What's Going On in Cuba?

This is a question I'm often asking. Ever since I've been little, I have had an interest in the island that wavers between low simmer and rapid boil. It might be because I spent a lot of time during my formative years in Miami, which in the 1980's wasn't the hip, pan-American party that it is now. I remember a dichotomy between old Jews and Cubans. I also remember that the Cubans looked like "white" people; they might have a more Mediterranean complexion, but if they didn't speak, you couldn't tell them apart from a Jew or an Italian.

I was always blown away by how much Spanish I heard. I also loved their stories. A guy who still works for the family company there, Manny, came to Miami as a kid with his brother, their parents making sure they escaped the Revolution. Stories like that are a dime a dozen in Miami. I find them fascinating. But, I digress.

I think what particularly fascinates me about Cuba is how an island 90 miles away from the most powerful country in the world has been able to maintain a centrally-planned economy and Socialist political stranglehold for over 50 years, thumbing its nose at us the whole time. Most of this is being practical: Cuba is always cozying up to our more flush adversaries, the Soviet Union, China, Venezuela, etc. Without these various benefactors, the Castro regime probably would have collapsed upon itself or adopted a more market-friendly, inclusive approach to governing.

Also, if you're Fidel Castro, you recognize the fact that you need protection from the United States. For decades prior to the Revolution, Cuba was to the United States what a son or daughter is to a narcissistic parent; the child exists to make the parent feel better about his or herself. Cuba was a playground for rich Americans, large corporations, and the mafia. Americans could behave with impunity. The country was essentially a vassal to it's larger neighbor. The United States even ran the country four separate times from 1898 to 1922.

Castro's revolution was obviously a rebellion to all of this abuse. It's absolutely pathological. Nationalizing American concerns. Implementing a centrally-planned economy. Enthusiastically throwing the country into the Soviet camp. The Revolution's raison d'etre is shunning the exploitative hand of the Yanquis.

Castro has done remarkable things for the Cuban people. He raised the national literacy rate from 56% in 1953 to 100% in 1986. Cuban health care is the envy of the world. But, he also made the country a case study in how central planning and governing by knee-jerk opposition to your enemy-neighbor can turn a thriving economy with abundant resources into an economy with zero growth in the official sector and essentially no functional state apparatus. Oh, and it's also a police state that doesn't tolerate any opposition to Socialism and one of the least free places on the planet.

A lot of Americans point to the US embargo as reason the Cuban economy is in such shambles and that it's working to remove the Castros from power. I say see above; they've done it to themselves. But, for 30 years, they had the Soviet Union to prop them up and even after the latter imploded, they have managed to keep on keepin' on, even without introducing too many market-oriented reforms like other Communist countries. I would even posit that the embargo gives the Castros cover to pursue a more authoritarian and rigidly-Socialist agenda. Try maintaining a Socialist autocracy when your subjects have iPhones with access to Twitter. It ain't happenin'.

On the technological front, I feel there has been a relaxation. More and more Cuban bloggers are becoming more and more bold. One of my favorites is Yoani Sanchez who paints us a picture of the banalities of day-to-day life in Castroist Havana. Some of it is remarkably similar to our own mundane travails. Some of it is totally alien. It's just so nice to have that window into a country from which we are so isolated. Another person I recently started to follow is Rosa Maria Paya, who is outspoken in standing up to the Cuban state for allegedly having a hand in the murder of her activist father. Again, another window so we can see what's really going on, absent the noise and filters we encounter from our governments.

But, have these green shoots yielded substantial gains in freedom on the island? Not really. In fact, nothing really is happening. Once in awhile, we'll hear grumblings that some American concern is engaged in some low level of trade with a Cuban counterpart. Or, we'll hear about a new outspoken political activist who is courageously "taking on" the oppressive Cuban state. But, nothing really comes of it. The island is still incredibly poor, Socialist, and closed off to Americans. Nothing substantial comes from either side. We are mired in a policy that hasn't worked for 50+ years and was implemented as a reaction to geopolitical reality 50+ years ago. Who knows when it will end?

So, what's going on in Cuba? Nothing. But, I'm watching in case something does.

#UNGA

I realize it has been a long time since I have published a post and that the chatter surrounding this year's United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) has died down along with its accompanying traffic in New York. That said, something truly remarkable happened this year coinciding with the annual General Assembly: the United States and Iran now strongly dislike each other, rather than outright hating each other.

I thought this was in the works years ago when the more liberal Khatami was President of Iran, but my hopes for a thaw between Iran and the United States were dashed when the more bombastic Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was elected President in 2005. During the latter's regime, emboldened by American flailing in neighboring Iraq, Iran stepped up the bellicose rhetoric. It also stepped up efforts to create nuclear weapons.  Besides the hostage crisis which accompanied the Islamic Revolution in Iran in 1979, I don't think we have ever been at a lower point in our relations with them.

Hope arose, however, with the election of the more liberal Hassan Rouhani, who is described as having more liberal leanings while maintaining good relations with the ruling religious elite. So, how do the flashpoint in Syria, the UNGA, and the election of a more reform-minded cleric to the Iranian presidency coincide to suggest the start of reconciliation between Iran and the United States?

Obama

The outcome of the flashpoint over Syria has made President Obama seemingly exasperated with the Middle East. I don't mean this in a bad way. In his speech to the UNGA, Obama made very clear the United States' strategic ambitions vis-a-vis the Middle East. If you wanted a caption for the speech, I don't think you could go wrong with "I'll Do What I Want". Again, I don't mean this to be a condemnation of anything the President conveyed. In fact, I find it quite refreshing.

The speech asked general questions about the current state of the world: how do we respond to Syria and how do we respond to threats against human decency? He then lays out where the United States stands on these issues.

What I find so refreshing is the unambiguous way he lays out the overarching theme of his foreign policy, impressive for a President who can be verbose on his best day and downright rhetorically confounding on his worst. I also like that he is not afraid to call out the "contradiction" that burdens us in the Middle East: "[T]he United States is chastised for meddling in the region, and accused of having a hand in all manner of conspiracy; at the same time, the United States is blamed for failing to do enough to solve the region's problems, and for showing indifference toward suffering Muslims." I think anybody who has been following our forays into the Middle East for the past 20 years let out a loud, validated "THANK YOU!"

Quite correctly, he said this "damned if we do, damned if we don't" dynamic has dampened the American people's will to get involved in such a tinderbox of a region.

He then very unambiguously says he will work diplomatically whenever possible, but "when it's necessary to defend the United States against terrorist attacks, we will take direct" action. This is a president who liberally - no pun intended - uses remote-control warplanes, so he can definitely walk the walk. This last line and the line "[T]he United States will at times work with governments that do not meet the highest international expectations, but who work with us on our core interests," reflect a much-needed "I'll Do What I Want" swagger that I think has been missing from this President's foreign policy. He didn't make apologies for the inevitable fact that we're going to offend some people due to the very complex realities of foreign policy. He also wasn't afraid to call anyone out: Iran, Russia, Arabs, Republicans.

Rouhani

When I printed out Rouhani's speech to the UNGA, I immediately noticed how much lighter it was than Obama's. I was thus surprised that the Iranian president could say so much in half the number of pages as Obama.

I was also surprised because I heard this guy was such a "reformer" - I'm writing after The Phone Call - yet he packed the first four pages reciting the same charges of American militarism that have been coming from Tehran since the Revolution. He eludes to the Cold War and US-Soviet bipolarity:

"At this sensitive juncture in the history of global relations, the age of the zero-sum games is over, even though a few actors still tend to rely on archaic and deeply ineffective ways and means to preserve their old superiority and domination. Militarism and the recourse to violent and military means to subjugate others are failed examples of the perpetuation of old ways in new circumstances."

Ouch. The branding that he's doing here is very transparent: the US represents the paranoid status quo. He gets to the meat of his vitriol by saying "[p]ropagandistic and unfounded faith-phobic, Islamo-phobic, Shia-phobic, and Iran-phobic discourses do indeed represent serious threats against world peace and human security." Now who's paranoid? While I am sure the history of human aggression can be traced to a lack of Iran-philia, I'm not concerned with what he says as much as I am concerned with how much this sounds like Ahmadinejad. It's bombastic and inconsistent with reality. I didn't really understand why anyone thinks this guy is a reformer.

From here, he continues his tirade against the Western warmongers and their "'superior us' and 'inferior others'" mentality. But, then on page five, it hit me. He lays out two items that Iranian hardliners would call a sop and objective observers might call "green shoots". The first item concerns Iran's nuclear enrichment program, where he unambiguously declares "[n]uclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction have no place in Iran's security and defense doctrine, and contradict our fundamental religious and ethical convictions." Furthermore, "[Iran] is prepared to engage immediately in time-bound and result-oriented talks to build mutual confidence and removal of mutual uncertainties with full transparency."

Wow. Well, you can't get more clear than that. This is a major step forward and a major concession, neither of which the ultra-nationalist Ahmadinejad would ever be able to utter. Rouhani quickly gets back to making jabs at US-Western militarism and sanctions, but it's all probably to save face. Give the domestic audience some good red meat and convey some realistic foreign policy. It's like a foreign policy feedback sandwich for domestic hardliners.

Am I optimistic? Not yet. But, the fact that leaders of these two countries, who have been downright hostile to each other for 34 years, actually spoke one-on-one is something we haven't seen since the Revolution. I think that's pretty remarkable.

I also think that an eventual normalization of relations between the US and Iran would be hugely beneficial for both. Iran has much more to gain as the end of sanctions and a US market for their energy exports would be a boon. For the US, you find yourself with a major energy producer who is no longer an enemy. Plus, your real power to counter Russian and Chinese influence in the Middle East is boosted significantly. But, even if Rouhani delivers - big "if" - we're a long way from normalization, so let's not get ahead of ourselves.

So, let's take stock. We have an American president who is no longer shackled by worries of offending anybody and has said he is open to working with anyone who doesn't operate contrary to our core interests. We have a situation in Syria that has been tempered by a diplomatic solution. We have a reform-minded Iranian president who is willing to sit down without pre-conditions. What a confluence of events. But, don't hold your breath.

Meanwhile, in Egypt

While the civil war in Syria might be the longest continuous revolution since the Arab Spring started in 2011, Egypt's revolution, some might argue, is the most prolific. Part of this is because Egypt is the largest Arab country in the world, so any revolution there should be considered a political benchmark for the region.

But, just like Syria's, it seems like Egypt's revolution is far from finished. What the world thought was a coup for representative democracy in 2011 has degenerated into a scenario that is, in my opinion, one step away from a civil war, replete with coups of a different, anti-democratic nature.

First, some context for those who need to be brought up to speed. In 2011, upon the ouster of Hosni Mubarak, who had been ruling Egypt with an iron fist for 29 years, Egyptians went to the polls and popularly elected the Muslim Brotherhood Party to be the majority in their fledgling parliament. "Majority" is a tad misleading, as with this being their first true democratic election - Mubarak had a rubber-stamp parliament - Egyptians had a plethora of parties from which to choose.

So, after its first free elections pretty much ever, Egyptians find themselves with an Islamist party having the most seats in its first de facto parliament. Forget the fact that Islamist anything is going to be a bitter pill for the West and Israel to swallow. You also have a secular military, moderate, secular Egyptians, and Coptic Christians who might be wary of Islamists being in a position of power. It turns out their concerns were warranted.

Simply put, the Brotherhood got greedy. When your constitution effectively shuts out opposition, pays lip service to freedom of religion while actually threatening it, and the fact that it was fast-tracked right at the same time that Morsi decreed himself sweeing powers, well, fears of Shariah law becoming commonplace don't seem that far-fetched anymore.

So, the world watched in July 2013 as the Egyptian military huffed and puffed and finally deposed Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood. A military coup; REALLY makes things complicated for the West, the United States, specifically.

Why? Because this isn't the Cold War anymore. During the days of the real-life game of "Risk" that was the Cold War, if a military deposed a leader whose interests were considered contrary to those of the United States - Salvador Allende in Chile is a good example - we tended to look the other way. Like "Risk", the two camps, US and Soviet, accumulated countries like cards.

However, due to changes in the geopolitical landscape since the fall of the Soviet Union, as well as due to obvious moral reasons, the United States tends these days to look down on military coups that depose popularly-elected regimes. In this case, though, if it were only that cut-and-dry. It is obvious that a military coup is anathema to democracy. That said, how do you balance moral sympathies with the the fact that, in this case, the deposed is anti-Western, anti-Israel, pro-Shariah, and was beginning to spread its autocratic wings. Forget American strategic interests; what about the threat that poses to secular and non-Muslim Egyptians?

That ambiguity, that muddle gray area that is now so endemic to international events, needless to say the Middle East, has put Obama between a rock and a hard place. Do you stand up for a government that is outspokenly anti-American, or do you endorse an anti-democratic coup? There are no good answers.

Just as Syria exposes a flash point in the New Cold War, this situation exposes a broader conundrum presented to foreign policy makers in Washington: we are increasingly seeing that the zero-sum outcomes of international events occurring in Old Cold War are being replaced by more and more situations where there are just no good outcomes for American strategic interests.

Beyond Syria, The Big Picture

The sun is our anchor. It literally holds our planet, and the other planets of the Solar System, in its proverbial swim lane. It is, to use colloquial parlance, the center of our universe.

I saw a picture yesterday which blew my mind. Prompted by a CNN alert that Voyager 1 has become the first ever manmade object to leave the Solar System, I wanted to understand what "interstellar space" is and, from there, how our sun, the aforementioned center of our little universe, fits into the galaxy. I've seen pictures of the Milky Way and other galaxies, but I have never seen how the sun fits into the big picture.

For the first time, I saw a representation that includes our sun, but where our sun is not the center of something. Even in this interstellar cloud, our sun is absolutely negligible. It really makes you feel insignificant.

So, what does this have to do with Syria? Well, it also hammers home the concept of the big picture and how the big picture's components can sometimes seem much bigger than they are. Over the course of the last week, the events in Syria, which seem to mark a pivotal time in world affairs - and in many ways, they do - have demonstrated that they are just a small part of a very big picture.

First, the events. Kerry's off-the-cuff remarks led to a concerted proposal by the Russians and Syrians that Syria join the Chemical Weapons Convention - which they now have - and turn their chemical weapons - which they had heretofore denied they had - over to the international community where they would subsequently be destroyed. The Obama administration is taking this into consideration, but they have insisted on language that spells out consequences for Putin and Assad not sticking to their word - always a distinct possibility - which, unsurprisingly, the Russians and Chinese, permanent members of the UN Security Council, have heretofore nipped in the bud.

So, Obama is left with either accepting a proposal which would mean essentially caving to the Russians and the Syrians, or executing a half-hearted volley of tomahawk missiles that the American public does not want him to execute and would do very little to punish Assad.

My feeling all along has been we need to do something. I was talking to my uncle yesterday and he summed it up perfectly: "When I heard he used chemical weapons, I instinctively, without even thinking about it, thought to myself that we need to do something. But, when I stop and think about it, what is shooting missiles at him going to accomplish?"Obviously, if you shoot enough, it would do some damage, but he's right, considering Obama nor the people over whom he presides really want to execute a missile volley at Damascus.

Charles Krauthammer wrote a scathing op-ed piece today stating that any decisions Obama takes now are going to save his face, but embarrass the country while emboldening the Russians, Syrians, Iranians, and Lebanese Hezbollah. There are parts to this argument with which I totally agree. Richard Cohen, on the other hand, wrote an op-ed piece which was equally as scathing, but took the opposite tack: Obama should have done more much sooner and now the US needs to be the world's policeman, stand up to the Russians and their autocratic friends, and teach this thug Assad a lesson. There are parts to this argument with which I agree, as well.

My first takeaway from all of this is that Obama - and the United States - is damned if he does, damned if he doesn't. There really is no good option at this point. But, a second takeaway has struck me as so profound, yet so fundamentally simple. This flash point in which we currently find ourselves - the United States and the great democracies of Europe on one side and Russia, Syria, China, and the emboldened 21st Century autocrats on the other - is just a manifestation of the new Cold War: representative government vs autocracy.

In my opinion, the allure of representative democracy declined dramatically after the US invasion and relative failure of the occupation of Iraq. In Iraq, the world witnessed firsthand a facade of democracy that quickly imploded under the pressure of sectarian differences. Democratization itself was an afterthought; it was only after weapons of mass destruction were not found that the Bush administration groped around at justifications for its war in Iraq and clumsily settled on democratization. It severely discredited one of the United States' keystone selling points. It also created a vacuum that authoritarian Iran was quick to fill.

Secondly, the global financial crisis exposed democracy's ricketiness and inefficiency relative to authoritarian regimes. One only needs to compare the United States' lackluster stimulus package in 2009 - replete with pork and guarantees to bloated unions - or the European Union's inability to get anything serious done on the profligacy of its southern members to China's dictatorial, yet streamlined and efficient, stimulus package to determine that, in this case, the liberal West turned out a sub-par product.

Having perceived over the last five to ten years that the US-led liberal west is waning, authoritarian regimes believe they are waxing. One regime of the latter group, Syria, is challenged from within and responds with characteristically brutal force. The players of the Realpolitik poker game - Russia, Iran, China, the United States, France, the United Kingdom - call, raise, and fold and now the pot is pretty big. This is a pretty significant standoff; nothing as big as the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the invasion of Poland, or the Cuban Missile Crisis, but it will be remembered as more than a typical Middle Eastern crisis. It will be remembered as the confluence of representative government's (democracy) influence and autocracy's. One seems to be in decline, while the other ascends. Only time, and skillful diplomatic maneuvering, will show who wins this hand.

Getting Syri-ous

Over a week has gone by since Obama announced he was seeking Congressional authorization and since such a period of time equates to a century during flash points like this, A LOT has transpired. That said, no authorization yet and no missiles have been fired. 

So what has happened?

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted 10-7 to approve an authorization resolution to be brought to the Senate floor for debate. This was expected, though - as was the myopic grandstanding by certain Senators who are positioning themselves for a GOP Presidential primary in 2016. But, I digress.

What is not expected is in what direction the House of Representatives will go- considering how hostile they are to the Obama administration. Not only that, the House is and always has been more of a reflection of the American people as a whole, rather than a more detached Senate. With that being the case, I imagine then that it's going to take a total game-changer - like a Syrian missile attack against Israel or the American ships standing by in the eastern Mediterranean - to win enough votes in the House. The public just doesn't have the appetite for another foray into a Middle Eastern crisis. 

As such, Obama and his staff are planning a full-court press this week. White House chief of staff Denis McDonough hit the Sunday talk shows yesterday to sell the case for intervention directly to the American people, where he sought to differentiate the case to involve ourselves in Syria from the case to involve ourselves in Iraq 10 years ago. Good luck. Obama, meanwhile, has been at the G20 meeting in St. Petersburg, Russia - oh, the irony - where he has tried, in vain, to acquire commitments from allies which go beyond verbal agreements that the use of chemical weapons on civilians is abhorrent. Apparently, it got testy and it really seems that Obama was the odd man.

Meanwhile, Russia, as Syria's chief benefactor, has turned up its stance to emboldened and almost bellicose. Putin has made it very clear that he supports Syria and has been sending Assad weapons and dispatched three ships to the area "in case of a possible evacuation of Russian citizens from Syria". Two amphibious landing vessels, a reconnaissance ship, and a third landing ship that is collecting unspecified cargo from a Russian port before joining the other three? That's a lot of hardware to evacuate citizens. 

Another question I have is what are those landing vessels going to pick up in Syria once they unload their cargo. Could it be more sophisticated weaponry, perhaps the kind that effectively take out planes or even fire missiles at ships waiting out at sea? I doubt Putin would blatantly sell the Syrians the kind of weaponry they could - and, based on Assad's rhetoric with Charlie Rose this weekend, would - be used to engage the Americans head on, but then again Putin is dangerous, is very enthusiastic to project Russian power, and sees himself, and by extension Russia, as a counterweight to American hegemony. 

Or might Putin and Assad be cooking something up? It seems as though today our Secretary of State stumbled ass-backwards into a way for Assad to squirm out of an American attack.


"When asked by a reporter in London whether there was anything Assad's government could do or offer to stop a military strike, Kerry answered:
'Sure, he could turn over every single bit of his chemical weapons to the international community in the next week - turn it over, all of it without delay and allow the full and total accounting (of it), but he isn't about to do it and it can't be done.'"


The Russians and the Syrians have taken this seriously and now, apparently, the White House is taking a "hard look". Oy vey...

Where to begin. First, Russia cannot be trusted. The only reason it is involved is because it views Syria as being within its "sphere of influence", a Cold War-era term whose frequent use by Putin suggests his soft-spot for the good ole days of US-Soviet bipolarity. Syria is also its client and is the recipient of countless  Russian weapons sales and transfers. Put simply, any deal brokered by Russia is going to aim to get Assad off completely.

More fundamentally, a diplomatic solution to this problem brokered by Russia would equate to a Russian win vis-a-vis the United States. We would be perceived as backing down and not sticking to our word. Furthermore, the perception would be that, as long as you get Russian support, you can do what you want. It would solidify a waning of US influence in the region and waxing of Russian influence. It would, thus, embolden Iran to continue their pursuit of producing a nuclear weapon and God knows what else. It would be opening Pandora's box. Period.

I sincerely hope that the policymakers in Washington - not the politicians themselves, but aides, staffers, and anyone else advising lawmakers - brush this aside for what it is: a ruse; a stalling tactic; a means for the Russians to help Assad escape punishment for killing over 1000 people with poisonous gas. That's what this is all about, right?

But, it looks as though the odds are stacked heavily against intervention. I suspect many a fence-sitter in Europe - and the US - will get with the Russian-Syrian program as a way to avoid yet another tangled mess in yet another Middle Eastern country. But, Obama has said explicitly that there will be consequences to Assad's use of chemical weapons. If he backs down when presented with a laughable Russian-brokered proposal, it will be detrimental to American influence for many generations. This has gotten quite Syri-ous.

Update on Syria

Since Friday, a lot of events have occurred, many of them contradicting each other, so I thought that 48 hours later, it might be a good idea to take stock of what has happened.

So far, France is our only ostensible ally in this venture, should we decide to pursue it. Yes, should we decide to pursue it because Obama has hit the ball into Congress' court. Yes, the same Congress that has tried to repeal Obamacare 72,000 times because they feel they have nothing better to do. But, I digress.

On Friday, the Secretary of State, John Kerry - who I think is fantastic in this role both in terms of his assertiveness and how he has been differentiating his tenure from that of his predecessor, Hillary Clinton - made a statement for the world that was just short of chest-thumping: he declared that Bashar al-Assad almost certainly used chemical weapons; he called Assad a "thug and a murderer" and left little doubt that the missiles were being loaded and pointed at Damascus. Despite the aforementioned assertiveness, one would think the declarative nature of this statement meant that his thinking aligned with Obama's.

Obama, however, decided to throw a curve ball when he gave his Rose Garden speech on Syria yesterday. He opened the speech by essentially reiterating Kerry's analysis from the day before. He used plenty of Obamaesque pleasantries, like characterizing Assad's chemical massacre as an "assault on human dignity" and "the country will be stronger if we take this course." Yes, yes, yes, but what did he really say? Well, despite the previous day's events in London, the President was "mindful that he is President of the world's oldest constitutional democracy" and decided to toss the matter over for debate to a very hostile Congress, in hopes they would authorize some sort of action against Assad.

The President made clear that action "against regime targets" would be "limited in duration and scope" and would require "no boots on the ground". Since Congress is in recess until September 9 - because, really, what better things do they have to do? - he offered no timetable for execution of a mission, but said we are "prepared to strike whenever we choose" and since we have the ships and missiles in position already, we could make it "effective whenever we want". Despite Cameron's setback, a war-weary electorate, and this Congress, the President said he was "confident of [his] decision" and that any mission we do execute "does not need [UN] Security Council approval." This last remark was obviously a jab at Russia, which is Syria's patron and has made it clear that they would veto any plan put forward in the UN.

According to a story that has been making the rounds today, Obama was ready to start firing missiles at regime targets on Friday. However, after a walk on the South Lawn of the White House that evening with his Chief of Staff, Denis McDonough, Obama came back inside the Oval Office, assembled his team, and informed them he was going to punt this issue to Congress for debate and, hopefully, authorization. I have to imagine Obama knew he was going to do this before the walk.

For one, this is classic Obama. It's a tough call and the majority of the American people do not want us to get involved. So, here's his choice: one, upset the electorate and fire some Tomahawk missiles at some regime targets which may or may not be strategic and may set the Syrian army back a little bit, but certainly not enough to do anything major or, two, stand by, do nothing, let Assad gas his own people with impunity, and embolden Russia. Sounds like a crappy choice to me. So, let Congress hold the bag.

Two, we apparently knew about a possible chemical attack at an unspecified time in the last year. If Obama was being briefed on chemical weapons available to and ready to use by the Syrian army, wouldn't he have by now arrived at a plan of how he would set the wheels in motion for a response to an attack with these weapons?

Three, the White House has been in constant contact with House and Senate leadership at least since Thursday.

I think Obama wants to take action, but is also mindful of the two wars we've been fighting for over 10 years and the backlash he got from some elements for bypassing Congress and helping Libyan rebels depose Muammar Gaddafi. I don't think he wants to stand by as Assad gasses his own people. I don't think he wants the US to suffer a crushing setback in international prestige, as an emboldened Russia and Iran would soar. I think the response to Assad's atrocities should be a relentless barrage of missile attacks against any military target our satellites can dig up. I think Assad needs to be punished and that Russia and Iran need to see that this guy isn't a pushover. Let's hope Congress doesn't cut off our international reputation's nose to spite Obama's face.

#Syria

Anyone else sick of the Middle East? I know I am. It seems to be the root cause of every problem in the world. Israel's existence in it is a primary driver for most of the negative feelings toward the US coming from the Middle East and our bellicosity in the region for the past ten years hasn't exactly helped.

Ever since the end of the First World War, the Middle East has been a tinderbox full of really dry wood just waiting for a spark. And we can blame the Europeans for this, specifically Great Britain and France: once they defeated the Ottomans, they carved the region up with absolutely no regard for demographic or ethnic boundaries. For example, the former Ottoman provinces of Mosul (Kurdish), Baghdad (Sunni), and Basra (Shi'ite) were lumped together by the British - in order to better exploit the vast petroleum reserves in each province - and became Iraq. We've seen how well that worked out. Woodrow Wilson, who championed self-determination, was incensed, but what could he do? The Europeans loved their empires, after all.

Syria, specifically, was an example of how not to create a country: it was the French side of the aforementioned land-grab where a puppet king was installed, until the French got sick of him. Then, 16 years of struggle against French occupation and the Second World War. In 1946, the French withdrew, but the late 1940's saw war with Israel and several coups d'état. After the Suez Crisis in 1956-57, Syria formally aligned with the Soviet Union. After years of tensions between various military men, Hafez al-Assad emerged as strongman in 1970. This brings us to the modern era and the Syria we grew up with.

The Assads are Alawites, a 12% minority of the Syrian population. They have ruled with an iron fist and made Syria a pseudo-communist dictatorship. They attacked Israel in the 1973 Yom Kippur War. They plunged the Syrian army into a 30 year occupation of Lebanon in 1976. When their patron state, the Soviet Union, disbanded in 1991, they allied themselves with Islamic Republic of Iran. So, basically, they have been a thorn in our side for almost 60 years vis-a-vis our interests in the region.

So, here we are. In March 2011, the Hafez's son Bashar's government - the latter took over for the former when the former died in 2000 - made a disproportionately brutal response to peaceful protests by pro-democracy activists. Both sides have dug in. Still sore by the invasion and subsequent occpuation of Iraq 10 years ago, the Obama administration has been loathe to get too involved because the American people do not have the appetite for any more military adventures.

Not only that, but the short-sighted mistakes of Misters Sykes and Picot almost 100 years ago haunt us still today. Syria is a patchwork of ethnicities who, at best, distrust each other and, at worst, want to kill each other. The vacuum created by both sides' entrenchment has been filled by elements that are hostile to not only American, but Western interests. That has made the President even less inclined to jump in on the side of the rebels.

That said, the President has always said the "red line" is the use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime against the rebels. If Assad crosses that red line, then...well, we don't know. As of today, according to Obama's own Secretary of State, John Kerry, Assad's military has used chemical weapons against innocent civilians in a rebel-held neighborhood of the capital Damascus. But, our President, in typical fashion, is being ambiguous. Can we blame him, though?

Americans overwhelmingly feel that any action against Assad should be approved by the Congress. A Congress that is pretty widely detested.

So, what now? I have been saying for days that the bombing should start any minute. And I wouldn't be surprised if it does. Or if it doesn't. Since the British Parliament denied their Prime Minister the vote to take action, all we have with us is France, a country that isn't very good at hiding the fact that it's foreign policy is all about its self-interest.

Meanwhile, another chemical attack occurred today. Perhaps Assad is trying to call our bluff. But, even if it's Obama, I wouldn't try to call an American president's bluff.