lost power – a stunning outcome.
The province is considered the conservative heartland of Canada with an economy dominated by the oil industry. Several U.S. reporters compared what unfolded to Texas waking up to a majority of liberals elected to its statehouse.
The results are a little more complicated than that, since the U.S. is largely unique in that just two parties dominate its political landscape. In Canada, however, the rise of the New Democratic Party benefited from conservatives splitting their votes between two separate parties. NDP garnered about 40 percent of the vote, while the two conservative parties combined for more than 50.
Regardless, the outcome means NDP and incoming premier Rachel Notley will be running the province and, if their election platform is any indication, big changes loom, especially for the vast oil sands. But it’s unclear exactly what they are.
As the Globe and Mail reported, the oil industry is “spooked,” since Notley’s party promised in the run-up to the election to complete “a careful review of how Alberta will promote resource processing and fair royalties,” and stated, “the people of Alberta as a whole are deprived of much of the benefit of our own resources.”
To the oil industry, that means royalty rates, the percentage of profits paid to the province, will go up. Canadian energy stocks tumbled after NDP’s victory and an investor told Bloomberg News the results are “completely devastating” for energy companies, which are already reeling from falling gas prices.
For her part, Notley has reached out to the energy sector and has said reviewing royalties doesn’t necessarily mean they will change. But how the province approaches the construction of the long stalled Keystone XL pipeline, which would transport Alberta crude across Montana and several other states en route to refineries in Texas, almost certainly will change. The incoming premier said she will quit lobbying Washington, D.C. for its construction (although she supports other pipelines) and she also wants to work on a national climate plan.
As Montanans, the question is what does it all mean for us? What does Cameron’s victory mean for our presidential election? And, perhaps more importantly with the province so closely intertwined with Northwest Montana, how will Notley’s premiership impact the Albertan economy and its approach to environmental issues?
At this juncture it is too early to answer that. What’s clear is that Notley will be tested as she simultaneously attempts to fulfill campaign-trail promises and address Alberta’s budget problems.
Rural States Losers in New FCC Internet Regulation
Montana is just beginning to see the makings of a legitimate technology sector in our state. It’s not just in Bozeman and Missoula, the potential for technology startups exists anywhere in the state with a decent Internet connection.
The upside is that Montanans in smaller communities have opportunities to connect to education, start businesses, and reach global audiences like never before.
It’s because that potential opportunity is so important that the new proposal by the Federal Communications Commission to impose heavy, top-down regulations on Internet connectivity should have Montanans concerned.
The FCC proposes to begin regulating the Internet just as it regulated telephone companies in the 1930s (in fact, it’s using the same “Title II” statute that was implemented over 80 years ago). It wants Internet providers to be considered “common carriers,” with a one-sized-fits-all business model mandated for all interactions between providers and consumers.
Those regulations didn’t serve well for telephone service, as evidenced by the innovation and explosion in consumer choice that followed the breakup of Ma Bell. It won’t serve Internet consumers or entrepreneurs well either.
The FCC’s ruling has created many unfortunate victims throughout American society. In this case, rural states like Montana will be the losers.
Under the FCC’s rule, Internet companies
will find it much more difficult to invest in new infrastructure. The first investments to go will be the most marginalized ones: specifically, rural areas with low population density. When the FCC’s rule goes into effect in June, we can expect that rural Montana will be treated as second-class citizens with subpar access to the Internet.
Worse, as Internet investment potentially dries up in rural areas and new technology is deployed in more populous states, the gap between the Internet haves and have-nots could only widen.
The frustrating part is that the FCC’s proposal for increasing its regulatory authority over the Internet isn’t even necessary. Over the past 30 years we’ve had nothing but amazing growth in Internet availability – all accomplished without the intervention of the FCC.
Why now, after the existing model has proven itself time and time again, would we suddenly scrap it and try something else – especially when that switch is a move from the free and open market to a Big Government central planning?
Montanans deserve the same Internet accessibility as the rest of the country and all the education and economic opportunity that goes with it. Please join with me in encouraging our delegation support bipartisan legislation that will keep the Internet free and open.
Sen. Doug Kary represents Senate District 22 in Billings. He is a member of the Senate Energy & TelecommunicationsCommittee.