I recently wrote the article below and am planning to submit it to the Obama HQ in NYC and to my new blog on the Obama website. If Obama embraces the perspective outlined in the article below (not necessarily through my doing, of course), I will embrace his candidacy.

From One Bara(c)k to Another
by Barak Epstein

Barack Obama has gotten off his game lately. His understandable compulsion to respond to the Clinton attacks is jeopardizing his popular image. How can Obama defuse the Clinton claim to sage leadership without playing into the ‘drama of personalities’ that Hillary and Bill have set up for him?

Fundamental economic and geopolitical realities play into Obama’s potential to be a transformative president. Globalization and the emergence of the information age increase the value of collaboration, understanding of global cultures, openness, and authenticity. Obama rode these trends into the national limelight. Now he needs to demonstrate that his political mastery of the Age of Globalization marches hand in hand with his cultural mastery of that same Age.

The pending energy revolution significantly links cultural and political trends of globalization. No other issue offers the opportunity to tap so deeply and simultaneously into the cultural thirst for a sustainable global economy and the economic needs (1) to begin to free us from oil and (2) to retrain Americans for an era in which cheap labor abounds in the rest of the world. Specifically, Obama should spread the gospel of a national science project that can help retrain America’s workers and provide ‘green collar’ jobs while addressing the challenge of climate change.

Amazingly, Obama can also ride the issue of globalization to a more confident and more coherent foreign policy stance. Thus far, Obama’s general expression of openness with regard to foreign policy scarily mirrors John Kerry’s 2004 fuzzy talk about ‘multilateralism’. Of course, an energy revolution would serve the goal of drying up some of the funds authoritarian regimes that impede the continuing spread of democracy and/or promote terrorism. Obama should take all of this a step further to emphasize the new opportunities for cooperation that globalization brings. Specifically, he should express the need to create a League of Democracies that works across continental boundaries to establish a world order that reflects America’s highest ideals as well as its national interests. This concept is symbolic of a foreign policy that is collaborative, as so many Democrats desire, but that is also proactive and truly American. The logic of such a policy has the potential to revolutionize the foreign policy of the Democratic Party.

For Obama to be as transformative as Reagan, his ideas will have to come across as clearly as his good character does. The key to articulating these ideas lies in the very cultural and economic trends that make Obama’s style so inherently appealing. Obama’s style is not entirely convincing as long as he plays the game of ideas according to rules that the Clintons set in the 90’s. Obama is playing a new game but has not announced the new rules yet.

AWAY . . .

I'll be away until mid-January (on my honeymoon!).

I'll be excited to return to your comments.

Some possible upcoming topics:

+more on Friedman's "national science project"

+discussion of possible energy alternatives, including raising some questions about corn-based ethanol (and the distortion of this political discussion caused by Iowa's early caucuses)

+???

A "NATIONAL SCIENCE PROJECT" 

OK, I'm on a Thomas Friedman kick . . .

Here he addresses how a "national science project" with regard to energy independence/alternative would be a powerful response to a number of national issues (energy, education, globalization, terrorism).  Another article of his humorously addresses many of these same issues in the context of a mock Iranian "National Intelligence Estimate" of the United States.

Yet another issue I'd like to highlight: It's become more difficult for talented scientists to come to the United States, post 9-11.  This has potential strategic significance for our entire country.

Amazingly, Friedman's national science project idea has implications for national infrastructure, economic innovation, labor, terrorism, the strength of the democratic world, the environment, and education.  I'll be excited to write/research more about this when I return from my honeymoon(!)

INNOVATION-BASED ECONOMIES

My writing on the intellectual stultification that can occur in oil-based economies and on the potential economic benefits of an American "Green Revolution" (see the Thomas Friedman link in the previous post) overlap in at least one way: They both point to the relevance of an "innovation-based" economy.

I've touched on the importance of an innovation-based economy in terms of its potential to promote democracy.  Friedman (in another article) addresses the importance of a culture of innovation for securing American prosperity as global economic competition intensifies.

TREE HUGGERS, HAWKS, (and LABORERS?)

The Set America Free Coalition aims to create links between environmentalists and security hawks interested in reducing American dependence on foreign oil (I would argue that domestically-produced oil would not be much better, environmentally or in terms of national security.).  Institute for the Analysis of Global Security (first referred to me by my brother, Jeremy) addresses some similar issues.

Thomas Friedman focuses on another aspect of the drive for alternative energies/energy efficiency:  potential benefits to the American labor force of environmental reforms.

How can we better develop coalitions between all of these communities and interest groups?

OIL and DEMOCRACY

Hmmm....  Let's think about the areas around the world that have presented the greatest challenges to a democratic world order in recent months . . .

My list would include Iran, Russia, and Venezuela.

What do they have in common?  All collect oil/gas revenues that pad economic growth even while repressing the innovation and citizen activism that underpin most dynamic and successful societies.

OIL and TERRORISM

The same trends apply to many Middle Eastern societies that are hotbeds for terrorism.  The resultant (1) lack of a strong civil society and of (2) a moderate middle class precludes those societies from presenting an organized response to disruptive, extremist elements.

THE PRESIDENCY

DISCLAIMER: I'm not a Bush-hater.  I support his vision of a global march to democracy and I think that he's been unfairly lambasted by many over the past seven years.

The lowest points for me, however, during the Bush presidency has involved the issue of checks and balances:

+I was willing to live with a panel that could secretly approve wiretaps of suspected terrorists; I cannot live with Bush's willingness to circumvent even that process.

+I was willing to live with the politically-motivated firing of US attorneys; I cannot accept Bush's defense of his prevaricating then-Attorney General (Alberto Gonzales) and the apparent willingness of the Bush administration to use a clause in the Patriot Act to subvert the traditional requirement of Congressional approval of US attorneys.

Venezuela and Russia have seen have seen dramatic challenges to their democratic institutions in recent weeks.  US democracy is much more mature and stable; still, we should therefore be reminded that institutions (e.g. Congress, the Justice Department) depend on citizen awareness and support for their strength and independence.

PORK

The engineering problems related to Hurricane Katrina and the Minneapolis Bridge Collapse caused me to pay closer attention to how infrastructure funds are distributed through Congress.  My sense has grown that the process is far from rational.  Congressional seniority and home state protectionism play too big a role in this process.

I'd like to share a couple of websites that show how the internet can open doors for citizens to follow their representatives' fiscal decision-making.  The Sunlight Foundation reports on legislative and business-related activities of members of Congress, and provides many useful links.  USAspending.gov is a governmental site that was started up in response to the "Transparency" Act of 2006.

The Great Oil Slick: Implications for Democracy, Terrorism, and the Environment

A recent John McCain article in Foreign Affairs magazine articulates some of the connections between energy policy, foreign affairs, and the environment:

"The transfer of American wealth to the Middle East through continued oil purchases helps sustain the conditions under which extremism breeds, and the burning of oil and other fossil fuels spurs global warming, a gathering danger to our planet." (Read the relevant section of the article at the bottom of the linked page.)

Future postings on this site will address (1) the links between oil-based economies, authoritarianism, and terrorism and (2) will include thoughts about how to promote ties between the environmental movement, pro-democracy movements, and national security hawks, with regard to these issues.

OIL, PORK, and the PRESIDENCY 

I am concerned about the future of the United States economy and body politic. The following topics will be addressed

+dependence on foreign oil

+pork: Congress' addiction to budgetary earmarks and unjustified subsidies

+the presidency: threats to the system of checks and balances by overweening assertion of Executive power