Nevada Supreme Court Rules in Favor of NBC; Against Kucinich

Not that I ever watch NBC (or its affiliates) for genuine news - but if all sources of legitimate information suddenly went off the air except for NBC, I STILL wouldn't watch it. The fact that a privately-owned for-profit media outlet can determine who participates in the debates (rather than some disinterested third party) is downright criminal. And it turns out - so is NBC's corporate owner - General Electric. Below is an article (old, but good) from media watchdog FAIR (Fairness in Accuracy and Reporting)

Extra! November/December 1994

Felons On The Air: Does GE's Ownership of NBC Violate the Law?
NBC Brings Good Things to GE

By Sam Husseini

General Electric's ownership of the NBC TV network has been in the news in recent months. As Extra! went to press, companies like Time Warner, Disney, ITT and Turner Broadcasting have reportedly been negotiating to either buy NBC outright or enter into some kind of partnership with GE. But a little-noted aspect of communications law raises questions about GE'sownership of NBC's broadcast licenses -- and its ability to sell those licenses to another company.

Shady Characters

The Federal Communications Act of 1934 created the Federal Communications Commission to regulate the airwaves, which are considered public property. The act states that the FCC should assess the "character...of the applicant to operate the station," and ensure that the "public interest...would be served by the granting" of a license.

Despite a general decline in the FCC's enforcement of the public interest aspect of this law, there is at least one factor that the FCC still considers before granting a license: whether the applicant has committed a felony.

In 1989, Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.), who chairs the House Energy and Commerce Committee, complained of FCC laxness in examining felons (Broadcasting, 1/1/90); his office said the policy "represents one of the excesses of the last eight years." This apparently led the FCC to issue a statement saying it would "consider all felony convictions," as well as "misdemeanors in certain circumstances," as factors in granting or renewing broadcast licenses. This announcement toughened a policy that had been weakened in 1985.

Shortly thereafter, the FCC revoked the broadcast license of WFXL-TV in Georgia because the license-holder was an individual convicted of laundering drug money. The FCC also denied the licensee's appeals to be able to sell the station, forcing him to forfeit his investment (Broadcasting, 8/12/91).

Not all felons have been treated so harshly. Alan Gottlieb, an anti-environmental, pro-gun activist who helped raise money for the 1988 Bush/Quayle campaign, was convicted of tax evasion in the mid-'80s. Though he was denied a gun permit for a time, he was granted the license for KBNP in Portland, Ore. in 1989.

Gottlieb, who also owns a chunk of the Talk America radio network, told Extra! that he disclosed his felony conviction to the FCC, but they still allowed him to purchase the station; apparently he convinced the FCC that his felony was due to a record-keeping mistake. To Gottlieb's knowledge, no one has contested his license.

A corporation, like an individual, can also lose its license on character grounds. "If you're going to permit corporate licenses in the first place -- which is questionable -- you've got to apply the same standard" to corporations and individuals, former FCC commissioner Nicholas Johnson told Extra!.

Broadcasting reported in 1991 (3/25/91) that "the FCC was considering holding license revocation hearings" for WNCN-FM in New York after its parent company, GAF, was convicted of securities fraud. The FCC dropped the matter after the conviction was overturned on appeal.

Even without a felony conviction, a corporate entity can lose its license because of character questions. In a prolonged case, the FCC decided not to renew the licenses of 14 of the TV and radio stations owned by RKO General ,a subsidiary of General Tire (now GenCorp). "The FCC decision was not based on the quality of broadcast service...but on the question of RKO's corporate integrity," Fortune noted (4/21/80). "General Tire was maintaining slush funds for such uses as improper overseas payments and questionable campaign contributions," Time later reported (8/24/87), and "allegedly filed false and misleading financial statements." Of particular concern was RKO's lack of candor in reporting these wrongdoings to the FCC.

RKO was stripped of one station (Boston's WNAC-TV) without compensation, and was forced to sell other stations for less than full market value, resulting in major financial losses.


Citizen GE

These cases would pale in significance if the FCC applied the "character question" to NBC's parent. As the owner of the network, GE controls the licenses for NBC's six owned-and-operated TV affiliates. These stations, located in key markets, are worth an estimated $2.5 billion.

But these assets could be threatened if the FCC ruled that GE's criminal record -- including a host of fraud, environmental, financial and employment violations -- made the corporation unfit to hold broadcasting licenses. (See Extra!, 6/92.) As William Greider writes (Rolling Stone, 4/16/92), "Citizen GE practices its everyday politics unhindered by its status as a convicted felon."

When GE acquired NBC's licenses, the rules were somewhat looser. On Dec.10, 1985, the FCC relaxed the policy on character qualifications, declaring that a large corporation could be held responsible for felonies only if the heads of the corporation or those directly involved in the broadcasting aspect were the wrongdoers. The very next day, GE announced it would buy NBC's parent, RCA, for $6.2 billion. (The timing, of course, was completely coincidental -- as was the fact that GE chair Jack Welch was an old friend of then-President Ronald Reagan, who had gotten his start in politics largely thanks to GE.)

GE was a direct beneficiary of the new FCC policy, as an AP report noted the following year (6/5/86): "Acting for the first time under a new policy on judging the 'character' of broadcast licensees, the commission determined there was no reason to deny the license transfers because GE had rehabilitated itself [since pleading guilty to fraud charges in 1985] and convinced the government it had taken steps to insure that similar violations would not happen again."

GE's Rap Sheet

But despite the FCC's faith in GE's redemption, the corporation has returned to its criminal ways repeatedly since it took over NBC. A partial sampling of its rap sheet since then:

In 1990, GE was "convicted of defrauding the Defense Department by overcharging the Army for a battlefield computer system." (Fortune, 9/5/94) GE paid $30 million in criminal and civil fines.

In 1992, GE "pleaded guilty to charges of fraud, money laundering and corrupt business practices in connection with its sale of military jet engines to Israel," the Washington Post reported (7/23/92). "Bob Pettit, general counsel to the FCC, said today that such convictions are 'relevant' for the commission to consider, but do not result in automatic loss of license," the paper noted.

GE currently faces anti-trust charges "of a scheme by GE executives to rig prices with DeBeers Consolidated Mines, the secretive South African cartel that controls much of the world's diamond production." (Fairfield County Business Journal, 5/25/92)

Most recently have come revelations of illegal reporting at Kidder Peabody, GE's investment subsidiary, which resulted in the dismissal of Kidder CEO Michael Carpenter -- who was brought in from another GE division by Welch in 1989 to put Kidder in order. "Like it or not, the scandals at Kidder Peabody were brought on by GE's management," Fortune asserted (9/5/94).

A February 1994 report of the Project on Government Oversight found that GE had 16 instances of fraudulent activity against the government since 1990 -- the most of any company listed (Daily Citizen, 3/14/94). Such revelations led Russell Mokhiber, editor of Corporate Crime Reporter, to note, "If the law were 15 strikes and you're out, GE would be banned."

The FCC is particularly concerned with questionable activity before other government agencies, since this might indicate a willingness to deceive the FCC. Despite GE's unsavory record, formal challenges have rarely been made to its ownership of the NBC licenses. Such cases were to be raised in a hearing against NBC by National Capital Communications Inc., which was filing a competing application for WRC-TV, NBC's D.C. affiliate. But NBC and NCCI made a deal whereby NBC would pay $295,000 (ostensibly for legal costs) to NCCI, in return for NCCI dropping its challenge Television Digest, 5/24/93).

"The Price They Ought to Pay"

In the past, the FCC has ruled that non-broadcast legal cases against GE "raise no substantial and material question" as to NBC's qualifications to own its licenses. (See Communications Daily, 3/5/92). But this was under an FCC with a more conservative cast, and preceded the somewhat toughened 1990 character policy. As things stand, "the FCC's rules on the subject are vague about what impact wrongdoing by one corporate subsidiary has on another," Electronic Media reports (7/27/92).

Any sale of NBC's licenses has to be approved by the FCC. This may give the agency (and anyone seeking to challenge NBC's licenses) an additional opportunity to review GE's fitness to own the outlets in the first place. Any action by the FCC against GE would likely result in a prolonged court battle, but could prove disastrous for GE should it lose.

GE maintains that it should not be held responsible for the actions of rogue employees. But Greider, in his book Who Will Tell the People, writes that this argument is disingenuous, given GE's "high-pressure management culture": "GE first turns up the heat on its line managers by creating a climate of purposeful insecurity -- everyone's job is at risk if his or her division's profit performance lags. Then, when division managers in the field are caught in false billings and other forms of profiteering, GE piously disavows them as 'miscreant employees.'"

The Washington Post (7/23/92) noted that "some disaffected former employees contended that GE's relentless competitive drive to dominate markets and increase profits fostered a climate in which some managers decided to cut corners to preserve their careers."

Says retired FCC commissioner Nicholas Johnson of the culpability of parent corporations like GE for illegal activity by subsidiaries: "If you're going to allow conglomerate licenses -- something that was prevented in the case of ITT [which tried to buy ABC] in 1967 -- this ought to be part of the price these guys ought to pay."

"Bozos and Thieves"

GE/NBC's potential vulnerability on this question has apparently been used for less than principled reasons. In 1989, Broadcasting Magazine (4/3/89) announced that "NBC will soon have a competitor for Ted Turner's CNN with CNBC," a cable channel that was originally conceived as carrying round-the-clock news. Shortly thereafter, Ted Turner attacked GE as "the most corrupt corporation in America," It was run by "bozos" and "thieves" who have been "indicted and admitted to stealing from the Pentagon."(Electronic Media, 4/13/89) Turner declared: "These crooks, these convicted felons, should be behind bars."

After hearing this implicit threat -- and after getting a cold shoulder from TCI, the nation's largest cable systems operator, which owns part of CNN -- GE decided that CNBC would become merely a financial and talk outlet rather than an all-news channel, thus preserving CNN's monopoly.

Curiously, one of the few outlets to have noted what it called GE's "Litany of Sins" was Fortune, which ran a cover story (9/5/94) about trading scandals at GE's Kidder Peabody division. This issue was on the newsstands when information that Time Warner (which owns Fortune) was considering buying NBC was first reported.

The complicated politics of broadcast ownership make it questionable whether Time Warner was trying to leverage GE in the Ted Turner fashion. Time Warner has reportedly proposed that GE would keep a majority stake in NBC's affiliates in any deal, since the FCC would (for now) frown on Time Warner, a major cable operator, acquiring broadcast outlets.

Still, it's odd to see Time Warner's Fortune complaining about corporate synergy: "When the Kidder scandal came to a head in June, GE went on CNBC, which it owns, to respond," the September 5 cover story noted.

Vulnerable Media

GE is not the only media company vulnerable to the "character" issue. Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. has been charged by the FCC with "either carelessness or recklessness" for failing to disclose a fraud settlement. (See sidebar.)

Turner ally TCI, which benefited from GE's backing down on CNBC, faces similar license problems; although its cable systems are not licensed by the FCC, TCI relies on FCC-regulated licenses to maintain its national system. A TCI anti-trust conviction led to a license challenge from the non-profit Media Access Project; TCI managed to hold on to its broadcast licenses, but had to pay the Media Access Project $50,000 in attorneys' fees (Multichannel News, 6/10/91).

And after the Wall Street Journal (1/27/92) ran an article headlined "Cable Cabal", which tracked a series of insider stock transactions by TCI Chair Robert Magness and CEO John Malone, Broadcasting (2/24/92) noted that "If TCI were ever convicted of a wrongdoing, its microwave licenses (and its current attempts to get a DBS [Direct Broadcast Satellite] license)could be jeopardized. Any conviction could disqualify TCI under the FCC's character-qualification policy, which is primarily concerned with felony convictions that suggest a willingness to deceive a federal agency or the public."

In the past, the government's potential to abuse the FCC's power to stripthe licenses of felons has chilled news media. In 1971, the Washington Post was concerned that if it was ruled to have violated the law when it published information from the "Pentagon Papers" -- classified documents about the Vietnam War -- the Post's broadcast holdings might be jeopardized. Publisher Katharine Graham "was really risking the television stations, all of them," by its reporting, editor Ben Bradlee noted (AP5/13/91).

What's needed are clear, tough and consistent FCC standards regarding the character of licensees. This would better ensure that the airwaves are used in the public interest in a vibrant manner without fear of political manipulation.

Sam Husseini is FAIR's activist coordinator.

NBC Brings Good Things to GE

While a licensee's deception of any government agency is always problematic, the FCC is particularly concerned when the commission is itself lied to. The FCC allowed GE to take over NBC in part because it accepted "GE's assurance that NBC News will operate autonomously, without interference by the new bosses." (Advertising Age, 6/16/86) But there is considerable evidence this has not been the case.

"Don't bend over backwards to go after us just because we own you," former NBC News president Lawrence Grossman said GE chair Jack Welch told him. The GE boss was worried, Grossman reported, "that in the news division, we might be off the reservation and might want to demonstrate our independence."

Grossman also reported that Welch gave him specific criticism, like telling him that "NBC's reporters should stay away from using depressing phrases like 'Black Monday'" to refer to the 1987 stock market crash. Welch even insisted that Today Show weather forecaster Willard Scott continue to mention GE light bulbs on the air. "It was one of the perks of owning a network," Grossman said. "You get your light bulbs mentioned on the air....People want to please the owners."

Grossman, who was fired in 1988, says he also got pressure from NBC head Robert Wright (who had come from GE Financial Services) when NBC News aired reports critical of MCA/Universal, whose TV arm supplied fare to NBC. "The vibrations or message that was being communicated [by Wright] was 'We're losing money and you guys are risking even more when you put on these reports,'" Grossman told Electronic Media (11/11/91).

Grossman's revelations were shrugged off by the FCC. William Johnson, deputy chief of the Mass Media Bureau, said: "If the owner has an opinion, he's entitled to say that to his employees. It's hard for me to see what's wrong with that." (Electronic Media, 11/11/91)

NBC News as also edited out or excluded negative reporting on GE, from GE's use of defective bolts in airplane engines to references to the INFACT-led boycott against GE. NBC News has also plugged subjects dear to its corporate parent's heart, as with a 14-minute series on a GE-manufactured breast cancer detector. (See Extra!, 1-2/91.)

Murdoch's Maneuvers

FCC regulatory decisions generally receive scant press coverage. The 1993FCC waiver that allowed Rupert Murdoch to control a TV station (New York's WNYW) and a daily newspaper (the New York Post) in the same market was an exception.

But some media accounts were bewildered as to why Murdoch would want the money-losing Post. One obvious reason, which indicates why such cross-ownership is prohibited in the first place, is that the Post could promote Murdoch's Fox TV network.

This would hardly be a new thing for Murdoch. As James Ledbetter pointed out in the Village Voice (4/13/93): "In 1989, Fox privately settled a $21million federal fraud suit charging it with, among other things, unlawfully padding its pockets by using Fox TV stations to advertise Fox films. Disregarding FCC reporting requirements, Fox didn't disclose that settlement when applying to renew the license of its Los Angeles station, KTTV."

The FCC review board said that omission, along with other Fox misconduct, "shows either carelessness or arrogance, depending on how the Fox compliance record is interpreted and we cannot sweep them aside lest we condone such conduct on the part of all FCC licensees." However, wrote Ledbetter, "Like good little deregulators, the board then promptly renewed KTTV's license, effectively sweeping the misconduct aside."

Just as troubling were some reports of how Murdoch obtained the cross-ownership waiver. In the mid-'80s, Murdoch had obtained a temporary waiver that allowed him to control the Boston Herald, Boston Fox affiliate WFXT, the New York Post and the New York Fox affiliate. However, he was forced to sell the Post and WFXT after Sen. Edward Kennedy (D.-Mass.) – a frequent target in the Herald and other Murdoch outlets -- got a prohibition on waivers inserted into an appropriations bill in 1987.

Though a court overturned the 1987 prohibition, Kennedy could still have caused problems for Murdoch. Instead, he backed Murdoch's 1993 repurchase of the New York Post. Daily Variety (4/12/93) noted that shortly after Murdoch received Kennedy's backing, Fox put on hiatus a hard-hitting documentary on alleged ties between John F. Kennedy and the Mafia. "It appears from the timing of the decision to suspend production on the JFK/Mafia project that Murdoch doesn't want to do anything that might anger his longtime adversary, Sen. Edward Kennedy," Daily Variety reported.

Allan Sloan noted in New York Newsday (10/24/93) that on the same day that Murdoch's News Corp. re-acquired the New York Post (with Kennedy's backing), it announced an option to buy back WFXT, saying that it would give up the Kennedy-bashing Boston Herald. "Could that be the sound of two backs being scratched?" Sloan wondered.

In early 1994, Murdoch announced the sale of the Boston Herald – on favorable terms -- to his close associate Patrick Purcell, who was to step down from several positions in Murdoch's operations (Boston Globe, 2/5/94).

As if David Horowitz and CampusWatch weren't enough

No longer content to use tear gas against students at Berkeley, the establishment weapons of choice now seem to be the taser and closed-circuitry cameras aimed at the offices of suspicious academics. Here's a really interesting article from The Nation about the increasing monitoring (and occasional violent repression) going on at US universities. It mentions the START Centers (for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism), one of which is housed at my University (University of Maryland). More disturbing than the tasing and surveillance is how homeland security is invading the campus curriculum (it's far cheaper and more effective to scare and brainwash people into supporting your cause than yanking out their toenails). Scary shit.

Kucinich Makes it into Debate

I love Dennis Kucinich. He seems to be the only candidate with enough stones to get up and say that this country has a lot of problems - and abortion and gay marriage aren't at the root of any of them. NBC was trying to block him from the debates in Nevada - but a judge ruled against them. So much needs to be changed, but mainstream Democrats don't have the courage to go against the major players that finance them (to the tune of $5 billion for this election). Here's the story.

EPA Blocks Tougher Emission Standards

This is a disgusting example of how politicized federal bureaucracies have become under this administration. Agencies like the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) are supposed to be apolitical - pursuing policies based on existing science and fighting industry on behalf of the American people. In what has become an all-too-familiar twist the agency is protecting vehicle manufacturers, not the environment. A few years ago something like this would have been unimaginable to me - but the Bush Administration has created a climate of political surrealism that makes Salvador Dali paintings seem ordinary. Here's the story.

Fraud in Defense Contracts

Not that it comes as any surprise, but the dollar amount of fraud in the Iraq War is nearing $800 billion. The House Committee on Oversight and Reform released a report putting the figure at $792 billion. A BBC article lays out some of the most egregious characters involved. Of course every penny spent in Iraq could be included in the overall estimate, since the war itself was a fraud perpetrated against the American taxpayer and the Iraqi people. Stiglitz estimates the overall cost of the Iraq War at about $2 trillion (yes, trillion). This estimate includes some costs that don't make it into the Bush Administrations official figures (like the cost to rehabilitate soldiers suffering from PTSD). It's a far cry from the Administration's original estimate for the cost of the war: $50 billion. Just for perspective that's about 1/16 of the total that's been fraudulently spent in Iraq.

More on US trumping up fears of Iran

Marc Lynch has a great article in the Christian Science Monitor that echoes my previous blog entry: "Fomenting Fears of a Shiite Crescent" and shows that leaders in the Gulf countries are turning away from the Bush Administration's campaign to demonize Iran - mending their own fences and pursuing a much more rational and moderate foreign policy than anything coming out of the US. It's a sad day when the Saudis make our government look like a bunch of crazy zealots . . . .

Wait, Wait . . . . Dana Perrino's An Idiot!

Everyone knows the Bush administration's entrance exam for service doesn't require experience, knowledge or competence. The now notorious litmus test for Coalition Provisional Authority hires was about their service to the GOP and their stand on Roe V. Wade - not whether they could point out Iraq on a map.

All this is disgusting - in my opinion it merits impeachment. But when the White House Press Secretary doesn't know what the Cuban Missile Crisis is - that's just priceless. Here's Dana Perrino on NPR's gameshow, "Wait, Wait . . . Don't Tell Me:"

"I had a situation the other day when they said President Putin said that our missile defense program was like the Cuban Missile Crisis. And so I got asked about the Cuban Missile Crisis and I was panicked a little bit because I really know nothing about the Cuban Missile Crisis...I came home and I asked my husband...wasn't that like, the Bay Of Pigs thing? And he said, "Oh, Dana.""

You can't make that shit up. This administration has went so far beyond the realm of imagination - it makes Orwell read like the tedious parts of a Jane Austen novel. I think anyone employed by the White House should be familiar with the COLD WAR NUCLEAR STANDOFF. If she doesn't know that John Adams had a peanut allergy I think we could all identify with her - but this is beyond the pale.

Fouad Ajami and Bernard Lewis really put the "ASS" in ASMEA (The Association for the Study of the Middle East and North Africa)

As I sit here in a low-budget hostel in Montreal waiting for the cleaning staff to pick up the condoms and empty beer bottles most likely strewn across my would-be accommodations for the next week, I was surfing the blogosphere, when I saw that Fouad Ajami and Bernard Lewis had founded their own association for the study of the Middle East to 'counter' MESA, the Middle East Studies Association, which I'm sure they view as apologist and, dare I say it - progressive. Wasn't Campus Watch enough? Since when can the people who make up the 'establishment' claim the mantle of rebellious, revisionist luminaries? Please - don't make me choke on my kashi.

On his blog Nibras Khazimi claims that influence peddlers like Ajami and Lewis have the ear of the administration because they "know what they are talking about." More like they just regurgitate the 'smoke 'em out of their holes' foreign policy that the Bush Administration wants to hear. Last time I checked this administration wasn't a clearing house for dissenting opinions. And I GUARANTEE that the members of MESA, per capita, have spent twice as much time living and studying in the Middle East as whatever membership ASMEA will actually draw. I'm sure the non-resident scholars at AEI and the Hudson Institute need some more institutional memberships - so ASMEA will be great for them. As for the rest of us, we'll keep our academic rigor, our opposition to the war in Iraq, our SOULS and our MESA memberships.

Engaging Syria?: We'd be crazy not to

Here's my new op-ed in Foreign Policy in Focus. The text is below:

Some world leaders are not exactly negotiating material. The recently deceased leader of Turkmenistan renamed the months and days of the week after himself and his family and tried to build a palace constructed entirely of ice. No one really tried to negotiate with him--he placed a ban on lip-syncing.

Syria's President Bashar Al Assad is negotiating material. In fact, he has shown moderation and restraint in recent months beyond what could be expected from many of his regional counterparts. First--the recent Israeli air strike inside Syrian territory is almost a carte blanche for violent retaliation--yet there has been none. Instead--Syria has lodged a formal complaint with the United Nations--not exactly the behavior we would expect from a leadership knee-deep in a nuclear program. Second, Syria has welcomed nearly one million Iraqi refugees with access to free education and medical care. The United States refuses even to admit Iraqis who have collaborated with coalition forces. Third, despite U.S. economic sanctions, an International Monetary Fund report released in August shows Syria continues to make real strides in reforming its economy. The United States has much to gain from negotiating with the young President, such as cooperation on Iraq, peace settlement between Syria and Israel, at least some leverage over Hizbullah and Hamas, yet it continues its almost unconditional policy of isolation.

Efforts by the U.S. Congress to ban flights through Syria's Damascus Airport is only the most recent manifestation of this political myopia. Congressional reports suggest that Damascus Airport is a "conduit for al-Qaeda." It takes only a moment to draw the comparison with our own failures in transportation security. If the richest, most powerful nation in the world cannot secure its aircraft how can a middle-income country with an aging transportation infrastructure be expected to do so? Senator Lieberman's references to Syria's "sprawling domestic intelligence and security services" that should be equipped to deal with such security breaches prompts a rejoinder about the controversy over warrantless-wiretapping in the United States. A ban on flights would be a major blow to Syria's tourism industry--an industry the new Syrian President has targeted for privatization and economic liberalization. If Damascus Airport is indeed a rest stop on the al-Qaeda superhighway, the answer should not be to ban flights but to coordinate with the Syrian regime to better monitor passengers and cargo. After all, the Syrian regime is a secular one that has its own bone to pick with radical Sunni groups.

Despite the necessity of improving relations with Damascus some hardliners in the Bush administration continue to insist on a policy that neither pushes the Syrian regime toward political reform nor benefits the United States strategically. Continued attempts to label Syria a "rogue state" while referring to Saudi Arabia as a "moderate Arab ally" and increasing military aid to the Egyptian state as the human rights situation there deteriorates, is impossible to square with stated U.S. objectives. Moreover it reinforces the already pervasive sense in the Arab world that U.S. policy in the region has nothing to do with democracy--and everything to do with propping up U.S.-allied autocrats.

The vast majority of accounts describe the Syrian President as a reformer who often loses out in policy contests to the hardline conservative elements in the Syrian Ba'ath party establishment. The Administration's hostile policy toward Syria only emboldens these repressive forces, helping them make their case that the United States is out for "regime change" and that engagement is a losing policy. Without a doubt the United States will not find an ally in Bashar Al Assad like it has found in the Saudi Royal family. But why would it want to? Formal, friendly ties are worth little when they tarnish the reputations of both parties. The Saudis are condemned as "apostates" for collaborating with the United States while the United States is viewed as hypocritical for dealing with an undemocratic regime.

In hindsight many U.S. foreign policy decisions appear clearly disastrous; it is rare that we can see a policy as erroneous in real-time. The United States should seize the opportunity afforded by the young President's restraint in responding to Israel by genuinely engaging with the Syrian regime. Recognizing this restraint as responsible, sensible policy also sends a message that negotiation, not aggression, is the law of the land. This may be a difficult message to relay to some leaders, especially President Bush who recently warned about a possible "World War III " with Iran. Some suggest we'd be crazy to negotiate with people like Ahmadinejad and Assad. But with the specter of WWW III on the horizon, we'd be crazy not to.

Shana Marshall is a PhD. student at the University of Maryland and a contributor to Foreign Policy In Focus.

Ari Fleischer's pro-War conservative group attacks MoveOn.org

I'm not going to mention the name of former White House Spokesman Ari Fleischer's conservative group, since they shouldn't get any free publicity, but suffice to say it contains one of the ubiquitous terms all conservative groups tack onto their overfunded righteousness fests (freedom, liberty, patriot(ism), victory, etc.) Leaving aside their lack of creativity, can we focus on Ari Fleischer's description of MoveOn.org from an interview with NPR's "On the Media?" He said MoveOn.org was a

"vestige, left-over of the whole peace movement of the 60's and 70's and favor deep military cuts and oppose funding of intelligence budgets. MoveOn.org immediately after the attack on our country urged that no military force be used to respond to the attack on our nation, they instead said we should work through international judicial organizations."

The fact that "peace movement" and "international judicial organizations" are used as pejoratives shows just how archaic and ignorant far-right groups like Fleischer's are. Last I checked, peace and international law were two concepts humankind has been struggling to obtain over several centuries - not something to be dismissed as utopian and unreachable. In fact there is a substantial network of international judicial institutions designed specifically for instances like 9-11. Yes, 3,000 people died. But compare this to Sudan, the Southeast Asian tsunami or even heatwaves in Europe and the deathtoll is small. Yes, this was a deliberate attack. But it was an attack by individuals, not another state. If we had taken the case before the ICC, all the resources of the international community would have been mustered to track down the network of criminals responsible for the attacks. The reputation of the US as the backbone of international order and as a country which abides by its own laws and values would have been upheld. (indeed, we created most of the international institutions in operation today after WWII).

What we would not see is a resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan and a disaster in Iraq both the result of our country trying to invade "on the cheap," with a fraction of the troops and resources necessary to occupy and rebuild two nations, without central governments, simultaneously. What we have now to leave to history is Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, two failed states where we have taken up partnership with the very same individuals who engage in the mindless violence we supposedly stand against, an international community that is no longer willing to cooperate with our government, ruined families and a national debt that will take away from education, health care, environmental projects and infrastructure improvements for generations to come. Perhaps Ari Fleischer thinks peace and international cooperation are not worthwhile goals. But the members of MoveOn.org think they are, and we should all support them in trying to bring reason and responsibility back to our foreign policy.