Tuesday’s Tea Party crowd, however, thought that federal taxes were almost three times as high as they actually are. The average response was 42% of GDP and the median 40%. The highest figure recorded in all of American history was half those figures: 20.9% at the peak of World War II in 1944.

Tea Partyers also seem to have a very distorted view of the direction of federal taxes. They were asked whether they are higher, lower or the same as when Barack Obama was inaugurated last year. More than two-thirds thought that taxes are higher today, and only 4% thought they were lower; the rest said they are the same.

As noted earlier, federal taxes are very considerably lower by every measure since Obama became president.

Read it all in Bruce Bartlett’s column in today’s Forbes.com.

[L]ess than 20%–and in two recent years, less than 7% and 4%, respectively–of the money raised by Freedom Alliance went to these causes, while millions of dollars went to expenses, including consultants and apparently to ferret the Hannity posse of family and friends in high style. And, despite Hannity’s statements to the contrary on his nationally syndicated radio show, few of the children of fallen soldiers got more than $1,000-$2,000, with apparently none getting more than $6,000, while Freedom Alliance appears to have spent tens of thousands of dollars for private planes.  Moreover, despite written assurances to donors that all money raised would go directly to scholarships for kids of the fallen heroes and not to expenses, has begun charging expenses of nearly $500,000 to give out just over $800,000 in scholarships.

It’s of course possible that this is a misunderstanding or mistake by Schlussel.

If mistaken, one would assume we’ll hear a defense from Hannity himself or his many admirers. If not mistaken, you’d assume we’d hear some kind of reaction from conservatives – and some kind of explanation/apology from Hannity. It’s not possible – is it? – that the conservative world will just pass by the affair in embarrassed silence?

True, Schlussel’s piece went up yesterday evening, and as of 9 am I can find no mention or reference in the conservative blogosphere. But its early.

So here’s my personal query. I’m going to set my google alert and twitter feed to find Hannity items. If anybody who can plausibly be considered a conservative discusses – even mentions – the Schlussel allegations, I’ll let you know. And if nobody does … well that’s not possible. Is it?

UPDATE: First mention! TheNextRight’s blogger RBIII tweets at 9:38 AM.

Apparently, allegations about Hannity are more important than that shredding of the Constitution if you’re a ‘Progressive.’

Posted at 9:44am

UPDATE 2:  Here’s John Tabin at the  American Spectator blog:

As Schlussel points out, reputable charities are expected to run with overhead of no more than 25%; these concerts are running with overhead of as much as 96%. I suppose it’s possible that Hannity himself wasn’t aware of what the balance sheet looks like, but a source tells Schlussel that Freedom Alliance founder Oliver North confronted Hannity at one point about how much of the charity’s money was being spent on private jets, luxury SUVs, and hotel suite. If that’s true, Hannity has a lot of explaining to do.

Posted at 11:20am

UPDATE 3: John Tabin reports at AmSpec:

“I’m hearing from reliable sources that Schlussel’s suggestion that Freedom Alliance pays for Hannity’s travel expenses is wrong. There’s little doubt that, if the numbers she cites are correct, the charity is seriously mismanaged, but it might not be as bad for Hannity personally as Schlussel’s report makes it look. Stay tuned.”

To win a vote in Congress, the President, practically speaking, must present a compelling national interest for the use of force. The clearest such national interest is to repel, prevent, or punish an attack on the United States. The resolution allowing the President to pursue those responsible for 9/11 represents the clearest such example. Another case involves where an ally of the United States comes under attack. NATO was created precisely for that case. Today, while a military threat to a NATO member has dropped in likelihood, there are American allies for whom such threats still exist. America has a relationship with Israel of this nature. We provided Patriot Missiles, and military crews to operate them, when Israel was under attack from Saddam Hussein in the first Gulf War. America used military force to restore Kuwait to its independence. Though we sought and obtained United Nations’ approval for that action, we never said our military action was conditioned upon obtaining that approval. Nor should it. When an ally is attacked, it is in our direct interest to defend our ally and repel the attack. And as the world knows this, attacks will be less likely.

*  *  *

“This 2010 election proceeds at a grim time for our country and for our state.

“Americans and Californians are enduring the most savage recession since World War II. This recession was incubated by bad government policy: bad policy on credit, bad policy on regulation, and especially here in California, by bad policy on government spending. Now a crisis brought on by misgovernment is being used to foist even more government – the biggest expansion of government since the New Deal.

“As government muscles into areas that are not its job, it neglects what is its supreme job: national security.

“The Rand Corporation reports more terrorist attempts on US soil in 2009 than in any year since 2001 itself. And since 2001, we have a new category of individuals: enemy combatants. This category was not in our vocabulary when I was in Congress. Enemy combatants have allied themselves with Al Qaida, or other similar groups who have made war on the United States. For them, the appropriate treatment is to be tried under military tribunals, with incarceration in Guantanamo, or, where appropriate, the death penalty carried out by military authority. The precedent for this comes from World War II, where we did not try Nazi saboteurs in civilian courts, nor hold them for deportation, but where we used military tribunals, culminating, in some cases, with the death penalty. For today’s enemy combatants, incarceration is entirely appropriate, pending the time when the organization with which they freely chose to affiliate themselves, no longer poses a threat to the United States. If that is a long time, so be it – that’s the course they chose.

“The Supreme Court has ruled that terrorist detainees are entitled to a hearing regarding whether they are, in fact, associated with such a terrorist group, a group that is essentially at war with America, but the Court has not ruled that any other rights we commonly apply to civilian trials are necessary.

“Yet the Obama administration has proposed to organize a full federal court civilian trial for Khalid Sheikh Muhammad in lower Manhattan. The New York authorities estimated the cost of providing security for the trial at $200 million for just the first year – only slightly less than New York annually spends on parks and libraries combined.

“The Obama administration’s approach is not only costly and risky – but legally and strategically ill conceived.

“Terrorism is real, and a deathly threat to our nation’s people. Terrorists allied with organizations that have taken up arms against the United States are not the same as bank robbers or securities fraudsters. They are more analogizable to pirates in our nation’s legal categories; and, from the earliest days of our Republic, our navy ships have been empowered to seize pirate ships on the high seas and hang the pirates.

“The harm from applying civilian court principles to the enemy combatants in the war on terror has already been seen. Out of fear of violating Constitutional principles developed in the civilian context, our country has already released many from Guantanamo; two of whom are now battle commanders in Afghanistan again fighting our troops. It is almost absurd that we allowed that result to occur.

“Let me make a quick review of other parts of the world.

“American troops are engaged in Afghanistan and Iraq. Every American takes pride in our forces. We wish them success – and look forward soon to welcoming them home.

President Obama is winding down the war in Iraq – a war separately authorized by Congress in 2002. The president has approved his own “surge” in Afghanistan, and he was right to do it. As a member of the US Senate, I will vote to ensure that the president and our forces in Afghanistan have all the resources they require to accomplish their mission.

“When force is needed, the Powell Doctrine best states the rules for its use. America must be united behind the use of force, the objective must be achievable, our use of force should be overwhelming, and it should be pursued to the finish. There is no war “on the cheap.” Such wars are unfair to our armed forces, and do not work out to be cheap as they pay in duration more than what they save in initial investment.

“To win a vote in Congress, the President, practically speaking, must present a compelling national interest for the use of force. The clearest such national interest is to repel, prevent, or punish an attack on the United States. The resolution allowing the President to pursue those responsible for 9/11 represents the clearest such example. Another case involves where an ally of the United States comes under attack. NATO was created precisely for that case. Today, while a military threat to a NATO member has dropped in likelihood, there are American allies for whom such threats still exist. America has a relationship with Israel of this nature. We provided Patriot Missiles, and military crews to operate them, when Israel was under attack from Saddam Hussein in the first Gulf War. America used military force to restore Kuwait to its independence. Though we sought and obtained United Nations’ approval for that action, we never said our military action was conditioned upon obtaining that approval. Nor should it. When an ally is attacked, it is in our direct interest to defend our ally and repel the attack. And as the world knows this, attacks will be less likely.

“What is true for an ally is no less true for America itself. An attack on America will be met with punishing force. The Taliban government in Afghanistan did not attack the United States on September 11, 2001, but it provided the safe haven for those that did. America under President George W. Bush rightly and clearly showed what consequence flowed from the Taliban’s permitting Al Qaida to operate out of Afghanistan territory.

“Uncertainty leads to heightened risk. Prior to invading Iraq, Saddam Hussein was told by our State Department’s representative that America had no interest in a border dispute with Kuwait. He greatly misunderstood that message, of course, but it was not free of ambiguity. When North Korea invaded South Korea in 1950, it was following a speech by Dean Acheson that America’s security in the Pacific extended as far north as Japan. North Korea wrongly inferred from that a statement that it did not go further. Today, the uncertainty that poses the greatest danger to world peace is Iran. What’s uncertain is not that Iran will obtain a nuclear weapon. Pray as we may, wish as we may, I don’t believe it’s practical to assume any sanctions will deter Ahmedinajad from finishing his work on a nuclear warhead, and a missile capable of delivering it. The uncertainty, rather, is whether the US will stand with Israel if Israel takes the step with regard to Iran that it took with Syria in September of 2008, and Iraq in 1981, and strikes to destroy the nuclear capability before it becomes operational. In the Vice President’s recent trip to Israel, the Administration sent a message that the US was restraining Israel for defending itself in this way. I believe that was exactly the wrong message to send. Rather, if the message that Ahmedinajad, and others in Iran, perceive is that the US will support Israel if Israel takes this step, then whatever small chance there may be to avoid having to take this step will have been enhanced. Uncertainty of what America will do, if Israel has to act, should be removed, and removed now.

“But the rest of the world has not vanished off the map. And, sadly, we see this administration presiding over failure in many other regions of the world.

“In South Asia: the Obama administration has put at risk the important new relationship the Bush administration built with India. Only last week, India inked a $7 billion arms deal with Russia, including the purchase of an aircraft carrier – this after the US made clear that the retired US carrier desired by India, the Kitty Hawk, would be mothballed, not sold. President Obama has made misstep after misstep with India, but the worst occurred during his November visit to China, when he suggested that China might have a role to play in the Kashmir dispute. If you sat down to deliberately invent the single most objectionable thing an American president could do or say from an Indian point of view, inviting China into Kashmir would be it.

“In Europe: the Obama administration burned our Czech and Polish allies by abruptly canceling a land-based missile defense on 24-hours notice. Governments that had braved threats from Russia to cooperate with us were left stranded and humiliated. The man who committed massive electoral fraud to cheat Ukrainians out of their free vote in 2004 has now been restored to power in that important country.

“In the Americas, the record has been especially bad. The Free Trade Agreements with Panama and Colombia molder in a desk drawer somewhere, even as Venezuela supports narco-trafficking terrorists. When a Venezuelan-sponsored chief executive overthrew the Honduras constitution to extend his grip on power, the Obama administration sided with him, not the country’s unanimous Supreme Court, nor the country’s legislature, which agreed with the ouster 122-6.

“In Mexico, we have a crisis of drug-related war and violence that spills across our border. There are courageous, honest police and armed forces fighting the drug lords in Mexico, but they are too often outnumbered. Here is an area of direct importance to all of us in California. We need to reduce the demand for illegal drugs in our country; Colombia wouldn’t grow, Mexico wouldn’t transport, illegal drugs but for our country’s demand. Our foreign aid assistance to training and equipping police is nowhere more needed than with our friends in Mexico. Taking the steps long necessary to make our border less porous will help immensely with drug traffic and potential terror infiltration as well. I think Mexico offers great potential for energy production and water desalination, facilities for both of which can be completed sooner than in our own state, and shipped north to where our demand is, while employing thousands of Mexican nationals in their own country. And in getting serious about the border, we also need to recognize that legal immigration, by those who follow our country’s rules, is now, and has always been, a net benefit to our country. For nine years, I represented Silicon Valley in Congress. Silicon Valley would never have existed without the legal immigrants who came to our state from every country on earth, to study, to invent, to stay, and to make our country better.

“America has provided economic assistance to other countries, to help open them up to free trade, to assist in the creation of democratic institutions, and to help alleviate suffering in the face of disasters, especially when acute, as recently shown in Haiti. I have been privileged to travel to more than twenty sub-Saharan countries as a Member of Congress, Subcommittee on Africa of the House International Relations Committee. I have formed a judgment that this kind of aid has to be kept to the achievement of simple goals. Disaster relief certainly qualifies. Providing wells and purification plants for clean water qualifies. Inoculating children from disease qualifies. A variant of the Powell Doctrine is needed here: our economic aid should be targeted to where it is likely to be successful, either alone, or in combination with the aid of other developed countries.

“I came to appreciate the unique gift of America to the world, indeed, to the progress of human civilization. We Americans are the society with the greatest amount of personal liberty the world has ever seen. It is not a coincidence that we have also achieved the ability to create more economic opportunity than any other country ever has. As a Congressman, and especially as a Member of the International Relations Committee, I was presented with the reality of how the rest of the world sees us, not in the press, or in the posturing of a regional strong man, but in the heartfelt, candid conversations of average persons around the world, and especially in the Third World.

“I recall visiting Burma, meeting with Ang Sung Su Ky, who was under house arrest for the simple fact that she had chosen to run for President against the military junta. But I also remember the whispered conversations with individual Burmese, especially the older folks, who had learned English in school, and who talked with us when the government guides were not around. They remembered a time when there was freedom in their country. They remembered the US as liberators, and begged us to help liberate them again.

“I remember the same in Syria, where a shop keeper constantly looked around, as she told us that things were not good, that one could not speak, that one had to leave to have any future, but that America alone could broker a peace that would undo the government’s hold over its people through the threat of war.

“I remember meeting the rebel commander in the Congo, at a time when US official policy was to support then President Mobutu. We met Laurent Kabila in the bush near Goma, and I and Congressman Don Payne, just by being there, carried a message that there would be a welcome for him in American eyes when he marched into the capital of Congo, Kinshasa, which he did a year later.

“I remember meeting the rebels in Yei, in southern Sudan, and talking on the phone with John Garang, then in armed resistance to the Bashir regime. That regime, still in power today, was repressing the people of the south, and also perpetrating horrors on its own citizens in Darfur. The promise of world condemnation was slow in coming, but at least he heard from two US Congressmen that there were Americans who stood with him, and against the horrors.

“In Somalia, citizens lined along the roadway from the airport, waving small American flags, just because two US Congressman cared enough to visit their country, when so many others were afraid.

“A village chief in Mali thanked me for the water pump that had been provided by US Aid to his people, to bring water from the Niger River to irrigate vegetables, providing just the difference between self sufficiency and hunger. He knew the United States as the country whose people had given his people such a simple thing. Nothing more complex, but nothing more important. And because of that tangible evidence of our country’s caring, and ability to care, he and his villagers, will never believe the lies spread about us by our detractors and sowers of hate.

“In Rwanda, students I was teaching, after class, out of hearing of others, told me that they had lost their families in the genocide, and what would America do if it started up again? What would WE do. Because America meant opposition to tyranny and savagery.

“And in Haiti, I learned that the transcendent hope was that they might have there what their relatives tell them about in America: a country where one does not have to fear physical danger, or even death, for speaking up for one’s own beliefs, and where someone has the right to make a living without being preyed upon by the more powerful.

“In every one of these instances, and in a hundred more, I saw America through the eyes of the hundreds of millions in the poorest parts of the world. I did not see anger, or resentment. I did not hear argument, or rehearsed repetition of slogans. I saw how America is really viewed: as the hope, as the place where there is real freedom, as the place where a productive economy allows enough for those willing to work to provide for themselves, and to make things better for our children than we ourselves were able to enjoy.

“I want to bring to mind the exceptional reality of what we are as Americans. We are what the rest of the world wants to be. Not because we are wealthy, but because we are free.

“There are many other issues where the next senator from the state of California should take strong stand in international relations. I have touched on only a few tonight. But I do hope I have conveyed the fundamental principles that would govern my approach to this most important component of the job of a United States Senator, especially a Senator from California, which is so much a part of the world. I would summarize all my points in one phrase: a commitment to freedom. We stand for freedom. We stand with our allies who grant freedom to their citizens. We stand for freedom of expression, and freedom of trade, and freedom of conscience. We stand for the right to live with freedom, freedom from fear of terrorist attack, either in our country, or upon our allies in the Middle East, Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Americas. The rest of the world will once again know America for its unswerving stand for freedom, as it did when President Ronald Reagan, and President Harry Truman, from different parties, but both patriots, stood up to the greatest modern threat to freedom, the Soviet empire, and with determination, patience, and unambiguous declaration of principle, achieved for our generation what we must now achieve and pass along to the generation that follows.”

Critics have seized upon stray remarks and acknowledged mistakes from an election cycle a decade ago to construct an image of Campbell entirely at variance with his own emphatically expressed views.

Campbell has responded to those criticisms directly, apologizing where warranted, correcting the record otherwise, at a press conference last week and on his website, here.

Now he’s taken another step: Today, Campbell will deliver a major address on national security issues to the World Affairs Council of San Francisco. FrumForum has obtained an advance copy of the speech. The speech endorses the war in Afghanistan, indefinite detention of illegal enemy combatants, support for Israel in the event Israel decides it must attack Iranian nuclear facilities, and an emphatic statement of commitment to Israel as a NATO-equivalent U.S. ally.

With the latest Field poll showing Barbara Boxer suddenly vulnerable, California Republicans would make a horrible mistake if they deprived themselves of their strongest candidate because of wild distortions of views that have now been restated clearly and emphatically.

CAMPBELL ON AFGHANISTAN WAR:

The President has approved his own “surge” in Afghanistan, and he is right to do it. As a member of the US Senate, I will vote to ensure that the President and our forces in Afghanistan have all the resources they require to accomplish their mission.

CAMPBELL ON TERROR DETAINEES:

We have a new category of individuals: enemy combatants. This category was not in our vocabulary when I was in Congress. Enemy combatants have allied themselves with Al Qaeda, or other similar groups who have made war on the United States. For them, the appropriate treatment is to be tried under military tribunals, with incarceration in Guantanamo, or, where appropriate, the death penalty carried out by military authority. The precedent for this comes from World War II, where we did not try Nazi saboteurs in civilian courts, nor hold them for deportation, but where we used military tribunals, culminating, in some cases, with the death penalty. For today’s enemy combatants, incarceration is entirely appropriate, pending the time when the organization with which they freely chose to affiliate themselves, no longer poses a threat to the United States. If that is a long time, so be it – that’s the course they chose. …

The harm from applying civilian court principles to the enemy combatants in the war on terror has already been seen. Out of fear of violating Constitutional principles developed in the civilian context, our country has already released many from Guantanamo; two of whom are now battle commanders in Afghanistan again fighting our troops. It is almost absurd that we allowed that result to occur.

CAMPBELL ON ISRAEL:

The lasting elements of alliance are a common commitment to democratic principles and human rights. We have such shared commitments with the countries of NATO, with our Pacific Ocean allies like Australia and Japan, and with Israel. We are not free of faults, nor are they. Yet we recognize that Israel like these other allies is a functioning democracy that tolerates a wide breadth of opinion, not permitted in any of the nations arrayed against her. We call this out, we refuse to be intimidated into silence, or into compliance.

If a country or group of countries requires that America boycott another country as a condition of normal relations with them, we will refuse. On that basis, America has passed and rightly enforces the anti-boycott legislation, making it unlawful for American companies to comply with the demand of certain Arab states that companies boycott Israel if they wished to do business with them. In a similar vein, the United States’ response to the sometimes on sometimes off insistence by China that Taiwan not be permitted to participate in international organizations should not be tolerated. We recognize that basic human rights flourish in Taiwan that are still not permitted in China.

CAMPBELL ON IRAN’S THREAT TO ISRAEL

What’s uncertain is not whether Iran will obtain a nuclear weapon. It’s all too certain that Iran will obtain a nuclear weapon. No pragmatist can deny that.

The uncertainty, rather, is whether the US will stand with Israel if Israel takes the step with regard to Iran that it took with Syria in September of 2008, and Iraq in 1981, and strikes to destroy Iran’s nuclear capability before it becomes operational. The Administration’s message is that the US wishes to restrain Israel from taking this step. I believe that is exactly the wrong message to send. Iran’s rulers need to hear a very different message. Iran’s rulers need to hear that if they do not stop their nuclear program, they are inviting an Israeli attack. They need to hear that the US will not try to restrain Israel. If Iran wants to avoid attack, Iran must stop building its weapons of annihilation. Uncertainty about what America will do if Israel acts should be removed, and removed now.

The ideal outcome, Stupak said, might be for the House Democratic leadership to get the votes they need without him and for the bill to pass.

“You know, maybe for me that’s the best: I stay true to my principles and beliefs,” he said, and “vote no on this bill and then it passes anyways. Maybe for me is the best thing to do.”

Profile in courage! And one more reminder that the stiff upper lip is not an American quality….

The new Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, is not a psychopath, and that is supposed to be enough.

But the structural incentives facing Palestinian leaders have not changed. The deal Arafat was offered in 2000 must look pretty good in comparison now, but it will not be renewed. So once again a Palestinian leader is faced with an identical quandary: the deal he can get will be a huge disappointment to his people, or at least to the best-armed faction of his people. If he signs, he will face an uprising.

Abbas has enough sense not to respond as Arafat did: He will not launch a doomed war in hope of better terms. But he won’t sign either. Instead, he’s demanding a round of preliminary Israeli concessions (construction halts) as a quid pro quo for agreeing to resume talks.

Click here to read the rest.

“Mom left a present for you in the basement.”

“The last time you said that, you locked me in the cellar for three hours.”

“This time we won’t.”

I think of that exchange every time the Obama administration promises to “restart the Mideast peace process.”

Like most North American Jews, I was a big supporter of the Oslo process in the 1990s. The prospect of real, complete, and enduring peace for Israel seemed to me to justify almost any concession.

So let’s go to the videotape.

In 1999-2000, the stars lined up in the most favorable possible way: the most concession-minded Israeli prime minister ever joined with the most persuasive American president ever to offer a package that contained almost everything the Palestinian leadership said it wanted.

Territories seized in 1967 (or their equivalent)? Check.

Palestinian capital in Jerusalem? Check.

Recognition of and compensation for Palestinian historical grievances? Check.

Some on the Palestinian side object that there remained some differences between the Israeli offer and the Palestinians’ stated goals. That’s true of course. As the saying goes, you don’t get what you want – you get what you negotiate. Don’t like the Israeli offer? Make a counter-offer.

That counter-offer never arrived. Instead, in October 2000, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat made a strategic decision to go to war, launching the most ferocious spasm of terrorism ever to strike the Israeli population: bombings of buses, schools, discotheques and a dining hall where families celebrated Passover. Altogether, more than 1,000 Israelis were killed before this “second intifada” was suppressed.

Arafat’s decision was motivated by a cruel but rational calculus. While the Israeli offer approximated the Palestinian leadership’s stated goals, it fell far short of the actual goals cherished by the Palestinian population – or anyway, of the best-armed factions of the Palestinian population.

Even if Arafat himself wanted peace – and who knows about that? – the Palestinian leader faced a quandary: If he signed the 2000 deal, or some slightly improved version of that deal, he would be denounced by more militant Palestinians as a sell-out. He might face some kind of uprising. Worse, he would likely have to rely on help from the Israelis and Americans to quell it.

Arafat resorted to war in order to escape this quandary. If the war went well – and if Israel then offered better terms – Arafat would not look like a weakling who signed a miserable deal for a much smaller sliver of land than Palestinians believed themselves entitled to.

No! He’d be a war hero, who through force and militancy had boldly extracted better terms from the hated occupier.

Unfortunately for him and for his people, the war did not go well. Arafat had hoped to leverage international opinion against Israel. But the 9/11 attacks – and the ecstatic reaction they elicited from Palestinians worldwide – locked American opinion against him. Israel invaded the West Bank in 2002, hemming Arafat inside his presidential complex in Ramallah. Then, to meet its heightened security needs, Israel erected a separation wall, imposing a de facto border less generous than the one it had offered in 2000.

The war had one more effect, very relevant to President Obama’s goals. It utterly disillusioned the Israeli left. Nobody of any consequence in Israel invests any hopes in “peace.” To the extent the Israeli left favors a deal, it is to obtain severance from the Palestinians, not because it still imagines future cooperation with them.

In the Obama administration – and even more in the international media – all this history has been wiped clean. The new Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, is not a psychopath, and that is supposed to be enough.

But the structural incentives facing Palestinian leaders have not changed. The deal Arafat was offered in 2000 must look pretty good in comparison now, but it will not be renewed. So once again a Palestinian leader is faced with an identical quandary: the deal he can get will be a huge disappointment to his people, or at least to the best-armed faction of his people. If he signs, he will face an uprising.

Abbas has enough sense not to respond as Arafat did: He will not launch a doomed war in hope of better terms. But he won’t sign either. Instead, he’s demanding a round of preliminary Israeli concessions (construction halts) as a quid pro quo for agreeing to resume talks.

Some of those concessions have been delivered: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared a 10-month settlement freeze back in August. But still talks have not resumed.

I have written elsewhere that the peace process has thus had perverse results, enflaming and globalizing a conflict that should be restrained and contained.

Admittedly that’s a contrarian view. But even if you share the more prevalent view that a peace process is a desirable thing, it’s important to avoid the error of Groening’s small bunny and to learn from past mistakes.

Oslo failed because of the enormous gap between the Palestinian leadership’s stated demands and their actual demands – because of the equally enormous gap between those actual demands and anything achievable in reality – and finally because of their assumption that responsibility for solving their problems rests on everybody in the world except themselves.

Have those gaps closed at all in the past decade? There’s no sign of it.

Originally published in The Week.

But it is always worth looking at the other Anglophone settler-states that generally score very similarly on efforts to assess social values. If you compare the United States to Canada, for example, I think you’ll clearly see that the key difference has to do with Canadian political institutions. The US system just makes it difficult to pass major legislative changes. You can like that or not, but it’s a major source of different outcomes.

He’s right about that – which I wish more Canadians would remember when they talk about how very, very different “Canadian values” are from “American values.” The most dramatic demonstration of the power of institutions comes from Peter Brimelow’s outstanding 1986 book on Canada, The Patriot Game. If the U.S. had Canadian institutions, it would have been governed through the 1980s not by President Ronald Reagan but by Prime Minister Tip O’Neill.