Taking One for the Country

In my mind, there are two lessons from Supreme Court’s 5-to-4 decision to support President Obama’s health care plan: 1) how starved the country is for leadership that puts the nation’s interest before partisan politics, which is exactly what Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. did; and 2) the virtue of audacity in politics and thinking big. Let’s look at both. It was not surprising to hear liberals extolling the legal creativity and courage of Chief Justice Roberts in finding a way to greenlight Obama’s Affordable Care Act. But there is something deeper reflected in that praise, and it even touched some conservatives. It’s the feeling that it has been so long since a national leader “surprised” us. It’s the feeling that it has been so long since a national leader ripped up the polls and not only acted out of political character but did so truly for the good of the country, as Chief Justice Roberts seemingly did. (source: Thomas L. Friedman – NYTimes – 01/07/2012)

I know that this was a complex legal decision. But I think it was inspired by a simple noble leadership impulse at critical juncture in our history to preserve the legitimacy and integrity of the Supreme Court as being above politics. We can’t always describe this kind of leadership, but we know it when we see it and so many Americans appreciate it. This is still a moderate, center-left/center-right country, and all you have to do is get out of Washington to discover how many people hunger for leaders who will take a risk, put country’s interests before party and come together for rational compromises. Why do we all jump up and applaud at N.B.A. or N.F.L. games when they introduce wounded Iraq or Afghan war veterans in the stands? It’s because the U.S. military embodies everything we find missing today in our hyperpartisan public life. The military has become, as Harvard philosopher Michael Sandel once put it, “the last repository of civic idealism and sacrifice for the sake of the common good”. Indeed, I found myself applauding for Chief Justice Roberts the same way I did for Al Gore when he gracefully bowed to the will of Supreme Court in the 2000 election and the same way I do for those wounded warriors and for same reason: They each, in their own way, took one for the country. To put it another way, Roberts undertook an act of statesmanship for the national good by being willing to anger his own “constituency” on a very big question. But he also did what judges should do: leave the big political questions to the politicians. The equivalent act of statesmanship on the part of our politicians now would be doing what Roberts deferred to them as their responsibility: decide the big, hard questions, with compromises, for the national good. Otherwise, we’re doomed to a tug of war on the deck of Titanic, no matter what health care plan we have. I see no sign of Romney being ready for such a “Roberts moment”. I still have hope for Obama. He’s entitled to a victory lap for daring to go big, ignoring his advisers, to bring health care to the whole country. It’s a huge achievement. He needs to go just as big on economy if he wants Affordable Care Act to be something we can actually afford. That requires economic growth. Yet Obama’s campaign has been all small-ball wedge issues, trying to satisfy enough micro-constituencies to get 50.1% of the vote.

Listen to broad reaction to Roberts. Look at powerful wave he has unleashed for big, centrist, statesmanlike leadership. That all tells me that people are also hungry for a big plan from the president to fix the economy, one that will bite and challenge both parties at the scale we need, fairly share the burdens and won’t just be about “balancing the budget,” but about making America great again. The opportunity for such a plan is hiding in plain sight. America today is poised for a great renewal. Our newfound natural gas bounty can give us long-term access to cheap, cleaner energy and, combined with advances in robotics and software, is already bringing blue-collar manufacturing back to America. Web-enabled cellphones and tablets are creating vast new possibilities to bring high-quality, low-cost education to every community college and public school so people can afford to acquire skills to learn 21st-century jobs. Cloud computing is giving anyone with a creative spark cheap, powerful tools to start a company with very little money. And dramatically low interest rates mean we can borrow to build new infrastructure and make money. “We are at a transformational moment in terms of our potential as a country, we have two candidates playing rope-a-dope”, said David Rothkopf, author of “Power, Inc.” If we can just get a few big things right today, a Simpson-Bowles-like grand bargain on spending and tax reform that unleashes entrepreneurship, a deal on immigration that allows the most energetic and smartest immigrants to enrich our country and a plan on energy that allows us to tap all these new sources in environmentally safe ways, no one could touch us as a country. Connect the dots for people, Mr. President, be the guy taking the risk to offer that big plan for American renewal, and Romney will never be able to touch you. 

South Korea to Sign Military Pact With Japan

In a much significant step toward overcoming lingering historical animosities with its former colonial master, the South Korean government has unexpectedly announced that it will sign a treaty with Japan on Friday to increase the sharing of classified military data on what analysts cite as two major common concerns: North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats and China’s growing military might. The announcement set off a political firestorm in South Korea, where resentment of Japan’s early 20th-century colonization remains entrenched and any sign of Japan’s growing military role is met with deep suspicion. The opposition accused President Lee Myung-bak of ignoring popular anti-Japanese sentiments in pressing ahead with the treaty, the first military pact between the two nations since the end of colonization in 1945. North Korea accused Mr. Lee’s government of “selling the nation out”. (source: NYTimes – 29/06/2012)

The accord, the General Security of Military Information Agreement, provides a legal framework for South Korea and Japan to share and protect classified and other confidential data. Cho Byung-jae, the spokesman of the South Korean Foreign Ministry, said South Korean ambassador to Tokyo, Shin Kak-soo, and Japan’s foreign minister, Koichiro Gemba, plan to sign treaty on Friday, after Japanese cabinet’s approval. United States has been urging the two countries to strengthen military ties, so the three nations can deal more efficiently with threats from North Korea. It was well known that South Korea and Japan, which enjoy thriving economic ties and cultural exchanges, were negotiating the deal, but opposition and other government critics here were caught off guard by Thursday’s announcement because earlier indications had been that historical hostilities would again delay a pact. The two remain locked in disputes over the ownership of a set of islets and over Tokyo’s rejection of talks on compensating “comfort women”, the Japanese military forced Koreans into sexual slavery during World War II. Military cooperation between the two has lagged, although a cautious military rapprochement sped up after North Korea’s artillery bombardment of a South Korean island in 2010. China’s naval expansion has also prompted politicians in the two countries to call for closer military ties. In the past week, the United States, Japan and South Korea conducted a joint naval exercise in the seas south and west of the Korean Peninsula.

Officials here said the need for the allies to share data on bellicose and enigmatic North Korea has grown with the increased uncertainty after the death of its longtime ruler, Kim Jong-il, in December. Under the rule of his son Kim Jong-un, North Korea has vowed to bolster its production of nuclear weapons. It launched a rocket in April, and although it failed to put a satellite into orbit, Washington condemned the launching as a test of intercontinental ballistic missile technology. Political opposition and several civic groups in South Korea warned new military cooperation deal would only intensify regional tensions and encourage Japan’s “militaristic ambition”. “When Myung-bak government started out, it was pro-American to the bone, and as it nears end of its term, it is proving pro-Japanese to the bone,” said Park Yong-jin, spokesman of main opposition Democratic United Party. Mindful of such a political offensive, Hwang Woo-yea, head of governing New Frontier Party, visited disputed islets in the sea between South Korea and Japan on Thursday in a symbolic gesture reconfirming South Korea’s territorial claim. “Every grain of sand here, every rock, belongs to South Korea,” he told South Korean police officers guarding the islets.