Don't believe the hype

1) Cash for clunkers

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091104/ap_on_bi_ge/us_cash_for_clunkers

Of the $3B in federal subsidies for vehicle trade-ins, almost 1/3 went to old truck/SUV to new truck/SUV swaps (that not only guzzle more gas, but also have dirtier emissions than compact cars). There were 677,000 trade-ins in total, and 1/7 of those were for new vehicles getting less than 20 mpg. Preliminary data show that the average trade-in mpg was 16 and the average new vehicle mpg was 25. So there were 137M registered passenger cars in the US in 2005, and let's say the number is the same today. If 677K vehicles were traded in, at an average mpg improvement of 56%, the CARS program improved the American auto fleet's fuel economy by 0.28%.

The most common trade was an older Ford F-150 pickup for a new model (at a whopping 1-3 mpg savings to the planet), which happened 8,200 times. There were even $500M in deals where the new vehicle got the same or WORSE mileage than the traded in "clunker", supposedly in violation of the program rules, but nevertheless still happened. The gov't is currently investigating. But hey, Ford and GM posted improved profits recently, and the recovery underway! On the green side of things, GOP senators on the Environment Committee boycotted discussions on the climate change bill, but Chairwoman Boxer passed it anyway.

2) Bill Clinton honored with statue in Kosovo

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20091102/wl_nm/us_kosovo_clinton_statue_2

The recently independent Kosovar Albanians honored their "savior" and champion Bill Clinton with a bronze statue and boulevard in his name at their capitol. First off, it was highly dubious for the US/EU/UN to grant autonomy and recognize breakaway regions at risk of ethnic cleansing such as Kosovo and East Timor, yet ignore the Ossetians, Chechens, Palestinians, Kurds, and others in similar predicaments elsewhere. But I suppose Indonesia has 17,000 islands, so losing one won't hurt too much (and Timor doesn't have much oil), and we just wanted to punish Serbia for its actions in the 1990s. Secondly, what was the deal with the mostly-forgotten Kosovo war anyway? In 1999, The ethnic-Albanian Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA, freedom fighters or terrorists, depending on who you ask) revolted against the Serb government. Albanians attacked gov't buildings and the Serb minority in Kosovo, and of course the Serb military and paramilitary gangs retaliated harshly (but not much worse than Sherman in Atlanta). Clinton and his defense secretary William Cohen made the media rounds to justify NATO intervention, claiming that "hundreds of thousands" died in genocidal attacks, akin to Rwanda or the Holocaust. Of course than number came out of thin air, and later investigations of human remains in the region uncovered ~2,000 corpses, and not all were Albanian or victims of genocide. But despite some protests, Congress gave the green light. NATO dropped the hammer on Serbia with 78 days of air strikes, including cluster bombs (weapons now rejected by most of the civilized world besides Israel, the US, and Russia), until the Milosevic government finally capitulated (at the behest of Russia). 10 years later and billions of dollars spent, Kosovo is still a dirt-poor near-failed state, there are still 14,000 Smurf peacekeepers there (including 1,000 Americans), organized crime has flourished, and Yugoslavian refugees have flooded Western Europe, so hardly a success story of American nation building. But better than Afghanistan and Iraq I suppose.

But what you may not know, and most mainstream media ignore, is that the NATO bombing campaign also killed hundreds of civilians and barely diminished Serbia's military capabilities. In fact, the bombing angered Serbs and accelerated ethnic cleansing against Albanians in some instances (the NYT estimated 4,600 Albanians killed AFTER the NATO bombing commenced). And after the Serb withdrawal from Kosovo, the "hands off" UN forces were unable to stop the vengeful KLA from brutalizing the Kosovar Serbs. It's quite possible that as many Serbs were killed/raped/displaced in the war as Albanians. But we sided with the Albanians because we didn't like Serbia for causing all those problems in Bosnia some years back, and Milosevic was a grotesque strongman. Serbia was misbehaving and challenging the credibility of the US and NATO in post-Cold War Europe, so we had to respond with violence, even if it upset our wary ally Russia (historically a supporter of Serbs) and destabilized Eastern Europe with a humanitarian crisis. The attached reports from the libertarian Cato Institute (yes I know, consider the source, but at least they had the courage to tackle the subject) give more details.

After the Serb surrender, Clinton said that we "did the right thing in the right way". But now we are indefinitely responsible for Kosovo stability (a gloomy prospect), which gives the people and their leaders little incentive for reconciliation and development for a better, truly autonomous future (the same quandary exists in Iraq). Maybe doing nothing was unacceptable, but war and bombing usually kill all hope of a diplomatic solution and increase hatred, not decrease it. And let's be honest, we bombed because we didn't think the Yugos were worth American blood, but attrition bombing can't stop non-uniformed thugs from killing innocents. If the UN left today, probably nationalistic/ethic violence would resume, so we have really painted ourselves into a corner. So yeah, Clinton was all smiles in Pristina at the statue unveiling, like Bush on the aircraft carrier. Why do they always seem to erect more statues of short-sigted, self-righteous warlords than true peacemakers?