Op-Eds

When U.S. troops marched into Iraq in 2003, I, like many Americans, was outraged at what I considered a senseless and unjustified military action. As I spoke to my mother about it on the phone, I noticed that the angrier I got, the more uncomfortable she became.

Just shy of 10 years ago, on Sept. 12, 2001, Secretary of State Colin Powell said the U.S. and its allies would “go after terrorism wherever we find it in the world” and “get it by its branch and root” so that it could “be brought to an end.” Things haven’t worked out that way.

“You are young, pretty, rich, clever, what more do you want?” Beatrice Potter’s poor relation asked her with a trace of exasperation. “Why cannot you be satisfied?”

For the bottom nine-tenths of humanity, the world has changed more in the last century and a half than in the 20 centuries before.

One might think this would be a good time to be in the solar power business in the U.S. After all, federal and state subsidies are reducing the costs of installing solar energy systems, and renewable portfolio standards in 29 states require electric utilities to generate some portion of the energy they deliver from renewable sources.

The debate on Social Security reform has reached an ideological stalemate, pitting collective responsibility to provide for the less fortunate against an individual’s right to one’s earnings and entitlements.

In the wake of flash-mob riots in several cities, fears of gang violence and age-old anxiety about kids on the streets, authorities in Philadelphia, Chicago and other cities are adopting or beefing up curfews that ban youths from being in public during school hours and at night.

The information glut that marks the 21st century is evidenced in some unexpected places. Last month, my organization, the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, released a report that sharply disputed conventional wisdom about terrorism along the Afghanistan-Pakistani frontier.

When I was 18, I did what many middle-class American college students have done ever since air travel became broadly accessible: I backpacked through Europe on a rail pass. Much cheap wine was consumed. Many beautiful European women were chased (unsuccessfully). Many hard-earned savings were spent at discotheques.

Policy makers struggling to understand the barrage of financial panics, protests and other ills afflicting the world would do well to study the works of a long-dead economist: Karl Marx. The sooner they recognize we’re facing a once-in-a-lifetime crisis of capitalism, the better equipped they will be to manage a way out of it.