Global Paradigms

Copyright (c) 2009 The Daily Star Tuesday, February 03, 2009 The US is no longer a global hegemon By Leon T. Hadar Commentary by Changes in the status and power of nations, just like changes in economic conditions, are not always immediately apparent. There is, in the jargon of economics, a recognition lag between the time when an economic shock, such as a sudden boom or bust, occurs and the time when it is recognized by economists, central bankers and the government. Recognition lag explains why, for example, economists have only recently acknowledged the current economic recession - several months after it began. And recognition lag might well be why officials and pundits are now failing to recognize the detrimental impact of the combination of the Iraq war and the financial crisis on America's standing in the international system. Some attribute Washington's current difficulties in dictating global developments to the Bush administration's mismanagement of US dipl...

Business Times - 03 Feb 2009 100 days of stimulating and bailing-out Obama's early months will be dominated by one agenda: giving the economy the right jolt By LEON HADAR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT 'ECONOMIC Signs Turn from Grim to Worse' screamed the top front-page headline of The Washington Post last Friday, reflecting the sour mood in Washington as well as on Wall Street and Main Street. Sales of new homes are plummeting. Businesses, including corporate giants like Microsoft and Ford Motor, have announced massive layoffs as unemployment claims continue rising while stock prices keep on falling each day. Later, the US Commerce Department reported that consumers and businesses cut spending during the last three months of 2008, causing the US economy to shrink by 3.8 per cent - the fastest economic contraction in 25 years. The toxic mix of a global credit crunch, a collapsing US real estate market and a decline in consumer spending are combining, as the prophets of gloom and ...

Published in the new issue of The American Conservative. F e b r u a r y 9 , 2 0 0 9 T h e A m e r i c a n C o n s e r v a t i v e 33 [ A m e r i c a n R a j : L i b e r a t i o n o r D o m i n a t i o n ? : R e s o l v i n g t h e C o n f l i c t B e t w e e n t h e W e s t a n d t h e M u s l i m W o r l d , E r i c M a r g o l i s , K e y P o r t e r ] Averting the Clash B y L e o n H a d a r IT WAS BOUND TO HAPPEN. In the same way that the movement against U.S. military intervention in Vietnam split, amoeba-like, during the drawdown of the war in Southeast Asia, the opposition to the war in Iraq seems to be disintegrating now that the presidential candidate who promised to withdraw from Mesopotamia—a position that is currently supported by 70 percent of the American people—has occupied the White House. In fact, opponents of President George W. Bush’s decision to oust Saddam Hussein and the ensuing American occupation of Iraq have never constituted a unified political force. The a...